The Questions to Ask Before Buying

When beginning a home search, you wanna narrow down what you’re looking for. Here are six things to determine before buying.

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Before you buy a home, there are a number of questions you should answer about the type of home you want to buy and where you want to buy it. Here are the riddles we recommend you solve first:

1. The neighborhood and surrounding area. What kind of place do you want to live in? Do you want to be within walking distance of amenities like restaurants or stores, or more spread out in a quiet area?

2. Is there new construction going on? If you’re buying a new home, that’s great. However, if it’s a newer neighborhood, you should know if there is any new construction ongoing in your neighborhood and how long it will be that way.

3. Do you want to live in a certain school district? If you’d like to live in an area with good schools for your children to attend, we’d be happy to provide you with a list of the best schools in the area. Even if you don’t have children, living in an area like this can have a significant impact on your home’s resale value.

It’s not always about just the house itself.

4. Meet with your lender and talk about payments. You should also discuss your utility bills and how much those are. There are a lot of different factors to look at when determining the affordability of the home.

5. What is the condition of the major systems in the home? There will be a lot of maintenance tests going on during the buying process. You want to set aside some money for repairs, or better yet, ask the seller to include a home warranty with the sale.

6. Look at the comparable homes. If a lot of homes in the area are selling quickly, it’s a good indication of positive resale value.

Sometimes it’s not just about the house itself, it's about the lifestyle you want to live and how the neighborhood affects those things. Regardless of when you plan on buying, make sure you pair up with the right Realtor so you can have a professional on your side to help you along.

If you have any questions for us, don’t hesitate to give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you.

How Can You Save Money During the Selling Process?

When selling your house, there are a number of ways you can save money during the process.

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If you're selling your home, there are a number of ways you can save money before the sale.

One trend we see a lot now is buyers really scrutinizing homes during the inspection period. Sellers can save time and money by hiring an inspector of their own before selling. We call this a pre-inspection. This will help sellers find issues before buyers or their inspectors have the chance to find them and mitigate any surprises before buyers see them. With a pre-inspection, sellers can save money by making repairs on their own terms.

Get a pre-inspection so you can make repairs on your own terms, not the buyer's.

You can also save up to 50% of the cost by telling the inspector that you don't need a report, which can be time-consuming. Instead, just ask to walk through the property with the inspector so they can point out where issues might arise. No two inspectors are the same, but it's worth the investment.

If you have any more questions about saving money before selling your home, you can always call us or shoot me a text or email. We'd be happy to help!

1 Easy Way to Make a Strong Offer in a Seller’s Market

In this hot seller’s market, writing a personal letter to the seller with your offer is a nice touch. However, here’s how you can take it a step further.

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The Bay Area market is extremely hot for sellers right now, and as a home buyer, you may face more competition for a home now than you may have in the past. What can you do to make your offer stand out and win the home you want?

Many Realtors would suggest writing a personal letter to the seller. Writing a “love letter” to the seller about their home will inform them about who you are, what you love about the home, and why they should choose your offer over others.

Let the seller see who you are and why you’re passionate about the home.

Though we think that this is a great idea, as a cutting-edge brokerage, we’d like to take another step up from this concept.

What we’re doing instead is encouraging home buyers to create a short video to send to the seller to let them see who you are and how passionate you are about their home. This will really help you stand out from all of the offers on the table.

This kind of emotional appeal to the seller will go a long way in getting your offer accepted. If you have any other questions about the best ways to get your offer accepted in a hot market like this one, give me a call or send me an email. I’d be happy to help you!