Beware of These Home Inspection Red Flags

Beware of These Home Inspection Red Flags

A home inspection not only allows buyers to learn more about their home, it also helps them uncover any potential problems.

Curbed.com recently featured a 14-point checklist to help home buyers during a home inspection. Here are a few items they suggest to investigate further during a home inspection that will give your buyers more confidence in moving forward.

HVAC system. Home inspectors will make sure the home’s heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning system is working, and they should also be able to estimate how long the home air conditioning condenser (the outside unit) should last too. They just need to check the serial number, says Nigel Turner with Total Home Inspection Services in West Milford, N.J. Many condensers last 12 to 15 years before needing replacement.

Water drainage. “The biggest issue of any home is always going to be water disbursement,” Turner told Curbed.com. “There’s the potential for damage to the foundation. If water is found to be in the vicinity of the house, you want the water to flow away from the house, not towards it.” Home inspectors who use an infrared camera may be able to uncover potential water damage that lurks beneath the surface of a home too.

Roof. Learn how old it is and any potential issues, particularly if anything that you may have to one day bring up to code. Roof problems are responsible for 39 percent of home owners insurance claims, according to data from Trulia.

Oil tank. Even if the house is heated with gas, it’s still important to check and see if there’s an oil tank on the property in case it once was heated by oil. A tank may still be present. Certain areas require the oil tank to be removed. Others may have just been filled with sand and gravel. Make sure you find out and to ensure it hasn’t leaked into the ground. “Make sure we sweep the whole property,” Elice Shikama of RE/MAX in Franklin Lakes, N.J., told Curbed.com. “Because sometimes sellers think they only have one. They could have multiple underground tanks.”

Chimney. “Chimneys can be a very costly enterprise, if there’s damage to the chimney lining on the inside, if the masonry around the chimney is faulty, corroded, or whatever it might be,” Turner says.

See the entire 14-point checklist that Curbed.com offers for home inspections.

Source: “Home Inspections 101: What to Look Out For,” Curbed.com (June 21, 2016)

Good Time to Lock in Mortgage Rates

Good Time to Lock in Mortgage Rates

Borrowing costs stayed low for yet another week for home buyers and refinancers. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage continues to hover near its lowest average in three years.

“Mortgage rates have been slow to adjust to the 10-year Treasury yield, which has increased 12 basis points since last week,” says Sean Becketti, Freddie Mac’s chief economist. “This week’s survey shows the 30-year fixed rate inching up to 3.56 percent, only 2 basis points above last week’s average. The low rates continue to be good news for the housing market, as existing home sales rose 1.8 percent to a 5.53 million seasonally adjusted annual rate in the month of May — the highest level since February 2007.”

Freddie Mac reports the following national averages with mortgage rates for the week ending June 23:

• 30-year fixed-rate mortgages: averaged 3.56 percent, with an average 0.6 point, rising from last week’s 3.54 percent average. A year ago, 30-year rates averaged 4.02 percent.
• 15-year fixed-rate mortgages: averaged 2.83 percent, with an average 0.5 point, increasing from last week’s 2.81 percent average. A year ago, 15-year rates averaged 3.21 percent.
• 5-year hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages: averaged 2.74 percent, with an average 0.5 point, holding the same average from a week ago. Last year at this time, 5-year ARMs averaged 2.98 percent.

Source: Freddie Mac

Top Housing Preferences Depend on Your Age

Top Housing Preferences Depend on Your Age

What you want in a home largely depends on which generation you come from. Lesley Deutch, a principal at John Burns Real Estate Consulting, studied the top housing preferences by age and revealed insights that can help builders figure out what types of homes to build for each generation.

1940s: Ages 67 to 76

“These buyers will stay active and live anywhere they want. Growth may be seen in urban areas and grandiose second homes near their grandchildren.”

1950s: Ages 57 to 66

“This generation will innovate retirement to be about health and family. They may increase demand for multigenerational living and retirement homes near their children.”

1960s: Ages 47 to 56

“This generation is more likely to welcome adult kids living with them. They are empty nesters and may gravitate toward remodels.”

1970s: Ages 37 to 46

“This generation gravitates to multigenerational living, due in part to foreign-born preferences.”

1980s: Ages 27 to 36

“For now, this generation still prefers the urban city living where they are likely to rent due to delayed marriage and children, however, there will soon be a large demand once they want to move to the suburbs for schools and a cheaper mortgage.”

Source: “Here’s What Homebuilders Think You Want,” HousingWire (June 21, 2016)

FAA Finalizes Rule for Commercial Drones

FAA Finalizes Rule for Commercial Drones

Using a drone to capture listing photos and videos or inspect properties is about to become significantly easier now that the federal government has finalized its long-awaited regulations over the commercial use of unmanned aerial systems.

The final rule issued Tuesday by the Federal Aviation Administration paves the way for people who obtain a remote pilot certificate to operate drones that weigh less than 55 pounds, as long as the aircraft remains within visual line-of-sight. Earning the certificate will involve passing a test of aeronautical knowledge at an FAA-approved testing center — but it will not require applicants to have formal flight training.

The FAA has, until now, required people wishing to operate drones commercially to obtain a so-called Section 333 waiver, and the agency has limited those waivers to people with a pilot’s license. That constraint has stood in the way of real estate professionals and others wishing to use drones in their businesses, despite the growing availability and decreasing cost of lightweight, remote-controlled aircraft equipped with cameras.

The new FAA regulations, which take effect in August, follow requests from industry groups, including the National Association of REALTORS®, for regulators to develop a framework that would allow people without specialized training to use drones for purposes other than a hobby. NAR sent multiple letters to the FAA during the rule making process and testified before Congress in support of the use of drones in the real estate industry.

“We’ve worked hard to strike a responsible balance that protects the safety and privacy of individuals, while also ensuring real estate professionals can put drones to good use,” NAR President Tom Salomone said in a statement. “That effort just took another big step forward. The rules will help more real estate professionals take flight, making the efficiency and innovation that drones have to offer available to a much broader base of operators.”

Although the new regulations eliminate the requirement that drone operators hold a pilot’s license, they contain a host of restrictions intended to protect people on the ground. Beyond requiring the operator or another visual observer to be able to see their drone while it is in operation, the regulations prohibit flying inside buildings or flying over people who are not connected with the flight. In addition, drone flights will be permitted only during daylight or twilight hours, drones must not fly faster than 100 miles per hour, and operators must be at least 16 years old.

The regulations will permit drone operators to obtain waivers from the FAA for some of the restrictions if they are able to demonstrate that their proposed flight will still be able to operate safely.

Meanwhile, NAR is calling for the FAA to develop less-restrictive rules for drones under four pounds. NAR also believes the FAA should come up with guidelines that would permit drone flights to go beyond visual line-of-sight, which is particularly important for aerial photography of large buildings or expansive tracts of land.

“We’re entering a new stage of drone use in real estate, and no doubt there will be additional questions and challenges ahead,” Salomone said. “NAR will continue educating its members on issues important to the safe, responsible use of drones so they can grow their business and better serve their clients.”

—By S. Silverstein, REALTOR® Magazine

Your Website’s Two Most Valuable Pages

Your Website’s Two Most Valuable Pages

Do you know how to optimize your website for conversions? You don’t have to be an expert in conversion rate optimization to make a big difference in your website’s performance. It just comes down to applying a few basic principles to the two most valuable pages on your site.

Take a look at your homepage and its “hero section,” which is everything that appears “above the fold” on your browser window. The first thing the hero section should have is a striking HD image that speaks to your business. But aside from that, you should pay special attention to the words you use to draw visitors in and drive them to take action. One of the most common mistakes real estate sites make with their hero section is building it around a “me” focus. Rather than entice visitors with imagery and words focused on them, we make it about us: who we are and what we do.

Your hero section should be all about the visitor. Instead of using images that feature you, your agents, or specific properties you’re selling, opt for an emotionally driven picture designed to highlight the benefits of working with your agency. On top of all that, give your hero section plenty of space to breathe. Don’t bombard your audience with dense text or confuse them with multiple links or calls-to-action. Make the main thing the main thing and eliminate all else. Remember, less is more.

Once you’ve made your homepage enticing and compelling, your next step should be to create a page (or multiple pages) focused directly on getting your visitors to take the next, smallest step in becoming a genuine lead. Many real estate professionals are under the impression that this means little more than putting together a contact page, which includes their email and phone number.

But getting your visitor to take that next step means creating what’s known as a landing page. A landing page is a stand-alone webpage designed to do one thing: get your visitor to take action. At their core, landing pages that convert speak directly to real people with real problems in search of real solutions.

Getting results on your landing page involves two vital steps. First, you must clearly identify what your landing page’s goal is. Most often this will be collecting a visitor’s email address. And second, you must connect your goal to solving at least one of the visitor’s problems. For instance, if you’re targeting first-time buyers with less than perfect credit, offer them an educational guide to securing their first loan, even if their payment record isn’t spotless.

Keep everything focused on a single goal and, just like the tips for an effective homepage, remove as much unnecessary information as possible. Too much information — such as including your phone number on a landing page when all you want is to collect an email address — only clouds its purpose and power. Create separate landing pages for buyers versus sellers and always include your location in your website language: It’s the difference between “Need to Sell Your House Fast?” and “Sell Your House Fast in Portland.”

We know that going online is the first step most home sellers and home buyers take in their property search, so this means your website must be built to not only attract them but convert them into genuine leads. But don’t get overwhelmed with terminology or technical issues. Instead, conversion rate optimization comes down to applying no more than a handful of principles to the two most valuable pages on your site: your homepage and your landing page.

Source: Aaron Orendorff is a regular contributor to Entrepreneur, Business Insider, Success Magazine, Fast Company, Lifehacker, and other online publications.

Where to Live by Personality Type

Where to Live by Personality Type

Could your personality fit better in a different city? Realtor.com®’s research team used Myers & Briggs Foundation data (you know, the creators behind the Myers-Briggs popular personality test) to look at the most popular personality types in various American locales.

Their research team took into account the best career options for the most prevalent personality types. They also analyzed various quality of life factors including affordability, and emerged with a defining list of cities that best fit certain personalities.

Take a look at their top city picks for each personality type:

Protector Personalities

• Characteristics: Dependable, practical, caring
• Top city choice: San Antonio, Texas

Provider Personalities

• Characteristics: Sociable, enthusiastic, warm
• Top city choice: Salt Lake City, Utah

Inspector Personalities

• Characteristics: Conservative, organized, detailed
• Top city choice: Orlando, Fla.

Composer Personalities

• Characteristics: Gentle, aesthetic, observant
• Top city choice: Boise, Idaho

Supervisor Personalities

• Characteristics: Decisive, take charge, practical
• Top city choice: New York, N.Y.

Performer Personalities

• Characteristics: Spontaneous, fun-loving, resourceful
• Top city choice: Austin, Texas

Champion Personalities

• Characteristics: Insightful, creative, open
• Top city choice: St. Louis, Mo.

Craftsman Personalities

• Characteristics: Analytical, curious, hands-on
• Top city choice: Chicago, Ill.

Source: “Which American City Is the Perfect Match for Your Personality?” realtor.com® (June 20, 2016)