What is SEV and TV? 0:27
How are SEV and TV calculated? 0:53
Why did my SEV go up? 2:30
Why did my taxes go up when I bought my house? 5:10
How do I lower my property taxes? 6:23
Final thoughts. 8:58
The other day while sitting in a closing with one of our agents, the wife of the seller asked when the title company moved in to their newly built building. Her husband, who owns a cement company, replied, “They moved in right after they didn’t use me for the concrete work.” I laughed probably harder than I should have. That response was awesome!
How nice would it be when someone says to me, “When did the Johnson’s put their house on the market?” to reply with, “Right after they didn’t ask me to list it for them.” Or “Did you hear that Mary just bought a house?” and I say, “Yeah, I heard that right after she didn’t use me as her agent.”
I’m not saying that I expect everyone to use me for their real estate needs. I realize that a lot of people know multiple Realtors. So it isn’t that someone chose someone else to work with, it’s more about who they chose to work with. Continue Reading →
My parents have never been into gossip. My dad sold life insurance for 40 years, and as a result, knew a lot of secrets. He knew when people were diagnosed with serious illnesses, when people were divorcing, and when a baby was on the way. When something would happen in our small town, he always knew about it first, but never said a word. When the rumor mill started and the story would change over and over, he kept quiet. He still knows a lot of secrets, and he’ll never tell them. He learned, as have I, that keeping your mouth shut is a very powerful tool in business.
Buying or selling a house is a very emotional experience. During this process, nerves are frayed. Without a doubt, sensitive situations arise. Because we know this, we know the number one way to combat it is to keep our mouth shut and our ears open. Telling too much information will ruin deals. My dad always told me that it wasn’t our business to tell someone else’s business. If I’m working with you, only you and whoever you tell know about it. If you want to tell people you found your dream home, tell all the people you want. They won’t hear it from me. Continue Reading →
A real estate transaction is full of surprises. You never know what will arise. Renegotiating the piddly stuff after an accepted offer is a bad idea.I recently listed a home that is an estate. The home itself is a little rough, but it’s structurally sound, has a nice floor plan, and has beautiful property. We priced it with all this in mind. We had a ton of showings right away, and we received an offer within a couple days of listing it.
After some negotiating, we had a signed, accepted offer. The agreement was a couple thousand under list price, some closing costs were kicked in, and the buyers would pay for all inspections. The buyer, being a contractor, did the home inspection himself. Following the inspection, he decided he wanted to start renegotiating the accepted offer. Continue Reading →
Last weekend, my husband and I hosted a party for his teaching staff at our home. He’s been wanting to do it for five years, and this year I finally relented. But I had a couple requests- new flooring and fresh paint. With two boys and three animals, our nine year old carpet had seen better days, and my walls had been tormented by light saber wars and bouncing balls. It took me three weeks to get the new flooring ordered and installed, the walls painted, new trim installed, and the dust explosion cleaned up.
It was a lot of work! And on top of the inside needing some improvements, the outside needed some attention, too. Landscaping is my hobby, but this summer I’ve been so busy with work that I hadn’t been able to weed as aggressively as usual. Bushes needed trimmed, plants needed pruned, and weeds pulled. I spent two days outside working on just that. For about ten minutes before the party, my house was absolute perfection. It was the best it had ever been, and the best it will ever be again. I looked at my husband and said, “If we ever want to sell this house, now is the time. This is what a house needs to look like to get the highest dollar.”
This weekend, I scheduled showings for three buyers. I showed twelve houses in one day. Guess how many of those houses were show ready? Three. And I’m not talking about houses that are $20,000 and need TLC. I’m talking about lakefront homes and homes on large tracts of land. So what does a show-ready home look like? Here’s a list: Continue Reading →
Back during his residency, my brother-in-law told us some pretty crazy stories of patients coming in with heinous ailments and injuries. And I know all those people didn’t migrate to just him, because we’ve all heard some strange things from other doctors as well. In fact, I just ran across a story on Facebook about the top 20 dumb patients to come to the ER.
One patient wanted to know if he could “catch” diabetes from a one night stand with a diabetic woman. Another was prescribed a medical patch every few days and she came in to complain that she had run out of room to put all the patches (not realizing you take the old one off and put the new one on…). Since my brother-in-law doesn’t tell us those stories anymore, I’m guessing it means that nothing really surprises him anymore, and he just goes about his day. Continue Reading →
“Do we have to go anywhere after school tonight?”
“Are we having pizza again on Friday?”
“Why do we have to take the trash out every Monday?”
“I don’t want to go to piano on Wednesday!”
If you’re a parent, you probably get similar questions from your children. My children would rather go home after school and do nothing but play Minecraft the rest of the night, but they know that certain days mean certain activities: Monday is trash day, Tuesday is soccer practice, Wednesday is piano, etc. They have come to expect this. They aren’t thrilled about it, they will whine about it, but it is expected.
Which brings me to real estate. Real estate is a world full of the unexpected. Our buyers look to us for guidance on the purchasing process, and the advice we give is based on our experience with a common word (and it’s variations) thrown in to each response. That word is: Usually. Continue Reading →
