Real Estate, Really

I've heard it several times now from men and women who participate in online dating: "I was ghosted!" Meaning, of course, that the person they were in communication with suddenly disappeared without a trace. They were expecting the sound of his voice on the other end of the line, or at least a few words via text. She was supposed to meet him at the local coffee shop at 7 PM, and she didn't show. The person disappeared in a diaphanous fog or was levitated into oblivion. Budding love died before it bloomed, and hope died with it. It sucks! For all who have been wounded by this cruel disappearing act, I can relate. In fact, most realtors know the throes of despair being ghosted can create. Our scenario is quite similar, actually. Zillow, the online real estate equivalent of finding a date, woos the would-be client with pictures of our perfect listing. The price seems right. Our testimonials don't reek. Looks like we might be a decent realtor with a pleasant listin...

Open houses are one of my favorite things about my profession in real estate. I love meeting the people, hearing their stories, discovering their needs and often, making new friends. The most fun thing about them, though, is how unpredictable they are. Let me take you through a relatively normal open house. I usually arrive at least twenty minutes early to set up the home. I turn all the lights on, put all the toilet seats down, open up the shades or curtains to let the sunshine in and set up the brochures. If there is whole house sound system, I make sure it's on. If not, I bring my Dell sound bar. With Norah Jones crooning At Last, I set my Open House signs up in the front yard, the red flag signalling K.Farish  (it's red) is in the house! Typically, there is at least one couple there ready to take the tour as soon as the door opens. They've seen the home online and can't wait to get in to walk around. They are the shoppers who have already determined what the pr...

Here are some rules for selling your home That might make it easy in the long run. You don't want buyers to randomly roam 'Cause losing the sale just isn't fun. First you want the world to view it Online or in person, however they can. With cell phone pics, you already blew it. Make sure the realtor hires a cameraman. These pictures will post on all the right sites Where buyers will ogle them many times Because they are shopping most days and nights. For years they've been saving their nickels and dimes. If your home is a mess, let's get it clean 'Cause buyers are fussy and don't want to pay For a home that's a wreck...not to be mean. Pull out the weeds and sweep up the floor, Wash all the windows and make all the beds. Paint the old trim; put a wreath on the door. We want your home to get into their heads. Once it's all lovely and ready to show Don't make it hard for the buyers to see. They come to open houses, you know, I...

I received a call from an out-of-area realtor mid-morning. The phone connection was broken and static, but his enthusiasm was real: "I have a really good offer on your listing!" he said. "I will send it over now." "Fantastic!" I replied. "I will take a look at it and get back to you with any questions or concerns." I paused to ask the question I always do: "Are your clients pre-approved for a loan or will they be paying cash for the home?" "No. A loan. They are pre-approved, and I will send the information with the offer." "Sounds good." Then we hung up. A while later I received the offer. Only it had the wrong date on the purchase agreement...one from weeks earlier. What I knew by this was the offer form he used to write up on my listing had probably been used several times before and the information changed. He'd just forgotten to look at the date. So, I called him and asked him to please redo the offe...

When acquaintances contacted me to let me know they were relocating back to California, I was happy to help them find a home to purchase. Preliminarily, I knew they had a foreclosure a little over two years before. They'd purchased the loan with an ARM (adjustable rate mortgage), which means they had a locked in low interest rate for the first couple of years, but then the rate went up according to the fluctuating federal rates. Their house payment rose so high it became difficult to make the payments.Their two years out from foreclosure is typically not quite enough time for many banks to loan again--three to five years is normal. They had been informed by well meaning banking friends to just stop making payments on their property. This is never really the smart thing if you want to keep your credit score anywhere near above water. So, in this case, they'd just walked away from their home. They didn't have a banker or loan broker working with them and asked if I would rec...

One of the stipulations on the offer that came into me from the realtor making it on my listing was a sixty day escrow. The loan officer from the out of state bank the buyers were using said he needed that much time for processing. It seemed odd to me because I'd looked over the financials presented to me at the time of the offer and the buyers looked really solid. My clients were relocating and were amenable to accepting the offer, so we did. I had the name and phone number of the lender after he reached out to me the first week of escrow. He was aggressive and chatty. I asked him at the time why he needed so much time for their loan. "We have gobs of loans to process right now," he replied. "A bit of a backlog."  Hmmm.  As you can imagine, not much happened the first couple of weeks in terms of moving the purchase forward. It's my responsibility as the listing realtor to check in with what is going on; it's the responsibility of the buyer realtor to...