What’s the Best Way to Make Sure Your Listing Is Seen?

Our team uses a variety of aggressive marketing strategies to ensure our clients find buyers. Here are just a few of them.

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Today, let’s talk about how to aggressively market your home.

First, why is it important to be aggressive when it comes to marketing your home? Most homes that sell for high prices typically sell in the first 30 days, so it’s very important that you market the property to increase the amount of traffic onto your property within that time in order to bolster your chance of getting the highest price.

The more homebuyers who come to look at your home, the better your chances are of getting a good offer quickly, meaning more money for you.

Here are some tips and tricks we at the Michael Kaim Team use to promote properties:

1. Internet. Today, 90% of all buyers start their search online before even getting out to look at properties. Make sure that your home is exposed on all the major sites as a featured listing. Getting featured-listing status is easy with our team because we sign up as a Zillow premier agent, and our listings stick out like a sore thumb. Websites like Zillow, Trulia, Homes.com, and Realtor.com are our top four sites that will expose your home right at the beginning of your listing period.

2. Professional photography. When you list the property for sale, you’ll want to make sure that the house is staged properly so that it looks great in photographs, which also ties back into maintaining a strong online presence.

3. Direct mailing and print advertisements. We have ads in every major news publication, so we’ll capture all the buyers who don’t search online. Additionally, we send out “just-listed” postcards to your area, which would tell your neighbors that the house is for sale. We can also post signs in your front yard to alert passers-by.

4. Email blasts. We can send out emails to not only the top producers in the industry, but also to our database of 20,000 buyers and sellers that we have registered on our site.

Between all of these marketing tools, we’re sure to find you prospective buyers. If you have any questions, you can always reach me by phone or email. Make it a great day!

How to Handle Early Offers

If you receive multiple offers on your listing right after it goes on the market, don’t panic. Here are three key tips on how to handle this type of situation.

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What should you do if you get multiple offers within the first few days of listing your home on the market? There are three main points you should consider.

First of all, don’t panic. Don’t make a rash decision, and make sure you evaluate the terms of the offer. When making a decision like this, there are a few terms that you need to consider:

• The strength of the buyer. When you’re working with a buyer, make sure you look at the contract to see how strong their down payment will be. They’ll need to have a pre-approval letter, as well as passion for your house—you don’t want a buyer who will back out because they found something minor in the inspection. Don’t accept a “take it or leave it” offer.
• Look at the type of mortgage they’re getting. If they’re getting a government-backed loan such as an FHA, VA, or USDA loan, there’s a good chance they’re not as strong as a cash buyer because they have a financing contingency.
• What sort of contingencies are in the offer? Maybe they have a house to sell or they want to have you pay for certain inspections. If they have a house for sale, they’re not going to be as qualified as a buyer with a non-contingent offer because the contingent buyer will have to go through the same inspections and contingencies as you will with them.

Sometimes, the first or second offer that comes on the table is your best offer.

• Be aware of the closing costs. Closing costs are a consideration with more than half of the sales under $200,000. A lot of buyers are looking for seller closing cost assistance, and that will have an impact on your bottom line.
• What is the closing time frame? The closing dates are important. The house that you’re moving into will have a set closing date, so be sure to look at the closing time frame in terms of when your buyer can close on your house. You might want to have your kids in school within the next 45 days, so you have to negotiate those terms that make sense for you.
• Look at the possession period. Most people won’t be able to close on the other house they’re looking to buy until they have the funds from selling their current home. Give yourself three to four days after you close to move out.

Secondly, make sure to notify all of the Realtors of your multiple offer situation. Have your agent notify all other agents who have submitted an offer to put their highest and best offer on the table. Give them a deadline; the agents and the buyers will appreciate this. Thousands of dollars could be left on the table by not letting those buyers come up with a better offer.

Finally, don’t throw out potential offers. Sometimes, the first or second offer that comes on the table is your best offer. You don’t want to wait too long to accept one of those offers, in case you come back to them and find out those buyers have moved on

If you have any other questions, you can always reach out to us. Have a great day!

The IDEAL Way to Invest in Real Estate

The key to successful real estate investing is as simple as one word: IDEAL. Today, I’ll be explaining what IDEAL stands for, and how it can help you build wealth with real estate.

Looking to buy a Home in Northeast Ohio? Search all Northeast Ohio homes for sale. Selling Your Home in Northeast Ohio? Use our home evaluation tool.

Why does investing in real estate make sense in today’s market? First of all, I want you to know that I’ve been investing in real estate myself for the past 10 years. A decade ago, my father convinced me to get into the real estate investment game.

Way back then, he told me one word that has stuck with me ever since. This one word can basically describe all of the values involved in real estate investing. The word is “IDEAL.”

So, what does IDEAL stand for? Well, that’s exactly what I’ll be sharing with you today.

“I” stands for income. When investing in real estate, you can either make a single sum of income by selling, or you can rent out a property and earn continuously.

The second letter, “D,” stands for depreciation. But, what investment benefit could possibly be associated with depreciation? Actually, you can depreciate the value of the property by 5% a year as a tax write-off. If you have 20 investment properties that you paid $100,000 for, you could be saving thousands in taxes.

Next, “E” stands for equity. If you’re working with the right real estate agent when you buy these properties, you’re going to get great deals. You’ll likely be purchasing bank-owned properties, estate sales, short sales, and other inexpensive properties that will earn you a lot of equity.

By remembering this one simple word and taking it to heart, you can earn a lot of wealth from real estate.

The fourth letter is “A,” which stands for appreciation. In a good market like the one we’re seeing currently, you can expect a 3% to 5% appreciation rate each year. This means that the properties you’re purchasing now will be worth a lot more down the line. In 10 years, you’ll have a lot more equity because of this appreciation.

Finally, “L” stands for leverage. When you own a property, fixed it up, and are ready to rent it out, you can then go to the bank and request a cash-out refinance. Most of the time, the bank will then give you 70% or 75% loan-to-value, depending on the appraisal. If a property is worth $100,000, you could be earning $75,000 back. You can leverage these earnings back into more investments.

At the end of all of this, you’ll find you can achieve huge success. If you remember this one simple word and take it to heart, you can earn a lot of wealth from real estate.

If you have any other questions or would like more information, feel free to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.