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Sold Off Market By Your Carmichael Real Estate Agent: 5324 Mustang Way
5324 Mustang Way, Carmichael, CA 95608 sold by your Carmichael Real Estate Agent Elizabeth Weintraub
One of the services I offer my sellers of homes in Carmichael and other communities throughout Sacramento is my tips for fixing up the home prior to sale. I make sure the types of improvements or repairs I suggest are things that will return 100% or more, because otherwise they don’t make financial sense. The things I suggest are often dependent on not only market conditions such as whether it’s a hot seller’s market or a buyer’s market, but also it’s based on the condition of the home.
This particular home closed escrow with your Carmichael real estate agent representing the seller. Another Lyon Real Estate associate who worked at a different office represented the buyer. But that’s not how it started out. It started out with a few showings, and then the seller had a personal reason for wanting to stop the showings for a few weeks. I immediately put the listing into temporary off market status and left it there, waiting to hear from the seller.
They had made a few repairs such as pulling the smelly dog carpeting in the entertainment areas and replacing it with engineered hardwood. I had them change out old jangly ceiling fans with more modern fixtures. We painted a boldly colored wall with a more neutral tone, fixed a few holes. However, the home was still in its original condition. There were drawbacks such as a remote bedroom in the garage, a funky kitchen and a weird layout. The upside was the huge lot, RV access, the pool, and location. It had potential and was very much livable.
When the home first came on the market, I had received a call from buyers who seemed very interested but for some reason, I don’t recall why, could not view the home. They called me when it went into TOM status. Turned out they had a real estate agent, so I talked to their agent and threw out the idea of writing an offer subject to inspection. I am required to present all offers to the seller. Just because I’m not marketing the home and it’s off market doesn’t mean she could not send us an offer.
While that agent was working on an offer, all of a sudden, out of the blue another agent called your Carmichael real estate agent, inquiring about the status of this off-market listing. I told her another agent was writing an offer subject to inspection and suggested she do the same. Whammo, two offers on a home that was not on the market. Our first buyer went into escrow. The second buyers, the guys who had called me, were furious. But, hey, go into backup, I suggested. Write a backup offer. Be in official backup.
Sure enough, the first set of buyers toured the home and decided, for all the reasons I already pointed out, it was not suitable for them, and they felt the home required too much work. That was fine. Because the backup buyers moved into first position and they closed escrow a few days ago. And this is how your Carmichael real estate agent came to sell a house that wasn’t on the market. This home at 5324 Mustang Way off of Winding Way closed at list price of $444,000. We capped the pest work at $3,000 and the VA buyer absorbed all other costs for repairs and pest.
Two Tips to Buying a Home in a Low Inventory Market Like Sacramento
- If you cannot find a home to buy in Sacramento, one thing your agent can do is call listing agents on the off-market listings. Sellers might be happy not to have to deal with a bunch of traffic later and will take a bird in the hand.
- What you can also do is put in a backup offer if you lose a multiple-offer bidding war. You have a very good chance, maybe 50%, of moving into first place. It is not unusual for first-time buyers to cancel.
If you’d like more tips, call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759. Put my 40+ years of experience to work for you.
The Sacramento REALTOR with the Highest List Price
Do sellers always pick the Sacramento REALTOR who proposes the highest sales price? Not if they’re smart they don’t. They should pick the REALTOR they most trust, like and who has the experience to do the best job for them. But what if they do take the REALTOR with the highest price and that REALTOR just happens to be me? That’s what happened this summer, and I wasn’t feeling really good about the fact that price might have been the main reason I was chosen to list that pool home in Carmichael.
I’m not underestimating my experience because I’m certain my decades in the business was a motivating factor, but I had the sneaky suspicion that if I had suggested a lower sales price, that seller might not have elected to list with me. It doesn’t mean I will sell out my ethics or tell a seller a price that I don’t think the seller will get just to obtain that listing. That’s not how I work. I do try to get the seller the highest price possible, though.
The thing is home pricing is so variable. There is no single list price, actually. There is a price it should be listed at, which is not necessarily the price a seller expects to get. There is a price a buyer might offer, which is not necessarily the price at which the home may appraise. There is market value and there is appraised value, and the two are not necessarily the same thing. It’s more of a strategy, mixed with science and emotion.
Much of my pricing is based on how the home feels emotionally to me. I know that might sound a little new-agey and touchy-feely, but buyers make offers based on emotion. I try to look at the home through the buyer’s eyes, and then I turn that feeling into a dollar figure, followed by a way to justify that price to an appraiser. It’s a different approach than most REALTORS use, and it’s been very successful for my sellers.
There were REALTORS in my real estate office who thought we had priced that Carmichael pool home too high. It didn’t have upgrades. It wasn’t remodeled. Some of the appliances didn’t even work. Other REALTORS at the listing presentations had suggested sales prices that were tens of thousands of dollars lower than mine. My suggested sales price was the highest. From a sole listing viewpoint, the price didn’t make sense. From a buyer’s viewpoint, though, it did.
We sold that Carmichael pool home at list price. It closed last week. So, while I always tell a seller do NOT pick the REALTOR who gives you the highest price, in this particular instance they might have just done that and it was not the wrong thing to do. Still, I hope they chose me for my willingness to always do what I believe is best for them and not because my suggested list price was the highest.
I don’t intend to beat out a competing agent by suggesting higher prices during a listing presentation. I do what I believe is right.
You Never Forget How to Ride a Bicycle
No matter how hectic being a Sacramento real estate agent is for me, I always try to set aside some time over the weekend to enjoy an adventure, something totally unrelated to real estate. There comes a point when I must pull my head out of my computer and go outside. And not just to take a listing, which is a lot of fun in itself, but to do something completely different. It keeps me refreshed, motivated and focused during the week. Agents who don’t take a little time off now and then can burn out.
Besides, I have just put another listing into escrow this weekend, an unusual property in Orangevale. Negotiation of a sale to fruition is generally a good cause for celebration. It’s not easy to put a sale into escrow when the seller doesn’t have email nor a computer. This is where having the luxury of 17 Lyon Real Estate offices around the Sacramento Valley comes in very handy. Without satellite locations for me to work in, I’d have to make several roundtrips by car to obtain signatures, which can eat up half an afternoon. It’s not the best use of my time, driving around. The best use of my time is talking with a client and advising a client.
Sliding my cellphone into my wristlet, my husband and I ventured off into Midtown. Although we live in Land Park, we often walk to Midtown because, well, because we have two feet and we can walk. The weather was beautiful. Homes in Midtown are unique and interesting. And all of that walking helped to burn up some calories we probably packed on after a stop for Dim Sum at New Canton on Broadway, but hey, a person can get hungry walking around.
It was about then that the thought popped into my head that perhaps I should buy a new bicycle. I don’t really like the bicycle I have. It was not a bike I picked out myself. It was a Christmas present one year from one of my ex-husbands who didn’t really know what he was doing. This was during the 1980s, and the doofus bought me a silver touring bike to ride around town, super skinny tires, turned-down handle bars (hard on the back) and one of those cross bars that if you fell on it, yowza, you don’t forget the pain. It’s also oversized for me, and it’s been hanging up in the garage for years gathering dust.
We headed over to the bike shop in Midtown on 24th & K Street: City Bicycle Works. This bike shop has a lot of inventory. If there’s a drawback to living in Sacramento, it’s the fact that most stores in town, regardless of what you want to buy, lack inventory. I was really attracted to the Bianchi bike in the photo on top of this page, but I ended up buying a hot pink Electra Townie (to the right). It has a basket to hold that imaginary cat who someday will want to ride with me, a chrome bell to warn those in my path to get the #$%& out of my way and, of course, a cellphone caddy.
Unfortunately, my new bike would not fit in the back of my husband’s Prius, so I rode it home. It was only 3 miles. Truth was I could not wait to get on it. There are bike lanes all over Midtown, but the ride down T Street under the shaded tree canopy was especially lovely. The other aspect I found to be especially enjoyable was being able to tap the bike pedal backwards to slow down. It’s one of those instinctive things a person like me would recall from when I first learned how to ride a bike in the 1950s. That feature is back in these new models. I guess they know their market for nostalgic town bikes.
Maybe today, after listing a pool home in Carmichael, I’ll take an hour off and head over to the river by Old Sacramento and zip down the levee. If you spot a woman on a pink bike with a cellphone attached to handlebars and her ponytail flying, wave hello.
