Twin Cities Real Estate

Price vs Product

Last night I had one of those rare nights where at 8:00 PM I was sitting comfortable in front of the TV letting my mind go to mush.  My husband Charles changes the channel when a commercial comes on.  He's off to see the score on a game, or seeing what some CSI is doing.  It drives me crazy.  He was not home so I got to see the entire show commercials and all.  I found an interesting thing about the commercials.  They were putting the price first and the product features second.

It reinforced what I was perceiving, money vs. product.  Pillsbury was selling these biscuits and rather than telling me how homemade they were and how good they were for my body, or how I would be making my family so happy, they told me the biscuits were 31 cents apiece. Target has changed their ads from being just trendy to telling us exactly how much that product is at their store.  As the model is going off to his job interview I know he is wearing a $19.99 tie.  This is all new.  We used to sell product and the consumer nicely fell into line and bought it.  Not today when the dollar is not going far enough for the typical family.

Listen up sellers.  This trend is happening in house sales.  The seller wants to fight it, but in the end if they truly want to sell their home, they need to sell price rather than house.  That is a difficult task as sellers have pride in their houses. They know the cost of all their improvements, and they want to see a return on their investment.  The buyer sees it differently.  They know supply, value decline, and they will wait until the price reduction happens. 

Sellers get ready for the "blue light special!"

Give Yourself a Gift

Buying a house is a bit like buying a gift for yourself.  A gift is not all about price but it is about giving something that you feel will give pleasure to someone.  A house not only should be a roof over your head but it should give one pleasure.

Right now buying a house is all about price and not about pleasure.  I think that is a shame.  I will hold a house open and the first question before the person will step in the house is ,what is the price, how long has it been on the market, when was the last price reduction, and what is the motivation of the seller?  Hello, do you even like the house?  Come on in and look around.

My buyers when they first start liking a house first will want to know how cheap they can get the house for.  Will this be a deal?  My question back is, "Does this house speak to you?  "Do you feel it meets most of what your are dreaming for? Yes, it is important to have a house fit into one's budget, but you just don't buy because it is a good deal, you buy because you "love" it.  My mother-in-law has a house full of things she has bought on sale and they remain in their boxes and have never been used.  I argue that if she had bought one thing she really wanted and not all the "stuff", she would have saved money.

A buyer should not look at the list price and think how much less can I buy this house for.  They should first look at the house, fall in love, and then buy for they perceive the value or not buy if they don't see the value.  A person buys a cashmere sweater because it looks good, feels good, and will last longer than a knock-off.  You know, the same is true with a house.  You buy a sold house and it will look good, last longer, and make you feel good. Go buy a gift for yourself, a house.  I'll even tie a ribbon on the door for you.

Never Give Up

We are told as little people just starting to walk and falling down, to pull ourselves up and try again.  After people have been hurt and are in therapy, they are told to keep putting one foot in front of each other.   The Minnesota Twins looked this evening as if they were going to lose their second game of the season. Perhaps some fans even went home as it did not look good.  Never fear, those guys pulled themselves together at the end of the game and won.  In other words they never gave up. 

Those of us in the real estate industry need to realize this is the 9th inning and we can't lose this game .Too many "fans" depend on us.  It is our live hood, investments of our clients, and the dreams of our buyers.   We have taken for too many months grief from the media, bankers, appraisers, our clients, and from fellow Realtors.  It is time to go to bat for ourselves and the team. 

As my mother would say, "Square those shoulders and go out the door and face the music."  We need to smile, stop pointing fingers of blame, tell sellers to list correctly, tell buyers to buy fairly, and tell lenders to "show us the money."  We can be the little ant that pushes the grain of oat up a big hill.  We can be the small town team in Indiana that wins the state basketball tournament. We can be Tiger Woods that comes back from knee surgery to win. We can and we will do it.  Watch out media we are out to prove you wrong, but of course you won't put that story on the front page.

Friends and Family

Friends and family can be on our phone plans, they can be at our family events, and they can be the ones to give advice when purchasing.  The last combination can be deadly to a real estate transaction. 

Recently I had a buyer who wanted to see a property for the second time and she wanted to bring a male friend along for a second set of eyes.  He was not the type of friend who reinforced her decision but rather he questioned every part of the house.  He wondered why a certain brand of windows was chosen when he thought X was a better brand.  He would not have laid the ceramic tiles in that direction, but he would have gone this way.  I had to bite my tongue as he dissected the house.  I causally asked him what he did for a living, and he told me he was a graphic designer.  I chatted some more and asked him if he had done remodeling.  He told me he has bought one house and he has not done much to it.  This was the expert that was helping the buyer make her decision.

After completing the rounds she turned to him and asked him what he thought.  I held my breath and made eye contact with him.  I wondered what he would say.  He said, "Well, I don't know much about houses but I guess this one is okay."  She then asked me and I said," You best know if the house meets your needs.  You will hire an inspector to find out the "health" of the house.  Remember, this house was built in 1930 and there have been several families that have lived here and made changes.  They are not here to tell us why they did what.  As long as they did not reduce the integrity of the house, I think you will be fine."  She has written an offer and now will see what that inspector says.

Friends and family should be supportive, but they must be careful not to overstep their bounds when they do not have the credentials to do so.  Being a friend can mean we think the ugly house they have fallen in love with is just grand.

Must See

"Must See TV"  NBC  in the early 90's created a formula for success.  They took four sitcoms and one drama and put them back to back keeping people hooked on their station through the night.  This formula had several sitcoms Friends, Will & Grace, Frasier, and Seinfeld that kept viewers glued to their seats and prepared for the drama of ER. The sitcoms have come and gone, but that drama ER has been there for viewers for 15 years.  Tonight it goes off the air. 

"Must See TV" did affect my real estate practice for a number of years.  I would ask people to meet with me on a Thursday night, and person after person was busy.  I realized it was that block of TV shows that they were watching.  I learned not to fight it but to see it now and then.  The characters of these sitcoms became part of our American culture.  We talked like them, had haircuts like theirs, and even started decorating our houses like where they lived.  The invention of machines that could tape the show and allow us to watch TV at our convince changed the "must see Thursday." 

Still, I see the remains of the influence of that night.  People still want to have a group of close friends that hang out at a coffee shop.  We have the doors taken off cupboards and we show our dishes and  we create the loft look in our properties.

We talk about these characters as if they were part of our circle of friends.  We watch returns or buy the series and really don't let go of these moments of having these people enter our lives.

Tonight we will see the last of the man  cast of characters that have been the medical team that have introduced us to diseases that many doctors don't even know about.  We will see the last of doctors falling in and out of love with one another. We will see the end of the "unreal" ER room.  Wait, I still have "Gray's Anatomy" I can get my fix on.

Who is the Fool?

Historically April Fool's Day is a blur as to why it is.  Some think it is because the Gregorian Calendar had been adopted and some "fools" still were going by the Julian Calendar. Another theory is that May 1st in most cultures is the start of spring and the planting season.  The "fool" was the person who did their planting on April 1st.  Get this, in Minnesota you are still the "fool" if you plant May 1st.

It does not matter how the day came to be, it is here.  Over the years radio and TV have played some noted pranks on the public.  Some employees were fired as the pranks were too real and caused panics. I never found the pranks funny and when they are played on you, they are even worse.  Our son when he was living out of state called early in the morning on April 1st and told us he was in jail and needed help.  We had woken from a dead sleep and it took a few minutes for us to put it all together.  I don't remember us laughing.  When I was in high school twins used to exchange classes and pulled the prank on their teachers and friends.  I don’t think those people found it that funny when it was played on them.

A word to the wise, let this day pass and get on with April 2nd.  Mother nature played her own prank with those snowflakes this morning.