Flat lined in Belmont (MA)

At the risk of jumping the gun, what with 8 more business HOURS left to this pale of a year of 2011, we can report that sales in Belmont were flat compared to 2010. So far for 2011, 146 homes changed hands according to MLS. This compares out to 143 homes for the previous year. Flat yes, but to dig a bit deeper shows a bit of contour to the Real Estate terrain...

Days on market went form 78 days in 2010 down to a stealthy 58 in 2011. Average price rose from 780k to 804k. It would seem, from the numbers view at least, that we had somewhat of a bidding war on our little hands -- a little war, anyway. Buyers were there -- sellers were not...when someone did put the "chalet" on the market, it went.

Now let us not jump the gun in the other direction (read that as shoot ourselves in the foot -- or face). Buyers were not throwing themselves at anything and everything -- they were NOT willing to die by the sword if they failed to sign a Purchase and Sale. In fact, they kept their collective cool and allowed 42 listings to EXPIRE (no sale) in 2011. In 2010, they refused to ink deals on 35 homes.

What does it all mean -- not much, I should hazard. Flat sales in a bad market can be great, but it should be reminded at many times, flat surfaces are, indeed, as slippery as a slippery slope.

Open House???

It is an Open House...I am down in the basement with a rather attentive couple. They are asking this and they are asking that and I am smelling "Offer to Purchase". They head out the basement door to talk things over and I head back upstairs to attend to the footfalls of other prospective buyers. I hazard not more than a small glance at the old woman sitting serenly at the kitchen table. I do notice, however, that she has a bemused calm about her, as though the years between the gentile time of her day and the harsh electronic nonsense of today have filled her not with a sense of doom, but of blissful longing for a simpler time.

Great, I say to myself. Perchance she will have a good word with one of the other prospects -- the one with whom she came. She'll say something about how the house glistens with the charm of another time and she would happily bequest a chunk of her estate to the purchase of this property.

I spend a few minutes in this agent reverie, and even pass her again. I proffer her a smile and a "How you do?"

"Oh, fine," she says, "A cup of tea would be nice about now."

I smile and joke, "I'll see what I can do, but right now I MUST excuse myself to attend business."

"You're excused," she says.

A few moments pass, and, inexplicably, my Open House is empty. I catch my breath to prepare for another wave -- the final 15 minutes. I sigh and think about how hard we sales folk do work -- sometimes. I begin to expend air into another sigh, when that mournful moan is cut short by one from another set of vocal chords...coming from the KITCHEN.

It is the serene old lady. Sitting there, calm as ever.

"Is there something I can do for you?" I ask her.

"That cup of tea you mentioned would be nice."

"Are you with someone."

"Heaven's no. I walked here all alone. When will Ida be coming home?"

At this I quake, for there is no Ida in this house, and I duly report this to her.

"Oh!", she exclaims, "I must have walked into the wrong house!" and she gets up to head to the door rattling off a litany of apologies the length of which you would expect to hear from a "Perp" who just got nailed stealing the Police Commissioner's car.

I tell her it is all right. I close up the house. I offer her a ride. She accepts. My reveries of a fat commission check are put on hold, and as I drive her down the road, she breaks me from my dismal state when she asks, "Tell me young man, that Green place that is in the center of town, that Starbucks,...do you think they might have a cup of tea in there for me?...And you?

The Grass is Always "Greener" in the Kid's Room

Ok, so it is fall and we are not into thinking of grass but, it appears, there is more to grass than a trip to Home Depot

The other day, I take a fine cusotmer to a modest home that is, to say the least, not ready to be presented

Really not ready for showing: clothes strewn about, cereal in the sink -- 2 bedrooms that are not up to standards generally accepted today (I supposed one could sleep in a garage and call it a bedroom). I surely had nothing to say, yet the buyer persisted in the tour and went upstairs to said non standard bedrooms. As we entered the one on the left, the eyes of the buyer met mine -- both our noses twitched and, "Wow", said the buyer, "Bill Clinton must have slept here."

"Or," I replied, "at least he did NOT inhale here!"

"Good stuff," my buyer editorialized, "I wonder where the kid hides it."

We made no attempt to find the, uhh, shall we say "potpourri". Rather we exited the home and went our way. There are better homes in the town, you know...the greener grass thing -- especially because in this house, the grass gets smoked.

What to do with the underwater house...

...Do you have that lot in the swamp, that piece on the rocky slope that cannot be attained for six months during the ice season, that Condo converted from a 2-Family? Well, there is something you can do! We'll get to that in a moment, but first we must introduce our inspiration.

These folks at this link are marketing a fun and educational (don't you hate that phrase? I think they use it for Chia Pets!) way to own Real Estate. You can buy a postage stamp size plot of land, have the deed, title, porperty tax liens and the whole 9 yards in any and every state. Be a Donald Trump! So the web site screams. Loads of fun for the kiddies. I can just picture the young lads and lassies throwing out their XBoxes for the chance to stare at a property deed all day. Wow! This is more fun than having a star named after you! (Talk about money for nothing!) Oh yes, my brother paid to have a star named after me. Never could find its twinkles in the heavens...must have gotton sucked into the same black hole that took my "Bro's" cash. But back to real estate.

So if you do have that swamp to sell, that rock, that desert, New Orleans, whatever, subdvide into postage stamps and market it as an educational experience.

The kids'll hate you for being a nerd, but the lawyers will love you for life.

When they write X, they really mean Y

When they write -- they mean...

Old charmer - an old and ugly house
Stunning house - the house is not ugly
Tudor - two bedrooms are in the attic which is not insulated; very hot in summer and very cold in winter
Cape Cod - styled after Third World slum dwellings
Sunny corner lot - noisy intersection of two busy streets
Easy freeway access - noisy arterial street close to freeway
Low maintenance lot - no yard; the kids will have to play in the street
Meticulously maintained in the original condition - the appliances are 50 years old
Ready to remodel - the house is about to collapse; you will have to invest twice the asking price in remodel before you can move in
Newly remodeled kitchen - 50-year old cabinetry and faucets have been replaced with cheap modern equivalents
Ready to move in - the interior has been painted with one coat of cheap paint
Desirable neighborhood - this little house is extravagantly overpriced because the neighborhood has a snobbish reputation
1 car garage - you can drive your Ford Escort into the garage but there is no room to open the door
In-city living - it is not safe to walk in this neighborhood after dark
Recreation room with wet bar - basement has been painted and has a faucet
Large family room - large basement
Bedroom in basement - basement has a 1′ by 2′ window
Lots of storage space - basement too small to be called a family room
Partial mountain view - you can see the tip of Mt. Olympus if you climb the roof
Territorial view - good view of your neighbor’s bedroom window
Build sweat equity - the house is not inhabitable
Storybook - the house is old and the roof is not flat
Efficiently designed kitchen - the kitchen is too small to fit two people at the same time
Seasonal creek - muddy ditch across the property
Usable land - all the trees are gone.
Doll-house - tiny place filled with ugly knick-knacks.
Country living - too far from anywhere to drive to work
Country in the city - a grotesquely overpriced large lot with a 2 bedroom house built before World War I
Cozy - not a single room could fit a full size bed
Three season sunroom - a small addition the owner did not have enough money to insulate
Close to all amenities - the backyard is a shopping mall parking
Beachfront property, complete remodeling in 1996, a steal at this asking price - hurricane Andrew motivated the remodeling; no hurricane insurance available, at any price
Must see inside - the outside is ugly
Motivated sellers - subtract 15% from the asking price
Easy to heat - see “cozy”
Wildlife nearby - children and pets get ticks and fleas
Near transportation - Amtrak train goes through the backyard, every 15 minutes, day and night
Pet friendly neighborhood - organic matter constantly deposited in the front lawn
Neighborhood watch - your next door neighbor has binoculars trained on your house
Just available - previous owner just died on the premises, hope you don’t believe in ghosts

Location Location Location (or Strike 1, 2 3 "yer" out)

Up top there is the hackneyed expression, dare we say Mantra of real estate folk. I've never used it myself, for it smacks of late night Real Estate infomercials, but here below is a tale of a small broker who learned the lesson of "location,location,location" the hard way.

The small broker operates out of her house, does, maybe one buyer rep transaction a year, mostly cajoled out of her bridge club or soccer mom connections. A nice little business.

In this particular case, our broker harrangued a friend for weeks about listing a house. The friend had, in passing, mentioned that they were going to sell, and our little broker sprung into action.

Bought a listing post, had a sign printed up, figured out how to do the boston.com internet thing.

The friend had intended to go to a big office to list her home, but, well, our little broker offered a deep discount on the commission, and she got the listing.

Gave her husband the signage and told him to get a rubber hammer and bang that sucker into the front yard of the house.

And our little broker is ready! The phone rings within an hour and our little broker is set with her appointment book. She takes the call:

"How may I help you?" she asks.

"You're the one who needs help," a disturbed voice wreaks, "What the hell is that crap doing in my yard?"

"Pardon?" our now timid little broker replies.

"The 'For Sale' sign, you dope! What the hell is that doing in front of my house. I'm not selling my home. Your sign is up in front of the wrong house."

Now our little broker is a bit flustered, but the selling instinct kicks in -- never let a prospect go before YOU go for the sell. "Well, since it is up," she asks, "are you interested in talking about selling? I am sure the home is lovely and will..."

At which point she is met with a tirade of words not meant for "the King's English."

She is told her sign was, of late, posted on Xxxxx Place. It may be found in the trash of the subject house on Xxxxx Place. And, of course, her friend's home is on Xxxxx STREET! Location, Location, Location.

One wonders what the husband ate for breakfast that morning,...or for that matter, what he ate for dinner that night.

"Gang Busting" Agent is Just Gonna Get BUSTED

An acquaintance of mine brought to my attention an agent who is, I was assured, a powerhouse on the south shore, a veritable ball of energy and top producer:

“You know what her slogan is?” my compatriot opined.

“Nope,” I say with naught hint of slogan in mind.

“It is, get this…’I’LL SELL IT IN ONE DAY' ”, that’s what she tells people, and she is going gangbusters!”

“Wow I say,” and I am thinking – yikes! Is this agent stupid or what? Or maybe she does sell ‘em in 1 day, in which case she is not doing her clients any good, ‘cause to do that, ya gotta be dumping properties on the market, not pricing them properly!.

I looked at her “1 day” progress and it appears that the “gangs” she is busting are little gangs (I guess Hell’s Angels, the Tong, and the Winter Hill Boys are out of her market area). She has 3 listings – they are active; one has been active for 100 days. The ONE listing she HAS sold was on market for 164 DAYS (maybe she sells them in her dreams every night and does not remember to wake up!).

To her credit, she is party to another transaction – she was a buyer rep on a condo that was on market for 81 days. So … she has collected paychecks on TWO sales in the first 7 months of 2011 (2 condos; one for 200,000; the other for 329,000 – gang busters or ghost busters???).

But all this is not the issue: the issue that chokes me is that phrase “I'll sell it in ONE day.”

I asked my friend about that -- what if she does not off load in ONE day?: “Well,” I was told, “She says to them that she tried. She is working hard and it is not like she is doing anything wrong or illegal; she tried in good faith to do it.” And my heart goes BLIP!

I should suffer this agent to take a gander at Grynowski v Silvia, (1994 Mass. App. Div 173) before she goes around making “good faith” claims upon which she cannot deliver.

To quote Grynowski as it applies to Consumer Protection Laws here in Massachusetts, 93A (Consumer Protection Law) “imposes responsibility for false statements made in good faith. The broker [sic] can obtain no refuge from liability because of the statement being made innocently on her part.”

This little “gang buster” is attempting to induce sellers to list with her by using a bold and audacious claim. What happens when she does not deliver (and she has NEVER sold anything in 1 day)? What ancillary damages did her irresponsible slogan precipitate? What damage was caused to that owner whose condo languished on market for 164 days? These are great questions, and fairly well cover fiduciary responsibility, ethics and just plain common sense and honesty.

I am confident that NO agent or broker in my organization, COLDWELL BANKER, would spew out such a quantifier and then smile off the failure with an “I tried”. I am relieved that she and I do not share the same logo on our business cards.

And one thing is clear: she may be trying to go gangbusters, but if she keeps this chicanery up, she’s just going to get BUSTED.

Cutting the Numbers Down to Size 1st half year Belmont (MA)

As soon as all the brokers come back from vacation, there will be heard out of them such a whoop and holler in Belmont over the super duper sales numbers for the first half of 2011. According to MLS, the average price of a single family home that sold in the first half of 2011 ROSE about $130,000 over the $735,883 set in 2010 (for the same period). That ought to pay for a few “Cape Codders” on a Thursday night!…but hold it right there…

Those numbers, “ya see” were propelled through the roof by 4 sales of homes that clocked out at over $2 Million each – 2 of them for WELL over 2 Mil. In 2010, one home went for the milestone, barely reaching the bar and selling out at $2,001,000. Pull out those sales, and you have a very different story.

Looking at the mainstay of real estate, the 3 Bedroom home, we can get a clearer picture: in 2010, the average a sales price for 3 BR spreads was $658,110; in 2011, the average was $657,328 – down a tad and a different story from what the tabloids will tell you.

Aberration you say, perhaps (not!).

Looking at condos we see an even bigger spread. Average price for all condos ROSE from $469k in 2010 to $541k in 2011 (wow). Yet the skewers were there too, all over the new Cottage Area, where condos were selling to the Mitt Romneys of the world for $850k, $950k, even over 1 Million a pop.

Looking at the Belmont bread and butter condo – the 2 bedroom in a converted 2/3 family home, we hear a different tome: average price in the first 6 months 2010?…$326k; in 2011 it was down to $307k.

Not at all encouraging in view of the fact the 3BR single and the 2BR condo are the bastions of the first time buyer, and a first time buyer market is needed to propel a second time buyer market and the third time and so on. This may all trickle UP…and if it does, agents will be heading to the beer halls and bar rooms with a different reason for drinking.

Similar Sales are Somerville's Sales (MA) RE 1st half 2011

What we are trying to say with the tongue twister up top is that Somerville’s sales for the first half of 2011 exhibited a remarkable similarity to the same period in 2010. Starting with multi family properties, we count (according to MLS), 75 transactions in 2011. In 2010?…we count 75 transactions. Average days on market? 83 days…80 days for 2010. We may well speculate that the extra three days on market was the extra effort put out by our friendly real estate agents going the extra mile for their listing clients and negotiating ‘round the clock Friday through Sunday to get the average price up….(hey…stop laughing). At any rate, average price WAS up from a bit below $496k in 2010 to a whopping $531k in aught 11.

Singles? The 28 singles that sold did so in 71 days and allowed owners to cash out at an average of $457k. In 2010, the average was a tad over $453k. In the efforts of full disclosure, we should note that 39 homes cut the deed in the first six months of 2010.

Condos? well ever an interesting game. The similarity falls off in unit sales (157 for 2011 versus 211 for 2010), but that is offset by significantly higher prices -- $392k for 2011 up from 2010’s 369k. Average days on market grew from 78 to 88 (hard negotiating again?). Ya just can’t put a bead on condos – just like last year and the year before: maybe that is the best similarity of all.

No Big Splash for Watertown Real Estate Sales so far in 2011

Watertown buyers haven’t exactly made a big splash in real estate so far this year, but they haven’t exactly jumped a sinking ship either. Total numbers of units sold for the first 6months of 2011 were down compared to the same period in 2010, 159 for 2011 versus 174 for ’10, but the blame for the drop rests with the Condo “fleet”. In 2010, 114 new condo owners set sail on the rocky waves of ownership: in 2011, a mere 89 have tested the waters. Average price? Down in the shallows --- 4 grand less than 2010.

Single family sales were up in units sold and price. (42 for 2011, 33 in 2010; $475k vs. $472k on the average price front). And Multis?…up by one unit over 2010 to 28. Average price was up to $506k, an increase of $16,000 over 2010. The only problem with the Multi sales was that agents had to tread water for an average of 99 days before bringing the deal to safe harbor. It took a mere 30 days to do it in 2010.

There might be some smooth if not spectacular sailing ahead. Not much direction here, but if something need be taken away how about conjuring an image of the annoying agents who block the hydrant with her BMW NOSE DEEP TREADING WATER IN THE SALTY BRINE FOR 99 DAYS…works for me!