Problems Sellers May Try to Hide

Problems Sellers May Try to Hide

Home sellers sign a disclosure document that they’re being upfront about any problems with the home.

“However, it can be very tempting for some to tell white lies or conveniently forgets facts,” says Wendy Flynn, owner of Wendy Flynn Realty in College Station, Texas. “In fact, a very large number of real estate lawsuits stem from owners misrepresenting their property.”

Realtor.com® recently featured some of the most common cover-ups that real estate professionals say they and their clients eventually discover.

Water damage: Water stains could be signs of leaks. “Many sellers try to conceal water intrusion in the basement, for example, with a pile of cardboard boxes or suitcases,” says Frank Baldassarre, owner of Ace Home Inspections on Staten Island, N.Y. If the home has obvious red flags – such as an odd odor or visible wall cracks – you may want to request removing a large picture frame to take a look at what may be behind it, Baladassarre says. Also, some home owners may try to use a fresh coat of paint to conceal water damage. As such, home owners may want to ask when the house was last painted. “If it was a year ago, they’re probably not trying to hide water stains,” says Baldassarre.

Bad foundation: Look for any jagged cracks in the wall. Zigzag cracks may signal a foundation problem, says Flynn. A bad foundation also could prevent cabinets and doors from closing properly.

Neighbor nuisances: “Home owners have an obligation to disclose what are called ‘neighborhood nuisances,’ but if they don’t, buyers have to rely on their word,” says Carrie Benuska, a real estate professional at the John Aaroe Group in Pasadena, Calif. “I know people who have asked their neighbors to keep noisy dogs inside during showings or only open their homes during strategic times of the day.” Buyers will want to take a walk around the neighborhood at different times of day to assess the area for themselves.

Temperature changes: “If you walk into a room and there’s a subtle shift in the atmosphere—maybe the air feels dry or damp—ask the owner what the room feels like throughout the seasons,” says Benuska. “The culprit is usually poor insulation, sometimes as a result of the owner adding a second room or floor to the home.”

Source: “How to Spot the Top Problems Home Sellers Try to Hide,” realtor.com® (April 4, 2016)

First-Time Buyers Love These Home Features

First-Time Buyers Love These Home Features

Mid-Atlantic real estate professionals are bullish on the housing market this spring, particularly due to the growing number of first-time home buyers entering the market.

In its 2016 Mid-Atlantic Housing Market Survey, MRIS – one of the nation’s largest multiple listing services – found that 57 percent of nearly 750 real estate professionals recently surveyed expect this spring to be busier than last year. The majority of the respondents cited low mortgage rates as the main reason they believe buyers will act faster this year than last year.

Eighty-eight percent of respondents predict there will be more first-time buyers this year too. With that growth, how do you appeal to first-time buyers with your listings? Respondents rated the following home features as the most important to first-time home buyers:

1. Updated kitchen and bath: 81%
2. An open floor plan: 59%
3. Low-maintenance features: 43%
4. Walkable communities: 36%
5. Energy efficiency: 20%
6. Strength of cell phone service or WiFi: 19%

Source: MRISblog.com

Jump-Start Your Client Base This Spring

Jump-Start Your Client Base This Spring

Are you on the hunt for more clients this spring? An article at RISMedia recently highlighted several ways real estate professionals can stay competitive during this season:

Find a way to engage with your community. Look for an event to sponsor in your area, such as a local youth sports team. Or, organize a workshop in your town that caters to new home buyers. Find a way to get your name out in your community.

Get more in-tune with your former clients. It never hurts to focus more of your energy on your past clients. They may be ready to move or finally buy. Find some excuses with targeted content to reach out to your past clients to remind them you’re there for them.

Increase your responsiveness. Don’t let any of your leads fall through the cracks. Buyers and sellers expect immediate responses, and they may quickly move on to the next agent if they don’t get that from you. Having a tough time keeping up? Then, adopt systems that make you more responsive through automation.

Source: “Spring Fever: Tips for Real Estate Agents to Stay Competitive,” RISMedia (March 30, 2016)

College Debt Delays Home Ownership

College Debt Delays Home Ownership

Student loan debt can negatively affect the ability and willingness of people to buy a home in the years after they leave college, according to new research by Federal Reserve Board economists.

For every 10 percent increase in student debt among people in the five years after they leave school, the probability of taking on a mortgage goes down by 1 percent, said Federal Reserve economist Daniel R. Ringo, who carried out the study with three other Fed economists.

To conduct the study, researchers used data from TransUnion, the U.S. Department of Education, and individual schools.

Their findings show that rising student debt levels are causing an entire sector of the population—people in their twenties and early thirties—to take longer to enter the housing market as a group than they would if they had less student debt, Ringo said.

Ringo described the research during a March 25 REALTOR® University Speaker Series session at NAR in Washington.

He said that multiple factors related to student loan debt can be linked to whether people take on mortgages in the first years after they leave school.

Aside from the fact that debt can lower a person’s credit score, reduce their ability to save for a down payment, and cause their debt-to-income ratio to make them ineligible for a home loan, people who are already saddled with loan payments—and know what it feels like to owe money—might be averse to taking on the additional financial burden of buying a home, he said.

A person with a substantial amount of student loan debt might say, “I’m just really uncomfortable with adding more debt to that … so I might want to wait [to buy a home] until I’ve paid down that loan,” says Ringo.

Ringo said he and his colleagues decided to examine the possible connection between education-related debt and home buying because the home ownership rate in the United States has declined markedly in the past decade while student loan debt has risen sharply.

Although a host of other factors could affect a person’s ability to take on a mortgage or interest in owning a home, the fact that the two indicators diverged caught the economists’ attention, he said. “This [was] enough to make us think that maybe there’s something going on here.”

—Source is from REALTOR® Magazine

Fireplaces Spark Interest in Buyers

Fireplaces Spark Interest in Buyers

Fireplaces are eye-catchers across all levels of homes, and savvy selling agents know that buyers will linger over a photo of one in a listing. With HVAC and smart-home technology controlling the environment, fireplaces have become purely a pleasure item, to the point where you can just watch a fireplace YouTube video on your smart TV.

For buyers who want the real thing, one design element they consider is the depth of the fireplace. A deeper firebox, according to Curbed.com, shows that the emphasis is for pleasure over function and allows a safer layout, keeping the burning logs away from the room.

But buyers who plan to use their fireplaces look for the Rumford fireplace design, a shallower design that reflects more heat back into the living area while moving air efficiently to keep smoke out.

Benjamin Thompson, who dubbed himself a Count during a stay in Europe, published an essay in 1796 that presented his design for a more efficient fireplace. By having a shallow firebox with widely flared sides, “the design… draws air into the fireplace very efficiently,” says Bruce Irving of Hammond Real Estate in Cambridge, Mass., a renovation expert who was a producer of PBS series “This Old House.” “That allows the flame to have plenty of oxygen to burn strongly and cleanly. And, on top of that, it effectively reflects heat into the room.”

Rumford’s design is a mainstay of homes built in the first half of the 19th century, but still comes up occasionally in modern homes designed for those who appreciate the element.

Source: “What’s the Deal With Old Fireplaces?” Curbed.com (March 24, 2016)

How Much Space Buyers Really Crave

How Much Space Buyers Really Crave

For the majority of home buyers, they want a home with about 9 percent more space than they currently have. A new study translates that to a median of 2,020 square feet.

But the amount of desired square footage can vary quite a bit among the different age groups, according to findings from the National Association of Home Builders’ “Housing Preferences of the Boomer Generation: How They Compare to Other Home Buyers.” For example, millennial and Gen X buyers desire the most space, at more than 2,300 square feet. Baby boomers and seniors, on the other hand, mostly would be happy with homes that are under 1,900 square feet.

NAHB’s study also found that more than half of all home buyers across all age groups would like to have a home with three bedrooms. Thirty percent of respondents say they’d prefer four bedrooms or more. Millennials and Gen X’ers are most likely to want a home with at least four bedrooms.

Source: “Housing Preferences Across Generations (Part II),” National Association of Home Builders’ Eye on Housing (March 17, 2016)