I’ve heard so many agents tell their customer/clients over the years,“call me any time”. I’ve seen ads where the agent insinuates that they’re there for you 24-7.

Now honestly, are you really available every hour of the day – every day of the week?

I believe when you use loose language to attract a buyer or seller, you live-or-die by your words.

What words do you use to make your customer/client feel as though you’re on their side as much as possible?

I’ve been around so long that I’m sure that I didn’t come up with this idea – I just remembered it and used it. So if your the one that originated this concept – my hat is off to you.

We all know that seller’s want the most money for the least cost.  So would I.  One of the driving forces behind listing a home is the seller’s motivation. One of the major components that new agents fail to pin down.  Some sellers have a time-frame in mind, and others just want to see if the market will produce a buyer who is willing to pay the asking price.

The 30-60-90 day technique involves having at least 3 different cost break-downs for the subject property when you arrive at your listing presentation.

The 30 day sale that I show is what my gut tells me it will sell for and the reality of what the buyer will ask for in terms of closing costs etc.  (I usually don’t get an atta boy on this one.)

The 60 day print-out will feature a bit of a higher price, but with the same costs.

The 90 (or sometimes 120  days or more -yuk) print-out will show what you anticipate the seller will want – or better yet, what they told you they expect to sell for.

After you produce all the facts and figures, you then ask the seller what they’re motivation is. Were they expecting a sale in a month or less or were they expecting their home to sell down the road.

I label each print-out so that if they choose the high end, I can always come back with the information that I originally gave them to assist them in choosing a better price.

 

Staging has been one of the best ideas in real estate over the past few years.  I’m totally impressed with the results.  It sure in the heck beats the old “put it in the MLS” standard.

So let me ask you this. You have a good listing in a bad location. The neighbors aren’t “tidy”, the fences into the sub-division are “tagged” and you’re getting no showings.  Where do you spend your money?

I know for a fact that ads will not work in this situation, because your listing doesn’t fit with the community it’s in. (Beautiful home in *%)^# neighborhood.)  

I don’t know what other agents do, but I have a budget that I plan to spend on my listings. How much of my total commission am I willing to spend to sell this property?  I try to spend it where I think I’ll get results.

I have actually paid to have a neighbors back yard fenced to hide their “stuff”.   I’ve paid to have fences re-stained in order to eliminate the graffiti that is in the entrance way to my listing.  (Make sure you have the owners that own the adjacent property sign a contract with you when you do this.)

Why spend $$$$ on ads that won’t sell the house?

Put your money where your eye and your wallet tells you to spend it.  Think outside the box.

We just had a deal go south today do to the lender’s involvement. This sale was written several weeks ago, but we didn’t discover until this week that the branch manager for the lender was the fiance of the buyer.

Her name was not on the purchase and sale. The buyer had his inspections, title review, seller’s disclosure, appraisal, & septic pump all in a timely fashion with no issues.

Suddenly he starts asking for things that we’re not part of the original deal.  Such as, “can I build a shop on the property?”  (It’s water front with a wet land set-back which he already knew)  We discovered that it was his fiance that was bringing up these types of issues – although they weren’t a condition of the loan.

I contacted the Owner of the mortgage company to ask if he could intercede with his manager, and remind her that her job was to put the package together. Obviously she had an emotional interest, but not a contractual interest.

That call to him was yesterday.  Today we get a rescission, asking for their money back because they weren’t able to build a shop on the property.

What would you say or do?

 

If you’ve ever had a listing that an offer came in on, and that offer didn’t include a financing addendum – what’s the first thing you think of?

“They forgot the finance addendum.”

So before you call your seller, you call the selling agent and ask if they forgot the finance addendum – or ‘is this really an all cash deal?”  The selling agent assures you that indeed it’s an all cash deal.  Hallelujah!

The down side to the offer is that it’s light on the price, and of course since the buyer scrapped and saved to obtain all this money, they expect a discount for cash.

My rebuttal to that kind of thinking is that (sic) “the seller gets cash in the end, either from you or from the bank – so why should they discount?  And if so how much?

I don’t think there’s really a mathematical answer to the question.  However, there is one huge benefit that the seller gets with an all cash offer and should place a lot of value on.

NO APPRAISAL!

In today’s market that’s worth a lot of money.  Remind your seller of that on an all cash deal – if you get one.

We just concluded a 60 day listing contest at our office.  That’s right…. a listing contest.

After reviewing where our business has been coming from over the past year or so, we came to the conclusion that approximately 70% of our business was coming from listings of ours that others were selling.

Our contest generated 119 listings in 60 day.

Here’s a picture of some of the winning team members.

Here’s a picture of some of the winning team members and their cash prize.

After 2 years of working with representatives from Tacoma’s real estate community, the City Council passed a new ordinance that requires Tacoma property owners to have a certified inspection of their private side sewer prior to the sale or transfer of a property, a major remodel or any construction over an existing side sewer.

This City ordinance requires a visual inspection of the building and property for sources of inflow and a television video inspection of the private side sewer from the building to the City of Tacoma sewer main to determine the condition of the pipe.

This ordinance becomes effective July 1, 2010.  It’s estimated that the cost(s) for an average sale will be $300-$400.

Do you think this is a good idea, or just an unnecessary charge to the seller?

 

I’m a “baby boomer” and for some of us old relics we find it difficult to make the transition into what makes today’s real estate work for us.

If you blog (you apparently do since you’re reading this) but would really like to enhance your business use of Facebook, Twitter, Youtube or Foursquare, I advise you to contact Marguerite Giguere.

Her email address is TheSkydivingRealtor.com.

Not only is she willing to assist you, but she breaks it down into “people speek.” 

I’m not really sure why some buyers want some one who is not a part of the purchase of their home to give an endorsement as a condition of buying.

With parents, it may be because mom and dad are loaning them the down payment, or it could simply be that they want reinforcement from the family that they made a “good choice”.

When it comes to siblings or friends, their endorsement may almost be impossible to acquire  - simply because of ego or because they believe that it’s their job to “get you a better deal.”

I”ve learned that when a sale is conditioned upon some one else’s approval (aside from home inspections and such), as an agent your antenna should be at full alert.

Remind the buyers before the “approval” that they’ve looked at many homes, they feel good about the decision they’ve made, and that for some un-known reason the party they’re are trying to get approval from may not be as giving as they’d hoped.

You’ll close more deals.

When I started in this business in 1978, I would have to say in retrospect that real estate was a recreational sport and not a true profession.

Over these many years we’ve done a lot to change that thinking, but in the mean-time we’ve lost a lot of our savvy.

For those of you who go back as far as the 70’s, you know what it’s like to have a “rate book” with you.  You also knew how to qualify a buyer within a few bucks.

But as we were striving for “professionalism“, we were forced to give up a lot of our knowledge because of litigation fears.

Suddenly, we didn’t know what the payment would be any more.  Your Broker (via attorney) said that there was less chance of liability if the buyer was advised to talk to a mortgage person.

How professional would you consider your Dentist to be if he refereed to your canine tooth as “the pointy thing just off to the side.”

Why would a consumer want to work with any professional that constantly says “I don’t know, but I know who does.?”

It’s not that tough to know what’s going on if you try.