Archive for July, 2010
Selling Your Home Advice
As a Buyer’s Agent I have taken clients through numerous properties for sale. With all the advice and media around real estate and home improvement its surprising to see how little sellers do to prepare for showings. It seems that many still don’t understand basic strategies for selling their home. With minimal time and effort you can optimize your homes appeal and increase your chances of selling your home quickly.
The number one rule is to think like a buyer: what are you looking for when you look at property? Help the buyer imagine themselves in your home.
Have you ever driven through a neighborhood looking for property for sale? Remember the one that stopped you in your tracks the one whose number you copied down so you could call the agent as soon as you got home? That home had curb appeal. Take a few moments to walk around your property what catches your eye? Some basic maintenance fresh paint and minimal landscaping attention could go a long way to selling your property faster for a better price. Although we’re told not to judge a book by its cover first impressions do count especially in today’s online environment. Take good photos because often it is the MLS image of your home that will or won’t! catch the eye of a buyer make it count.
Once youve got the buyer through your front door keep them there: get rid of the clutter put away your personal items and make sure your space appears open and airy. Any mess or disorder will distract the buyer you want them imagining themselves living in your home not noticing its defects.
And dont hang around while the potential buyer is looking at your home. Although you might be eager to point out all of its features part of the excitement of looking at a home is the discovery let the seller have the space to do it on their own.
There are countless resources available on the Internet on television and at your local library if you want more ideas. Remember that buyers want to find a property its up to you to make yours desirable. Although some buyers are creative enough to see the hidden jewel its faster and easier to polish yours first.
About the writer: Charlie Pigeon is a professional Buyer’s Agent serving the Southwest Florida area. For more information on Southwest Florida homes properties in or for more information on the Southwest Florida real estate market contact Charlie today or visit www.charliepigeon.com.
Screw The Lender!
As the foreclosure epidemic in this country continues to rise homeowners are finding themselves facing more difficult times. Like most homeowners foreclosure is the last this you expect to happen to you however life has a way making unexpected twists and turns and before you know it your home is in jeopardy of being taking from you.
Many times foreclosure occurs do to circumstances outside the homeowners control. Such as
- Job Loss
- Divorce
- Medical Emergency or extended illness/disability
- Death in Family
Often times these situations are just temporary and all the homeowner needs is just a little time to get back of their feet.
However instead of taking proactive steps to avoiding foreclosure what happens is the homeowner often becomes embarrassed or ashamed of the situation they face and tend to ignore the problem.
To compound the problem many troubled homeowners are in denial or dont understand the seriousness of the situation. Often believing that they will take care of the problem later only to find themselves out of options once reality does set in. It is said that nearly 50 of all homeowners in foreclosure never seek help in any way.
Be Ware
Because of the rise in foreclosures nationwide more and more fraudulent people and or companies are beginning to surface. Many of these frauds are developing in the form of foreclosure rescue firms. What ever you do DO NOT TRUST foreclosure rescue firms everyone of them are scams!
These people prey on the vulnerability of troubled homeowners and bleed them of thousands of dollars to “help” stoptheir foreclosure yet over 99 of all homeowners who use rescue firms find themselves in even worse shape then they started.
Most homeowners can feel overwhelmed by the process not knowing where to start who to talk to what steps to take and everything else.
This is what leads trouble homeowners into trusting these rescue firms. It’s the fear of believing that the foreclosure process is in some way overtheir head. It’s not!
However it is crucial that you deal with your situation properly.Unfortunately there is no single solution that works best for everyone it all depends on your personal situation. Dont compound your problems by getting in deeper by making poor decisions. I.E. foreclosure rescue firms!
If you end up falling intoone of the many foreclosure traps you could lose much more than just your home.Youmay severely damage your financial future.
Avoiding Foreclosure
If you find yourself in or facing foreclosure you best thing you can do for yourself is to seek help as soon as you realize you are unable a make your mortgage payment. A great place to start is www.ForeclosureSpecialReport.com. Gathering as much information about the foreclosure process will greatly increase your chances of preventing it from occurring.
If you are in foreclosure now or soon will be you should know there are options available to you. No matter how largeyour loan iswhether you’re in bankruptcy your house need repairs or your tile is loaded down with liens you do have options and there are real solutions available to you. Remember you’re not in foreclosure your home is!
To learn more about your options: www.foreclosurespecialreport.com.
About the writer:nbsp;nbsp;Bill Walker
CEO
www.ForeclosureSpecialReport.com
Save Your Credit And Avoid Foreclosure
Calm your nerves and read the following tips before calling:
1. See if your monthly statement contains the phone number to the lender’s loss mitigation department. If not call the customer service number and ask for that department. At most lenders the loss mitigation department helps borrowers determine which workout option they qualify for. Some lenders have their collections departments advise borrowers on workout options borrowers may be sent to their collections department.
2. Be ready to wait on hold for a long period of time. Its not a good idea to call on your cell phone to rap up your minutes charge your phone in advance and be ready to hang on the line for a long period of time.
3. Some representatives in the loss mitigation department are cranky mean over worked and not trained. If you are being treated badly or if the information that you are being told doesn’t sound or seem correct remain calm and polite get as much information as possible hang up…and then call back.
4. Share all details about your financial situation with your lender.
Your lender will ask a series of questions to assess your financial situation. Some lenders like Wells Fargo Home Mortgage have specialists with both the training and technology to prequalify a caller for a workout option right over the phone. Other lenders do not have this technology and will send you a “work out package” to complete and send back to them.
By preparing yourself in advance and having the financial documents including income and expense numbers in front of you when you make the call you might be able to get a resolution within minutes. The lender will probably ask you to fill out similar documents that describe your financial situation. They will review and analyze the documents before offering a solution to bring your loan uptodate. So organize your bills statements and anything else that will help give an accurate picture of your current financial status.
An explanation of your current financial circumstances.
Details about your current income including pay stubs statements regarding unemployment disability social security retirement pubic aid or and other similar documentation.
A list of your household expenses.
An explanation of what occurred to put you in this financial circumstance. Otherwise referred to as your hardship.
K. Patrice Williams has a BA in Economics as well as a law degree. She has successfully managed both residential and commercial multimillion dollar income producing assets and budgets for more than 10 years. As a 1st year law student Patrice established a real estate development and consulting business and acquired over 30 rental properties. As the housing market values decreased like millions of other Americansher properties were negatively impacted by shifting ARM’s combined by a sluggish economy. Patrice has researched and personally implemented almost all of the preforeclosure techniques detailed in the book: “6 Simple Steps to Avoid Foreclosure”. http://www.avoidforeclosuremanual.com
About the writer:nbsp;nbsp;
About the writer:nbsp;nbsp;MARK Z a top real estate sales associate in the United States and based in
the Northville real estate
market. If you’re looking to buy or sell property in the West
Bloomfield real estatearea
be sure to visit Mark at markzproperties.com.