Sniffing Out Motivated Home Sellers; 4 Clues — & a Red Herring Black Friday isn’t just when retailers offer their best deals of the year. It’s also the time of year when home Buyers can score deep discounts (at least in the Twin Cities; I don’t know about milder markets like Phoenix or Miami). How...Read More
Dubious Campaign Promises — Exhibit A; How Many Loopholes Can YOU Spot? “If they’re too big to fail, make ’em smaller.” –George Shultz, Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of State (and a former Treasury Secretary). At least in some parts of the country, Hillary Clinton’s thread-the-needle comment about big banks last week would be met with a...Read More
Riding Mower + Hovercraft + Trowel = Riding Trowel (of course) Except for the part about ramming into each other, the three contraptions pictured above look — and move — a lot like bumper cars. In fact, the devices (called “ride-on power trowels”) can cost up to $40k apiece, and are used in commercial construction to...Read More
“Modern Family” Season 7, Episode 7: “Phil’s Sexy, Sexy House” When it comes to showing TV Realtor Phil Dunphy in plausible, work-related situations, the writers for sitcom Modern Family have been remarkably sure-footed spanning almost 150 episodes. See, “Halloween Night Open Houses“; “Phil Dunphy, (TV) Realtor”; “Phil Dunphy’s ‘Modern Family’ Rival: ‘She Lied, She Cheated, She Won“;...Read More
Maybe They’re Counting Four Stairs I’ve seen homes with as much as 3,000 finished square feet in the lower level — “basement” to non-Realtors (it was a very big house). And I’ve seen homes with no finished square feet in the lower level (typical of 19th century homes that have limestone foundations and only partial basements with...Read More
