5 Seller Mistakes That Could Be Costing You Money

5 Seller Mistakes That Could Be Costing You Money!

I was going to title this blog 5 Mistakes That Could Prevent You From Selling Your Home, but I'll be honest, in the seller's market we are currently in, these mistakes, won't stop your home from selling. With inventory so low, even the following 5 mistakes won't prevent your home from selling, but they may cost you thousands of dollars!

So, if you are planning on selling your home make sure you don't make one of these mistakes. (Of course, if you hire me to sell your home, I'll make sure you don't make these mistakes.)

1 - Overpricing Your Home
     Everyone wants to get as much money as possible from the sell of their home which makes it easy to overprice it. Even if the neighbor's home just sold for $600,000 that doesn't mean your home is worth $600,000. Price is typically the reason a home doesn't sell and even if it does sell, price can be the reason you didn't get as much as you could have for your home. A home that is priced too high won't attract as many potential buyers. In today's market with limited inventory, you want as many potential buyers bidding on your home as possible. Don't limit the number of potential buyers by overpricing your home.

     As an agent, when I am negotiating with a buyer's agent, if I can tell them we have 10 offers and then ask them to submit their best offers, you win!

     The best way to reach the right price is to talk with your agent AKA - Me. I can provide you with a complete market overview and together we can find the right price for your home.

2 - Not cleaning properly
     When you are ready to sell your house, it needs to be spotless. Cleaning your home to sell is different than cleaning your home to live in. Think Spring Cleaning plus. All the daily cleaning needs to be done of course, but have you cleaned all the blinds and window treatments? How about the baseboards? When is the last time you washed the front door and got all the cobwebs out of the garage and closets? Did I mention clutter yet? It may be time to rent a storage unit to store stuff until your home sells. The goal is to showcase your home, not all the stuff you have accumulated over the years.
     I have a great checklist I can provide for you to use to make sure you don't miss anything when you are getting your home show worthy!

3 - Poor Quality Photographs
     I shouldn't be surprised anymore, but I still am everytime I pull up a listing online and see terrible photos. If you don't believe me, just check out these photos
     No matter how often we are told not to, people do still judge a book by it's cover. And people will judge your home by the photos they see online. If the photos turn them off, odds are they won't come see your home.
     If you hire me to sell your home, I will take professional quality HDR photos that present your home online, the way it ought to be presented. If you aren't familiar with the term HDR photos, it's simple. I take 3 photos with different exposure settings and combine them into one picture allowing each area of the picture to look the way it should. Have you ever seen a picture of a room that looks dark because the light coming through the window? Or a picture where the room looks good but the window is a washed out mess? HDR photography corrects all of that.

4 - Making it difficult for agents to show your home
     If you want to be sure and get fewer buyers viewing your home, make it difficult to show. Selling your home is a crazy time with a lot going on, but you need to be as flexible as possible and be ready to leave anytime an agent wants to bring a client by. If a potential buyer can't see your home tonight while they are out with their agent, they may just find another home.
     As your agent I can make it as painless as possible by fielding calls and clearing it with you first before anyone comes to see your home, but I'll encourage you to be as flexible as possible when someone is wanting to come see your home. That might just mean taking that meal you just cooked to the park and having a picnic. 😀

Download My Free Complete Home Seller's Guide

5 - Leaving Pets at Home During Showings
     I understand it isn't always possible to have the pets out of the house, but if it is possible at all, it really needs to be done. Not everyone is going to love your dog as much as you do, no matter how cute she is. Many people are scared or allergic. When someone is viewing your home, you want them to relax and take their time and fall in love with your home. You don't want them worried about the dog or sneezing the whole time. So go ahead and take the dog for a walk, or have a neighbor watch her. And by the way, this doesn't just apply to dogs. If you have a snake, gerbil, whatever, it's best to have a neighbor or family member keep an eye on them for you.

If your goal is to sell your home for the most money possible, then you need to do everything you can to make that happen. As your agent, I'll make sure we get as many potential buyers as possible interested in your home. I'll work with you to make sure we set the right price, have it looking spotless, have great photos and get as many people as we can to come see it in person and fall in love with it. So if you want to sell your home and make sure you don't leave any money on the table, call me.

Bedroom Designs To Avoid

Bedroom Designs To Avoid

Let me first clarify by saying that these are tips to avoid when you are selling your home. When you are living in your home, I say you do whatever makes you happy. If you enjoy thick drapes, bright colors and 28 pillows on your bed, then by all means go get some thick drapes, paint the walls bright pink and stack those pillows! 

But when you are ready to sell your home, here's a list of tips from Realtor.com for you to think about. After all, the goal when selling your home is to present it in such a way that buyers fall in love with it.

Thick Drapes

     Remove thick curtains, which require a lot of vacuuming to keep dust at bay. Instead try Roman shades or woven blinds with black-out panels.

Cluttered Shelves

     Leave one or two shelves open and arranged neatly with books or other objects. Fill the rest of the shelves with baskets and bins of belongings.

Bright Paint Colors

     Avoid colors like pink and lime green, especially in kid's bedrooms, which indicates a long weekend of painting to buyers.

Overstuffed Rooms

     Pay attention to furnishings size and scale. If there is too much room or the bed is too big, the room will feel claustrophobic.

Towering Pillow Piles

     For most beds, limit the pillows to the ones you sleep on, and then a bolster or square European pillow.

Download my Home Seller's Guide

And that's just the bedroom! When you are staging your home to sell, there is a lot to be done. The good thing is, if you call me, I can go through everything with you and get your home ready to attract the greatest number of serious buyers.

So go ahead, give me a call and let's get rid of those pillow piles!

Trivia Tuesday

In 2009 there were nearly 3 million foreclosures in the United States! If you were a homeowner in 2009 I'm sure you felt the crunch, whether you were foreclosed on or upside down in your mortgage, it was a rough few years.

One of the questions I get asked most often is what I think is going to happen in the market. As I'm sure you know, it is a seller's market right now and the price of homes continues to climb much like it did in the early 2000's before it crashed. In fact in the Central Valley many homeowners saw their value drop nearly 50%. So the big question is, "Is that going to happen again?" Are we in for a crash?

I'm only guessing of course (which by the way anyone who shares their opinion is also guessing) but my opinion is that the market will correct itself but nothing like the crash we saw in 2009. Why? Mainly because, due to that crash, the current loans are better. The loans people have now are loans they truly qualify for. 

But prices can't continue to go up like they are. From what I read, I expect prices to continue to rise through 2018 mainly because of the low inventory of homes on the market. It's the old rule of supply and demand. But as more homes come on the market, I expect to see a correction and home prices to cool off a bit.

So when is the right time to buy? It's simple really. When you are ready. The answer is different if you are buying investment property, but if you are buying your primary residence, that you plan to stay in for many years, you buy when you have the down payment and can find the home you want.

So are you ready? Call me, let's find your home.

Have a home to sell in this seller's market? Then calling me is what you need to do. I'll get your home sold!

Monday Morning Coffee June 19

Single-family housing starts increased slightly in April, a continuing positive trend that should help America's home buyers, who have been battling the problem of limited housing inventory.

Also, the most recent National Association of Home Builders housing index showed that home builder confidence surprised most economists in a positive light in May and remains at very high levels. 

The best and most beautiful things in the world cannot be seen or even touched, they must be felt with the heart! ~ Helen Keller
His birth certificate says 16. His face says 80. His body size says 6. His mind says 35. His medical diagnosis says, "Failure to thrive," but that's a lie. Few people you'll ever meet thrive like Sam Berns.

Ask Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots.

"I get to meet a lot of people in my life," Kraft says. "But I've never met anyone quite like Sam. I love the kid."

Sam has progeria, which ages him at eight times the normal rate. Even though he's a junior at Foxborough (Mass.) High School, he looks like a tiny old man. And yet he plays drums in the marching band, umps baseball games, wears his Eagle Scout badge, invents things, makes straight A's, talks like an after-dinner speaker, and is trying to decide whether to go to MIT or Harvard in two years.

Pray he lives that long.

When Sam was 2, his parents were told that he probably wouldn't make it past 13, the usual life expectancy for the one in 4 million kids born with progeria.

They were told that he would be a living time lapse. His skin would wrinkle, his eyesight would fade, his hair would go, his nose would beak, his head would swell, his face would shrink and there would be nothing they could do about it. There's no cure.

But Sam's parents, Dr. Scott Berns and Dr. Leslie Gordon, didn't listen. If nobody was coming to the rescue, why couldn't they?

They started a foundation and after years of work, helped identify the gene mutation that causes the disease and the first experimental treatment for it, lonafarnib.

But with Sam's time running out, they need money -- $4 million -- to figure out through clinical trial if it's a cure. That's where Kraft enters.

Kraft read about Sam in the Foxboro Reporter. This is a man who watches young men perform astonishing athletic feats with their bodies. This is a man who still grieves his wife, Myra, who died two years ago at 68.

In Sam, he must have seen a tragic meld -- a young man dying of old age.

He invited him to a Saturday practice, just before the Patriots' September 29 game in Atlanta, and liked him so much he decided to donate $1,000 for every year Sam had been alive. 

But then Sam mentioned his birthday was October 23. Now the donation had to be $17,000. "Smart businessman," Kraft grinned.

And that was just the start of Kraft falling in love with a young man trapped in a senior citizen's body.

Kraft: "Who's your favorite player? I'll introduce you."

Sam: "Oh, I could never pick just one player. Football is a team sport."

So Kraft introduced him to the entire team. He met Tom Brady. Bill Belichick. Everybody. They gathered around and made Sam look even tinier.

Then Sam gave the whole team a speech, telling them how they could strategically beat Atlanta and quarterback Matt Ryan.

"Make Matty Ryan feel uncomfortable ... so he throws an interception and we get the ball back. And drive it in."

The players and coaches stood there scratching their heads at this little old boy who sounded suddenly like Vince Lombardi.

"You're looking at him and these 300-pound guys are coming at him and he's got such a calm demeanor," Kraft says. "We need to keep him alive. We need to keep him strong and healthy."

And maybe they need to hire him as a coach. The Patriots rattled the Falcons 30-23.

"I should've had him at the Cincinnati game," Kraft moans.

The soup thickened. Sam invited Kraft to a screening of a documentary, "Life According to Sam", that airs on HBO Oct. 21.

The longer Kraft sat there watching it, the more his wallet itched. The more he learned about Sam, the more he gave. His donation went from $17,000 to $100,000, to $250,000, to, finally, a $500,000 matching donation. Now that's a movie that can OPEN.

He couldn't help himself. "I'm looking at him and seeing how smart he is," Kraft remembers, "how passionate, how full of life.

And I'm thinking of so many other friends I have who are just, 'Woe is me.' ... I haven't been moved like this by someone in a long, long time."

I know what he means. I spoke with Sam for a half-hour and felt as if I was talking to a U.S. senator.

Wait. I felt as if I was talking to somebody with much more sense, charm and polish than a U.S. senator.

"I was so inspired by Mr. Kraft," Sam says. "Maybe because we're alike in so many aspects. I'm extremely inspired by how he approaches things and who he is as a person ... I am so grateful that he's given this initial push, this initial mobilization, to finding a cure and helping so many."

You know many 16-year-olds who talk like that? Or 66-year-olds?

At one point in the terrific HBO film, Sam says, "I didn't put myself in front of you for you to feel bad for me. You don't need to feel bad for me ... I want you to get to know me. This is my life."

Where does he get the courage not to feel sorry for himself, or beg for it in others?

"Sometimes I do feel badly," he says. "When that happens, the first thing I do is accept the fact that I feel bad about it. The second thing I do is remember that most of the time I do feel happy. And that's how I negotiate through that feeling and get past it."

See what I mean?

At one point, Kraft showed Sam, a Patriots fan since birth, the three Super Bowl trophies. It filled Sam with awe and hope.

"Hopefully the run isn't quite over," Sam told me. "We're going to try to keep getting better and keep this going."

Do, Sam. Please do. 

Written by Rick Reilly

Hidden Cost of Homeownership

Hidden Cost of Homeownership

(Ok maybe not hidden, but ones that you may not always think about when buying a home)

It's easy when you are purchasing a home to focus on the down payment, closing costs, and monthly payments. Those of course will be your largest payments and you need to make sure you can afford them. But, there are other costs associated with purchasing a home, that if you are currently renting, you might not think about.

Some of those costs include - 

• Property taxes
• Home Insurance Premiums
• Maintenance and repair costs
• Pest Control
• House cleaners, gardeners, etc
• Electric, gas, water, trash and more.

Property taxes are often included in your monthly payment to your lender, but if not, they can add up. In California, the property tax rate is composed of three types of levies: general tax levy, voter approved bond indebtedness repayment, and special district assessments. The general tax levy is frozen at 1%. Depending on where you live, the other components can vary, but on average property tax in California is 1.25% of the assessed value of your home. So if you purchase a home for $600,000 expect your annual tax bill to be approximately $7,500.

Home Insurance premiums are another expense you will be dealing with when you purchase a home. They can vary greatly, so you always want to shop around, but a good way to estimate it is to divide the value of the home by 1,000 and then multiply by $3.50. So that $600,000 home would have an annual Home Insurance premium of $2,100. This is also typically in your monthly payment to your lender. So if you hear them mention PITI that stands for Principal, Interest, Taxes, and Insurance and becomes your monthly payment.

Maintenance and Repair Cost - Let's face it, if you own a home, things are going to break. That new stove, will be an old stove one day and it will quit working. That fence might not handle the rain and wind as well as you hoped it would. Your sink faucet will spring a leak, the garbage disposal will quit, door knobs will break, and let's not talk about what happens if the HVAC unit goes out. So when you are a home owner it is important to budget for repairs, so that when they come up, you are ready. One estimate says to set aside 1% of your home's value every year for repairs. That's might be a little on the high side for us here in California where the home values are so high, but whatever number you come up with, you need to plan on fixing things.

Pest Control - This isn't a big expense and it's one you can do yourself, but after a couple of ant infestations you may decide to turn it over to the pros and it can run around $70 per month.

House cleaners and Gardeners - If you've been renting an apartment you might find that new big home to be a big chore to clean, or that gorgeous yard with all the grass and trees might end up taking up your weekend you had hoped to spend relaxing in your yard. Again, both of these are chores many people decide to do for themselves and avoid the cost, but if you think you might turn those over to the pros, make sure to include it in your budget.

Utilities - Even if you were renting you were probably paying many of your utilities. But expect that cost to go up if you are buying a larger home. If you are moving to the Central Valley, expect to be running your A/C during the summer which means a higher electric bill. If you are moving close to the Bay, those bills drop as the climate is mild and you can get those nice breezes coming through your windows to cool things down. But wherever you buy at, utilities will be a big monthly expense that you need to plan for.

Download My Home Buyer's Guide

So, did you make your budget and decide you are ready to be a homeowner? Then you should call me and we'll go find you a home!

Tuesday Trivia

I probably can't find you a home where you can watch the sunset twice, but if a view is what you are looking for, let me know. 

Do you want an upstairs bedroom with a window facing West so you can watch the sunset? We can find that. How about a porch facing East so you can enjoy your coffee as you watch the sunrise? That's possible too. It's simple really, if you are ready to buy a home, you need to call me first. Then tell me what you want in a home and I'll do all the searching for you until we find you your perfect home. (Well almost perfect anyways. I can't find a free home) 😀

Monday Morning Coffee June 12 2017

According to the National Association of Home Builders, housing starts have climbed from a total of 784,000 in 2012 to 1.162 million in 2016.

The NAHB currently estimates it will have 1.242 million housing starts in 2017, continuing its upward trend over the past five years.

While home prices are not expected to make any major jumps, they will continue their upward trend, continuing to cater to repeat buyers.According to the 2016 NAR Profile of Home Buyers and Sellers, first-time home buyers, who make up 35 percent of the market, pay a national median price of $182,500. This is far below the Census Bureau’s reported median sales price of new homes of $304,500. 

For home builders to be able to sell to a higher-price clientele, those individuals need to sell their existing homes, which over the last few years have finally started gaining positive equity.

Ben Stein's last column: For many years Ben Stein had written a biweekly column called "Monday Night At Morton's." (Morton's is a famous chain of Steakhouses known to be frequented by movie stars and famous people from around the globe.)

On August 9, 2004, Ben wrote his final column to move on to other things in his life. Reading this is definitely worth a few minutes of your time...  

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How Can Someone Who Lives in Insane Luxury Be a Star in Today's World?

As I begin to write this, I "slug" it, as we writers say, which means I put a heading on top of the document to identify it.

This heading is "E-online FINAL," and it gives me a shiver to write it. I have been doing this column for so long that I cannot even recall when I started. I loved writing this column so much for so long I came to believe it would never end.It worked well for a long time, but gradually, my changing as a person and the world's change have overtaken it.

On a small scale, Morton's, while better than ever, no longer attracts as many stars as it used to. It still brings in the rich people in droves and definitely some stars.

I saw Samuel L. Jackson there a few days ago, and we had a nice visit, and right before that, I saw and had a splendid talk with Warren Beatty in an elevator, in which we agreed that Splendor in the Grass was a super movie. But Morton's is not the star galaxy it once was, though it probably will be again.Beyond that, a bigger change has happened. I no longer think Hollywood stars are terribly important.They are uniformly pleasant, friendly people, and they treat me better than I deserve to be treated. But a man or woman who makes a huge wage for memorizing lines and reciting them in front of a camera is no longer my idea of a shining star we should all look up to.How can a man or woman who makes an eight-figure wage and lives in insane luxury really be a star in today's world, if by a "star" we mean someone bright and powerful and attractive as a role model?

Real stars are not riding around in the backs of limousines or in Porsches or getting trained in yoga or Pilates and eating only raw fruit while someone is doing their nails.They can be interesting, nice people, but they are not heroes to me any longer.

A real star is the soldier of the 4th Infantry Division who poked his head into a hole on a farm near Tikrit, Iraq. He could have been met by a bomb or a hail of AK-47 bullets. Instead, he faced an abject Saddam Hussein and the gratitude of all of the decent people of the world.A real star is the U.S. soldier who was sent to disarm a bomb next to a road north of Baghdad. He approached it, and the bomb went off and killed him.A real star, the kind who haunts my memory night and day, is the U.S. soldier in Baghdad who saw a little girl playing with a piece of unexploded ordnance on a street near where he was guarding a station. He pushed her aside and threw himself on it just as it exploded. He left a family desolate in California and a little girl alive in Baghdad.The stars who deserve media attention are not the ones who have lavish weddings on TV but the ones who patrol the streets of Mosul even after two of their buddies were murdered and their bodies battered and stripped for the sin of trying to protect Iraqis from terrorists.We put couples with incomes of $100 million a year on the covers of our magazines. The non-coms and officers who barely scrape by on military pay but stand on guard in Afghanistan and Iraq and on ships and in submarines and near the Arctic Circle are anonymous as they live and die.I am no longer comfortable being a part of the system that has such poor values, and I do not want to perpetuate those values by pretending that who is eating at Morton's is a big subject.There are plenty of other stars in the American firmament...the policemen and women who go off on patrol in South Central and have no idea if they will return alive; the orderlies and paramedics who bring in people who have been in terrible accidents and prepare them for surgery; the teachers and nurses who throw their whole spirits into caring for autistic children; the kind men and women who work in hospices and in cancer wards.Think of each and every fireman who was running up the stairs at the World Trade Center as the towers began to collapse. Now you have my idea of a real hero.I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters. This is my highest and best use as a human.

I can put it another way. Years ago, I realized I could never be as great an actor as Olivier or as good a comic as Steve Martin...or Martin Mull or Fred Willard--or as good an economist as Samuelson or Friedman or as good a writer as Fitzgerald. Or even remotely close to any of them.But I could be a devoted father to my son, husband to my wife and, above all, a good son to the parents who had done so much for me.

This came to be my main task in life. I did it moderately well with my son, pretty well with my wife and well indeed with my parents (with my sister's help).

I cared for and paid attention to them in their declining years. I stayed with my father as he got sick, went into extremis and then into a coma and then entered immortality with my sister and me reading him the Psalms.This was the only point at which my life touched the lives of the soldiers in Iraq or the fire fighters in New York.

I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters and that it is my duty, in return for the lavish life God has devolved upon me, to help others He has placed in my path.

This is my highest and best use as a human.

Buyer Tips for a Seller's Market

Buyer Tips for a Seller's Market

If you are looking to buy a home, then you already know that it is a tough market right now for buyers. Homes are selling fast and there are more buyers than there are sellers. That means if you find a home you love that hasn't already sold, it probably will sell soon and will most likely receive multiple offers. So how can you, as a home buyer, find and buy the home of your dreams in this crazy market?

While there are no guarantees, here are a few tips that can help.

1 - Get pre-approved. This should and probably does go without saying, but if you aren't already approved for a loan, why would a seller take your offer over others who are? When a seller has multiple offers, they get to choose the one they believe has the best chance of closing and being pre-approved is a must-have first step.

2 - Get instant notifications when homes come on the market. When homes are selling as fast as they currently are, you can't wait a day or two to find out about a new home that hit the market. If you do, chances are they already have 2 or 3 offers. What you need, is a way to be instantly notified when a home that matches your criteria comes on the market. Guess what? I can set that up for you! Once we meet and talk about your needs and what you are looking for, I can set up a home search that notifies both of us instantly as soon as a match comes on the market. Then we can schedule a showing and, if you decide to, put in an offer.

3 - Hire a REALTOR® who moves fast. Not all agents are created equal. In this market, you need an agent who is tech savvy and able to stay on top of the market. You need an agent who can meet you in a timely manner and won't waste time getting an offer submitted. You need an agent who understands that time is of the essence in a hot market. You need an agent who would write a blog giving you tips to help you buy your next home. (If you didn't get that last part, that agent is me.)

4 - Be ready to make an aggressive offer. It's important that you realize that it is a seller's market and that you are competing against other families who also want "your" home. This is not the market to low ball an offer. You need to be ready to come in with your best offer. It is also important to know that the highest price doesn't always win. Can you close in 14 days instead of 30? That could be important to a seller who needs out right away. Do you have an all cash offer? If so the seller knows the offer won't fall through due to financing. An aggressive offer is one that stands out above the others. A good agent can work with you to determine what will make your offer stand out. Have I mentioned I am a good agent? :)

Download my Home Buying Guide Here

Buying a home in the current market can and most likely will be a stressful experience. Hiring the right agent can help take a lot of the stress away. What you need to realize is that people are buying homes today. Buying a home isn't impossible, it is competitive. And in order to compete, you need to be prepared with all the tools and a good agent on your side who can get your offer accepted.

If you are ready to buy a home, call me. 

Monday Morning Coffee

Typically the unemployment rate would affect mortgage rates, but last month the decline from 4.5% to 4.4% brought the unemployment to the lowest level since May 2007, and had little affect on rates.However, in last month's meeting the Fed made no change in the federal funds rate and there was no change in the language describing the Fed's policy. 

The result is consistent upward pressure on mortgage rates and another anticipated increase this summer.

Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time. ~ Thomas A. Edison
He was starting a delivery business… he was making a promise to make deliveries faster than his competitors… he had a plan that covered every detail, every contingency, every dollar that would be spent and thus earned, and he knew he was destined for greatness.

After all of his planning, countless hours of work and a grand opening that would launch this new venture into the stratosphere, he received an abysmal 6 orders to start his illustrious career in delivery.Yes, 6 orders is a few hundred dollars in revenue, and maybe a bicycle delivery company in New York could have survived it, and though it might not pay the bills, maybe a document delivery company in San Francisco could have started with such a slow first day and then made a comeback.

But 6 orders totaling a few hundred dollars in revenue will kill a delivery business with the overhead of Jet Airplanes, a payroll of employees that included highly paid pilots and well, millions of dollars at stake.Thus, since business did not increase, the life span of this new delivery venture was literally 1 month.With the intense belief and desire to make his venture succeed, he refined, re-tuned, re-planned and made the changes needed to exceed the original 6 orders.With a new grand opening, orders did exceed 6, but were still not promising, however, with excellent service, promises delivered and repeat and new business growing quickly, Fred Smith did not have to close Federal Express again, and it did become the success that he knew it could be.

Most people do not know the story behind the story, that Fred Smith and Fed Ex failed so miserably in the first attempt, (really, just 6 orders) that even the staunchest of entrepreneurs would have given up.What if he had given up after that first embarrassing and abysmal failure?  What if?