Three out of four homeowners would rather fix or replace appliances than accept a lower offer when selling their home, according to a new survey of about 1,000 consumers from Cinch Home Services, a home warranty company. They believe upgrading the appliances can add more value to their home, too.

On average, homeowners believe upgrading their home’s appliances will increase their home’s value by $13,668.

About half of homeowners surveyed say they plan to upgrade their current appliances before selling. They are prioritizing repairing or replacing the air conditioner, dishwasher, and water heater prior to listing their home for sale, the survey finds.

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission

Americans want more social distance from their neighbors. A new Pew Research Center study finds a shift in home preferences since the pandemic with more consumers saying they want a larger home, even if it means local amenities are further away.

That marks a shift from 2019 when more Americans were desiring smaller houses that were “closer to each other, but schools, stores, and restaurants are within walking distance,” according to the Pew Research study.

Six in 10 U.S. adults surveyed say they would prefer to live in a community with larger homes that had a greater distance to retail stores and schools. That is up 7 percentage points since 2019. On the other hand, 39% of consumers surveyed say they prefer a community with smaller houses that are closer together and near amenities, down 8 points since 2019.

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission

The home flippers are returning to the market, even as their profit margins have dipped to a 10-year low.

About 4.9% of all home sales in the second quarter were from home flipping—defined as a single-family home or condo transaction that was bought and sold within 12 months. The home flipping rate is up from 3.5% in the first quarter of 2021 but still remains below levels throughout most of the last decade, according to ATTOM Data Solutions’ latest 2021 U.S. Home Flipping Report.

Profits are less for a home flip. The gross profit on a typical home flip—the difference between the median sales price and the median paid by investors—was $67,000 in the second quarter. That is a 33.5% return on investment compared to the original acquisition price—down from 40.6% a year earlier and the lowest point since the first quarter of 2011.

Meanwhile, the median price of homes flipped in the second quarter climbed to an all-time high of $267,000, up 18.7% from a year earlier. Those price increases, however, failed to surpass the increases that investors were absorbing when they purchased the homes they sold in the second quarter, according to the study. The gap—prices rising more on a purchase than resale—led to profit margins dropping, researchers note.

“Home flipping rebounded during the second quarter, but profits sure didn’t,” says Todd Teta, chief product officer at ATTOM. “The typical home flip around the country netted the smallest return on investment in a decade. However, it’s not like home flipping has become a losing proposition. A 33 percent profit on a short-term investment remained pretty decent, even after renovation and holding expenses. But with a few more periods like the second quarter of this year, investors may need to reframe how they look at these deals.”

The largest home flipping rates in the second quarter occurred in:

• Savannah, Ga. (flips comprised 9.5% of all home sales)
• Fort Wayne, Ind. (9.3%)
• Canton, Ohio (9%)
• Ogden, Utah (8.9%)
• Indianapolis (8.9%)

The metro areas with the highest returns on investment for a home flip in the second quarter were:

• Oklahoma City, Okla. (ROI of 196.4%)
• Fargo, N.D. (185.7%)
• Pittsburgh, Pa. (154.2%)
• Omaha, Neb. (135%)
• York, Pa. (115.1%)

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission

Scientists at Purdue University have created the whitest paint in the world, and their research, published in April, shows that the ultra-white color could drastically reduce or even eventually eliminate the need for air conditioning.

The stark white paint works by reflecting 98.1% of sunlight away from the building. It also emits infrared heat, which means it absorbs less heat from the sun than it emits. “A surface coated with this paint is cooled below the surrounding temperature without consuming power,” Purdue University reports.

What’s more, this white paint on a roof area of about 1,000 square feet could cool a building by the equivalent of about 10 kilowatts, according to a research paper. “That’s more powerful than the air conditioners used by most houses,” said Xiulin Ruan, a professor of mechanical engineering at Purdue.

The paint has been listed in the Guinness World Records book as the whitest paint ever invented.

Most white paints currently sold tend to get warmer, not cooler. But this white paint contains a high concentration of barium sulfate, which is also used in photo paper and cosmetics, that is behind much of its cooling effect, researchers said.

Researchers said they are working on making the paint available to the public.

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission

Tony Bertucci with NOLA Living Realty decided to stage his abandoned home listing in Metairie, La., using stand-up porcelain dolls. The dolls appear in photos that show a home with moldy, torn-up kitchen cabinets and ripped-up floors and walls.

“I did it just to get the house some attention because the house was so hideous and horrifying,” Bertucci told WKRN.com. “I wanted to do something to lighten up the photos of the house.”

His plan worked: The home went under contract after one day. He attributed the attention to the photos. Realtor.com® had called out the home as its most popular listing last week.

Bertucci is the owner of the home. He bought the home with plans to fix it up and sell it. However, Hurricane Ida damaged several of his properties and he decided to give his other homes precedence.

He marketed the 1,370-square foot, three-bedroom home as-is to investors and flippers. It was listed for $149,500.

Bertucci said potential buyers asked him if the house was haunted and they wanted to know more about why the dolls were there. “I just told them the dolls were my clients,” Bertucci teased to WKRN.com. “I said they were selling because the house was much too big for them.”

View the listing—and the dolls—at nolalivingrealty.com.

Also, read about other creative ways that real estate professionals have staged listings with unusual characters or objects:

If All Else Fails, Wear a Panda Suit

A Roaring Success? Agent Uses T-Rex to Market Home

REALTORS® in Costume: What Would You Dress Up As for a Listing?

Brokerage Reveals Listings’ ‘Skeletons’

The Grinch Is Trying to Sell a Home

Bigfoot Sighting: Creature Appears to Lurk in Listing Photos

Agents Turn to Spider-Man to Save Their Listings

The Horrifying Reason This Listing Went Viral

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission

When you hear “prefab,” you may think double-wide mobile home. It’s a misconception the industry has long been trying to clear up.

Prefab, a type of construction method, can be found at the luxury home level. More prefab options are stretching into the high-end market, combining quicker construction timelines with ultra-luxury touches.

Prefab homes are built offsite in a factory, delivered to a home site, and assembled faster than a traditional stick-built house. About 50% to 80% of the construction of a prefab home is done offsite.

Demand for luxury modular homes has increased during the pandemic. Method Homes, a prefab manufacturer, reported that sales in 2020 were up by 50% compared to 2019 sales, The Wall Street Journal reports.

Modular homes—often with a contemporary design—can be customized and are fetching higher price tags. Joseph Tanney, the founder of Resolution: 4 Architecture in New York City, designed a seven-bedroom, nine-bathroom modular home in Bridgehampton, N.Y. that sold in September 2020 for $4.7 million. The home included a pool, pool house, decking, geothermal and solar power systems, and green roof.

In the luxury market, modular homes are speeding up build times. For example, Brian Abramson, co-founder and CEO of Method Homes, told The Wall Street Journal that a high-end custom 4,000- to 6,000-square-foot traditional stick-built home could take 16 to 18 months to build. A modular home of a similar size could take less than a year.

National Association of REALTORS®
Reprinted with permission