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Tips for improving curb appeal 2007-09-13 02:54:33 When selling your home, the goal is to sell it quickly at the highest price while investing as little as possible in renovations. With a limited budget and a little effort, you can greatly increase your home’s appeal by focusing on what buyers will see on the first visit.  If they don’t like what they see outside, they’ll never walk inside. Curb appeal can often mean the difference between a house sitting for months or selling in the first week. The view from the street can net you more traffic than you might think. Eighty-four percent of all home buyers use the Internet to shop for a new home, according to 2006 figures from the National Association of Realtors. First impression is key. People shopping on the Internet give it one look. If they don’t like what they see, that’s it. Here are a few tips to help you prepare your house for sale: Tip #1: Refresh the Exterior First impressions count when it comes to selling a home. A majority of buyers wi ...

Guest Post: The Front Lines 2007-09-12 16:34:46 This post was removed at the author’s request as the guest author felt that it was being misconstrued and therefore I have honored their request. — Morgan Share This ...

Appealing to Eyes and Ears of Buyers 2007-09-12 15:10:37 by Jim Adair One of the main reasons I wanted to sell my last house was because of the smell. It was an old semi-detached home, and our neighbours had a basement kitchen where they did a lot of cooking. The gourmet food they cooked may have smelled great to them, but the odours that leaked and lingered into our house were not pleasant for us. A new poll by Royal LePage shows that the odour of a home has a huge impact on buyers’ decisions about whether to buy a home. The idea of “staging” a home to make it look attractive to buyers has become popular during the last decade, with many new home staging companies offering advice about how to make the house more attractive to buyers. The poll says that while appearance and cleanliness are important, 53 per cent of buyers said strong odours such as pet and cigarette smells had a stronger impact on their impression of a home than overall tidiness and cleanliness, strong wall colours, or an outdated facade and landscapin ...

Options for placing buttons at the bottom of a form 2007-09-12 13:04:10 The other day Dana was busy exploring new treatments for the buttons for our offer wizard and Leo found this very relevant article on the subject, Primary & Secondary Actions in Web Forms which explores the subject using eye tracking tests: While the primary goal of most Web form designs is to get people through a form as quickly and painlessly as possible, there are situations where slowing people down is advisable. When choosing between primary and secondary actions, visual distinctions are a useful method for helping people make good choices. ...

Toronto area housing starts fall 2007-09-12 07:54:03 Sales of new homes in the Toronto area remain healthy, but that isn’t being reflected in current housing starts, according to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp. Starts edged down in August to a seasonally adjusted and annualized 32,000 from 35,100 in July, the federal housing agency reported yesterday. One problem has been that developers are having trouble getting work crews, which are too busy with single detached housing to work on condominiums. “While pre-construction sales of condominium apartments remained at record levels over the past year, condominium apartment starts have been lower,” said CMHC senior market analyst Jason Mercer. “The answer to this conundrum lies with the fact that builders have completed fewer condominium projects this year and have not been able to shift as many resources to new projects.” The current slowdown could cause capacity problems in the future, said Brian Johnston, who heads the Ontario Home Builders’ Associ ...

First-time buyer issues 2007-09-12 03:03:17 Consider closing costs when buying a home Buying your first home is an exciting process. You determined how much home you can afford, you saved your down payment, you and your real estate prodessional found the perfect home and your offer was accepted. While the purchase price of your home is the largest cost you will encounter, there are other costs to prepare for when buying a home. It’s a good idea to budget some extra cash to cover the cost of obtaining a mortgage and “closing”� your real estate transaction. Here are some of the extra cost items you should consider: Appraisal fee Mortgage lenders will usually loan a percentage of the home’s purchase price or the market appraisal of the property, whichever is lower. The appraisal is either done by someone on the lender’s staff or by an outside professional approved by the lender. The cost of the appraisal is most often the responsibility of the home buyer. Application fee Find out whether or not your ...

Home Staging Goes Green 2007-09-11 12:08:49 Without a doubt Green is the way to go these days.  With our environment at risk who can deny that focusing our efforts on “going green” is the way to go.  Although some regions have yet to develop a Green bin for composting you can do you part by using a personal composter in your own backyard to recylce food products.  Another way to make energy effecient heating and cooling systems work better is to keep the fans on in the bathrooms.  It will help circulate the air and keep the temperatures equal within the house.  So what will you do to go green?? I challenge you to make small changes around your house to ensure that your kids and their kids will enjoy a cleaner future. Tara Savelle, CSP www.homeondisplay.ca ...

Commercial Real Estate Markets 2007-09-11 07:48:15 August Sees Over 800,000 Square Feet In Leased Space With 806,743 square feet of space leased, August 2007 turned out to be another solid month for the Greater Toronto Area Industrial/Commercial real estate market, Toronto Board Commercial Council Vice Chairman Garry Lander announced today. “This summer, a total of 3,070,102 square feet of space has traded through the TorontoMLS system,”� Mr. Lander said. “This is up 13 per cent over the 2,716,065 recorded during summer 2006.”� At $6.35 sfn, prices for Industrial leased space (all size categories) rose 12 per cent over August 2006. Commercial properties also increased from that time-frame, rising 12 per cent from $15.86 sfn to $17.86 sfn. Sales Market Highlights In August, 53 sales of Industrial/Commercial properties took place through the TorontoMLS system. Of them, 23 were industrial buildings in all size categories that sold for an average of $100.30 per square foot. This compares to a figure of $78.54 der ...

Guest Post: My lender is toast- do I need to pay my mortgage now, and to whom? 2007-09-11 07:47:26 Today Twist from Housing Doom shares with us some information on an all-to-common question in light of the recent spate of mortgage company closures. Thanks Housing Doom! With Tucson based First Magnus filing for Chapter 11, the Arizona Daily Star thought it would cover the very pertinent question of “What do I do about my mortgage payment now?” On September 4th the Mortgage Implode-o-meter was reporting 145 imploded lenders, so obviously this is a question of interest beyond the borders of Tucson. Of particular note was the importance of HELLO and GOODBYE letters: Some borrowers [might be] wondering what might happen to their loans, and where they should be mailing their future monthly checks. Luckily, there is a document “? probably buried somewhere in borrowers’ packets of closing materials “? that addresses situations like this. The document is usually called a “servicing disclosure statement,” and it explains the notification require ...

Honest Company or Scammers? You decide - Part II 2007-09-10 13:50:10     Last week I received the email that is below.  It's about my “Honest Company or Scammers? You decide” post.  I've reprinted the letter, with permission, removing the names protect the writer's identity. I was so glad to read this blog on Joanne Pearce. I have been searching for info of any kind for months. I have a house for sale and it has been on the market for over a year. I received an offer from Chi Rho Investments in March that was a great offer. I spoke with 2 different people. Eric and Joanne Pearce. The said they originally were Pearce Enterprises. I was trying to get them to give me any info that I could check their validity. They said they were not able to give out that info but they were on public record in the state of Florida so I could find out that way. I spoke with the bbb and could find nothing. I spoke with the chamber of commerce. nothing. I spoke with the board of realtors. No one had heard of this company. When I questioned them ...

We’re Going to Have to Crash the Convention, Like Jesse Jackson in 1988! 2007-09-10 07:56:10 BusinessWeek is surveying its readers about the best new online real estate service of 2007. Somehow Redfin didn’t even make the list of contenders, probably because we’re not available in many U.S. markets. But we’re the only ones challenging the traditional real estate industry, by actually brokering the purchase and sale of homes. The world may still need what one eye-rolling friend of mines now likes to call a YAREM (”Yet Another Real Estate Mashup”) but it absolutely cries out for someone using the Internet to change the game in real estate. Maybe next year, we’ll make the grade. ...

Guest Post: Emergency Response Team: Tools to Prepare Yourself for Buying in the Future 2007-09-10 06:57:52 Today Dr. Housing Bubble shares with us some tips on buying a home in a bear market. Thanks Dr. HB! There is no question that we are living in a multi-year housing bubble. All you need to do is take a look at some of the Real Homes of Genius in Southern California and you’ll quickly realize the magnitude of this housing mayhem. Is there any doubt that lax lending standards played a part in supporting this housing market especially in overpriced metro areas? As we are facing depreciating markets, rising inventories, and tightening credit what can a prospective buyer do to prepare for a housing bear market? There are a few tips that you can do to prepare yourself for the coming years; playing house, maintaining your credit score, and buying when fundamentals make sense. Playing House Most people jump into an overpriced home only to realize they bit off more than they can chew. In an appreciating market, you are given a get out of jail card because all you need to do is list t ...

A new home, fresh off the line 2007-09-10 02:44:29 At 224 McDougall Crossing there’s a foundation without a house. Next week, the rest will arrive, right down to the kitchen standing in place and the chandelier glittering in the dining room. Megabuilder, Mattamy Homes is constructing a subdivision of houses in Milton, a Toronto suburb, that are assembled on the factory floor and then transported by truck. “The chandeliers are hanging, the tiles are grouted, the hardwood is shined up,” says Ron Cauchi, president of Mattamy’s Stelumar operation. Mattamy is Ontario’s largest house builder and the company’s new Stelumar plant in Milton represents the first time in Canada that prefabricated houses have been turned out by a mainstream builder on such a large scale. Anybody who purchases a new house from a builder wants two things: a sturdy structure and a predictable closing date. Legions of buyers have suffered through problems with both. For years, Mattamy has been looking for a way to improve the quali ...

Not Toronto’s bedroom 2007-09-09 03:31:07 Durham Region moves beyond its reputation as Toronto’s bedroom community A commuter town. A sleeper community. Suburbia. Call it what you will, but the term no longer applies to the lakeshore communities that make up Durham Region. “This area used to be a bedroom community for Toronto, but not anymore,”� says Don Campbell, president of the Real Estate Investment Network (REIN). “It’s really come into its own.”� The Alberta-based real estate market guru says he was pleased to find a growing community when he visited Durham for a tour in late August.”It is an area going through a positive transition,”� he said. In the last 10 years, Durham’s population has exploded, reaching close to 600,000 at the last census count in 2006. Much of the growth has pushed out of Toronto, as people opted for affordable housing at the cost of a longer commute to the office. But Mr. Campbell says recent economic indicators point to the fact that Durh ...

Redfin Hits The New York Times 2007-09-08 17:29:39 The front page of yesterday’s New York Times business section discusses traditional real estate agents who are leaving the industry, those who have stayed, and — woo-hoo! — Redfin’s growth. The article has been the #1 most-emailed business story, but in the general polls still trails an expose of microwave popcorn’s role in lung disease and a review of the great publisher Knopf’s equally great rejection letters to prominent authors (”This time there’s no point in trying to be kind…”), often written by Alfred A. Knopf or his wife, Blanche. ...