Everything But the Kitchen Sink & The Avenues

A short while ago, I "wrote" about a little place I was getting ready to list in The Avenues here. It was not ready to sell at that time, but it is now. Albeit there still needs to be some clean up and straightening--It's time to sell it. The last item to attend to was the kitchen sink. It had aged a bit and needed tile replacing in certain areas. Now that it's done, we are on our way.

"But wait," you might say. "Aren't you just a Fremont real estate broker? What's with this Menlo Park business? and The Avenues"? First of all, Menlo Park is beautiful and the listing call was a great excuse for me to take just a short drive over the Dumbarton bridge over to The Avenues. I love that area as you can tell by my attempt at some expository writing in the aforementioned blog post. I did not know it was called The Avenues at that time. Second, was the fact that I just knew I could help this seller get her goal of selling The Avenues house and moving into Fremont. Lastly, technology has made out-of-area listings much more palatable for the office to work with. Proximity is good, and it is something I preach to my agents, but we knew we had a good handle on it.

One necessary evil, some might say, is to chat up an agent or two in that area and find out the local tips and tricks to maximize the listing strength. I did just that. Here's what I found out that I did not know previously or just needed affirmation. First, I became reaffirmed that we had priced very well. Second, I learned that there is a huge difference between 5th Ave. and say 18th or 16th Ave., The Avenues. The latter being extremely desirable and part of what is referred to as "The Avenues." Nice touch, I thought. What's more, is that "The Avenues" belongs to FOBA (Fair Oaks Beautification Association) where the residents are encouraged to go beyond just upkeep, and it is working. The largest contributor to this well-found news was Shelly Roberson of Palo Alto. She owned properties in The Avenues some time ago and not only loved the area, but watched the area as FOBA went to work and beutification took place as well as the equity build up. She had many good things to say about our listing over all and was quite helpful. Needless to say, all the agents in the SCCAOR (Santa Clara Association of Realtorsa) were polite, helpful and wanted to share. I wonder if BEAR (Bay East Assoc. of Realtors), the membership I belong to, would behave the same way.

After we had reciprocated the listing in The Avenues, we have syndicated the listing to more than 50 websites using Point2Homes and http://www.tricityhome.com (as a cute featured property at the time of this writing) more will follow suit I'm sure, but it will not end there. I plan on using many different means of getting information out as I hold the flag for Bay East Association of Realtors in "The Avenues."
By Jeff Pereyda