Email Elizabethselling a home in sacramento
When Sacramento Home Buyers Cancel a Contract
Delivering bad news to a seller in Sacramento is every bit as horrible as shooting antibiotics down your cat’s throat. You know it’s gotta be done, and you’re the one who’s gotta do it, but it’s not pleasant. I don’t know a Sacramento real estate agent alive who wants to tell her seller a buyer has gone sideways and fallen off the edge of the cliff, but so many of them are not watching where they’re walking these days. They seem to be unsupervised.
La-dee-la-dee-la-dee-dah, oops, over the cliff. It’s almost like a video game. Not real.
I blame it partly on DocuSign. It’s so easy to sign a residential purchase contract these days, why, you can sign on your cellphone. Blip, blip, done. It’s easier than buying a latte-half-soy-pumpkin-caramel at Starbucks. With whipped cream. Except by the time you finish consuming that 800-calorie fat bomb, at least you feel satiated. When Sacramento home buyers sign a purchase contract, it’s much more forgettable.
Oh, did I buy a house this afternoon? Slaps forehead. How silly of me. No, sorry, I didn’t want to buy a house. I wanted tickets to the TBD fest. Clicked the wrong thing. Please cancel the contract.
It’s a sorry state of affairs when I find myself grilling buyer’s agents about how much time they have spent with their buyers, how well they know them. Agents tend to use the term “client” rather loosely. Some stranger calls, asks to meet at a home and, around 2:00 AM, after the bars close, that person decides to sign the RPA waiting patiently in DocuSign, is that person a client? Or, is that a person we’ll have to chase around for the next couple of weeks to get the cancellation signed because her intentions to buy a home were never there in the first place?
Perhaps buyer’s agents should discuss next steps and consequences, and help a buyer figure out if the buyer truly wants to purchase a home before presenting a buyer with click here.
Selling a Home to Reluctant Buyers in Sacramento’s Fall Market
Selling a home in Sacramento is more challenging today over our spring market. Many a Sacramento real estate agent is frustrated with the way our real estate market has changed this fall and having a hard time dealing with home buyers. It doesn’t matter if one is a listing agent or a buyer’s agent, you’ve still got to deal with that home buyer if one wants to get into escrow. Selling homes in Sacramento is what I do for a living. Don’t look at me sideways, somebody’s got to.
Gone are the days when upon receipt of a goofball offer a listing agent could say: Hey, buddy, pony up or don’t let the door hit you in the butt. Neither can a listing agent adopt the attitude of say, have you suddenly morphed into a moron or were you simply born stupid? Because one would not under any circumstances poke fun at those who came into this world unprepared, unsupervised and without the ability to reason and deliver rational thought — that would be unacceptable behavior, especially after test results proved the individual was incapable of functioning in a social environment in a normal manner. That would just be mean.
Now, the tables have turned, the winds have shifted and we’re wearing our underwear inside out. We Sacramento listing agents are grateful for an offer. Any offer. It’s like, hey, sweetie, yes, you, you with the head-to-toe tattoos, shaved head and metal gauges in the lobes, come over here and sit down next to me. Here’s a satin pillow. Let me rub your feet and bring you a cup of tea. Would you like lemon? A cool towel for your neck? A copy of People Magazine?
To survive in any real estate market, a good Sacramento listing agent must be a chameleon. Go with the flow, change with the market. Adapt.
Last week a first-time home buyer made an offer on a home in Elk Grove. After much discussion, weighing the pros and cons, my seller negotiated and then elected to accept the offer. Everybody was happy. We changed the status of the home in MLS to pending. The following day, the buyer’s agent called to say the buyer had changed his mind because the buyer’s wife didn’t like the home.
What? Let me talk to the guy. I would say: hey, just divorce her. Get rid of that witch. There are plenty of women in this world who would LOVE that home in Elk Grove. She doesn’t deserve you, man, if she can’t see the beauty in your world. You do something nice for that woman and you get crap. You don’t need that.
And this is why sellers love me.
An Accepted Purchase Offer in Sacramento is Only the Beginning
When buying or selling a home in Sacramento, the parties often don’t realize that it’s hardly over when both sides sign an accepted purchase offer; in fact, the process is just beginning and anything can go wrong. This is where FSBOs (For Sale By Owners) tend to struggle and where real estate agents with less experience can mess up as well.
Think of this point in time as that scene in the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy, all freshly scrubbed and sporting her sparkly ruby slippers, is merrily laughing and singing with her gangly companions, setting out from Munchkin Land to skip down the Yellow Brick Road, just before Glinda vanishes in a puff of twinkly fairy dust. Everybody is happy and excited, looking forward to arriving in the magical Emerald City. They have no idea what lies in store for them.
And neither do most Sacramento home sellers and buyers.
This is when your Sacramento real estate agent can make a world of difference to you. Selling a home in Sacramento is a lot more than just finding a buyer. It means qualifying the buyer, thinking ahead and predicting what could happen, and taking steps to prevent the trees from strangling you and throwing apples at your face. It means fighting off the winged monkeys.
And, if it’s necessary, making it snow.
Keeping everybody on the path to closing. And happy. It’s not the money, either, because a commission check can lose its luster fast if the seller or buyers are unhappy when it’s all over. This is no easy feat. But it’s what I do every day, and I believe I do it well. Going into escrow is just the beginning. If you’re looking for a veteran Sacramento real estate agent, please call Elizabeth Weintraub at 916 233 6759.
How to Sell a Home in Sacramento Fast and Close Under 30 Days
A seller who lived a ways north of downtown Sac called last month to say he needed to sell a home in Sacramento fast, because he had just accepted an unexpected job transfer and had to move across country in 30 days. I love challenges and thrive on those types of opportunities. This couple had purchased the home a few years ago as a bank-owned home and were worried about disclosures and condition. They also were located in a small pocket of newer homes, nestled in a subdivision just down the street from what Bob Dylan might call Desolation Row.
As with any potential listing, I point out the positives and I don’t gloss over the negatives with my sellers. Both carry weight with a buyer, and sellers need to look at the sale of their home from the eyes of a buyer because that’s how homes sell. Sometimes sellers are worried about the tiniest things that carry no consequences of sale, and sometimes they overlook the major things that are really a big, big deal. That’s where a veteran Sacramento real estate agent can be a huge help. I share what sellers need to do and what they don’t need to do.
What these guys needed to do was clean up the house and keep it tidy. Mow the lawn. Clean out a few pieces of furniture. No repairs, no fixing anything except one loose cabinet door in the master bath that required a screwdriver to straighten up. Then, cooperate with showings, no matter how crazy it made them for a week.
We discussed the comparable sales, all of which were pretty much brand new homes. Their home was resale, older. Big difference. However, there wasn’t much on the market, either, and they had desirable factors such as four bedrooms and it was a sought-after single story. They priced it at the hottest price point in Sacramento for this type of home, and we let the market dictate.
The market responded favorably. I personally contacted every buyer’s agent after a showing. We received many offers and accepted the offer from the strongest buyer at the strongest price, which wasn’t necessarily the highest price, but it was 5% over list price and in line with the new home sales. We held our breath as I talked with the buyer’s appraiser and whammo, the appraisal came in at the sales price. You couldn’t ask for anything better than this.
Probably the best part was the home sold and closed in fewer than 30 days, even with marketing time. The buyer’s lender was able to quickly perform. The seller signed their escrow documents while packing in the convenience of their own home. As they drove across country through the cornfields of the Midwest, a wire transfer deposited the proceeds of sale into their banking account. The seller texted: “You are the best; we will never forget what you have done for us.” Peace of mind is priceless. But money helps.
Punxsutawny Phil Predicts 2014 Sacramento Real Estate
Punxsutawny Phil says this is the week in Sacramento real estate in which the rubber meets the road. When the market starts to hop like mad. Because finally, all of those winter vacations are pretty much over, the holidays are gone, the Super Bowl is finished — well, I heard it was finished in the first 12 seconds of the game, but I don’t follow football so I would not really know. But I do know almost everything there is to know about Sacramento real estate. Not ashamed to admit that.
2014 Winter Carnival in downtown St. Paul, MN
We can now freely hold open houses and not be freaking out over which football teams are playing, and whether visitors will come to the open house. The weather will begin to warm up a little bit, although we still desperately need rain, and I don’t care if it rains during an open house because people will still go out to look at homes in the rain. We are not wimps in Sacramento. We don’t cower in a little rain. Look at these photos of the Winter Carnival in St. Paul yesterday shot by my sister, Margie. It was 8 below zero.
2014 Winter Carnival Como Park, St, Paul, MN
On top of this, new listings are coming on the market. This Sacramento real estate agent has got about a dozen in the pipeline that I’m working on, and it’s these listings that will make up some of the March to May closed sales. You might think that May is a good time to go on the market, but actually May is a good time to close escrow. All of the activity for the next 3 months mostly originates in February. Think about that if you’re considering selling your home this spring. And be happy you don’t live in St. Paul, Minnesota where, dare I say once again just to remind you, it was 8 below zero yesterday.
Sure, we’ve got holidays this month but they’re not the type of holidays to interfere with real estate. I’ve got news for you: Punxsutawny Phil, the groundhog who saw his shadow yesterday, he wants you to buy a house. So do Presidents Lincoln and Washington and Obama. It’s the American thing to do, to own your own little piece of real estate, your own heavenly spot on earth.
Call Elizabeth Weintraub, your Sacramento real estate agent, at 916 233 6759. I answer my phone.
Photos: Margie Burgard, St. Paul Winter Carnival 2014
