HOw to get your home prepared for the market in 30 days

How can a buyer get interest for purchasing your house? Impression is the keyword. You just need to get your house ready to sell by doing some preparation. Get inspected by a professional if you want to pay a little effort for maximum results, or if you don’t want to spend much money by paying professional you can do by yourself for getting your house ready to sell. Like the old saying goes: “If you want something done right, do it yourself!”

Now that become a question, how to get your house impressed a buyer? Those are the steps for getting your house ready to sell to a buyer.

Beautify Your Exterior

What you do is just beautifying. The goal is to make your exterior look pretty and fresh to impress your buyer. Just to inform you that the exterior becomes the first impression to overlook a house. There are two sensory organs of a buyer you must impress. Those are eyes and nose. By bringing the garden homelike condition to your house exterior, making it looked pretty and freshening it up. The steps you can do are:

- Get the grass, trees, flowers, and plants tidy and fresh by mowing and watering it
- Clean up the curb and entering path and put the potted flower in the sides.
- Freshen up the smells by put scented potpourri.
- Clean up all of windows and entering doors.
- Get rid of equipments out of sights.
- Paint the walls if necessary.

Make the Interior Cosy

After buyer got impression from your house exterior, do some simple works to get the cosiness of your house interior. It aims to make a buyer feel homelike buy entering your house. These are the steps:

- Clean up the tile floors; scrub it if there are some bad spots.
- Get rid of spider net from your ceilings.
- Wash the carpets with a fragrant soap.
- Get your furniture placed tidily and gets rid of unnecessary one.
- Brush the closets
- Clean the garage, basement, and attic
- Get the windows opened and clean, it will bring freshness to your house inside
- If you have pets, bath them.
- Put some fresh fragrance in air conditioner.

Repairing and Replacing

Some Repairing and replacement is necessary to do, if there are some broken furniture, equipment, or appliances. Just check out:

- broken or missing door
- cabinet handles
- ceilings
- ventilation filters
- broken tiles in bathroom and kitchen
- faucet
- wallpaper
- some furniture

Get Your Friends’ Opinion

Assume some friends like a buyer, and get some advice and suggestion to make your house get more ready to sell. And the most important thing is your friends feel your home like their own home. Consider also hiring someone to come in and set up professional furniture, i.e., stage your home. Most important, use services to help you list your home online and or find potential buyers. Remember everyone whom you are associated with, your church, your club, and any organization who will allow you to post your information on their grounds.

Seek the advice of your trusted realtor. If you don’t have a licensed realtor, become good friends with one, it’ll be worth your weight in Gold to you! If you don’t have a good realtor, I highly recommend you get one. The difference in this market could be your home selling or not.

7 Tips for Sellers

Selling your first home can be a nerve-wracking experience. When buying your first home, it’s normal to be a bit scared – but also excited & with plenty of plans for the future. However, when it’s time to finally sell your largest investment, many sellers are filled with questions and doubt. Will my home sell? How should I price it? What do I need to do to make sure it’s in showing condition? When it’s time to sell your largest investment, you need sound guidance & advice. Follow these tips to your first successful sale.

1) What Was Once Your “Home” is Now Your “Property”

It’s normal to be emotional about your home. You’ve celebrated holidays, entertained friends & family, & hopefully have great memories in your home. However, as soon as you’ve made the decision to sell your home, it now becomes a financial asset. It’s no longer your “home,” it’s now your “property.” As hard as it is, try and remove any emotion from the sale of your property.

2) Location, Condition, & Price

How quickly & successfully you can sell your property boils down to location, condition, & price. There’s not much you can do about location. However, you have the perfect opportunity to make sure your home is in great showing condition, and you have full control over the asking price of your property. Make the right decisions over what you can control – condition & price – and you should be able to successfully sell your property in a reasonable time.

3) Forget How Much You Paid For Your Property

What you paid for your property has little to no effect over its present value. The most important factors to your property’s present value are the comparable homes that have sold within the last 6 months. This can be a little hard for some sellers to swallow, because it’s something you have no control over. However, understanding this fact is key to successfully selling your home in a reasonable amount of time.

4) It Doesn’t Matter How Much You Spent on Improvements

Improvements to your home do play a big part in your home’s value, but the amount you spent on those improvements doesn’t mean much. If you spent $1000 on materials for wood floors, and installed them yourself, that doesn’t mean that your home is worth only $1000 more. Conversely, if you significantly overpaid for improvements to your home, it doesn’t mean that your home is worth that amount more. Again, market value plays the biggest factor. If homes with wood floors typically sell for $5000 more in your neighborhood, your home is worth $5000 more than comparable homes without wood floors.

5) Consult a Realtor ASAP – And Focus on Service

Once you’ve made the decision to sell your property, contact a reputable Realtor as soon as possible. Interview Realtors until you find the agent who is right for you – it might take one listing presentation, and it might take many more! While it is important to take note of the marketing fees each agent will charge, focus your attention on the services an agent will provide. Selling your home can be stressful, and you want to make sure that the agent guiding you through the process will provide you exceptional service & communication throughout the transaction.

6) You Get One Chance to Make a First Impression

Property condition can help you immensely when selling your home – and it can also be as big a detriment. Make sure & improve your property as much as possible – within reason. Touch up any necessary paint, de-clutter your home, plant fresh flowers, & make sure your home has a pleasant aroma. Your Realtor should help you with sound advice to get your home in top showing condition.

7) Relax

If you’ve priced your home correctly, made sure it’s in good showing condition, & hired the right agent, you should sell your home in a reasonable amount of time. However, you’re still at the mercy of the market. Relax, maintain your home’s showing condition, & adjust the price if market conditions & feedback call for it. Pay attention to average days on market, but don’t become too distraught if it takes a little longer to sell your property. You’ve done all you can to successfully sell your property, and it surely will!

Real Estate Market Trends

Once you look at these trends which run off the average house price you will be able to see how much the market has increased over the past 15 years. you will also see that over the last year it has gone down. This is interesting stuff.

The first Graph Below is the Local trend for prices of homes in Taranaki from 1992 till now.

The second Graph Below is the National Trend for prices of homes in New Zealand from 1992 till now.

The graphs are displayed in monthly bars. so each line is the seperate months data for that year and time. It shows the general trend quite simply as been going up but it also shows very well the trend of the past few months where house prices have started to fall quite significantly.

Negotiation Tips for Buyers

As you go about shopping for a home on Taranaki Real Eestate market, perhaps the most important factors that you need to keep in mind are those associated with negotiating the best price on a home that you are interested in purchasing. By following the tips and suggestions set forth for you here, you will be in the best possible position to negotiate the most favorable price on a piece of Taranaki Real Estate that you hope to call “home.”

First of all, when it comes to negotiating the most favorable purchase price on a home, as a buyer it is important that you try to come to an understanding of the seller’s motivation. By understanding the seller’s motivation, you will be in a better stance to determine whether or not the seller will be more willing to accept a lower price for the property.

Second, you need to understand that the listing price more often than not is not the price that the seller will be willing accept. In the vast majority of instances, the seller has padded the listing price at least to some degree with the idea that negotiations will take place.

Third, before you actually make an offer on a home, you need to do your homework. In this regard, you need find out the market value of the residence in question. By knowing the market value, you will have a better idea of what a reasonable sales price for the property will be at any particular point in time.

Fourth, you do need to demonstrate some flexibility. Do not maintain a take it or leave it stance. If you do take such a position, you likely will lose the deal from the word go.

Fifth, if you do end up having to increase your offer price, you will want to seriously consider asking the seller to give you something tangible in return. For example, you might want to request that something damaged be repaired or something else along these lines.

Sixth, keep in mind that the whole real estate sales transaction is kind of like a game of poker. You want to maintain a poker face and not reveal to the seller your strategies or objectives. Keep your hand to the vest.

Seventh, if you have the ability to pay cash for a home or if you have been pre-approved for a home mortgage loan, you will want to use this strong financial position to your advantage. A seller will be more willing to do business with someone who intends to make the purchase with cash or who has been pre-approved for a home mortgage loan.

By following these pointers, you will be in the best position to obtain the most advantageous purchase price for a home.

Agent Interferance.

One thing i want to comment on today is with the increasingly hard market and the grip coming on the housing market in regards to sales agents are becoming to fight each other to get listings and clients to work with them. This behavious in which i have become myself a victim of is terrible behaviour.

When a person decides to list a property with a person, and a particular company that person is therein been employed by the vendor to sell there home. Selling your home is not a simple step in your life. There are many factors that cause this. One major one is agent compition and the other main one is the personal emotions to the sale of the property. Both are interlinked as i will explain.

The personal emotions to selling a house are a normal human emotion. As your house is for many people on of the most valuable asset that you will own you dont want it to be treated lightly. And the last thing you need is it to be taken as a compition by the people selling it. The emotion of the selling process is largely due to price. Price is the biggest part of getting real estate right and if not treated with the utmost respect in terms of buyers expectations and seller expectations it can put a big cloud of doubt over the sale from one day. As a seller you want to get the best price you can in your pocket after any fees as you can. and as a buyer you want to buy for the least you can.  This is again a natural human emotion so to speak.

Now in regards to the agent compition which is particuly noticable in this upcoming market. Some agents as i have personally noticed are taking actions to try and get bussiness for themselves and are taking measures that in my mind i call wrong and immorral. I will not go into these ways as i will be delging into the territory that they are in but i will point out some ways for you to become more aware of whats going on.

 One of these things is to be very careful of the agent that will cut their fee to get your listing. This has a double ended sword effect. One it will limit the amount of agency action that your listing will get. Naturally any person in the world that has two similar jobs to complete will attemp the better paying one first. Its just common sense. Two is the possibility that if the agent is keen cut his commission how would he feel about cutting your price. Simple really.

But the most disturbing thing and the one that i have seen time and time again is the agent that overprices the property from day one. As the owner you need to know how your property sits in any current market. If for example you know your home is only worth $500,000 and the person you trust to sell your home prices it against someone else at say $570,000 your home is going to be at a great disadvantage in the market and you will have to settle less for what you expect. This creates a terrible feel for you as the seller. This is happening and happens more so for the agent to get the listing. In todays market when there are less sales you really honestly need to place your home well in the market.

Another thing is that i am seeing alot of is because houses are taking longer to sell some sellers are getting worried that their agent isnt doing their job well. In some cases this could be the case in which you need to talk to the person themselves.  But something that is not good is to start talking to somone from another company about your problems and the house hasnt sold. Your agent if they have your interests at heart should be trying everything they can to get your home sold, but it does take time. Always communicate openly with your agent about your concerns. Try and avoid getting involved with another agent untill its really nessassary. It will only contridict the information your agent tells you but may also cause you to resent your agent and that is the absolute worst thing to let happen.

As i explained above emotions are a major part to the transaction of real estae. Trust is important but there are things that can make your home harder to sell. The couple of points above are only a few of the things that do happen. But in my opinion are all important. If you have anything else that you know of that does concern you or something that we should point out here please leave a comment.

Cash vs Subject to Sale

This is an increasingly interesting topic that we have seen in todays market.

With the average time for a house to sell increasing every month, and now standing at 50 days in New Plymouth, it is harder to sell houses. You as the buyer are taking longer to make the descision to buy, as the rush isn’t there. This in turn creates the buyer to be picky about what they want to buy.

But on top of this sellers know that it is hard to sell there house. Vendors should be starting to become smarter and realise that the market isnt going to wait around for them. When a home enters the market the buyer will look at it and compare it to the rest of the market. And make there descision from there.

When it comes to putting offers on homes being cash unconditional is the most powerful negotiation tool you can pull out of your pocket. This gives the seller the certainty that there house is then sold once they agree to the price.

Subject to sale means that the buyer needs to sell there house in order to fund there purchase. Now alot of things can happen in this time of trying to sell there house. One is that the owner of the house to sell overprices and wants a higher price than that of the market will give it. The other thing is that the condition or location of the home means that there arent any buyers in the market for this home, or there are others that are better. The third thing that can happen and which has just happened to me recently is that the purchaser of the home that needs to sell there home looses interest and cant be bothered to sell there home any longer, or they have found something else that they like and decide that they don’t want to sell. But in my case they didnt tell me this, they just refused to listen to any advise i gave them and avoided all the avenues that i tried to create for them so that a sussessful sale could be negotiated.

Now this does happen and its a waste of everyones time when it does happen. So for the people that want to sell there house to purchase another one be very careful and make sure you are prepared to do all that you can to sell your home.

At the end of the day a cash offer is far more powerful and you could even negotiate a better price with cash as well. And remember that you are buying and selling in the same market so any advantage or disadvantage as a buyer and seller are canceled out.

Recession, whats going to happen if it does happen?

This information come out today and is something that should be monitored by everyone in New Zealand. In terms for real estate its hard to judge what impact it could have. But any impact will be the same right accross the board.

Recession cannot be ruled out – Cullen

12:48PM Tuesday March 18, 2008

 

Your Views

Is economic recession likely in 2008?

Finance Minister Michael Cullen has warned a recession cannot be ruled out as the economy struggles against a weak housing market, drought and the international credit crunch.

The Bank of New Zealand warned at the weekend that the economy was being hit by a “perfect storm” that would probably blow it into recession.

Dr Cullen today acknowledged it faced some stiff short-term challenges and a technical recession – negative growth for two quarters – could not be ruled out.

“Given drought, given the international financial turmoil, given the credit squeeze, given the housing market coming off, it would be foolish to rule out the possibility that there could be two successive quarters of very small negative growth at some point in the next year or so.

“But we are not expecting to see the economy going through the floor,” he told reporters.

“I think people when they hear the word think of depression and something long, sustained and with large increases in unemployment.

“I don’t see the prospect of that.”

Asked if the Reserve Bank should be cutting the Official Cash Rate to cushion any blows, Dr Cullen said that was a matter for the bank’s governor.

But he said business tax cuts, which come into force next month, would have a limited cushioning effect and monetary policy was still the best tool in that regard.

Prime Minister Helen Clark said there had been no advice from Treasury that the country was heading into recession, but there was likely to be some “rub off” from the weak United States economy.

However that was counterbalanced by rapid growth in the developing economies of Asia, such as China and India, she said.

“The advice I’ve seen is that New Zealand has a wide basket of markets that it trades into, in fact China on its own could substantially hold up commodity prices, so we are as well positioned as any country to deal with the volatility.”

- NZPA

Taranaki market still healthy.

As advertised in todays Taranaki Daily News the latest quarter statistics from the national bank show our market here in Taranaki outshone the rest of New Zealand. The number of slaes New Plymouth rose by 29% up 0.6% nationally. And the average house price was up fractionally against a drop that was experienced nationwide. The average time for a house to sell in Taranaki was 45 days.

The other things that showed in these statistics were that building consents were up which backs onto strong economic activity. The officials are sudgesting tha the good gains and strong economic growth felt was a rsulult of the recently commissioned Tui gas field, the notice of Methanx reopening part of its processing plant and the anticipated increase in the Fontera payout.

These seem to be having a positive spin off on Taranaki’s property market with strong volume of sales. So its an interesting time out there for a buyer right now. But its definately not bad.

Whats the importance of pricing your home right for the market

Home Pricing Mistakes

• By far, the worst mistake a seller can make while seling their home is hanging the wrong price tag on a home. If the home is priced too high, buyers won’t look at it. If it’s priced too low, sellers worry that they’ll give away profits. But the fact of the reality is if your home is overpriced buyers will not put any offers on it. This in time will cause huge frustration to the seller as there has been no offers on their property. But on the other hand, if the property is priced right within the market at the time buyers will naturally in thier travels look at it. The whole point is to then get one or more of those buyers to want to put an offer forward. If more than one buyer wants to buy the same property at the same time this will definately create a price war and then the price goes up. But this will only happen if you price your home right and competitively in the market.
• Pricing a home to sell is an art. Part of the market value is based on comparable sales, but other factors to consider include market movement, demand, the home’s location and its condition. These are all looked at in depth by your real estate professional when they appraise or list your property. Quite often Real Estate companies canvas property for you in order for a large scale comparasen. This is the best feedback you can get. The more price feedback the better you will be in order to get that price right, as everybody has a different opinion on price depending on there emotional attachment to the property.
• If the home is overpriced buyers might submit lowball offers which tend to result in an immediate offer rejection. These low offers tend to infuriate and insult sellers. When these low offers do come in instead of becoming furiated as the seller take it in and use it as another form of feedback so that you can quickly establish the fair maket price of your home. Remember everthing has a positive to it.
• Some agents deliberately overstate the value of a home and push a seller to sign an overpriced listing. There are many reasons why some agents do this, but the bottom line is sellers lose a competitive edge when later ruducing the price to meet the market. Sellers who “test the market” get stung. The huge danger we face in the current market is chasing the market down. This means you over price your home to the market at day one. Two weeks later you decide to drop it a little, but at the same time the market has dropped the same amount your willing to drop. So you gain nothing. Also at the same time the buyer interest becomes less and the spiral downwards turns to an ugly trend.

• The bottom line and the best advise i can give to anyone willing to sell is to price your home right. Listen to the professional advise you get. This advise is valuable and has its merits. Also take an active role in pricing your home. Look at the market and compare yours to others on the market at the time. But when doing that remeber that the homes that currently are on the market may well be over priced themselves. Professional advise by the people who work in the market everyday is the best way to always go.

What Are Buyers Looking for in New Plymouth

Buyers in New Plymouth are no different to buyers around the rest of New Zealand.

Generally all buyers look for potential at the listed price and look at ways the property could be improved for resale value. Most people wouldnt buy a house for $300,000 that needs $30,000 spent on it to update it that would only get a maximum of $310,000 when they go and sell it a year later. But who knows some people don’t worry about that sort of thing. Generally buyers like that bargin.

When looking for that bargin what is it your thinking of in terms of the sale?

From my experience almost all buyers are thinking of resale value and the potential of the property to be improved. Generally a buyer doesn’t want to buy into work. But sometimes a house comes on the market that needs work done to it. These can be good buys as the person selling it has already taken into account the cost of the work and the house will be a good buy. Renovating these days doesn’t cost an arm and a leg and generally doesn’t take to long to complete. With the advent of kitset kitchen and things of the like it really doesnt take to much time or money to complete.