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Elizabeth Weintraub
Not Every Person in Sacramento Has a Sense of Humor
The subject of monkeys came up this morning during a conversation with my husband. Well, actually he brought up the subject of monkeys, which made me ask if knows that Germany seized Justin Bieber’s monkey. I only mention Justin Bieber because a) I spotted a photo of his tiny capuchin monkey in the paper and b) who likes Justin Bieber? My husband says Justin Bieber is like Hamburger Helper. Just add pre-teens, stir and voila: instant concert sensation!
You can probably see why my husband and I get along so well. We make each other laugh. I try to bring a little humor to my client’s lives as well. Sacramento real estate is a subject many of us can chuckle about. I believe everybody has room in his or her daily routine to laugh now and then. Plus, laughter relieves stress, and it makes you feel better about the world and your place in it. Even the most horrible situation, like, say, a short sale, can be made a bit more plausible if you can find a humorous aspect to it.
Every once in a while, I run across a person who doesn’t seem to possess a sense of humor. This means I have to be careful what I say and realize if my jokes fall flat, that the jokes are probably not appreciated and, in fact, could be inappropriate for the situation. A Sacramento real estate agent has a duty to be professional. Take a former client whom I asked to appear in a photograph with me. When I asked if he minded if a reporter from the newspaper shot his photo as we listed his home, he was all for the publicity. He added: I’ll remember to shave.
I wrote back: And pants, don’t forget to wear pants.
Well, he didn’t see the humor in that. That’s probably because I didn’t catch the fact that he wasn’t trying to be funny when he said I’ll remember to shave. I thought he was joking with me. He wasn’t joking. He was being serious. He actually meant that he might have to leave himself a note because it’s possible he would forget. Maybe he had to tie a string around his finger before bedtime? Because, maybe he doesn’t look in the mirror in the morning, or maybe he doesn’t stroke his face to discover something weird is growing there. Perhaps he is fearful that an electric razor will suddenly jump from his chin and race across the top of his head? I have no idea how he struggles with this.
You just don’t know about people. That’s why it’s good to take stock upfront and make sure a person enjoys your sense of humor before you lay it on them.
Photo: by Van Newland at Pecan Street Fair, Austin 2013
Fannie Mae Lip Service and Its Bad Press
We used to call them hypocrites but now we call them corporations or politicians because those are more polite words. Those words don’t necessarily expose the underbelly. For example, you know what lip service means, right? It means the lips are moving but the words that are coming out of those lips are meaningless. Some real estate agents would say that Fannie Mae is pretty good at giving lip service. But when it comes to being an advocate for home buyers, there is little actual support or action to back up some of Fannie Mae’s statements.
My mother used to say: forget what people say and look at what they do.
Fannie Mae has been under attack by all sides lately. Much of the criticism has had to do with the fact that in many situations Fannie Mae will over-estimate the value of a home, in particular, short sale homes. The theory is Fannie Mae over-estimates the value so it doesn’t have to deny the short sale, which might be its actual goal. If the value is too high to receive an offer or even appraise, then Fannie Mae can be assured that the short sale won’t happen and the home will go to foreclosure. When the home goes to foreclosure, it pops into Fannie Mae’s REO inventory, and Fannie Mae now has the opportunity to provide its own over-market financing, which can result in shoving more unsuspecting homeowners underwater the day the escrow closes. Don’t you love lip service?
Whenever I spot a home for sale in Sacramento that is offered with HomePath financing, the sales price is almost always 10% to 20% above market value. The beauty of HomePath financing is there is no appraisal to dispute the value. Home buyers can get suckered because they don’t know the value.
Well, now Fannie Mae has implemented a new procedure for short sales, most likely in response to the uproar from agents across the country. This new procedure now involves obtaining 2 appraisals on the short sale home. Fannie Mae hires its own Fannie Mae appraiser, the guy with the rose-colored glasses, and an independent real estate agent to do a BPO. Except the independent agent who does the BPO probably isn’t paid enough to do all of that work and completes the BPO in hopes that Fannie Mae will someday hire that agent as its own REO agent. Everybody has an agenda.
This way, regardless of what happens to the sales price, Fannie Mae can say it was proactive. It’s better than a poke in the eye with a stick, but it still seems like it might be lip service to me.
The Best Place to Find Homes for Sale in Sacramento
A potential buyer from Florida called yesterday to discuss buying a second home in the Pocket area of Sacramento. I asked what made him pick the Pocket out of all the places to live in Sacramento. Turns out he used to live in Sacramento, and he likes that neighborhood. Not necessarily Greenhaven, mind you, but the Pocket; although Greenhaven and Pocket border each other, they are different.
This guy told me he was primarily interested in preforeclosures and short sales. I hear this preference stated often, and I realize what it means, even though the person who is sharing that preference may not. It means that a buyer wants to buy as much home for the dollar as the buyer possibly can. The buyer is not afraid of having to fix up a home or put a little sweat equity into it if the price is under market a little bit.
In short, the buyer wants a deal. A good deal. Reality says a buyer doesn’t really need to buy a preforeclosure or a short sale to get a good deal. In fact, most of the better deals lie in homes with equity. Short sales are no longer distressed sales; banks want market value for the short sales. Banks sometimes obtain 2 or 3 opinions of value before they will allow the home to sell as a short sale.
The pre-foreclosure properties are a myth. They don’t exist. Oh, I realize that buyers can find those homes listed on such websites as Trulia and Zillow, but those are marketing ploys. Those homes are not for sale. These websites buy feeds from all kinds of sources, even sources that report when homeowners have failed to make payments and are headed for foreclosure if they don’t bring the loan current. But it doesn’t mean those homes are for sale or will ever be for sale. It is very misleading and confusing for buyers. Although, it brings eyeballs to Trulia and Zillow, and traffic is what matters to Trulia and Zillow. The information doesn’t need to be accurate — just look those goofy Zestimates.
The best place to find homes for sale in Sacramento is on a Sacramento real estate agent’s website. That’s because those IDX feeds originate at MetroList, which is the Bible and our God in real estate. You can search for home listings in Sacramento, homes in Placer, El Dorado or Yolo counties, which include West Sacramento and Davis on my website or any other agent’s website. You will get everything that is for sale and not just my listings.
Although, I did get a call yesterday as well about where a person could find my listings. If you want to look at just the homes listed by Elizabeth Weintraub, you can watch the revolving listings on the right side of my home page. Or, to be more proactive, you can click on the LISTING tab at the top of my website. That will show you just the homes that are listed by this Sacramento real estate agent.
I promise, you won’t find homes that are not for sale, removed from the market or were never for sale in the first place. The status modifiers are clearly noted, well, except for those active short contingents, you have to read through the listing to find it. Yet, a real estate agent’s website is the best place to find homes for sale in Sacramento. You can also sign up for automatic listing emails, so every time a new listing in your desired area comes on the market, you will receive an email. If you’re not a do-it-yourself person, you can call me, and I’ll be happy to set you up. You can call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759.
How to Get a Sweet Deal in This Sacramento Real Estate Market
If you’ve ever required special circumstances to sell your home in Sacramento, this is the market in which to do it. As a REALTOR in Sacramento, I can tell you unabashedly that buyers will agree to do some of the craziest things just to buy your house. It’s a seller’s market. Sellers rule. I keep thinking that we can’t possibly make the restrictions and conditions under which a seller will sell any more ridiculous, but then I surpass my own thoughts and beat my wildest imagination.
There is very little inventory in Sacramento. If you’ve got a desirable home, you can pretty much write the rules, as long as you’re not breaking any laws, under which you will agree to sell. Me? I just go with the flow and try to make my sellers happy. What I think about the situation is not really important. What matters is what my sellers would like to do and whether I can accomplish that for them. I don’t run around thumbing my nose at people, telling them I know more than they do, even if I do. I just find out what the seller wants, and then I determine whether I am up to the challenge. I love challenges.
I’ll show you one nutty situation. We were ready to close escrow on an Elk Grove short sale when one of the tenants refused to move out. The tenant said he’d go when the sheriff tossed him out on his ear (code for: give me some money). Two days before closing. The buyer’s agent said the buyer was canceling under those circumstances, so I put the home back on the market, with a pending rescission modifier. The confidential comments informed agents that a buyer would have to purchase this home sight unseen and close escrow with a hostile tenant inside. I received a bunch of offers. No joke.
Realizing this, the existing buyer closed.
In another transaction that closed last month, a seller did not want to move out until he moved into his new home. He was steadfast about it, and nothing I could say would change his mind. He also lived in a somewhat difficult area because this little pocket of homes sat among others that were nonconforming. There was only comparable sale. We bumped the price by 6% above that one comp and put it on the market. We received a good half-dozen offers or so, and one of those offers was cash and 4% above the list price. That means the home sold for 10% more than the last home like it. See, it doesn’t cost to hire a Sacramento real estate agent, it pays you.
On top of this, I put the seller into a contingent purchase for a short sale in Elk Grove. Elk Grove, one of the hardest places in town to buy because buyers can stand 30 deep. The contingency period didn’t last very long because I sold and closed his existing residence in 7 days. The buyer of his residence agreed to let the seller rent-back for a period of up to one year at about a $500 reduction from the monthly market rent. He has the right to move out during this one-year period with 30 days’ notice. If that’s not a sweet deal for that seller, I don’t know what is.
If you’ve got a home to sell in Sacramento, go ahead and call your Sacramento agent Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759. Put 39 years of experience to work for you.
Happy Together Tour at the Crest Theatre in Sacramento
When I first laid eyes on the groovy poster for the Happy Together Tour, the show coming to the Crest Theatre on July 6th, I was hesitant. Because the first band listed was The Turtles, and while they are an OK group from my teen years, they weren’t all that fabulous to me. I read down the list and my eyes landed on the guy from Three Dog Night, yawn, yeah. Followed by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap. OK, Young Girl get out of my mind. What? Is he a pervert, lusting after jailbait? Might be silliness. But then I saw Mark Lindsay, whom you may recall from Paul Revere and the Raiders, and hey, maybe this would be a fun show in a goofy sort of way. The clincher was Gary Lewis and the Playboys. Everybody loves a clown, so why don’t you?
I suggested the show to my husband, who immediately pooh-poohed it. He muttered something about John Lennon and the rattles of jewelry in the balcony, and then he started coughing, wheezing and singing like Tom Waits, telling me there will be nothing but 70-year-old people hobbling about in the lobby. See what I put up with? What he really means is now I will owe him one. I might have to do something dreadful like go the grocery store or eat stir-fried weeds for dinner and not moan about it.
It seemed like a perfect evening out to invite my friend, Barbara, and her husband. Sure why not, the four of us could go to the show. That way Barbara and I can bond in sisterly solidarity belting out This Diamond Ring Doesn’t Shine for Me Anymore while our husbands roll eyes and acknowledge each other’s boredom through those all-knowing glances.
I had a listing appointment yesterday over at Woodside, but I pushed it back by 15 minutes so I would have ample time to go online and buy advance tickets, prior to the public offering. I have ticket buying down to a science. I open the seating chart in one browser and starting a few minutes before the opening time, I begin clicking refresh over and over in another browser. Often, the Crest is off by a few minutes, but luck was on my side yesterday.
Bank of America had just sent me a revised counter for a Cooperative Short Sale, moving a few fees around when I realized, OMG, it was 9:59. Time to go to the secret link to buy tickets. Darn. The website said tickets were not on sale. Like a person with a psychological disorder, I drooled and clicked refresh again and again and again, and whoa, I was in. Just like that. I entered the code, and the website took me to a page to select tickets. I could not believe my eyes. Front row and center seats, four tickets were mine! That almost never happens. My heart raced. My eyebrows got stuck together.
I clicked buy and the website took me to a new page, one that I had not seen before. Oh, no, something new. It wanted my user name and password. Did I have a user name? I quickly tried to open a vault where I store passwords. It did not immediately respond. That’s because emails were hitting my email account at the same time an update was about to take place from Adobe Reader. Everything slowed. If I had a dog, I would have kicked it. No, not really, I would never kick a dog. I might kick a Republican, though.
I looked through possible user names and could not find a name for that website. It was then that I noticed the continue button. I clicked. Now it wanted my credit card information, which I threw on the page from memory. I could not believe we got front row and center seats. My eyes were spinning in circles. Breathing became difficult. My fingers trembled.
I clicked BUY.
The screen returned to my credit card information. What the? I know I put the code in the box. I entered it again. The screen returned to the page with my credit card information and missing 3-digit code. I entered a completely new card and a new code. The screen returned to the page with my credit card information. Was this like the movie Groundhog Day? Do I have to listen to Sonny and Cher over and over? Oh, I see, it had unchecked the box that I checked NO to whether I wanted insurance. I clicked BUY again fully confident that now the sale was complete.
Big red letters: Your Time Has Expired. Start Over.
Ahhhhhhh. I unleashed a string of unpublishable words. My cats ran for cover, paws over their little kitty ears. And just like that, I ended up with Row 2 tickets. Row 2, where I will have to sit and stare at the people who are sitting in Row 1, IN MY SEATS.
Yes, I realize how petty and shallow these thoughts are, and how I should be strung up my toenails because female babies in China are being murdered and we broke the planet and honeybees are dying and the air is so bad over Mauna Loa that it will never be safe to breathe again, while I am spending my valuable time left on earth griping about having to stare at the back of the heads of those people who will be in my seats at the Crest Theatre for the Happy Together show.
