When selling a home, your home’s landscaping could be your best advertisement. If potential home buyers are excited by your home’s curb appeal, you will have a better chance of getting them inside to tour your home and eventually make an offer. Home staging services and real estate agents agree that curb appeal is of utmost importance when selling a home, so be sure to create an effective plan for your property by using the following landscaping ideas to sell your home.

Tackle Simple Landscaping to Sell Your Home

If you have a lawn, clean it up. Of all of the landscaping ideas to sell your home, this is one of the most obvious. If you’ve been mowing regularly to a height of about two inches, you should have a nicely maintained lawn. Mowing too low can cause shallow root growth and make your lawn more susceptible to drought and weeds. Weeds are more prone to grow in areas where the lawn is weak. Patch brown spots in the grass by raking and over-seeding any bald spots in your lawn. It is also important to reduce soil compaction. Use sidewalks to walk to your front entryway rather than walking across your lawn. Repeated patterns of use across your lawn can compact the soil and leave tracks where grass will not grow. A well-established lawn can enhance your home’s curb appeal, and home staging services, real estate agents, and even potential home buyers know that a well-maintained lawn will help sell a home faster than a brown one full of weeds.

Clear and fix driveways, sidewalks and patios. Potential home buyers notice things like dirty paving, moss-covered sidewalks, and cracked concrete. If needed, pressure-wash driveways, patios, and sidewalks before putting your home on the market. If you have large cracks in sidewalks or driveways, consider patching or replacing them. Do whatever you need to do to show potential home buyers that you’re serious about your home’s maintenance.

Keep leaves and other debris picked up. Don’t force a potential home buyer to walk over grass clippings, leaves, branches or pine cones. The more tidy your home’s landscaping, the easier it will be to sell your home.

Let color help you when selling a home. Yellow evokes the emotion of buying, so plant yellow flowers near the entryway.

Landscaping Ideas to Sell Your Home in Winter

Experienced landscape architects and garden designers know that one of the first seasons to design for is winter. This is when your home’s garden is at its most stark and dreary. If your home is on the market in winter and you haven’t planned for this, there are landscaping ideas to sell your home even as the days grow shorter. When it comes to home staging, real estate agents will tell you that staging your home in winter is extremely important.

Keep snow and ice at bay. The top tip from home staging services and real estate agents: If the potential home buyer can’t get in easily, the house won’t sell. As stated above, this means keeping walkways and driveways free of ice and snow.

Take advantage of natural light. As much as possible, show your home during the high-daylight hours. If you show your home after work in the winter, you’ll be completely in the dark and potential home buyers won’t be able to see how your landscaping adds to the curb appeal of your home. If you must show your home at night in the winter months, turn on all the lights so your home glows and invites potential home buyers from the street.

Play up seasonal scents. Set the scene and help the buyers see themselves living happily in your home. Consider placing a basket of cinnamon-scented pine cones by the entryway. Once potential home buyers are inside, offer them apple cider or hot chocolate. At this time of year, appeal to the senses that make potential home buyers feel cozy and warm, like they have found a ôhome.ö

Put lights on timers. You can’t be home all the time and you want your home to look warm and welcoming whenever prospective buyers drive past. Put indoor and outdoor lights on timers. Inspect the outdoor lighting around the door. Is there enough light to make it feel inviting and safe? If not, get the fixtures changed or have new ones added.

Prune deciduous shrubs and trees. In winter, while deciduous trees and shrubs are dormant and without leaves, is the best time to prune. Don’t let overgrown vegetation block the windows or path to the entrance. Cutting back shrubs and tree limbs will let the sun inside and showcase the exterior of your home. Be cautious, though, and don’t overdo it! No potential home buyer wants to see a tree with lopped off branches. If you don’t understand proper pruning, hire a home staging service or experienced arborist to tackle this important landscaping task.

Landscaping Ideas to Sell Your Home in the Fall

Home sales tend to slow down during the fall when kids go back to school and temperatures start to drop. If you’re selling your home in the fall, you need to take extra measures to stage your home and make it stand out above others on the market. If you’re home-staging to sell your house in the fall, consider the following landscaping ideas to sell your home:

Stay on top of raking, raking, and more raking. The landscaping needed to sell your home in the fall involves both color and persistence. Fall color can add the curb appeal needed when it comes to the all-important “first impression.” Deciduous trees, like Katsura or Japanese maple, turning shades of crimson and gold, can add extra appeal to the total look of your home’s exterior. Leaves strewn across your front yard, however, can decrease your home’s visual appeal. You need both fall color and dedicated maintenance to give your home the curb appeal needed to sell your home in the fall.

Celebrate the season. Add a fall wreath to the front door or place a few huge pumpkins or a fall display on your front entryway to welcome potential home buyers.

Landscaping Ideas to Sell Your Home in the Summer

Keep your lawn maintained. Brown patches on lawns ruin the effect of a beautiful garden, so keep grass as green as possible. If you’ve tackled the lawn maintenance tips offered above and you’re still stuck with a brown patch as potential home buyers are about to arrive, strategically place some garden furniture or a birdbath on top of those unsightly lawn blemishes.

Make your landscape feel like an exterior room. Clear patio paving of any debris and use outdoor furniture to make your backyard space feel like an inviting oasis. If you’re having an open house, place an aluminum bucket of ice full of bottled water at the entryway.

Landscaping Ideas to Sell Your Home in Spring

Spring is the best time to sell a home. Inventory almost always rises in the spring, because the largest number of potential home buyers actively searching for a new home occurs during the months of April, May and June.

If your home has been on the market since the holidays, consider taking it off the market for a few weeks and then putting it back on the market. Nobody is going to look at your home in the spring if it’s been on the market for several months. Potential home buyers gravitate toward fresh, new listings.

Here are some landscaping ideas to sell your home in spring:

Mow diagonally and edge your lawn along driveways, sidewalks, and planting beds. Manicured lawns and edging tell potential home buyers you pay attention to small details and care about the maintenance of your home. Mowing diagonally creates an optical illusion and makes your lawn seem larger.

Transplant tulips and daffodils or buy flowers in containers. Yellow stimulate buying urges. After a long winter, potential home buyers are anxious to see the first signs of spring. Yellow tulips and daffodils induce feelings of happiness and contentment. Arrange containers in a grouping of three near the entrance.

Place a welcome mat out for cleaning shoes and an umbrella stand at the entryway. When it comes to weather, spring can be very unpredictable. In some areas, one day it can be 75 degrees and snowing the next. If it’s raining, give potential home buyers a place to stash umbrellas and wipe their feet before entering your home.

Curb appeal can do a lot of your marketing for you. Utilize all of these landscaping ideas to sell your home and you will be showing your home to its fullest potential!

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Making an of Offer on a House Without a Buyer’s Agent

Thinking about making an offer on a house without a real estate agent? Nervous about negotiating the best house price in this crazy economy? We don’t blame you. When it comes to buying a home, negotiation can mean the difference between a few thousand dollars and tens of thousands of dollars. It’s stressful and scary, especially if you’re doing it without an experienced real estate agent. Negotiating a home selling contract in this current real estate market is also financially tricky. This is where an experienced agent who has sold in times of real estate booms and past real estate slumps can save you more than the commission you pay them.

For those brave enough to consider making an offer without a buyer’s agent, here are a few tips on negotiating house price:

Negotiating House Price Tip #1: Arm Yourself with Information

The most important information is a Comparable Market Analysis (CMA), which is a neighborhood survey of the similar and recently sold homes in your neighborhood of choice. There are several places you can get partial information about sold houses online these days, but it is important to choose the right homes and get full information. This is another way a professional real estate agent can help you save money. Agents have access to the most up-to-date real estate data and are experts at figuring out which houses truly belong in a CMA. More importantly for today’s economy, a real estate agent can tell you how short sales and foreclosures in the neighborhood can affect negotiating an offer. House pricing is very tricky in this economy.

Once you have access to a detailed CMA, check out the houses as much as possible. A real estate agent might be able to get inside some of the houses that were just recently sold or have a current offer. You can check to see if the house you’re looking at is up to par or if it falls frighteningly below the homes listed in the CMA. This is a great way to tell if your house is near the proper price point or if there is leeway in negotiating an offer. House pricing is much more complicated these days than it used to be. Rather than comparing features like which houses have pools and which don’t, buyers are weighing short sales against foreclosures and traditional home sales.

Negotiating House Price Tip #2: Figure Out the Seller’s Motivation

Information is key in negotiating house price. But, finding out how your dream house price compares to the market is only part of the process. The second is figuring out the seller’s motivation. It’s the fun part û play detective and look inside the home seller’s mind for a minute. Do they have to sell their house or do they want to sell? Motivation isn’t always revealed û the seller’s agent doesn’t necessarily have to give you this information. However, if you have a good real estate agent, he or she often can get the information from the seller’s agent.

ôHave toö reasons:

• They are relocating for a job.
• They just got laid off and can’t afford the mortgage.
• The house is close to foreclosure and they don’t want to ruin their credit history.
• They just had an addition to their family and truly don’t have enough space.

ôWant toö reasons:

• They are testing the market to see if they could sell their house.
• They want to buy a different house while housing prices are down.
• They want to buy a new house while mortgage rates are low.

You can see what scenarios give you bargaining power. When the seller has to move, you have more bargaining power. Right now, most people aren’t selling to try and ôtest the market.ö They’re selling because they have to. Knowing the timing of a move or how long before the house may foreclose is very important when negotiating house price.

Negotiating House Price Tip #3: Don’t Waste Time

Buying a home can be super stressful. You don’t have time to waste with sellers who won’t budge and you shouldn’t waste the seller’s time with a low-ball offer.

How do you know if sellers are wasting your time? If they won’t discuss asking price in relation to similar homes in the neighborhood, they probably are not serious about selling the home. Sellers will do this when they’re unsure about moving or to figure out how much they can get for their property.

Just as they shouldn’t waste your time, don’t waste theirs. Don’t give them a low-ball offer just to see if they bite. It makes you seem like you’re not ready to buy or that you want to scam them. If you are truly interested in the house, this is not a good negotiating tactic.

Negotiation is an art, not an exact science. Experienced real estate agents have practiced different techniques and know what works when negotiating house price and what doesn’t. Once again, in today’s economy, negotiating house price can be much easier if you have an experienced agent on your side. Negotiating a home selling contract is a tricky proposition if done on your own.

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For the first time home buyer, buying your first home is one of the most exciting things you will ever do. If you have spent years living in apartments, there is nothing more satisfying than owning your own property. The process can be a little lengthy and you might hit a few bumps in the road to home ownership. The following tips will help the first time homeowner avoid some of the hiccups.

Step one is to talk to a real estate agent about the home buying process. It should not be a sales meeting and you should be able to find an agent that will agree to meet with you about the basics without having to sign a sales agreement with them. If you cannot find a good agent to talk to, you might want to consider talking to a loan officer at your bank or a mortgage broker.

An equally important tip is to get your finances in order before you apply for a mortgage. Order a copy of your credit report so you can check it for accuracy. Mistakes are common and you want to make sure that there is no fraudulent activity. You have the right to dispute errors on your credit report. If you come across something that you know is an error, circle it and send it to the reporting agency along with a letter of dispute.

Next, you should really study the mortgage industry. You need to be able to find the right loan and lender most suitable for your needs. Familiarize yourself with industry terms like debt to income ratio and adjustable rate mortgage. Learn the difference between pre-approval and pre-qualified. It will all seem foreign at first, but taking the time to learn the business will spare you from headaches in the future.

Also, you need to figure out what your wants and needs are. What kinds of amenities are you looking for? How many bedrooms? One story or two story home? You also need to consider the size of the down payment and figure out what you need to do to come up with the money for it.

You must learn about how real estate agents work. There are buyers agents and sellers agents. A buyers agents responsibility is to negotiate the best deal for the buyer. The goal of the sellers agent is to get the price that the seller most desires. The best way to find the right agent is to ask your friends for suggestions. They have all probably been in the same boat, so they can probably recommend a good real estate agent.

When meeting with a potential agent, pay attention to how they treat you. Make sure they listen to you when you talk about what you want. Also, how are their follow up skills? Do they take the time to return your calls or emails? If they do not take the time to respond, move on. There is a better agent out there for you.

When looking for a home, consider all of the possibilities. Look up real estate agents websites. Do not rule out For Sale by Owner Properties and foreclosed homes. Housing and Urban Development (HUD) homes can often be found for very reasonable prices. You do need to find an agent that is approved to sell HUD homes if you choose to take that road to home ownership.

Before you even think about making an offer, you need to consider the resale value. You might plan on being there for a long time, but you just never know. You might opt for a different climate to alleviate your allergies or you could simply be transferred by your company. You want to pick a good location that will be attractive to others as well.

Another issue that cannot be ignored are the deed restrictions, which govern what you can and cannot do with the property. If it has always been your dream to have a pool, you want to make sure that you do not buy a home in a subdivision that will not allow it because of deed restrictions.

Home inspections are an important part of the equation. Talk to your agent to find out when the inspection will be performed. It varies state to state. Sometimes the inspection will be right before the contract is signed and other times, they are performed right after an offer is made.

Finally, make sure you stay on top of things. Any number of problems can crop up at the last minute and delay the purchase of your home. If you are not sure about something with the paperwork, do not be afraid to ask questions. You might think of something that everyone else has overlooked.

Purchasing a home is a time consuming and sometimes frustrating task, but it is worth it when you have your backyard barbecues.
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If you are thinking of buying a home, you must take the following 3 essential steps before even starting to look for a home to buy.  Otherwise, you are setting yourself up for possible dissappointment, or maybe selling yourself short:

1.  Get a copy of your credit report, and your credit score.  Even better, get these from all of the 3 major credit reporting bureaus: TransUnion, Experian, Equifax.  Under federal law, you are entitled to get a free report once a year.   AnnualCreditReport.com is the official site to order your free report.  Bear in mind, this does not include your credit score, which you’ll have to pay for.  It’s about $8 per company.  You can get free credit scores by signing up for free trials on various credit monitoring sites.  Just Google search “credit score” or “credit score free” for such sites.  For a terrific report that explains the credit scoring process and some of the myths associated with that process, read the special credit report, Revealed, by Dan Beck of Credit Management Specialists.

2.  Review your credit reports very carefully, and make sure all of them are accurate.  If you see something you don’t recognize, investigate and make sure it is legitimate.  If you recognize something that you know is not yours, that has been paid, or is incorrect, you can formally dispute it.  Ideally, all of your credit reports should be accurate before applying for a loan.  Otherwise, you risk being denied a loan or not being qualified for the best one, or just delaying the application process.

3.  Meet with a local lender to get pre-approved, not just pre-qualified, for a loan.  You should not take this step until you know your credit reports are accurate.  When you request a copy of your credit report, it does not count as an “inquiry.”  An inquiry can adversely affect your credit score, especially if there have been several in recent months.  When you meet with the lender, come prepared with copies of your credit report(s) and score(s), information and verifying documents regarding your employment, income (pay stubs, tax returns), monthly household expenses, and monthly debt.  Most lenders will have a questionnaire or list of things they will need from you, so ask them for it.  With this information, your lender can pre-qualify you to give you and idea of what type of loan and amount you might get.  However, to get pre-approved, the lender will need to submit your application, review your documentation to verify the information, and order a credit report (which is an inquiry).

Armed with this preparation, you will have a very good idea of the type and amount of loan you qualify for.  You can then begin searching for homes,  knowing you can actually buy the one you want when you find it.

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We’ve been hearing for quite some time that it’s a buyer’s market and a great time to buy.  That is probably not going to change any time soon in 2011.  So what happens if you’re a seller or thinking about selling?  Are there good reasons to sell now?   Here are 5 reasons why now may be a good time for you to sell:

1. Buyers are buying.   If the increased buyer activity I experienced locally in the 2010 fourth quarter and through the holiday season is any indication, buyer confidence is being restored.  As the real estate market continued its downward trend in 2010 and more foreclosures hit the market, it appears buyers are finally realizing there are some good deals, even hot deals, out there that they need to take advantage of.  The percipitous jump in mortgage rates over a 2-day period in the last quarter may have also contributed to this activity.  So, why not put your home in front of these buyers who are seriously looking?

2. You plan to buy another home once you sell yours.  If you plan to buy another home, particularly a move-up home (i.e., bigger, more expensive), then whatever you may lose by selling  now will  be made up upon your purchase.  You, too, can take advantage of the buyer’s market.  What you need to consider is how much equity you have in your home today, not compared to 3-5 years ago at the top of the market.  Value is relative to current circumstances.  To illustrate, let’s say you bought your home 10 years ago for $150,000.  In 2006, it was worth $300,000, but now it’s only worth $250,000.  You’ve still realized a gain of $100,000!  Forget about  the hypothetical,  paper loss of $50,000.  Again, by selling now, you will also be buying a home that also may have been worth $50,000+ more 3 years ago.

3. Interest rates are still low, but will go up as the market improves.  Now this may seem more advice to a buyer than a seller, but what a seller needs to keep in mind is that the more interest rates go up, the less a buyer can afford to buy.  A rule of thumb is that for every 1% the mortgage interest rate goes up or down, a buyer’s buying power goes up or down $10,000.  So, assume the interest rate  is 4.75% today and a buyer qualifies to purchase  a home at $300,000.   If in 6 months the interest rate goes up to 5.75%, that same buyer (assuming no other changes in circumstances) could only buy a  a home for $290,000.  If in a year the interest rate increased to 6.75%, the most the buyer would could afford is $280,000.   If you wait another 6 months to a year, you may have to lower the asking price from $300,000 to $280,000 to get it sold.  In short, it is somewhat of a gamble to wait 1-2 years to sell in hopes that the appreciation in your home’s value will exceed the effect of increasing interest rates.

4.  It will cost you less to rent than to keep paying your mortgage and other housing expenses.  Most of us have bought into the “American Dream” of home ownership and, in fact, have enjoyed the real  emotional and financial benefits of home ownership in years past.  Unfortunately, during the boom years, too many Amercians also used their homes as ATM machines or collateral to finance other purchases or investments that were not appreciating or income-producting assets.  With the burst of the real estate bubble and the economic depression taking on global proportions, many people have now started questioning the American Dream as a right versus a privilege, or even as a wise investment given a someone’s economic and personal situation.  So, if you find yourself with a refinanced mortgage or 2 or more mortgages with combined payments that exceed the monthly rent of a comparable home, then maybe now is a good time to sell and rent something cheaper.  If you can do so and put away the difference into savings or use it to pay off other debt, this could make more economic sense until your financial situation and the economy improve.

5. You have to sell.  Okay, I realize need or distress does not make this a good time to sell, but it does make it a reason to sell now.  And reasons number 1 and 3 come into play.   If you find you can no longer make your mortgage payments, the worst thing you can do is bury your head in the sand or hope for some miraculous turn of events, i.e., you find a new job, get a huge pay raise, win the lottery, inherit a small fortune, or whatever is needed to get you out of your distressed situation.  I’ve experienced too many sad cases lately of people getting much less for their homes or being forced to walk away with nothing by failing to  seek expert advice and act promptly and reasonably upon it.  That included failing to price a home very competitively to get it sold promptly which caused it to  languish on the market as the market continued to trend downward.  Even though there are signs of an improving market, reason number 3 may prevent you from getting top dollar for your home if you wait too long to sell or do not price it competitively in today’s market.

So why might it not be a good time to sell now?  Well, that would be if you don’t have to sell, don’t plan to buy another home, your mortgage payment (principal, interest, taxes and insurance) plus maintenance costs are equal to or less than the rent payment (for which you get no tax deduction) on a comparable home, or you simply want and can afford to live in your home for at least another 3-5 years, or indefinitely, until the market improves.

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Building “green” may be a modern day buzz word, but it’s something to be taken seriously when considering what to buy or invest in or where to spend your money when remodeling an older, less energy-efficient or environmentally friendly home for resale purposes.  To see what buyers want most in the way of green features, read below the research survey results from Keller Williams® Realty:

Oct24 – KW Research

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We hear a lot about “foreclosures” and buyers and investors looking for “foreclosures” and real estate agents advertising  “foreclosures.”  In fact, what most of these people are referring to are REO (real estate owned ) properties, that is, real estate owned by the bank.  These are properties that have actually gone through the legal foreclosure process, been offered for sale at a public auction, and when no one exceeds the bank’s minimum bid, it goes to the highest bidder, i.e., the bank.

Once the bank gets the property back, it then lists it with a local real estate broker, usually after getting 2-3 BPO’s (broker price opinions) and possibly a formal appraisal.  This means that when the property is initially listed, it is listed at a price the owner/seller/bank believes is market value.  If it doesn’t sell right away, the bank will generally lower the price, and keep lowering the price in regular intervals, typically after 30 days.  This is, of course, just a general rule, and not all banks readily lower their price or do so within any given period of time.

That is one benefit of foreclosures (i.e., REO’s, bank-owned properties).  If you’re patient, and not emotionally tied to a particular property, you can keep an eye on it and wait till the price hits your “sweet point.”  The flip side, of course, is that someone else my swoop in and buy it first.  The pitfalls and problems of buying a foreclosure are the subject of another post.  But in today’s economic climate, foreclosures do spell “bargain” for a lot of people.

If you’re searching for foreclosures on the internet, a good indication that a property is an REO (if the listing doesn’t flat out tell you) is that it will indicate that it is sold “as is, where is” and that the seller makes no warranties, etc.  This doesn’t mean you are totally at risk.  If you go under contract on a foreclosure, you still generally have all the rights of any buyer to do your due diligence with respect to inspections, title review, review and approval of covenants and HOA governing documentation, and getting your financing if the contract is conditional on that.

In a recent presentation by the Montrose County Public Trustee, Rosemary Murphy, last month, she revealed that at that time,  there were already about 120 pending foreclosures.  She said she was expecting about a total of 400 to be filed by year’s end.  This compares with about a total of 160 filed in 2009.  For more information on the pre-foreclosure process and public auctions, visit the Montrose County Treasureer/Public Trustee Site.  There you can also get a list of properties currently in foreclosure and of the pending pre-foreclosure sales and outcome of such sales.  I just checked, and there are 26 pages of pending foreclosures.

As Public Trustee Murphy told us, the vast majority of these properties will not sell to a private buyer at the public auction.   Consequently, we can expect many, if not most, of these to become bank-owned/REO properties, aka “foreclosures,” that will soon come on the market as an MLS listing with a local real estate broker.  I just checked the local Internet for REO/bank-owned residential properties in Montrose County.  Click here for a list of these 62 listings.

Foreclosures are a sad and continuing fall-out of the economic disaster we have been experiencing the last 3 years.  But foreclosures also represent a golden opportunity for those who can take advantage of them, whether as a first-time homebuyer or an investor.  To find out if buying a foreclosure is right for you, consult your local foreclosure real estate expert.

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As the expiration of the First Time Homebuyer Tax credit approaches (April 30th), there have been varying reports on how much this tax credit has really stimulated housing purchases. The consensus seems to be it has helped those who already were considering buying to get off the fence and do so; otherwise, it hasn’t been a big factor.  That has been my experience as well in Montrose.

The problem continues to be the buyer’s ability to qualify for financing, as well as the overall affordability of home ownership. Those who have bought their first home may have been surprised by some unforeseen new expenses, as noted in this article from RISMedia.  However, one thing the survey does not address is the benefit of the mortgage interest and property tax write-offs. First time home buyers should be surveyed again in a year after they have been able to take advantage of the write-offs, which in most cases will more than make up for the additional overall expenses of home ownership.  For more info on these tax benefits, you should consult with your tax advisor.

Tax credit or not, home ownership still continues to be one of the best investments and the American Dream.  That has also been my experience in Montrose, even in this continuing challenging market.

~Ninah

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