Email ElizabethHow Soon Should You Call Your Sacramento Agent?
A potential seller called yesterday to ask how far in advance she should talk with an East Sacramento agent about putting her home in Elmhurst on the market. She didn’t want to jump the gun or make too many plans before they were ready to sell, but on the other hand, she wanted to be prepared for the sale and have some kind of idea how much she might net from the sale.
One of the things she expected to do was replace a deck because she thought the buyer’s lender would force the repairs. See, the thing is unless it’s attached to the house, it probably won’t be considered for the pest report. Besides, a seller’s opinion and a buyer’s opinion might differ, so this is where consulting a local real estate agent comes in. An experienced agent’s advice can be invaluable.
It’s never too early to talk with an agent. I am working with some sellers months in advance of selling a home in the Sacramento area. Some homes are occupied by tenants, and it’s almost always better to show that home without a tenant in it, so we wait for leases to expire. Other sellers have personal family situations that make home selling at the moment difficult but easier down the road, not to mention, there is such a thing as timing the market in Sacramento because our spring and fall markets are the strongest.
We have cutting-edge echnology at our disposal in real estate. You might use Skype to to chat with your kids across the country, but a Sacramento real estate agent will use FaceTime to take an out-of-area seller on a tour of their home. I FaceTimed sellers in Texas yesterday and was able to show them mold in the bath, potential dry-rot on the eaves, weathered cabinets, a cracked tile, overgrown vegetation, and literally walk them through their home in Elk Grove as we talked, without them physically present.
If you’re thinking about preparing your home for sale and want to work with an agent, one of the services we provide is helping a seller get ready to sell. You can call this Sacramento real estate agent, Elizabeth Weintraub, at 916 233 6759. It’s never too early to talk.
How to Get a Short Sale Credit Report as Paid in Full
Up until now, it has been very tricky and almost impossible for a seller to immediately buy a home in her own name after closing a Sacramento short sale unless the short sale credit report shows paid in full. There were a few other ways to do it such as having a high FICO and big down payment, and working with a smaller bank that funds portfolio loans, but if a short sale seller has a high FICO and a big ol’ wad of cash, the short sale bank probably won’t grant the short sale. It has been like a Catch-22.
There is one way around it. Very few real estate agents seem to know about it because their bedime-reading material is not changes to government short sale programs. It’s how to get a short sale credit report as paid in full. I’ve read the recent HAFA Supplemental and know that this change exists, but I haven’t really tried it until now. This is the coolest thing ever. To qualify, the seller cannot have a Notice of Default filed. It is preferable to be current on the mortgage payments, but if a seller is behind a payment or two, it’s not the end of the world. Not every short sale bank investor will allow a seller to be current but many have loosened guidelines to allow for it.
Which makes sense when you think about it, even though banking rules don’t always make sense to us mere mortals. It makes sense that the investors would prefer to get some money than no money, but that would mean somebody was actually looking out for the investors and not just pocketing big ol’ wads of cash through the PSA agreement. When a seller comes to the bank to ask for a short sale and plans to continue making payments, you’d think a bank would not have to say: Sorry, we don’t want your stinkin’ money. Stop making your payments, go into arrears, and then we’ll short sale it. Because that’s ludicrous. But like I said, banking rules don’t always make sense until somebody yells out: Hey, what’s that man doing behind the curtain?
The new HAFA short sale guidelines allow for a different type of reporting of the satisfaction of mortgage for less than the full balance to the credit bureaus. If there is no Notice of Default filed, the short sale credit bureau reporting is PAID IN FULL. Not paid in full for less than agreed, no, no, no, none of that garbage. Paid in FULL. Do you know what Paid in Full means to a person’s credit report? It means the loan was paid off. Period. There is no derogatory credit. If there is no derogatory credit, there is no hit to the credit score.
Paid in full for a short sale credit report is huge. This is humongous. This is incredible. About time, too. If you’re thinking about doing a short sale in the Sacramento area, call your #1 Sacramento short sale agent, Elizabeth Weintraub, at 916 233 6759. I am a HAFA Certified Specialist.
Babyboomers Might Find it Hard to Shop at REI
My husband often drags me to shop at the Sacramento REI over by Arden Fair when we’re about to take any kind of a trip that will expose us to the elements. He’s such a Boy Scout. We are visiting the southeastern area of Alaska this September. It rains a lot in the Inside Passage; it is often misty. I suspect he’s worried that our small ship will hit an iceberg and sink or the captain will die of a heart attack out in the middle of nowhere. My husband is the kind of guy who would wear a hidden passport hung by a string around his neck.
So, off to REI we go to buy shirts and jackets made from wicking material, base layers, second layers, outer layer garments that are not cotton — because you can’t wear too many layers in Alaska. The problem I discovered with trying to shop REI is much of the women’s recreational clothing at REI is made out of spandex or closely tailored. REI seemed to be more forgiving in the men’s department but not the women’s. This store fits a nitch. Targets its customers. And I think REI is saying that women Babyboomers should not shop at REI unless they are spring chickens, fit as a fiddle, right as rain and all those other spindly descriptions adults over 60 use.
Well, what do you expect from a store where the men who look like broasted chickens shop for bicycle shorts? REI sells to the camping enthusiasts, hiking and biking and kayaking guys, and many of those people could be poster models for outdoor fun in California.
You’d think the store could have a special section for us Babyboomers who don’t always have the luxury of an elliptical in the bedroom, but no. As we were about to approach the check-out line, my husband pointed out the little camping tents for cats. There was a row of miniature tents stacked on a shelf right in front of us. How ingenious. The tents were big enough for a small dog though like, oh, I dunno, a Pekingese or even a pair of Chihuahuas. Perfect for a baby, too, I figured, so parents wouldn’t accidentally roll over on the kid. It’s a great solution for young families who want to camp together. What will they think of next?
Except those tents were models of the large tents. Very funny, Adam. I guess there’s not enough room in the store to set up the big tents so shoppers can see what they look like. If there’s not enough room for that, there’s probably not enough room for a Babyboomer section. Drats.
Is the Era Over for Sacramento Front Lawns?
Are front lawns in Sacramento over? Experts are saying that the era of the lawn in the West has seen better days. Some cities in the Southwest have front yard ordinances that prohibit lawns all together. Lawns are a pain-in-the-butt to maintain. I became so busy in real estate over the years that I no longer have time to mow our front lawn, so we hired a gardener. Then, after staring at the crabgrass and all the other crap that has inched into our 1/4 acre of grassy paradise over a few decades, we decided to kill it all, spray RoundUp everywhere, and put in a brand new lawn, specifically designed to be drought tolerant.
Except our gardener, with his fancy riding mower that he just bought, transfers seeds and bits of other neglected lawns into our pristine environment. In days of extreme heat, I can practically watch the weeds grow and spread. Crabgrass especially. The stuff nightmares are made from. The only way to get rid of the crabgrass is to grab a spade and dig them up myself. Which turns me into fanatical lawn woman — which I don’t want to be.
In fact, as I’ve been reading books about moving to the Big Island on Hawaii, a lawn filled with big ol’ piles of lava seems a better choice to me. I know you probably can’t imagine why a person of relatively sound mind would want a yard to look like the day the Earth blew up after a nuclear holocaust, like in the movie Tank Girl, but there are good reasons for it:
- Reason #1, you don’t have to water it.
- Reason #2, you don’t have to mow it.
- Reason #3, you don’t have to spray chemicals and pesticides.
Lava rock just sits there. True, it doesn’t support the vegetation that people move to Hawaii to gaze upon such as palm trees and exotic anthuriums, but it’s maintenance free. It would be almost like living in Las Vegas, with an ocean but without the casinos and extreme heat. You might not know this, but because the weather and soil conditions in Hawaii can cause trees to grow 10 feet a year, you might have to mow your lawn 2 to 3 times a week!
I was thinking about that when I looked at a lawn in Roseville this weekend. I’m listing more homes in Roseville. It was crabgrass city. In fact, if one dug up all of the crabgrass, I don’t think there would be any lawn left. It would be dirt. The seller asked if it was worth replacing the lawn. Well, in that price range, probably not, because although a new lawn would make the house sell faster, the cost would not be returned 100%. So, look for a new listing, a home in Roseville, to come on the market later this week. Just don’t spend any time staring at the lawn, OK?
Here is a link to read up on Sacramento front lawn ordinances: what you can and cannot do to your Sacramento front lawns in the city. These ordinances do not apply to Roseville.
Whose Listing Is It Anyway?
If a Sacramento real estate agent doesn’t spend much time online, the agent is kinda hosed in this business. Many agents and their sellers are unaware that a listing can show up on a popular website without the listing agent’s name or contact information. It happens every single day, as there are many homes for sale in Sacramento on the internet without the name of the listing agent or listing broker. This means not only does the listing agent remain unknown, but a potential buyer will probably call a buyer’s agent at a competing brokerage.
On the Elizabeth Weintraub website, through my MetroList-partner IDX feed, buyers can search every single listing among homes for sale in Sacramento. Every listing brokerage is identified in this listing feed because that’s the way our Sacramento MLS works. It complies with the law because it makes up its own rules. It’s pretty much the god of Sacramento real estate.
Try explaining this to an annoyed real estate agent who can’t figure out why my picture and contact information shows up on his listing. I regularly get those kind of calls. Agents need to monitor and work on their internet presence. I’ve been working online since 1991. It’s pretty much second nature to me. I go back to Bulletin Boards and squealing dial-up modems.
So, yeah, my listings enjoy great exposure. Put my name into Google and you’ll find almost 1,000,000 results. I challenge you to go to a website and not find one of my listings among the homes for sale in Sacramento. I plaster my listings everywhere and treat each as the individual piece of gold that it is.
At the same time, I provide every listing on all Sacramento homes for sale and beyond on my website. If you’re looking for Sacramento homes for sale, the website for Elizabeth Weintraub is the place to be.
You can call me at 916 233 6759. I answer my phone.
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