Archive for December, 2007
Time of the signs: Let there be light
This is my column for last week from the Arizona Republic (permanent link). Since I wrote this, Cathleen found a solar-powered flood light solution, which we’re testing now. At some point — ideally when there is more sunlight and when electrons aren’t quite as sluggish outdoors — I’ll let you know how it’s working out.
Time of the signs: Let there be light
We’ve been playing with sign lights.
Signs matter. If you’re trying to sell your home, the yard sign just might swing the balance. A whopping 63% of home buyers discover homes they’re interested in seeing from yard signs, and the sign can be the first “salesman” for the home in one out of every six home sales.
Our signs are custom-made for each home we list, with big photos of the interior of the home. The idea is to swing the balance toward our sellers by whatever means we can think of.
But I cannot imagine a more profound enemy of custom real estate signs than darkness. During the day, you can spot the signs, see the photos, read the copy. At night, our signs, like all real estate signs, are silhouettes against the void.
So we’ve been looking for lighting systems that will extend the hours our signs are visible — from twilight to 9 pm at least, although all night would be ideal.
Our first swing at the ball is a device called the Listing Light. It uses six C-cell batteries to set two light-emitting diodes ablaze. It actually works in the sense that the signs seem to be aglow from a distance, and they are completely readable up close. But the effect is a lot like reading by flash-light — doable, but not to be preferred.
(That’s a flash photo. We wish out lights were this bright!)
My friend Teri Lussier, a Realtor in Dayton, Ohio, has set her husband loose on the problem of lighting signs. His first invention builds the lights into the underside of the crossbar of the sign post. By now, he’s playing with the idea of building a box composed of two translucent signs with fluorescent tubes inside, much like a commercial sign.
I like what ground-mounted flood lights do for a home, so I’d like to make a deal with a seller to get an electrician to illuminate the home, building in two additional flood lights for our signs. This would not be cheap — but as our massive unsold inventory makes plain — cheap efforts don’t get the job done.
Technorati Tags: arizona, arizona real estate, phoenix, phoenix real estate, real estate, real estate marketing, technology
No commentsGovernment interference will prolong housing woes
This is my column for this week from the Arizona Republic (permanent link):
Government interference will prolong housing woes
Want to make an economic problem worse? Interfere with it.
As I write this, the Federal Reserve Bank just cut the Federal Funds Rate by another quarter-point. Why? To try to stimulate the housing market.
Last week President Bush put together an attestedly voluntary agreement among lenders to freeze interest rates on certain adjustable rate mortgages for five years. The plan is voluntary in the same way that your rowdy Uncle Sid volunteered for the Marines instead of serving 90 days in the clink. Even so, Congress is still rumbling about involuntary solutions to the housing crisis.
So what’s the beef? Everybody’s just tying to help, right?
The problem is that all investment is based on planning. Before I risk my capital, I need a reasonable assurance that it will be returned to me — ideally with a healthy profit. There is always some risk in investing, but if the government can change the rules of the game at any moment, then the risk of investing soars. Doing anything else becomes much more attractive.
Consider: If I plant the right seeds and cultivate them properly, I can expect a bountiful harvest. But if the government were able to control the weather, and if it announced that it might or might not schedule a hard freeze for mid-July, I would be better off doing almost anything other than farming.
If I have capital available to lend, should I lend it where I know for sure I’ll get five percent interest, or should I lend it to a borrower who will promise to pay me eight percent — until Big Mother cuts that back to four percent as an act of mercy. If it were your money — and in many cases it is, in the form of insurance and pension funds — what would you do?
It’s plausible that we’ll go through the same amount of economic pain, with or without government involvement. But free markets self-correct quickly, liquidating bad investments and getting back to business. Government interference will almost certainly prolong our agony — to no good end, and therefore probably to our net detriment.
Technorati Tags: arizona, arizona real estate, investment, phoenix, phoenix real estate, real estate, real estate marketing
No commentsWeb site demonstrates how much goes into staging a home for sale
This is my column this week from the Arizona Republic (permanent link):
Web site demonstrates how much goes into staging a home for sale
Week after week, I hammer away on the idea that the only homes that will sell in our current market are the ones that are priced right, prepared right and presented right.
But here’s an unwelcome fact about the real estate market: Home-sellers can be bull-headed. I don’t know how many times I’ve had sellers tell me all about what is wrong with the other houses for sale in their neighborhood.
My answer? I agree. But we’re not talking about those houses. We’re talking about what it will take to sell the sellers’ house.
And that’s when I get to hear about all the improvements the sellers have made — some of which are actually worth what they think they’re worth.
But what I really want is for my sellers to look at their own home with the same critical eye they bring to the neighbors’ homes. It’s motes and beams, surely, but seeing your home through a buyer’s eyes is a very instructive exercise.
It’s fun for me, because one of the things I tell sellers is, “You know what’s wrong with this house. You know exactly what you would frown over — or your mother-in-law would frown over — if you were seeing this home for the first time. Those are the issues we need to address before we can try to sell this house.”
This is the threshold of staging, which entails a lot more, in most cases, than laying out a few decorator items. A home that is prepared for sale is in complete turn-key condition, with no obvious defects left uncorrected.
One of our listings in North Central Phoenix just sold. We made a before-and-after record of the staging process, so you can see what we’re aiming for. You can view this demonstration by clicking here.
Staging is all the rage right now, and preparation is only one part of a sound marketing plan. But staging is a wasted effort if the home is dirty or in palpable disrepair. Our slide show illustrates a more robust idea of home staging.
Technorati Tags: real estate, real estate marketing
No commentsBloodhoundRealty after dark: Illuminating our yard signs
By: Greg SwannDecember 1st, 2007
Category: Buying and Selling Homes,Distinctive Homes,Historic Homes
The trouble with trade shows is the shopportunities. I can restrain myself, by Cathy can be suggestible. Jeff Brown had been talking to me about after-dark lights for our yard signs, but it wasn’t until StarPower, when Cathy saw the product offered by ListingLight.com, that we bought into the idea:
That’s flash photography. The light emitted by the ListingLight is adequate for reading at night, but taking a useful picture would require a tri-pod. Even so, they do the job. Where every other sign on the street is an unreadable silhouette, ours pop out at a distance.
Is it enough to sell the house? Perhaps not, but every little thing helps. There’s no telling when the buyer is coming by, and, even in Arizona, evenings are dark in Winter.
Technorati Tags: arizona, arizona real estate, phoenix, phoenix real estate, real estate, real estate marketing, technology
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