Facebook
X
Pinterest
Copy Link
Can You Sell It in the Shortest Time Possible?
| Can You Sell It in the Shortest Time Possible?
Posted: 13 Jul 2012 04:00 AM PDT Monday’s blog created a strong request for us to address each of the four questions homeowners have. We have answered these questions each day this week. This is the final question. – The KCM Crew
Let’s review: Make the House SalablePrice It RightRemove All the Obstacles That May Delay the Sale
Hope we helped you with our posts this week. |
We left this question for last because the answers to the first three questions give you the best chance to sell the listing in the shortest time possible.Can You Take Care of All the Hassles?
| Can You Take Care of All the Hassles?
Posted: 12 Jul 2012 04:00 AM PDT
Monday’s blog created a strong request for us to address each of the four questions homeowners have. We will cover one question each day for the rest of the week. Today, we are reposting a previous blog about the necessity of having a team when selling a home. – The KCM Crew
In real estate today (maybe more than ever), it also takes a team. As with a basketball team, each member needs certain skill sets and proper coaching on how to weave the different skills into a cohesive unit to achieve the desired outcome. The evolution of how things work has created a necessity of excellent communication between all the players. The needs of buyers and sellers have developed an even broader need for new members of a great team. A great working relationship between an agent and a loan officer is an obvious connection. Changing mortgage guidelines, appraisal challenges and qualification standards requires everyone working together. But, there are so many others whose expertise may be needed to properly advise today’s clients. An AccountantOne of the reasons people buy a home is that they hear of the tax advantages. What really are they? How will the purchase affect my monthly cash flow? Should we adjust our exemptions with our employer? What about home repairs and depreciation? What about parents who gift money to their kids…is there a smart way to do it? And for sellers, especially people who may not be buying a new home, what are the consequences of their sale? Capital Gains Tax? Can/should they consider “gifting” proceeds to relatives? Long term health care? Life Insurance? That leads to … A Financial PlannerHow does buying or selling real estate impact cash flow and long-term savings and planning? AttorneysDivorce attorneys, estate attorneys, elder care attorneys and even bankruptcy attorneys have a role in many transactions these days. Choices made without their counsel can have very damaging repercussions. Home Inspectors, Termite Companies and Home Improvement ContractorsThese professionals protect customers from nightmares, or explain the costs associated with preventing or curing problems. Making a decision to buy or sell a home has far-reaching effects. To think your real estate agent or loan officer is an expert in everything is not prudent. However, aligning yourself with a professional who surrounds themselves with other professionals is extremely wise. Make sure the people you work with have a network of related experts that you can tap into. You need to be represented by a TEAM! |
People say: “It takes a village to raise a child”. The realities of today’s life (two family incomes and such) have forced a family to lean on others (neighbors, relatives, teachers, etc.) to protect and teach our young people about culture, history and acceptable behaviors. Teams, because of their ability to provide specialized solutions to problems, have often proved to be more efficient deliverers of information.Can You Get Me the Best Price Available?
Can You Get Me the Best Price Available?
Posted: 11 Jul 2012 04:00 AM PDT
Monday’s blog created a strong request for us to address each of the four questions homeowners have. We will cover one question each day for the rest of the week. – The KCM Crew
Whenever a person sells anything, they hope to get the highest price possible for the item. This obviously applies when a homeowner sells their house. In many cases their home is the largest investment they have ever made and hope to get the highest possible return on that investment. For that reason, they will want to see that you can give them the right advice in order for them to get them ‘the best price possible’.
Here are the things we (the KCM Crew) believe that you need to help the seller accomplish this goal.
A COMPETITIVE MARKET ANALYSIS (CMA)
Be prepared to share with the seller the completed sales of houses similar to theirs that have taken place in the last 90 days. Also share with them their current competition: homes similar to theirs that are now on the market and will be attracting the same purchasers.
AN UNDERSTANDING OF THE SUPPLY & DEMAND THEORY
The price of anything is determined by the supply of that item in relationship to the demand for that item. The direction the value of houses in a marketplace is headed can be determined by this principle. Here is a good guideline:
1-4 months available inventory identifies a sellers’ market with prices probably appreciating
5-6 months available inventory depicts a normal market with stable prices
7+ months available inventory identifies a buyers’ market with prices probably depreciating
INSIGHTS INTO WHAT MAY IMPACT PRICES IN THE NEXT 6 MONTHS
The volatility of a market can often be foreseen by examining the underlying data points that may influence prices in the future. (For example, if an area has a large percentage of homeowners 90 days behind in their mortgage payment, there is a good possibility that foreclosures will begin to increase in the region. An increase in distressed properties usually results in a decrease in home values.) Insights like this should be shared with the homeowner
Can You Sell My House?
Posted: 10 Jul 2012 04:00 AM PDT
Yesterday’s blog created a strong request for us to address each of the four questions homeowners have. We will cover one question each day for the rest of the week. – The KCM Crew
The most important need of anyone attempting to sell their house is – TO GET IT SOLD! It is imperative that you, the agent, are very direct in what it takes to get a house sold. Here is a checklist we (the KCM Crew) put together for you.
ACCESS
A seller should be willing to give almost unlimited access to potential purchasers if they are looking to sell. Any restrictions to showing the home will result in fewer buyers which could result in a lower price, a longer time on market or both.
CONDITION
Condition goes a long way in determining whether or not a house sells. Bringing in a professional stager is the ultimate answer. If that is not possible, the seller should at least be willing to remove all the clutter and ‘throw on’ a fresh coat of paint where necessary.
MORTGAGE OPTIONS
Very few owners are willing to give a first mortgage to a potential buyer. However, there are other mortgage options they perhaps should consider. Allowing FHA financing is an example. Perhaps, they would be willing to help the buyer out with a seller’s concession. The easier it is for a purchaser to finance the home, the greater the chance more buyers will be interested.
PRICE
Every house must be sold twice: to the buyer and to the bank if a mortgage is involved. To get a home sold the price has to be right. There are studies that have shown that listing a house at a price greater than the market warrants results in that home taking a longer time to sell and also selling for less money
Which is Better: Rent or Own?
Another positive report!!!
InfoGraphicYou know what will ruin your day? A bad Quality of Service Survey…
Generally I love seeing that a client has filled out a QSS (Quality Service Survey) after they have bought or sold a property with me and I can’t wait to read them. I’m very proud of the fact that I’ve earned the Quality Service award from Century 21 four years in a row. In 2008 I had a 91% Quality of Service rating, in 2009 & 2010 it was 97% and in 2011 it was 93%.
So last night I was excited to see two emails alerting me that two clients that had recently closed on properties had filled out a QSS. I quickly signed in to Century 21 and brought up the surveys. I opened the first one… a 41% rating? What? No! Must be something wrong…
My first reaction was it must be wrong, then I got defensive. How could this be? I had done everything I could, the house sold quickly and for a good price, what on earth could they be upset about? So I decided it wasn’t my fault and I went on to read the other QSS which was highly complimentary and then I felt better. But not really because it just kept nagging at me, a 41% rating? And they didn’t plan to use me or Century 21 again or recommend us. Really? What had I done?
I finally went to sleep but it was the first thing I thought of this morning. I went over & over the transaction in my head… the house had sold for asking price within 7 days, the inspection had been a little tricky but we had come to an agreement I thought everyone was happy with and it closed quietly and without incident.
I guess the moral of this story is that what may seem normal to me in this crazy game we call real estate is probably a scary, confusing, complicated mess to the “normal” person. I obviously can’t fix what has already been done but I’ve contacted the client and I’m going to try to learn from this and make sure it never, ever happens again.
I need, I need, I need…acreages!
I need acreages…to sell that is.
I try not to use this blog to sell anything but this is serious and I’m getting desperate. I need more acreages to sell. I have buyers that are ready, willing and able to buy right now. But they have specific needs & wants. I need your help to find these acreages!!
Specifically I need…
- an acreage with 100-200 acres, south or south central Iowa, suitable for deer and/or pheasant hunting
- farm land, tillable, 40-200 acres, central Iowa
- an acreage with 10+ acres, suitable for horses, nice home with 3+ bedrooms, anywhere from Huxley to Webster City, $400,000 or less
- an acreage with 20-80 acres, pasture for cows, with our without a home, Ames to Jewell area
- an acreage 2-5 acres, home with 3-5 bedrooms, within 10 minutes of Nevada, $175,000 or under
- an acreage within the South Hamilton school district, 2-7 acres, 4-6 bedrooms, $170,000 or under
- an acreage between Jewell & Webster City, 2-5 acres, 4-6 bedrooms, move in ready, $200,000 or under
- acreages to rent or buy on contract within 20 mins of Ames
4 insider tips for getting multiple offers
4 insider tips for getting multiple offers
Mood of the Market
By Tara-Nicholle Nelson
Inman News®
The market is heating up. No, really.
Coast to coast, a much higher percentage of listings are (a) selling, period (b) selling, fast and (c) selling at or above the asking price than they have during any spring in recent memory. Don’t take my word for it — fromChicago to Orange County, Calif., local papers have picked up and started to report on the phenomenon.
Yet and still, today’s buyers hold in recent memory the real estate mountaintop and the depths of the recession; some have been waiting out the market for years, hoping for a deal, but unwilling to buy into a declining market. Others actually lost homes to foreclosure at the beginning of the housing recession and are on the comeback trail. And competition from short sale and foreclosure listings is still abundant.
Long story short, the days when every home on the market got multiple offers are still a thing of the past. By and large, the listings I see receiving multiple offers and selling for over asking on today’s market have the following ingredients (a recipe sellers can replicate if they’d like to set the stage to receive multiple offers, too):
1. Pristine and staged. The homes that I’ve seen get multiple offers in my own market recently are immaculately clean — not a whiff of anything within noseshot, so to speak — and dressed to the nines. Their photos look like something out of a home decor catalog or design magazine — like no one lives there, even if someone does. Their owners have often spent months in advance cleaning, decluttering, organizing, primping and otherwise sprucing their homes for sale with the intention of blowing the competition out of the water.
I won’t purport to capture the art of staging in a sentence, but prepacking is a good visual to hold in mind as you prepare your home. (And anecdotally, I will say that it strikes me that a large proportion of multiple-offer homes have actually been professionally staged. I’d urge a seller who wants multiple offers to explore whether there’s some level of staging service or even staging advice that is worth the investment, before dismissing it as too expensive out of hand.)
2. Low prices. The homes that get multiple offers are not priced at the top of their markets. In fact, I know that many of their listing agents and owners specifically aimed to list these homes slightly below what they believed to be the true fair market value of the property at the time they listed it. Why? What seems like it might be risky is actually a time-proven strategy for cranking up the number of buyers who come view the property.
When buyers see a beautiful home listing online for less than they’d expect for the area, they show up in droves, eager to get a great home for a great value. And the math from there is simple — it takes more showings to drive more offers.
Once these value hunters are at the place and fall in love with it, they often become willing to offer more than the asking price if they need to, to secure it in the face of competing offers, knowing that it was priced well to start with.
3. Ample exposure to the market. Part of the effect of a low list price is that it creates an auction atmosphere, the environment that churns up bidding wars. The other half of the auction equation is ensuring that the home has ample exposure to the market, both in terms of time for buyers to come see and fall in love with the place and in terms of marketing the property aggressively to reach as many prospective buyer/bidders as possible.
Ample exposure can be achieved in several ways. Professional photography. An aggressive online marketing campaign — most experienced local listing agents will happily brief prospective seller clients on what they do in this vein. One ample exposure method I’ve seen become a standard practice in my area is to create and publish an offer timeline. In my town, it’s now almost universal for listing agents to list the home a day or two prior to the broker’s open house, hold it open for brokers once, hold two general Sunday open houses and then take offers the Tuesday following the second Sunday open house.
By publishing this timeline as part of the listing, buyers are assured that they will have time to see the place and get their ducks in a row in order to compete for it. And sellers are assured that they will not forgo the great offer that might come tomorrow by virtue of taking a good one that comes in the day after they put the home on the market.
Now, sometimes, aggressive buyers force a seller’s hand, making an offer immediately upon seeing the property, despite a preset offer timeline. In those cases, the listing agent can call up all the other agents who have expressed an interest in the place and offer them the opportunity to get in the game. For this reason, and for any other important updates or changes that might come along, it’s essential that buyers and their brokers let the listing agent know if they plan to make an offer, even early in the published offer timeline.
4. Showable on demand. Hard-to-show homes just don’t sell, when there’s lots of competition. When buyers’ brokers put their home tours together, if a particular listing requires too much notice (i.e., 48 hours) or too many calls and callbacks for appointment-setting, they’re very likely just to turn to one of the other dozens of homes that’s easy to show. Anything that diminishes the chances your home will be shown diminishes the chances your home will receive multiple offers.
To get multiple offers on today’s market, in fact, a seller’s home must be showable on demand. If you require an appointment, you should keep advance notice requirements as low as possible — an hour or less is ideal. Even better is to be accommodating and let brokers show your home at their leisure — ideally, stepping out or running to the market when they come by. Allowing your broker to put a lockbox on the place and let it be shown at all times while you’re at work or out and about on the weekends will require that you keep the place in tiptop shape, 24/7, but it will also be well worth it.
