Seller Help

Don’t leave your house naked

Phoenix By Area

Just me popping in with a little tip for home sellers. We’ve all heard of “curb appeal”. The home above has none of it. The home below, on the other hand. . . . . . .  now that’s curb appeal! These two homes are approximately the same floor plan in the same neighborhood. Neither [...]

15 July 2010 Read the full article →

With MLS photos, details really matter

Seller Help

Before After There are a few crucial details that made the After picture much more appealing (not counting the angle at which the photos were taken): red door black shutters green grass possibly fresh granite gravel in the semi-circle shape flowerbed filled with red flowers white window rollershades all the way down Red shows up [...]

14 June 2010 Read the full article →

Listing Strategy – Trapping vs Hunting

Seller Help

“What did I do today to sell my listings?” That was a question which used to haunt me early in my career.  I knew I had marketed my listings everywhere buyers were likely to be looking for houses, and I had campaigned to the neighbors who might know somebody wanting to move into their neighborhood.  [...]

28 April 2010 Read the full article →

Great packing, moving idea

Lifestyle

Color-coded packing tape marked with the name of the room the stuff goes in. This is so cool!  U-haul.com sells this stuff, $2.95 for a 30yard roll. Frugalista bargain-hunter anal-retentive tightwad that I am, I wondered if I could do better on pricing.  I looked around online and found that OfficeMax sells ‘paper tape’ for [...]

8 April 2010 Read the full article →

Listing Price: What Matters, What Doesn’t

Seller Help

(this article is reprint) I was watching one of those HGTV shows not too long ago. Flip That House, or Sell This House or one of those. The show featured a novice investor who bought and rehabbed a 1970’s tract home. She managed an amazing transformation of the entire house. She opened up the kitchen [...]

25 February 2010 Read the full article →

Personality goes a long way

Buyer Help

A conversation between Jules Winnfield and Vincent Vega, from the movie Pulp Fiction: Jules: Pigs are filthy animals.  I don’t eat filthy animals. Vincent: Yeah, but bacon tastes good.  Pork chops taste good. Jules:  Hey, sewer rat may taste like pumpkin pie, but I’d never know ‘cause I wouldn’t eat the filthy mother-fu**ers.  Pigs sleep [...]

1 December 2009 Read the full article →

Beige Paint Sells Houses

Seller Help

I’ve written before about “real estate beige”, and Chris Butterworth has written about getting a crisp, clean line between two colors of paint. This is a textbook example of real estate beige. This is exactly the tonal difference you’re aiming for when repainting beige to sell your home. And believe me, nothing impresses buyers more [...]

18 November 2009 Read the full article →

Realtor Commmissions, Briefly

Op Ed

Very brief post for today, for a change. Thought: The Best and The Cheapest are mutually exclusive. Related Posts Where Does the Money Go When a Realtor Sells My House? Our broker, the Phoenix Real Estate Guy, on how much most Realtors earn Heather Barr is a Realtor and a happy workaholic. She eats more [...]

10 November 2009 Read the full article →

Right-Pricing: List Price vs Sales Price

Seller Help

Yesterday our colleague and good friend Dru Bloomfield wrote a terrific post comparing sales prices with list prices, and what can happen to sellers employing various pricing strategies. A couple of highlights: “On September 25 the percentage for all areas & types within the ARMLS database hit 97.01%, exceeding 97% for the first time since [...]

29 September 2009 Read the full article →

Photos Make a Huge Difference Too

See Arizona

I’m piling on to Chris’ post yesterday about how staging can determine whether buyers make offers or make tracks. Pictures make a huge difference too. Buyers love LOTS of pictures. Quantity doesn’t substitute for quality however. A word about the condo Chris wrote about yesterday, with the fabulous view. We both agreed it was one [...]

16 September 2009 Read the full article →

Staging makes a HUGE difference – a note from the trenches…

Seller Help

We were out with “winter visitor” buyers yesterday, looking at semi-luxury condos in Scottsdale and North Phoenix.  We found two interesting units at Edge in Grayhawk: Views Views Views!  One unit had what might be the single best location in all of Grayhawk.  A south-facing 3rd floor balcony gave uninterrupted views of Scottsdale and Phoenix, [...]

15 September 2009 Read the full article →