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Housing Market Trends

I Suppose it Depends on Your Definition of “Nearly”

“This Property Sits on Nearly a Quarter Acre!” The agent’s boast (above) on MLS caught my eye, because the listed home is in a neighborhood — Seward, near the Mississippi River — not known for larger lots. So, I looked up the lot dimensions in Hennepin County’s tax records:  40′ x 129′, for a lot...
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Doing CMA’s For Home Sellers

Make that Three Times Once upon a time, I used to tell prospective Sellers that the Comparative Market Analysis (“CMA”) I was about to do would be repeated two more times. First, by the Buyer’s Realtor, trying to advise their client what to offer (and ultimately, to expect to pay). And second, by the appraiser dispatched...
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“If the Economists’ Forecast is Accurate . . .”

Financial Forecast Sophistry “Economists have predicted 9 out of the last 5 recessions.” “If you lined up all the economists in the world end to end . . . they wouldn’t reach a conclusion.” “If you lined up all the economists in the world end to end . . . it wouldn’t be such a...
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Proliferating Downpayment Assistance Programs

It’s hard enough — as a busy Realtor — keeping up with new listings, pre-list’s, pending sales, showings, inspections, walk-thru’s, closings, listing presentations, networking, etc. for a stable of a dozen or more concurrent clients. The last thing I’m interested in doing is becoming an expert on the various downpayment assistance programs that seem to...
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Condo’s With a Catch

The $64,000 $500,000 Question:  Can You Finance It? Apparently, there are now a number of Downtown Minneapolis condo’s on the market listed at “too good to be true” prices. The catch? They’re in buildings with checkered histories, making financing more difficult if not impossible. Specifically, the list of stumbling blocks include: –Buildings with pending litigation due to defects; –Condo...
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“Show and Sell!”

One of the more popular posts on this blog was “Real Estate Clichés & How to Avoid Them.” To that, I have one more term to add:  “show and sell.” Usually appended to the Agent Remarks field on MLS, it’s a generic — and meaningless — exhortation by the Listing Agent to the Buyer’s agent...
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