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.

 

 

 

 

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.

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.

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. 

How a Picture Can Make or Break the Sale of Your Home

The internet is a wonderful marketing tool to showcase homes for sale. I read a statistic recently that 94% of home buyers begin their search on the internet. This provides a tremendous opportunity for us, as real estate professionals, to draw a much wider pool of prospective buyers to our listings. It follows that we would use this opportunity to showcase the homes we list in their best light.

Great Room of 516 Lincoln, Huron, OH

So why do certain real estate agents, including some who have a large listing portfolio and many years of selling under their belts, do such a poor job of marketing their clients’ homes on the internet?

What Makes A House a Home

Recently, a client was agonizing over whether or not to sell her home. She’d lived there many years and spent a lot of time and money fixing the house and yard up to be just the way she wanted. She envisioned staying there the rest of her life with all her friends and her adult children living close by. Then her husband got a job in another state. After much discussion, she finally made the difficult decision to sell her home in order to be with her husband.

Her dilemma got me thinking about what makes a house a home. Why do some of us choose to stay in the same house and neighborhood for most of our lives feeling contented with that choice while others feel the need to move to a new house and locale every five to seven years?

Is Your Realtor a Deadbeat or a Dynamo?

Is Your Realtor a Fat Cat?

There are six d-words that provide a great “litmus test”, for not only choosing the best real estate agent but also for choosing any person you’d like to work, play, pay, consult or couple with based on how many of these six traits they display.

For purposes of this article, my focus is on d-words to seriously consider when choosing to work with a REALTOR. The more of the following 6 words used to describe your Real Estate Agent, the more likely you are to have a satisfying experience when selling or buying your next home.