Market Overview

This conversation spans topics that include the recent National Association of Realtors settlement and the impact it will really have on the real estate industry, what buyers and sellers can expect from the market this spring, interest rates now and later this year, and more.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
You are listening to the Remax realEstate Insights Show, where you get real
talk by real agents, brought toyou by Remas of Southeastern Michigan. Hello
and welcome to the Remax real EstateInsights Podcast. We're happy that you're joining
us today. I'm your host,Janette Schneider, happened to be the president
of Remas of Southeastern Michigan. Withme today is Paul Brock from Remax Classic.

(00:24):
Paul is a frequent guest on theshow, and boy, did the
timing and the stars aligned for thistopic to have him in today. We're
going to talk about the spring market. That was the original plan, and
we'll get to it. Did somethingchange in the last couple of days.
In the last couple of days,we're going to take the scenic rout to
get there because, as you mayhave heard, unless you're living under a
rock, there was a substantial settlementthat the National Association of Realtors entered into

(00:49):
on Friday. We're recording this ona Monday, so this is kind of
fresh news and we're going to diveinto that a little bit before we get
to you know, kind of localmarket conditions and stuff like that. It's
a lot on everybody's mind. SoPaul, let's start with your thoughts.
So you probably got an email lettingyou know that this settlement came down.
What was your initial reaction. Iwas I'm still shocked over it. It's

(01:11):
really a misrepresentation of which will behappening in the real estate market, and
it's creating a lot of confusion,not only for agents, but for the
buyers and sellers in general. Ihad a listing appointment this morning and twenty
minutes talking about what's going to change, and I'm like, nothing, Nothing
really changes in this except for inJuly. We as realtors can't disclose how

(01:34):
much we're paying the buyer's agent.They will find out when they ask,
right, because we can't disclose iton the MLS. That's the only change,
boy, which I mean in yoursitting here by you think, well,
that sounds pretty simple, but that'snot how it's being portrayed. Whether
wherever you get your news, whetheryou're streaming it, watching it, scrolling

(01:56):
through, it doesn't really matter.The headlines have been very catchy. What
I've realized in the last few yearsis news is opinion. You have a
news story and then you have let'ssay a headline, then you have their
opinion of the headline dictating the message, and so it is interesting. I
never really realized that until recently.You know, you get into politics and

(02:19):
you see a lot of that,but this is really misinformation at its peak.
I think they want to do isthey want to sensationalize a story.
It changes very little for realtors andso on. But I think what emphasizes
is this, we are in thecommunication business. We communicate to sellers and
to buyers what the market looks like, what the landscape looks like, and

(02:40):
how to go ahead purchasing a property, and how you can see things before
the inspection happens. We kind ofour job is to communicate facts to people
and then let the market kind ofdetermine where those facts may go. So,
for example, using round numbers,you're going to sell your house,
I'm going to say it's worth fivehundred thousand. A buyer agent does their
job, I think it's four seventyfive. Their offer comes in, we

(03:01):
counter the offer, and all ofa sudden we meet somewhere in the middle.
In theory, that's why the springmarket situation is so interesting, because
that would be how it used tobe spring markets. But these two entities
they work together. We work withthe agents to kind of get information back
and forth, and then we aslisting agents or buying agents relate the story

(03:24):
of the seller or the buyer backto the individual parties. So we're determining
what the market looks like, determiningthe seller's and buyer's motivation and what their
abilities to purchase will be. Andare we get that via a buyer approval
from the bank, mortgage approved fromthe bank, and inspector will dictate something

(03:44):
with that as well. And wekind of all work together in getting things
done. But I may not worktogether if I'm working for a seller,
I may be working against the otheragent but still communicating. So here's where
a value is. It used tobe sealer pay the full freight, which
is typical. You know, wehave a long time ago when you had
a fiduciary responsibility to the seller asa buyer. It kind of was a

(04:09):
buyer's get screwed here because of theagents got paid via the listing the seller.
And now we disclose who we're workingfor upfront, and that tells what
the seller still pays. What youcan do. Now, if you and
I go into a contract together,a genet and I go into contact together,
and you're going to hire me asyour buyer agent, I can set

(04:30):
up Payjenette. You're not going towork for X percent. We dictate that
up front. The seller chooses topay it in the contract, and that's
great. You don't have to payme anything extra. The challenge could be
is that there's multiple offers and we'renot ahead, and you're now abligated to
pay a buyer agent and you don'thave the resources to do that. Let's

(04:53):
say you wanted This is where itreally hurts the people. I hope you
can follow this on the radio.There's not there's not a let's say,
yeah, let's say you're offering fivehundred. You can't afford to pay a
buyer agent because you don't have theability, you don't have the resources to
do so, and you put itback on the seller to pay the buyer
agent. Here's where it hurts.The buyer agent can afford it, maybe

(05:13):
they're a buyer can that that buyercan then the seller cannet more money from
that other buyer agent. So whodoes it hurt? First time buyers?
First time buyers and experienced agents.So you're going to find that it's a
really a negative thing for people whodon't have a lot of resources, who
are entry level buyers, first timebuyers especially, and it's another kind of

(05:36):
weight on them to get a legup into buying a house where there is
money to be made. I saythis a lot. You make your money
in buying and selling. You makeyour money in your job. You make
your wealth in owning things like realestate, not stuff of that nature.
And real estate has been very,very good over the last few years,
very very lucrative as an investment.It has been you know, you go

(05:59):
from this three percent interest rate toseven percent interest rate and you think,
oh my gosh, the real estatemark is going to fall apart. But
we have a few things going on, especially if you're in Nova or Farmington
Hills or Northville and so on Troy. You have a lot of Asian and
Indian buyers, people coming in thecountry legally to do these jobs, it
jobs, doctors and so on,because there's not enough Americans to do these

(06:21):
jobs. So they're finding resource,they're finding these people coming in. So
we have that whole new thing comingin the whole new entity coming in Nova
is like seventy five percent Asian Indianfamilies in Nova, which is a great
thing. I love it. Ilive in Nova, our kids go to
school in Nova. Everyone's smarter,right, they define all the teneticoats right,

(06:44):
and this is a great thing forus. What's what's also a challenge
is we have how depending on howyou look at the news, seven eight
million people coming in the country legallyillegal how every want to call it,
But they're coming in the country andthey have to have they have to live
somewhere. It's simple. They can'tlive in tent cities forever. So we
have this issue where builders can't buildhouses fast enough. There isn't enough land

(07:06):
in the name plate areas to buildnew subdivisions. What used to take six
months to build takes a year anda half to build. And now you
had this really interesting dynamic where peopledon't want to sell their houses. They
don't want to leave three percent togo to seven. If they go out
of state, they're going out ofstate at three percent, renting their house
and buying somewhere else. So manyAmericans have multiple houses because of that three

(07:31):
percent interest rate. Those who neededto move have done so and left the
three percent behind, left the threepercent in the house there. But I
want I want to get too faroff topic. I think I think it's
one thing kind of just genuinely leadsto another. There is a snowball of
challenges coming in to people who wantto buy a house. And the one
thing that I think that I've beenreally concerned about since the announcement, you

(07:54):
know, of the National Association ofRealtors in the settlement, because it's a
it's a big number, and that'sgetting a lot of play, and a
lot of the headlines that I've reador heard have something to do with you
know, they're making a line thatI don't think exists. They're taking the
settlement and they're saying home prices aregoing to go down. And I have
heard that multiple times. And thepeople at the gym are probably going to

(08:16):
get sick of me because I keepsaying, no, it's not you and
I have been doing this for afew years to two years, and we've
been talking, but we've been talkingabout a worthy bubble happening. It's going
to explode now. There are somepockets that are having a challenge, like
for example, if you're in SouthFlorida right now, you have the Florida
market was mostly people up north buyinga property down there to rent out and

(08:37):
ultimately go visit down there, andthey would have multiple properties down there to
rent out. Well, since Disney'shaving some issues, people aren't visiting Disney
as much and the rental market iskind of falling apart there. So the
average person buying a house, thechallenges is there's not enough houses for the
average buyer. I think I readthat there were five years of building to

(09:00):
absorb the number of buyers who wantto buy a house, which is incredible.
It is incredible. And that's andthat's where when I see this misinformation
coming where there's starting to you know, there's you know, laying an expectation
that because of some lawsuit that wasfouled in Missouri that we can get into
you know, all the ways thatI think this is silly, but they're

(09:20):
leading consumers to believe home prices thatare coming down. And I just feel
that that is negligent reporting because that'snot going to happen because the housing industry
and the price of a home hasfar more to do with good old economics
todd demand and there's not enough supplyto meet the demand, and you just
laid out and then demand honestly keepsgrowing. It is, it's growing,

(09:41):
it's not shrinking because the interest ratesmost people have come to Most buyers at
this point have come to term,we're in the sixes ye, and will
be that way. We're going tobe that way. People like people said,
oh, I want to wait togo back down to three again.
It will never in our lifetime godown to three again unless the world is
falling apart and they need to restartthe economy. Here's the news. The
economy is so good that they willnot have any reason to drop rates to

(10:07):
incentivize people to buy things. Youhave major stock gains recently, which has
put people put money in people's pockets, who then therefore do something with brick
and mortar. Typically, right,you make money on paper, you want
to put it into a car,or a house, or a college education,

(10:28):
something more tangible. So you takethese gains and allocate them over here.
What I'm seeing a lot of too, as we get older, us
baby boomers get a little older,we're helping our children begin to finance their
houses again. This is such ahave and have not story. Those who
have money help their children buy ahouse. Those who grew up poor.

(10:50):
I grew up very poor when Igrew up. We didn't have the resource
to be able to do that.And if you grew up in your in
a situation where you don't have alot of resources, all of these headwinds
are now against you. Lack ofhousing. Redford is two hundred thousand to
buy in Redford, three hundred thousandand four hundred thousand to buy in Lavonia,
two hundred and twenty thousand of buyin Garden City and in Westland.
You're like, well, when didthis happen? Yeah? What happened?

(11:13):
When you know you're your person,that McDonald's is making sixteen dollars an hour.
It just there's so many dominoes atfall that create this challenge that we
have right now, and that isthe the the increase of value in things.
It could be a guitar, itcould be a house, it could
be a car. They all haveinflated value now because inflation is where it

(11:37):
is right. There's something again,when I talk to people about buying or
selling the onion, you start peelingthe onion, and you get to the
core of what is really going onhere, and it starts with gas price.
They're going back to four bucks again. Soon they're already in the threes,
right yep. And therefore food pricethey're gonna go up, and therefore,
you know, people are gonna needto make more money. At people
in California saying I want to maketwenty five to thirty fifty dollars an hour,

(11:58):
You're like, we're a stop.Yeah, right, So I don't
think it stops anytime soon. Andthe builders, it's three times. Here's
a challenge, real quick changing topics. Again. Builders can't build houses fast
enough because it takes three times theresources to develop the land that was just
developed before COVID. So instead ofpaying one hundred thousand to develop anybody,

(12:20):
I pay three hundred thousand developmlant.And then you have to find labor to
build the houses and right, andyou have these resources to come in off
the boats to come in to youknow, put the house together. You
know, you have lumber, youhave you know, oh my gosh,
steel pipe, all that stuff tobuild a house. Got to bring it
all in and so it is athe supply chain is still a challenge for

(12:43):
them. So you have you haveall these headwinds to build a house and
the market a house, and tobuy a house. Then you have this
issue that popped up a couple ofdays ago. Wait, how do I
buy a house again? Who doI pay? How do I pay?
And if I get I pay you? Then how does it affect me to
how's it affect my down payment tobuy the house? And it is becoming
a a bigger mess. And thenthey added a complication that, in my

(13:03):
opinion, didn't need to be fixed. Commission was always negotiable. I mean,
they're trying to fix something that Idon't think was broke to be to
begin with. I think it wasalways not that I'm disagreeing, it was
always known regularly. It's typically threepercent, typically yeah, three percent to
the listing agent, three percent tothe buyer agent. And if we sell
it ourselves, sometimes we cut abrake. And there are there are ways

(13:24):
to finagle around this. The airchallenge for agents, specifically buyer agents,
because most agents in here that youheard of, our top agents are mostly
listing agents who work with some buyers. But if you're a young agent getting
started out and you have only buyersto work with. I mean you're facing
an uphill battle, which is common. I mean when you're first starting,

(13:45):
Yeah, first starting for sure,and even those who are I mean a
couple of years ago, I soldone hundred and forty four houses. Now
I'm selling seventy five eighty houses.Because the here's the other challenge, or
that challenge to me, is thatthe inventories are down that much. Yeah,
because it's not like you do sidedyou're taking half of the year off.
My wife's like, what are youdoing around the house. You've been
here now, yeah all the weekstreights you have any houses to show exactly,

(14:11):
but no. But we're seeing thatuniversally. You're right. I mean
I see it from you know,from the jeer iscident. When I'm looking
at statistics, you know, onbehalf of southeastern Michigan, and I recognize
a lot of the names that havebeen in our system for a long time,
and I look at it and said, you're all still really productive.
You're just the inventory is just notthere to put up the same. It's
relative productivity I learned. I'm learningmy ego has gotten to a point now
where I'm learning that it's a relativeright. If there's forty percent less houses

(14:35):
to sell year over year, likein twenty nineteen, I was looking at
my numbers, then the twenty twentythree, and I'm like, wow,
wow, how did that go fromthat? It's just because there's not enough
opportunity, And then they're The veryinteresting thing is people who have investment properties.
You know, when do you cashin? I mean, do I
want to cash in now? Andrents are really high and values are really

(14:56):
high? Maybe? But why notif I I have a three percent mortgage
and I'm making good money on thatmortgage, It's hard. There's no incentive
really to get rid of that unlessyou have a bad tenant or something around
that line. But it's funny.Many people have created wealth by just simply
well, I can't afford I don'twant to sell my house. Now,

(15:16):
I'll sell it. I'll buy ahouse now somewhere else. I'll keep my
other house. And all of asudden they're like, wait a minute,
I I made money on it.I think a couple hundred thousand dollars here.
This isn't this isn't bad, andit's not bad. And you have
people to rent to because you havepeople coming in from overseas to they have
nowhere to go, so they rentout properties. And what's funny is they
come in and sometimes they come infor a company and say company acts is

(15:37):
from Japan on the person leaving isfrom Japan. They are replacements from Japan
and they just swap right out cyclethem through. So it's fascinating to me.
Well, it's very interesting because youknow, there's always kind of an
industry within an industry, right Imean, and it's it's just kind of
interesting what you get to know.Now. I wasn't planning to ask you
this, but kind of open thedoor to you know, real estate as
an investment and kind of what you'vejust been talking about is kind of more

(16:00):
like the individual. I have ahouse, I paid on my mortgage for
ten, fifteen, twenty years whatever, I've got it very manageable, I
can afford. I've got the wealthto go buy it another house and then
rent, rent house a outlive inhouse b if you will. What are
you seeing as far as because there'sbeen recent reports that there's more investor purchases
in the market than there has beenin the past, are you seeing any

(16:22):
of that? Well, outside ofthe major companies who buy houses to the
tune of thirty forty thousand houses thatthey own. What I find is a
more mom pac kind of thing.Okay, let's say I have an engineer
type who doesn't really want who isn'treally good at communicating, doesn't want the
hassle of that. It's higher affirmto come in and manage the property for
them, and then they can keepthat interest rate and the numbers make sense.

(16:47):
You have inflated value of your house, you don't want to sell it
and realize the capital gain right now, and you have inflated value of rents,
want to go ahead and take thatrent put it into the house that
I have a very low payment onor no payment on, and have the
annuity every month to come in.So the average person used to just get
rid of their house, take theirmoney, and probably to the next one

(17:07):
and go that road. Now we'reseeing more people saying, you know,
I like this idea. You knowI can see where this makes more sense,
and if you have a decent agentexplaining that to them, then it
will make sense. And then thereare those who don't want to deal with
it because you know, all ittakes is one roof, one furnace,
one phone call at three am,there's eight thousand here. I'm like,
this isn't worth it. I don'twant to do this anymore. But financially

(17:30):
it can make a lot of sense. It's a tax deduction. There's value
in it, and people are doingthat more now. So you had mentioned
earlier, just talking a little bitabout kind of I guess maybe the national
movement of people because I think especiallyduring COVID, you I mean, we've
often known that Michigan is a statethat has snowbirds. They find the condo
as they age down in Florida,they come back in the spring and all
that. Then we had COVID,and whether it was Michigan, New York,

(17:52):
Illinois, there were a lot ofstates for political and other reasons that
started to flood to the South.Time has passed and grandkids might be here,
you know, other family members arehere. The Midwest is still relatively
affordable. I mean, even thoughprices have gone up here, like you
were sharing before, when you compareit to the rest of the country,
the Midwest is still affordable. Checkout Arizona condos that there are four hundred

(18:14):
thousand dollars here for twenty two hundredsfor a feet they're eight fifty nine hundred
thousand dollars there. I help peoplewho, hey, can you look at
this contract for me? I'm sellingmy condo in Arizona or California, and
the prices locally are very reasonable.I mean, I think it has to
do with I mean, are youin Alabama, Mississippi right where you know

(18:37):
we're actually golfing Mississippi a little whileago, and I was laughing because we
went to a restaurant and the priceswere like three years ago. Really,
wait a minute, how did thishappen? Just because I think that that
there is prices per where you live. You know, you go to California,
you're going to pay a ton ofmoney for things. You go to
Florida, it's supplying demand there.But in Michigan, especially locally, there

(19:00):
are still very reasonable houses for veryreasonable prices. So there's to our broader
point. Whereas the market going,it's going up. So those people who
know it all the gym and theyhear a report there is a supply and
demand problem. There isn't enough housingin Michigan economy. There's an auto business

(19:21):
doing very well. Part ev partgas combustion engine there's a whole tech to
support them, and businesses moving inhere to where they need more engineers,
it people, and where we havea lot of good baying jobs. It
isn't a state that's losing people.For example. I don't want to get
into this too much, but haveyou seen the recent news about Frisco San
Francisco's commercial space. Yes, there'sthere aren't no there are no Walgreens,

(19:48):
Targets, groceries, and so youhave people walking around a city that's desolate,
but it's a once amazing city.We don't have those issues here where
there's rampant crime time or issues ofincreased taxation. We have a very moderately
affordable area with basis for you know, groceries and dining and entertainment area all

(20:12):
close by. And so I don'tsee this economy locally changing except for going
up and further up. And thisis something obviously that you track and are
you seeing because you mentioned before youmentioned cities from Garden City and Westland to
Livonia to Genova. You know whatI mean, which is which kind of
encompasses a variety of different price pointsdepending on you know, as a buyer

(20:33):
where you're at in the market.Some of those are a little bit better
known as first time home buyer markets. Others can be considered a move up
or you know, have some luxuryhomes. Are you seeing you demand kind
of the same regardless of price point, or is there is there you know,
something that's a little different than theother. When it comes to that,
I think it's interesting because people whoare who see that there is money

(20:55):
being made in real estate. It'sfunny. It's like any type of investment.
There's good money to make in it. People flock to it. There's
nobody made to it, Nobody wantsto touch it, right, It's very
interesting. Well, when a houseand garden city for entry level property was
one hundred thousand and now it's twohundred thousand, I think I was reading
a statistic that the market is upfifty percent in autos, groceries, housing

(21:21):
since twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, fiveyears. Fifty percent appreciation. I mean
that is a remarkingle blowing. Sowhy not? So to our earlier point,
why where do you want to invest? Well, you can live there,
have a tax right off, growequity, and have a place for
your family to grow into. Right, and if you those who have three

(21:45):
percent mortgages don't want to move.If you grow out of your place,
you add on, you attack on. And if you have a twelve hundred
square foot ranch, attack on afour hundred square foot land the living room
in the back, and all ofa sudden you have sixteen hundred square feet
and you have your kids place tostay. So I'm seeing a lot of
that, lot of renovations, alot of people doing extra stuff to their
house because it's the worst case.They don't have to buy and they and

(22:07):
their money will go into a appreciatingproduct. Yeah, so you're not going
to put forty thousand dollars and gettwenty thousand dollars back out again, you
put forty eighty one hundred thousand dollarsinto something it'll hold or create more value
for your property. So those thatare I mean because there are there are
still homes being sold, just notas many as there had been. So
for those that you're working with,clients that you've had over the past year

(22:29):
or two that you have the threepercent interest rate but still chose to Yeah,
there's needs to need downsize. Isthat what you're seeing is it downsizing
drives a lot of those mostly andagain again goes back to you know,
those of us who are in ourfifties or sixties, because that's not far
away the stairs or your two storycolonial. We're pretty easy to climb in
your twenties and thirties, may notbe so easy to climb in your fifties

(22:52):
and sixties. And therefore you havepeople who are growing a little older.
Do you want them to have theadversity of going up and downstairs? If
your loved one falls, then youhave a problem. So you're seeing a
lot of one and a half stories. So people who are who need to
move because they need to move,that's who really is doing something. And
people in this business, ay theypass away. You know, there's something

(23:15):
that the divorce from. Yeah,you go from a young couple to having
two kids, and you kind ofyou don't you need this, you need
the space. And so your jobis paying well, you're doing very well.
Those who aren't moving. It's notpeople who have oh I have a
two car garage, I got tohave a three, or I want to
have a three. Don't want move? It's much more difficult. You can

(23:36):
go ahead and rent storage or dosomething that way. And I find a
little bit more of a headwind forthose who want to move. But those
that are like you said, yeah, that are having a life experience,
which we've set up in a lotof times, they start with d diplomas,
diapers, divorce. I've never heardof the D. That's funny.
There's there's a bunch of d's thatsurround you know, that surround moving and

(23:57):
when they happen. I mean,eventually you can love your three percent rate,
but at some point, if thehouse is too small or like you
said, it's becoming a safety issue, at some point, I don't love
that three percent right enough to stay. One of the things I found as
well as a man, when yourwife says, hey, I think we
should move, used to be like, okay, whatever, I won't,
you know, take it too seriously. But with the divorce rates being fifty

(24:19):
percent, life's yeah, I wantI want to make her happy, so
yeah. I Usually it's not tosound sectic, but usually it's women who
want to move and have another placeto go to. Men get dragged along,
and with women working, with womenbeing more of a decision maker in
the house, there is more dictatingto move and men are kind of going

(24:44):
along with it. In fact,one of the biggest trends in the market
right now. There are single womenin their twenties and very mature women in
their late twenties and thirties who havematured in their job, who are who
realize, hey, listen, I'mI'm doing this with or without And it
is a fascinating thing as equality andthese jobs are taking place. Women used

(25:08):
to always, in my opinion,control the market with their personality. Now
they're controlling the market with their pocketbookbecause they're making as much or more than
their men are, and they're dictatingtheir moving well. And if you're a
single female, they're outpacing their singlemale counterpartnership. Yea women graduate college with

(25:30):
more women college degrees, more womenin the marketplace. Women are told by
their parents don't rely on the man. So there is a lot of this
in the marketplace today. And notto get too cultural, but it is
a when you look at an agentwho is a professional, I have to
read the market and tell people whatthe market looks like. That is a
huge sea change in the market.Over the last ten fifteen years. I've

(25:52):
been around a little bit longer thanthat, but it is a women are
to be dealt with. They mustbe. They can't just oh no,
They will dictate what goes on inthe world for more generations. This is
just starting tip of the iceberg.Is I think so, and I think
there will be I don't want gettoo cultural, but as women become more

(26:12):
masculine, you'll see that they willbegin to realize in their thirties, hey,
wait a minute, wait a minute, the family is a good idea.
The best idea is to get marriedand have children at that point.
Instead of realizing that twenty two,they're realizing at thirty two or thirty five,
and that is where they can makegood money doing a really good job.

(26:33):
And then they may maybe go morepart time when they're a young young
parent and jump right back on thetrain when their children are a basis.
Yeah, so I think women actuallywill be a main force to the economy
for years to come because they're taughtthat they also have a bigger brain than
men do. They are way betterthinkers. My wife is way smarter than
I am in many many ways.I might know this little niche of real

(26:56):
estate, but her opinion on thingsof just other things. It's just better
than mine. She just has anability to multitask and multi think at different
different things. I'm more of asingular at real estate. I'm really really
good. I'm not sure that Ihave a lane of real estate, and
I'm working out a little bit,but much more than that, I don't
know a whole lot. And that'skind of interesting aspect. Women tend to

(27:18):
be more broad thinking, and becauseof that, I think that they are
a better force to work with interms of the workplace. Well, and
I happen to see a post thatyou were in a Sun soccer game.
I believe so you're doing that too. So it's a passion. I mean,
you have children are awesome when youget in them in sports and get
a chance to see how they cangrow mentally as much as physically. That

(27:44):
that's really exciting to me. Ifind myself as a motivational speaker many times
to my family, to my children, and to my clients because in this
job, much like everything else inlife, you get an idea. Okay,
and my house is worth five hundredthousand. My friends say it's worth
six, the market says it's worthfour. The inspection says, it's worth
three. You get this wave.I'm like a wave in my hand by

(28:06):
the way in front of Jeannette,and it's a wave of up and down
emotions. If you can't keep yourselfin check. This is where experience comes
into and having a little bit ofconfidence and knowledge of the marketplace. You
have to have someone kind of holda tide when when things get crazy.
A really good friend of mine said, and crazy waters. The place to
go is underneath where it's calm,and reget reinforce yourself to yourself back together

(28:30):
again, then go back up intocrazy. Sellers and buyers are experiencing this.
Buying a house is in Selling ahouse is really emotional. You I'm
gonna sell my house. People arecoming into your house. Maybe they have
shoes on if you have no shoeshouse, or you're leaving paperwork on their
front there on your desk. Peopleare looking at it. Oh, this
is Jeanette's house, I know Jeannette. Or this is policized, I hope.

(28:52):
This is a very emotional thing.People are in your house, so
you go to one making judgments aboutit. They go in your closet,
they're looking at your stuff. Theygo on your refrigerator. I mean they
are judging, and so you think, oh my gosh, after a couple
of days on the market, likeI want this over. I don't want
people in my house. It's veryemotional, and buyers like, how can
I get this house right? Andso you have these two forces working in

(29:17):
tandem in the beginning and then splittingapart at the end with inspection challenges or
appraisal challenges. And here's where wehave value calming it all down, going
back to what the purpose is thepurposes? How do we get from A
to B? A I found ahouse B closing, and how do we
get there with any kind of withthe least amount of resistance? And so

(29:38):
how do we represent both sides?How do we represent the buyer's side.
My job is to find a wayto negotiate, but do it fairly,
and if I can get my gutmy seller more money or get the buyer
a little bit less off than I'mdoing my job. But these jobs are
not simple. They take they requireI'm probably two to three hours a day

(30:00):
and just researching the market. What'sgoing on in the stock market, How
does that affect interest rates? Howdoes that affect the economy, what's going
on in the economy, what's goingon in the auto business, who's coming
in, who's leaving. So Ican kind of put myself in a position
of here's information for a seller orhere's information for a buyer. How do
we negotiate in this marketplace given allthe dynamics, and you've got to communicate.
Communication is really big because when you'regoing through it, let's say you're

(30:26):
going through it as a single woman. You've lost your husband and you're going
through it alone. That's a wholedifferent dynamic than if you have you're a
spouse, a partner, you haveparents, support, kids, support,
there's people all around you. Ifyou're by yourself and you don't know what
to do, it's someone you cantrust. So doing this for thirty four
years I kind of built up areputation for that. Other agents are really

(30:48):
good at this as well. Youcan be in the business for a month
or thirty four years. There's valuein each one of us. The one
month person may say, Okay,I'll do whatever you need to do.
Now run the world for you.Other people might say, you know what,
I know what to do, andhere's how we're going to get through
all of this. I've seen everything. I've seen two thousand and nine when
the market crafts, I've seen twentytwenty, when everyone's buying every house,

(31:11):
and so the idea is to helpthem get to that simple thing. If
you have a job, if youhave a family, your focus is on
that. My focus is on howdo I get this to go through?
How do I get this from Ato B? Well, I mean,
and I just went through it.I mean, folks that have listened to
the show, not you recently,and it was I mean, while we
had had been looking, we hadhad a deal that fell through last summer.

(31:32):
Oh my gosh. And so it'sjust, you know, it's part
of the it's part of being abuyer. Right now, right, you're
probably I mean, you're probably gonnalose. We lost out, Yeah,
we lost out on wanting I feelis that hurt a little bit? It
did? But you know what,I had COVID at the time, So
you had COVID. I had COVIDat the time. So when everything was
falling apart, I'm kind of like, you know, I'm too tired to
really care. I had the reallytired, tired version this is I'm sorry,

(31:55):
but this is the this is thepart of it. I always say
to people. Business has been business. Real estate is an emotional business,
very much so. And you cango up and down and get pissy.
You're fine, you're happier, smellingall I got. I found the right
house. Oh there's twelve offers.What do I do? How do I
do it? Hey, I'm here, I'm here to calm it all down.

(32:15):
And I think you really need that, because let's take somebody like myself,
who's you know, in the industrysomething I don't know the dynamics of
what's going on right now. I'mvery clear on what's going on. And
we ended up writing an offer theweek of Christmas, not when I had
planned to do this, but it'swhen a house came back on the market
at a reduced rate that got myattention because I liked it in October,
couldn't afford it in October, cameback on at a different at a different

(32:37):
price point, and so it's like, Okay, you've got my attention,
and you know, overall that wentwell, But now we're selling our house,
and like you said, it's verythere's a lot because now I'm trying
to pack up and move and I'mtrying to clean and get the house right
now knows who you are. Imean only your radio personality bapsing you on
TV too, so people recognize whoyou are. And I was trying to
keep that a little under the radar, you know, and stuff like that.

(32:59):
And it is it's high emotional becauseit's it's your money, it's your
investment, it's it's you know,all of a sudden, it becomes really
real, as they say, Andit was helpful they have somebody else with
a calming personality. I've got this, you know, you know, you
just take a breath. Let's lookat it this way. You know,
we did have multiple offers come invery blessed as a seller, you know,

(33:21):
to have multiple offers, you know, I tell you right now is
going to throw one right out thedoor right away. But I mean the
other three were pretty you know,similar, So which one makes the sense
for us to look at? Andit's very helpful to have somebody that's not
as emotionally attached to the outcome asyou are, that is that expert that
can cut through the clutter, youknow, communicate with you like you said,
and kind of bring forth what asthe buyer or the seller you need

(33:44):
to focus on, because otherwise you'relike this, you're looking at every thing.
And here's here's part of the thingtoo. As a tactic that I
use, I love when the seller'shome. My buyers are saints, right,
they're the sweetest people ever, right, so you kind of marry them
to get other and they get emotionaland you may have a cons right,
And so whenever I can put abond with a seller from my buyer,

(34:07):
then I'm gonna try and do thatbecause there's an emotional attachment. We may
not have the best offer, butlike them. Yes, So that's a
tactic. But so going through this, did you happen to like anybody?
Because people agents will do this.They will write a letter hereous, Okay,
so you have that letter coming inand all of a sudden, now
these people are great and they're gonnabe a great part of your a great

(34:29):
partner carry on for your home,and great neighbors for your other neighbors to
know. And that's a tactic thatwe use to try and find way much
like I get this a lot,God, this this kitchen looks a lot
bigger than the pictures. Right,We're not trying to make the kitchen look
bigger. It's just the way thecamera looks at those. But you can
try to make your buyers or sellerslook better to the market when you're trying

(34:50):
to negotiate them. You negotiate theoffer, and a tactical uses buyers is
to make them more a person asopposed to a contract or a number.
And then all of a sudden,people may say, oh, I really
want this young family to have myhouse, so I had my family here.
They remind me of me. Yeah, yeah, when we I mean,
and you do think about the neighbors, you know, a little bit.
And because I went back and everythinghappened so fast, And it's so

(35:13):
funny because my husband, who's moreof an introvert than I am, was
the one that happened to be outwhen neighbors were around to tell them we
were moving. And I'm like,I kind of thought i'd be that You're
the one to do this. Solife was happening, It was going real
fast. I made a point tocome back and knock on doors to say
goodbye, you know, to people, as things were rapid. You're a
person who's a neighbor who has arelationship with people over the years, right,
Yes, people do. Yes.I was just going to pack up
in the middle of the night andgo. So I was even knocking on

(35:35):
some of the doors to say goodbyeto people. And the one goes,
were you giving stuff away over there? He says, there was so much
traffic outside of your house. Ithought you were doing some type of a
giveaway. So let me ask youthis. We're reverse roles here for a
second. This is fascinating to mebecause this is this is a message for
people who are looking to buy.So it's just huge round numbers. I
don't know what price to your house. Don't tell me the price to your
house. I'm gonna use three hundredthousand. Let's say the agent said your

(35:58):
house was worth three hundred thousand,and you had multiple offers. One was
three eighteen and one was three nineteen. No difference except for you liked the
three eighteen people and their agent,which offer would you take? You already
have beaten expectations. Yeah, I'malread getting over asking. Yeah, your
first thought is one, there's twopoints one. Your first live is what

(36:22):
gets me to closing fast. Besttime you used stick at timeline for me
because I already owned a second house, so that was my first thing,
How quick can I get to theclosing table? Or two? Who do
I want to sell my house tosee? I didn't really know any of
them. I st making a businessassisis. I was making a business decision
because we'd already moved out, thehouse was vacant, you know, and
stuff like that. And for me, and it was smart because our agent

(36:45):
articulated that because you know, oneof the offers tight in the timeline,
and they moved it up so closingwould happen in three weeks. My agent
knew that meant something to me becauseit would prevent me from having to make
two mortgage payments and or let's sayit's a week difference, that's seven nights
of you not worrying about it.You have your money. And I tell
people all the time, don't complicateit. If it's a five hundred dollars

(37:07):
item on a big house, youknow, don't make an issue of it.
Make an issue of Hey, we'regoing to get you to closing,
and the way you can do itthe fastest and the easiest will get you
an offer signed by the seller.That's what they look at. The numbers
are important, But if I haveone thousand dollars less here or there,
I've already excited expectations. I'm goingto go with the easiest way to get

(37:30):
me to closing. Yeah. No, And I mean it was funny because
you didn't know the situation at all. You didn't even know I had moved
till we walked in here, sowe didn't plan this. This was the
organic conversation. But I think thisis important for people who to know,
Hey, what do I do?You know, most of the people don't
know how to buy or sell ahouse, or they do it every thirty
years or twenty years or something sovery infrequently. Yeah, and so we
do it every day, you know, hundreds of times a year sometimes,

(37:52):
you know, in my case,we're very blessed to do that. So
I kind of understand where that is. And it is that way where if
you can find a way to getthe closing fast, justice and the easiest.
Obviously cash is king, but mortgagesnow have if you have a good
credit score, mortgage companies will wavethe appraisal. Speaking of mortgage companies,
yes, I think they're having ahard time right now, according to some

(38:13):
of the mostly latest reports I've read. Yeah, absolutely they are you know,
losses you know on the books andthings of that nature. Well,
I mean there's no refive business,none, I mean, there's none for
that. So they're not getting anyancillary business from that unless you're in a
situation where you have to get themright, right. Yeah, And there's
i mean we addressed earlier, justthe business coming organically from existing home sales

(38:36):
is down. It's just down.There's no two ways about it. So
absolutely they aren't as funny you mentionedwaving appraisals, going back to them on
both sides of the equation of buyingand selling an appraisal was not done for
various reasons, and so I meanit's been interesting that was not an issue.
Yeah, for those who don't know, if you have let's say you
have an ANERN credit score, areally high crest right, eight hundred is

(38:57):
typically the right number in that rangeseven ninety eight hundred, and that that
tells the bank that you have hada history of paying your obligations on time
and off and they will more thannot waive the four hundred dollar appraisal,
which is great for you as abuyer. The bank doesn't make any money
on the appraisal, and the appraiseris also out of work. So this

(39:19):
business all my friends who are inauto business and so and say, oh,
your business is not doesn't change themarket. Really. When you have
mortgage companies, you have title companies, you have individual realtors who are losing
income and losing money, it's abig deal. Appraisals is a part of
that, a part of that kindof whirlwind or ecosystem of the real estate,
which is which is true and theusually they're kind of the guy wearing

(39:42):
the black hat, right, Imean, that's kind of the role that
they've been cast in, especially ifthere is an issue. But you're right,
infinite appraisal is not done either becausea good credit score or somebody's putting
fifty percent down, you know,or forty percent down on the you know,
on the home, and then thebank doesn't require it. That's an
income opportunity lost to an appraiser,for sure. And what we do same
thing as an an inspector. Ifpeople are which I don't agree with waving
inspections, but if people do,then the inspectors out right and what we

(40:06):
do lenders talking to listing agents righttelling them that they're great, more money
down again, talking about how toget our deals accepted, taking money off
the table of a stock or ofyour four oh one k or even out
of your house to offset a newpurchase. These are happening to make these
offers look better. And it's away of the world right now, there's

(40:27):
no more. Hey, three percentdown, you pay the closing cost and
we'll do all this together. Thatmay have happened in twenty ten, twelve
fourteen, not in twenty twenty four. Isn't it crazy? Twenty twenty four
already? And here we are,it is? I mean, and how
different to some degree? I mean, some things in the industry haven't changed
at all, to some degree,but then other things changed dramatically, and
it's just you roll with it.A lot of these a lot of the
agents I see, they're like,hey, oh my god, how yeah,

(40:50):
I haven't seen you in a coupleof years, Like yeah, I
still you see your name, yousee your name on plaques and apports and
all this o of stuff. Andyou're like, Okay, he's still around
or she's still around. And it'sfunny. The strong have survived survived,
Yes, and I think that's goingto continue to be the case, especially,
like you said, in a marketlike this, because we've come from
being kind of an order taking business, which really is maybe the way it
had the appearance of It never reallywas that way. But back in let's

(41:13):
say twenty twenty, like you said, everybody was coming out of the woodwork
to buy new homes to This isa craft. This is a craft,
and it's not for the feint ofheart. It isn't. This is something
where you have to be in itfor the long haul. And you again,
representation. I don't want to harpenthis too much. It is really
important to have somebody who can findthe house, who may have resources also,

(41:35):
who know of listings that are poppingup and being able to get you
a house over another agent. Isit's a part of the trade that is
kind of lost. If your reputationis excellent, I'd rather work with an
agent who has been around twenty yearsthan in one who's been around five months,
because I know that that twenty yearagent as clients who are personal clients
of theirs, they've been around,they've worked with them before, they know

(41:57):
the ropes. Person's been around notthat long may have other challenges. They
might. I mean, as somebodywho's been around twenty years has figured out
a way to survive in this market. It also tells you that you know,
maybe you know them personally, maybeyou don't, but it's like they've
got what it. They're going tofigure out a way to get a deal
put together. If they've survived thislong, they're going to figure out a
way to do it. That's right. So how was your market then you
had? How long was your housein the market, and how fast did

(42:20):
it sell? It went coming soonon a Friday and we had four offers
by Sunday. Yes, that's typicallywhat happens. So when I have a
listing pops up. I listed onethis morning. We're going to have it
on the market Wednesday, we're gonnahave start showings on Thursday, open house
on Saturday, and we're going tohave people flocking to it and then hopefully,
I mean, if everything works outright and I haven't missed anything here,
we'll have the same situation. Andtypically houses that are priced right or

(42:43):
that are that are in the rightcondition that it's kind of how the market
goes, did you use professional photographer? Yes? And did you do any
drones? No? No, wedidn't. We didn't do a drone on
our The use of photography has beenone of my guys who I use now.
I remember I met him. Hedid primarily million dollar houses in Birmingham

(43:04):
and I did three four hundred thousanddollar houses in Farmington Hills, Novae,
right, and I'm like, ohmy gosh, this guy is so good.
I want to talk to him,as tell him. He goes,
and he goes, I want towork with you. I'm like, I
want to work with you. Sohe has this million dollar quality right of
shots and he is incredibly he's creative, right, and he has all my
stuff for me, and it isa great way. You see the pictures
online of the cell phone shots,you know, dark corners, right,

(43:28):
the guy in the bathroom, butnow we have I mean, if you
do things right, and this isworldwide, I'm showing a house of virtually
today. Guy in California. Bythe way, speaking of California, people
are moving out of California like crazy, coming back home again. That's a
very interesting thing. But we're seeinga lot of these virtual showings now.
It used to be because of COVID, but now it's because people are buying

(43:50):
houses from out of state and theyknow if they're out of state, they
cannot compete. I can't come backWednesday Sunday for a house that hits some
market today because it's going to bepending by Sunday. Exactly right. Yeah,
interesting and probably very true, becauseI mean that's what how our situation
played out, is how as Iyou know, like kind of like you
said, I was anticipating it shouldand could you know, given the house

(44:12):
was clean, we felt we hadit price right, you know all of
that, but you never know.I mean you just you never know.
And yeah, that is exactly theway. And again goes back to the
stability of the confidence that I've beenthere before. I know, you're just
what a perfect example of going,I'm gonna sell my house at the top
dollar. Oh my god, I'mcleaning my house. It's gonna look and
I saw this. This happens toevery My hand's going up and down,

(44:34):
down south, up north, andthis is just the way it is.
And that's why I think we dothat's why we're valuable. Kind of like
seeing a stockbroker an accountant, alawyer. I look at us in the
same way. I know maybe mostpeople don't look at us that way.
But my job is to interpret themarket, settle it all down, and
find a way to make it happen. And then we do make it happen.
It was much more difficult when itwas a buyer's market, because the

(44:57):
sellers just you know, they kepttaking lif and less and less for the
house when the market was soft.But people who stay through and just have
confidence that will all work out foryou, they will, they'll prevail in
the end. You can't get yourselfemotionally frustrated over because it is a it's
not just a nine to five.I would say that most people who buy
a house. If my case anyway, we bought our house. My wife

(45:22):
and I. I didn't want tobuy the house. It's too much money.
And I was working all day,came home, we had stuff to
do, and at eleven thirty atnight, She's like, we're going to
buy this house. And I'm like, okay, I mean, we'll call
him now. I'm like, it'seleven thirty at night. I'm not gonna
call him now. We'll call him. Call him. So I called them
the next morning. But it isamazing how many conversations happen between ten and

(45:43):
midnight when one person says, we'rebuying this house. Do whatever it takes.
Yeah, I don't want to loseout. Back to the wife situation,
it could be the guy too,but typically it's a wife said,
hey, listen, we're moving here. I'm done with how you want to
do things. We're doing it myway. I'm getting the time, getting
some stuff. Oh my gosh,it's funny. So a couple of last
questions, real quick advice to buyersin this market, because it can be

(46:07):
if you know some buyers out there, they've been out there a little bit,
they're a little bumped and bruised.Then maybe they've lost out on some
deals, you know, and stufflike that. If you hit somebody coming
to that wanted to be a buyerin this market, what would be some
general advice that you'd give that.First thing I want to know is how
long they have to they have tobuy. Okay, typically if someone coming
out of a lease, so theywant a timeline, right, there was
a timeline, So I want toestablish that. First second, find out

(46:29):
how much they want to spend fora property and get a feel for how
much they want to spend beyond that. So there's, hey, I want
to spend two hundred thousand dollars fora house, but I can lay it
forward to fifty. We're gonna beWe're gonna spend two forty. It's going
to be uncomfortable. So I tryand find where are those edges right?
Where are the rough edges? Whereare the easy edges? How far can
I how far can we go withthis? Yeah? Exactly without saying push

(46:49):
I don't want to. It soundslike I'm being like a pushy salesperson.
But well if there's always that sayingbuyers are liars, right, I mean
we don't. Maybe I don't saythat in a mean way. Is it
just is they? You know everybodyI did this same thing. This was
my budget. No, it reallywasn't, because you wait, because when
all it was said and done,that wasn't my budget. There's getting what
your budget is. There's getting whatyou want and so finding out what you
want and can you afford what youwant? And then if you can,

(47:10):
how much does that put you outof your budget at home? And will
it take your children out of Catholicschool into private you know, out of
private school into a public school.Those are choices people have to make.
And by me and the and theagents knowing that we can kind of skirt
around these other issues right without havingto This person can afford a million dollar
house, but they want to wantto spend seven right, because they want

(47:32):
to have a life, They wantto have vacation, they want to have
a lifestyle. So I start withthose two questions, and when do you
pun on moving? How soon doyou want to be there? Right?
Where do you want to be?And what was important to you? It
could be you may want a ranch, you may want a colonial, You
may want to be in Redford,you may want to be in Novae.
Right, So these these is ita ten year house, a five year
house, a two year house?Do you want to raise your family there?

(47:53):
There's a lot of different questions youneed to ask, kind of like
a doctor ask a patient. Doesit hurt here? Does it hurt there?
Right? So are determining what isvaluable kind of triash, Right,
we triash a patient come in thereand then we find try and find them
what they have identified. If you'relooking for a ranch, maybe you can
do a story and a half aslong as you have the first four bedroom.
And so we find that that way, and we go ahead and give

(48:14):
them the expectation of the market.If a house, a great house pops
up, it's going to have threeor four offers. Are you prepared to
wave inspection? Are you prepared towaive appraise? Are you prepared to put
money down? Are youre pared togo over the asking price? And just
kind of help them understand this isthe world you're getting into, which is
why renting is so easy. Ifyou look at how much money you spend

(48:35):
in rent and you take the banddata off and pay more for the house,
you have a tax deduction equity,you'll have the value you have your
own property. So I look atit that way. If it's a tenure
or more property, really want thatclient to feel like this is an investment
worth making. I'm a little uncomfortable, But with the wages increasing and maybe
the rate's going down, I'm surewe'll talk about that. The imaginary rates

(48:58):
going down from five cuts nowt intwenty four to I hope it gets cut
in August. That'd be great ifit got cut, But I don't think
it's going to not based on thereports that are coming out, economy is
too strong. No, it doesn'tlead to that. So my goal is
to, like I said, triagea buyer, kind of get a feel
for what they're looking for and providethe service to get them there. It's
one thing to get ask all thequestions, but if you don't deliver,
then what good are you? Right, So my job is to then deliver.

(49:21):
Here the houses are fitting your criteria. You know, are you willing
to go from Birmingham to Royal Oak? You know, do you want to
nameplate area? Do you have tohave that school system? I mean,
if you look at things this way, it's a very important part of the
process is determining what you want tospend and where you want to be.
Are you handy? You know,as I mentioned, there's a lot of

(49:46):
other people coming into the country rightnow. They may not be as handy
as people who are used to trades. And I'd be more specific A lot
of our Indian friends who come inthey don't have a history of learning how
to fix up a house or soon. They want something newer. You
know, a lot of people whoare who are used to working on a
car working on a house they don'tcare about. They can they can get

(50:06):
a fixed up or no problem atall. So determining what's what what also
is there too and then more importantlyfor the client, if I have the
resources available to help them fix upthe house, they may not. They
may see, okay, this Ican't deal with this kitchen being this old.
Why have a guy who can dothe kitchen for you. It solves
that problem. So we become problemsolvers along the way. Yeah, kind

(50:27):
of what's to you know, theirtrades and stuff like that that can help.
So flipping the coin because that wasthe buyer side. Now you have
somebody that you know, the rarebird that does want to sell their their
home in this market for whatever reason, and they're going to come to you
and say, you know, okayI want to sell. You know,
is there anything I need to doto get my house ready? So let's
say we're talking about this, andI would do you want to get the

(50:47):
top of the market dollar for thehouse, meaning you got to put work,
you got to put work into itto get that top out, or
do you want to sell it theway it is? You know, what's
important to you about this process.Do you want do you only want weekends
showings during the week, How doyou want to structure your life around?
This invasion is about to happen toyour house and you can do it two
ways. You can do it asis, if you don't want to do

(51:09):
all the work to it. Ifyou if you have to sell now,
which is fine. We can sellnow and then we'll get top dollar for
the property in its current condition.So the least expensive way to make a
house look great, cheapest way todo it carpet and paint. By far,
paint is the cheapest way to makea house go from blah like those

(51:31):
gold collars in two thousand and fiveto the blues and grays in twenty twenty.
Right, it is, It isthe best way to do it.
If your kitchen's you know that darkcabinry that you bought in twenty and fifteen,
you want to change it the lighter. A painter came over and paint
that cabin up, and boom,you go from dark kitchen to let kitchen.
These I'd say, these things withthese things and net you the most

(51:51):
amount of money. And if thatextra five or ten fifteen thousand dollars.
Extra is vital and you're willing towait and kind of do Itay, yeah,
yep, then that's important to you. If not, you want to
do it the way it is.The market's very strong. I just did
this guy that did this to thisguy today, we were talking about listing
his house. I went over thelast we did it this week and we
just had him cleaned it up alittle bit. Single man. Right,

(52:14):
coffee table was a rubber made astorage box. I said, let's go
to Target for a second here andget a rug and get a normal table
for this, and just changes thenamic of things, because you know,
guys are guys, right, theydon't think about those things. We got
to make it look appealing to allparties. So he put two hundred bucks
into his house and change it fromhe had cardboard under his chairs. I

(52:39):
said, maybe an area rug huhright, maybe an area rug a little
well here, So the goal isto take it from that to make it
look more appealing to the marketplace.And I think overall, and those were
I mean a couple of relatively inexpensiveI mean didn't he didn't have to get
on a ladder, and he didn'thave to roll paint to do that.
I mean that was literally relatively quicklittle things, but it was gonna set

(53:01):
the tone up. Yeah, itdoes. Staging a house obviously, there's
there's things you can do. Infact, I went one of the things.
I was believe funny. I hadthis awaiting nice house I listed and
the furniture was designed wrong, andthe lady was like, like Martha Stewart,
she just I was like, canI change your furniture? It's like,
well, of course, what doyou want to do? And I
changed it around and she's like,oh my god, it looks better.

(53:23):
I'm I may not be a professionaldesigner, but I see a lot of
houses. I know what works,and I know it works and doesn't work
right. You can't have a couchgoing against the area walk in, so
you move things around a little bit, and that part of it. I
know it sounds really inconsequential, butin the long in the big scheme of
things, when you have a moreinviting property, people tend to be more

(53:45):
comfortable there. They can see themselvesthere. One of the questions I asked
people when they're buying a house,can you see yourself living here? Get
up, Get out, get upin the morning, grab coffee, sit
here, do this, read thepaper, watch the news, have your
kids get up. Can you seeyourself living here? Yeah? One thing
that looks cool, but is itfunctional? You know, vacant houses when
you have a very difficult bacont house. I had this condo in a neighborhood.

(54:09):
There was no wall for a TV. It was all open, looked
really cool, but you couldn't puta lot of function. No, it
was not. So I asked themget all your stuff out of here because
it was very clunky how the houseworked. And sure enough it was somebody
else's problem to make it not clunky, right, and I don't want.
The goal is to make their lifeeasy, not disrupt your life too much,

(54:29):
and yet create some value in howdo we best strategically? You put
this house together and put it upfor sale. Well, because you're right,
I mean something as little as youknow, some people might kind of
pooh pooh staging, you know,if you will. But the reality of
it is is it can make aroom look bigger or smaller, you know,
depending on how things are let out. It can it can help me
envision. Oh yeah, our stuffcan go boom boom boom, you know
right here, or I'm like,where are we going to put Well,

(54:51):
I have a piano and in acouple of the houses we looked at,
I'm like, where's the piano going? I can see you playing the piano.
I said, that's a deal breakerfor me. I have to have,
you know, And it's not likea baby grain. It's not a
huge it's not a huge one.But you know some houses, I'm like,
ah, there's no place for it. So this isn't happening. Well
again, it depends on what youcan what you wanted to afford, how
big a space you wanted to have. You're going from two story to one

(55:12):
story. You know, obviously you'recondensing rooms and so and so. You
don't mean not have our music roomanymore, But is there a place for
you to put your music into aroom? I'm pretty that's a pretty sensitive
topic to me. I have abunch of guitars I like to play,
and is there enough space where Iwant to go? Is my family,
my wife especially, is she gonnabe having to listen to me struggle with
this? Is there a place Ican go downstairs? Upstairs? Where do
you want to be to play it, and I know these things, but

(55:35):
this is personal. This is aboutyou, and I think when people look
at generally speaking, this is abusiness, but it's a personal business and
it's an emotional business, and therehas to be some sort of conversation to
be had to say, Okay,if you don't tell the agent this house
doesn't work for me because of that, I'll wonder why this house isn't working
for you, right, and I'llget confused. So, knowing what the

(55:58):
person wants, I see a lotof how it may not work for Jeanette
today, but it might work forBob and Mary just fine. Yeah,
no, Jeanette, Bob and Mary, I got a great house for you
guys, everything you're looking for,right, and it may be you know
again, price points and so allthat stuff kind of is important to how
this fits together. I'm sure youhad to get uncomfortable a little bit,

(56:19):
and it's managing uncomfortableness to get yourselfinto the space where you're comfortable again.
Oh yeah, my uncomfortableness was wewent from having a basement to having a
crawl m Yeah. Wow, yeah, I'm not ready for that. I
thought you were going to say,I went from a house to a condo.
Holy Coyle. That's a big dealtoo, going from something where it's
not where you have privacy to whereyou don't have privacy. Yeah, I

(56:43):
mean, and there's like any it'sall along the way with any purchase,
first time buyer, you move up, move down by or you know,
whatever you are, you are makingchoices and concessions, you know, maybe
along the way. And yeah,one of them was that, and I'm
like, where's all our solars?Dov I go, It's amazing how two
people can fill a basement. Butyou know, but we did a lot

(57:04):
of purging, did a lot ofcleaning out, and we I mean,
we still have to settle a littlebit in a few things, but we've
moved in. Both cars are inthe garage, so you know, you
figure it out. Well. Youknow, part of this job is you
can see people grow and see peopleat the end of life, right,
And one of my experiences was Iwas selling this senior development, senior place

(57:25):
as a house. I had seniorsliving there and they were in their eighties
and they were confined to a bedroomtheir whole life. Now, think about
this, You have a you startout with one thousand square foot ranch.
You build your four thousand square foothouse, it whittle down to a bedroom,
a few pictures and a couple ofthings of your memories of you as
a with your family, a coupleof pair of clothes and so on.

(57:45):
But it all builds up and itall goes away. And so as most
people are getting older now, thebaby bloomers is a huge generation from fifty
eight to fifty nine to seventy orso right that generation, and we're experiencing
that right now. We're going upfrom our building stage with our families,
our kids are leaving to go tocollege, and now we're looking to downsize
these things. And it's a toughreality. You don't need. If you're

(58:07):
seventy and your kids are gone andyou have three thousand square feet, you
probably can fit into seventeen. Andit's a question of do you want a
dining room, do you want thefourth bedroom, do you want a basement?
Do you need that stuff? Becauseyou're looking now, you're not needing
to grow anymore, you're looking tosimplify, and that's part of real estate.
It's kind of fun, is whatis the purpose of this move?

(58:28):
And if you look at part ofyour life as what is the purpose of
you doing this? What's the purposeof your life right now? What's purpose
of our conversation? I constantly askedthat question to people, and they begin
to realize that there is a needor a want. If your purpose is
to downsize, simplify so you guyscan have next ten years of travel and

(58:49):
different. Right, you don't needto have buying the groceries for kids,
you don't need to do how normalhousehold expenses they have diminished. So therefore
the purpose of this house might bevery different, which is needed to understand
because what is challenging is not lettinggo. Some people will go ahead and
have their four thousands, for ifyou're going on three and they haven't changed
anything. They just going down fromfour to two or eighteen hundred. Now

(59:14):
their life is where it really kindof should be. And does your stuff
is that important to you as itused to be? Right? Is having
a basin full of things you neveruse as important as it used to be
to you? If it's not,simplify, maybe get new furniture, get
really the old stuff. You havea whole new life, and it it's
a when you begin to open upa little bit. It's a pretty emotional

(59:36):
thing because you start seeing people indifferent phases of life. Well, I
mean, because I don't need alot of the stuff that either hanging on
from high school or you know thebox you looked at once in a blue
moon, the old wedding dress.There's a lot wow, going back in
time. A lot, yeah,a lot of things that you're like,
do I really need this? AndI want my bikes. You know that
I still ride. You know Iwant this, I want that. Those
are the things that I want.Those don't know you that she is still

(59:58):
twenty five right at heart, yes, and you're athletic. You're constantly working
out. Permanent smile on her face. How you hear her on the radio
is exactly how she looks in reallife, it is you can kind of
get a picture of that. RightAnd so as agents or as people,
we really want to know what's importantto you is being by a church,
being by Kensington Park, being bya park to go for a walk where
I look has a ton of parksclose by, right, So you may

(01:00:20):
want to buy a house, youcan go walk your dog to that space
where other people are there, orI don't want to know anybody. I
want a private backyard, there's there'sa there's there's a there's a house for
everybody. I was gonna say somethingto stay in the car business. So
there's a butt for every seat rightfor every car right. So there is
there, this is, and thereis that way for a house too.
And it's important for you as buyersand sellers. It's important you to know

(01:00:42):
and crystallize what you want because ifyou don't want something but it looks appealing
to you, but it's not valuableto you, and you're gonna get yourself,
you're gonna go off to a differenttangent and not really buy. Buyers
and liars buy what you're really lookingto purchase. So I don't want to
I don't want a second floor.You buy a two story houses on the
water, right, and I wantedthat water was really important to me.
Well let me know, yeah,so we can kind of modify it,

(01:01:06):
can modify around it. Well,we've actually been chatting for an hour,
believe it or it's been an hour. Yeah, it's been an hour already.
So we're gonna we're gonna you wrapthis, so I guess you know,
as we're as we are wrapping anyfinal words. As we're heading into
the spring twenty twenty four market.Last year it was it was a slower
market than you know then we've seenthe last few years. I think there

(01:01:27):
was some expectation this year might bea little better. How you know,
how are you seeing things? Justkind of broad picture, how do you
see this year unfolding? Very similarto last year? I do think this
is my conspiracy theory hat right.I do think that the overall market,
gas prices, interest rates will bemore normalized come July August for the election

(01:01:50):
time, because there was a reasonto make things be back. Don't want
the economy a stranger in one areaor another before an election. Right,
So, no matter how things aretoday, whatever data this is, this
is what March, yeah, twentiethsomewhere on that right, Yeah, By
July August, I think rates willcome down a little bit. At that
point, you could say gas pricesgo back down in the high twoes probably

(01:02:12):
maybe early threes. Just look likeit's normal. But the reality is with
that time, as rates are moreattractive to buyers, more buyers will want
to buy. I'm looking I'm enjoyinga parabolic chart here prices will just go
up like this. So buying whenrates are high is not a bad thing
because you can always refinance after buyingthe product, But when the product will
be more affordable, prices will goup. For that product is more supply

(01:02:36):
than there is, there will bemore demand than there is supply. Yeah,
And that's kind of how I seeit this year too. I mean
that's what in any expert from alot of different fields, economics, real
estate, you know, you,mortgage industry, you name it, everybody's
somewhat singing off the same song.Shoot on that is that Yeah, mid
years when things are probably like yousaid, gonna because they both sides.
If you're a conspiracy theorist, youwant things to play out a certain way,

(01:02:59):
you know, depending and where you'reat. And there is I think
the Fed will have the Fed hasset all year the market's too hot for
rates. We're going to push itdown the road a little bit. But
they've always pushed it down the roadto July, and I think there is
a to be fair, right ifyou're for one Saturday there, it doesn't
matter. The The question is whatwill happen? And my crystal ball says,

(01:03:19):
what will happen is rache will normalize, go down to about six six
and a half probably ish, right, and then gas will go down and
they'll be more affordable. And thenwhatever the question is is what happens from
there? Yeah, because I dothink depending on who wins, market can
go one way or the other withthis. And I think the we've already
seen what the market is doing rightnow is because the economy is very hot

(01:03:43):
and very strong, and the airA side may see opportunity to start job
owing the FED to cut these ratesbecause it is affecting that it's not affecting
rich as much as affecting middle tolower middle and to lower class. The
more challenge you are financially, themore difficult this market is. And you've
got to ease up this inflation.The first thing you can do is cut
gas prices. You gotta cut oilprices and cut interest rates so people can

(01:04:06):
afford to do things. I mean, think about this. You're making fifty
thousand dollars a year five years ago, You're making fifty one thousand dollars this
year. You can't keep up,No, no, not now with the
price of that, Like you said, just just getting to work in gas
and food. You know when thosetwo things are are skyrocketing because everybody needs
to eat, right, needs ahouse over there faster. And Hamburger was

(01:04:28):
three four dollars now it's seven dollars, right, so everything is double what
it was, half of what itwas, fifty percent rise from twenty twenty.
That's the fact that came out recentlythat that's across the board. So
the price go to the grocery store. You'll figure it out too. They
have to moderate these prices to comedown again. And then from moderation,
what happens, right with eight ninemillion more people in the United States to

(01:04:51):
feed, the clothe, the house, the autos to put to work somehow,
right, it's going to be there'sgoing to be a big demand for
product and people are going to makewho own product the sell product. I
make a lot of money from it. I hope it's you, and I
hope it's in real estate. Well, thank you very much. We've been
talking has great words to end on. We've been talking to Paul Rock from
Remax Classic. Paul one last questionif anybody listening and they might want to

(01:05:15):
reach out to you directly to getsome counsel and advice. What is a
good place for them to do thatbest place is my phone cell phone two
four eight area code seven six zerofive zero zero eight. If you want
to do an email benonymous or justhave a more private thing, Paul Mruk
at gmail dot com. All rightywell, thanks for being our guest Paul,
and thanks for all of you listening. We've covered a lot of ground

(01:05:38):
today and hopefully it was helpful toyou. If you are thinking of buying
or selling this spring season or anytimethis year, we give you some good
things to think about. You guys, stay tuned. We will be back
again with another episode soon. Takecare. We hope you enjoy today's episode.
Don't forget to subscribe, write areview, or rate the show as
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(01:06:00):
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