I Listed Hell, It Sold--A Powerful Technique Revealed

When Realtors are asked to take a listing, they don't see just stucco, studs and foundation. Since Realtors are people too, what may normally be viewed as just a property that will soon change title is seen more as a home, being part of the family it belongs to. Well, recently I was not asked to sell a home nor just stucco, studs and foundation--but rather a piece of hell itself. (This is not the actual photo).

The home was smitten with crack shacks in the backyard and with several people-sized holes in the fences that allowed these shacks to be so frequented that users had to make reservations to get in. I found out later that the main house too had a secret passage in with no lack of want from vagabonds and other scary people. Had it not been for the story attached to the owner, I would have passed on taking the listing. Something had to be done. Realtors have hearts contrary to some beliefs.

It was a sad but all too common story that many of you have witnessed as well--The owner/seller could no longer maintain the home to say the least; not to mention the loan. Both had gone by the wayside. He, along with the fully grown children living at the house, had no means to stay afloat. Of course my opinions on that were nay the time nor the place. As the owner left the property, it got even worse.

The owner had to move away, and or the sake of brevity, I dare not go into details about the home's condition, nor the repeated break ins during the listing period. But in short, the situation was iniquitous and getting dangerous. My wife did not want me going back to check up on the listing by myself. And, I admit, that property truly felt transgression when I did.

I ruminated on the real estate proverb, "A listing only needs one buyer. And his joy shall come forth from it's foundation." I prayed for that one buyer to arrive--to save the home from destruction. That one buyer came, saw the property, realized it's "vision" and wrote an offer.

Stunned, I entertained my own vision of the buyer mimicking the character of Jules from Pulp Fiction quoting Ezekiel 25:17 before writing the offer. I agree that the house needs to be cleansed, but please don't take my divine retribution reference for the house or this post too seriously but as tongue and cheek.

The powerful technique was prayer and the answer was truly heaven sent. I do count my blessings, but I won't count my chickens just yet. It still has to close escrow. Never the less, it seems that good will triumph over evil once more.

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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You Posted A Forward? Why You Lazy...

I am no economist, but my eyebrows raised when a long-time trusted escrow officer actually forwarded this to me.

It is not my info nor is it from my site, so no credit goes to me. Judge or yourself. If I dig a little, I can find out who wrote this and let you know.

They wrote:
-----

I'm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG.
Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to all Americans as a "Dividend".

To make the math simple, let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide
U.S. Citizens 18+ Our population is about 301,000,000 +/- counting every man, woman and
child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up..
So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billion that equals to a
hefty "$425,000.00."

My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a "Dividend"
Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So let's assume a tax rate of 30%.
Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25.5
Billion right back to Uncle Sam.

But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket.
A husband and wife have $595,000.00. What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?

• Pay off your mortgage - "housing crisis solved"
• Repay college loans - "a great boost to new grads"
• Put away money for college - "it'll be there"
• Save it in a bank - "create money to loan to entrepreneurs"
• Buy a new car - "create jobs"
• Invest in the market - "capital drives growth"
• Pay for your parent's medical insurance =E 2 "health care improves"

Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it...instead of trickling out If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every
adult U S Citizen 18+

As for AIG - liquidate it and Sell off its parts.
Sell off the real estate. Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

Here's my rationale. We deserve it and "AIG doesn't" we were not invited to the last 10 years of "party time" bonuses.

And remember, this plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because
$25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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C'mon, Let's Face It!--On facebook (tm)

You may not know this yet, but my blog needs readership. Yes, your reading it now, but just look at my comments on my previous blogs. My Livermore real estate website website http://www.tricityhome.com gets quite a bit of traffic, but my blog?--I have 0. Go ahead and comment. Shock me.

My Active Rain blog is a mirror of this one, and it gets some readership due to the fact that Active Rain bloggers simply feed off Active Rain, kind of an obsession with those bloggers there.

But more on facebook is being published all the time. Lee Aase, the Chancellor of Social Media University, Global (SMUG) writes references to the news media about the applications of facebook below.

Here are some links to major news coverage about Facebook:

• USA Today
• Newsweek cover story
• TIME
• LA Times on application development in Facebook
• Fred Vogelstein’s LA Times essay on Facebook.
• Two articles in MarketWatch (Lee Aase is quoted here and here.)

Granted, I am very new to facebook and it's applications, but you can bet that facebook is an innovation in the home and in the business world. And, I will definitely be looking closer into the ways that it can help our office and our industry. At least there people write on my "wall."

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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What Does Dental Floss and Net Sheets Have In Common?

I have a great mentor/broker friend that I as a broker confide in sometimes. We share ideas and sometimes war stories.

I heard the latest doozy of his through his wife which allowed the story to leave more to the imagination, and it went something like this:

Fred, mentor, had been working with a young couple who qualified as buyers for around $400k. Fred drove them around for months in and around a not so nearby city in an obligation to help them in buying a home. Cudos.

Last week, an amazing listing became available for sale by an elderly couple selling their home. They had really fixed up their place with dual pane windows, granite counter tops, etc. Ready to move in, the offer was made, and very gratifyingly, accepted. Needless to say, the young buyers were beside themselves in elation. So was Fred. He was in pain and needed the lift in his spirits. The escrow came right around the same time Fred had the unfortunate but very necessary appointment with the dental surgeon, a 4 hour surgery appointment during that week.

The sellers of the new escrow, the elderly couple, were also in escrow for a replacement home in Florida and had been working with a Realtor there to get the job done. During that week, Fred received a call from FL. The agent representing the Florida purchase performed a net sheet (four days after the FL escrow opened) and the news was bad. It turns out that the Florida buyers could nowhere near purchase the property or hardly any other property for that matter and had to cancel the agreement both in FL and alas with Fred and his new buyers here.

Fury, tears and lawsuits were in the air. Fred, pained by speech, worked hard to calm things down, but the tears of the pain would remain for quite some time for the down trodden buyers due to the loss of their home and Fred because his mouth hurt.

Should the agent in FL have performed the net sheet a bit sooner--you think?

FYI, Fred's surgery went as scheduled with few mishaps.

Word to the wise. Do the net sheet ASAP.  And, brush and floss regularly.

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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What's a Livermore Home Buyer Agent to Do? Here's One!

Every home owner has found those "Just Listed" cards in their mailbox, then as an afterthought, tossed them in the trash. Well, as part of my GRI (Graduate, Realtor Institute) education a while back, I had the fortunate experience of learning some great marketing tricks while at the same time not upsetting the delicate ethical goings on of the real estate industry. One of these such tricks was a postcard.

For the agent who represents the seller, (the listing agent) they get to mail out all kinds of things for the homes they are listing:

• Just Listed: Livermore Beauty w/ Huge Lot
• Pending: Livermore Home for Sale
• Just Sold: Livermore Home for Sale

Well, there are many buyer agents out there that can use the exposure too. Often, the buyer agent's credit gets swept under the rug while the listing agent gets all the glory for selling the house. But really, there are some agents that mostly represent buyers, and they do it quite well. Furthermore, why shouldn't they promote their services to the immediate community? It turns out that a buyer's agent must get permission from the listing brokerage to advertise or promote a home for sale that belongs to the listing brokerage. It's a bit of a hassle, and most buyer agents seem to let it go. Now, they do not have to.

Back to the postcard. In one of my GRI classes, the instructor had the idea of using a different title in the post cards that allow the buyer's agent to have a reason to get postcards sent out. Instead of having "Just Listed" in the headline, why not have it read, "My Buyer Just Bought?" Capital idea!

Several things on the buyer agents agenda get a booster shot. The "My Buyer Just Bought" card:

1. Gets the Livermore buyers agent name out in the community.
2. Promotes (Livermore home owners/sellers http://www.tricityhome.com take notice).
3. Eliminates the need to ask for Livermore listing broker permission.

So, to all you buyer agents out there--there's now another great way to get noticed for the hard work you do.

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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Sunnyvale CA Homes vs. Fremont CA Homes

I live and work in Fremont CA. I used to live in Sunnyvale CA for most of my years growing up. So, when I took a listing in the Parkmont area of Fremont in July of 07 and got 2 showings in one month, (very low), I got a bit involved in some unique statistic gathering.

I wanted to find out percentage of turnaround in competing areas. Percentage of turnaround is the number of homes that have been bought and sold within a measurable duration of time. It's important to know because this figure will tell us what areas are moving real estate. What's more, is that turnaround determines both supply and demand. Measuring the number of homes for sale on the market is one thing, but measuring the number of homes purchased within a unit of time reflects the demand for the area and completes it's economical circle.

Putting some of the math aside, the basic concept is to count all of the listings that have been listed within the last 3 months (this is the duration that I needed at that time). Out of those listings of homes for sale in Fremont (for example), you then need to determine how many have sold during that time. You now have the first part of the calculation, the difference between the two categories. Divide the difference by the number of total listings, and you will have a percentage of turnaround. I have the results below for competing areas of Fremont CA homes for sale and Sunnyvale CA homes for sale.

It turns out the Fremont CA homes http://www.tricityhome.com turnaround during May 1st--July 31st, 2007 were measuring in at 14.7% (yuk). That means that out of 100 homes listed for 3 months, less than 15 homes sold in that time. The other 85 homes out of 100 sat on the market testing the patients of both seller and agent. As an aside, interestingly, the sellers viewed the agents as the first target for the blame. I was included in this, and it is understandable from a limited point of view. We realtors are the window to the real estate world for the clients. However, in short, Realtors were not the blame. Let's get back to the point. Sunnyvale came in at a whopping 47% turnaround. About half sold in 3 months and in 6 months, most of the rest were gone too. That's more than 3X more turnaround than Fremont--Sunnyvale kicked the pants off of Fremont. Were the realtors better in Sunnyvale? No. What made the difference? I have my suspicions.

My chief suspect is socioeconomic. Most of the homes purchased in Sunnyvale were surrounded by the demand for a location relative to the center of the technology industry. It's been the heart of the silicon valley since the 70's. It still is. Schools also played an important factor. Although Mission San Jose High School in Fremont is ranked in the top 10 nationwide, it only makes up a small geographic area within Mission San Jose High School's attendance map. Home prices tend to be inflated in the Mission San Jose area as well anyway due to homeowner perceptions of value relative to a school. Schools in Sunnyvale rank very high as well. Although it may not be safe to say that Sunnyvale just happens to have more "established," and "high tech" buyers than Fremont, conversations with other brokers in both areas tend to support this thought in part.

As a by product of the statistical study, we noticed that home prices stayed stronger in Sunnyvale and were not shaken in the negative direction by the economy. In Fremont, sellers and agents were quick to reduce home prices in order to create a demand and help bring in the buyer force. The sellers who reduced quickly, got their homes sold. The home in Fremont (the one from our office that prompted this study) did not reduce quickly enough. The seller did not feel it necessary to do so. Hence, it became a statistic of one of the 85% of homes that sat. In fact, it never sold. I did, however, sell one of its neighbors who reduced their price. I handed them their keys last week. For those in Fremont who reduced too little too late, Ouch.

by Jeff Pereyda

• Phone: 510 742-3212
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