Our Promise to You:
We Promise to never give you a price for your home that is unrealistic and will only help you to sell your competitions home and be on the market longer and sell for less than it could have, just because we want your listing.
We Promise to never tell you that “I have a great buyer coming into town in a few weeks who will love this house” just to get your listing.
We Promise to never tell you that our listings sell close to 8% higher on average than other homes when it is factually far from the truth.
We Promise to always put your best interests before ours.
We Promise that you will NEVER be lied to and that you will have access to us by phone from 9:00 A.M. to 9:00 P.M. 7 days a week and you will receive a return phone call within hours.
Our neighborhood is using a private online network called Nextdoor Cold Spring Hunt, and we think you'll benefit from joining us. On our Nextdoor site, neighbors can share community events, recommendations, items for sale/free, crime/safety concerns, ideas about how to make our neighborhood better, and more. Please join us to build a better neighborhood. Go to http://coldspringhunt.nextdoor.com and sign up.
The Best Time to Find Out Your Home’s Value Is When It’s . . . NOT FOR SALE!
If you’re contemplating a move, now or in the next year or so, this is the perfect time to learn what your home is really worth and what you can do to improve its selling price for the near future. Why find out what your home is worth when you’re not ready to sell? Lots of reasons! You may decide now is not the time to sell based on your equity. You may want to be sure Insurance coverage is adequate. You might be looking to re-finance and before you start through the process of paying for a formal appraisal, etc., you may want to see the value. You might be wondering if it’s the right time to invest in remodels or upgrades. Some homeowners discover that making the improvements would be more expensive (and stressful) than buying a different home! Sudden career changes require that you know your value so you can make smart decisions. You may want to get a home equity loan and need to know if you have enough equity. You may just want to start “prepping” your home to relieve some of the stress down the road.
When your home isn’t for sale yet, it’s a great time to find out what it’s worth. We’ll answer all your real estate questions and provide you with a price opinion or comparative market analysis to show you how it compares to other recently sold homes.
Question: A Realtor told me I should be prepared to sell by having my home pre-inspected. How do you feel about this?
Answer: When we have someone who has an older home that could turn up several problems it’s better to pre-inspect. There could be a problem that turns up in the inspections that the buyer simply doesn’t want to deal with or the seller cannot afford to address. This way we can sell as-is and the buyer knows what they’re getting into.
The problem with pre-inspections is that, now, you have that information and you must disclose it. If you make the repairs then there’s no problem but if you don’t, you have to let the buyer know what you now know. In our experience one home inspector will find something that another one will not. In homes of our age we don’t really recommend a pre-inspection. We feel our homes are new enough that there shouldn’t be a major (deal-killing) problem. That being said, you should always account for $1,000 to $2,000 for repairs that your buyer will ask for such as radon remediation; cracked fireplace inserts; windows that don’t function properly; missing shingles; unprotected GFCI’s in baths and kitchens, etc. More on inspections in our next newsletter!
Housing Market on the Move to “Normal”
All indicators are in place for a robust spring market with increasing prices!
The 5 main measures that tell us this are:
1. Construction starts are UP.
2. Existing-home sales recovered all fall.
3. The delinquency and foreclosure rate is at post-crisis lows.
4. Interest rates are historically low.
5. Inventory is lowering and decreasing time on market.
Sump Pump failure fix—for those of you who were good little boys and girls and sent us your email, you received this information and discount information. For those of you have not yet sent us your email, you’ll have to find this great article at www.gutner.com on our blog. If you would like to be included in special info and neighborhood discounts and have not done so, send your email to jeri@gutner.com.
No room this month for what’s for sale and what has sold in your neighborhood this past month but we have made that easily accessible to you at www.gutner.com. Click on links and then “what’s selling in your neighborhood”. You can see an entire history of the neighborhood and everything that sold, is under agreement and is for sale! You’ll love this wonderful tool that keeps you abreast of sales with lots of information on time on market, average prices in a neighborhood, etc!
Relocating thru a Relocation Company????
They’ll send you 2 of THEIR Realtors (many relocation companies own Real Estate firms!) BUT you can select your own Realtor. Many people have told their Relocation Specialist they want to see and interview us. YOU always have that choice!!!
EVERYBODY’S DOING IT!
Remodelers report that kitchen and bathroom projects remain the most popular remodeling jobs with home owners increasingly upgrading both rooms and making major repairs as they decide to stay in their current homes longer. Nearly 50 percent of remodelers report seeing an increase in the number of home owners who undertake remodels to avoid moving compared to the 2010 findings. Both kitchen and bathroom remodeling projects were up 17 percent from two years ago, with bathroom remodels cited as a common job by 78 percent of remodelers and kitchen remodels at 69 percent. Since 2009, bathrooms and kitchens have switched places in popularity, with bathroom remodels moving into the top spot as the most common type of remodeling project.
“As the priorities of home owners shift, remodelers have to adjust to the needs of their clients,” says NAHB Remodelers Chairman George “Geep” Moore Jr., GMB, CAPS, GMR and owner/president of Moore-Built Construction & Restoration Inc. in Elm Grove, La. “And while the motivation behind a home owner’s decision to remodel may have changed, their desire for quality, professional results have not. Professional remodelers remain committed to the highest industry standards.”
Repairs and replacements of old components and the desire for upgraded amenities were cited as the top reasons for customers to hire a remodeler. More than 60 percent of remodelers reported increased demand for repairs and replacements of old components in the past two years, while more than half of remodelers said that the desire for upgraded amenities increased. In contrast, more than 20 percent of remodelers said there was a decrease in customers remodeling to increase home values as an investment.
In addition to kitchens and baths, other popular remodeling categories included window/door replacements (44 percent), whole house remodels (35 percent), room additions (33 percent) and handyman services (31 percent).
