How to Attract Buyer in Todays Real Estate Market!

The Real Estate market is incredible at this time! Prices are flattening out, inventory is beginning to shrink for a number of reasons (sold, removed for the holidays, winter doldrums and some people have realized they are not competitively priced). These factors plus the buyer incentives (Tax Credits), make this a great time to market your home. But be careful! There are a number of factors that you need to be aware of as a seller.

First and foremost is the price. In the past, the sellers were able to over price a house and eventually the market would catch up to the price and a transaction would fall into place. That has changed and when sellers don’t realize this it will cost them money! So the first rule is to 'Price the Home on the Cutting Edge of the Market’. Your home must be the standard bearer of the price range. Every house must compare unfavorably to yours, so when a buyer looks at other houses they feel that yours is the best deal for them. Pricing your house in this manner will bring you the highest possible price in the shortest time, with the least hassle. Accurate Pricing is first the step in attracting qualified buyers.

Here are some other key ingredients to make a successful transaction!
1. Clean up the joint. No one wants to walk into a cluttered mess. Yes you have to live in your house while you are marketing it, but don’t let the house get away from you. (You know that is when the buyers will want to come) and you are forced to say no or worse to go crazy trying to do a quick clean to impress only to have the buyer spent 10 minutes in the house and leave. So stay on top of things, think dress for success!
2. Make the outside look great! You only one chance to make a first impression! Doors should latch and unlock easily. If there is paint needed, do it! Kid’s toys put away. Garden hoses rolled up! A nice WELCOME MAT in place. A place for the buyers to wipe their shoes, in case of inclement weather a place to easily remove shoes or booties to protect your carpets. (if floors are slippery avoid booties)
3. Make the kitchens and baths shine! These are the most expensive areas of your house. Make them look that way. Even an older bath can sparkle.
4. Basements should be organized so the buyer and eventually the home inspector can get a good look. This also make the home seem bigger and user friendly.
5. Have all the mechanicals serviced. Boilers should run quietly and clean. This helps in the inspection and can save lots of money and aggravation at the point of sale.
6. Do some inspections prior to the sale! This tip will save you money! Have an inspector come in and do a radon test in air and water, have heating contractor check out the system, have septic pumped and inspected and if the roof is questionable have a contractor available to give a quote. All these actions will help you to negotiate a selling price from the side of strength. Knowing that these big ticket items are addressed and would come to bite you after the inspections. Buyers will demand these items to be repaired, and you can comfortably provide the results to them, thus removing them from the table. If the house needs any repairs you can build them into the original price and not have to deal with the unknown in the middle of a transaction.
7. Hire a professional that will work for you and protect your interests in the transaction. This agent should be well versed in today’s financing, work closely with attorneys, inspectors and appraisers. They should be full time and have a strong office staff. The agent should also be well versed with the property so they are able to provide information to prospective buyers and buyer agents.

I hope these tips will assist you in the marketing of your homes. Please give me a call and we can discuss these items further, plus prepare marketing plans that will fit your needs. I can be reached at 203 586-9167, or at my office Century 21 Home Services Scalzo 203 -264-1400 xt 2003. For more information about me please go to; www.jeffcoltsellsconnecticut.com .

Happy New Year! Lets Start Thinking Outside the Box

We all have hopes and dreams for this New Year. Sadly, there will be a huge number of home owners that will have lost their homes to foreclosure. This is an unfortunate circumstance. Over the next year there is reportedly going to be approximately 1.4 to 1.5 million more foreclosures that will hit the market. This is a staggering number. The banks do not have the ability to adequately handle this overflow of properties. The adjustable rates are ready to tick up and that will force many into despair.

I have a suggestion to throw out to the powers that be; many banks are talking of repaying the TARP funds and that they have reached financial security. That is BS! The only way they have become whole is by smoke and mirrors, selling off bad loans and forsaking the general public in their time of need. I do not want the lenders to suffer a loss; they deserve and need to get paid as prescribed in the original notes. (Here is my suggestion) If the lenders used the Tarp money to pay for the adjustment of the mortgage up tick (in other words Buy down the rate utilizing the government funds) we could avoid many of the next round of foreclosures. The recipients of the funds would need to be current in their mortgage and would be required to pay back the money with interest upon the sale of their homes or upon a reammortization of the debt in a prescribed time period (5yrs). It sounds complicated, but actually it is a mortgage principle that was used years ago. It is a buy down with an equity adjustment to avoid a negative value.

Here is the outcome that I would hope to achieve.

1. Home owners get to keep or sell their homes; thus avoiding foreclosure, short sale nightmares and the ruining of the American Dream

2. The lenders would not loose the money that they so desperately need to make the country function as intended. We have already allocated the TARP funds and much of it currently are not utilizing.

3. The lenders would not have to try to maintain a slew of houses that inevitably fall into disrepair and yield pennies on the dollar for the amount owed.

4. Neighborhoods, cities etc would not devaluate to a point where they suffer from tax delinquencies, increase crime rates and the general malaise that flows along with high foreclosure communities.

5. Pride of ownership returns to many communities that so desperately need rebuilding.This fix may seem like a band aid for a short period of time (5 years) but a lot can change in that much time, especially if the downward cycle can be lifted.

My guess is the cost of funding this buy down plan would be less than the losses incurred by the mismanaged, broken down, frozen and neglected properties that the lenders are trying to sell. The general public can not purchase these albatross’ due to the inability to finance these elephants. We need to start thinking outside the box!