Million Home

Define your goals, wants, needs and expectations. A good place to begin is by exploring your short and long term goals in life and how selling your home fits in. I will walk through a process I use to thoroughly understand my client's goals, wants and needs to ensure that your expectations are met.
Determine the best price for what's going on in the market right now. We assess the current state of the market and what comparable homes are actually selling for by reviewing a Comparative Market Analysis (CMA) on your home. That way, we can objectively determine its fair market value and price it right.
Prepare your property so that it is in top-selling condition. Most of us don't keep our homes in top-selling condition. I will work with you to help you see things from a buyer's point of view. I will consult with you on what to repair, replace or remove so that your home makes a GREAT first impression.
Implement time-proven, research-based marketing strategies. Your home will be marketed with a 10 point marketing plan that has the highest potential for bringing not only the most buyers, but also the most qualified buyers to your doorstep.
Show your property. Always keep your home in top-selling condition. When you leave for work, make sure that your home remains in top-selling condition. You know what they say about first impressions!
Receive an offer. When a buyer decides to buy your home, an offer will be presented. I will advise you on the offer and whether the buyer is qualified to purchase your home.
Negotiate to sell. Most offers require some level of negotiation. We will work together to decide your parameter and I will negotiate on your behalf.
Have your home appraised and inspected. Once you have accepted an offer, I will work with the buyer's agent to coordinate an appraisal, inspections and a survey (if required). If the buyer requires that certain repairs be made on your home, I will continue to negotiate on your behalf and recommend vendors so we move successfully from contract to closing.
Prepare for closing. A few days before closing (also known as settlement), I will contact the title company and the buyer's agent to ensure that all the necessary forms and documents have been prepared. I will meet with you to review the closing documents and let you know what additional forms and information you need to bring to the closing meeting.
Close! At the closing meeting, ownership of your property is legally transferred to the buyer. I will be present to advise you and ensure that everything goes according to plan.

No, you don't have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars to renovate your house in exchange of above-market value. Other than knocking down a wall, adding another roof, there are 10 small things you can do to drastically boost your home's value:

Make your kitchen really cook. The kitchen is still considered the heart of the home. Potential home buyers make a beeline for this room when they first view a home for sale, so make sure your kitchen looks clean and reasonably updated.
For a few hundred dollars, you can replace the kitchen faucet set, add new cabinet door handles and update old lighting fixtures with brighter, more energy-efficient ones.
If you've got a slightly larger budget, you can give the cabinets themselves a makeover. “Rather than spring for a whole new cabinet system, which can be expensive, look into hiring a refacing company,” says serial remodeler Gwen Moran, co-author of “Build Your Own Home on a Shoestring.”
“Many companies can remove cabinet doors and drawers, refinish the cabinet boxes, then add brand-new doors and drawers. With a fresh coat of paint over the whole set, your cabinets will look like new.”
If you're handy, you can order your own replacement cabinet doors and door fronts from retailers like Lowe's Home Improvement or The Home Depot and install them yourself.
Give appliances a facelift. If your kitchen appliances don't match, order new doors or face panels for them. When Nicole Persley, a Realtor with Real Estate of Florida, in Boca Raton, was sprucing up her own home to sell, her mix-and-match kitchen bothered her. The room had a white dishwasher, microwave and wall oven mixed with other pieces that were stainless steel with black trim.
When Persley called the dishwasher manufacturer to see about ordering a new, black face panel, the customer service representative clued her in on a big secret: Many dishwasher panels are white on one side and black on the other.
“All I had to do was unscrew two screws, slide out the panel and flip it around. Sure enough — it was black on the other side!”
Persley, who has remodeled numerous homes for resale, says that a more cohesive-looking kitchen makes a big difference in the buyer's mind — and in the home's resale price.
Buff up the bath. Next to the kitchen, bathrooms are often the most important rooms to update. They, too, can be improved without a lot of cash. “Even simple things like a new toilet seat and a pedestal sink are pretty easy for homeowners to install, and they make a big difference in the look of the bath,” says Moran.
Moran also suggests replacing an old, discolored bathroom floor with easy-to-apply vinyl tiles or a small piece of sheet vinyl. “You may not even need to take up the old floor. You can install the new floor right over the old one,” she says.
If your tub and shower are looking dingy, consider re-grouting the tile and replacing any chipped tiles. A more complete cover-up is a prefabricated tub and shower surround. These one-piece units may require professional installation but can still be cheaper than paying to re-tile walls and refinish a worn tub.
Step up your storage. Old houses, particularly, are notorious for their lack of closet space. If you have cramped storage areas, Realtor Moe Viessi of Miami suggests adding do-it-yourself wire and laminate closet systems to bedrooms, pantries and entry closets.
Firms like ClosetMaid allow you to measure and redesign your closets online. You can also get design details and parts for these systems at many large home-improvement stores. Most closets can be updated in a weekend or less.
In the end, your closets will be more functional while you're living in the house and will make your home look more customized to potential buyers when you're ready to sell.
Add a room in a week or less. “If you have a three-bedroom house with a den, the only reason the den can't be considered a bedroom may be because it doesn't have a closet,” says Persley. “If you add a closet to that room, you've now got a four-bedroom house. That adds a lot of value.”
Persley says it's usually possible to add a custom closet system and drywall it in for less than $1,500.
Mind the mechanics. Finley Perry of F.H. Perry Builder in Hopkinton, Mass., advocates spending a few bucks on nitty-gritty stuff. “It's often very worthwhile to hire an electrician and plumber for a couple of hours to look over your electrical services, wrap or fix loose wires, fix any faulty outlets, and check for and fix any water leaks,” Perry says. “Those details tell a buyer that someone has really taken care of the home and can really influence its price.”
Look underfoot. Carpeting is another detail that can quickly update a home and make it look cleaner. A professional carpet cleaning is an inexpensive investment, especially if your rugs are in good shape and are neutral colors.
If your carpet is showing serious wear, cover it with inexpensive, strategically placed area rugs. Unless it is truly hideous, most Realtors don't suggest replacing wall-to-wall carpeting right before you sell your house. The new homeowners may want to choose their own carpeting after they move in.
Let there be light. If you have boring recessed lights in your dining and living rooms, consider replacing one of the room's lights with an eye-catching chandelier. Home stores offer a wide range of inexpensive, but nice-looking, ceiling fixtures these days. If you have a ceiling fan and light, you can also buy replacement fan blades (leaving the fan body in place) to update the fixture's look.
Reframe your entry. Do you have a flimsy little knob on your main entry door? If so, spring for a substantial-looking handle-and-lock set. “A nice, big piece of hardware on the front door signals to newcomers that this is a solid home,” says Viessi.
Also, if you're stuck with a basic steel front door, Persley suggests painting or faux-finishing it for more eye appeal. “It's becoming a trend in Florida to add wood-grain doors to a home's entry or garage. The good news, though, is that you can easily paint existing metal doors with stain and paint,” she says.
After using a good metal primer, Persley gives the door a base coat of paint (again, be sure to use one approved for use over metal). For a cherry wood look, Persley uses a burgundy base paint. After it dries, she brushes over the base coat with a cherry wood stain. “It really looks amazing, and it only takes a few hours,” she says.
Consider curb appeal. Although it sounds obvious, a nicely mowed lawn, a few well-placed shrubs and a swept walkway makes a great first impression. “What buyers see when they first drive by your home is tremendously important,” says Viessi.
If you don't have a green thumb, consider hiring a landscaper to install some new sod, plant a few evergreen shrubs and give your front yard a good cleanup. “These kinds of changes can instantly change people's perception of your home and, therefore, increase its value,” says Viessi. And hey, your neighbors will love you for it, too.

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The amount of foreclosures in Denver is going through the roof! One out of three sales we deal with here is a foreclosure. OUCH!!! Then everybody blames the lender for writing those risky optional ARM loan which provides a teaser rate and resets shortly after, pushing the home owners out of their homes after the payment is increased drastically.

So, here is a question you may ask. If lender knows that you can only afford $1500 a month payment, why would they give you a loan that will reset to $3000 a month payment a short time later? Well, if the interest rate stays as low and the housing market continue to go upwards, then it may not be such a big problem. But it is just not the case right now. Somebody made a wrong bet.

But that is still not the point. Here is the scoop. The lenders normally sell your mortgages to investors in the secondary market. The rocket scientists on Wall Street figured out the ways to repackage and resell mortgages. Lender gets the cash immediately after selling the mortgage, They also collected enough fees from you to recoup the risks. Wall Street Bond manager packages the risky loans with other investments to the investors with the right to be the first ones to get paid. So you are going to foreclosure? Who cares! Realtor's collected his commission already, Mortgage broker who sold you the idiot loan such as Optional ARM is already got paid 4 times more than he should have if he just sold you the 30 year fix; The banker has sold your mortgage to the bond market, bond manager repacked your mortgage with other fancy investment stuff and sold to the investors. Then, you lose the home, the bank gets your home back and resell it again. Boy, this picture just gets uglier and uglier.

When everybody is blaming the mortgage industry in the wake of the foreclosure crisis, I blame Wall Street for creating this whole mess by being way too creative on packaging mortgage based securities. Because of the rocket scientists on Wall Street, banks started to care less about home owner's capability to repay the loan, more and more investors are buying high risky investments in return of higher yields, which fueling the whole lending money pool. All the sudden, money is coming from everywhere, loans are written without any concerns, and home owners are buying bigger and better properties they can't afford.

This housing downturn is really inevitable considering so many homes sold in the past few years are really not meant to be sold. So what do we learn from this? At least, never ever get yourself an Optional ARM loan. If you are buying your primary resident home, prepare 10% down payment, clean up your credit, get a 30 year fix loan and tell your mortgage broker to shut up.

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Most advice columns tell you how you should do things. But there are all kinds of things you shouldn't do, either. Here are 10 frequent financial mistakes that consumers routinely make -- and you should avoid.

Don't:

Choose the Wrong Mortgage: With the advent of instant refinancing, home loans are no longer the lifetime obligations they used to be. Still, you don't want to be saddled for even a short period of time with the wrong one. Investigate all your options, then lay your choices side-by-side and do the math, making sure to compare worst-case scenarios. Be sure to look at initial interest rates, future interest rates and payments (if different), and the possibility of prepayment penalties.
Confuse "Pre-Approved" and "Pre-Qualified" with a Loan Commitment: These are debatable terms in real estate because not all lenders apply the same definition to each expression. In fact, one leading real estate dictionary contains neither expression because their definitions are uncertain. According to one school of thought, however, when you are "pre-qualified," the lender is making an educated guess about how much you can borrow based on information you've provided. When you are "pre-approved," the lender has verified everything you have told him or her and is offering to lend you up to a given amount at current interest rates -- under certain conditions. Whether pre-qualified or pre-approved, final clearance and a check at closing -- a loan commitment -- are subject to an appraisal satisfactory to the lender, good title, a last-minute credit check, and other verifications. When meeting with lenders, always ask how they define each term and what additional steps will be required to obtain a loan.
Have Too Much Credit: Excessive credit is almost as bad as no credit or even bad credit. Even if you pay your bills on time, lenders tend to focus just as much on how much credit you have available to you as they do on timeliness. So being up to your ears in car loans and credit cards is a sure way to be turned down for a mortgage. Postpone any big ticket purchases until after you buy your house.
Lie on Your Loan Application: Exaggerating your income on a mortgage application or putting down other untruths can be a federal offense. Lenders rarely prosecute liars. But if they find out later, they can call your loan due and payable. Don't ever sign your name to a loan application that is not completely filled out, either. Loan officers have been known to stretch the truth to get a client approved, but it's the borrower who ends up paying the price, often in the form of monthly loan payments he can't afford.

Hide If You Can't Make Your Payments: The worst thing you can do is ignore phone calls and letters from your lender when you are behind on your payments. Lenders have many options at their disposal to help keep borrowers from losing their homes to foreclosure. But they can't do anything for you unless they can talk to you about your difficulties. Lenders are the enemy only if you give them no other choice.
Skip a Home Inspection: Failing to make your purchase contingent on a satisfactory home inspection could be a costly mistake. Independent home inspectors examine houses from stem to stern. They'll be able to tell you whether the roof and/or basement leaks, whether the mechanical systems are in good shape and how long the appliances should last. They can't report on things they can't see, but at least their trained eyes are better than yours. So don't pass just to save $300-$400; that's money well spent.
Hire Just Any Agent to Sell Your House: All real estate agents are not the same. You want to look for those who specialize in your neighborhood and are top producers. Ask your candidates how they plan to market your house, what you can do to make the place more attractive to prospects and how much you should ask. If you don't like any of the answers, looks elsewhere. And above all, stay away from relatives. Unless Aunt Bessie or Nephew Nick fit the description above, keep looking.
Fail to Check Out a Remodeler: Never, ever hire a contractor who knocks on your door or says his prices are good for only a few days. Reputable remodelers don't solicit door-to-door, and they don't cut prices just because they happen to be in your neighborhood. Check out a potential contractor thoroughly by calling several of his past clients, your local better business bureau, his bankers and suppliers, and your local consumer affairs agency.

Pay Too Much Upfront: If a contractor asks for more than a third of the contract price as a downpayment, chances are something's wrong. At worst, he's a scam artist who has no intention of returning after he cashes your check. At best, he's undercapitalized and can't afford to purchase materials on his own. Or, in between, he could be using your money to pay workers on another job. Never give a contractor cash, either.
Burn Your Mortgage: It's a wonderful feeling when you make your last house payment. After all, the place is now yours, all yours. Many people celebrate by holding a mortgage burning party. But they torch the original document. Don't. Make a copy and burn that instead. Keep all your loan docs in a safe place

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There are a few things you should know first before picking a realtor to sell your house:

About 80% of realtors quit after their first year
Another 80% of realtors quit after the first 5 years
Average realtor closes 4 - 9 transactions a year
National average income for a realtor is about $12000
Top 5% of the realtors make 95% of the industry's money

Being said, you can see that very likely you will be dealing with a fairly new agent who is trying to “make it”. Even if you are dealing with a “seasoned” agent, he/she might not have been actively selling homes consistently throughout the years. If you hire a red hot agent, he/she might not have all the time for you since one person can only do so much… Even if everything looks good on paper (years of services, number of assistants, etc…), the agent may not be knowledgeable about your neighborhood, or worse, lack of moral and ethical characters to do the right things for you.

It is a really tricky process to select one agent out of tens of thousands. Although I can't cover all grounds, I hope this little guide could get you started on the right track:

Don't just sign up with an agent because she is your boss's nephew's girlfriend. It doesn't mean anything. Instead, interview at least 3 agents based on the criteria that matter to you. For example, you might want a neighborhood expert, or someone who understands your culture background.
Always include a neighborhood expert agent in your interview list. Drive around your blocks and see who got the most signs. If you know an agent who lives in the neighborhood, interview this person too since he/she has the most intimate knowledge about this neighborhood. One caution when working with neighborhood agent: watch out for low balling on the price. These agents know the numbers well. The unethical ones will try to do a quick sale rather than getting you the fair market value. So when pricing, they will try to set it lower than market value so the property can sell quicker, which in term netting them a big fat paycheck in fairly short amount of time. Ask to see the comps and do your own homework. Ask the agent to show you the comparable houses that are currently selling in your area so you can do a first hand comparison.
Ask the agent's experiences as real estate professional. Of course, the longer the better, but also keep in mind that new agents usually are the hardest working agents. Well established agents may not give you much attention you deserve.
Observe how the agent present him/herself on the first visit. If an agent comes in and just wings it, don't hire the person. Look for an agent who comes in with a presentation (paper or on computer) to explain to you how he/she plans to sell your house and roughly what price you may get. The agents who do homework will most likely put more effort in selling your house.
It's quite common to run into agents who will only put your listing in MLS, put up a yard sign and disappear. So make sure the agent has a marketing plan such as Internet advertising, color flyers, photos, open house, etc…
Spot the unethical agents who only care for their own benefits. This is a bit tricky to do. But if you observe carefully, you can catch some red flags. For example, if an agent pushes real hard to have you sign the listing agreement even before discussing what he is going to do for you, you better run. If an agent sets the price real low without having any comps to back it up, it's not a good sign either. Or, if an agent would accept a higher than norm price to list your property without arguing about the fair market value, this agent only cares about putting up a yard sign in your neighborhood to market his/her name to your neighbors.
Finally, you want to feel comfortable working with this agent. Don't feel obligated if you don't feel the connection. Remember, you are stuck with this person for months to carry out one of the most important transactions in your life, so it is your right to pick one you like.

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