Sellers: Please LEAVE So That I Can Sell Your House!
July 5th, 2008 Categories: Busy Girls Guide, Chico Sellers, My Opinion on Things
Despite the fact that most sellers have undoubtedly been counseled by their Realtors to leave during showings, a large number of sellers choose to remain.
After a recent, painful, house-viewing excursion with some home buyers on a search for Chico CA real estate, I feel the need to approach the situation head-on.
You seem, Mr. and Mrs. Home Seller, to not comprehend how detrimental your very presence is to the sale of your property. If you fully understood the repercussions, I am certain that you would work with the Realtors, not against them.
For most home buyers, your being in the house makes for an uncomfortable showing. It’s hard for a buyer to freely explore a property and excitedly converse with family members when you are hanging on their every word and following their every move. Buyers may not feel that they can discuss the negatives of the house, for fear of insulting you. Similarly, they may not want to display too much enthusiasm, because a poker face is an important aspect when negotiating, and they don’t want you to think they LOVE your house. Lastly, they don’t feel they can roam at will to discover all the house has to offer. Many buyers are so conscientious about your overhearing them, they refuse to discuss their thoughts until we have made it safely into the car!
Although you think you’re being helpful by providing us with a running commentary and guided tour, you are shooting yourself in the foot! More often than not, the things you find fascinating and important hold very little interest to the buyer. They don’t want to hear about how your mother’s uncle suggested you put the laundry room near the kitchen, but you, in your infinite wisdom opted to put it near the bedrooms instead. They also don’t want to hear about your special tupperware drawer, your cat’s litter box problem, or your weight issues after switching your thyroid medication. As a seller, you might be saying to yourself, I NEVER get in the way… I only point out the positive factors that will help sell my house! Yeah… ok. I have endured endless “showings” of Chico property performed by well-meaning sellers and it’s a rare situation indeed that a seller doesn’t deter from the task at hand.
Keep in mind that the buyer is trying to picture himself in the house, along with his furniture, his family, and his activities. Professional home stagers will encourage a seller to remove all items such as family photos, excess furniture, and clutter to facilitate the buyer’s bonding with the property. The goal is to remove the distractions so that the buyer can figure out how he can make the space his own. The focus should be the bones of the house, not on YOU! By attending the showing, you defeat the very purpose of “staging” the house for sale, and many buyers will resent the disruption.
Real life examples!
1. I recently accompanied a buyer on a showing in which the seller was the tour guide. The woman was bright, bubbly, and extraordinarily full of personality– a true pleasure to meet. We got to hear all about her children, her cooking abilities, her extended family, the history of the building of the house, and her hobbies. When we finally made it back to the car, both the buyer and myself were at a complete loss as to the details of the house. Did it have granite? Where was the 3rd bathroom? Did we actually see the bonus room?? We had no idea, but we could tell you how many kids she had, and what her husband did for a living.
2. A home was advertised as being a 4 bedroom, 3 bath property. After nearly an hour listening to the seller expound on the virtues of the home, we were finally shown the “4th bedroom” which was actually a room so small that you couldn’t fit a twin size bed in there. Considering the buyer had a very strict need for 4 functional bedrooms, the house wasn’t appropriate. Instead of discovering the flaw within the first 2 minutes, we were forced to endure an hour of meaningless banter. The buyer was so infuriated that she refused to even consider the minor remodel possibilities of the home which would have rendered the house functional for her family.
3. I once showed a house during which time the sellers planted themselves on the porch with cocktails and appetizers. The home was so small they were able to monitor our visit every step of the way. Upon exiting the house, they cleverly (or so they thought) addressed every concern the buyer had mentioned while in the house. The problem was that my buyer was extraordinarily unusual in every sense of the word. He had very eccentric views on relationships, politics, and day to day living. The sellers managed to offend him several times over as they chattered on thinking that they were coming across as charming and informative. Despite the fact that the house was a perfect fit for him, he left the property focused instead on how much he disliked the current owners. Shortsighted, on the buyer’s part, I know. However, having spent an inordinate amount of time with that particular buyer, I had learned to avoid his hot spots and feel strongly that I could have sold him that house had the sellers not unwittingly killed the deal for themselves.
Sellers, please keep in mind that you chose to list your home with a professional Realtor rather than trying to sell the house yourself. You must allow the Realtor to do the job! Try to remember that most of us sell properties full time, to earn a living. We put a great deal of time and effort into learning the art of marketing and negotiating real estate. We want to sell your house!
Most importantly, as the buyer’s agent, we have the advantage of knowing the client’s particular interests, needs, and deficiencies, and can therefore appeal to them more effectively than you can.
If you have important details that the average Realtor or buyer will not recognize upon viewing the property, there are very effective ways to provide the information without being intrusive or distracting.
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Leave photographs of your home taken throughout the seasons. Is your home breathtaking in the fall or spring? Do you have an amazing garden? SHOW US with pictures.
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Leave notecards or flyers on pedastals or attached to doorways to explain special features, materials, warranties, or interesting history about the room or area.
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Work with your listing agent to compile a binder with all sorts of interesting facts, inspections, pictures of floor plans, or anything else that you would like to share. Leave it in a place that invites the visitors to peruse it.
If only, Mr. and Mrs. Seller, you could please LEAVE, we could do a better job of selling your house!
P.S. That doesn’t mean exiting the house as we are trying to enter. I know you’re dying to see what the new buyers look like, and you just want to say “hi”, and you just have a couple of things you want to share with us that are really important, and you just want to offer us iced tea and cookies, and you’re just trying to be welcoming… but please leave BEFORE we get there!!
P.S.S. If you don’t want to give your potential buyers the heebie-jeebies, don’t sit in the car or across the street in your neighbor’s living room watching us with binoculars. You might think you’re being sneaky, but we can see or feel you there, and the overall effect is not a good one!
This particular post sparked quite a reaction from my fellow Real Estate Professionals. SELLERS, if you weren’t already buying my opinion, please peruse the thoughts of over 70 other Realtors by clicking here!
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Chico CA Real Estate Mortgage Meltdown
December 3rd, 2007 Categories: Chico Financing
by guest writer Mike Wiegert, broker, Chico Homes
SUBPRIME! TEASER RATE! ADJUSTABLE RATE MORTGAGE!
Locally, these terms were once only known to those people that worked in the Chico CA real estate or mortgage business and a small percentage of people that took an actual interest in the workings of national mortgage markets. Today, these words are commonly known to anyone who reads a newspaper or watches a daily news program.
Our newfound familiarity with mortgage terminology is primarily due to the recent crisis surrounding a near collapse of the sub-prime mortgage markets. Why do they call it market? Because, essentially that is what it is, or was. In recent years, Chico homebuyers and those refinancing existing Chico home loans had a huge array of loan programs to choose from. Much like your favorite grocery store, some of these products were sensible and had value in the long run. Other products were just a quick way to get a new homebuyer, often with low or marginal credit scores into a Chico property with little regard for future events.
A commonly used mortgage in the sub-prime market is the 2/28 ARM. This is an adjustable rate mortgage where the rate is fixed for 2 years, and is then reset to equal the value of a rate index at that time, plus a margin. Because sub-prime margins are high, the rate on most 2/28s will rise sharply at the 2-year mark, even if market rates do not change during the period. This means that while the loan is affordable to the borrower at the initial rate, it may not be affordable after two years when the rate is reset. This type of mortgage is really only of value to borrowers who are assured of certain events that involve a significant increase of income, a situation that is unusual to most of us.
For the average wage earner, a dramatic increase in housing payment is a formula for disaster. Therein lies the problem: a sharp rise in mortgage defaults and foreclosures of those once euphorically happy homebuyers. So whom do we blame? We could blame the eager and enthusiastic Chico mortgage lenders who promoted the loans, rationalizing the validity with the forecasts of increasing appreciation of the homes. We might take a swing at aggressive Chico CA Realtors, also believing that these products were the only possible way for their customers to realize the great American dream of homeownership. We could hold responsible the Chico homeowners themselves for getting caught up in the buying frenzy with little or no regard for their own future.
How many people out there have ever bought a car that they couldn’t afford, only to have to sell it for a loss and absorb the shortfall? Why blame any particular person at all? We all got into this mess together, and we all are feeling the results as the issue resolves itself. So, how is this glob of knots going to untie itself? I don’t think that anyone has a convincing answer to that monumental question.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson discussed a plan at a meeting with top banking regulators and industry representatives last Thursday and is expected to announce details of the proposal this week.
The plan would freeze mortgage rates for stressed borrowers who took out loans with low teaser rates that are due to reset to a much higher level. The obvious benefit of such a plan would be that these borrowers would, for the time being, be able to hold on to their homes. At the same time, the lenders won’t be inundated with foreclosures, thereby forced to open large departments to deal with holding, maintaining and marketing these properties.
Many folks are really angry that the Federal Government would step in and bail out lenders that are experiencing high rates of foreclosures, and help individuals desperately unable to afford the higher payments of their newly reset mortgages.
Ultimately, they feel that these foolish lenders and borrowers will be sponsored by the American taxpayer and in truth, they are right. It’s always the taxpayer dollar that is used to support a national crisis, isn’t it?
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Looking to buy or sell Chico CA Real Estate? Need a Top Producing Chico CA Realtor? Call Sandi Bauman 530-864-5407 or email [email protected]. Specializing in REO, residential, relocation, investment & ag property.
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My perspective: The Chico, CA Real Estate Market is not THAT bad!
October 7th, 2007 Categories: Chico CA Real Estate Market Stats, Chico CA Real Estate News, Chico Sellers
Call me a hopeless optimist if you like, but I don’t think the Chico CA real estate market is half as bad as everyone makes it out to be!
The power that the media has on people’s perception of reality is both amazing and frightening.Considering the facts stated below, can anyone really argue that the Chico CA real estate market is all that horrible?
These numbers represent all class of property including single family homes, residential income, commercial, manufactured homes, vacant land, ranches and farms, year to date as reported by the Sierra North Valley MLS.
Year Listed Sold % Listed Sold Avg List Price Avg Sold Price List/Sold DOM
2007 6498 2067 31.81% $303,327 $289,171 95.33% 92
2006 7401 2430 32.83% $302,084 $290,848 96.28% 73
I’m thinking the numbers look pretty gosh darn good! My biggest caution to sellers would be to expect an extra 20 days on the market for a reasonably priced house to sell.
To sum it up, approximately 40 less properties per month have sold in 2007 than in 2006. Nearly 400 Chico Realtors have closed at least one transaction this year!
Compared to the statistics that are being posted for other regions in the United States, I really think that Chico CA has faired very well. Take Ponciana, FL for instance. Only 1.77% of their total inventory is actually selling! It appears that Chico CA property is a safer investment than you might find somewhere else.
Am I really the only one seeing this glass half full?
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Looking to buy or sell Chico CA Real Estate? Need a Top Producing Chico CA Realtor? Call Sandi Bauman 530-864-5407 or email [email protected]. Specializing in REO, residential, relocation, investment & ag property.
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