Many people think the idea of buying or selling real estate during Winter is a crazy idea. This is especially true if you live in a Colorado mountain town like myself. I have had this conversation several times recently with clients and so I thought it would be helpful to share some insight to what the actual experience looks like to buy or sell during the Winter months.
If you are considering selling during the Winter, here are a couple tips to keep in mind:
If you are considering buying during the Winter, here are a couple tips to keep in mind:
I hope you find this article helpful and if you are considering buying or selling during the Winter you are now more confident about that decision. Whether you are considering buying or selling, please feel free to contact me anytime to discuss your goals and we will personalize a strategy that fits your situation and get to work to accomplish those goals.
Have a Happy 2017!
One of the big takeaways from the survey recently produced is that over the next five years, home prices will appreciate 3.5% per year on average and cumulatively will grow by around 18%. So we set out to answer the question of how do rising prices impact home equity?
For example, let’s assume a young couple purchased and closed on a $250,000 home in January of this year. If we only look at the projected increase in the price of that home, how much equity would they earn over the next 5 years?
How do Rising Prices Impact Home Equity?
Since the experts predict that home prices will increase by 4.5% this year alone, the young homeowners will have gained over $11,000 in equity in just one year. This is a larger equity gain than the 4 years that follow it but nonetheless a great way to start your path to building equity!
Over a five-year period, their equity will increase by over $46,000! This figure does not even take into account their monthly principal mortgage payments. In many cases, home equity is one of the largest portions of a family’s overall net worth. Just like saving for retirement, the earlier in life you start building equity, the more wealth it will accumulate as you age.
Not only is homeownership something to be proud of but it also offers you and your family the ability to build equity you can borrow against in the future. If you choose not to borrow against the equity you have built than your net proceeds of a sale end up being that much higher when you decide to sell the property. If you are ready and willing to buy, find out if you are able to today!
Contact Shawn Manwaring, REALTOR in Colorado:
There are some people that have not purchased a home because they are uncomfortable taking on the obligation of a mortgage. Everyone should realize that, unless you are living with your parents rent free, you are paying a mortgage – either yours or your landlord’s.
As The Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University explains:
“Households must consume housing whether they own or rent. Not even accounting for more favorable tax treatment of owning, homeowners pay debt service to pay down their own principal while households that rent pay down the principal of a landlord plus a rate of return.
That’s yet another reason owning often does—as Americans intuit—end up making more financial sense than renting.”
Christina Boyle, a Senior Vice President, Head of Single-Family Sales & Relationship Management at Freddie Mac, explains another benefit of securing a mortgage vs. paying rent:
“With a 30-year fixed rate mortgage, you’ll have the certainty & stability of knowing what your mortgage payment will be for the next 30 years – unlike rents which will continue to rise over the next three decades.”
Paying a Mortgage
As an owner, your mortgage payment is a form of ‘forced savings’ which allows you to have equity in your home that you can tap into later in life. As a renter, you guarantee the landlord is the person with that equity.
Interest rates are still at historic lows, making it one of the best times to secure a mortgage and make a move into your dream home and start paying a mortgage that you own! Freddie Mac’s latest report shows that rates across the country were 3.43% last week.
Whether you are looking for a primary residence for the first time or are considering a vacation home on the shore, now may be the time to buy.
If your real estate search brings you to Colorado, contact Shawn Manwaring and he will be delighted to assist you!
You’re under contract, have completed inspection, objection, and resolution. Your loan is very close to being funded, all that’s left is the appraisal. Just as every other inspection has a price, the appraisal also has some costs associated with it. So what is the cost of appraisals and can you shop around?
]The cost for home appraisals today varies a bit by geographic region, but it has always varied too by the complexity of the assignment. It takes a lot more time to appraise a custom home in the mountains, for instance, than to appraise a tract home in the city.
Of course, this makes perfect sense. It would be very easy to compare a house in a subdivision to another house the exact same size and floor plan, with extremely similar finishes, conveniently located directly across the street. Conversely, it would be much harder to try to figure out the value of a home if there wasn’t another home like it anywhere.
The appraisal tells your lender how much the home is worth. The appraiser uses recently sold homes in the immediate area and compares them to the home you are buying in order to come up with a value. If there aren’t any recently sold homes like yours, any recently sold in your area, or both, their job is infinitely more difficult. Some areas of difficulty that are more time consuming for your appraiser may affect the home appraisal cost.
An appraisal seems like an easy place to game the system. Simply hire someone you know already and make sure the appraisal comes in where you need it to. Before the current regulations went into effect, this is exactly what people did.
The Cost of Appraisals
In 2008 new regulations put a firewall between mortgage originators (loan officers/any production folks) and the appraisers to make it impossible for stakeholders to influence the appraisal.
Today we have to order the appraisal through an online portal via the lender’s website. (Mortgage companies and banks do the same, so it isn’t any different. The originator cannot choose or have any contact with the appraiser.)
The lender engages an independent Appraisal Management Company (AMC), which maintains a panel of independent appraisers throughout the country. An appraiser may belong to several, if not dozens, of AMC panels. The loan officer is not even allowed to talk to the appraiser, much less influence them in any way.
There are several implications to this organization: The customer may not shop for the appraiser. The appraiser is selected independently and only through this system.
There is no cost difference between refinancing and purchase transactions, although, as noted above, there could be differences for complexity or scope. For instance, if you are buying a rental property, the appraiser will be asked to complete a rental survey in addition to the appraisal — obviously, the home appraisal cost will be higher.
In the past, I’ve recommended that sellers give a cheat sheet of sorts to the appraiser when they get there, including measurements of their home and a list of improvements along with information about the neighborhood, explaining any homes that sold recently for a less-than-market price for reasons not readily apparent. On my street, I know of three houses that sold last year for significantly less than they should have for reasons that would not be known to someone who wasn’t in tune with the latest neighborhood news.
Hampson says, “I do meet the appraiser when it’s my listing and always bring comparable’s. Sometimes they appreciate it.” I would always recommend doing this. If they don’t look at the comparable’s you bring, you haven’t really lost out on much. But if they do take them into consideration, you can control the process a bit more.
Every single piece of property is 100 percent unique — there will never be two properties that are exactly alike. However, the more unique your property is, the more difficult it will be to value, and the higher the chances are that your appraisal will come in low.
The cost of appraisals will run between $350 and $600 for a home that is easier to appraise — and could run much higher for a unique property. Shopping around for the best price isn’t really an option, so focus on making your home look its best, and ask your agent for a list of favorable comparable’s to share with the appraiser.
Here is another resource from our friends at Realtor.com regarding appraisals: Appraisal Info
When you are in the real estate market and searching for a Colorado realtor, I would love the chance to work with you!
You have found your new home and you are so excited to move in that you cannot wait to complete the final steps before closing! While you daydream about arranging your furniture and putting your dishes into the cabinets, make sure you are giving proper attention to the very important final walkthrough of your new palace. Preparing for your Final Walkthrough is a crucial step before closing. This should take place after the home inspection and 2-7 days before closing. Prepare yourself by getting plenty of sleep for mental clarity, bringing a support system to help out, and packing a few small tools to aid in your walkthrough. Being very careful to check every detail will ensure you have a happy homecoming when the keys are finally yours.
Preparing for your Final Walkthrough
When preparing for your final walkthrough, make sure you check every appliance, window, door and electrical outlet. Check all faucets and flush all toilets. Open every cabinet. Bring someone with you and task him or her with checking a particular area or category. Though your inspection has already occurred, there could be problems that may have come up since. You may find that a faucet that worked during inspection is no longer working after the seller removed a water filter improperly. It could happen that a roof leak has caused water damage that was not visible before. You can use a phone and charger or outlet tester to check every outlet in the house. Take a notebook with you and write the name of each room on each page to record any issues.
Are there any items that the seller agreed to leave behind such as light fixtures, shelving or outdoor structures? Be thorough in checking that these items are in place and intact. A specific area that always gets overlooked is landscaping. Walk the yard while referencing photos from your previous visit to ensure that no trees or shrubbery or built-in patio items were removed if the agreement was for them to stay. Use your notebook and camera or phone to document any issues. Be very specific.
After the seller’s belongings have been removed, check all storage areas and nooks for items left behind. You do not want to be responsible for throwing out a box of old paint left in the garage or heavy crates full of magazines shoved in an attic corner. You also do not want to have to communicate with the seller or have them come by to retrieve items while you are trying to make the home your own. Check walls again to make sure no damage occurred while moving out. It is not uncommon for television sets to leave gaping holes in walls or for a sofa to take out a chunk of a doorframe on its way out. Make sure any potential issues are properly repaired, and not just patched up to provide temporary visual appeal.
It is very important that you schedule your final walkthrough with plenty of advance time for repairs to take place. Remember, you may need to schedule an additional walkthrough to double check that all loose ends are tied. Giving yourself an extra week is often easier than rescheduling a closing due to a dispute. Your home is your investment and making reasonable requests for repairs or changes is part of the real estate process. Do not let your eagerness to settle in cause you to settle for less.
If you are searching for a homebuyer’s guide, I have also completed that for you.
Are you like some of the other thousands of people moving to Colorado recently? If so, chances are you are curious about the Colorado Real Estate market and what is happening. Before you dig in deep to Colorado real estate, you might want to get an understanding of the Centennial state as a whole. This article will help you with that.
As you might learn, Colorado is home to more than 5 million people. Last year in 2015 it is estimated that more than 101,000 people decided to move to Colorado. With that said, we are in the midst of a population boom! Typically a population boom like this will come with a real estate boom on its tail. That is exactly the case here in Colorado. Even small towns in the Western Colorado real estate market like Glenwood Springs have felt the surge in population therefore creating a spike in real estate prices.
What most people find when they arrive in Colorado and start to figure out their housing plans is this. Unlike most other places where it makes sense to rent an apartment and get your feet wet with surroundings before buying, the opposite is true. With the population boom, rent has sky rocketed in most areas of the state and if you have the means to do so, purchasing real estate can actually be less expensive than renting! An average 2 bedroom condo in Colorado will rent for approximately $1,400 per month right now. You can still purchase a 2 bedroom condo in many places for around $200,000 resulting in a monthly mortgage payment of around $1,000.
The big thing here is that you need to be ready to purchase real estate sooner than later if you plan to stay in Colorado and build your life in this beautiful state. By saving money, ensuring your credit score is good and reducing debt to income ratios, these will all help you achieve the goal of purchasing real estate in Colorado. Although it can be challenging, it will certainly be worth it when you are able to call a property your own and no longer have to pay for someone else’s mortgage!
Another bonus of purchasing real estate in Colorado is that if you ever need to move, you can easily rent your property to cover the costs. This is investing 101 and a sure way to start building incredible equity for yourself. Whether you are planning to purchase a forever home, an investment property or just a weekend getaway in the mountains, I would love to chat with you about your real estate goals and do all I can to help you achieve them!
Summer is here! The temperature isn’t the only thing heating up right now. So is the housing market in many areas of the country! Here are four great reasons to consider buying a home today instead of waiting. Whether you are located in Colorado or somewhere else in the country, these will more than likely all be applicable. Here are some reasons to buy real estate this Summer.
CoreLogic’s latest Home Price Index reports that home prices have appreciated by 5.9% over the last 12 months. The same report predicts that prices will continue to increase at a rate of 5.3% over the next year. The Home Price Expectation Survey polls a distinguished panel of over 100 economists, investment strategists, and housing market analysts. Their most recent report projects home values to appreciate by more than 3.2% a year for the next 5 years.
The bottom in home prices has come and gone. Home values will continue to appreciate for years. Waiting no longer makes sense in our current real estate market.
Freddie Mac’s Primary Mortgage Market Survey shows that interest rates for a 30-year mortgage have remained around 4% as a national average. Most experts predict that they will begin to rise over the next 12 months. The Mortgage Bankers Association, Freddie Mac & the National Association of Realtors are in unison, projecting that rates will be up almost a full percentage point by this time next year.
An increase in rates will impact YOUR monthly mortgage payment. A year from now, your housing expense will increase if a mortgage is necessary to buy your next home. Consider this when deciding whether it’s worth waiting another year. At 4% and good credit a $400,000 home will cost you about $2,000 per month currently. At 5% the same home could cost you as much as $2,300 per month.
As a paper from the Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University explains:
“Households must consume housing whether they own or rent. Not even accounting for more favorable tax treatment of owning, homeowners pay debt service to pay down their own principal while households that rent pay down the principal of a landlord plus a rate of return. That’s yet another reason owning often does—as Americans intuit—end up making more financial sense than renting.”
Think about it… how much longer do you want to pay someone else’s mortgage payment?
4. It’s Time to Move On with Your Life
The ‘cost’ of a home is determined by two major components: the price of the home and the current mortgage rate. It appears that both are on the rise.
But what if they weren’t? Would you wait?
Look at the actual reason you are buying and decide whether it is worth waiting. Whether you want to have a great place for your children to grow up, you want your family to be safer or you just want to have control over renovations, maybe now is the time to buy.
If the right thing for you and your family is to purchase a home this year, buying sooner rather than later could lead to substantial savings. Hopefully these reasons to buy real estate this Summer help you with your home buying decisions. If you are located in Colorado, give Shawn Manwaring a call and he would be delighted to assist with all your real estate endeavors.
Selling a house with tenants can be problematic or a blessing in disguise. This article was written to help you discover tips for selling a house with tenants.
There are lots of questions that arise and you may ask “where does one begin?”
The secret here is that a lot will depend on the working relationship between landlord and tenants. Seemingly helpful tenants at first might turn out to be tenants from hell and completely wreck any hope for a successful conclusion of a property sale! Or the tenant ended up playing quite the crucial role in getting the property sold.
How can one improve the odds of getting it right, and actually be able to sell the property?
The following Tips For Selling A House With Tenants will go a long way in getting clarity on all those questions:
A landlord isn’t prohibited from selling his property while there are tenants with a lease agreement occupying the property. This lease tends to precede the sale of property which means that the tenant is perfectly entitled to remain at the property until the end of the lease period.
Even though tenants are entitled to stay on one will actually see quite a few tenants looking for another accommodation. Due to the uncertainty created by an incoming landlord and/or unfavorable terms at the next lease negotiation.
Yet another reminder why one has to read the lease agreement so questions regarding the rights and obligations in the event of a property being sold, will not be unknown elements! In most cases both landlord and tenant will give one another additional flexibilities in the event of the property transferring owners.
The tenant might even be allowed to cancel the lease prematurely and find a new accommodation once the decision has been made that the property will go onto the market. If those are the terms then no penalties can be placed upon the tenant if he chooses to break the lease agreement.
However if nothing specifically is noted in the agreement regarding the sale of the property, the tenant will not be able to just walk away from the lease agreement.
As much as the new landlord needs to respect the terms of the established lease agreement so will the tenant need to respect the agreed upon contract. Especially if the new landlord bought the property with a buy-to-let investment goal in mind!
Who knows, by playing open cards with the tenants, and perhaps giving them the first refusal, selling a house with tenants might be the fastest way one has ever sold a property. Even if the tenants don’t buy the property they will feel very appreciated by having given that opportunity.
Quite a few rather big uncertainties remain:
Will the tenants be helpful and/or flexible when it comes to showing times for the real estate agent?
How will the property look like during showings?
How will the tenants behave during the sale of the property?
The huge uncertainty of not knowing whether the tenants will be helpful in getting the property sold, and hereby risking wasting a lot of time (and money lost as the property becomes stale by sitting on the market for weeks and months on end!), result in a lot of landlords preferring to rather wait until the end of the lease agreement before placing the property on the market.
Besides basic cleaning and freshening up the house, an empty house does show its imperfections more easily, so make sure to address those few cracked tiles in the kitchen or bathroom, as well as fix those small hairline cracks in the walls. Small renovations don’t need to cost a lot of money and will definitely help in the sale of the property!
Although we know that empty houses don’t sell easily there’s a huge upside of a 24/7 ease of access for the real estate agents to show clients!
According to most real estate agents, selling a house with tenants is asking for trouble, will get messy and rarely ends on a good note!
Nonetheless, the reality of the situation is that not every landlord has the luxury to wait for months until the lease agreement expires before selling their property. Even then, it might easily take as long before the house is sold, which means loss of rental income for the landlord.
In the event that the tenants have offered their cooperation in getting the property sold, it’s important to lay down some ground rules. Personally, I refer to these opportunities as the real estate agent’s chance to excel at managing expectations!
What will the condition of the property be like during the selling process?
How long in advance will the agent give the tenants notice for showings? How long is too long or how short is too short?
Will there be open houses?
Will the tenants be getting feedback of what’s happening with the showings?
In the end, will there be some sort of reward for the tenants in exchange for their assistance?
On the one hand, the tenants’ privacy is important, while on the other, it’s important for them to understand the need to be accommodating for showings!
Selling a house with tenants, uncooperative ones that is, will be viewed by most real estate agents as mission impossible!
These are the people who actually live in the house, day-in day-out, who are very familiar with the property, know every problem or shortfall the house has, and who are very familiar with the neighborhood!
Can you imagine the damage these uncooperative tenants could do?
Unleash these tenants on some unsuspecting interested buyers with their complaints, and that’ll be the last you ever hear from those buyers again!
Why bring through interested buyers if you don’t know whether you’ll actually get access to the property, arrive yet again at a pig sty, or worse, having those tenants hang around during the showings!
Waiting it out until the lease expires all of a sudden doesn’t seem to be such a bad idea after all, does it!
Money talks!
The cooperative tenants will very likely see some incentive reward heading their way for the help given during the sale process; the uncooperative tenants might change their bad attitude once they find out how much they’re about to make for being normal.
Of course, this is a tit-for-tat exchange: the tenant needs to clean up his mess on a daily basis (ideally 1st thing in the morning), and make sure to be available for showings! The landlord will then work on a big discount on the rent (e.g. rent amount cut by 50% per month), or other great incentives, such as helping to pay for the outgoing tenants’ moving expenses!
Will it be an offer the tenants can’t refuse?
When selling a house with tenants, it can be a potential minefield. Be sure you understand all the tips for selling a house with tenants before you get into it!
From a legal point of view, the landlord needs to make sure to have verified his tenancy facts, his lease agreement and run his actions by his legal counsel. This is all in order to avoid getting stuck in an ugly legal fight with his tenants!
All the tips for selling a house with tenants have been given to you. When you are ready to make the plunge, contact Shawn Manwaring, Realtor in Glenwood Springs, Colorado.
History & Location
Located 170 miles west of Denver and 30 miles from Aspen in the heart of Colorado’s central Rocky Mountains is Carbondale. Carbondale was first occupied by the Ute Indians then by silver prospectors cattle ranchers and potato farmers.
Discussed as one of the “Top 12 Towns” in the “50 Next Great Places to Live and Play” by National Geographic Adventure magazine. Also listed as one of the 50 Best Places to Live/Most Active Towns by Men’s Journal magazine. Carbondale is a great base camp for recreation enthusiasts. Resting in the shadow of 12,953-foot Mt. Sopris there is plenty to do in Carbondale. This includs biking, hiking, gold medal fly-fishing, kayaking, and world class skateboarding. In winter excellent cross-country skiing can be found at Spring Gulch and beautiful snowmobiling and snowshoeing trails are accessible in all directions. World famous downhill skiing and snowboarding is 30 miles away in Aspen/Snowmass and also 15 miles away at Sunlight Mountain in Glenwood Springs.
For a spectacular driving experience take the West Elk Loop that is a Colorado Scenic Byway. It starts and ends in Carbondale and wanders on the edge of town. The commercial airports of Aspen, Eagle/Vail and Grand Junction offer convenient access to Carbondale.
At an altitude of 6,181 feet, the Carbondale area is characterized by an average of 295 days of sunshine, low humidity, cold but mild winters and comfortable summers. Carbondale often avoids storms that can inundate the surrounding mountains creating its reputation as the “banana belt” of the Roaring Fork and Crystal River Valleys. There is a significant day to night temperature swing and precipitation can vary greatly from year to year. Average snowfall is approximately 69 inches. The growing season averages 98 days with the last spring frost about June 1 and the first killing frost about September 15. Carbondale residents embrace a sense of community. This manifests itself in the promotion of recreation, great dining, art and artists, public radio, renewable energy and resources, community gatherings and events. It also boasts a wide range of economic, social, and philosophical viewpoints.
Carbondale Colorado Real Estate
Carbondale, located in Garfield County, Colorado, is home to 6,492 people and is a suburban community. The median household income is $60,597. 54% of residents of Carbondale are married and 35% are families with children. Half the residents in Carbondale commute just 30 minutes or less to work, with 31% of residents holding white collar jobs and 69% residents holding blue collar jobs. The median age of homes is 19 years. In Carbondale, 54% of homes are owned, 37% are rented, and 9% are not occupied. Last year, 133 Carbondale properties were sold and the median sale price of a home was $437,934.
Carbondale Colorado Real Estate is fairly diverse in nature. Because of the mid-valley location offered by Carbondale, it attracts all kinds of real estate action. Only 10 miles from Glenwood Springs and 30 miles from Aspen makes for an appealing location to many people. In addition to location Carbondale offers a culture that is second to none in Colorado.
If you are in the Carbondale Colorado Real Estate market than chanced are you are shopping for something $300,000 or more. With high demand comes high pricing unfortunately. We start to see real estate prices increase significantly as you leave Glenwood Springs and head towards Carbondale. There are a variety of factors that contribute to this phenomena.
As of today there are 27 listings in Carbondale under $500,000. By increasing the budget to $1,000,000 there are currently 77 listings. In Carbondale we see a huge diversity among properties offered. Starting at $315,000 you can purchase a 1,248 square foot 3 bedroom 2 bathroom condo. There are several condos and town homes located near the downtown area of Carbondale.
As you approach the $500,000 mark you start to break into the single family home market. Single family homes in Carbondale range from small lots and properties to large ranch properties. Very few single family homes come with HOA covenants. This sometimes is a big deciding factor for buyers.
To learn more about the town of Carbondale HERE
