Staging Your Home to Sell

• Freshen up the home by painting walls a light, neutral color, such as antique white. Lighter colors appeal to a wider range of buyers and make each room look larger.
• Take a close look at the floor coverings in each room. If you have hardwood floors under the carpet, you will always make money by removing it, even if the floor is not in perfect condition.
• Allow as much light as possible to enter the room. Open up or remove all draperies, blinds, shades or other window coverings.
• Removing the clutter of everyday life - all utilitarian items, stacks of paperwork, toiletries, kitchen utensils, electronic equipment and television sets.
• Remove furniture from each room that does not go with the decor, such as items that stand out too much and items that are worn or of an unappealing color.
• Place the remaining room furnishings in a way that makes best use of the character of the space. A room should be balanced so that people do not focus on one particular piece of furniture.
• Now that you've removed the clutter from your home, adding some nice but inexpensive accessories will greatly elevate the perceived value of the home.
• Clean, clean, clean. Every crevasse within the home should be spotless and gleaming. Even your normal weekly cleaning can not come close to the quality of clean you need.
• You can't over spend on fresh plants and orchids, elaborate floral arrangements and landscape plants. All these provide a strong addition to the ambience you want to create.

Real estate blogging has been a boon to consumers by describing the local housing markets in far greater detail than any news organization. The challenge in blogging has been in consistently maintaining market commentary with a journalistic discipline. I've been discussing the "breaking news" paradigm as the most time efficient way for blocs of agents, whether within a brokerage company or created via social networks, to maintain "ticker tape" market commentary to complement blogging. We're moving into the age of the "Real Time" Web.

The point is both blogging and micro-blogging have different communication purposes, but adds "dimension" to the writer:

• Blogging provides in-depth research, analysis and demonstrates domain expertise.
• Micro-blogging alerts and validates analysis, and demonstrates commitment to market commentary.
• Both enable conversations to happen.

Micro-blogging "breaking news" compels consumers ready to make a transaction compelled to "time" the transaction similar to how consumers watch Marketwatch.com to make stock buying decisions. No smart consumer is going to buy GM stock today without watching breaking news. Once the consumer is hooked on the breaking news, the consumer confirms their decision to "follow" the micro-blogger by examining their blog content for evidence of expertise. For real estate marketing, a micro-blogging and a blogging presence are very complementary to capture attention, and then validate expertise, respectively. All this consumer analysis is done without the bloggers' knowledge, making it even more important for the blogger/micro-blogger to focus on delivering useful content.

The Return of the Basement With lot sizes limited, builders are looking for space underground. Once a typical feature of homes in the Northeast, basements are rising in popularity nationally as a way to create extra space. New technologies in insulation and waterproofing are allowing builders to add basements in any climate. They can serve as game rooms for kids, home theaters, or just the "man-cave" for Dad. Builders are even creating underground garages for homes and townhouses to free up space for living areas above, notes Irvine (Calif.) architect Rick Emsick.

The Death of the Living Room The kitchen, living, and dining areas are continuing to merge into a great room or family room. In a 2007 study conducted by the National Association of Home Builders, half of those surveyed said they would do without a formal living room if it meant a larger family gathering space. In some cases this is a refection of the connection to the outdoors as well, as home buyers want fewer walls and unobstructed views out into the backyard, says Craig Delahooke, director of custom development for John Laing Luxury Homes.

The Home Office No longer just a spare bedroom, the home office is evolving into an entirely separate structure such as a casita in the backyard or even a separate wing near the garage. Having a separate entrance for the home office allows today's increasingly mobile workforce to receive work-related visitors or hire an assistant at home without having these people traipse through the main house.

Wireless, but not Cordless With wireless laptops allowing people to carry their computer to any room, that little computer nook that was popping up at the top of the stairs in many new homes is starting to disappear. Instead you're likely to see a charging station or "Mom's Desk," a little space, typically in the kitchen, where cell phones, laptops, and other devices can be charged.

The Soft Loft The industrial look with concrete floors and exposed brick is over. Thousands of these pseudo SoHos popped up even in cities such as Dallas and Houston that lacked an industrial past. Downtown lofts have seen some of the steepest price declines in this bust. "Architects love to show these wide-open floor plans, but the reality is people want some privacy," says Los Angeles architect Jonathan Watts. He says new condos are returning to more traditional floor plans. Lofts are adding hardwood floors, sliding doors, even wall-to-wall carpeting to warm them up.

Say Bye to Bling As befits this economy, homes are getting less ostentatious. That means less ornate wood, stone, and iron work. No more grand entrances with curved-marbled staircases. The stairs are shifting to the side of the home and back to their utilitarian purpose. Even fireplaces are flickering. Only 46% of all new homes came with one in 2007, according to the U.S. Census. That's down from 59% in 1996.

The Green Badge of Honor It almost goes without saying, but green continues to be in, despite the latest slide in gas prices. Even the giant New American Home promises to use "net-zero energy" thanks to devices such as solar panels and designs that let in natural light. Home buyers used to love wowing their friends with the size of their McMansions. Now, says Sean Degen, vice-president for architectural services at home building giant Pulte Homes, "you're going to see more people having a green badge of an honor."

Aging in Place Builders say it's rarely something they overtly try to sell, but consumers are responding to features such as wider doors that can accommodate a wheelchair or walker, master bedrooms on the first floor, and tasteful looking handrails in the shower—amenities that will help baby boomers stay in their homes as they grow old.

Mortgage Applications Steady in Latest Week

The number of mortgage applications filed last week was essentially unchanged from the week before – at least on a seasonally adjusted basis.

This week’s index stood at 1245.7, compared to 1245.4 the previous week, adjusted for the Christmas holiday. On an unadjusted basis, the index decreased 40 percent compared with the previous week and was up 155 percent compared with the same week a year ago.

The refinance shore of mortgage activity declined to 82.3 percent of total applications, down from 82.9 the previous week.

Mortgage rates declined slightly:

• 30-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 5.03 percent from 5.04 percent
• 15-year fixed-rate mortgages decreased to 4.79 percent from 4.91 percent
• One-year ARMs decreased to 6.15 percent from 6.36 percent

A buyers' market should be just that—a buyers' market. It's not a fence-sitting, waiting, loitering, delaying, dawdling, postponing, vacillating, hesitating, wavering, faltering, pausing, foot-shuffling market. It's a buyers' market. By its very name it means buyers should be doing one thing and one thing only—buying. So where are the buyers, and why aren't they buying?

The great irony of a buyers' market is that even though the opportunity to buy is high, buyer urgency tends to hit an all-time low. The media becomes the excited purveyor of negative news and uninformed advice, and buyers buy it all. Actually, it feels like the only thing they're buying. 

Their reluctance is ironic since not so long ago buyers were incredibly excited about buying—and it was a sellers' market. Prices were escalating and it was perhaps one of the most difficult times to buy value and yet people were buying like there was no tomorrow. Buyers were afraid of losing out by not buying, even though the advantage was all to the seller.

Now a shift has occurred. Fear is still in the driver's seat but the tables are turned—the fear of paying too much seems to stop most in their tracks and immobilizes them. When they should have been afraid of paying too much they weren't, and now that they shouldn't be afraid of paying too much they are. 

It's one of the great paradoxical moments of any market and the herd instinct at its most pure. Reluctance in the face of great opportunity becomes an agonizingly defining characteristic of a shift.

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