For Sale: 3BR/2BA Single Family House in Winchester, CT, $399,000
The Friendly Real Estate Broker loves real estate questions and inquiries. Baseball trivia is welcome also.
February 19, 2009
2009 First-Time Home Buyer Tax Credit Facts
Here are the facts. This is no longer proposed but the law.
FAST FACTS:
This is a TAX CREDIT not a Tax DEDUCTION your buyer will get up to $8000 credit towards taxes owed upon filing 2009 Tax Return
It no longer needs to be repaid as long as buyers keep house three years
FIRST TIME BUYER is anyone that has not owned a PRIMARY home in the past three years
This credit can now be used with CHFA!
FAST FACTS:
This is a TAX CREDIT not a Tax DEDUCTION your buyer will get up to $8000 credit towards taxes owed upon filing 2009 Tax Return
It no longer needs to be repaid as long as buyers keep house three years
FIRST TIME BUYER is anyone that has not owned a PRIMARY home in the past three years
This credit can now be used with CHFA!
January 31, 2009
December 18, 2008
Who was Grace Perego?
In 1927 real estate was a profession dominated by men. One woman who dared to succeed was REALTOR® Grace Perego from San Francisco.
At NAREB's Twentieth Annual Convention in 1927 she had the distinction of addressing the delegates in Seattle. Perego stressed that women were not limited to success in residential real estate. "It is true that many women make their start in the real estate business selling homes because they seem naturally adapted to this line," she said, but added "the only continue in this field until they 'find' themselves and develop a broader knowledge of real estate, then they invade any branch they choose."
Perego began her career in 1913 building flats and apartments. During World War I she traded a building for a ranch, expanding into rural real estate.
In 1945 she subdivided land in the center of San Francisco that would be called Perego Heights. In the 1940s she broadcast a weekly radio show on home maintenance and interior decorating, and covered the same subjects in a column for the San Francisco Chronicle. She taught Apartment House Management in the University of California Extension Division and authored a book, "Apartment House Ownership and Management."
Twenty years after the Seattle Meeting Perego spoke to the Women's Council at NAREB's 1947 Convention in San Francisco. Her career would span six decades and over fifty years.
At NAREB's Twentieth Annual Convention in 1927 she had the distinction of addressing the delegates in Seattle. Perego stressed that women were not limited to success in residential real estate. "It is true that many women make their start in the real estate business selling homes because they seem naturally adapted to this line," she said, but added "the only continue in this field until they 'find' themselves and develop a broader knowledge of real estate, then they invade any branch they choose."
Perego began her career in 1913 building flats and apartments. During World War I she traded a building for a ranch, expanding into rural real estate.
In 1945 she subdivided land in the center of San Francisco that would be called Perego Heights. In the 1940s she broadcast a weekly radio show on home maintenance and interior decorating, and covered the same subjects in a column for the San Francisco Chronicle. She taught Apartment House Management in the University of California Extension Division and authored a book, "Apartment House Ownership and Management."
Twenty years after the Seattle Meeting Perego spoke to the Women's Council at NAREB's 1947 Convention in San Francisco. Her career would span six decades and over fifty years.
March 3, 2008
The Wrong Real Estate Agent
There are probably more levels of analysis regarding the current real estate market than there is about climate change. Opinions are flying, The market is overbuilt. It's the mortgage industry's fault. It's the weather. It's the cost of energy. Real estate is too expensive.
Depending on the area of the country you're in, some or all of these things may be true. Yet here in Litchfield County, CT, we are simply experiencing a buyer's market, meaning that supply currently outweighs demand. In many towns, there is a one year supply or more of homes or land on the market and naturally that can cause home and land sales to slow down, and sometimes prices to drop.
So that should explain why your home or land hasn't sold, right? Maybe. Or maybe it's something else entirely. After all - your home is shipshape, its priced spot on, and it's in an area where property is moving, isn't it?
You might just have the wrong Real Estate Agent.
How can you tell? Here are some of the common symptoms that tell you that you may have the wrong agent.
Depending on the area of the country you're in, some or all of these things may be true. Yet here in Litchfield County, CT, we are simply experiencing a buyer's market, meaning that supply currently outweighs demand. In many towns, there is a one year supply or more of homes or land on the market and naturally that can cause home and land sales to slow down, and sometimes prices to drop.
So that should explain why your home or land hasn't sold, right? Maybe. Or maybe it's something else entirely. After all - your home is shipshape, its priced spot on, and it's in an area where property is moving, isn't it?
You might just have the wrong Real Estate Agent.
How can you tell? Here are some of the common symptoms that tell you that you may have the wrong agent.
- The wrong agent does not attend all showings of your property. Without the seller's agent onboard for all showings, a great advantage has been created for the buyer beyond the current market conditions. The wrong agent schedules a showing of the property, gives out a "lockbox" combination and then relies on another agent to sell the property. The wrong agent assumes that some other agent will do the work they have contracted with you to do themselves.
- The wrong agent does not sell their own listings. This is an important distinction. The seller's agent should know their listings inside and out; and therefore is in the best position to actually sell it. The wrong agent explains something like "typically, most listings are sold by another firm or agency". Not true. Of course it happens that other brokerages sell other companies listings, but your broker is under contract with you to sell your property, not to have someone else sell it.
- The wrong agent doesn't offer any specific insight into your property. Statements such as "based on the CMA, properties like yours typically sell in the following price range within 60-100 days" should land on you like a piano from a balcony. That's not insight. That's five minutes of surfing on the Connecticut Multiple Listing Service (MLS).
- The wrong agent claims open houses don't work. Again, nonsense. Do they always provide buyers? No, but homes do get sold at open houses and open houses are a low pressure way for people to see your home. They also produce the occasional casual shopper who just happened to be driving by, saw the signs, and later becomes interested. The wrong agent just doesn't like working Sundays.
- The wrong agent doesn't call you. You have to call them. The wrong agent claims that because they don't have any good news to tell you, that "they don't want to bother you". Worse still, the wrong agent doesn't answer their phone promptly and doesn't return voicemail calls for days. A good agent welcomes the opportunity to speak with you, whether the news is good, bad or neutral.
- The wrong agent doesn't have a thoroughly professional website to attract the nearly 80% of all real estate buyers who begin their search online.
- And finally, the wrong agent asks for price reductions almost immediately. Even though they are behaving such as in items 1 through 5 above, and are not thoroughly engaged in the sale of your home, they want you to take 10,000 dollars out of your pocket for their non-performance.
There are other symptoms of the wrong agent, and some are harder to detect. Such as the agent's reputation among other agents. That's difficult to verify, but if your property is not selling it could be that no one likes working with your agent. Trust me, this is more common than you think.
If I were hiring an agent to sell my home or land today, I would ask them the following questions:
- Will you attend all showings of my property? Do you have experience selling properties like mine?
- Will there be a lockbox on my property? If so, why is it needed if you are going to be here anyway? (We don't use lockboxes for many reasons, one of which is we view them as a potential security risk.)
- Do you sell your own listings? Can you give me two examples/references where you have successfully done so?
- What specific challenges do you anticipate selling my property? What can we do to overcome them?
- Based on the price we are listing the property for, should we anticipate having to drop the price? If so, at what point would we do that and for how much?
- Will you be conducting an open house at our property? What do we need to do to prepare the property for the public?
- How will we communicate and how often? Will you return my phone calls promptly? Will you call me consistently to keep me apprised of all activity?
- What is your website address, and how is it ranked in search engines? Where will my property be marketed online? How will my property be marketed online?
- What is your relationship like with other agents in the area?
The wrong agent will be exposed with these questions. No matter if it's the mortgage market, buyer's market, the general economy, or even the weather, hiring the wrong agent to list and sell your home or land will almost always cost you.
Yankee New England Real Estate is a progressive real estate brokerage that specializes in listing and selling homes and land throughout Litchfield County.
"Real Estate Done Right"
Dan Tolman, Broker, Realtor 860-738-1900
June 3, 2005
Real Estate No-Bubble
If you listen to the national news media, they would have us all bracing for the biggest real estate bust in decades.
It’s not going to happen here. This so-called bubble is a euphemism for what most common-sense folks have known for a long time. In many areas of the country, and a few here in the Northeast—housing prices have been pushed way too high. Pushed by speculators, pushed by low or no-interest mortgages. Even though real estate continues to be one of the strongest investments you can make—forecasting gains of more than 10% annually is sheer speculation. To put this in perspective, our rising home prices here are still only gaining 8% annually adjusting for inflation. Yet, there is room for price growth here still. If, that is, economic conditions improve. What the media is not reporting—is that although personal income grew 5.8% last year, home price increases are outpacing personal income. The most important factor in a housing market is the economic fundamentals of the local economy. And the local economy is you and me, we are. So our watchword in maintaining a healthy real estate market is to be “reasonable”. Do not buy more house than we can afford simply because of an attractive low interest mortgage. And don't’ just consider the downpayment, think of the 360 after that.
Most Realtors® won’t tell you this, but the primary reason for the run-up in home prices here has been low interest rates, not housing values. Simply put—if you could afford a $250,000 house at 7.5% you could now afford $300,000 at 6% and prices went up accordingly. That’s not value, that’s just plain capitalism. If interest rates rise, this may result in price stagnation for our area, but not a correction. We here in the Northwest corner are in good shape, and should be for years to come so long as we exercise that increasingly rare trait—common sense.
It’s not going to happen here. This so-called bubble is a euphemism for what most common-sense folks have known for a long time. In many areas of the country, and a few here in the Northeast—housing prices have been pushed way too high. Pushed by speculators, pushed by low or no-interest mortgages. Even though real estate continues to be one of the strongest investments you can make—forecasting gains of more than 10% annually is sheer speculation. To put this in perspective, our rising home prices here are still only gaining 8% annually adjusting for inflation. Yet, there is room for price growth here still. If, that is, economic conditions improve. What the media is not reporting—is that although personal income grew 5.8% last year, home price increases are outpacing personal income. The most important factor in a housing market is the economic fundamentals of the local economy. And the local economy is you and me, we are. So our watchword in maintaining a healthy real estate market is to be “reasonable”. Do not buy more house than we can afford simply because of an attractive low interest mortgage. And don't’ just consider the downpayment, think of the 360 after that.
Most Realtors® won’t tell you this, but the primary reason for the run-up in home prices here has been low interest rates, not housing values. Simply put—if you could afford a $250,000 house at 7.5% you could now afford $300,000 at 6% and prices went up accordingly. That’s not value, that’s just plain capitalism. If interest rates rise, this may result in price stagnation for our area, but not a correction. We here in the Northwest corner are in good shape, and should be for years to come so long as we exercise that increasingly rare trait—common sense.
Yankee New England Real Estate is a progressive Real Estate Brokerage that specializes in listing and selling homes and land throughout Litchfield County CT.
"Real Estate Done Right"
Dan Tolman, Broker, Realtor 860-738-1900
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