Archives (page 6 of 15)

October 10, 2009

The news media may insist that the real estate market has turned the corner, but my attitude toward work is simple: “Just say yes!”

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

We represented the buyers for a million-dollar house, our first, that closed this week. A week from now, we will be listing a million-dollar home, also a first for us. We are carrying two listings at $450,000 right now, with another to come, and we will be listing another home at $800,000 shortly.

But also this week, I sold a property for $65,000. Just a few weeks ago, one of my listings sold for $27,000.

Am I schizophrenic? I hope not. But I am scared to death to say no to anyone right now.

Salespeople like to say yes. It’s not in our nature to turn people down. We like to make people happy if we can.

But I have no idea when this recession is going to end, so I don’t want to pass on any opportunity that might present itself.

Here’s the funny part: We’re living with a foxhole mentality, but 2009 is going to be our second-best year since we came into the real estate business. We’re not rich by any means, but we’re making more money than we have in the past three years.

But here’s the unfunny part: Virtually all of our income for 2009 is coming to us in the second half of the year. Our business was all-but-moribund in the first two quarters, and we came much too close to losing our own home.

So I am not proud, bashful or shy. If you have a real estate problem, I’m ready to talk about it. We’re working sixteen hours a day, at least, seven days a week. We haven’t taken time off in three years, and I don’t know when we will take our next vacation.

The job is survival right now, and I know we’re not alone among Realtors in thinking this way.

I’m nobody’s bear, and I would love to believe all the cheerleading I hear in the news about the real estate market. But my strategy for now is to just say yes to every opportunity I get to earn a living.

October 3, 2009

Despite the hype, the long-term trend of home prices in Phoenix is still steadily downward

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

With all this activity in the Phoenix real estate market, prices must be going up, right?

Wrong.

Sales prices for bread-and-butter single-family homes in Metropolitan Phoenix were down in June, July and August. They were up in May, and it looks like we’ll finish higher in September. But the net effect is to put average home prices right back where they were in March of 2009.

That’s right. We just worked our way through six very busy months, with the $8,000 first-time home-buyers tax-credit as a huge incentive to buy houses, but sales prices for those homes are virtually unchanged.

How can that be? Haven’t we heard about shortages of homes, about frenzied bidding wars? If you’re trying to sell a home right now, market activity can look like manna from the heavens. But if you’re trying to buy, what you’re seeing may look more like a plague of locusts.

But taking account of the bigger picture, none of that matters. The Phoenix real estate market is over-built, especially at the lower end of the market. The long-term systemic trend of prices is downward, and it will be for quite a while. Incentives like the tax-credit can stimulate activity, but until demand eclipses supply, prices will continue to deflate slowly.

When the tax-credit lapses, the pace of that deflation will quicken. If banks start to reintroduce foreclosed inventory at a faster rate, prices will drop even more. Arguably, we are two or three years away from reselling all of the homes that will have to be repossessed and resold by lenders.

And prices could be low and trending generally lower that whole time. New home builders are not able to compete in this market, so we’re not adding new inventory. But until the supply of foreclosed homes is fully absorbed, prices probably will not go up.

And even then, don’t bet your life savings on dramatic upswings. It took us a long time to dig this hole, and it could take a long time to dig our way out.

September 26, 2009

Looking for a reason to buy real estate? How about free ice cream?

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

When I was a kid, my Uncle Jack, my mother’s oldest brother, told me a story I’ve never forgotten. He was at a little county fair way out in corn country. Nothing special, just beauty contests for hogs, cheesy little rides and sticky, sugared confections.

Late in the day, the ice cream vendor decided to pack it in, announcing that he was giving away what was left of his inventory. People elbowed their way to the front of the crowd, so eager were they to get something for nothing. They walked away with the ice cream piled into their bare hands, rushing off to their cars, leaving a trail of melted drips behind them.

The lesson I took from my uncle’s story was that those folks didn’t really want ice cream. They were willing to get themselves dirty, and to get their vehicles dirty, just to have something for free. Most of them probably didn’t even eat the ice cream, and they certainly couldn’t have enjoyed it. Imagine trying to inhale a glutton’s quantity of chocolate-fudge-swirl before it melts all over your clothes.

Could that be what’s going on right now with the $8,000 first-time home-buyer’s tax credit? I happen to be carrying three listings that are undeniably “investor’s specials” — which means they’re a good buy, but they need a lot of work. Even so, my phone is ringing off the hook with agents trying to sell those houses to owner-occupants — folks with very little cash trying to get an FHA loan so they can buy a house, thus to get $8,000 in “free” money.

Do those buyers really want homes, or do they just want that free money? What will happen to the properties when the $8,000 is spent? Should we dial the clock back to 2006 to see if anything looks familiar?

Meanwhile, the National Association of Realtors is campaigning for even more “free” money to bribe even more otherwise-unmotivated buyers. The only thing that could make the deal sweeter would be a double hand-full of “free” ice cream.

September 19, 2009

When the weather finally breaks in Phoenix — it breaks for ten solid months of pure paradise…

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

If you live in New York or Boston or Chicago, there will come a day in the Spring when the cold will seem to be in full retreat. The sun will be shining. The icicles on the trees will be melting, and the tickle of the cold drops of water on your hair and neck will make you want to throw your arms out wide and rejoice in your release from the awful prison of Winter.

That happens in Phoenix, too, but it happens six months earlier, on September 15th. Mid-March has its own charms, when the citrus trees open their blossoms and the air is thick with the nectar of heaven perfected. But it’s when the Summer breaks in Phoenix that people come outdoors, knowing that the next ten months will be simply perfect.

Consider: On August 15th, the late-afternoon temperature could be 115 blistering degrees. The sun will be relentless, seeming to hang for hours above the horizon, seeming never to set. The relative humidity will be 40% or more — which doesn’t sound too bad until you remember the temperature. Late in the day, huge storms could come thundering into the Valley of the Sun, flooding the low-lands and even tearing the roofs off of older houses.

That season — we call it “the Monsoon” — lasts from July 15th to September 15th. But when September 15th rolls around… paradise ensues. Daytime high temperatures drop to below 100 and the relative humidity tops off at below 10% — so dry you can smell the dry leaves and pine needles baking in the sunlight.

That might still sound too hot to you, but it’s not. It’s just perfect, an ideal time to be outdoors — all day and all night. There is simply no place like Phoenix, no place on Earth. We suffer, slightly, during the Monsoon, but we are repaid with ten months of the kind of weather that other cities are lucky to see for ten days in any given year.

And Winter — which you are just now beginning to dread — is our most perfect season of them all…

September 12, 2009

Are banks “warehousing” foreclosed homes in the Phoenix real estate market? If so, sooner or later something will have to give

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

Break out the champagne! Prices for bread-and-butter resale homes in Metropolitan Phoenix were up for the month of August! Hurray!

“Up by how much?” you ask. Well… Not very much, alas.

The average price for a three-bedroom, two-bath, stucco-and-tile American Dream home was $119,666 in July. In August, that number had risen to the lofty sum of — wait for it — $119,872.

In any other business, a difference like that would be written off as noise, but in real estate — hot dang! — it’s a bonanza!

Here’s what’s really happening: Banks are foreclosing on many, many houses, but they’re only dribbling a few at a time into the marketplace. In conjunction with added demand caused by the $8,000 first-time home-buyer’s tax credit, we’re seeing what looks like a shortage of available homes.

And yet, even in these straightened circumstances, prices are essentially flat. As an example, the average price for these homes was $121,898 in March.

One theory has it that the banks are releasing just enough inventory to maintain stable prices. That’s a satisfying explanation — given that it conforms to the observable facts — but who knows if it’s true.

Meanwhile, if the banks are in fact warehousing ever-increasing quantities of homes — foreclosed upon but not listed for sale in the resale market — eventually something will have to give.

Even though the banks might own those homes “free and clear,” there are still carrying costs associated with warehoused homes. Lawns must be mowed — or at least weeds must be chopped back. Roofing tiles will crack and break away, exposing the home to water damage. Pests of all sizes will invade the home, some to eat the wood, some to steal the appliances, the piping, the wiring — whatever is left undefended.

If we assume that this is true — that banks are acquiring foreclosed homes at a faster rate than they are releasing them into the resale market — then sooner or later something has to give. The banks simply cannot warehouse those homes long enough for the market to recover.

September 5, 2009

Even though much of the current real estate “news” is really just hype, there can still be good reasons for you to be in the market

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

Get a load of all that great housing news! Median prices are up! Sales volumes are up! The prognosis for the future? Up, up, up!

Here’s a different take: If it looks, walks and talks like hype, it’s probably hype.

Are houses selling well, compared to a year ago? They are — but the federal government is giving first-time home-buyers $8,000 in free money to buy houses right now. If that tax credit is not extended or replaced with something even more generous, the music will stop on November 30th.

And while median home prices may be up, prices for homes that normal working people actually buy are flat at best — and they have been trending downward since December of 2005.

But what about the shortage of available homes you have read about? What about the multiple offer scenarios, with homes selling for thousands of dollars over list price?

What would you expect to happen when you artificially stimulate demand at the same time that you artificially limit supply? We should be doing what your grandpa used to call “a land-office business.” Instead, even with $8,000 in free money, prices are still trending downward.

And that artificially-limited supply — all of the foreclosed homes that banks are withholding from the marketplace — will flood the market sooner or later.

If you’re in the real estate market right now, what you should do depends on your circumstances.

If you’re a seller, make a deal. Your carrying costs will almost certainly exceed any gain you can hope to realize by waiting out the market.

If you’re a first-time home-buyer, jump. If you’re not under contract by October 15th, you’ll probably miss out on the tax credit — and houses are not easy to get, taking account of the artificially-limited supply.

Buying with a loan? Interest rates are low for now, but they may not stay that way.

Buying all cash? Sit tight. As sweet as prices look right now, it seems likely they’ll get a lot sweeter when the banks finally release all the homes they’ve been hoarding.

September 1, 2009

Does your smart-phone hold within it the future of real estate marketing?

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

Do you have a smart-phone like the iPhone, Blackberry or Palm Pre? How much time do you spend on it? Is it possible that your smart-phone is your primary interface for accessing the internet? If you’re not there already, can you foresee a day when that might be the case?

It’s certainly that way for us, and we see smart-phone surfing as the next big wave in internet use. Because of that, we’re devoting more of our marketing efforts to promoting real estate by smart-phone.

As an example, we just added SMS messaging from a company called Drive-Buy Technologies. If you happen to drive by one of our listings, you can text a short message to a pre-set SMS account number and you will get a return SMS message with a link to a mobile web site featuring property details, photos and a link to that property’s main web site.

Want to see it in action? Text HOUND1 to 88000.

I’ve never been a huge fan of video as a real estate marketing tool. But smart-phone technology is changing my opinion. The integration of YouTube into smart-phones is so seamless that touring a home by video — as you sit outside in your car — is suddenly a viable option.

Another use for real estate video on smart-phones would be a sixty-second neighborhood tour — photos of houses, nearby stores and restaurants, schools and parks. And that video might link back to a Google map of the neighborhood, with each featured landmark shown on the map.

We’ve also just added the SmarterAgent smart-phone MLS client. This is a tiny app that gives you access to the full Phoenix-area MLS database. You can search for homes any way you want — by address, zip code, school district, MLS number. Even cooler, the app will use your smart-phone’s built-in GPS system to show you listings at your current location.

Is the smart-phone the future of real estate search? Maybe not, but when you spot the house of your dreams, won’t it be nice to find out all about it — right there on the spot?

You can download our smart-phone MLS client by clicking on this link, or simply text HOUND to 87778.

August 26, 2009

Unleashing the power of internet technology on real estate transactions

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

We’re wired Realtors, and we always have been. The very first thing I did as a Realtor was to set up a web site to attract clients. We made money on the internet from the very beginning.

Since then, we’ve adopted every new idea that’s come around, along with inventing quite a few of our own. We publish a national real estate weblog — BloodhoundBlog.com — to help other wired Realtors come to grips with technology.

Because I’m working with a lot of buyers right now — and because buying a home has become such an ordeal — I’ve been working to make my technogeek status even more robust. Good enough is not good enough any longer. If I want for my clients to get the home of their dreams, my offers have to be first, fastest and best.

To that end, I just bought a new Apple MacBook Pro, and I’ve been outfitting it with the software I need to do contracts from anywhere, in the fastest possible time.

The Arizona Association of Realtors gives us all a program called ZipForms as part of our dues. In the abstract, ZipForms makes filling out forms fast and painless. It falls somewhat short of that ideal in reality, but it will do for now.

But ZipForms integrates with a web-based service called DocuSign, which permits me to capture signatures on-line, in the form of e-signatures.

So I can whip out a purchase contract in ZipForms while standing in the kitchen of the house we’re buying. Mrs. Buyer might be at her mom’s house in Albuquerque, while Mr. Buyer is in New York on business.

No matter. I can set up DocuSign for each buyer to sign the contract in sequence, then have it come back to me for my own signature, then forward the whole package to the listing agent. We can literally do the whole job in a half-hour or less — a big improvement over printing and faxing and running documents around to get signatures.

There are more new technologies we’re playing with. I’ll talk about some others next week.

August 24, 2009

Fishing for the details takes the fun out of real estate fish stories

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

“You won’t believe the deal my buddy got on his house. He paid thirty cents on the dollar!”

“You’re right. I don’t believe that.”

“I’m not fooling with you. The house was worth $300,000, and he picked it up for a hundred grand.”

“It was worth $300,000 when?”

“Huh?”

“He got it for $100,000 in what condition?”

“Huh?”

“The house might have been worth $300,000 four years ago. And it might have been in great condition back then, too. What was the list price when your friend put the house under contract?”

“It was listed at $97,500. But the original listing was for $300,000!”

“I don’t doubt it. A lot of homes have been on the market for years. What kind of shape was it in when your friend saw it for the first time?”

“It was great! I mean, there were some holes in the walls, and some of the doors were missing. But it just needed some touch-ups on the paint. And the carpets were hardly stained at all!”

“What was the kitchen like?”

“Cherry! All it needed was a range, an oven, a dishwasher, a microwave and a fridge.”

“In other words everythng but the kitchen sink.”

“No, that was gone, too. But the counters and cabinets were in great shape, just missing a few knobs.”

“So some nice folks bought more home than they could afford during the housing boom. They couldn’t make their payments, so they put the home on the market for more than it was really worth, even back then. It sat on the market for four years, through a normal listing or two, through a short-sale listing, and then it finally sold to your friend as a lender-owned home. Is that about right?”

“You bet! He got a smokin’ deal!”

“Except he didn’t pay thirty cents on the dollar, he paid $2,500 over list.”

“Oh, whatever. Did I tell you about the trout I caught last week at Lake Pleasant? I swear, it was bigger than my arm!”

“Now that I believe.”

August 24, 2009

Why does BloodhoundRealty.com not require registration to use our MLS search? It’s a matter of morality — but the moral is the practical

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

The issue of whether or not to require registration to gain access to MLS search came up at BloodhoundBlog.com, our national real estate industry weblog. This is a topic about which reasonable people can differ, but we have very strong moral reasons for making MLS search freely available. But, as always, the moral is the practical: Behaving the way we do tends to attract precisely the kinds of clients we want to do business with — and for whom we can achieve the best results. The world runs by itself.

This is my take on the issue, quoted from the comments at BloodhoundBlog:

We don’t ask visitors to register for IDX search. We are having our second best year ever, and we should finish the year — having started with five months of near-drought — in the top 1% of income-earners — “the rich.” I have zero data to support my position, because I haven’t collected any, but I believe that much of our recent success owes to the FlexMLS IDX system and our deployment of it. But, even so, we have never insisted upon registration and we never will, for the simple reason that I am not going to treat guests in my home as prey, not now, not ever. Your mileage may vary, and I don’t care, but everything in our lives is philosophy first, and we do not change the way we behave until we have become convinced that our past position was morally wrong. That will not happen in this circumstance.

I would have to go and do the math on self-selected Flex registrants (we register a lot of people who come to us by other means on the site — emails, form responses or phone calls, etc.), but my guess is that we’re skinning cats with one out of three, perhaps more than that. The people we work with tend to repeat, to refer or to become full-blown sneezers, so we know that our overall approach to the people we work with is effective. In any case, I have zero desire to have 24 phone conversations to unearth the one motivated buyer or seller in a double-dozen “leads.” I expect I could do better making random phone calls or handing out business cards at the Circle-K.

I spoke about this at the first BloodhoundBlog Unchained. Everything we do for marketing is devised to get our ideal clients to firmly self-select for us before they ever do anything to make contact. I had a relo form like that today. The form came in at 6:18 am — the prospect is in the midwest. I had a walk-through with an investor, so I didn’t call him until noon. He had found us and stopped shopping. He hadn’t talked to anyone else in the six hours I left available to him. And he thanked me several times, first, for not insisting upon registration, and, second, for not dumbing the IDX system down. In fact, we configured our installation of MLS search to be much more robust than ordinary real estate sites, but we love it — and our clients love it — because we can make it so much more rigorous than ordinary IDX sites.

We target-market for high-Ds and high-Cs — thoughtful, prosperous people who don’t intend to be jerked around. Not jerking them around seems to be a very effective marketing strategy. When we finally add a high-C of our own to our team, we can start to make a stats-based argument. But it won’t make any difference to me. We do business the way we do because we believe it is the right way to do business — in every detail. We have never betrayed our principles for money, and we never will.

When you search the Phoenix-area MLS system on our site, you are using exactly the same tools we are using, from exactly the same database. We give you the most robust search we can, because if a central vacuum system or a heated pool matter to you, then they matter.

But if you want to search the MLS here and then work with another Realtor, feel free. We know we deliver better value to our clients, but we also know that that value proposition only appeals to people who are actively seeking better value. If any old Realtor will do, in your view, then we’re probably not the Realtors for you. The world runs by itself.

But if you have not yet played with our MLS search, dig in. In forthcoming posts, I’ll talk about how to use the logic of the system to pull out some amazing results. But the FlexMLS software is amazing right out of the box. If you take the time to play with it, you’ll never search anywhere else — no matter who your Realtor is.

And if you should start to wonder why other Realtors provide a clunky, dumbed-down MLS search — and have the nerve to ask you to register for the privilege of slogging through it — give us a call. We do everything better, not just MLS search.

August 22, 2009

How real estate transactions can fall apart — and how Realtors work to keep the parties together

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

For a Realtor working with home-buyers, there are three times where a transaction has a high likelihood of falling apart.

The first is during the initial contract negotiations, of course. Buyers and sellers can go through a lot of haggling by counter-offers before they reach a meeting of the minds. And with so much competition for low-priced houses right now, it’s very easy for buyers to dicker themselves right out of a deal.

The second opportunity for a deal to fall apart is during the inspection process and the subsequent repair negotiations. My stock argument to sellers is pretty simple: If you don’t fix it before the buyers move in, they will have to fix it before they move out. If we’re paying full price or something close to it, we deserve to buy a property in turn-key condition.

To complicate matters, FHA and VA loans require that homes be in habitable condition. But lender-owned homes are sold “as-is,” as are most short sales. And even sellers with equity may not be able to afford to undertake needed repairs.

Perhaps surprisingly, the third time when a home sale is at risk of falling apart is at the very last minute, when the Realtors, the lender and the title company are all working full-blast to close the transaction.

It is at this final stage of the process that seemingly insuperable obstacles arise: The lender blocks funding over some previously unobjectionable contract language. The seller has turned off the utilities before the final walk-through. One or more parties get cold feet so bad they are frozen stiff.

Add to all this the outrageous emotional stress that goes along with such a huge, life-altering change. The smallest disruption can set people off when they’re this tightly strung.

But as crazy as things might get, the buyers still want to buy and the sellers still want to sell. It is the job of the Realtors to hold the transaction together when it seems as if every force of nature is conspiring to tear things apart.

August 18, 2009

The perfect in-town location? How about 2 blocks from the light rail?

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

Whether you buy this home as a residence or a rental property, you could not ask for a better location. You’re just two short blocks from the light rail station on 19th Avenue. And just beyond that is The Phoenix Spectrum Mall.

This house, 2040 West Missouri Avenue in Phoenix, is a rock-solid Phoenix ranch home, block construction. But it needs love — which is why it is priced so aggressively.

This home is offered at $104,995, a smokin’ deal. Call your agent to find out how to make it your own.

August 13, 2009

Have you been looking for a “pay-dirt” fix-and-flip candidate? You’ll find a rich vein of ore on Cinnabar Avenue

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

A full-scale remodeling job on an older home consists of two steps: First rip out everything that needs to be replaced. Then install all the new stuff — fixtures, flooring, paint.

This house, 4830 West Cinnabar Avenue in Glendale, is halfway through that process — and, in consequence, it’s selling for half-price.

We all know what makes a good flip: Upside. This is a rock-solid block home in a stable west-side neighborhood. The floorplan is ingenious — but you’ll need to exercise your imagination to see it. But if you’re looking for a fix-and-flip — or a fix-and-rent — or a fix-and-move-in home, you’ve got good bones to start with — and a price to die for.

This home is offered at $84,995 — and turn-key homes in the neighborhood are selling for twice that. Call your agent to find out how to make this home your own. But don’t dally. The property is showing several times a day. This opportunity won’t last long.

August 13, 2009

The buyer’s agent is the unsung hero of the home-buying process

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

When we list a home for sale, two-thirds of everything we will do for the seller will have been done before we hit the MLS.

There is a similar disparity of effort on the buying side: Of all the work your buyer’s agent undertakes in your behalf, two-thirds of it will happen after you have put a home under contract.

That seems counter-intuitive. After all, you depend on your buyer’s agent to shop listings for you, and then to take you around to see them. When the showing is done, the work is done, too, isn’t it?

Far from it. You’ve found the home of your dreams and it’s all you can think about. But your buyer’s agent is busy figuring out how to write exactly the right offer, to make sure you get that home. And once you’re under contract, your agent will start to chip away at a long checklist of tasks that need to be taken care of to successfully close escrow.

There are so many things that can go wrong in the purchase of a home, it’s a wonder anyone ever gets to move. But, more than anyone else in the process, it’s the buyer’s agent who keeps things moving, who organizes all paperwork and gets it where it needs to go, who coordinates the inspectors, who keeps everyone informed and keeps the documents flowing.

And it’s the buyer’s agent who tends to keep the escrow process civil — and civilized. The seller may not want to do repairs or to bring the price down to reflect a low appraisal or to move out in time to permit a thorough final walk-through. It’s the buyer’s agent’s job to smile and sweet-talk the seller and the listing agent, to keep the transaction in motion when it seems always to want to grind to a halt.

You found a home you love, and that’s great. But if you make it all the way to close of escrow, it’s because your buyer’s agent was plugging away behind the scenes, day after day, to make it happen.

August 11, 2009

What’s the best rental home to buy? One with the tenant already in.

by Greg Swann

Sun City Real Estate Broker

Picture a charming home in a shady corner of Phoenix. Good bones, reliable block construction, mature landscaping. Now give it the best feature of all, for a real estate investor: A performing tenant already living in the property.

That’s what you’ll find at 2425 West Cheery Lynn Road in Phoenix.

The house itself is sweet, and the location could not be more perfect: Minutes from downtown Phoenix, seconds from the I-17 Freeway. But the presence of the tenant means that this home will be cash-flow positive from the day you buy it. No months of frustration waiting for a lease-up. No angry glares from your spouse as an alligator eats up your savings.

This home is offered at $109,995. Call your agent to find out how quickly you can add it to your investment portfolio.