Thinking of selling your San Ramon, Dublin or Pleasanton home? I found two great posts today that all home sellers should consider reading.

Dear Ms. Seller: Why Would You Sign a Six-Month Contract?  by Toby Boyce

Here is the comment I left on Toby’s post:

Great questions and points to wrestle with.

We offer our sellers two guarantees - One is that we will sell their home in a specified amount of time or we take a hit in the pocketbook. The other is our cancellation guarantee - they can cancel at any time if they are not happy with our service.

We can offer these guarantees because we know our business and we conduct our business with integrity and attention to the clients needs.

We Can Always Reduce the Price Later by Athol Kay

I have a firm belief that sellers stand to make the most money possible from a sale when a house is priced right, from the first day it comes onto the market. Plus it will usually sell quicker and easier.

One of the most difficult, yet greatest services a real estate agent can provide a client is a realty check on current “market value” of the property. The market value is what someone is willing to pay for the house which is often vastly different from the “utility value” of the house. The utility value is the value the property has for the owner which includes history and emotional investment.

Knowing the local market and the market trends is a must for good service. If your agent does not show up with graphs, statistics and other information to help explain the local market to you and how this affects the pricing of your property – keep shopping for an agent.

ALSO – lose the attachment to seeing a nice big ad of your house in the newspaper. Statistics show that only one percent of homes sell from an ad. The number one influence on selling homes remains the network of Realtors® in your local community and the national referral networks they have built.

The communities of Alamo, Danville, and San Ramon, CA are served by the Realtors Marketing Association. The communities of Dublin and Pleasanton are served by the Valley Marketing Association. Every week real estate agents present new listings to hundreds of local agents at these events. There is also a lot of networking that happens where people keep your property in front of these professionals.

Number two in influence is the Internet. In their marketing presentations, many agents still focus on the print ads they will use to feature your house. They do this for you, not because it is effective, but because you expect it (or they are stuck in the past). Having your home all over the Internet will do more for you than that big Sunday ad. Effective posting on the Internet takes time and skill many agents will do one or two things on the net, but comprehensive exposure of your property on the Internet is not something the average agent understands or can do. Question your agent about their Internet marketing and promotion skills.

And then I found this interesting post:Does money make you mean? by Jay MacDonald   

We all know that money can't buy love or happiness. But could just thinking about money actually make you mean?

A new behavioral study finds that folks with money on their minds are less helpful, less considerate and less willing to ask for assistance or engage with others than those who have not been preconditioned to money. On the bright side, the money-minded tend to be more independent and focused and they tend to work longer on a task before asking for help.

If you or your agent is only focused on “the money in it for me” – what’s being ignored or lost?

One of my joys is the experience of connections. For the last couple of years I have watched many fascinating people enter into the field of my experience that brought with them a network of connections. I'm always curious how life will unfold and how connected networks will connect with other networks and what will come of it all.

It's one of the great things about blogging and the evolution of the Internet.

Today, I was privileged to join Pat Kitano of TransparentRE and Jim Walberg of The Bay Area Team in a discussion of where the future of real estate and the real estate agent may be heading. We met up at Starbucks in the Marketplace Center in San Ramon, Ca. All three of us attended the weekly Realtors Marketing Association meeting just across the street at the San Ramon Community Center.

After Jim hassled a bit to get his WiFi connected (see my rant on that), the lively discussion began. It was great to sit back and listen to Jim & Pat converse. They each bring a completely unique perspective, experience and history to the table, but it was clear they share a common vision of where they feel real estate is going.

All of us think there are huge opportunities available for those willing to "step out into thin air" as Jim says - trusting that the ground will rise up to meet your foot.

Just a great morning with connections.

Plesanton TriValley Realtors® Marketing Association

I attended the TriValley Marketing Association meeting yesterday (Jan 11) at Tommy T's in Pleasanton, CA. This was the first meeting of the year and was well attended. It was also the first time we've met at Tommy T's.

It was an energetic and enthusiastic crowd with many listing presented (see some of them below) and the "High Priestess of Poop" presenting the coveted Pink Flamingo to Pat Griffin for continued excellence in the field of "Home Mobility."

This month's room sponsor is the Pleasanton Weekly - many thanks to them.

New MLS Listings Presented at TriValley Marketing Association:

There were 22 properties listed on the tour sheet and we gathered flyers for the following properties. The Harper Team can help you with these or any other homes, condos or townhouses for sale in Alamo, Danville, San Ramon, Dublin, Pleasanton or Livermore, California.

In addition, we have an established network of professional Realtors we work with throughout the Bay Area and The U.S.

Here are some of the featured properties for sale:

• 5610 Belleza, Pleasanton, CA. Central location -1 bed condo w/garage. end unit w/lots of light.
• 3307 Touriga Drive, Pleasanton, CA.4 bed 2.5 baths Lots of updates
• 7409 Stonedale Drive, Pleasanton, CA 3 bed 2.5 bath Townhouse in the Gables
• 676 Concord Place, Pleasanton, CA  2 bed 1.5 bath Condo – end unit
• 439 Cabonia Court, Pleasanton, CA. 4 bed 3 bath home in Ruby Hill
• 4608 Inyo Court, Pleasanton, CA 3 bed 2 bath over $100K in upgrades
• 3537 Gulfstream Street, Pleasanton, CA 4 bed 3 baths
• 2756 Hartley Gate Court, Pleasanton 3 bed 2 bath single story home
• 7558 May Way, San Ramon, CA 5 bed 2.5 bath Updated kitchen
• 2377 Avalon Way, San Ramon, CA. 5 bed 5 bath in Windemere
• 6162 Bay Hill Court, Dublin, CA  5 bed 5.5 bath overlooks 9th hole of Dublin Ranch Golf Club
• 6410 Dijon Way, Dublin – Torrey Pines location 2 bed 2 bath condo
• 10708 Ian Lane, Dublin, CA  2 bed 2 baths Townhome w/garage
• 3934 Tamworth Court, Dublin, CA. 3 bed / 2.5 baths 2 car garage

Some of these are expired listings that are returning to the market. There is a fair amount of controversy in the real estate industry regarding the practice of re-listing which can give the consumer a false impression of how long a property has been on the market (DOM – days on market). Ask your real estate agent to check the listing history to verify DOM to strengthen your negotiating position.

Remember, as a buyer, it costs you nothing to employee the services of a professional Realtor®

Real Estate News & Market Trends

Pleasanton, Dublin, San Ramon - CA.

The Alameda & Contra Costa County MLS weekly data for Dublin, San Ramon & Pleasanton. (blue = Active; green = Pending; purple = closed)

With listings returning to the market after the holidays, we see Pleasanton and Dublin active listings have started to trend up. San Ramon continues to decline in active real estate listings.

Pending sales in Dublin and Pleasanton dropped slightly while San Ramon showed a slight increase.

Our office stats show the following for months of inventory on hand:

• Alamo 3.73
• Danville 5.45
• San Ramon 5.73
• Dublin 4.80
• Pleasanton 5.00

The closer the blue and green graph lines come together, the more active the market.

It's impossible to get an accurate figure of Days on Market (DOM) as it is a fairly common practice in the real estate industry to "freshen" (remove from the MLS and re-list) listings if they sit on the market too long. 

We attended both the San Ramon Realtors Marketing Association meeting and the TriValley Marketing Association meeting this week. Both meetings were well attended with many listings being presented.

The general consensus is that the market is becoming more active as buyers move to take advantage of interest rates. Most agents feel that 2007 will be slightly up from 2006.

Real Estate News

Here is my (Brad Inman) summary of takeaways from Real Estate Connect NYC:

1. The trend of declining real estate commissions will reverse this year because there are more listings and fewer Realtors and because the discounters are in trouble as consumers go back to old reliable.
2. Wall St. will introduce new mortgage instruments in an attempt to keep the housing market alive.
3. Woes in the sub-prime mortgage market will hurt liquidity for EZ home loans and will create a minor real estate scandal mid-year.

Countrywide Financial Corp. reported its December and the good news for those looking for evidence that the housing market is picking up was that loan applications were up 11 percent from the same month a year ago.

After bottoming in the fourth quarter of 2006, existing-home sales are forecast to gradually rise through 2007 and into 2008, while new-home sales should turnaround by summer, according to the latest forecast by the National Association of Realtors.

Rates on 30-year mortgages rose this week to the highest level since mid-November after a better-than-expected employment report renewed inflation worries in financial markets.

The Harper Team monitors over 50 Real Estate and News Feeds daily to bring you information pertinent to the San Ramon Valley & TriValley real estate market including the communities of Danville, San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton. We welcome suggestions.

Search our blog articles via the Tag Cloud - just click on a word that interests you.

On the home page of our site, after the title, are the words - It’s All About You (The Client). That’s the focus of our business. We realize that every client is bringing us a unique situation.

I mention this because this morning I read this great post by Terri Murphy - Listing Loser - Missing the Big Bucks  In this post, Terri gives us a great example of what happens all too often in the initial client/agent interview.

The interaction that Terri describes is not an experience you will have with The Harper Team. When you list your home in San Ramon, Danville, Dublin or Pleasanton with us, you get a team of people working to aggressively market YOUR home. While including what traditionally works, we step outside the box as much as possible, and we stay on the leading edge of the change the real estate industry is going through. And we stay on top of the real estate trends in our market (Danville, San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton, CA). At least, twice a week you can find postings on our blog of those local real estate trends and other news affecting the local housing markets.

Greg over at The Blue Roof gives us this post today

It’s interesting to me how much the industry has evolved in the last 14 months, but it’s also all relative. There are hundreds of thousands of Realtors out there who don’t know anything about Zillow or any other “New, Innovative Real Estate Model”.

They, and their clients, just go on day to day buying and selling homes and it’s business as usual.

Sometimes I forget that most real estate agents really don’t know or care about any online models. For many, the only website the even know of is their company site, if their company even discusses it with them, or even has a site at all.

The Harper Team sees this everyday in our office (Keller Williams Danville CA) and in our local marketing association (San Ramon Realtors Marketing Association). We are amazed at how the constant stream of links and info we mail to other agents on the evolving nature of the real estate industry and technology fall on deaf ears. The most common reply is – I can’t keep up with it all. Our response – is there any choice?

WebHome USA addresses this issue in their post - Agents In Real Estate 2.0. Will We Be Like Travel Agents, Accountants, Used Car Salesmen Or Lawyers? The Agent's role in Real Estate 2.0 is rapidly evolving.  Real Estate 2.0 is all about the Internet and an Agent's ability to quickly establish and develop a virtual relationship with home buyers and sellers searching the Web.  It's less about the Home, and more about the Home Page.

Our site, our marketing, and our knowledge of technology and the industry are constantly evolving. Just yesterday we added Instant Messenger capability to our blog. If we're online you can contact us immediately through the Plugoo widget in our sidebar. There is much more to come as we continue to evolve our business to address the needs of our clients in helping them to buy, sell or invest in our local real estate markets - Danville, San Ramon, Dublin, Pleasanton - California.

The Harper Team monitors over 50 Real Estate and News Feeds daily to bring you information pertinent to the San Ramon Valley & TriValley real estate market including the communities of Danville, San Ramon, Dublin and Pleasanton. We welcome suggestions.

Search our blog articles via the Tag Cloud - just click on a word that interests you.