Tara O'Brien's Minneapolis Real Estate Update

Make your home warm and inviting to boost your home’s value and speed up the sale process.

Warm, neutral-colored paint is key when staging your home.

The first step to getting buyers to make an offer on your home is to impress them with its appearance so they begin to envision themselves living there. Here are seven tips for making your home look bigger, brighter, and more desirable.

1. Start with a clean slate
Before you can worry about where to place furniture and which wall hanging should go where, each room in your home must be spotless. Do a thorough cleaning right down to the nitpicky details like wiping down light switch covers. Deep clean and deodorize carpets and window coverings.

2. Stow away your clutter
It’s harder for buyers to picture themselves in your home when they’re looking at your family photos, collectibles, and knickknacks. Pack up all your personal decorations. However, don’t make spaces like mantles and coffee and end tables barren. Leave three items of varying heights on each surface, suggests Barb Schwarz of www.StagedHomes.com in Concord, Pa. For example, place a lamp, a small plant, and a book on an end table.

3. Scale back on your furniture
When a room is packed with furniture, it looks smaller, which will make buyers think your home is less valuable than it is. Make sure buyers appreciate the size of each room by removing one or two pieces of furniture. If you have an eat-in dining area, using a small table and chair set makes the area seem bigger.

4. Rethink your furniture placement
Highlight the flow of your rooms by arranging the furniture to guide buyers from one room to another. In each room, create a focal point on the farthest wall from the doorway and arrange the other pieces of furniture in a triangle around the focal point, advises Schwarz. In the bedroom, the bed should be the focal point. In the living room, it may be the fireplace, and your couch and sofa can form the triangle in front of it.

5. Add color to brighten your rooms
Brush on a fresh coat of warm, neutral-color paint in each room. Ask your real estate agent for help choosing the right shade. Then accessorize. Adding a vibrant afghan, throw, or accent pillows for the couch will jazz up a muted living room, as will a healthy plant or a bright vase on your mantle. High-wattage bulbs in your light fixtures will also brighten up rooms and basements.

6. Set the scene
Lay logs in the fireplace, and set your dining room table with dishes and a centerpiece of fresh fruit or flowers. Create other vignettes throughout the home—such as a chess game in progress—to help buyers envision living there. Replace heavy curtains with sheer ones that let in more light.
Make your bathrooms feel luxurious by adding a new shower curtain, towels, and fancy guest soaps (after you put all your personal toiletry items are out of sight). Judiciously add subtle potpourri, scented candles, or boil water with a bit of vanilla mixed in. If you have pets, clean bedding frequently and spray an odor remover before each showing.

7. Make the entrance grand
Mow your lawn and trim your hedges, and turn on the sprinklers for 30 minutes before showings to make your lawn sparkle. If flowers or plants don’t surround your home’s entrance, add a pot of bright flowers. Top it all off by buying a new doormat and adding a seasonal wreath to your front door.


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Labels: buying a home, buying and selling a home, condo for sale, home buying process, home for sale, home staging, homes for sale in shakopee, minneapolis realtors, sell my house, staging your home for sale

By knowing how much mortgage you can handle, you can ensure that home ownership will fit in your budget.

Homeownership should make you feel safe and secure, and that includes financially. Be sure you can afford your home by calculating how much of a mortgage you can safely fit into your budget.Instead of just taking out the biggest mortgage a lender qualifies you to borrow, consider how much you want to pay each month for housing based on your financial and personal goals.Think ahead to major life events and consider how those might influence your budget. Do you want to return to school for an advanced degree? Will a new child add day care to your monthly expenses? Does a relative plan to eventually live with you and contribute to the mortgage?Still not sure how much you can afford? You can use the same formulas that most lenders use, or try another of these traditional methods for estimating the amount of mortgage you can afford.

1. The general rule of mortgage affordability
As a rule of thumb, you can typically afford a home priced two to three times your gross income. If you earn $100,000, you can typically afford a home between $200,000 and $300,000.To understand how that rule applies to your particular financial situation, prepare a family budget and list all the costs of homeownership, like property taxes, insurance, maintenance, utilities, and community association fees, if applicable, as well as costs specific to your family, such as day care costs.

2. Factor in your downpayment
How much money do you have for a downpayment? The higher your downpayment, the lower your monthly payments will be. If you put down at least 20% of the home’s cost, you may not have to get private mortgage insurance, which costs hundreds each month. That leaves more money for your mortgage payment.
The lower your downpayment, the higher the loan amount you’ll need to qualify for and the higher your monthly mortgage payment.

3. Consider your overall debt
Lenders generally follow the 28/41 rule. Your monthly mortgage payments covering your home loan principal, interest, taxes, and insurance shouldn’t total more than 28% of your gross annual income. Your overall monthly payments for your mortgage plus all your other bills, like car loans, utilities, and credit cards, shouldn’t exceed 41% of your gross annual income.Here’s how that works. If your gross annual income is $100,000, multiply by 28% and then divide by 12 months to arrive at a monthly mortgage payment of $2,333 or less. Next, check the total of all your monthly bills including your potential mortgage and make sure they don’t top 41%, or $3,416 in our example.

4. Use your rent as a mortgage guide
The tax benefits of homeownership generally allow you to afford a mortgage payment—including taxes and insurance—of about one-third more than your current rent payment without changing your lifestyle. So you can multiply your current rent by 1.33 to arrive at a rough estimate of a mortgage payment.Here’s an example. If you currently pay $1,500 per month in rent, you should be able to comfortably afford a $2,000 monthly mortgage payment after factoring in the tax benefits of homeownership. However, if you’re struggling to keep up with your rent, consider what amount would be comfortable and use that for the calcuation instead.Also consider whether or not you’ll itemize your deductions. If you take the standard deduction, you can’t also deduct mortgage interest payments. Talking to a tax adviser, or using a tax software program to do a “what if” tax return, can help you see your tax situation more clearly.

Labels: buying a home, buying and selling a home, home buying process, homes for sale in shakopee, homes for sale., minneapolis market, minneapolis real estate, mortgage information, what do I qualify for

We released the monthly housing stats for August 2008 last week. Here's the gist of what we had to say.

Sales activity in the Twin Cities housing market continues to post healthy numbers. For the second consecutive month and only the third time in the last 39 months, pending sales posted a year-over-year increase. August saw 4,411 purchase agreements signed—an increase of 15.0 percent from August of last year. There has not been a year-over-year increase this large since November of 2004.

There were 18.8 percent fewer new homes on the market in August 2008 than in August 2007. The total inventory of homes for sale at the end of August was 9.2 percent lower than the same time last year, which is actually a good thing. We've been needing fewer homes on the market, and we're starting to get what we needed. There's still plenty to choose from out there.

Home prices are still on a downward trend. The overall August median sales price of $200,000 fell from last year by 13.0 percent. Lender-mediated homes posted a median sales price of $150,000, a decrease of 9.6 percent from last year. Traditional properties had an August median sales price of $229,900, a more modest decrease of 4.3 percent.

Due to the decline in home prices and a downtick in mortgage rates, affordability is up. Buyers are taking notice and jumping back into the market to take advantage. We're eager to see how this plays out in the snowy months.


As published by: Minneapolis Association of Realtors

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Labels: homes for sale in shakopee, housing, housing prices

Once again, the big story in this week's activity report is the huge upswing in pending sales activity relative to one year ago. For the week ending August 23, there were 818 pending sales, an increase of 26.8 percent from the same week in 2007. Over the last three weeks, we have now posted 545 more pending sales than over the same three weeks last year.

Part of this year's increase is due to legitimate increases in demand brought about by attractive prices, still-healthy mortgage rates and a "last call" flurry of consumers utilizing FHA's seller-funded downpayment assistance program before it is discontinued on October 1. The other reason for the year-over-year surge is the Valley Fair-esque downward dive that activity took last year at this time amidst the initial media frenzy surrounding the now-infamous "credit crunch."

The supply of homes for sale continues to decrease, now down 7.7 percent from last year. For September, our Supply-Demand Ratio is 9.29, which means there are 9.29 homes for sale for each buyer in the market. This is a hearty 24.2 percent decline from last September and is due to the falling supply and rising demand.

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Labels: foreclosure, homes for sale in shakopee, market update, minneapolis condos, minneapolis market, Minneapolis Neighborhoods, minnesota real estate, real estate sales, short sale

Who is responsible when a home doesn't sell? I hear almost daily about how homes with valid purchase agreements are being forclosed on because they seemed to have been lost in the shuffle at the bank. It is no secret that when you are dealing with a short sale there are bound to be hurdles, but no one expects the bank itself to be the biggest hurdle of them all.

Banks and lenders are overwhelmed by the amount of forclosures and short sales they currently have; however this is not a new problem and one would assume that by now they could have hired enough staff and things would be moving more smoothly.
Lets talk about Short Sales. On average a file that has a purchase agreement, or multiple purchase agreements for that matter, sits in purgatory for a minimum of 4 to 6 weeks before it is ever even assigned to a negotiator. At that time an appraisal is ordered which is another 7 business days. Once the appraisal is in it is another 7-10 business business days before the negotiator can get the investor to look at it. Once all of this has happened a decision is made. DO YOU STILL HAVE A BUYER?

Who is responsible when mistakes are made? Where is the accountability? I cannot speak for all agents, nor can I speak for all banks but I can tell you from my experience about a transaction I had that will shock you; it shocked me.

My sellers had purchased their home in 2005 at the peak of the market and because of the economy and their careers had fallen behind on payments. Making the decision to sell at this time can be very difficult and embarrasing. They decided none-the-less to sell. In November we submitted the short sale package to the bank, complete with all the necessary bank statements, pay stubs, tax returns, hardship letter and listing contract. They paid $780,000 for the property in 2005. We put the home on the market in January of 08 for $625,000, the current market value. We lowered the price after 30 days to $575,000 and received a notice of sheriff sale for January as well. We received a cash offer on February 9 for $575,000 (yes, full price) with a closing date in June. The offer was submitted the first time to the loss mitigation department at Greenpoint Mortgage on February 12; complete with purchase agreement, market analysis, net sheet and listing contract. I followed up every week to get updates and every week was told the same thing, "This file has not been assigned to a negotiator yet, someone will be calling you or your seller when we get there." After one month of this I started to call twice a week. After two months, I began to worry. I had my seller call as well to see if he could get anywhere. I would sit on hold forever and be passed around everywhere. Finally after 11 weeks I received an email from Greenpoint stating that they did not know where this file was or what happened to it, but could I re-submit. Well, on May 15 I received the approval; the problem is that the buyer walked on that very same day. They were fed up and didn't think the home was worth it anymore. By the way, the appraisal came in at $495,000. WE LOST THE BUYER, I was just sick about it.

To make a long story short, the next offer came in at $410,000 and the bank declined the offer. The home was foreclosed on August 7, 2008. Now I ask you, who is responsible for this mess. The sellers will have a foreclosure on their credit and the bank will spend several thousand dollars to get this home re-listed; only to sell it for about $350,000.

Greenpoint mortgage should be ashamed of themselves. No one has taken responsibility for this over at the bank and no one probably will. This is not an isolated incident. Ask around, most if not all agents have similar stories. What is it going to take to get these banks to listen to us. If I waited 12 weeks to give my seller an answer, they would take my real estate license. Time is of the essence; for who? The banks do what they like, when they like and dont have to answer to anyone, is this right?

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Labels: bank screwups, foreclosure, homes for sale in shakopee, minneapolis market, short sale

5 bedroom, 5 bathroom, extra large 3+ car garage. Quiet lot with neighbors on 1 side only. Priced to sell. Gorgeous home, turn key. Hardwood, stainless steel appliances, ceramic tile, bar, great room, double fence, heated pool and more...

Labels: homes for sale in shakopee, shakopee home, shakopee real estate