Staging a home – more and more this is becoming an absolute must. Buyers now have more options than they have had in some time, so Sellers must actually do some work to prepare their homes for multiple showings. The property I am marketing now in Minor Hill is one of the best-prepared homes I have seen in some time (the fact that it is my listing is beside the point; the owners are meticulous and well-prepared).This is an excellent article that lays out some simple tips on staging. They are all good advice; the best one is the most simple – “Don’t skip a single room: “Which rooms wouldn’t you want to sell?”” I hired professional stagers for my property in Wintergreen. They did an excellent job. The house is sparsely decorated, and they took the time to analyze the property’s best features and then highlight said features.
Date Archives February 2006
Bah.
A therapeutic post … This weekend I showed a blind-call in a couple of townhomes in the Charlottesville/Albemarle area. Followed up with an email and a voice mail. No response. This afternoon I received a call from another agent saying that she had a “client” that wanted to make an offer on a property I had shown to them. There is a distinct and important difference between a customer and a client.
New listings
We have put several new properties on the market in the past several days, in part to hopefully take advantage of the upcoming Match Day, when Medical Residents find out where they will be attending school for the next several years. CrozetLake MonticelloWynridge, Village Square, Stonehenge ($229k), Stonehenge ($217,900), Four Seasons (all of these are 10-15 minutes to UVa.)
Affordable Housing
This editorial in the WP lays out the workforce housing situation quite well. One thing the author does not do is identify solutions, beyond calling for government subsidies. Having done the math, Lerner, like other developers, feels little incentive to build large quantities of smaller, affordable units for which profit margins per unit are much slimmer and for which always-variable absorption rates must be much higher. Developers also know that affluent buyers are less affected by volatility in interest rates and employment.According to MacGillis’s report, Lerner’s managing director of construction, Peter M. Rosen, offered a concise, unambiguous explanation of the developer’s thinking: “We respond to the market. The company would be willing to build more and smaller units if you guarantee the market.” Fairfax County, MacGillis reported, had envisioned another scenario but “wasn’t exact enough in its demands: It extracted an agreement only for a minimum number of residential square feet, not of housing units.”Affordable housing is not an isolated issue.
Local housing market review
The DP has two interesting articlesDavid Hendrick provides a good analysis of the local market and its prospects for the upcoming year. Charlottesville is unique, for a variety of reasons. One of which is – “Charlottesville is a destination area,” said Casey Dawkins, director of the Virginia Center for Housing Research. “It seems to be the case that there is still potential for growth.”…”Virginia is one of a few states where you see dramatic regional difference,” Dawkins said. “Charlottesville will probably continue to grow, as will Richmond. For the rest of the state I would anticipate smaller increases.”On the flip side, if people cannot afford to live in Louisa, traditionally one of the more affordable counties, where can they afford?
A negative Zillow review
I didn’t think it would happen. Someone realizes that pricing homes is part objective data analysis, part subjective analysis.Zillow provides a good starting point and a good “ballpark” number. Replacing an expert? Not yet.
“Green” bills in VA House
At least somebody is looking for ways to encourage sustainable housing. Directing the Virginia Coal and Energy Commission to study the feasibility of enabling legislation to authorize localities to provide real property tax incentives to encourage buildings to be constructed using “green building” or “sustainable” designs consistent with Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standards. Ironic that the Coal and Energy Commission is responsible for studying green feasibility.