What’s My Home Worth?  A Sensible Guide To Pricing A Home For Sale

Posted on June 8, 2014 by Tim Freund

When I am asked to meet with a potential seller to discuss listing their home for sale, the first thing I need to understand is their motivation.  Why are they selling?  Could it be there have been changes in the family or changes in employment? Perhaps it’s as simple as the desire for a different location, amenity or maybe it’s health related.  The second thing have to do is to research the property because I am going to have to give an opinion of value.  Keep in mind that an opinion of value for selling is not the same as appraised value.  My opinion is designed to get the home sold for the highest price, in the shortest amount of time, for the least amount of hassle.  An appraisal is designed to give the bank a general sense as to the value of the security (the home) for their investment (your loan.)  So how do I approach this process?

The obvious starting point is to look at the structure size and the property size and to find homes that are similar in nature.  This is called finding comparables or finding “Comps,” as you will often hear them referred to.  Comps are tricky business because no two homes are ever the same.  Still, it’s all we have to go on. Thus recently sold homes form the backbone of our property value assessment.  Closed sales however, only tell part of the story.

Circling back, we need to consider the motivation.  Why?  A seller’s motivation has a direct impact on the value of their home.  Huh?  Let me explain… If a seller is not in any kind of hurry, our approach to pricing is going to be different from a seller who needs to sell quickly.  Naturally I will argue that every seller needs to sell quickly since the faster sale invariably achieves the highest sales price.  That said however, a seller that is willing to wait indefinitely for that “Buyer that just loves my home,” may find that in fact if they wait long enough, “The One” will come along and pay the asking price.  Most sellers don’t have the benefit of time, or at least don’t have the desire to see the process extend over months or possibly years.  So motivation does have a direct impact of the value in the context of selling.

The next thing we have to consider are the pending sales.  These are the properties in escrow.  These are the sales that have taken place in the past 45 – 60 days.  They are important for the obvious reason that they are the most recent sales.  The problem here is that we don’t know how much they were negotiated for, rather only the asking price.  The number of days on the market will help us to guesstimate the sales price.  If a home is in escrow and sold in 5 days, we can assume fairly safely that the agreed price was at or possibly even above ask.  If that home on the other hand sat on the market for 120 days or longer and has already had several price reductions, it is fair to assume it did not go out at asking.

Next I will consider the competition.  How many homes might be an alternative to the one I am selling?  This is significant because the more choices a buyer has, the more compelling my pricing has to be.  Remember in the context of selling, competition (or absence thereof) will influence our pricing approach.

Once we have analyzed closed and pending sales and evaluated our competition, it’s time at look at absorption rate.  Absorption rate is found by taking the average time on market divided into the number of homes available; ie: 12 homes sold in 3 months, 12/3 = 4 are selling per month.  In other words, how quickly the homes for sale are being absorbed by the buyers gives us vital insight into how we will price ours.  For example if the avg. number of homes selling per month is 2 and there are 18 homes available, there are 9 months’ worth of inventory (18/2 = 9).  If like the earlier example the avg. per month is 4 then with 18 homes on the market the absorption rate is 4.5 (18/4 = 4.5).  It will take 4.5 months to sell all the homes on the market.  If our goal is to be sold in less than 60 days and the average is 135 days, we need to be priced lower or offer more than our competition.  By the way, the National Association of Realtors deems a balanced market, one not favoring buyers nor sellers, to be 6 months’ worth of inventory.  In our area I believe that magic number closer to 3 months.  California must always me in a state of perpetual shortage or else the value of Malibu wouldn’t be any higher than that of Dallas.  Notice that nowhere do I consider the “I need to get this much out of my home to sell,” in this discussion.  The “Need” discussion rarely has any relationship to the market value of a home, nor what it will eventually sell for.  That’s not to say it’s not an important consideration, it is, but it is not connected to my opinion of value.

By now I imagine by you’re about ready to stop reading and hire a Realtor, which is exactly what you should do.  As a Realtor I do all this analysis for you and more. Because it’s not just comps and absorption rate that determines how to price a home for sale, but also understanding the overall market, buyer demands and amenity/condition evaluation.  Putting all these elements into a blender is basically how you figure out a sensible, approximate price, but putting that approximate pricing estimate together with a marketing strategy is exactly why you hire a professional.

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Steve Ballmer, The LA Clippers And The Conejo Valley Housing Market

Posted on May 30, 2014 by Tim Freund

Twice a day the father of two middle schoolers, checks his favorite MLS site to see if anything new has come on the market.  He’s looking for the perfect place to call their next home.  It has to be on a good lot, preferably with a view and a great location.  It needs the right number of bathrooms and bedrooms and the kitchen has to be really upgraded since his wife loves to cook.  A pool would be nice but it has to have a three car garage and of course it has to be in the right school district.  They’re a busy family so remodeling is out of the question.  In fact, their current home was an older home when they bought it 15 years ago and they did all the work to fix it up, but that was life BC (Before Children) and they certainly aren’t going to do that again at this point in their lives.  This is pretty much the description of the move up buyer in our Idyllic community of the Conejo Valley.

Across town another couple, slightly younger, is searching for their first home.  They’re in their late 30’s, both working professionals and they have two small children approaching elementary age.  Since they aren’t selling a home with equity to roll into a new place, all the money has come through hard work, saving, a few stock options from his company and a couple of lucky investments.  They’ve saved 20% for a down payment and have finally paid off their student loans.  As professionals they work long hours, come home to spend a little family time and put the kids to bed.  Lucky for them, her mom is able to help with the kids.  They need a house large enough to accommodate everyone but they have no extra money to remodel after the 20% down nor do they have the time or acumen to do it themselves.  This is our typical first time buyer.  The traditional late 20’s/early 30’s first time buyer couple doesn’t buy in the Conejo Valley anymore.  It’s too expensive and their first job out of college simply doesn’t pay enough for them to qualify under the tight lending standards today, plus they have some pretty big student loans they need to pay off first.

Meanwhile, the homes in the Conejo Valley aren’t getting any younger.  In fact, there hasn’t been a sizable new home subdivision in more than a decade and there won’t be any either, the community is built out.  There’s simply no land left to build new homes.  Over the past several years, buyers looking for a new home had to settle for something totally remodeled or something “newish.”  The need for the desired “turnkey” home has been largely satisfied with an abundance of investor “flips.”  These were homes purchased at steep discounts at the foreclosure auction during the down turn of the economy.  These investors would take a blighted property, fix it up, putting in all the newest niceties and turn a handsome profit.  There were no shortage of flips from 2009-2013 but those days are over what with distressed properties (foreclosures and short sales) declining as percentage of the market every month.  So given this reality, what are our first time and move up buyers to do?  Simple, they fight with others just like them, over the scant number of updated, upgraded homes.  So while inventory is rising and sales are declining, buyers complain that there isn’t anything on the market and if it’s nice, they end up in a bidding war with someone equally qualified as they.  And this brings me to the Los Angeles Clippers potential sale to Microsoft Billionaire Steve Ballmer.

Prior to putting the club up for sale, Forbes had valued the LA team somewhere well under a $1 billion.  After all, the lowly Milwaukee Bucks just sold for the highest price ever for an NBA team at $558 million and in the Clippers, we are talking about a playoff team located in the 2nd largest media market in the country.  Not only have the Clippers been a playoff team for 3 years in a row, they have the core of their roster signed for the next 4-5 years and have a fantastic coach.  They play in a great arena, have a new state of the art practice facility and oh by the way, the new television contract is coming up for negotiation in 2015 and that is going to be a windfall for ownership with the NBA being the fastest rising sport in America.  So what has this all to do with our two couples and their struggle to find a home?

Imagine that after many months of home hunting, the dream house comes on the market for our move up couple with middle school aged kids.  It’s got most everything they are looking for; the schools, the square footage; the Viking kitchen; the cul de sac, pool, yard and oh yeah, an amazing view.  Along with their evidence of down payment and prequalification letter, our family of four write a full price offer even though the home is priced significantly higher than the comparable sales in the area suggest it is worth.  Since our couple have been looking and looking, they are not going to miss out on this place, it’s nearly perfect!  Then the unimaginable happens: 4 more offers come in, with some even over asking price.  What??  How can this be?  The ensuing bidding war is crushing for four of the five bidders since only one will win.  And that winning price?  Significantly over ask and eons from the last neighborhood sale.

You see like the LA Clippers, this home had location, desirable amenities and was up for sale in a market where there isn’t another comparable property available and it is unknown when the next might come on the market.  To this end, the home went to the person most willing to step up and pay way over what common thinking would suggest it is worth.  And like Steve Ballmer, the couple that won the bid, knew they were probably over paying for the home, but they didn’t care because value is in the eye of the beholder and they recognized that another opportunity like this was unlikely to come along any time soon.  They wanted it, had the where with all to pull it off and darn it, they weren’t going to miss this chance over a little bit of money.

Now what do you suppose the owners of a losing team like the Orlando Magic or even a big market club like the Philadelphia 76er’s are thinking?  They are figuring that if the Clippers are worth $2B, even though their arena isn’t as nice as the Staples Center and even though their roster isn’t stacked with young allstars under contract, rather it’s filled with maybe-one-day rookies and a bunch of bloated contracts of hasbeen players and even though they aren’t in LA, they are thinking their ball club is worth similar money.  Not as much of course, but maybe 10% less, say $1.8B.  And if one of those clubs comes were to come on the market, what do you think would happen?   How about nothing?  In fact maybe they don’t even get an offer since they are so overpriced no billionaire Wall Street hedge fund manager is going to touch them and the club just sits on the market for sale.  This is exactly what is happening in our housing market.  Homes that are not fixed up are coming on the market in droves so our inventory is swelling, but they are not what the buyers want nor are they priced to reflect the improvements required and thus they are not selling.  “I’m not going to give my home away,” they say.  Or “Look at the home up the street.  It sold for ’X’ and my home just isn’t as updated so it should be worth ‘X’ minus the upgrades.”  Of course they completely under value the upgrades and under estimate the cost to put them in having never done them themselves.  Coupled with the fact that no buyer is going to pay a price for a home that after the home has been upgraded by them, is only worth acquisition cost plus upgrade cost.  No.  They are going to want to pay below that because why would they do all the work and not have some sweat equity upside?  They won’t and rather will just wait for the upgraded one to come on and buy that instead.  So what is going to happen?  Sellers of non-updated homes will have to lower their price until it gets to a point where a buyer has enough upside potential to purchase and fix it themselves.  Until then, our inventory is going to continue to grow and prices of remodeled homes, continue to rise.

So did Steve Ballmer over pay for the Clippers at $2B, I think he would say no.  Did our move up couple over pay for the dream home?  They too would say no, because market value is after all defined as “What a willing buyer and a willing seller agree to without the presence of duress.”

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The Latest From Case-Shiller And Thoughts On The Economy

Posted on May 28, 2014 by Tim Freund

The latest Case-Shiller Home Indices came out yesterday and there were few surprises.  Price appreciation declined in almost every market, a fact that suggests that home values are stabilizing.  This should come as no surprise since for most markets the first half of 2013 was when the greatest appreciation occurred.  This has been especially true in Southern California.  It is a natural occurrence that as we get closer to the tail end of the previous cycle’s boom, that the year over year comparison of home values should draw closer.  Assuming prices have been relatively flat since July of 2013, we should find that the year over year appreciation number would become zero or close to it anyway.  If for example we’ve gone up 2% since last July, we should be 2% higher when we compare this July to last.  It’s totally logical.  If prices were to continue to show a spread in the coming months, this would indicate that appreciation may not have stopped in July, rather that it continues to rise only at a slower pace.  At some point either the % of change will be zero or may even go into the negative, that is unless we continue to appreciate some measurable amount each month over the last indefinitely.  I suspect it should near zero as we get into the fall.  Of course even within Case-Shiller there are 20 markets that the numbers are based on and some markets may continue to appreciate.  Every market is local and appreciates or declines at its own pace.

In reading the report, a couple things stood out to me.  First was that San Francisco is about the hottest market in the country.  Not a surprise given that the Bay Area is home to the nation’s largest economic engines of tech and biotech.  The other interesting cities were Denver and Dallas.  If we are to believe the media reports, Texas’ economy is growing exponentially as more and more companies are lured there because of a belief that it is a better climate for business and offers a lower cost of living.  It will be interesting to watch the effect on Dallas of its appreciating housing market.  Denver is interesting because the only economic windfall I am aware of there, is their legalization of marijuana. It begs the question, is dope fueling the housing industry in Denver?

Another interesting point to come out was the dearth of single family home building.  Virtually all the construction gains were said to be in multifamily apartments.  And while this is clearly needed, it is not the engine for economic growth that single family home construction is.  What we know is this: home builder stocks prices have been on a torrid pace since the housing began its rebound.  We also know that in areas like California, there is a shortage of land and nationwide a shortage of build-ready lots.  There is also a shortage of skilled labor to build single family homes since so many workers had to learn new skills for new careers when home building came to a standstill during the Great Recession.  In addition there’s the pent up demand factor.  With new homes in short supply after years of anemic home building volume and with the decline in investor flips due to the decline in distressed property availability, newer or updated properties are selling at a premium.  This premium should push home builders to build.  But if there’s no ready land and not enough workers, that’s just not going to happen.  Fed Chairwoman Yellen recently expressed concern over the slowing of the housing market.  Talk about a tiger chasing its tail.

Housing is slowing because prices and interest rates have risen while incomes have not.  With housing slowing, builders are being more cautious and measured in the number of units they are building.  New home availability is a catalyst to move and a monster job creator.  The absence of new homes leaves would be buyers only access to older used homes to move to.  Thus many would be buyers remian on the sidelines since there is a shortage of newer and improved or updated properties available.  This in turn leads to a continued slowing in housing, which then logically leads home builders to use greater restraint when building, creating fewer jobs, repressing income growth which leads to… a slower housing market and a floundering economy.  Thus it would appear that our current economic lethargy may continue and this could lead to pressure on home values.  What could change this course?  More jobs, better jobs, maybe changes in tax policy or maybe a slight give back of some of the housing value gains we experienced last year.  Maybe a little decline will be just enough to get buyers off the fence and back to buying, providing a spur for the next wave of home price appreciation.  Alas, only time will tell.

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When Is It Time To Replace Your Realtor?

Posted on May 12, 2014 by Tim Freund

You’ve been on the market for many months and your home hasn’t sold.  Maybe you got some traffic in the beginning but what was a trickle, has now turned into a tortuous drip.  You’re getting pretty anxious because you really want to sell and it’s supposed to be a good market.  So why isn’t your home selling and is it time to replace your hired help?  This is a particularly difficult question for any home seller who hasn’t been able to get their home sold.  The closer you get to the listing expiration, the more you start thinking, “Is the problem with my agent?  Would I be better off with another company?”  “I really like them but…”

Before we directly answer this question of replace or not replace, there are some things we need to examine first.  Let’s start with communication.  The number one complaint from sellers about their Realtor is their failure to communicate.  So ask yourself, “Does my agent reach out to me or do I have to call them?”  If the answer is the latter, you need to address this and it’s best addressed early on.  If you aren’t articulating this frustration, you need to.  If after doing so they still are falling short of your expectation, then yes, you probably want to start anew when the listing expires.  Mind you, being a Realtor I don’t say this lightly but from the beginning you need to lay out certain understandings and one of those is communication.  Establishing clear expectations is the first step to a successful relationship with your agent.  If you said to your agent, “Text me for showings” and they didn’t that’s a reason to be disappointed and if the problem were to go unchecked or unattended, that disappointment will lead to anger and frustration.  This is no way to maintain a quality working relationship.  That’s not to say that if they are communicating but you are micromanaging, that maybe you may need to look in the mirror and ask yourself, “Am I being constructive or do I have a need to control the situation?”  I have had situations where a certain seller is on top of my every move and that makes me less effective and the more tedious every conversation, the less I want to call or communicate.  This is just human nature and if love is a two way street, so is business.  However, in the end, if you are a micromanager, be honest with yourself and honest with your agent and if after you’ve done so, you still aren’t satisfied, you’ve every reason at that point to work towards terminating the relationship.  One thing to bear in mind here is that a listing agreement is a binding contract and you can’t unilaterally end it until the listing expires. If you are really unhappy and the agent is not responding or addressing your concerns, you should escalate and speak with the broker or office manager.  They have the ability to be an intermediary and even help assign another agent from the office whose personality more aligns with yours if the situation truly is untenable.

The next thing you want to ascertain is the trust level you have with that agent.  Ethics and trust are absolutely essential to having an effective agent/seller relationship.  If you doubt the agent’s ethics or not sure you trust them, you are never going to be fully satisfied or happy with the outcome of the transaction. You will always have a gnawing doubt that your interests were not being fully considered.  Remembering that selling a home is a stressful process, the last thing you want to wonder is, “Is my agent really looking out for me or are they just thinking about their commission?”   Conversely, if you have a rapport with your agent based on mutual trust, respect and communication, the process though stressful, can be rewarding.  You must have trust in your agent.

At some point you’ll want to examine is your agent’s job performance.  Every employer does this and so should you.  This review should be a sit down, straight forward talk between you and your agent, though it seldom is.  Rather what tends to happen is that time passes and the listing expiration sneaks up on you.  This however circles us back to communication issue and is your agent keeping you informed and giving you assessments of your progress?  Part of an agent’s job is to eliminate surprises. 

“My agent didn’t bring me a buyer.”  This is a pretty common complaint when your home doesn’t sell.  While it is possible that an agent has any number of potential buyers for your home, more times than not they don’t have “the one” and the job of getting your home sold is really about getting your home exposed to as many potential buyers and agents as possible.  “Some agents have a bigger network and are better connected, right?”  True.  But that doesn’t mean they have your buyer now and have been patiently waiting for your listing to expire to show your home.  If they had a buyer, they would have shown them your home already.  In real estate one of the oldest tricks in the books is for an agent to tell a seller that they “have a buyer for your home,” get the listing and then mysteriously, that buyer never materializes.  Or worse, some unethical agents have been known to bring in an offer from a shill buyer and in some cases even open escrow only to have the buyer cancel.  I heard of this in our area only recently where an unscrupulous agent actually brought an offer on a home with her brother in law (of different last name) as buyer, opened escrow and then on the day the buyer’s contingencies were to be lifted, cancelled, just to get the listing!  By then it’s too late to change and difficult to prove any wrong doing.  Does it help to be with a larger office?  Not really.  All homes go on the same multiple listing service (MLS) so once listed, your home is exposed to everyone.  In the beginning if you were hoping to sell without ever actually having to go on the market, then a larger office might offer an advantage as a “Pocket Listing.”  But this typically sells you short on sales price since you are not getting exposed to every possible buyer, only those from that office.  A bigger office may have more agents, but the MLS has all the agents.  Most transactions involve two agents, two agencies.

We started this discussion with the framework that the listing was coming to an end and you are considering making a change in representation since your home hasn’t sold.  Let’s assume you’re satisfied with your agent’s communication and that you trust them.  Since they didn’t have the right buyer for your home and it’s been sitting on the market unsold, it’s time to ask if they are marketing your home effectively and doing the things they said they would when they took the listing.  If your agent told you they would have professional quality photographs but took the pictures themselves with their iPhone, you have a legitimate gripe.  If they told you they would hold an open house every weekend and they aren’t, that’s not right.  If they said you’d be a featured home on Trulia, Realtor.com or Zillow and you look and you are not, they haven’t lived up to their promise.  Some agents will actually put their commitments in writing.  I include a partial list of my marketing plan in my listing presentation book and some agents will even make it part of the listing agreement itself.  However, if the agent is doing everything they said and you’re still not getting traffic, changing agents is not likely to have an impact.  Why?

A correctly marketed home should have quality photographs, maybe video or virtual tours, be on all the websites and in some print media etc.  And so long as you’re paying a full commission and your agent isn’t a complete unknown/out of area agent or has a really bad reputation, one which gets them and your listing boycotted by other agents (yes this happens,) then the problem isn’t with the marketing and changing agents won’t help.  OK, what is the problem then?  When a home is in good show ready shape and has been marketed properly but still doesn’t sell, ultimately the problem is pricing.

This argument seldom sits well with the home seller, but let’s face it, in the end the reason any home doesn’t sell is price.  Price for the condition, price for location, price for size, room count, amenities, lot size, priced for the current market.  It’s always price.  What distinguishes one agent from another is their market knowledge in setting the price, their ethics and the expertise to help you achieve the highest possible price by properly preparing your home for sale.  An agent must effectively present the home to the public.  (Effectively is the key phrase and that speaks to all the marketing we’ve already discussed.)  Changing an agent will not make your home more saleable though it might make you feel like you are doing something.  Since many sellers feel helpless when their home doesn’t sell, changing agents seems like their only recourse.  I compare this to a ball club firing the manager: even if they have a winning record and faced a lot of injuries, if they didn’t win the championship, sometimes the coach still gets fired.  The owner just has to shake things up.

So before you look to fire your agent, ask yourself, “Do I like my agent and do I feel they have done a good job even though we’ve not sold” and most importantly, “Do I trust them?”  If the answer is yes, then you should probably relist with them when the listing expires.  If you aren’t satisfied with something other than the fact there’s little traffic or you haven’t gotten a satisfactory offer, then you should consider making the change.  Sometimes new blood can inject new life into a property.   More times than not however, it’s not the new blood that brings the offer, rather the price reduction that the new agent gets from you, that creates the interest, that sells the house.

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For Sale By Owner

Posted on May 4, 2014 by Tim Freund

Every once in a while when I am on a listing presentation, I get asked to explain why a seller shouldn’t just sell their home on their own?  Put another way, why they should have me do it?  I love this question.  That might seem a little counter intuitive; I mean, who wants to have to defend ones livelihood?  Many agents stumble here because they may not have thought it through enough to actually be able to verbalize the many benefits of hiring a Realtor to represent them.  But I like this question because it opens the door to a conversation I want to have and lets me explain what it is that I do and why I’m worth top dollar.

The first and most obvious point I start out with is the marketing aspect of my job.  I’ll explain that my expertise on market conditions, market value and home preparation are going to help them price the home in a manner to get it sold for the highest price and in the shortest amount of time.  I’ll tell the seller how they’ll get a higher price by being on the multiple listing service (MLS) and exposing their home to the entire Realtor community and that this also feeds their listing into the online real estate sites like Trulia and Zillow and Realtor.com.  How it also goes into all the brokerages online sites as well like Redfin and Yahoo Homes amongst many others.  When asked about the For Sale By Owner or discount brokerage sites that will put a listing on the MLS for a flat fee, I must acknowledge that this is a vehicle for selling your home on your own, but I remind them that they’re still paying a commission by doing this.  I usually get the blank stare or maybe a “Huh?” to this reality.  “Of course you’ll pay a commission” I’ll say.  I’ll explain that to go on the MLS, you have to offer compensation to the cooperating broker.  It’s usually about here that the conversation will roll over to commission.

When a broker lists a home for sale for a 5% or 6% commission, the listing broker only receives their portion, typically half, at closing.  So on a 6% commission agreement, the listing office keeps 3% and pays 3% to the agent bringing the buyer.  Therefore if a seller goes it alone or with the help of one of these discount services, they still have to pay the half of the commission that goes to the agent representing the buyer.  “Well what if I only offer 1%?  That’s $8,000 on my $800,000 home.  That’s a lot of money.”  I am happy to explain that while it is true that $8,000 is a lot of money, a qualified buyer is worth far more than that.  So when an agent is representing a qualified buyer, they are not going to accept less than they feel that buyer is worth and on an $800,000 home, that buyer is worth a lot.  “You mean an agent won’t show my home to their client for less than 2.5% or 3%?”  This is a great question and the answer may surprise you.

Most agents are aware of the compensation being offered even if they say they don’t pay attention to commission, it’s only human nature.  If it’s a 2.5% commission, they will gladly show a home and usually speak well of the home if they believe it offers the amenities and value their client is looking for.  But if we are offering a compensation of 3%, I argue we might actually get them to work a little harder for us.  If you aren’t paying them a full commission, even if they are willing to show it to their buyer, how hard do you think they will work to point out the positives of your home?  Not very.  So paying the buyer’s agent’s commission is truly imperative.  That then leaves us with other half of the commission equation: the concept of paying for someone to represent you and help you sell your home.

This usually brings me back to the marketing side of my job and I’ll remind them that I am not paid if I am not successful in bringing them a satisfactory offer.  Moreover that I will expend considerable money in the process of marketing their home, which I only get back via my commission at closing.  They don’t pay for any of that.  I go into all the other forms of marketing the home that I offer.  This starts with professional quality photographs.  I’ll typically ask if they have been online looking at homes, which of course they have and then if they judge a home at all by the photos they are looking at?  At this point the light starts to go on because they realize that to be successful they are going to need some great pictures online.  I then bring up things like a property specific website; enhanced presence on those online sites like Featured homes etc.; there’s my personal website and my company’s website; there’s other forms of online advertising and agent to agent communiques.  We’ll talk about print media and how I’m not a huge proponent of that as a marketing vehicle anymore, but that it is sometimes helpful when promoting open houses.  Oh yeah, open houses…

A seller’s interest in open houses can really vary from seller to seller.  Some want them as often as possible while others don’t at all.  I usually explain that at minimum, we want one at the beginning since we never know where our buyer is going to come from and neighbors are often our best advertiser.  Plus there’s all those “Free Agents” out there that want to see the inside of homes, but aren’t yet affiliated with a broker and we want to expose our home to them as well.  Besides, how else are people going to see your home?  At this point I remind them that if they are without representation, they would be holding their own open houses and showings and letting total strangers into their home.  Moreover that they would have to restrict Realtor showings to the times that they’re at home.  So that would mean only weekends and evening after work.  Yikes!  What if a Realtor wants to show during the work week?  By restricting access, we make it that much harder to sell.  Having strangers in your home is kind of creepy; suppose they are just scoping out your artwork and things like jewelry?  Are you going to send your family out every time you show or is the whole gang going to hang about while a potential buyer is looking at your home?  How can they possibly focus on your home’s features with you following their every move?  It’s at about this point that the would be seller starts squirming in their seat because let’s face it, selling your home may sound easy enough until you start looking at the reality of what is entailed.

“So now Mr. and Mrs. Seller, let’s say that offer comes in and you start to read the contract… the contract that’s 24 pages long… and the agent for the buyer is asking for your disclosures…”  Disclosures?  As a seller you have a responsibility to tell the buyer about your home.  “Everything?  You mean like the time the toilet over flowed and I had to fix the ceiling?”  Yes.  “What about the cat that always peed in the corner?”  Yup.  “Do I have to tell them about dad’s passing in the front bedroom?”  As you can see, a seller who goes it alone is going to have a lot to answer for.  Are you going to counter that offer?  Perhaps about now you start thinking that maybe you’ll just offer the buyer’s agent a percent to handle everything?  So now you are paying a buyer’s agent commission and a portion of a seller’s agent commission but you’re the one who had to determine how much the home is worth; what if you under sell?  Or worse and you over price and it doesn’t sell at all – which is usually the case with for sale by owner?  You also have to market the home yourself.  You don’t have anyone to advise you on the negotiation; you’ve still got the buyer’s inspection looming, termite, repairs, escrow, title, hazards disclosures, appraisal, the buyer’s loan approval to consider and monitor… what if the buyer tries to renegotiate or refuses to close?  Yeah, there’s a lot that can happen and a lot that can go wrong in a real estate transaction.

Can you sell a home on your own?  Of course you can.  But here’s a little tidbit fact: When I list a million dollar plus home, I am almost never faced with defending my importance; that conversation is typically in the lower to mid-priced home range.  The reason is pretty obvious:  the more savvy the seller, the more they recognize the value in having professional representation.  Now not all Realtors are created equal, so you need to do your due diligence when you choose your representative.  In the end I firmly believe that you get what you pay for and there’s a reason phrases like “Penny wise, pound foolish” exist.  So if you’re thinking of selling or know someone who is, give me or someone like me a call; it will save you money not cost you money; your family will be thankful for it and so will you.

Posted in Disclosures, Dual Agency, For Sale By Owner, Real Estate | Tagged , , , , , | 5 Comments

Donald Sterling And The Face Of America

Posted on April 27, 2014 by Tim Freund

The explosive remarks attributed to Donald Sterling Saturday serve to remind us that discrimination and the racist caricature that has plagued our nation, still exists.  It’s important that we acknowledge this and recognize that just because it’s below the surface, doesn’t mean it’s gone away.  Out of sight does not mean out of mind.

As a LA Clipper season ticket holder for 14 years, I can’t tell you how disappointed I was upon hearing the diatribe from Mr. Sterling.  I felt for sadness the players and sadness for me as a fan and I wondered, “Should I not got the game on Tuesday night?”  I’ve concluded that I will go to support the players and because I want my team to win and I want to see it.  I tweeted to several players that they are like Jessie Owens in the 1936 Olympics: they are the face of America and need to go out there and win.

I’ve been watching a lot of NBA playoffs lately because my team, the Clippers, are in the playoffs.  That also means that I have to watch a lot of commercials.  The commercials I am seeing point to the fact that as a nation we are growing more tolerant, more diversified and more aware of this diversity than ever before.  If one thing is true in our country, it’s that the mighty dollar trumps all.  If businesses see a monetary benefit in racial tolerance, they will embrace it.  Remember Montgomery Bus Boycott of 1955?  The source of change can come from many places.  Take for example the current Honda commercials.  One shows an African American sales person walk into a showroom and up pops a cardboard character (think a police gauntlet shooting range.)  The family that pops up is Asian.  In fact the first character is not only Asian, but female.  In another commercial, the salesperson is Latino and the customers are of varying races and sexes.  Then there’s the Old Spice commercial that comically has an Asian woman saying “Old Spice look what you’ve done, you’ve made a sexy man right out of my son…” and it cuts to the Asian son with an Anglo woman.  Or how about the Carmax commercial that focuses on an African American man with a bow tie, who is noticeably effeminate and I have to assume gay?  Or the BMW commercial that shows an Anglo man nervously speaking to the father of his Asian girlfriend with her family looking on.  The father nervously thinks the young man is going to ask for his daughter’s hand but instead the boy says, “We bought a diesel!”   My point is that we are embracing our diversity like never before and yet views like those of Donald Sterling, still persist albeit under the radar.  In real estate, we have laws designed to protect people from racial discrimination, but laws are enforced by people and it’s people’s attitudes that have to continue to change.  I recently had a landlord say they didn’t want to rent to a family with children and I had to set them straight; that this was discriminatory and illegal. As offensive as Mr. Sterling’s comments are, they will serve a valuable purpose by reminding us that while we as a nation come a long way towards racial acceptance, we’re not there yet.  And how do we best respond?  With our pocket book.  We don’t buy Clippers tickets next year if ownership doesn’t change, just as we boycott restaurants that won’t serve gays.  It is incumbent upon all of us to stand up to discrimination, be it of race, color, age, religion, national origin or sexual orientation.  This is the law as it pertains to real estate; it is the law of our land and it is the law that we should all strive to keep in our hearts.

Posted in Demographics, Real Estate | Tagged , | 1 Comment

A Big Day For Conejo Valley Buyers And Sellers  

Posted on April 11, 2014 by Tim Freund

OK, so maybe a Big Day for the Conejo is a bit of an exaggeration.  Still, it’s worth noting that today our total number of units stands at 497.  The reason this is significant, is that with 3 more available units, we’ll mark the first time in two years that we are at 500 total properties available for sale, leaving little doubt that we are no longer in a seller’s market.  Taken with the monthly sales numbers we have now, we are creeping above 3 months inventory.  In other words if no new homes came on the market it would take us just over 3 months to sell out.  The National Association of Realtors states that a balanced market is 6 months of inventory.  I maintain that California has to be in a state of perpetual shortage or else why would a home in Malibu sell for any more than one in Kansas?  Obviously there has to be a shortage of Malibu homes for sellers to command such a high price like Malibu enjoys.  For me that magic number is 3 months inventory, and that’s what we have.  So by my rule, we are now in a balanced market; one that neither favors buyers nor sellers.  This of course is a good thing… usually.  Let me explain.

Everyone agrees that it was in no one’s best interest for us to have a repeat of last year’s chaos in housing.  A 20%+ jump in prices in 6 months is crazy.  Repeat that and we’re no longer crazy but in a bubble and when bubbles burst, they leave a big mess for everyone to clean up.

You would think therefore, that everyone should be happy with the current market.  Not so.  There is evidence that certain neighborhoods are experiencing record breaking prices; prices that exceed the last bubble in 2006-7.  I recently saw a home sell for a price similar to an offer I wrote for the same model two doors up in 2006.  However, I am also seeing homes sit on the market getting very little traffic.  Why is that?  It’s difficult to say for sure, but newer homes seem to be selling best, that and ones that have been completely redone.  Flipped homes are moving well and at high prices, so too the remodeled beauty or the rare entry level home.  Conversely, homes that require some work are just sitting and sitting.  I believe this is due in part to the fact that buyers today don’t want to do any work.  They want finished and upgraded.  I suspect this has as much to do with our crazy lives as it does to the fact prices rose a lot last year and don’t forget that remodeling takes cash and can’t easily be wrapped into the loan.  When prices rise like they did, it puts homes out of reach of many would-be buyers.  A buyer I’m working with for example told me he missed the jump in values and super low interest rates so the motivation to buy, just isn’t there.  If the dream home were to come up, he’d write, but he suspects that a home with that criteria would be beyond his top end price point; the market has moved that much.

OK, so buyers aren’t motivated and aren’t happy with the selection at current asking prices.  Even with more inventory coming on, they just aren’t bending over backwards to buy anymore.  The sellers aren’t happy either though which is interesting.  I am seeing higher and higher asking prices and that in part is why homes are sitting.  The higher asking reflects the changed market and the entrance of new sellers into the market.  They come loaded with an inflated value of what their home is worth.  The fact that home prices went up 20% last year is great, but they want even more this year.  This is the mentality.  The thinking seems to be, “Why should I sell if I can’t get my price, I’ve waited this long?”  There’s an old adage in negotiations that states a good transaction is either a win-win or a lose-lose.  A bad one is when you have a win-lose or lose-win.  I would characterize the current state of home market as a standoff between buyer and seller.  Sort of like a lose-lose in negotiating, keeping in mind that a lose-lose is still a good deal for all parties since neither is taking advantage of the other.  Maybe that’s why neither side is really happy with the current state of the market, neither is winning.  Go figure.  One thing is for sure, the market never stays static for long so expect something to change; one side or the other is eventually going to prevail.

So here we are; we’re in the spring selling season; inventory is rising as it should yet the market feels a little muddled.  Are prices going to drop?  Maybe, they certainly aren’t rising in most neighborhoods, so maybe they will give a little of the big 2013 run up back.  On Wall Street they call this a correction and a correction is always viewed as both healthy and a good opportunity if you are a buyer.  Will they crash?  Doubtful but we could see a little correction this summer and if you’re a seller, take note and make the adjustment now before everyone else does.  If you’re a buyer, now’s not the time to relax.  Have your check book ready because that home you wanted might be just around the corner and at a slightly better price than you may have thought.

Posted in Economics, Real Estate, Remodeling | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Home Inspection: What To Expect

Posted on March 2, 2014 by Tim Freund

Most people I meet don’t know that in California, every home is sold as is.  It’s sort of a presumption that the seller will make repairs but this is not always the case.  Why should a seller make any repairs then, if they are not required to?  The obvious answer is that they want to sell the home and given the choice of some small fixes or having their buyer walk, sellers in general opt to make some repairs.  Another common misconception is that the inspection is always paid by the buyer.  While almost always true in Southern California, in the San Francisco Bay Area, it is actually the other way around.  In San Francisco for example, the seller will pay for the inspection, make any repairs they want and then include the inspection report and repairs made with the original listing information.  From there a buyer will probably not do a full inspection and unless there is something incredibly wrong with the property, write their offer as is.  It’s actually a fairer way to sell and buy when you consider the requirements of full seller disclosure and the oft misguided use of the Request For Repairs as a means for a buyer to renegotiate the original offer (by asking for some huge cash credit to close).

When I have a buyer write an offer, we discuss the issue of inspection and disclosure.  I explain that the seller is required to disclose anything that can materially affect the value or desirability of the property.  I recently sold a home that the seller repaired a ceiling leak a week before we went on the market.  A pipe all of a sudden started to drip, a stain was formed and the seller repaired it.  In doing so they painted the spot on the ceiling.  Thus the repair was invisible.  Why they asked, should they tell the buyer about it then?  I explained that any buyer that would back out because of this disclosure, is the very buyer we want to tell, for if we didn’t and they found out later, we’d all get sued.  So tell them and let them back out if that’s what they want to do.  Disclosure is the best way to stay out of trouble.

Every home, even a brand new one, should have a home inspection.  I tell my buyers that the inspection is our “first line of defense.”  If for example, on the inspection the inspector points out staining in the attic, this would trigger a roof inspection.  A roof inspection costs about $350.  If there is no evidence of leaking and either the home is less than 20 years old or the roof is, why spend the money?  If the inspector doesn’t find evidence of water intrusion, why do a mold inspection?  On the contrary if the find a sink appears to have been leaking for a long time, now a mold inspection may not be a bad idea.  If there’s no major cracking or all the doors close just fine, why pay $500 for a structural engineer?  You see, the inspector is going to go through home with a fine toothed comb.  In doing so they will find things and depending on what they find, will determine whether there’s a need for subsequent investigation and inspection.  That said, if a client has a child with asthma or some other specific health concern, things like mold inspections may be a good idea if for nothing else, piece of mind.

How does one choose an inspector anyway?  Naturally I have my list of preferred vendors and more often than not my clients defer to my judgment.  Is there risk in this for me as the referer?  You bet.  However I believe that the risk is lowered by my knowing a host of good inspectors from which my clients rely, as opposed to the Yellow Pages, Yelp or “my friend is a contractor and he’ll check it out for me.”  A good thorough inspection should take about 3 hours on an average 4 bedroom 2000 square foot home and cost between $400-500.   If the home is a raised foundation it will be more.  If it significantly larger or has a pool it can go $600 and if it is a giant 7000+ square feet, expect around $1,000.  Interestingly I have seen inspections take as little as 45 minutes.  When this happens and it only happens when I represent the seller because I don’t use that kind of inspector, I tell my seller that this kind of inspection is great when you’re the seller, not so great if you’re the buyer.  Like a doctor or attorney or even a Realtor, you really don’t want to go with the cheapest one out there.  Money spent on an inspection is some of the best money you’ll ever spend.

So what types of things typically show up on an inspection?   Obviously the age of the home has a lot to do with this.  A home built in the 1990’s is going to have different issues than one built in the 1940’s.  Where I sell, most of the homes were built after the 1960’s so by and large they have a lot of the same issues.  If it was a Viet Nam era built home, there is always concern over aluminum wiring.  Copper was in short supply in the late 1960’s early 1970’s and many builders turned to aluminum and a substitute.  Aluminum would be fine if it weren’t for the fact that it heats at a different rate than the electrical panel and this can cause a gap between the wire and the screw causing arcing and this can cause a fire.  Galvanized plumbing is notorious for building up deposits that eventually slow the flow of water.  Clay sewer lines crack; tree roots can be an issue in older homes too causing slow drains and back up.  What about in newer homes?  Typical problems here have to do with builder’s contractors who take short cuts or City inspectors who don’t read manufacturer specs.  For example many attic forced air units (furnaces), are set directly up wooden platforms.  Most manufacturers want a sheet metal barrier put down and metal supporting feet.  Is this something that is commonly asked for?  Yes.  Double lugging, though really common,  is not allowed either.  This is where the electrician put two wires on the same screw in the panel.  An easy fix but one that is important.  Sprinklers spraying the house, that’s a commons one.  Does the seller always fix?  Not so much.  Water heaters, air conditioning, the list of possible corrections is seemingly endless, so where does a seller draw the line and what should a buyer be asking for?

I always advise my clients that “health and safety” is and should be a point of discussion.  If something is a fire hazard, could cause mold or cause someone to get hurt, these are things a seller should be responsible for.  Cosmetic things like bad caulking are Ok to ask for but cracked tiles, chipped stucco or a difficult to operate door handle, again, not so much.  Do buyers sometimes ask for the moon and stars on their request for repair?  Yes they do.  How a seller responds really depends on the market condition at the time; is it a buyer’s or seller’s market?  Also how difficult are the fixes?  Many times the nickel and dime things are one afternoon with a handyman and a few hundred bucks.  Hardly worth fighting over.   Your agent should be there with you and have a working knowledge on the costs estimates or at least have the trades available to refer you to.

So if you’re buying be diligent and practical.  If you are a seller, ask yourself what you would want the seller to fix if you were the buyer.  I tell every buyer and seller that there are two negotiations with each transaction: first is price and terms; (what’s the price, how much down, what’s excluded, when do we close etc.?)  The second is the request for repair.  It’s always the more difficult of the two.  But if you keep your eye on the prize, the prize being a successful close, the repair request is manageable and a smooth transaction that much more likely.

Posted in Disclosures, Inspection, Real Estate | Tagged , , , | 1 Comment

Thoughts On The Latest Case-Shiller and Prices

Posted on February 26, 2014 by Tim Freund

When the real estate market was at its lowest point, prices had to by definition do what?  Either stay flat or rise.  After all we’re talking about the lowest point.  For argument sake, let’s say that low point was in early-mid 2011 and by the following year we’d have some year over year gain.  It could be modest, maybe a percent or two or maybe even mostly flat.  This was what happened in between 2011 to 2012.  Then in 2013 things changed and we saw substantial gains which continued for about 6 months hitting double digits. That is, until the Fed announced that they had thoughts on tapering their bond purchases.  Correspondingly the 10 year bond yield jumped as bond sellers dumped bonds in the single greatest bond selloff in U.S. History.  Within three weeks treasuries and mortgage rates rose 1%.  The brakes had been put home appreciation.  The market that followed could best be described as treading water.  This is not the least bit surprising given the previous 6 month, 20% run up and the shock to the system of a 1% jump in rates.  By fall there was a return to normalcy in the marketplace: Prices and activity sagged in the fall just like they usually do.  The holiday’s typical slowness ensued and naturally with the onset of the spring buying season, we expect a pick up again.  In looking back a year to what was then, already a month into the rapid acceleration in price of 2013, we see that the percent of gain as compared to this year is less.  In other words, by the end of February, prices were already higher than in January.  So February 2013 to February 2014 would be a smaller percentage increase than the aggregate increase of January 2013 to Feb 2014.  Confusing I know, but you have to remember as we compare prices on a 12 month basis, we are comparing to a time when each month was higher than the last; the year over year gain is going to decline with each month.  The only way it could rise at the same pace every month would be if the 20% annual appreciation trend were to continue and/or accelerate month after month, year after year.  We know that’s impossible.

We also know that 2013’s appreciation virtually halted about July.  That means that as we approach July 2014, we will see the percentage of year over year gain is going to get smaller and smaller and that if we were truly flat since July 2013, July 2014 would show appreciation at 0%.  That’s what a year of flat price appreciation would mean.  But that’s not what I think we’ll see.

OK, I know I’ve completely confused you by this point but what all this means is that since we saw big gains last year and this year shows only modest gains, it could be said that we are in a trend of moderation and so year over your gains will become smaller.  Slight gains some months, flat in others for an overall modest 3-5% appreciation.  We should therefore, neither be concerned nor surprised, that Case-Shiller shows a continued decline in year over year appreciation.  If we start to see month over month depreciation, then we can start to wonder about the sustainability and health of the real estate market.  I neither expect that nor worry about that.  I am happy we are entering a period moderation in property appreciation.  I don’t want another bubble.  And because I anticipate inventories will remain tight for many, many years to come, I see continued upward pressure on prices, not the other way around.  Why do I think we will be tight for many, many years?   In large part because we haven’t been building enough homes to accommodate a rising population and an improvement in the employment rate.   To quote John Burns from Real Estate Consulting, a company that examines and forecasts housing trends for Southern California homebuilder The Irvine Company, “Since the US has been adding more than two new jobs for every home built for the last several years and there are less than 1.2 jobs per household, we will clearly need to start building more homes soon.”  What could derail my hypothesis?  Recession.  You might think a sharp rise in interest rates too.  However, a rise in interest rates will almost certainly be in response to wage and inflation pressures which are a condition brought about by an overheating economy.  More income and higher rates of affordability equals higher property values.  After all, inflation does not affect everything except housing.  So short of recession, tight inventory shall remain and the market will remain stable and healthy.

There it is, Case-Shiller is going to continue to show a slowdown but this shouldn’t be cause for concern.  Until housing inventory growth matches family and job creation, pressure shall remain on prices.  And should income grow, as a result of a vastly improved economy… well suffice to say, you’ll want to make sure you already own real estate, because that’s a horse that can run and leave the idle naysayer in the dust.

Posted in Economics, Real Estate, Remodeling, The Real Estate Bottom | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Thoughts On Choosing A Realtor

Posted on February 16, 2014 by Tim Freund

A friend called me up the other day asking me to help her sell her home.  I told her that even though I could technically list it, I really wasn’t the right guy for the job; that someone local would be better.  She then asked me for a referral to a Realtor in her area.  She knows I have been selling homes since 1990 and wanted me to help her make the right choice.  I asked if there was someone she knew specializing in her neighborhood?  Of course there was, she said, but in this case she wasn’t sure she wanted them because it was a father-son team, with the son having taken over the dad’s business and that the dad was mostly retired. Thus I set out to find the best match for her, with little or no knowledge of whom to interview.  This is a position that many would be buyers and sellers find themselves in: who to work with on this most important transaction and how to go about selecting the right representative?

The first thing I began my search with was finding a CRS, a Certified Residential Specialist.  In full disclosure, I am a CRS.  So what is that?  A CRS is a designation for an agent or broker who has sold $25M in real estate over a 5 year period.  Pretty easy for a decent California Realtor, not so much if you are in most of the other states.  A CRS also has to complete 75 transactions within that same 5 year period.  Easier if you sell $75,000 condos in Ohio, not so easy in place like Southern California.  But that’s not all. A CRS also has to take a slew of 2 day CRS classes as well.  So to become a CRS designee, you have to have completed additional educational reuirements, plus achieved a certain dollar and sales volume.  Fact: CRS represent just 4% of all Realtors yet they handle 80% of all transactions.  In other words, a CRS is a pro’s pro.

The second thing I look for is broker vs. agent (and yes, I am a broker too).  Though most Realtors are commonly referred to as a “Broker,” in fact most are only agents.  The difference?  Education, responsibility and liability.  To become a broker in California, an agent must have either a college degree, be an attorney or have been an active practitioner for at least 2 years.  A broker has to take a ton of additional classes and only then, be eligible to sit for the 2 part, 8 hour State Broker’s Exam.  A broker can hang their own shingle and sell whereas an agent must practice under the supervision of a licensed broker.  There’s a joke I like to tell my clients when I meet them for the first time: What’s the difference between a California driver’s license and a California real estate license?  Not everyone in California has a driver’s license.  Sadly this is not entirely untrue, however a broker’s license is down right uncommon and frankly hard to get.

Once I have pared my list to brokers and Certified Residential Specialists, I look at them on the web.  I want to see if they have a site.  I want to see if they are active on Trulia and Zillow; I look them up on Facebook, LinkedIn and Yelp.  I’m looking for someone who is somewhat on top of social media.  This is especially true for sellers because the days of putting a sign in front, placing the listing on the MLS, and getting top dollar are long gone.  Today’s agents need to be savvy, use professional photos, use social media to market properties and even use video through vehicles like YouTube.

Premier Service is another tool to use.  Premier Service is like the JD Powers for the real estate industry where clients review their experience with their agent.  The information is compiled by a neutral third party and then publicized. I have been a Diamond Award winner in the past, the highest possible ranking, but it’s very hard to achieve that distinction every year.  It’s requires great reviews, a minimum volume and a high percentage of client participation.  Many real estate companies don’t want to be responsible for dealing with bad reviews so they don’t participate in this industry leading survey group.  If nothing else, Premier Service is a good tool to weed out certain agents and agencies.

Once you’ve done your research, it’s time to begin the interview process.  Some people are going to want the “heavy hitter;” the agent that is doing 75 or more transactions a year.  While there is nothing wrong with this approach, I tend to prefer the agent who is going to provide more personal service.  I mean let’s face it, if I’m doing 100 transactions a year, you’re dealing with one of my assistants and not so much me as I am out soliciting new business.  Their operation may be completely professional, but I prefer a more boutique approach.  By the same token, I don’t want someone who used to be really busy and now is semi active.  You’ll find this a lot in real estate.  It’s said a Realtor never retires, they just fade away and I don’t want that agent either.  The internet and social media research should help to weed this type of agent out.  I also need to look at their dollar volume productivity.  If I am selling a $700,000 home, I probably do not want someone who is selling $75M a year. The reason is that this type of agent is likely specializing in the high end and wouldn’t be attentive enough to my smaller, lower priced property.  Conversely if I have a $5M estate home, I don’t want the agent who’s not doing big dollar volume because a property like this costs significant money to properly market.

Lastly is the issue of personality.  This is pretty hard for me as a referring broker to assess, but something you are going to want to take into account.  My wife for example will run from anyone who’s a fast talking salesperson.  She wants someone who listens and carefully explains the process and importantly doesn’t talk down to her if she doesn’t understand something.  If you don’t feel a connection with the agent you are interviewing, as hard as it is, you need to thank them and let them know that you don’t think it’s a good fit.  When you hire someone to sell your home, the listing agreement will lock you up for 6 months or longer so you have to feel good about the person you hire.  Can you get out of it?  Maybe, but a contract is a contract so you don’t want to assume you can cancel at will.  When you engage an agent to help find a home, though such a contractual agreement is not that common, it’s still not easy to fire an agent.  In fact it’s downright awkward.  Honesty is always the best policy, so if you start feeling that your agent isn’t doing what it is you want, let them know what you’re expectations are and if you don’t like how they respond, email them and let them know, you’ve decided to go a different direction.

Though this process as I’ve described it is a bit time consuming in the beginning, it will pay off in the long run with better satisfaction and most importantly, success. Thankfully with all the information available for you to do research, hiring the right agent has never been easier if you just take the time.

Posted in Dual Agency, Real Estate | Tagged , , , , , , | 1 Comment