Email Elizabeth
Elizabeth Weintraub
A Solution for Home Buyers Facing a Contingency Release Deadline
A Sacramento real estate agent who represents sellers is generally vigilant about following the terms of the purchase contract and asking buyers for a contingency release upon the specified dates. Unless otherwise altered, buyers typically agree to release inspection contingencies, loan and appraisal contingencies by the 17th day. The listing agent is sometimes viewed as an ogre or a downright meanie if her seller asks the buyer to perform in accordance with the contract.
It’s not unusual after a request for contingency release for this listing agent to receive from the buyer’s agent a tirade of blistering words, mish-mashed together in a denunciatory nature, sounding as though the buyer’s agent is angry but lacks an ability to grasp the right words to get the point across. Sort of reminds me of Daffy Duck sputtering you’re despicable. The buyer’s agent generally ends the diatribe with the supposed justification of: I’m just protecting my buyer.
One can’t help but wonder that if an agent is protecting the buyer, why is the agent advising the buyer to breach the contract?
As a standard of practice and care for my clients, we send buyer’s agents an email notice as a courtesy the day before a contingency release is coming up. We ask politely to send us the CR form and remind the agent that a contingency needs to be released. In some cases, you’d think we asked them to strip naked and dance in the streets. Shield the eyes. Some agents have never heard of the contingency release. Some prefer to explode over it. Fortunately, most buyer’s agents respond in an appropriate manner. But some don’t.
If we don’t receive a contingency release, though, the next step is to ask our sellers if they want to issue a Notice to the Buyer to Perform. This gives the buyers 2 days to produce the document or the seller may have the right to cancel the transaction. Will the seller cancel if the buyer doesn’t perform? Some sellers will cancel the purchase contract faster than you can say sore losers shouldn’t talk to the press after losing at Belmont Stakes — especially if the sellers have backup buyers willing to pay more.
The biggest issue is generally not the inspection contingency that generates the reluctance, it’s releasing the loan contingency. Not to mention, there’s a whole ‘nother discussion as to whether a Small Claims Court judge would even award an earnest money deposit to a seller, but buyers and their agents don’t know that. The simple solution is if a buyer needs more time — due to the way loans are scrutinized with all the delays going on in today’s market — then the buyer, through her buyer’s agent, can ask to extend the contingency through an Extension of Time addendum.
It’s not the listing agent’s job, however, to tell the buyer’s agent what to do or how to protect the agent’s buyer. An Extension of Time (ETA), if agreed to by all parties, can extend a particular contingency period in the purchase contract. Stay in contract. Don’t breach it, don’t let it expire, stay in contract.
What John Wayne, Newport Beach and Arrested Development Share in Common
Back when I used to live in Newport Beach, California, and sell real estate in that Orange County mecca, during the 1970s-1980s — I hate to add, before many of my clients were born — John Wayne was a pretty big deal; probably still is. I am presently reading John Wayne: the Life and Legend, by Scott Eyman. I can see some of you saying, John Who? When I cruised by Lido Isle in my Bayliner, out-of-town guests would ask me to point out his house where Pilar Wayne at the time lived. They named the Orange County Airport after him and put up a 9-foot bronze statue, although the Duke was six-three-point five. It was this statue that got me into a lot of hot water.
Mostly because I had the gall to poke fun at its politics by suggesting they place the statue at the entrance to the harbor where seagulls could poop on it, instead of sticking it up at the airport where it now resides. I believe that was a piece I wrote as a freelancer for the Daily Pilot, a newspaper in Newport Beach. All holy hell broke loose over that. John Wayne was a person larger-than-life and one of the few celebrities we had in Newport Beach back then, besides Joey Bishop.
The same thing happened when I contributed an article to the Orange County Register about selling real estate. I thought it was hilarious, suggesting that most real estate agents were actually unemployed, but the Board of REALTORS in Newport Harbor would have banned me for life if they could. No sense of humor, these people.
If you asked people outside of the area where Newport Beach was located back then, they probably could not tell you and, if they could somehow pinpoint it on a map, they were confused by the fact it faced south. If you lived there, people thought you were filthy rich, even if you weren’t. It was a fairly conservative climate, to put it mildly, except for some of the people who lived near the beach.
As a person who would not belong to any club that wanted her as a member, for a few years I belonged to the Balboa Bay Club, if you can believe that. I served on the Kentucky Derby Day committee one year, before my best friend Betty passed away, even though I had nothing of substance to contribute and little in common with anybody except Betty. This was when publisher Bob Page approached me about writing a social column about the BBC, which I rejected.
Having lived on the Balboa Peninsula makes watching Arrested Development all that more amusing for me. Especially the scenes filmed at the Balboa Pier and Fun Zone. My favorite activities did not involve eating frozen bananas, but fell more along the lines of playing skeeball and riding the ferris wheel. It’s probably one of the reasons I never get tired today of biking over to Old Sacramento. Although we are missing essential elements such as the ocean and the bay, we do have the river. Two rivers. And we don’t have a statue of John Wayne anywhere.
This Agent is Accepting New Home Listings in Sacramento
It’s been a stressful couple of months in Sacramento real estate lately as this listing agent has been focused on winning challenge after challenge. It can take a slight toll. In the middle of all of this action, it’s important to pause and assess the housing market to best advise my clients. This is when I often head for a massage. It’s nice to feel a human touch on my skin. To unwind and relax. I visited Images Salon on Riverside next to Vic’s Ice Cream in Land Park yesterday and was delighted. Ten times better than the place not to have a massage in Land Park.
I’ve got 12 escrows pending to close before my birthday this month, and once I realized how many were already sold, it’s made me more excited to work even harder to sell the remaining few I have and to gather more listings. I have a small number of homes in various stages of prep and, after a manicure, pedicure and haircut, these will be available for sale, but I am also accepting new home listings in Sacramento to sell over the summer. Moreover, believe it or not, I am working on the Sacramento fall real estate market.
It’s always a cycle in real estate, and it’s a balancing act to make sure my home listing inventory is not more than I can personally handle. For example, a few years ago, I had 70 listings and that was about the maximum this agent can comfortably handle, but today that number of home listings is small enough to count on two hands. That’s because inventory has been dramatically reduced in Sacramento. Plus, it’s rare to tackle a short sale anymore; those days are gone. Compared to a few years ago, I feel almost like I am on vacation, if it were not for the constant challenges of pending escrows. Any agent can flip a home into escrow but getting it closed is where the true professionals shine. To better explain cycles, let’s look at the housing market numbers in Sacramento:
Studying the Trendgraphix chart above and searching MLS, one can really notice the cyclic trends. For example, at the moment, the number of residential home listings for sale in Sacramento per the MLS are 3,253. The number of pending sales, which include a handful of pending short sales, are 2,908. That means we’re still running out of homes to sell. It’s a drought, although not as severe as our water drought.
The first thing I notice in the May Trendgraphix report above is the column for May looks very similar to the column for October of 2013. But what is different about it is two-fold. First, the pending sales in October were quickly moving down as fewer homes were selling. However, the pending sales in May are continuing to move up, a trend that began in January and shows no signs of slowing! Closed sales fell off slightly in May, probably due to the flakes and unqualified buyers, but I predict that June closed sales will correct. Second, our pending sales exceed those closed. It’s been that way all year.
You don’t see the smaller details, but as a busy Sacramento real estate agent, I can tell you that our inventory over the past year and half has doubled. We moved from 1 month of homes for sale to a little over 2 months, but that it still not enough home listings to sell. Our days on market has increased to 31, meaning buyers are taking longer to make the right choice. Home buyers are also hitting prices harder as homes are selling on average at 98% of list price. A buyer might say that sellers are 2% overly optimistic, but as a listing agent I know it’s the other way around.
If you’re looking to hire the best Sacramento real estate agent you can find, your best bet is to call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759. I’m presently accepting new listings. Will your home be sold by Elizabeth Weintraub next month? There’s one way to find out.
Chart: Trendgraphix
Selling the White Elephant on the Block
Part of my 40 years in real estate involve a stint during which I bought homes to fix up and sell — and, I’m proud to say, not one of those homes was a white elephant. Doing the buy, fix and sell was easy for me for several reasons. First, I was single, so I didn’t have to argue with anybody about my material choices or order of construction, not to mention, I didn’t have anybody under foot. Second, I had a lot of experience selling homes to draw upon. I didn’t do stupid things, and much was based on experience plus my excellent intuition. Third, I was willing to take the time to learn how to do the work myself, and time was not of the essence because I lived in the house — so no matter how many times I messed up, I could repeat the task until it was perfect.
There are some homeowners who don’t care if their home improvement project or remodel is absolutely perfect, but I am not one of those people. I set high standards — sometimes impossible by another’s definition — and I achieve those goals. I visualize. I will capture an image in my head and intently focus until it comes to life. The ability to focus and direct my energies in one direction is one of the reasons I have become a top ranking agent in Sacramento. I concentrate on the job at hand and do it well, because if it’s not done well, it’s not worth doing.
Today, when I meet with people who have over-improved their home and turned it into a white elephant, or have plans to do so, I cringe. Because I know without a doubt that the challenge to sell will be practically impossible to meet. These over-improved homes will appeal to such a tiny fragment of home buyers that it could take years before they find a buyer who is foolish enough to be underwhelmed by the facts and blown away by the emotional impact.
Because that’s the combination it takes to sell a white elephant.
People by their very nature want to live around other people just like them. They tend to gravitate toward conformity. Nonconformists live in corner homes, for example, but people who are not mavericks prefer the comfort of the middle of the street. If a buyer wants to spend half a million for a home, that buyer will purchase a home in a neighborhood of other homes worth half a million. She won’t buy a home in a neighborhood of $300,000 homes, much less on a busy street, and spend $500,000.
This is basic real estate 101: Location. Location. Location.
Unfortunately, those HGTV shows have turned ordinary homeowners into lunatics. Everybody wants to be a flipper, whether they have experience is not relevant. And that’s how they end up trying to sell a white elephant. Let’s not even try to talk about an appraisal because that discussion will simply make your head hurt more than it already does.
Buying a New Home in Land Park Sacramento
When I talk with people I haven’t talked with for years, they often ask if I am living in the same home in Land Park, as though the first thing they would do if they were selling 100 homes in Sacramento year after year would be to buy a new home. Not because I need a new home, mind you, but because I could. They ask I suppose because my existing home is not a mansion nor an estate, and that’s what they would buy. It’s just a plain ol’ single level home, around 2,000 square feet in Land Park.
It’s not located on a premiere winding street in Land Park and there is no view of William Land Park. There is no second or third floor. No marble floors with floor-to-ceiling columns. No four-car garage. No pool in the back yard. There is nothing all that remarkable about our home in Land Park. It suits our needs, and we’re happy with it.
But people are still astonished that we haven’t traded up or built our own mini-mansion because it’s something that most other people would do, I guess. I think buying a larger home is one of those items on a list when people play what one would do if one won the lottery. A larger home means more to clean, higher taxes and more crap that could go wrong. But that’s me. I’m also over 60 and less inclined to move again. My husband echoes that sentiment.
Fortunately, my clients often think differently and they might move every 5 to 7 years. I met with clients a few days ago who buy homes dirt cheap, remodel them and move up. It’s called buy, fix up and sell. There’s nothing wrong with that approach and, in fact, it’s a method I used myself over the years. We all have our different dreams and things we reach for. And that’s OK.
I dream of travel. I love to see new places, encounter different cultures, meet new people who can’t understand anything I say and vice versa (and I’m not just talking about the South). This morning I received a digital version of the Four Seasons magazine and was sidetracked for a while, reading about gourmet street food in Singapore, Budapest theatres and how to get a free night in Langkawi.
But a new place among Land Park homes for sale is not on the horizon for us. Our present home is just fine, even though we’ve lived here forever. If you’re looking to buy or sell a home in Land Park, please call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759. I know just about every inch of my leafy neighborhood.
