Congratulations to me… Mr. Oregon

A Fun Friday break from the daily grind…

I like Friday’s.  Truth be told, I like all seven days, but Friday just seems more fun (even though as a real estate broker I don’t really get weekends “off”).  I also like Google Voice.  Truth be told, I love Google Voice.  I had the predecessor, Grand Central, way back in 2007, and when Google bought them, I just had to hope…

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Swimming Upstream in a Confluence of Corruption

Vancouver Real Estate: How Big Banks and Big Government can Influence our Local Market.

I rarely dip my toes into the political abyss, but the confluence of Wall Street, Real Estate and Big Government was just too big to pass up in this case. I understand, nearly to the point of apathy, that I can do little to control the outcome of these macro-economic issues. But that doesn’t mean it…

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An Eradication of Crickets and a Return to Real Estate Writing

The only thing we’ve heard around this blog the past several months have been the crickets. That’s not good. But I’ve decided to write here again. Coming back to the blog, some things will change. It’s going to be more diverse. If nothing else to keep my attention. Sure, we’ll still have all the goodies from my real estate reporting and analysis. But I’ll tend to go off on a tangent here and there. Some zigs when I might’ve zagged before, that sort of thing. You never know.

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Vancouver Real Estate: Of Crystal Balls and Market Bottoms

As you know, I am a fan of the old stock market axiom that numbers don’t lie, people (with agendas) do. So I have been looking to the numbers, not the press releases, to tell us what to expect next. Real Estate 101 tells us its all about supply and demand, not sound bites and catch-phrases… Anyway, as I’ve told anyone who would listen, we are struggling to find a bottom and have been somewhere in the lower part of a “U”-shaped bottom for months now. So as I looked at this month’s market data, my analysis gave me a glimmer of hope.

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Market Stats so Scary they were Released on Friday the 13th

The local Vancouver Clark County Real Estate market report, as generated by RMLS, came out Friday the 13th of all days,and whether you are a Triskaidekaphobiac or not, these were some scary numbers.

While Months of Inventory (of houses for sale) was down January to February, it was up year-over-year/February. There’s enough real estate data points, ratios and percentages to give anybody wiggle room to spin this…

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Vancouver Real Estate Market Cools… Inside the House

While I’m not about to equate showing houses to the physical hazards of, say, working on an oil rig or handling nuclear waste, the upcoming cold streak and the number of vacant houses without electricity are going to make for some interesting real estate showings in the Vancouver and Clark County market this next week.

One of the things I tell my home selling clients all the time is that we want the buyer to stay as long as possible during their visit. Heck, hope they pull up a chair and start redesigning the kitchen and then measure the living room to see if their sectional will fit. All this bodes well for the seller, as the potential buyer starts to see how this house can become their home.

But, when it’s near freezing inside,

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Vancouver Real Estate: Why an Offer Won’t Pay off Your Mortgage

While I “get” the concept of “limited representation” (you know, those flat fee listing options) to help sellers get some MLS exposure and find a buyer, it’s what you do AFTER you find the buyer that really matters.

I tell my selling clients all the time – finding the buyer is actually the easy part (although it has gotten to be a tad more challenging in the past year). The hard part is keeping the deal on track and getting it to the closing table so a seller can actually maximize that equity.

Just try cashing an “offer” at the bank.

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Vancouver Real Estate: Where Priced Right Really is Half Sold

If you’re going to have go there eventually, why put off the inevitable?

I’m talking, specifically, about those two words sellers fear and buyers expect “Price Reduced”.

It doesn’t HAVE to be that way though. I’ve recently had the chance to dig deep into some data. I did a dissection of some Real Estate stats from the Vancouver, Clark County real estate market during September, 2008 that puts a huge exclamation point on the old adage “Priced right is half Sold!”

I took a detailed look at the sold Single Family Residential homes in September, 2008, specifically looking for correlation between Sales Price and Days on Market. The results were nothing short of startling.

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