Advice for Pricing Your Home in Today’s Market
In yesterday’s blog, I touched on the unwillingness of sellers to come down off of their list prices. I have a few more things to say about pricing a home.
This is an interesting phase in the market in terms of how to price a house. In the seller’s market of 2005, when real estate prices [...]
Advice for Buyers and Sellers in a Changing Market
I’ve been negotiating a few contracts and am noticing an interesting trend. It seems that the number of cases in which a buyer can get a home for a drastic reduction from the list price is diminishing. Over the past month, I have dealt with real estate contracts all over town: Mt. Pleasant, Hollywood/Meggett, Downtown [...]
Tales from Midtown Open House
I think the worst part of the market downturn is past for the Charleston area. We see more and more showings on our listings all the time, and the number of buyers who seem to be actively looking has more than doubled. I think prices for real estate are already discounted, and people should not [...]
Spring has Sprung in the Lowcountry…
…and that means it’s time to wash away those winter blues! In fact, according to the Soap and Detergent Association (did you even know there was such a thing) three-quarters of Americans engage in spring-cleaning. In fact, their surveys indicated that more than 80 percent of people who spring clean agree that it helps them [...]
Escrow vs. Pre-Closing Repairs vs. Allowances
As promised, here is the skinny on getting repairs done in conjunction with a closing. Each method has its positives and negatives, which I will now outline.
Take the following example: home goes under contract, home inspection is completed, revealing the need for repairing a leak in the roof. Per the South Carolina Real Estate Contract, [...]
Hints for Closing Day
I finally had my dual agency closing on Friday. Boy, was I glad to get that one closed. The hard thing about Dual Agency is that you have double the amount of people to worry about. The closing was actually a bit of a pain because the mortgage company did not get [...]
Termites and the CL-100 Letter
Many people who are relocating to the Charleston area, and even some who aren’t, are shocked and dismayed to learn that we have termites here. While the word “termite” has some pretty scary connotations, they are simply a fact of life in the Lowcountry, and with a bit of risk management, should not be [...]
The “Short Sale” and Foreclosure
I spent yesterday looking at more property in Hanahan, Goose Creek, and Summerville. It seems like once we work the size my client wants into the price range she needs, we are looking at greatly discounted houses, which turn out to either need a lot of work, or be a short sale situation, or [...]
Dual Agency
I have a dual-agency closing coming up for a listing in Hanahan. Dual agency is where I represent both the buyer and the seller. In a normal agency situation, I would represent only one client, and would of course uphold that client’s interests over the other person in the transaction, who, presumably, has [...]
Staging: The most important tool to sell your house.
Sometime this week, I am going to help Jeff stage one of his listings in North Charleston. He’s been getting some negative feedback in terms of its showing condition, and our conclusion has been that the place needs a “Woman’s Touch” as it is currently set up as a bachelor pad. They have [...]
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