SUPER BOWL AND REAL ESTATE?
February 9th, 2010 categories: Buying, Market Trends, Selling
It would seem there is no connection whatsoever–NOT! The weeks after the big game have traditionally been the beginning of Spring Market–at least in Chicago. Actually this year activity seemed to begin before the game. Things have ground to a halt today because we are in the process of getting up to a foot of snow. My office is tucked away in a corner of our big office and doesn’t have a window–usually I wish it did and today I don’t miss it. Snow has been falling steadily all day and at some times has been blowing horizontally past our windows. When I do stick my head out, I wish I hadn’t. Enough of my whining and whimpering about the weather–I choose to live in Chicago because I love the city and the weather comes with.
The tax credits may have helped put a bit of pressure on the buyers and sellers to buy or sell earlier than in other years. Don’t let that pressure fool you into making an inappropriate choice for your agent. Remember you are hiring someone to help you buy or sell your biggest asset. A personal interview is the best idea–for either a buying agent or selling agent. Make a list of questions to ask the agent. And for goodness sakes, don’t hire a Realtor just because Aunt Hattie’s best friend’s niece is one. Ask your friends for their recommendations, and don’t hire a person just because of that recommendation either. You need an agent whose business acumen and whose personality make you reel like you could work well with them.
Here are some of the questions that you might consider asking an agent:
- How long have you been a Realtor?
- How many listings or sales have you had in the area or building (for condos
- What is your knowledge of the market area–a 10 year veteran of sales in Glen Ellyn is not going to bring much knowledge to Streeterville .
- How many listings do you typically carry and how many of your listings sold last year, what percentage of list price did they sell for, and how many days on market for those listings? Keep in mind that 2009 was a bottom of the market year.
- How many buyers do you typically work with?
- How do you keep your clients aware of what is going on in the market? E-mail, phone?
- Fees have to be discussed with a listing agent–what do you get for your money?
A sure kiss of death should be an agent who doesn’t return calls promptly–even after you have hired them, remember you can fire them by canceling the contract. References–ask for them but don’t expect anything but positive thoughts–who would give you the name of someone who would say bad things? You wouldn’t want to work with an agent with that small an intellect, now would you?
These thoughts are a rehash of ideas we have talked about before–a bit of a reprise never hurts–freshens up our minds.
Here are three articles that might be of interest to you:
Commute Time and Cost–is it Worth it?
This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 9th, 2010 at 2:17 pm and is filed under Buying, Market Trends, Selling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
