Find an Agent You Trust

July 30, 2010Find an agent that you are comfortable sharing the information that will make your house-hunting more fruitful. Also, find an agent whose experience you respect and trust. Without trust, you will not get the most out of working with an agent. Throughout the home buying process, you will be sharing personal information. At the bare minimum, you will need to be honest about your finances...

Understand Your Home Buying Motives to Develop the Best Search Strategy

July 28, 2010There are many different reasons to purchase a home, and the story behind your purchase defines your future home better than how many bathrooms and bedrooms you want. Each motive will require a different home search strategy. For example, a first time home owner is likely to be in a different situation than someone shopping for a ski in ski out condo in Breckenridge, each will require a different...

Can You Save Money By Not Using A Real Estate Agent?

July 27, 2010For some, convenience, advice, and peace of mind that a professional will correctly finish the job is more important than saving money. Others will go with the cheapest option, no matter what will be sacrificed. Whether you value time, money, convenience, or experience, you will be best suited by working with an agent. For me, I take this type of question very seriously. I do not carelessly...

Buyers Beware of the Home Stager

July 23, 2010I was reading today about a favorite trick of real estate agents, "home staging." In case you are not familiar with the concept, the idea is to make the house more appealing to buyers by preparing a home for viewing. For example, sometimes having a million dusty nick nacks all over the place can detract from the beauty of the home, and reduce its appeal to buyers. The home stager is advertising...

3 Ways to Interview Your Buyer Agent

July 22, 2010Choosing your buyer’s agent is like hiring someone to work for you. You have several opportunities to determine whether the agent is a good fit before you sign your buyer agency agreement. Take advantage of these interview opportunities. There is a great list of questions to ask your agent before working with them. In addition to these questions, here are a few other “tests.” 1) How...

How to Choose a Buyers Agent

July 21, 2010Buying a home is probably the biggest investment I’ll ever make, and that’s true for most people. This is not something to take lightly. I hate to say it, but I will- there are some bad agents out there. Agents with good intentions and little experience, agents with bad intentions and lots of experience, and probably even some agents with bad intentions and no experience. But,...

The Home Search: Experience vs. Online Tools

July 18, 2010I was just sitting down to write about why online home searches can give an incomplete picture. Since I haven’t been home searching in a while, I went back to my old friend Zillow to look at the home we almost purchased. One feature I really loved on Zillow is that it gives the transaction history from public record, so you can see how much the current owners bought it for, etc. This...

Author: kcadmin