Quick Answer: “It Depends — But Usually Less Than Buyers Think” “At the closing table, the Seller will walk away with a check ” and whether the money comes from the Buyer or the lender doesn’t matter.” –“Do Home Buyers Who Pay Cash Get a Discount?”; The Wall Street Journal (11/4/2010). The answer to the...Read More
Proof That High Pressure Sales Tactics Don’t Work Based on 13+ years experience representing hundreds of Buyers and Sellers, I’d estimate that the odds of any one showing leading to a consummated transaction are perhaps 1 in 10. The exception to that? If the Realtor is headed to the airport, or otherwise under acute time...Read More
Losing $100k(?) to Save $21k Rule #1 in real estate is that everything’s negotiable. Rule #2: there are times when it’s best to forget Rule #1, and preemptively take care of an issue before it threatens to torpedo a deal. That would certainly have been true in the case of a certain upper bracket Wayzata home...Read More
Deal Makers & Deal Breakers I don’t know about other housing markets, but at least in the Twin Cities, it’s not customary to include floor plans in MLS listings. In fact, I’d estimate that fewer than 1% of all listings have them. The two exceptions I’m aware of: 1) new construction, especially upper bracket and...Read More
Going through a 1940’s Lake Nokomis home this week, my Buyer spotted something upstairs that raised her (and then my) eyebrows: the floor tiles didn’t match in a couple of places. Especially if the home has an older roof, that can be a sign of previous leaking directly above the affected areas. In this case,...Read More
Are the Numbers Padded? One of the statistics available to Edina Realty agents (and their clients) is how many people have saved a specific listing on EdinaRealty.com, the Twin Cities’ most popular real estate site. Especially when a home isn’t selling (or even getting showings), more than 6-8 saved searches is encouraging, and can indicate potential...Read More
