10 suggestions to kick-start selling your home faster!

Let's be honest...a few basic elements can make all the difference between a quicker home sale and an excruciatingly frustrating ordeal. The important thing its to stay open, receptive, informed ...and most of all, positive! By following these few tips below to speed up your sale in this market, you will put your home at the top of that buyer's list!

1. Finish the "honey do" list. Just about every homeowner has a string of little repairs that never quite get done. Now's the time - Fix the screens, oil that squeak, patch the cracks, paint the trim. Stuff that you've stopped noticing could be shouting "Deferred maintenance!" to every potential buyer.

The cost: A few bucks if you're handy, a couple of hundred or so if you hire someone who is.

2. Get inspected. A pre-sale inspection can help identify problems that could thwart a sale in time to fix them. If there are no major problems, an inspection can publicize that fact to buyers.

Having an inspection report on the counter during the open house shows the buyers you have nothing to hide!
The cost: Around $400.

3. Pack up the clutter. Too much stuff makes rooms look smaller and focuses buyers' attention on your possessions rather than the home you're trying to sell. Professional stagers recommend removing as much as a third of your things to better show off rooms and closets. Everything will have to move eventually, why not get a head start?! Clutter eats equity! Remember, buyers can't imagine themselves living there if they can't see the space.

The cost: $150 to $300 a month for three months' storage.

4. Depersonalize and neutralize. The first items that should go in those packing boxes are family photos, collections and just about anything else that screams "you." Streamline your artwork and consider toning down bold decorating statements. That means neutral shades if you need to repaint walls or replace carpets.

By neutralizing your decor, you can help give them the blank canvas they need to imagine your house as theirs. The point is, they need to visualize your space as theirs!

The cost: $10 and up for paint; $500 and up for new carpet.

5. Clean like a fiend. "I mean Q-Tip clean," taking a cotton swab to faucets and fixtures, scouring fingerprints from all the switch plates, shining windows until they're spotless and vacuuming up every last dog hair from the baseboards. You'll need to banish suspect smells as well. If your pets have had one too many accidents, you may need to replace the affected carpet and padding and have the underlying floor sealed. If you're not sure how your place smells, get your least tactful friend to take a few whiffs and tell you the honest truth.

The cost: $10 or so in home cleaning products, if you do it yourself; $75 and up if you hire help.

6. Stage the rooms. Stand in the doorway to find each room's focal point, and use furniture placement to highlight that. The back of your sofa shouldn't block the view of the fireplace, for example, and the dining room table shouldn't be sharing space with the stair climber. You should remove any extraneous pieces of furniture so space appears larger, but you may be able to "repurpose" them in another room. Be creative and have fun with it! The cost: Nothing, if you do it yourself; $1,500 and up if you hire a professional stager.

7. Tend to the floors. Keeping them spotless won't help if they're dated, worn or impossibly stained. You shouldn't spend a fortune installing hardwood or tile, though, since you're unlikely to recoup the cost. Look for compromises that can improve the home's appearance without busting your wallet.

Carpets should be steam-cleaned to see if they're salvageable. If not, you may be able to reduce the costs of replacement by offering to do some of the work, such as removing the old carpet and moving furniture.

The cost: Anywhere from a few bucks to a few hundred bucks.

8. Kick up the curb appeal. You may not realize how many sales you're losing before potential buyers even get to the front door. Most people will start their search for a home on the Internet. If your house's Internet photo doesn't 'wow' them, they might never call for a showing. Make sure your front landscaping is in good condition and appears inviting, clean, and manicured.

9. Pick the right publicist. If you're working with an agent, you'll want one who can really sell - somebody who knows your neighborhood intimately and who's enthusiastic about your home....someone other agents want to work with that will help your cause. If you're going to try to sell your home yourself, make sure you're up for the job. Hawking a home can be hard work....its best to leave it to the professionals!

The cost: 3% to 6% of the sale price of your home.

10. Set the right price. A seller may think she's just testing the market with a high price tag, assuming buyers will at least make an offer, but buyers may assume she's unreasonable and move on.

Your goal should be a fair price -- something that's reasonable given the price of other homes in your area.

Buyers who are actively searching for a fairly-priced home, will pounce on what they perceive is fair value.

Mortgage rates hit new low of 4.17%

I was parusing MSN.com/RealEstate and fell upon this article. It always good to "be-in-the-know" so I thought it fitting to share this exciting peice of real estate news! Enjoy....

 

Fed's buy of Treasury bonds brings back low rates, and refinancing is up, but economic woes are keeping many out of the market.

Posted Thursday, November 11, 2010 1:35:36 PM

You know how we told you to say goodbye to record low mortgage rates? Well, you can say hello again.

The average rate for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage dropped to 4.17%, yet another new low for Freddie Mac records. Rates have dropped from 4.91% a year ago. They had started inching up again after hitting a low of 4.19% the week of Oct. 14, rising to 4.24% last week, but were driven back down by the Fed's plan to buy $600 billion in Treasury bonds.

The last time we saw rates this low was in 1951, when loan terms were shorter and rules were different, and many of us hadn't even been born. Freddie Mac started its Primary Mortgage Market Survey in April 1971, when the rate for a 30-year loan was 7.31%.

The average rate for a 15-year fixed-rate loan fell to 3.57% this week, the lowest rate since Freddic Mac began keeping records in 1991. That was down from 3.63% last week.

Janna Herron of the Associated Press explains how the Treasury bond purchase affects mortgage rates:

The extra demand means Treasurys will produce lower yields for investors. Mortgage rates tend to track those yields. Mortgage rates have been at or near historic lows since April as investors, concerned about the health of the global economy, shift their money into Treasurys, pushing down rates on the bonds and consumer and business loans.

The low rates are unlikely to do much to help the housing market, reminding us that interest rates are just one factor. As Frank Nothaft, vice president and chief economist for Freddie Mac, said:

Despite historically low mortgage rates, however, the housing recovery continues to be slow owing in part to household job uncertainty and tight credit conditions. The unemployment rate has remained at 9.5 percent or higher for the past 15 months, while commercial banks tightened lending standards in 16 of the last 17 quarters, according to the Fed's Senior Loan Officer Opinion Survey.

The number of applications for both purchases and refinancing applications rose this week. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s weekly survey, the number of refinancing applications rose 6%, and the number of purchase applications rose 5.5%. Refinancing accounted for 81.7% of the mortgage applications.