Housing recovery prediction: Next year - Santa Cruz Sentinel
June 30, 2008
It’s time once again to play the game - when is the housing market going to recover? The Santa Cruz Sentinel is taking another stab at it:
[From Housing recovery prediction: Next year - Santa Cruz Sentinel]
Don’t expect the housing market to recover this year.
Robert Kleinhenz, deputy chief economist for the California Association of Realtors, forecasts a turnaround next spring.
Just thought I’d pass that along. I had a bunch more stuff I wanted to talk about, but it’s 11:33 PM and I still have lots more “real” work to do tonight before hitting the hay and gettin’ back at it tomorrow morning bright and early.
Posted by SantaCruzBroker at 11:34pm
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From Santa Cruz to Vegas
May 22, 2008
I’m goin’ to Vegas. And no, I didn’t just win the Superbowl, but at times it feels like I did. Other times, it feels like I’ve just been pushed under a bus. Such is the real estate bidness.
I’m going to come right out and admit it: I love Las Vegas. Las Vegas is one of those really polarizing town - you either hate it, or you love it. I have yet to meet anyone who told me, “I feel kind of lukewarm about Las Vegas.” That town seems to bring out some really visceral reactions in people.
As it happens, I’m not going there to have a good time, although I may, in spite of what’s on the agenda. I’m going there to attend a couple of seminars - two in the same week! One seminar is so I can get started on getting my CRS Designation. I’m a great believer in Realtor designations - those are the strings of letters you often see after Realtor’s names: Joe Blow, Realtor, GRI, ABR, SRES. Sound familiar? I have two Realtor designations - GRI (Graduate of the Realtor Institute) and e-Pro (”e-Professional”).
Why do I believe in getting designations, especially since hardly anyone outside the business knows what they mean? For several reasons. One reason is that there is very little training and education that is required for Realtors, really. The barrier of entry is just so low into this profession, all kinds of hacks and wannabes fill our ranks. Getting designations is just one little way to differentiate yourself - at a glance - from the rest of the crowd. Another reason is that I actually care about being knowledgeable and professional, and a little education and training never hurts. And, while I said that hardly anyone outside the real estate profession knows what those designations mean, many of my colleagues in the industry (especially experienced, long-serving Realtors) do know what those mean, and when you see an offer coming in from someone with, say, a CRS designation, you kind of know that this person is likely to have something of a clue as to how the business actually works.
I actually have another designation, too, but it’s not a Realtor® designation. I’m an RDCPro - a Residential Default Certified Professional; in other words, I’m a certified “expert” in REO (”real estate owned” - bank-owned foreclosure property). And that brings me to the other seminar happening in Vegas the week I’m going.
There’s a super-secret, invitation-only, one-day conference going on. Actually, I didn’t get invited, sniff. But I heard about it, and I wrote in and asked to be invited, and they sent me an invitation. I also invited one of my colleagues, who is bound and determined to break into the REO business. This super-secret REO conference is to last just a single day, right smack in the middle of the CRS seminars. So I’ll do one two-day CRS seminar, take a day off to play in Vegas, then do this REO seminar, and then two more days of CRS seminars…and then on Sunday, I’ll fly home.
It’s going to be pretty punishing. Not the seminars, not Las Vegas - no no. It’s going to be punishing staying away from my business right now, for a whole week, during the busiest time of year - how many deals will I lose? Also, when I come home, how much work will have piled up on my plate? I shudder to think. But, onward and upward - I am committed to being the highest caliber Realtor I can be, and if I have to go through Vegas on that journey, well that’s just as well. I’ll be out of town from June 8 to June 15 - I’ll bring a laptop with me, of course, and my cell phone - I’ll be out of town, but not out of touch.
Posted by SantaCruzBroker at 8:04am
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Home sales see first monthly gain in 6 months
May 21, 2008
I’m drinking my coffee and seeing what’s new in the world via my handy RSS Reader NetNewsWire, and I came across this interesting article on SFGate.com:
The Bay Area housing market displayed its first positive sign in months as the volume of April sales rose by its highest percentage in at least 20 years. Real estate experts, however, warned that the trough of the real estate downturn still could lie ahead.
Yeah, I know, it’s the Bay Area, not Santa Cruz - but what happened in Santa Cruz mirrored what happened in the bay area - namely, sales were up sharply, as reported in the Santa Cruz Sentinel in their article on Santa Cruz April 2008 home sales on May 14. They didn’t quote me in that article, sniff, although the reporter, Jondi Gumz, did send me an e-mail asking me to weigh in, I guess I replied too late in the day or my comments weren’t pithy enough - or both.
What it all means is that it looks like we are getting near the bottom. We are probably not be there yet - except in Watsonville, where we definitely are at the bottom. Unless there’s a big fat recession with big job loss, which of course would probably signal a deepening spiral further downwards. I think 2008 is going to turn out to be the Year to Buy in Santa Cruz. Don’t let it pass you by.
Posted by SantaCruzBroker at 8:59am
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That Keller Williams Kool-Aid
May 13, 2008
I recently completed a transaction as the buyer’s agent with an agent for Keller Williams. It was a short sale, and yes, it dragged on for months - we got into contract in January, and closed in late April. After all was said and done, the seller’s agent and I agreed to meet for coffee and to exchange some final documents and so I could get the key to pass on to my buyers.
You may not be aware of this, but Keller Williams agents are kind of messianic about their company. They love it over there. A few months back during the Watsonville REO tour that we had, I had met another KW agent, and she spoke in glowing terms of her company, and in particular about this training that they had, which was open to agents from any brokerage, not just Keller Williams.
So when I was sitting down for coffee with the seller’s agent, I started talking to her about Keller Williams and the training that they provide. Not surprisingly, she was very enthusiastic and encouraged me to come on down for the next training session they were putting on. I agreed to do so, and so yesterday I sat through 2.5 hours of training on getting listings, put on by a very able and passionate trainer.
As promised, the training was excellent. Honestly, probably better than any real estate training I have been to. There’s one thing in particular I took away from that training, which I want to share with you. If you are a seller, please sit down, pour yourself a nice tall glass of kool-aid, and listen to this.
Keller Williams has a pretty good pricing strategy. It’s simple, and it goes like this: price your home below “market price.” A good bit below. Like, 10% below. Then, market the heck out of it and wait 21 days before taking offers. The buyers will beat a path to your door so quick it will make the neighbors upset because obviously, you’re having one heck of a party and they didn’t get invited.
A home which is priced clearly below market value will attract multiple offers. There is good example of this every day, with these REO properties. The banks price these things low. They price them to sell. And they do, quickly, and usually with multiple offers. It is very common for these properties to sell for over asking price, often by 10%.
This pricing strategy is an excellent one, especially in a market like today’s. In an appreciating seller’s market, it’s not such a bad thing to over-price your property by 10% - sooner or later, the market will catch up to you, and you’ll probably end up getting that extra 10% if you wait long enough. However, when you are in a declining market, if you do not sell your home quickly, the market will probably pass you right on by.
In a declining market, people don’t want to buy for fair market price, because the market price is dropping, and next month, it’s going to be worth less than it was the month before. You need to list your property under fair market price, attract multiple offers, and sell it for the most the market is willing to pay for at the moment.
That’s a winning strategy, and it’s working spectacularly for the banks selling their foreclosure properties, and it is also working for sellers who price their homes to sell.
I’m going back to Keller Williams on Wednesday for another training. Not sure what it’s about. And yes, I know, it’s all a trap. They want to seduce you into signing up with them by providing world-class training gratis and showing you that there’s a better way to sell Real Estate. I have no intention of leaving Thunderbird Real Estate at the moment - I’ve long thought that my next step after Thunderbird would be to open my own brokerage (I’m a licensed real estate broker, after all). But if one day you see me sportin’ a mustache and talking feverishly about how great KW is, you’ll know how it all began.
Posted by SantaCruzBroker at 8:28am
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Santa Cruz Real Estate - What’s In, What’s Out
April 22, 2008
This morning I was frantically running off a few flyers for one of my listings in Watsonville (a great mobile home in an awesome park - check it out). I needed to do a few errands down in Watsonville before my weekly office meeting, and loading up the flyer box at this listing was one important thing on my list. As I was standing by the printer waiting for the job to complete, the managing broker of Thunderbird comes up to me and asks if I’d like to participate on a panel.
“Panel?” I said, “Sure! What panel?” You know me, I never look a gift horse in the mouth - if the boss is going to give me an opportunity to be in front of a bunch of potential real estate buyers, I’m there! She explained: “We’re putting on a discussion about what’s in, what’s out in today’s Santa Cruz real estate market. We’re getting a few lenders together and some of the agents in the office to do a public event. I’d like to invite you to come along and talk about foreclosures in Santa Cruz, because that’s what everybody is probably going to want to know about.”
Hey, sounds good. I know about all kinds of real estate aside from foreclosures, but I imagine they’ll let me chime in if I have something I feel needs to be said on another topic. Here are the topics slated for discussion:
- What is the current state of the mortgage industry?
- What loan programs work best in the current market?
- What strategies can buyers use to best position themselves to buy?
- What is the prognosis for interest rates in 2008?
- What do home prices look like now?
- What is a short sale and how do I buy a home through a short sale?
- Why is now a good time to buy?
- What are some ideas to help me sell my house now?
- How can I use the Internet to help me buy or sell a home?
You, dear reader, may have noticed that there’s no topic about buying foreclosure real real estate. Presumably that topic will be added to the next version of the flyer they are handing out.
The panel discussion will be held on Thursday, May 8th at 6:00 PM at Santa Cruz Title Company in Capitola - 1955 41st Avenue, just three doors down from Starbucks (behind the Burger King, Citibank, and various other corporate logos).
If you are interested in going, please call my office to sign up: (831) 475-8400. Or, just contact me and I’ll put you on the list. They say “Space is Limited, Call now to Reserve a Seat” - but I don’t imagine the fire marshall will be on-hand to shut us down if we should exceed the rated capacity from the room. But if you do register ahead of time, we’ll probably make sure there are enough cookies for everyone (no promises).
Posted by SantaCruzBroker at 8:50pm
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