Sometimes we are contacted by people looking to relocate to the Capital Region. Having lived and worked here our entire adult lives, we can only imagine how daunting it must be to decide if both a job and a location are a good fit for your life. While we can’t help determine if the job is right, we do help people decide if this is somewhere they can imagine themselves living.
I recently attended a seminar, hosted by a local bank, to learn more about renovation loans. I had some familiarity with 203K loans (more on those later) and knew that buyers could roll in the cost of renovations into their mortgage. However, I mistakenly thought these sorts of loans were only for big projects, houses in need of major rehabbing. The long and short of it is that you can get a renovation loan for anything from a kitchen remodel to a whole house rehab to a pool and everything in between.
We have been contacted recently by former clients who live in the Town of Guilderland. This isn’t surprising because Guilderland is going through a town-wide reassessment, which all communities do periodically and they have recently notified all property owners of their tentative new assessment. While it’s theoretically possible for a property’s new assessment to be LOWER than the old one, it’s more typical for it to be HIGHER, which can be cause for alarm. Hence the phone calls and emails from clients. Even if your community is not going through a reassessment right now, this is the time of year when the tax roll is being formalized so we figured it’s timely to review the process.
In last month’s blog post on home issues that cause buyers concern, we mentioned mold and given what a common household problem it is, we thought the topic warranted its own post. Mold is a natural substance that is everywhere. It grows best in warm, damp, and humid environments and reproduces by making spores. Many of us are sensitive to mold and can experience mild allergic reactions (stuffy nose, wheezing, dry or red eyes) or more intense reactions when exposed to it. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) does not recommend routine testing for mold, the logic being if you see it, remove it.
As important as knowing what you want in your next house (see last month’s blog musings) is learning about what should be cause for concern. Every house has limitations - shag carpeting, dated paint colors, older roof, overgrown landscaping are just a few examples; and many of these negatives can be relatively easily remedied. Some may even be desirable to a buyer looking to give an older house some TLC or hoping to score a deal on a fixer upper. If you are up for it, buying a solid house that needs updating is a great opportunity. What we want to discuss are issues that don’t always have easy fixes. We strive to ensure that the buyers we work with are aware of the following before they decide whether to proceed with a purchase:
Whenever we are contacted by someone interested in buying a house, the first thing we do is schedule a time to meet. It’s important to us to not only tell prospective clients about the services we provide, but also to learn about what they are hoping to find.
Buying a house is so much more than buying a structure you will live in. It’s buying a lifestyle, a community, a home. It’s deciding whether you want to live in a walkable community where the houses are close together or in the country where you can’t see your neighbors. It’s figuring out if you are excited about home improvement projects or if you would rather just unpack and start inviting people over. It’s deciding where you will raise your family or spend your retirement years. It’s everything in between.
Last month we talked about the value of open houses and the month before the importance of good real estate photography; two aspects of the McSharry and Associates Marketing Plan. This month, let’s step back and look at the whole package of services we provide to our seller clients.
Hosting an open house is a very common method of marketing a listing. They are easy to schedule, inexpensive to advertise and can bring traffic into a house. They have been standard industry practice for a long time, but are they effective?
Google “bad real estate photos” and you will come up with 10+ pages with examples of hilariously terrible pictures that made it onto Multiple Listing Services across the country. Everyone pretty much knows a bad real estate photo when they see it, but what does a good picture look like and are they really that important? Let’s tackle the second question first...
Windows are an important feature in every home. Walking through houses with buyers, I always point out the windows. Are they original or replacement? More importantly, are they in good shape? If they are in poor shape, should they be replaced or repaired?