The signs in the driveway are cute, but let’s get real here people: buyers simply won’t take you seriously if you don’t have an professional listing hosted on an online MLS, like Yigdigs.com.
Now that the entire world has seemingly been taken over by interconnectedness and technology and iEverything, you as a seller are really shooting yourself in the foot if you’re not tapping into that valuable resource to reach people and create interest.
I was having a conversation with my pop the other day, who is currently trying to line up investors for a business start-up, and he is using online social media to find his customers. Well, the same principle applies to selling your home—and now there is the evidence to prove it.
Released in the National Association of Realtors 2009 Statistics Sheet—where they compile endless amounts of data on everything involved in the real estate market—is some very demonstrative data showing that people are using the internet in greater numbers and with greater success.
According to last year’s NAR Stat Sheet, more that 9 out 10 buyers (94%) used the Internet to find their homes. Likewise, 90% of sellers list their homes online. So if you are one of the few that aren’t listing online, you’re cutting yourself off from 94% (!!) of buyers and remaining within the 10% minority. Plus, since only 11% of the market is For Sale by Owner-driven, you’ll do well to cater to buyers that have an agent working for them. They won’t even glimpse your house if you don’t have an honest-to-goodness MLS.
The stats are in and there’s just no way to deny it anymore. An online presence when selling your home is becoming the norm—and fast. So stay up on your prowess. Yigdigs.com is a great place to start. Not only do you get a professional looking listing service, but you have plenty of help at your fingertips—from online video tutorials to forums and communities with countless resources.
Archive for May, 2010
Why You NEED an MLS
Sunday, May 30th, 2010Senate Passes Restoring Financial Stability Act to Help Ailing Homeowners
Saturday, May 29th, 2010In an effort to quell the egregiously high number of foreclosures and “underwater” mortgages, the Senate has opted to help out the unemployed homeowner with what they’re calling the Restoring Financial Stability Act. Basically, this is a program designed to give relief to people suffering from the job market’s bout with unemployment and the responsibility of having to pay a mortgage.
This Act will derive money from Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) and funnel it down to struggling homeowners in the amount of $50,000 per. This way, homeowners can still afford their houses while they find a new job.
This comes at a time when many critics are saying that any improvement in the housing market is solely because of a governmental crutch and not a sign of true health in the industry. FHA loans have eclipsed Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac loans this last quarter as more and more underemployed are given the opportunity to purchase houses at ridiculously low interest rates. I wonder how the talking heads will respond to this move?
Faces of Real Estate: Lewis Ranieri aka The Godfather
Friday, May 28th, 2010I’m sure some of you may wonder how the housing market—what with all of its stocks and bonds and securities and trading—how it came to be the juggernaut of capitalism that it is today. How did a simple transaction of a buyer purchasing a house from a seller get jumbled up in national banks and loans, debt, and all those other things that us non-bankers aren’t really too sure of.
Well, Lewis Ranieri might have something to say about it. After all, he is the “godfather” of mortgage finance.
Responsible for the development of buying and selling mortgage backed securities, or securitization, Ranieri has basically pioneered an entire way of fueling our economy via loans all by himself. Just a refresher: securitization is the process of pooling debt and then selling the bundled debt. The idea is that if the debt is bundled properly, the risk of the debt not being paid off is greatly reduced. Investors buy this debt based on the idea that it will be paid off, thus providing the loan while at the same making an investment that is “guaranteed” to return.
Ranieri had the foresight to apply the idea of securitization to mortgage loans, thus creating mortgaged backed securities. It was his banking innovation that bankers abused leading America into the housing crash.
In recent news, he has been a very vocal critic on how this whole housing market crash thing is going to play out. From a recently published Bloomberg Business News article, Ranieri has been cited saying a rebound in the housing market is at least a good three years away due a backlog of bank possessed and newly constructed inventory.
Strong words from a wise man. I’m much inclined to take his word for it.
Reason of the Week #12 BOOKS!
Wednesday, May 26th, 2010There is a plethora—yes, plethora—of information online on pretty much anything FSBO. But little do many of you know, there is just as much info out there in books. Yes, books.
A simple search on Amazon.com reveals tons of FSBO handbooks. But instead of buying those books, you can just trapse up to your local library and get ‘em all for free. I think you might be surprised at how many books and tapes and movies your library actually has. In order to do it right, it’s a smart investment to collect as much information as you can, and the For Sale by Owner community has an endless amount of literature published on the matter. USE IT!
Candy Says…
Tuesday, May 25th, 2010See, not all realtors are bad.
I ran across this little tidbit from the Dallas Morning News website Real Estate forum called Dallas Dirt. Here, a very helpful realtor gives some good insight into the FSBO process. Dallas Home Real Estate Editor, Candy Evans, is kind enough here to assist an unsure seller with some very pertinent information about how to begin the FSBO process and even offers up her time to help clean the place up.
Strangely though, she never suggests that the seller list with a professional Multiple Listing Service, only the free forums like Craiglist, Facebook, and Twitter. I would suggest, in addition to Candy’s wonderful insight, that the seller definitely look into an MLS. Half the time, buyer agents won’t even give a property a second glance if they don’t have a professional and reputable MLS.
It’s a good little read for anyone who is doing the FSBO thing for the first time and might get overwhelmed by the vast array of resources out there online.
Fraudulent, Older, Possibly Fatter FSBO Scammer
Saturday, May 22nd, 2010Since it’s Saturday, I figured we could have a little fun here in honor of the weekend.
Every now and then, you will read something online that just makes you laugh out loud. Unfortunately for me, I was in the middle of a busy coffee shop, and everyone stared. Don’t ask me how I found this ridiculous page. Lucky for you, I did.
Detailed here is a story of an FSBO scammer in Costa Rica, who was pulling strange bank stunts in order to scam homeowners out of some petty cash.
Apparently when this picture was assumed by the plaintiff, the accused was much older and fatter than she remembered.
Now I could preach to you about making sure you know who you’re dealing with, don’t trust just anyone, yada, yada, yada. You’ve heard it all before, and if you don’t know, just look back at some the previous blogs I’ve posted about this particular topic.
ALWAYS CONFIRM POTENTIAL BUYERS AND SELLERS’ FINANCIAL SOURCES THROUGH A LENDER AND BE AWARE IF YOU SUSPECT SOMETHING FUNNY GOING ON. IT COULD BE THIS GUY TRYING TO SCAM YOU!
That’s all I’m going to say. What I really want to focus on are the hilarious captions underneath the pictures of the accuser and the way the person responsible for this website is sort of using it as a means to bring this scammer to justice—like their own little Costa Rica’s most wanted.
Have fun!
Lender Fraud Ranking Website Wins Suit Against New Hampshire Banks
Thursday, May 20th, 2010The blogs are starting to take over.
This article was incredibly interesting to me considering that I, myself, am a blogger. In the great state of New Hampshire, a website blog has taken an appeal over a high court to the Supreme Court and won permission to post materials that they were previously asked to take down.
The story goes that ML-implode.com, a site dedicated to tracking the collapse of the nation’s mortgage lenders, posted materials about MoSpec, a Mortgage Specialist subsidiary, concerning reprimands for fraudulent practices by the New Hampshire and Massachusetts Banking Departments. When MoSpec’s president passed their offenses off as “compliance issues”, an ML-Implode writer argued otherwise.
Based on a 2007 loan chart the revealed a not-so-flattering ethical side to MoSpec, ML-Implode writer Brainbattersby railed against MoSpec president’s comments. The company struck back by suing the site and demanding that they remove the posted materials and the corresponding smear. Mortgage Specialists won their case and the content was removed. So what did the site do? They took it all the way to the New Hampshire Supreme Court. Surprisingly, the Supreme Court found in favor of ML-Implode.
(You can read the official court ruling, here.)
Since, the material has been reposted and the comments by the site blogger have been reinstated. The NH Supreme Court’s ruling is a big step in the way of online free speech—a subject the up until recently has not had much legation. Times are changing fast and the Constitution is having a hard time keeping up. We’re pretty much writing the rules as we go. Here’s what the recent New Hampshire Supreme Court ruling means: 1) they have made a distinction between dragging a company or person’s name through the mud and just presenting the awful truth, 2) they have given more clout for the freelance/citizen journalist types, and 3) have maintained the right for media sources—even websites—to protect the identity of their sources.
This ruling was pretty big news up in the Northeast and on some national news sites for its First Amendment, Right to Free Speech nature. That’s one for the little guys.
Reason of the Week #11: Make it Easy on Your Buyers
Wednesday, May 19th, 2010As if being a buyer needs to be any more difficult. You’re deciding your future, weighing your options, trying and trying to get the perfect home for you and your family. And now, you have to deal with an agent. All the red tape just to make an offer.
But when you go FSBO, there’s no need to go through listing agents to make offers, you get to contact the seller directly. No more red tape. So make it easy on your buyers and be the seller they want: FSBO.
Faces of Real Estate: Nouriel Roubini aka Dr. Doom
Tuesday, May 18th, 2010I’ve been reading about this guy a lot lately, so figured it would be appropriate to give him a face. From regaling us of tales depicting a catastrophic housing collapse back in 2006, to publishing a highly acclaimed novel about housing, to giving foreboding diatribes about the dilapidating EURO-market, Nouriel Roubini has had his hands all over the real estate industry for the last decade.
For starters, Mr. Roubini is an NYU professor who has recently published a book entitled “Crisis Economics” about the boom and bust system of housing. The NY Times famously donned him, “Dr. Doom”, because Roubini predicted back in 2006 that the U.S. Housing Market would soon experience a bust followed by a deep recession. He, as you may have noticed, was right.
In lieu of such tortured success and the time he’s spent telling the world “I told you so” without actually saying it, he still acts as an expert consultant on anything from mortgage practices to national debt crises.
Renowned for his talks to the IMF he was tossed off as a perpetual pessimist in 2006 when he enlightened the audience to his findings on the market. But once everyone saw what was going on, Roubini found rendemption.
“He sounded like a madman in 2006,” recalls the I.M.F. economist Prakash Loungani, who invited Roubini on both occasions. “He was a prophet when he returned in 2007.”
Recently, he can be seen giving his usual dark take on the European economic crisis currently striking Greece, Portugal, and other countries who’s economy is too weak to support the failing EURO. Although the man may tend to see things as glass half empty, he’s predicted an awful lot of scenarios. A good guy to know…
