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Once Upon a Time There Were 3 Homes in Escrow
One would think it was an April Fool’s joke the way things seem to be going this morning in my Sacramento real estate business, but I can assure you that it’s entirely coincidental that 3 properties are going back on the market today pending rescission through absolutely no fault of the sellers. It’s those buyers. Once we had 3 homes in escrow and then not.
You would think buyers would have received the message by now that we have limited inventory in the marketplace, and they are pretty much lucky to be in escrow on any home. But with any strange market comes strange buyers as part of the mix. The problem is as a listing agent, we don’t meet the buyers face-to-face and we have no idea really whether they face mental challenges or are just drunk or stoned. The scenarios seem so similar at times.
I want to suggest hey, buyer’s agents, why not rifle through your buyer’s personal belongings to see if they have stashed illegal drugs in their coat pocket and better sniff that water bottle, does it contain vodka? Because I don’t see any other explanation for such absurdities. I know for some people it’s a lot of fun to be in escrow and picture what life would be like after closing, but for some of those people, it pains me to say, well, they can harbor no intention of closing. Some of them don’t realize it at the time, I’ll give them that much; but others are fully aware, they’re just playing in some other kids’ sandbox, one that the cat visited.
Just seems like a big case of buyer’s remorse sneaking into town on slipper-clad feet. Like that purple smoky haze cast as a curse by Maleficent over Storybrooke. Three perfectly good homes in escrow back on the market today. It’s unbelievable. Enough with the negative, let go of that — time to focus on the positive. These will sell again. They always do.
If you need a turnkey home in Elk Grove at $225,000, or a model home condo in West Sacramento by the Lighthouse Marina at $195,000, or a huge upgraded home with hardwood floors and a fabulous view in Natomas around $300,000, please give this Sacramento real estate agent a ring today at 916.233.6759. I’ll be more than happy to help you find that perfect home and slip you into backup position as we await the processing of the inevitable. No April Foolin’, I promise. When we put homes in escrow, they generally stick.
Sacramento Spring Home Selling Starts in the Rain
One of my Elk Grove sellers yesterday almost passed out when I called to say we had sold his home. I’m not joking. He could not believe it, and that’s putting it mildly. One day he’s a guy with a home in Elk Grove that is almost upside-down with a roof at the end of its life and the next day he’s slipping $50,000 into his pocket. I’m sure that’s the way it seemed to him. “Buttt,” he stuttered in disbelief, “We haven’t even been on the market for 2 weeks yet.”
When a listing is done right, much of the work is done upfront. Sellers don’t see the hours we agents pour over our listings, highlighting this feature, brightening this spot, cropping thusly, and plastering it everywhere online. Or the time invested to study the comparable sales and help the seller to choose just the right sales price. Or the number of inspection reports obtained from roofers, pest workers much less our own visual inspections, rearranging, color coordinating and staging the home a little bit. What they see is a buyer walking in the door and cooing, “I want this home.” It sends sellers into shock.
It was an unbelievable day yesterday for this Sacramento real estate agent. I don’t always have days like that Wednesday or I would probably drop from exhaustion. In addition to receiving an award from Leading Real Estate Companies of the World at my office meeting, bringing in a breakfast item for a potluck to honor veteran and former SAR president Barbara Harsch, and adding another curb scrape to the front lip spoiler on my car on my way to drop it at the body shop, it seems like everything happened in three’s. First, I took 3 new listings: met with the sellers, inspected the homes, shot my photographs, signed all the paperwork, explained how showings work, all that stuff.
Lyon Real Estate and I are bringing to the Sacramento spring home selling market today a gorgeous remodeled home in East Sacramento at 700 San Antonio Way at $649,000. The attention to detail in this remodel is astounding. Another new listing is a home in Carmichael, just north of Fair Oaks and east of California Street at 6145 Fountaindale Way at $350,000. This is a single-level, open floor plan with vaults and attached deck, surrounded by mature landscaping, built in 1992. The third new listing is located at 17 Oasis Court, which is on a culdesac, built in 2008 (among newer homes in central Sacramento), with 4 bedrooms and 2 baths at the affordable price of $195,000.
On top of this, I put 3 listings into contract and into escrow. Like the home of my Elk Grove seller who almost had a heart attack. I picked up 3 new clients by answering my phone as I was driving around Sacramento, too. We’re just getting started in this Sacramento spring selling season. See, focus. That’s the name of the game, and an agent must be on top of her game. Besides, it was too rainy to take my daily bike ride through Land Park yesterday anyway.
Finding a Replacement Property for a 1031 Exchange
Lots of investors from the Bay area call top-producing Sacramento real estate agents when they decide to sell — which is how I end up working with many of them — and the shift I spy on the horizon now is to 1031 exchanges. You might not know this, but I got my start in real estate in the 1970s by working solely with investors, many of them first-time investors. I sold investment properties exclusively for about 9 years, and I moved into real estate from my certified escrow officer position, during which I processed and closed a large number of 1031 tax deferred exchanges.
It’s funny how some things can come full circle. Now that the market in Sacramento is picking up, more investors have equity and some of them want to put that equity to work elsewhere. They don’t want to pay taxes on the sale of their investment property if they don’t have to, and most of them don’t as long as they find and identify a replacement property within the 45-day period and effect a 1031 exchange. (There are minor sub-rules that don’t apply to very many, so I won’t go into those.) The more important rule is an investor has 180 days to close escrow.
My new clients have a rental home in Elk Grove they want to exchange. They don’t live in the area and have discovered how difficult it is to manage an investment property without family nearby. A drive into Sacramento from the Bay area can take 2 to 3 hours each way. Some investors might prefer to move their equity to another town.
A 1031 Exchange wouldn’t be such a nagging problem if we had more inventory in Sacramento. I try to explain that investors actually have about 75 days, if you look at this systematically. Once an offer is received to buy the investor’s rental property, that escrow period is about 30 days, give or take. That means 30 days + 45 days = 75 days. But people, being people, sometimes look to the worst case scenario. Like, what happens if they can’t find a replacement property?
Being in real estate, I know they will find a replacement property for a 1031 Exchange, even if they’re looking out-of-area, because I know real estate agents and how the business works. But that doesn’t help the investor if they’re not standing in my Jimmy Choos, and looking at this from my viewpoint.
This is yet one more reason why we need more inventory in Sacramento. To give investors an assurance that they can find that replacement property, and two more properties along with it as a backup. If you’re thinking about deferring taxes on the sale of your investment property, talk to your accountant and then call this Sacramento real estate agent, Elizabeth Weintraub. I’d love to help you to locate a qualified intermediary and sell your investment home, 916.233.6759.
Spotlight: Homes for Sale in 95624 in Elk Grove
This weekend I’m meeting with my electrician and his wife in Elk Grove to talk about selling their home in 95624. As a top Elk Grove agent, I sell many homes in Elk Grove and, over the years, that city has developed into one of my speciality markets. The ZIP code of 95624 is close to the ZIP 95829, but that area of 95829 is in Sacramento, not in Elk Grove, even though homes in 95829 might be located in the same Elk Grove school district. All of the homes located in 95624 are within the city limits of Elk Grove.
Speaking of which, the schools are a primary reason many people with families choose to live in Elk Grove. There are 15 public and private elementary schools, 5 middle schools and 5 high schools, according to Trulia. Time Magazine in 2006 named Elk Grove as the fastest growing city in the United States, just as the housing market was beginning to crash. Many homeowners lost tremendous amounts of equity from 2006 to 2012. But today, we are on the road to recovery. Many people who thought they didn’t have any equity are amazed to discover that they can now freely sell their home in Elk Grove.
Homes in the 95624 ZIP code of Elk Grove priced between $350,000 and $400,000 can be more difficult to sell if the bulk of the homes in a given neighborhood are priced near $350,000 and you have that odd $400,000 home. But it doesn’t mean it won’t sell or that you won’t get top dollar for it. It just might take a little bit longer. I sold several in the upper end of that price range recently — closed a home in East Park at $385,000 last week and a Meritage Home in Britschgi Ranch will close shortly. In February, for example, there were only 7 homes in that price range that closed escrow. We’ll see an uptick this month, I predict. At the moment, MLS reports we have 229 homes for sale in 95624, which have not yet sold nor closed escrow.
The competition grows a bit more intense in the $300,000 to $350,000 range. Last February out of 29 listings in that range only 11 sold. That equals about 1 out of 3 homes. The hottest price range, though, is the “under $300,000,” those homes priced between $200,000 and $300,000. The pending sales in that price range for February exceeded the number of homes for sale.
And this is exactly where my electrician’s home is located. We’ll probably need to spruce it up a little bit because most people don’t live in the manner in which they would present a home for sale to the public. We live like real people and not characters in a fairy tale, but it is the fairy tale I will sell. This is a one-story home in a neighborhood in which many investors have flipped homes, and it’s a popular place to live.
I talk to everybody about real estate because it’s my passion. Even when I’m having an extra electrical receptacle placed under my home office desk. Thinking about buying or selling a home in 95624? Call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916.233.6759.
Finding Your Best Elk Grove Real Estate Agent Has Nothing to Do With Commission
When the first words out of a potential seller’s lips in Elk Grove are how much is your commission, I figure I’m talking with a person who doesn’t really understand the value of an excellent Elk Grove real estate agent — whose clients call her the best Elk Grove agent they’ve ever hired. In fact, it’s quite likely the individual believes all real estate agents are the same, which is too bad, and the person sees no value in paying an agent her worth because, down deep, they believe the agent is “worthless but necessary.” It’s an incredible insult, yet the caller sees it as shrewd negotiating and continues to try to kick the commission down a percentage point or two. These sellers are simply focusing on the wrong thing.
I always tell sellers that they can find a cheaper agent and an agent who will offer discounted and lesser services. Although all commissions are negotiable, I charge the same percentage I have always charged for the past 40 years. In exchange, they’ll get superior service, and my expertise will more than pay back more than my commission because they’ll probably get more for their home and enjoy a smooth escrow. I manage details, stay on top of my transactions and promptly communicate.
This is why I was not completely stunned when clients decided I deserved more than my commission, but I was stunned by their expression of gratitude. These were delightful sellers I met over FaceTime when I put a contractor’s box on their home and took them on a virtual tour in real time. They lived out of state. I helped them to prepare their home for sale, and gave them advice about what they needed to do to appeal to today’s Elk Grove home buyers.
Later, held numerous open houses, plastered the home everywhere online through extensive marketing, and followed up on every single showing. Some buyers who came through the open houses thought the home was priced too high — based on smaller homes in the neighborhood that sold for less. For some stupid reason, they wanted to pay the same price for a big home as for a small home. But I championed on and, sure enough, this was one of the few homes in Elk Grove that sold for more than list price.
The sellers sent me an unexpected Christmas gift from Nordstrom, an expensive perfume set. Last week, I received a bottle of Bollinger Cuvee Champagne. When we closed escrow on Friday, a Nordstrom gift box arrived, containing a certificate easily exchangeable for a pair of Jimmy Choos. Holy cow! When I thanked them profusely for such overwhelming generosity, they responded: “You really went above and beyond and felt put in effort on our behalf greater than we have seen from any other REALTOR. We felt that for you to simply get the same rewards as a REALTOR doing just what they needed to wasn’t appropriate.”
So don’t listen to this full-service Elk Grove agent substantiate her commission, listen to happy sellers. If you don’t feel this way about your agent, maybe you’re working with the wrong agent.
