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Increase in Number of Elk Grove Homes for Sale
While talking with a client yesterday in Elk Grove, the strategy for pricing came up in the conversation. The client suggested that I must have a certain way that I advise sellers to pick a price for their home. Although I sell an awful lot of homes in Elk Grove — enough to put me on the radar of companies trying to sell buyer leads to top producers — my strategy is not the same for every home. That’s one of the things that sets me apart from other Elk Grove agents.
I take into consideration the temperature of the marketplace and blend that with the seller’s goals to develop a unique home pricing and marketing strategy for that particular home. It’s also what keeps real estate so completely fascinating for me. If every real estate transaction was identical, I’d most likely not have lasted in the business all these decades.
Not to mention, the fall market in Sacramento is different than the spring market of 2013. Springtime in Sacramento was wild and crazy, coupled with limited inventory. Now, interest rates are inching toward 5% and inventory has more than doubled. The demand is still strong, especially among entry-level homes, but the strategy is different to sell. The light green columns above indicates number of homes for sale in 95624, 95757 and 95758.
Sellers can’t be as demanding as they might like. Homes need to be priced right. A seller must prepare a home for sale. She can’t leave dirty dishes in the sink, floors cluttered and expect to quickly sell. Yet, it is still a seller’s market. Just not as strong as spring.
The Elizabeth Weintraub Team has a couple more homes coming on the market in Elk Grove. Watch for these gems and act quickly if you’re looking to buy a home in Elk Grove. Our sellers don’t need two dozen offers. They simply want that one qualified buyer who loves the home. Is it you?
Chart: Trendgraphix
Timing the Sacramento Real Estate Market
A seller in Elk Grove just pocketed an additional $75,000, due to timing the Sacramento real estate market. It’s not that I recommend trying to time the market, because it’s almost impossible to do. But you can get lucky. It’s a roll of the dice. Just look at Donald Trump — oh, my poor eyes — because he doesn’t always accurately predict much of anything.
We put this home in Elk Grove on the market in the spring of 2012. I sell an awful lot of homes in this particular part of Elk Grove. This home is located in the highly desirable area of the Machado Dairy subdivision over by Bruceville and Bilby, close to Machado Dairy Park. Buyers like this neighborhood for the schools; the homes are somewhat newer with mature trees. It’s bordered by farm land, which makes you feel like you’re out in the country with all of this open space.
There are so many upgrades in this home. People wonder why a home next door with the same square footage sells for so much less, and it’s upgrades. Ask a short sale seller about upgrades. They will tell you about the cost of every single upgrade down to the penny. But this home was not a short sale, it was a regular equity sale. When we came on the market, many of the homes around it were short sales but even so, we sold at the highest price possible — at a price that barely squeaked through an appraisal because there were no comps in that immediate neighborhood.
The buyer could not close. She could not close because she could not get her tax returns verified because she filed her taxes late. The government was running behind. When the buyer’s escrow extension expired, the sellers canceled the transaction and decided to wait. That was a smart move.
Now, a year later, because the market had gone up, I wrote to the sellers to suggest that they sell their home in Elk Grove at this time. Still, there were almost no comparable sales to justify her sales price, but we sold at the top of the market. The sellers made an additional $75,000 by timing the sale.
About Selling Homes in Elk Grove
There are some things I know about that I do not care to know such as Simon Cowell got his best friend’s wife pregnant and why Aretha Franklin, the beloved godmother of soul, doesn’t quite trust modern medicine, but there are other things I know that carry significance, especially about Sacramento real estate and selling homes in Elk Grove. Now, having an almost 40-year career in real estate, I can tell you that it’s very common for clients to have a different idea of what an agent should do to market their home than what an agent believes is the best course of action.
That’s OK, because I go with the flow. I want happy clients. I want more referrals coming to this Sacramento real estate agent, and unhappy clients generally don’t give referrals. It is the referrals and 5-star reviews that keep the doors to my business open. When I’m selling homes in Elk Grove, I want those Elk Grove sellers ecstatic!
But yesterday I elected to make an exception. A seller asked if I would put a box of fliers on the post outside of her home in Elk Grove. I could do it but it would be pointless. It was good that I took the time to explain my reasoning because the seller agreed. Here are few reasons why it’s not a very good idea to put out flyers when selling homes in Elk Grove:
- The home in Elk Grove is located on a cul-de-sac off a quiet street so walk-by traffic is unlikely.
- We want potential buyers to call us. That’s why my Elk Grove office phone number is front and center on the gigantic For Sale sign, followed by a rider with my cellphone number, and another rider with the cellphone number for an Elizabeth Weintraub team member.
- Kids often swipe flyers.
- My Virtual Agent system attached to the for sale sign gives potential buyers many opportunities to get information. They don’t even have to call an agent or talk to an agent. By calling an 800#, all data is sent as a virtual tour to their cellphones. They can text a code, just like American Idol, and all data is sent as a virtual tour to their cellphones. Or, they can take a picture of the QR code with their cellphone and all data is sent automatically to their cellphone.
- But probably an unexpected reason is the home will be sold by the time we get out there with a box of flyers.
If you’re thinking about selling a home in Elk Grove, call an experienced Elk Grove agent, Elizabeth Weintraub, at 916 233 6759. The Elizabeth Weintraub Team was just named by Real Trends as one of the top 25 best real estate teams in California.
Would You Like to Adopt Two Rescue Chihuahuas from Land Park?
You know what’s really great about working as a veteran Sacramento real estate agent who has extensive short sale experience? There is a certain amount of respect for my short sale knowledge bestowed upon me by my clients. Everything else real-estate related? Forget about it. Forget about all of decades I have worked in real estate. Forget about the fact I sold $32 million last year. Forget about the fact media recognizes this Sacramento real estate agent as an expert to regularly interview. Forget about the fact that I write about Homebuying for About.com and have for years. None of that matters to some people. But talk about a Sacramento short sale and my name lights up the sky.
There are some days that I feel just like Rodney Dangerfield because let’s face it, the public, on the whole, are often led to believe that being a Sacramento real estate agent is easy-peasy work and anybody with a cellphone could do it because hey, look at their aunt, their cousin, their next-door neighbor! If a person is hoping to be respected and valued, a person should not search for those kinds of accolades in real estate.
If you want to be unconditionally loved, get a dog. In fact, get two of them. Twice the love. Have you ever thought about adopting a couple of Chihuahuas? I happen to have a pair living in my back yard, and we’re going on Day 4 of the rescued Chihuahuas now. You will see those dogs are no longer considered “lost Chihuahuas in Land Park” or even “found Chihuahuas in Land Park,” they are rescue Chihuahuas. And they are available for adoption to a good home.
We took the rescued Chihuahuas to the Sacramento Animal Shelter yesterday, filed a Found Dogs report and brought them back to our home in Land Park. Also, had them scanned for microchips, but like no collars, no microchips. Come to think of it, two of my cats are microchipped and one is not, so next visit to the vet, guess what? None of the cats venture outdoors. But there could be an busted-open screen, a door left ajar or they could encourage a passerby to break-in and trade our big screen TV in exchange for freedom, you just don’t know.
As we were going through the July Lost Dogs book, which is a big book filled with pages for every day of the month (4th of July was a really busy day) I noticed my clients’ name in the book. These are wonderfully genuine people, the kind you don’t forget. I represented them as buyers when they purchased a home in Land Park 7 years ago. It was a case of not overlooking the overpriced home. They were also my sellers, and I represented them as their listing agent on the sale of their existing home. I managed to sell their home in Elk Grove in the nick of time to fund the purchase of an overpriced home in Land Park. It was a complex escrow for both selling and buying, but they listened to me, trusted me, and I got the job done. Which is what they said when I called them to ask if they ever found the lost Chihuahua they filed the report about.
The husband said he did not want to talk about two rescued Chihuahuas, so I asked him to put his wife on the phone instead. Not going for it. Call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759, if you would like to adopt a couple of super cute and lovable Chihuahuas. If you want to buy or sell your home in the four-county area of Sacramento, well, you can call me for that, too.
Has Your Sacramento Home Price Increased by 30%?
In a conversation with my financial advisor yesterday, she asked if every Sacramento real estate transaction has its share of problems or if it just seems that way. She recently sold her home and bought a new home, so she’s had a little first-hand experience. The answer to that question is yes. Your agent might spare you all of the unnecessary details, but almost every real estate transaction has some glitch pop up. Part of the problems are fueled by the parties themselves: the sellers and buyers. Part is just due to the new climate: the post-Bubble real estate climate, without tossing in limited inventory and rising rates. And newspaper headlines don’t really help.
It’s not that the newspapers are wrong, it’s that people don’t read newspapers. They scan the headlines, believe they have digested the entire story and move on to other things. We live in an Attention Deficit Disorder society.
The headline in the Sacramento Bee story a few days ago was Sacramento-area home prices jump almost 30% in a year, lead 30 biggest metro regions. I read that and my stomach sank. Stomach sag is something that can happen completely out of the blue to us old people who forget that planking is our friend, but the main reason for my distress is because I know that many sellers will believe they can get one-third more for their home than they can actually get, based on that article headline. Please, listen to your Sacramento real estate agent, that article doesn’t literally apply to a Sacramento home seller. The reporter is talking about median prices for last month as compared to median prices from a year ago.
Median prices means half the homes sold for more and half of the homes sold for less. It doesn’t mean YOUR home. Every neighborhood is different. For example, we have a ton of inventory in Land Park right now. At the moment, a quick check in MLS shows 27 homes for sale in 95818 under $400,000 — which encompasses homes for sale in Land Park, Curtis Park and a few blocks north of Broadway. According to Trendgraphix, in July of last year, we ended that month with 18 homes for sale under $400K in 95818. There’s a bit of a glut right now in that price range in Land Park.
But take a look at 95757 in Elk Grove. That neighborhood is in high demand, over by I-5 / Franklin /Whitelock. Part of the demand is the schools. It’s also on the edge of construction, and many of the homes are somewhat newer, slightly more expensive than other parts of Elk Grove. A check in MLS for 95757 shows 23 homes for sale in Elk Grove under $400,000, which is a hot price point. Last year in July, Trendgraphix showed 24 homes for sale. Pressure is on this ZIPcode.
In other words, a seller will get more offers and a higher price for her under $400,000 home in that particular area of Elk Grove than she is likely to get for a similarly priced home in Land Park. Real estate is local. I sell a lot of homes in Elk Grove as an Elk Grove agent, especially in 95757, and I see it first-hand. I also specialize in Land Park because that’s where I live, and many people know I am also a Land Park agent.
As usual, the devil is in the details, and if you wonder whether your home has enough equity to sell, call a Sacramento real estate agent to get a free opinion of value. You can call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759.
Note: Interest rates are going up. Interest rates have increased by 1% already this year and, when rates rise, real estate prices tend to take a dip.
