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Elizabeth Weintraub
Need a Land Park or East Sacramento Agent? Hire a Specialist!
In this day and age, you really need a specialist, especially when it comes to selling homes in the Land Park area or East Sacramento neighborhoods. These homes are not your grandmother’s home in Elk Grove or Lincoln. These central city neighborhoods are long established and the homes are as different from each other as New Orleans is from New York City. If you need a Land Park or East Sacramento agent, I am your specialist!
In fact, it’s kind of hard to do anything without a specialist on your side. Like last Friday when I pulled into my driveway in Land Park, I noticed check engine oil illuminated on my dashboard. It had actually been lit up for several days, and I kept hoping that it was just a freaky thing that would eventually stop. The worst that would happen, I figured, is my car would stop running, and I’d abandon it at the curb and grab a cab, eventually calling for a tow truck, but that was unlikely. The way they make these warning features, you’ve generally got a bit of time before all hell breaks loose.
But I’m also a person who gets crap done. I take charge. I don’t sit around in the dark weeping helplessly because my lights won’t go on. Nope, I flip the breaker switch, grab a screwdriver, take apart my light switch and replace it. At least those things haven’t changed much over the years. Unlike a car. I opened my front trunk and looked for the engine. It wasn’t there. No friggin’ engine. I’m not really sure where my engine is located, but I suspect it’s in the middle somewhere, somewhere I can’t get to. I found the windshield washing fluid and the brake fluid, but no oil.
At this point, my husband ventured out. We opened the back trunk and dug through my piles of lockboxes and sold sign riders. Hmmm. What is this? My husband turned a cap and hot pink fluid sizzled out, which he quickly recapped. Well, that wasn’t the oil. Good thing I had had the foresight to have handed him a rag beforehand. I finally resorted to reading the owner’s manual. Yes, when all else fails. Read the manual. Turns out a person can check her oil by turning the key in the ignition, letting the engine idle and pushing a lever near the dash.
I had too much oil, that was the problem, and I just had the oil changed in Midtown. But I also had taken it to the dealer after that for warranty work, and some well meaning yo-yo must have topped off the oil, which is the wrong thing to do for a high performance vehicle like this. The mechanic was probably unsupervised.
You’d think the dealer is a specialist but the dealer’s job is to sell cars. The service department is auxiliary. Even the manufacturer won’t let the dealer perform warranty work without specific permission. My maintenance specialist is located in Midtown, and he removed a quart of oil for me.
If you need a real estate agent to buy or sell homes in Land Park or East Sacramento, call Elizabeth Weintraub. I live in Land Park, and my office is located at the edge of Midtown where it meets homes in East Sacramento. I know these neighborhoods. I know other areas in Sacramento, too. If you’d like to talk, please feel free to call 916.233.6759 or email me. I just might work in your neighborhood. I sold more than 150 homes last year, exceeding $32 million. You can trust that I know what I’m doing.
Please Don’t Pack the Carbon Monoxide Detector
The topic of what stays and what goes with the house seems to be a never-ending story. Having that what is a fixture talk with my clients is part of my real estate practice, but sometimes I feel like I should be handing out cards with tips on them because people don’t always remember my advice. I could create my own board game out of selling a home in Sacramento, now that I stop to think about it. Kind of like Monopoly with a get-of-jail-free card, I’d hand out a get-a-free-carbon-monoxide-detector card.
Except you know what home sellers do? They go to The Home Depot and buy a carbon monoxide detector, almost put out their eyes ripping open the stupid plastic packaging, stick the thing into the wall and, when they move, they take it with them. Before the appraiser shows up. I can’t tell you how many times that has happened, and I have to remind sellers not to swipe the carbon monoxide detector when they move, yet they forget.
Then, I get the call from the buyer’s agent demanding to know why there is no carbon monoxide detector in that house. Why didn’t I tell the seller about a carbon monoxide detector? California law requires every home must have a carbon monoxide detector, and appraisers will walk out the door, leaving the appraisal unfinished, if there is no carbon monoxide detector. The seller doesn’t recall taking it because it probably wasn’t the seller who packed it. It was a kid or the movers or somebody else. That’s why we need a sticker to go on the front of the carbon monoxide detector that says DON’T REMOVE.
Something similar to the tags that are attached to the underside of chairs that people always leave hanging down like cat toys. I mean, people don’t remove those things, why do they take the carbon monoxide detectors? Probably because they’re sticking out in the wall and in the way of moving a mattress down the hallway. Next thing you know, the carbon monoxide detector is in the box along with all of the lightbulbs. Please, leave the lightbulbs, people. I know they aren’t cheap anymore, but the value of a used lightbulb is not what you think it is.
Like those plantation shutters some sellers of short sales want to take with them. They’re not likely to fit another window. They are also fixtures and should stay with the home. If you had to sell those planation shutters on the open market, you’ll never get anywhere near what you paid for them. They are not valuable objects. If you remove them from a window, you leave holes in the window frames or the wall. But if you absolutely can’t sleep another night unless you are allowed to take the plantation shutters with you when you move, then remove them before you put the home on the market. You can strip remove just about anything from the house if you do it before you put the home on the market.
Once a buyer spies a fixture that is attached, it is a fixture that conveys with the home. Ask your Sacramento real estate agent what stays and what goes with the home. We’re happy to explain fixtures. But, please, leave the carbon monoxide detector behind. Even though a carbon monoxide detector does not fit the description of a fixture because it can be easily unplugged and removed, it needs to stay.
The Remote Control Thorn from the Transfer Disclosure Statement
Before I share this amusing story with you about a transfer disclosure statement and remote controls for a garage door opener, let me preface it by saying this is not to single out any particular buyer’s agent in Sacramento because it could happen to anybody. You can’t examine my closed real estate transactions for the month and figure out who I am talking about because I have had a whole bunch of closings this February, but the story made me laugh, so you would probably like it.
To start with, I always advise my sellers when completing their transfer disclosure statement to think before they indicate how many remote controls they have in their possession for the garage door opener. I explain that they might want to put down one instead of two remotes, even if they own 2 remotes. The reason is often there is one person who is the last person in the house after it is sold. This person might go back to check on the house or pick up that last box of belongings, and when this person drives out of the garage and closes the garage door, this person tends to drive away with the remote control and not realize it.
It’s after escrow closes that this Sacramento real estate agent will often get a call from the buyer’s agent. The agent will demand that the seller provide restitution for the missing remote control because the transfer disclosure statement the seller signed promised 2 remote controls to the buyer and there is only one remote control. Most real estate agents I know do not want to deal with the issue of remote controls. We probably don’t even want to hear the words: remote control, yet we do. It’s like a thorn in our sides. That remote control thorn. It grows up out of cement all by itself without water or sunlight.
It all started with the closing last week of this particular home in Sacramento. First the buyer’s agent submitted a broker’s demand after closing asking for a higher commission split, although the commission was clearly shown in MLS. The agent said a speaker at the Sacramento Board of REALTORS meeting had recently explained that commission splits reflected in MLS are incorrect. That’s interesting. Because it is the commission in MLS that governs the transaction, so there is some sort of disconnect going on and confusion. That set me up for the question about remote controls.
The agent insisted that I had told her there were remote controls. Now, I know that I never talk about remote controls to buyer’s agents because, like I said, I do not much care for the remote control thorn. I don’t mention whether there are remotes, where the remotes would be kept, how many remotes the seller would own — I keep my mouth shut about remote controls.
I pulled out the transfer disclosure statement and looked at it. Sure enough, the box for remote controls was left unchecked. The line for the number of remote controls was left blank. The seller did not even disclose whether he had a remote control and, since he didn’t live in this house because it belonged to another family member, he probably did not have any remote controls nor any knowledge of their existence.
I sent the transfer disclosure statement to the buyer’s agent to show there were no remote controls conveyed with the property. The buyer’s agent sent me the AVID I had completed and insisted I noted there was a remote control. Under “garage and parking” I noted there was a garage door opener. I also said doors were stored in the rafters. No mention of a remote control. See, this is how miscommunication can happen in real estate. A garage door opener is not a remote control. It is a device secured to the ceiling that opens and closes the garage door when activated by a button attached to the wall or a remote control, but it is not a remote control.
The #2 Top Agent at Lyon Real Estate
Yowza, this Sacramento real estate agent received the #2 Top Producing Agent Award at Lyon Real Estate for 2012 yesterday — which, in case you’re wondering, does not mean I try harder — yet gazing upon it makes me wonder: where do old awards go to die? My awards fill up two shelves in my bookcase. Many of them are made from crystal or glass formed in pinnacle or other appropriately awardy-looking shapes. Then, there are the plaques. Some of my plaques go back to 1979, when the California Association of REALTORS named me one of 30 people in the state of California who qualified to earn the educational RECI designation, an acronym for Real Estate Certificate Institute, which, when C.A.R. discovered so few agents qualified for the designation or even cared to qualify for the designation, it discontinued the recognition, probably because there wasn’t enough money in the process for C.A.R.
The award for being the #2 Lyon agent out of 900-some is a gigantic engraved crystal vase. It has my name and the fact I earned the top 1% status of all agents at the company. It looks exactly the same as the Top 1% award I won in 2011 when I placed #5 in the company, except that vase is noticeably smaller. So, that must mean it’s a much bigger deal to be ranked in the top 3 agents than to be ranked in the top 5 agents, or maybe the company just had more money this year to spend on crystal vases. Not knocking being a top agent at Lyon, just wondering. It’s not like I can put flowers in the vases because that would be kinda tacky. You can’t really use them for a purpose. They have to sorta sit there and look pretty all by themselves.
I also picked up for the second year the #1 Top Agent Award for the Lyon Downtown office, although our office is actually located in Midtown Sacramento. This office was once located downtown a long time ago in the 1940s, but why change the name now, I guess. We’re just the Lyon Downtown Office, even though we serve Midtown, Land Park, Curtis Park and East Sacramento, as well as the rest of Sacramento and into Placer, Yolo and El Dorado counties. The size of the award is identical to the #1 Top Producer Award I received in 2011. But it’s bigger than the #2 Top Producer award from 2010 and the #3 Top Producer award from 2009. I guess it’s good to see the awards get progressively bigger as the years go on.
But after all is said and done, and I’m kicking up my feet on the deck looking out over the ocean as the sun sets, where will these awards be kept? Will I leave them behind in the states? Ship them to my niece? Box them up in the attic I don’t have? What do people do with old real estate awards?
Looking for a Sacramento Real Estate Agent for Listing Your Home?
Do you need a listing agent in Sacramento? I love winning listing presentations. I freely admit it. Even after all of these years in the business, the excitement is still there. If a Sacramento real estate agent did not like to win a listing presentation, I’m betting that agent probably works elsewhere and not at Lyon Real Estate. It’s not that I compete all that often because sellers and buyers just hire me; I’m rarely interviewed. I’m lucky and very fortunate in that regard.
In fact, when a seller called me last week to make an appointment, he mentioned that he planned to interview two other listing agents in Sacramento. I asked him why because most sellers go to my website, read all about me and then decide to hire me on the spot, and that’s what I told him, too, because it’s the truth. If you think that sounds a arrogant, it’s only because you don’t know me yet. It’s just confidence, not arrogance.
This confidence I display comes from staying true to oneself, not trying to be somebody I am not. Somebody once told me decades ago that if you walked like a duck, dressed like a duck (probably in those top hats and tails), talked like a duck, eventually you would become a duck. But he was wrong because I don’t quack, and nobody is shoving a tube down my throat to fatten up my liver.
When I went to visit with the seller a few days ago, I recognized a home on the corner I sold 4 years ago. I am familiar with that neighborhood. That particular home was a short sale, and I had represented the buyer. I figured I could call that former client and ask him to keep an eye on the home while it is on the market, providing I win the listing presentation. I get a little nervous when my listings are vacant, so it’s good to know buyers and sellers all over town.
We talked about the home; I listened to the seller’s story. Every seller has a story and reasons for selling. I like to make sure we are on the same page and I fully understand a seller’s expectations so I may fulfill them. Everybody has different things they want. I don’t want to second-guess how to make a seller happy, that’s for rookies. As we chatted, the seller shared that the person who would most likely be handling his estate sale also happened to have a real estate license. That’s not unusual as something like one in every 35 people in California has a real estate license. I made him smile when I said, “So I guess this competition is down to two real estate agents because you look like a man who is too smart to consider hiring a part-time real estate agent.” But, see, it was true.
I then went on to explain how I market real estate, my extensive online presence and use of mobile tools, which is where and how buyers are looking, many search for homes in Sacramento on their cellphones. I like to jump out in front of buyers so no matter where they turn, there I am. Hello. Hello. Hello. Would you like to see this fabulous home? You can’t get away from Elizabeth Weintraub online. Except maybe Facebook where everybody knows my name and is drunk all the time. I don’t know who all those people are on my homepage.
The other thing I mentioned is I am not a K-Mart agent, but I also tend to make my sellers a lot more money. I’m a really good listing agent in Sacramento. I earn my commission. Could he hire somebody cheaper? Sure. But why? Why take the chance your net will be less because the agent is less aggressive? I tell sellers not to be penny wise and pound foolish. If we’re apart, say, 1% on the commission, that’s a drop in the bucket as compared to the service the seller will receive from me. After all, this is a seller’s market in Sacramento. Anybody can stick a sign in the yard and find a buyer in this market. That’s a small part of the picture. What a seller needs is a Sacramento real estate agent who can move them through negotiations, into escrow, and out the other side to closing.
That’s the difficult part.
In fact, while I was at the home, a neighbor came over to say he would be interested in buying the home. Of course he would be. He thinks he can take advantage of the seller and be the only bidder. The seller will get the most money from exposing this home to the largest pool of buyers and hiring the most experienced and assertive agent he can find to market and negotiate and, that agent, I’m thrilled to say, is me.
This four bedroom, two-bath home in Sacramento will go on the market about the middle of March. The seller told me yesterday it will be listed by Elizabeth Weintraub at Lyon Real Estate. Woo-hooo!!! See? The excitement never vanishes in this business.
