Gabrielle's Blog

Sorry for the delay in getting these out this month. Time sure goes by fast!

Hopefully this makes sense. I haven't figured out how to do a good job inserting tables into blogs yet, so all the nifty colors and fonts fall apart making this a bit more difficult to figure out.

It's interesting looking at the activity for various "areas" of Auburn. We're so diverse here. As with most other areas, the lower-priced homes continue to sell well. Gads, there's actually fairly brisk selling going on for homes in the Auburn West Hill neighborhoods. Less than six months of inventory!

Remember, what we're looking at here is to help determine what might happen if you were to list your home ... For example, if you listed your home in the West Hill area for under $300,000 ... you might expect that it would take just under six months to sell it. Well, of course, YOUR home would sell much faster, as it would be the best prepared, the best priced, the best overall! Working with an experienced listing agent (like me!) will help certainly help!

 Every single neighborhood, whether on the West Hill, East Hill, Academy, or not even in Auburn, has it's own personality and historical time line. As you evaluate your course of action -- whether buying or selling -- be sure to carefully study what's really happening for homes like yours in your own neighborhood.

Don't hesitate to ask your agent to help you interpret what the numbers mean. That's what we're here for! 

Buyers, what is "perfect?"

Believe me, I understand that this is a buyer's market ... and in a buyer's market, buyers can really really be choosy, but let's talk about this for just a minute.

Here's a scenario:

Suppose you walk into a house and right away the wallpaper in the entry is just a turn off for you. Do you walk further? Or do you leave?

Let me throw a couple of ideas out to you:

Suppose, just suppose, that should you walk through that wallpapered entry, you find that the rest of the house is, to your taste, poorly decorated or poorly painted, or the colors just don't appeal, or the carpet is worn, or it has cooking smells, or wet doggy smells, or whatever. The layout is perfect. Big rooms, big yard, great bones! But OH, it just needs sooo much paint, new carpet, etc.

What do you do?

Do you pass on the house because it just needs too much work?

Do you attempt to see past the decorating and into the house?

Is it your taste that's different, or is it the seller's?

What if that weird house is priced considerably below the rest of the market? But at the top of your number? Will that make a difference?

So ... let me ask this question another way: How long do you anticipate you'll stay in your new home? Long enough to make it yours? Would "any" house be absolutely/exactly to your taste on first look?

I believe that, for the most part, homeownership is long term. Granted there are investment properties, but I'm not talking about those here. Making a house your own is part of the charm and, for some, one of the biggest reasons a home is bought. So the walls can be painted florescent pink with purple stripes if they want. (just don't do that on the outside if there's a Homeowner's Association!)

Granted, as an agent I attempt to counsel my seller clients that staging works wonders and minimizing the "uh oh" factor is critical. Sometimes, however, a seller absolutely loves their decorating, or even more commonly now, just can't afford to make any neutralizing changes. Perhaps the Distressed Property thing is going on. Sometimes there's just extreme push back from a seller when encouraged to allow changes and modifications to be made.

I also attempt to counsel my buyer clients to look beyond the surface of a home. To look at the layout, the potential lifestyle the home, yard, and neighborhood provides.

So ... back to my original question: Do you walk further and look for the hidden beauty in a house that's in your price range ... or do you leave?