Don’t be Insulting!

I know you are the buyer and I know everyone says it’s a buyers market, but there is still some real estate etiquette that you need to keep in mind.  The other day I was out on a call to see a house that Mr. Seller has had on the market with another agent.  The other agent had not produced a buyer so Mr. Seller had terminated the listing and is running ads in the paper himself.  He had a prospecive buyer that had come out to see the house and Mr. and Mrs. Buyer just loved everything about the house and made arrangements to get back in touch with Mr. Seller. 

They left and Mr. Seller and I got down to the business at hand (another property) .  While  we were talking, he received a phone call.  I could not help overhearing the conversation, so I listened.   Mr. Buyer was calling to see if Mr. Seller would take $$$ for the property and they could close next week.  The $$$ offer was $40,000 under asking price!  Mr. Seller was INSULTED!  And he told him NO!  This situation could have been a negotiable deal if Mr. Buyer had not insulted Mr. Seller.  But if didn’t work out that way.  Keep in mind that the sellers of property are people, too.  They are selling to get what the property is worth.  If you insult them, they won’t even talk to you.  If the offer had been $20,000 under, Mr. Seller would have thought they might possible be able to meet in the middle.  But to be that far under……..there would be no meeting of the minds.  So have some respect for the sellers or they won’t sell to you!

Realtor or Sell it Myself

The house you are living in was a wise purchase when you bought it, but now you want or need to sell!  You could be upsizing, downsizing, relocating or just want to live in a different part of town.  This is when you come to the crossroads of hiring a realtor or just selling it yourself.  Money is always the factor here–Have you heard of those OUTRAGEOUS fees that REALTORS charge??– and everyone wants to save a buck or two!   Besides, Ralph, over there, he sold his home by himself, so why can’t I??  Well, you can.   Personally, I’m not going to help you because this is what I am trained to do and I charge for it, but if you think you can do it yourself, then go for it!  (I would not ask a doctor how to do an operation and do it myself, either, but I won’t stop YOU from doing it.)  If this doesn’t work out for you, then you will be faced with the decision of getting a realtor or not moving.    The biggest problem with getting a realtor at this point is that your house is not NEW on the market anymore.  Everyone that has driven by it–or thought about stopping by–will think that you are asking too much for it because it didn’t sell.  Trust me!  It’s true!  That wasted time on the chart of activity is LOST!  And you can’t get it back.  No matter what you do, it is still not a new listing.  This is true, also, when your house doesn’t sell so you change real estate companies.  That piece of property just isn’t BRAND NEW on the market!  So be careful if you decide to try to sell it yourself.  You might just get what you paid for—-nothing.

If, on the other hand, you want a realtor to take care of all the business in marketing and selling your house, hire one.  Call about 3 of them and get them to come out and give you a “listing presentation”.  Just like you are doing a job interview–only you are doing the interviewing!  Make a decision on who you want to handle the marketing and selling of your home.  Just like all car mechanics can’t fix a radiator, realtors are not  alike either.  Will the agent WORK?  How often will they call you??  What is their marketing plan?  Can work with them?? –Or do they annoy you?–How real estate savvy are they?  Do they know what’s up in your neighborhood??  All these are the questions you need answers for!!  The famous question:  how much can you sell my house for??  Well, that’s another story.

Too good to be true

What kind of house are you looking for??  A fabulous home for $10,000 would be great! Right?  Climb down off of whatever cloud you are on and be realistic.  The temptation to even think that you will find it is a figment of your imagination.  The stories of that house that Uncle Joe got for a buck or two, just probably isn’t so.  Not that I am calling Uncle Joe a liar, but people usually leave out the details that weren’t so pretty.  In fact, just last month I got a call from a young couple looking for some acreage with a 3-4 bedroom house on it.  They found it on the internet.  Listed at $42,000.  RED FLAG!!  It boasted of 4 bedrooms and 2 baths on 37 acres.  Sounds too good to be true.  The pictures looked pretty good.  I called the listing agent and asked about it and what she said sort of tipped me off that it was going to need some work.  Actually, I asked her if she had a contract on it and she said, ” Have you been out THERE??”  So,  that prepared me a little.  Anyway, we drove out there and it was your typical bank owned property.  Overgrown, trash all around, signs of abandonment and evidence of dogs.  Big dogs.   The neighbor next door came over to check out who was there and what they were doing and gave us more information than we ever wanted to know about the place.  Of course, keep in mind that it’s great to have a neighbor like that if you are buying–but not so good if you are selling!  That guy told us about the well (it didn’t work all of the time) , the septic ( non existant), and how the owners would dig a hole in the back of house, fill it up with trash, fill it in when it was full and dig another hole….probably why the backyard had some “pothole” issues.  The list just went on and on!  You get the picture?  And we hadn’t even been inside yet!  Oh, yeah, that was interesting.  It really was four bedrooms and two baths, but it was not good.  That’s all I am going to say about it.  Well, I have to say something!  Try an image of an old barn and a trailer–like, connected–oh, and they had had dogs in there.  I’m not sure that the bathrooms had water–the well issue–and there was instead a bucket!  For REAL!  And the neighbor said it had been cleaned up!  I don’t remember how many dumpsters he said they had taken out!  But even he was amazed at how much stuff had come out of there!

And I’m the realtor, trying to say something positive!  So, I suggest that the land is worth the money and they could always bulldoze the existing property down and build a house over on the other side.  They passed on the deal, but are still looking.

Buyers BEWARE!  Not all of the defects in a foreclosure can be so readily seen by the naked eye and yet all of them are “as is,where is”.

I’m ready to buy!

Okay!  You have all of your ducks in a row.  Your credit is in line, you’ve been approved…..Now what.  Well, this is where a real estate agent comes in.  Some of them will take over your lives if you let them, so find one that you at least like.  Hire that person!  Yea, give them the job of finding you the right house with all the bells and whistles that your heart desires!  This shouldn’t cost you any money!!  It’s like….FREE!!  The seller of the home you buy, will pay for your agent!!  It even gets better!  Your agent will have to put up with all of the headaches, and then some, to get the whole thing put together and signed at closing!  What a deal!!  All you have to do is sign a buyer’s agency.  This gives you the right to representation.  Of course, your end of the deal is to be LOYAL to your agent and CALL them always if you want to look at a house.  It will be tempting, after weeks of looking at homes, to run across a FOR SALE BY OWNER sign and call it yourself!!  But don’t do it!!  Call your agent!!  Or you will see a sign go up in the yard of the house on the street you always wanted to live on and think they will sell it before you get a chance to buy it(whew)…..just call your agent!  Honest!  They WANT to do this!  This is their job.  Now, don’t abuse them, by calling 40 times a day or wanting to look at houses even though you would never buy them.  Just use them!  And remember it’s FREE for buyers!!  So, the first thing is to find a realtor that you like and hire them.

Is it a good time to buy a house??

Everyone keeps telling you that it is!  So, one day you wake up and say, hmmm, I think I want to buy a house.  Well, what do you do?  Most people get on the internet and start looking for a house to buy.  They search and look and search and look.  What a concept!  How many times I have received the call from a homebuyer that wants go look at the houses that they have picked out.  My first question is, “Do you have a pre-approval letter?”  Their reply is “No, we only want to look at houses for $100,000.”   Well, if you aren’t approved, it doesn’t matter what YOU think you can afford.  You need a bank or mortgage lender to decide on how much money THEY think you can afford!  Are they going to be willing to invest in YOU!  That is the question!  So, before you utter the famous words–My credit is not so good–think about what you are asking for!  Would you give $100,000 to someone who doesn’t have any credit??  Or has only been on the job for a month?  Or has no money in savings?   Or has a few bills he decided not to pay??  But yet you are indignant about having bad credit!  And you expect them to just overlook your bad habits.  So, before you think about buying a house, you should take care of your credit.  Yes, that means even the things you weren’t supposed to be responsible for in the divorce settlement!!  I know, I know, it’s the principle!!  But now, it’s YOUR credit that is being affected in a negative way.   So you must decide to take care of business or not!  And those bills you got when you were young, made some bad decisions, got sick, had no insurance, moved, lost your job, bought more than you could pay for, filed for bankruptcy,co-signed a loan for a friend, had a car repossessed, she left me, he left me, it wasn’t my stuff, ………you get the picture.  All of those kind of things.  You’re going to have to FIX it.  Just like you fix your broken car or fix your broken washer or whatever, you’re going to have to FIX your broken CREDIT.  And we all know that when something is broken, it usually cost some money to have it fixed!

So, you go to the bank or mortgage company.  Apply for a home loan.  no matter how bad you think your credit is!!  And they will tell you what you are going to have to do in order to straighten it out.  (Ask for a copy, then you can see it for yourself!)  This could take some effort and money from you, so be prepared.  Do what they tell you.  It could be so bad that you would have to go the “repair” guy.  But I will tell you that without doing this, you will probably NEVER get a home loan.  Popular belief is that after 7 years the debt just goes away!  That is a lie.  It will not go away from your credit.  So FIX it now! 

Now, if on the other hand you just happen to have  credit that you have been taking care of and a pre-approval letter, it just might be a great time to buy a house!

Realtor@DebraWalters.com

$8000 FREE MONEY

It’s not very often that anyone will offer you FREE MONEY!!  But it’s true!  If you are a first time homebuyer, and if you buy a home by Dec. 1, 2009, the government will send you a CHECK for $8000!  If you’re thinking that you want to take advantage of the $8000 tax credit that the government is willing to give you then you’d better act FAST!   This offer will expire on on December 1, 2009.    No kidding!http://www.irs.gov/newsroom/article/0,,id=204671,00.html?portlet=7

Contact:  Realtor@DebraWalters.com

Hello world!

Welcome to Places for People! Of course, it will take awhile for me to think about what I want to say and figure out how I’m going to say it so just stay with me.   Informative information–sounds impressive,huh?– for people looking for new places to hang their hats (hmm, no that’s sounds like a hat rack)–park their cars (no,not a parking lot)–how about a place to live in.  And buy.  Not rent.  How about a place to call your own!  Okay, that sounds good!  So off we go!  I will attempt to honestly answer all of the questions that you might have about Real Estate and didn’t know to ask.  Stay tuned!