How We Helped Andy and His Wife Feel Comfortable Purchasing Their First House

“My wife and I’s experience working with Joe was top notch. Joe was very professional throughout our whole process and leading us as new home buyers, not really knowing what to expect, made the process really clear. He was always willing to connect with us. We would call him in the evenings and I always wondered if he got a day off. It seemed like he was always working so he was always really quick to respond, very thorough. He always made us feel welcome with asking questions and almost made us feel like family. He just got to know us as people and got to know what we were looking for. Great experience overall. We highly recommend Joe to anyone looking to buy a house or sell.”

Is Fall a Good Time to Sell Your Portland Home?

Don’t make the mistake of waiting until spring to put your home on the market. There are three main reasons why fall is the perfect time to sell your home.

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Fall is here and many home sellers are wondering if they should wait for spring to put their home on the market. There are three reasons why fall is actually the perfect time to sell your home:

1. You will face less competition from other homes on the market. Right now, there are only 1.9 months of inventory available on the market. That means if no new homes were listed on the market, we would be sold out in less than two months. That is way less inventory than we saw in the spring or summer but there are still a lot of buyers out there. Now more than ever, our market really needs inventory.

2. There are more motivated buyers in the fall. Right now, most buyers in the market want to get into their new homes before the holidays. There will still be a lot of people looking for homes in January or December, but fall buyers tend to want to close before the holidays.

3. Values continue to skyrocket. Home values have gone up 11% from $350,000 in 2015 to $390,000 in 2016, which is incredible for our marketplace.

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Our market needs new inventory now more than ever.

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If you have any questions about the fall market or about real estate in general, give me a call or send me an email. I would be happy to help you!

Why the Fall Is a Great Time to Buy a Home

If you’ve been waiting for the best time to purchase your next home, the time is now. Here are my top three reasons to buy your next home in the fall.

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If you’ve been looking to purchase your next home and are worried that you missed out on the summer season, I have great news for you: the fall is actually a great time to buy a home. Why is this? Here are my top three reasons:

1. There is less competition in the fall. Though many people are under the impression that the selling season ends around Thanksgiving and doesn’t start back up again until the following spring, in the last three or four years, we’ve found that the market is less affected by seasonality every single year. This means that there are fewer buyers on the market to compete against, so it's less likely that you will end up in multiple offer situations.
2. Quicker and smoother closing transactions. Because of the reduced inventory, inspectors and appraisers are more available. During the spring or summer, it can take between 45 and 60 days to get a property closed in escrow; during the fall, it’s possible to close in 45 days or less.
3. Interest rates are still low. Conventional and FHA financing rates are running between high 3% to low 4% right now, which is outstanding. Remember, just a 1% bump in interest rates can make a big difference in terms of your buying power.

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You can close on a property in less than 45 days during the fall.

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These three factors together make fall a great time to purchase your next house, so be sure to speak with your local real estate agent soon. If you have any other questions about buying or selling real estate in the Portland area, give me a call or send me an email. I’d be happy to help you!

Neighborhood Spotlight: Modern Villages in Hillsborough

Today I wanted to shine a light on the Platform District and Orenco Station in Hillsborough.

Both have become wildly popular destinations for home buyers looking to find a connection point where high-tech meets rapid transit, home-grown shops, restaurants, and neighborhood pubs. It’s a truly walkable village with tons of retail gems, including markets, wine, restaurants, bars, and a bakery, just to name a few.

The Urban Plaza is a half-acre area modeled off of traditional town squares, and they host outdoor movie nights in the summer and a skating rink in the winter. The Platform District and Orenco Station were designed to bring a Central Park-like quality to the city, and there are multiple parks with areas for outdoor ping pong tables, bocce ball courts, and pet parks.

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It’s a truly a walkable village with shops, restaurants, markets, and pubs.

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Real estate appreciation has seen a rise of 15% to 20% over the last couple of years; condos and townhouses start just below $200,000 and can get up above $500,000 for some of the brownstones. Single-family homes are relatively new at about 10 to 12 years old, and start in the mid $300,000 range and can get up to about the $500,000 mark.

With lots of sustainable job growth anchored by great companies, the neighborhood looks to be a hot location for years to come in Portland. If you have any more questions about these wonderful neighborhoods or you’re interested in a free real estate consultation, give me a call or send me an email today. I’d love to speak with you!

The Problem With Zillow in Portland

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A Zestimate is Zillow’s algorithm for determining home values. Since Zillow gets its information from public and user data to figure out home value, how accurate are those Zestimates? What happens if your Zestimate is too low or too high?

Zillow does not do actual home value appraisals, and yet they give themselves 4/4 stars for accuracy in the Portland area. If you look closer, you will see that Zillow data reports that only 43% of the time, the Zestimate is within 5% of the home’s real value. In Portland, the average sale price is $400,000. That means your Zestimate is probably $20,000 too high or too low, and 57% of the time, the Zestimate will be more than $20,000 off!

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The real value of your home is set by buyers in the marketplace.

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So what’s the bottom line for you? Don’t get too upset if your Zestimate is much lower than you thought, and don’t get excited if it’s higher than you expected. The real value of your home is set by what buyers are paying in the marketplace.

To find the true value of your home, you need to see what buyers are paying for similar homes on the market. A real estate professional can help you figure that out. If you have any questions about your home’s value, just give us a call or send us an email. We would be happy to help you!

A Portland Market Unlike Anything from This Decade

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The Portland marketplace has some very hot spots, and it's leading to a market unlike anything we've seen this decade.

New listings to the market are actually down 2% year-to-date right now, and closed sales are up 7%. The average sale price of a home is up 12% from $336,000 to $376,000 here in the marketplace. What does this all mean? We have less inventory, and we have more people buying in the marketplace. Home are flying off the market much faster than they were before; market time is down 30%.

Some areas are feeling crunched right now with values shooting up along with less and less inventory. North Portland is down 14% in new sales and up 15% in average sale price. Southwest Portland looks similar with sales down 16% and sale price up 9%.

Oregon City and Canby are two hot areas right now, up 20% in sales and up 14% in average sales price. Other surrounding areas have seen an 11% increase in value right now, and they're really strong. We're struggling still with inventory sitting at only 1.4 months, and that's not very healthy. We're looking to be more like 6-8 months for a balanced market.

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It's a really interesting marketplace right now, nothing like we've seen in the last 10 or 12 years.

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It's a really interesting marketplace right now, nothing like we've seen in the last 10 or 12 years. If you're thinking about selling, you need to have someone working for you who understands the nuances of this market. If you're thinking about buying, you really need to have a strategy put together and you need to be very aggressive with offers - especially below $400,000.

We appreciate you tuning in today. If you have any further questions, please feel free to reach out with an email or phone call.

How Is Marketing Going to Sell Your Home in a Hot Market?

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When the market is hot like it is in Portland right now, the marketing that’s done to get your home sold is extremely important. There’s a common misconception about marketing in a hot market where people think they can just get away with listing a home on the MLS or putting a sign out in the yard and buyers will come flocking. That’s not necessarily true.

Great marketing is the thing that gets your home sold quickest, and for the highest dollar amount. To have this type of marketing, you need to be able to get your home in front of as many people as possible. That’s the difference between being lucky and having a plan for success.

The real estate market has changed a lot over the years. It used to be just local, or regional. Now, real estate is local, regional, national, and international due to the rise of the internet, and the fact that 98% of home buyers begin their searches there. Portland has become not only a national, but international destination, and your marketing needs to reach out to those people all across the world.

Brand advertising and property marketing are both important, but there is a distinction. Powerful marketing is not just directed towards the property, it’s also advertising that directs to your property and the brand marketing itself. Brand marketing creates impressions with buyers and the more impressions you have, the more exposure you have, and the more buyers you have. That’s what we want.

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Portland has become an international destination.

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If you have any questions for us about this topic or anything else real estate-related, give us a call or send us an email. We’d love to hear from you!

What’s Happening with the Portland Real Estate Market?

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Today, we’re going to talk about the Portland metro real estate market after the first quarter of 2016.

The average price in our area is $360,000. Over the past few months we’ve seen an appreciation rate of 7%, which is extremely healthy. Those 10% and 15% appreciation rates are unsustainable in any market, so 7% is good news.

On the other hand, inventory is an issue for us right now. We have two months of inventory, which is not healthy at all. We need about 3 to 5 months of inventory at least for a more balanced market. What does this mean to you?

First of all, if you’re thinking of buying a home, make sure you get pre-approved right away. Know what you’re looking for, and know what areas you want to live in. Don’t get discouraged if you don’t get the first home you make an offer on. The property you are looking for will come up soon.
 

If you’re selling, you definitely have a good opportunity to sell. However, just because this is a seller’s market doesn’t mean you can go crazy and overprice your home. Your home still needs to be in great condition, you need to price it accurately, and you need a strategic marketing plan.

Finally, whether you’re buying or selling, work with a trusted real estate professional and a mortgage professional. There are many nuances in this market and you need a professional to keep track of everything that’s going on.

If you have any questions, give us a call or send us an email. We would be happy to help you!

All You Need to Know About Investing in Portland Real Estate

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Today, Todd Gydesen of Guild Mortgage joins us to share a few tips for those who are looking to purchase their first investment property.

The minimum down payment required by Fannie Mae on an investment property is 15%. The problem with that is the difficulty of obtaining the mortgage insurance needed to make that happen. The standard down payment, then, is 20% down. If you put 25% down, that extra 5% down will improve your interest rate by almost half a point due to the Fannie Mae adjustments for risk level. In the long run, that lower interest rate will make a huge difference with what you’re trying to do!

Once you have the down payment ready, you need to prepare your reserves. Essentially, your reserve is the amount of money you have left in your possession after the transaction is closed. Fannie Mae simply wants you to have a certain number of monthly payments for all the properties you have financed. 

In most cases, you can use rental income to qualify for this sale. When you’re buying an investment property that already has a tenant in it, that’s the easiest way to go. You can use 75% of what the monthly rent is to count against the new monthly payment. If the home is empty, all you need to get is a lease agreement and a deposit check that’s cleared your account. This is a great way to buy an investment property without having to qualify for all of the payments!

If you would like to reach Todd directly to discuss your options, give him a call at (503) 312-4686 or visit him at www.GuildMortgage.com! If you would like assistance finding a great investment property, or if you have real estate questions of any kind, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at any time! We would love to hear from you!

How We Helped Patrick With Our Knowledge of Real Estate

"Joe Reitzug has always been my go to guy. He is by far the most knowledgeable real estate resource that I have ever came across. It has been invaluable working with him, bouncing ideas off of him, and getting a real sense of what the market structure is like in our area. I couldn’t speak highly enough about Joe. He definitely is the man in this area."

How We Helped Ted Find His Perfect Home

"My family and I went to Joe Reitzug to find a home. I asked him if he might be able to help us out and not only did he help us out, he went out of his way to make sure to listen to everything that we wanted and he went out and found a place that was perfect for us! It has been a great thing ever since. Anything that we needed he went above and beyond. My expectations were constantly being met."

How Can You Finance Two Homes at a Time?

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Today we have some advice for you about how to finance another home while selling your own. To help me explain this, I have Todd Gydesen with Guild Mortgage.

So, how do you finance a home while selling your own? You need to get creative with a down payment because usually the funds from the sale of your home would be used for this. You can borrow against a 401K or perhaps you could liquidate some other assets.

Your debt-to-income ratio will be affected because you need to qualify to pay off both of your monthly mortgages. This can get tricky and it will put people out of their comfort zone, but that doesn’t mean that it’s impossible.

Recasting the loan is something else we need to explain. This is where you buy a home without selling your first home, and then you sell it and have all this equity that you did not use to purchase the second home. We can take that money and apply it to the principal of your second home, and this will also lower your monthly payments! You need to check if your lender will allow this, but it’s totally feasible.

If you have more questions about this, please don’t hesitate to contact me!

How We Went Above and Beyond for Todd

“Outstanding results. Very service oriented and very savvy in the market, in other words he was able to move our home quickly, get us taken care of, get us the new house found very quickly. It was just a seamless transaction. Everything went smoothly and it always felt like he was doing above and beyond every time.”

Trying to Buy and Sell in Portland?

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Real estate transactions can turn dicey quickly when you’re trying to buy and sell a home simultaneously. However, you do have some options and this is something that we do for clients fairly often.

Your first strategy is making a contingent offer on a home that you want and then selling your home. The only thing wrong with this is that sellers will probably not take a contingent offer. Our market is simply too hot for this strategy right now, but it could work on homes that have gone stale.

Your second option is to get your home market-ready and then hopefully get it sold in a week or two. At this point you can go in and make an offer on a home you like, and you don’t have to put in a contingency. You do run the risk of having to find temporary housing, but it will be a better option right now with our current market climate. 

A lot of people don’t understand that they can go out and make an offer on a home and then begin to sell their own home. This takes some planning, but it’s entirely possible. You can take the time to find the property you want, and it will not be contingent. This may take more time to get your finances in order, but this is probably your best option if you can afford it.

If you need help buying or selling in Portland, please don’t hesitate to contact me!

How to Get Your Portland Home Ready for the Market

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Today, we want to share some strategies to help you get your home looking its best when you go to sell this spring.

One of the easiest things you can do is take a look at all the major systems in your home to see how long ago they were installed. The National Association of Home Builders has a measurement that tells homeowners how long these systems should be good for in your house. Here's a list of a few of the biggest items and how long they typically last:

- Wood shingle and shake roofs: 20-30 years.
- Central heating and air: 15 years.
- Water heaters: 12-15 years.
- Gutters: 30 years (checked periodically!). 

After taking a look at these items, take a walkthrough of your home as if you were a buyer. Look for discoloration in your hardwoods and bumps in your floor. Walk around, look at the floors, walls, and ceilings, and try to identify water damage. Often, you can see these things with the naked eye, which will allow you to get them fixed before a buyer spots them.

Lastly, if you want to be 100% sure your home is ready for the market, bring in a professional home inspector before listing. They offer a pre-listing home inspection, which costs about half as much as a regular inspection. They'll look over all the major systems and give you a great report!

If you would like more insights into how to get your home ready for the spring market, please don't hesitate to reach out to us. We would love to help you get your home ready to sell quickly and for top dollar! We look forward to talking soon!