Twin Cities Motivated Sellers The Twin Cities ranked seventh among the 50 largest cities in the U.S. in terms of the share of reduced-price listings, with 34% of for-sale listings in the 13-county metro area [seeing] price reductions as of Sept. 1. The size of the average price reduction in the Twin Cities was 9...Read More
The Art of Doing Comp’s I’m working on an assignment for a client now that’s proving devilishly difficult: identify the premium associated with a home on a small, metro lake so that it can be priced appropriately for sale. The lake in question isn’t Lake Minnetonka, Lake of the Isles, or other “marquee” name. Rather,...Read More
How Close is Too Close? I expected the question sooner or later, but I officially received my first, “how is the [Southwest] light rail line going to affect my property value?” inquiry from a Cedar Lake-area homeowner this week. No doubt, the impetus was a series of public hearings the last few weeks that seemingly...Read More
Subjective vs. Objective See if you can spot the difference between the following, two groups of statements: Group 1: “The prettiest house on the block!”; “character-filled”; “one of Southwest Minneapolis’ most desirable neighborhoods” Group 2: “2,650 finished square feet”; “1 1/2 story bungalow”; “4 BR/3BA” If you can’t tell, the first group consists of subjective...Read More
After Almost a Year, The Fog Lifts Maybe it’s just me, but it certainly seems as though, almost one year after the financial system’s September, ’08 “heart attack,” some clarity and consensus are emerging about exactly what happened, and why. If you’ve been on a desert island, read Robert Wilmer’s excellent “Where the Crisis Came...Read More
No News is Bad News Today’s Star Tribune features a homeowner’s nightmare: a plumber hired to fix a major leak collected payment, started the work — then disappeared, leaving the homeowner marooned in a non-functioning Kitchen turned inside-out (“Learning the Hard Way”). Apparently, the homeowner never did a background check on the contractor. Which begs...Read More
