Make Sure to Highlight Hidden Gems When Marketing Your Home

Activerain, a network for real estate professionals, recently did a survey of their members to see which attributes they felt mattered most to buyers when choosing a home to purchase. There were three categories: 1) Features that were typically included in the price and worth every penny; 2) Lifestyle Attributes which encompassed neighborhood amenities; and 3) Hidden Gems or items that may not be reflected in the price of the home but add value to the buyers of the home over time. They rated these items on a scale from “not valuable” (lowest rating) to “very valuable” or “worth every penny” (the highest rating). They then calculated percentages based on how people rated each item.

It was interesting to see what percentage of real estate professionals from all over the U.S. and Canada felt was “very valuable” or “worth every penny” in a home and community. I’m putting those in the Ann’s Digest condensed version of this article to share with you. If you want to read the entire article, it’s called “Where to Look for Hidden Gems in Real Estate”.

Things that topped the list of features typically included in the listing price that they felt were “worth every penny” included amazing views (69%), neighborhood quality (69%), great schools (66%) and new roof (66%). From there the “worth every penny” attributes dropped down to 50%-the percentage of real estate professionals who believe that backing up to green space is worth every penny.

On the lower end of the “worth every penny” spectrum, only slightly more than 1/3  of real estate professionals (39%) believed that granite counter tops were “worth every penny” of what buyers paid for a home with this feature. If you spend any time watching HGTV, you may think that granite is the only surface worth putting in if you want to get top dollar for your home. This survey indicates that is thinking fueled by the media.

The lifestyle attributes listed as “very valuable” in making the decision to purchase a home included quality of the neighborhood (69.32%) and good schools (66.53%). Commute time was only thought to be “very valuable” by slightly more than a 1/3 of the real estate professionals (37.78%). Which means that people will trade a longer commute time for living in a good neighborhood with good schools. Makes sense. On my street in Huron, there are at least 3 people who commute to the Cleveland area each day for work. Living in Huron township on the east side of town still gives residents access to good schools and neighborhoods while also making the commute to more plentiful jobs manageable.

Hidden Gems are the features of a home or community that offer value to the homeowner over time, but whose value is typically not reflected in the price paid for the home. The highest rated “Hidden Gem” in the survey were hardwood floors under carpet (54.84%). Ripping up carpeting to refinish hardwood flooring is not a typical DIY project that a new homeowner wants to tackle. It can be an expense to hire a professional, but it’s something that can be done over time. Next highest on the list of hidden gem attributes were having great neighbors (42.04%). Anyone who has ever had a neighbor clear off your snow-covered driveway when there are 14 inches of snow on the ground and the temperature is 10 degrees, knows how nice it is to have a good neighbor. I am fortunate to have several neighbors who occasionally do things like that for me.

The article made the point that when marketing your home for sale, it’s important to not only focus on the obvious things that make a home and community valuable to buyers like location, views, lot size, high-priced upgrades like granite counters, neighborhood quality and great schools. It is also important to focus on highlighting those things that don’t immediately come to mind that add intrinsic value like hardwood floors under the carpet, green upgrades like solar panels, mature and native landscaping, and last but not least, good neighbors.

 

 

 

 

Resolutions

Resolutions

This past weekend, I went to River’s Edge in Cleveland for an educational retreat called “Yoga and the Brain”. There, I joined 26 other people, mostly from NE Ohio, eager to learn the latest research on what happens in our brains during the practice of yoga and how our thought patterns affect our everyday experience.

My place in the sun at River’s Edge Yoga Retreat.

The biggest takeaway for me from this weekend was the idea that our minds get stuck on loops. Every year we have high expectations of ourselves and begin the New Year with resolutions of things we plan to do from here on out that we hope will somehow make us be better or do better as parents, employers, employees, spouses, children. Often, these resolutions are just reheated versions of the resolutions we made the year before (and didn’t keep). By February, most of our resolutions typically fall by the wayside and we beat ourselves up, for once again, not doing what we resolved to do back in December and January.

We spend so much of our lives thinking about what we are going to do or ruminating on what we’ve already done that we miss our greatest gift-the present.

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Time to Sell the Family Home and Downsize

There’s a movie that came out about 20 years ago called, The Doctor. William Hurt plays Jack MacKee, a doctor who doesn’t relate to what his patients go through until he’s forced to walk in their shoes when he’s diagnosed with a life-threatening illness. I’ve been thinking of that movie over the past two weeks-ever since I made the decision that it’s time to sell the family home and downsize.

House of Yin Yoga Studio in Huron

House of Yin Yoga Studio

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sounds of rain pelting the transom window near my bed got me up and going early.  Seemed like the perfect morning to head over to House of Yin Yoga Studio in Huron to take their Saturday morning yoga class.

Spruce Up Your Home without Spending Big Bucks

If you’ve checked out HGTV on-line or on television, it may seem like you can’t sell a home today without putting in granite counters, stainless appliances and hardwood floors. I  talk to homeowners daily who sat tight for the past 5 years, waiting for the real estate market to turn. They’re  now eager to sell their homes and take advantage of what is fast becoming a seller’s market.  But for many homeowners who struggled to stay afloat during the recession, the cost of getting their house ready for sale to appeal to today’s buyers, seems out of reach.

Getting your home ready for sale doesn’t have to break the bank. A good, spring cleaning will take you a long way. In addition, here are 6 things you can do today to make your home attractive to today’s buyers without spending big bucks.    

1)  Plant flowers It amazes me how many people have professional landscaping around their homes but fail to plant a single flower. Trees and shrubs help to soften the hard lines of a house but individual flowers add color, drama and visual interest to a landscape. They also  say that someone cared enough to make things pretty. You don’t have to spend a fortune or days digging in the dirt to make this happen. Sometimes all it takes is adding a hanging plant near the front door.

2)  Declutter  This means getting rid of everything you don’t want, don’t use and will not take to your new home. Clear kitchen and bathroom counters of everything you don’t use daily. Get rid of all but the current issues of magazines and newspapers. For those items you just can’t part with but don’t use regularly, box them up and store them in one area of your home, out of sight, if possible.  May and June are great months for garage sales so you could actually make  money on all that unwanted stuff. You know the old saying, “One Man’s Trash is Another Man’s Treasure”. What doesn’t sell at the garage sale can find a home with the Salvation Army in Sandusky, Firelands Habitat for Humanity in Huron or Goodwill in Huron, Sandusky and Vermilion.

3)  Wash Windows  Clean windows speak volumes. They let in light. They let people see the world outside clearly. They give the impression that your home is well-tended.  If you get in your car or someone else’s and the windshield is covered with dirt, dead bugs and dust, what do you want to do? Enough said.

Five Ways to Get Motivated in February

Five Ways to Get Motivated Today 2/22/2013.

Seeking inspiration to get to work or even the motivation to get out of bed in February in Northeast Ohio is a challenge. Today is one of those days. Living along Lake Erie today means no sunshine, winds gusting 20 mph from the southwest, temperatures in the low thirties, and schools from Milan to Monroeville closed under the threat of freezing rain.

Here are five things that inspired me this morning:

Greatest Rescue Ever

A good night’s sleep.  For you lucky people who regularly go to bed at night and sleep a full 8 hours without waking up, or only wake for a quick pit stop, this is a no-brainer. For the rest of us whose brains run on overdrive at least 20 hours a day, a good night’s sleep is sublime.

My dog, Gracie. Her mantra for a morning walk is like that of the postal service, “Come rain, snow, sleet or hail, we deliver the U.S. mail.”  They call dogs like her a “rescue” dog but I often wonder, “who rescued whom?” She’s got the sweetest eyes I’ve ever seen.

Erie Metroparks Dog Park Gets Two Paws Up

Erie Metroparks Bark Park Gets Two Enthusiastic Paws Up

The heavy, iron latch on the first gate clanked open and she felt herself untethered in a small, holding pen. She’d broken the clasp on her leash earlier in her zeal to catch up to one of her humans who chose to run while her other human struggled with her, walking too far behind. For a shepherd/collie mix, the instinct to herd her humans together proved too strong for the leash.

Gracie at Erie Metroparks Dog Park

The second latch slid open the gate to her freedom. Gracie bounded off with unbridled joy towards the other dogs without a backwards glance. We watched with a mixture of pride and trepidation, feeling like parents dropping their child off for the first day of kindergarten. 

7 Reasons Not to Wait to Buy a Home

Many potential buyers are still on the fence, wondering whether it’s the best time to buy a home. Some fear buying before the market has fully recovered. Others are concerned that they may lose out if they jump in too early before prices and interest rates have hit rock bottom. Here are 7 reasons why I believe now is the best time to buy a home:

A beautiful home for sale with sold sign out front

1) Mortgage Interest Rates are on the Upswing 

Nobody has a crystal ball, but all of the economic indicators point to mortgage rates rising this year after several years of historic low rates. Rates have not been this low since the 1950s, when long-term mortgage rates went into effect and Dwight D. Eisenhower was President.

Escape to Jamaica

January is my least favorite month. It’s like 31 Mondays in a row. New Year, new resolutions, new game plan. Problem is, the weather along Lake Erie in Northern Ohio typically doesn’t cooperate with all my best and newly-laid plans. The air is frigid, the skies cloudy, the landscape dreary.  The hardest part for me is that what stretches ahead is at least a couple months more of the same.

The first two weeks in January are typically a pretty slow time of year for real estate activity. Although there are buyers out there wanting to get a jump on the masses, very few people want to think of putting their house on the market when they’ve just put away their Christmas decorations. My argument about breaking from the herd of traditional sellers and listing your home now when there is so much less competition instead of waiting until spring, is subject for my next blog.

View from our room at Negril Escape

Today as I watch the snow fall outside, I want to talk about the value of taking a tropical vacation in early January. Jamaica in January is a great getaway. Even though it’s officially high season, every hotel I checked had vacancies and they were willing to offer discounts on their high season prices. The sun shone brightly every day. The temperatures hovered between 75-85 degrees. The water temperature was 80 degrees.