Housing Winners & Losers in Sellers’ Markets & Buyers’ Markets Every housing market has its winners and losers. Every housing market. So, 7-8 years ago, when the market was tanking, the big winners were first-time Buyers — at least ones with (good) jobs and unblemished credit. With rock-bottom prices and an ocean of inventory, many...Read More
Square Pegs into Round Irregular Holes The input field on MLS for room sizes asks for two numbers: the room’s width and its length. Which works great if a room is rectangular. But what if it’s not? If the room has a dormer, is L-shaped, curved, or otherwise defies a standard “width x length” measurement,...Read More
Averaging Apples & Oranges Here’s some no-brainer real estate advice: if you can find a 1,113 square foot Manhattan condo for $200k . . . grab it! Ditto for a 713 square foot condo in San Francisco for $200k. Of course, in real life, those properties would likely fetch 6x – 8X(!) that amount. Lies,...Read More
Where: near Rittenhouse Square in Philadelphia. When: Labor Day Weekend, 2017. What: under construction townhome. How much: no idea. You’ve got to hand it to the listing agent for this Philadelphia townhome: their sign “made ‘ya look.” While there’s obviously more to real estate sales than that . . . it’s a good start!Read More
Calculating Premiums & Discounts in a Comparative Market Analysis (“CMA”) How much value do Realtors and Appraisers assign to an upstairs Laundry when estimating a home’s fair market value? The honest answer is, I’ve never seen it broken out as a specific adjustment, with a corresponding price tag (or even range) assigned to it. My...Read More
Financing Contingency Pitfalls One of the surprises lurking in the standard Minnesota Financing Addendum is the weaker of the two clauses addressing the Buyer’s financing. In layman’s terms, it says that if the closing date arrives and the Buyer’s financing falls through: a) there’s no deal; and b) the Buyer gets their earnest money back. For...Read More
