Top 10 Reasons to List Your Home with Avery-Hess

1. Global affiliations through our national and international marketing partners allow us to distribute your home and all its pertinent marketing material all over the world

2. The largest listing syndication network in the USA that drive your listing to dozens of the most trafficked websites in the world that include: Google, Oodle, CraigsList, Realtor.com, Trulia, Zillow, Homefinder and many others.

3. Full time Sales Associates, experienced and well versed in their local markets.

4. All of our agents specialize in their local niche markets and posses a deeper knowledge of local conditions enhancing their ability and skill to negotiate on your behalf.

5. Leading Edge analytical tools to get your home accurately priced to sell.

6. Exclusive Text-on-Demand technology tailored to deliver information about your home to the new ultra-connected consumer.

7. Proprietary MyLife Home Search Tools – allowing your home to be marketed using our unique lifestyle based Real Estate Search

8. Our Avery-Hess technology lab is dedicated to staying on the leading edge of innovation to market your property and get it sold

9. iPhone, Blackberry and Google Search Apps that allow your home to be marketed and promoted in our increasingly mobile environment

10. Customized marketing materials to highlight and promote your home in print, regional and commuter publications.

To start the listing process for your home, or to see what it is worth in today’s market, contact: customercare@averyhess.com.

To learn more, or do some research, visit: www.averyhess.com

Selling Your Home – What to Consider

It is important to remember that there is no “one-size-fits-all” approach to selling your home. There are many factors to consider when selecting an agent to list your home, and outlined below is a quick 4-step summary of important things to consider.

1. MARKET CONDITIONS: Everyone would LOVE to sell their property and realize a 250% return on their investment. But the reality is that if you really do need to sell your home, you have to price it correctly in order for it to sell. The main consideration for an effective pricing strategy is the current market conditions. Your agent should be able to provide you with in-depth analysis on the current local market conditions. You may also want to go hyper-local and ask for information about recent sales in your particular neighborhood or development vs. a zip code or larger geographic region so you can better understand market conditions and trends at a macro and micro level.
2. CONDITION OF YOUR HOME: This can be tough. You have to try and be as objective as possible when it comes to the condition of your home; try to look at your home with the critical eye of an outside observer. Your agent can help you with this. In fact, your agent can be utilized as YOUR source of objective feedback about the condition of your home and the necessary steps you need to take in order to address and correct any issues.
3. PRICE: Ahhh… the big one. Price. This is the MOST important factor to consider when listing your home for sale. Be realistic. Look at the neighborhood comps and CMA’s when deciding on a list price for your home. Remember, you may LOVE your home, BUT it will not sell for any more than what the market dictates.  Do your research so you can make an informed decision on pricing. There are a lot of terrific sites out there with interesting information about home sales and prices, use them. Utilize your agent to help you interperet this data, and compare it to actuals from your neighborhood and local communities. Ask your agent to deliver you information on any pending sales that are releveant to your home sale (if available) so that you can guage pricing trends. Your agent should be able to provide you with accurate, up-to-date comps, market trends, PRICING trends (are prices increasing or decreasing locally? If so, by how much? How will this affect the sale of YOUR home? etc.) and help you mold all of this information into an effective pricing strategy.
4. MARKETING: Your agent has just assisted you in setting a terrific, empirically driven price on your beautiful home. Now what? TIME TO MARKET IT. Get it out to as many potenial purchasers as possible. Get it on-line. Get it syndicated. Make sure your agent and their company sends YOUR home to as many real estate search sites as possible. Make sure they have advertising vehicles for your property on Craigslist. Make sure that your agent is prepared to market your home via Text Message to deliver information to purchasers who prefer to search and communicate this way. Make sure your agent can deliver a mobile, GPS driven experience of your home to purchasers. Make sure your agent has a network of agents and brokers (such as Leading Real Estate Companies of the World) to market your home to. Make sure your agent places as many photos of the interior and exterior of your home as possible on-line. Get a custom website made for your home. If this sounds like an on-line heavy marketing plan,that’s because  IT IS. 90+% of consumers start their home search on-line, make sure your home is visible in the on-line space.

Do your research, select a great agent, get your home sold.

Search for homes, and do some research: www.averyhess.com

Are they short sales or long, drawn out sales?

According to a February study conducted by Campbell Communications, only 23% of short sale offers that homeowners receive from potential buyers actually close. Many homeowners watch buyers walk away as months pass dealing with lender delays, lost paperwork, and unreturned calls. Another Campbell Communications survey in March of 2008 found the average time for a mortgage servicer to respond to a short sale offer was 4.5 weeks. By this February it had doubled to 9 weeks and is currently 9.5 weeks. It’s not all the lenders fault though. Inexperienced real estate agents who don’t turn in complete paperwork and make the necessary contacts are also causing holdups.

So the government is stepping in to launch efforts to simplify and speed up the process. The Treasury Dept. will detail a plan to streamline the process by providing standardized documentation, cash incentives to lenders and a moving allowance to homeowners. I hope they get this straightened out soon. There are a lot of buyers suddenly clamoring to find a home. Unless the $8000 tax credit is extended beyond December 1, there will be a lot of disappointed buyers missing out largely due to ineptness.

Understanding the process and communicating it with your client will eliminate a lot of headaches.  Be sure to do your due diligence and stay on top of things.

Search for Homes: www.averyhess.com

Will Stabilizing Summer bring Winter Wonder?

I read an interesting article in The Washington Post today, “Housing Market on the Brink of Recovery, Relapse.” The article not only points out the number of foreclosed-property auctions and the hardest hit areas, it brings me back to a previous blog the end of May. Current trends in the DC Metro market place as a result of low inventory and $8,000 tax credit deadline quickly approaching, buyers are no longer looking … they are buying. Affordable loans with interest rates around 5% give buyers the buying power needed to secure the home they desire in multiple offer situations … leading to increased sale prices.

Short sales and foreclosures tend to lower neighborhood prices, even though the majority of foreclosures are priced at market, the stigma they leave on a neighborhood is not easily recovered. In the months since the foreclosure moratorium ended, lenders have tried modification programs to keep homeowners in their homes where ever possible. However many believe that there are enough looming foreclosures, not as a result of bad loans but employer cutbacks and layoffs, to lower prices once again if the banks flood the market. The question remains, if a large number of foreclosed properties are released into our market during the fall what will the winter bring?

Search for Homes: www.averyhess.com