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mls: Is That Home for Sale in Carmichael Because I See a Sign in the Yard - 04/13/12 06:21 AM
On my way to an appointment yesterday, a Lyon real estate agent called. She said she and her clients just got out of her car in front of my listing in Carmichael. Before she could say anything else, I said, "Here's what you do: open the doors, get back in the car and drive away. Don't look back. Just go."
This home has been in active short contingent status for 76 days. We have a half dozen offers with a few as a back-up offer, within the first week on the market. Hardly a day goes by that I don't get … (7 comments)
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mls: The Market Should Bring Out the Best in Agents and Not the Worst in Us - 04/02/12 08:36 AM
When the market tanks, agents get edgy. That's no big surprise. Agents tend to get their knickers in a twist when they see their income swirling into an abyss. How will they eat? How will they pay their own mortgage? Will they still be a real estate agent next year or will they take up camp sleeping under a bridge? Real questions. Real problems. But don't beat up on each other, for crying out loud.
I cannot begin to count the number of conversations I've had lately with agents who find it difficult to carry on a phone conversation using their … (12 comments)
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mls: What Will the Bank Take for That Short Sale? - 03/19/12 07:28 AM
A reporter for Investor's Business Daily quoted me as a reliable source in an article about mortgage fraud. She chose a statement that needs repeating: "A short sale is a privilege; it is not a right." No government authority is forcing banks to do a short sale. Banks grant a short sale because it makes sense to the bank to do it. If a bank can save 20% to 30% by doing a short sale over foreclosing, it will most likely choose the short sale.
But the bank will want what it perceives to be market value. Whether its perception is … (8 comments)
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mls: Will a Buyer's Agent Tell a Buyer Not to Buy Her Dream Home Because the Agent is Not Paid Enough? - 02/28/12 07:23 AM
The thing about being a Sacramento short sale agent is the surprises just keep coming. No matter that I've been in the business for more than 35 years, I still haven't heard it all. Even though I've been selling short sales pretty much exclusively going on 7 years. See, one of the reasons I write this blog is because there is an abundance of new stuff every single day to blog about. There's always something horrible happening. It's the way of the short sale, grasshopper.
For starters, all of my listings contain verbiage in MLS that discloses to buyer's agents the … (7 comments)
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mls: Even if You Sign a Short Sale Counter Offer You Can Lose the Deal in a Seller's Market - 02/17/12 07:28 AM
I am doing my best to bring more inventory to the market in Sacramento. Especially more listings of short sales. Because, guys, we're running outta homes to buy. It's astonishing when I look at some areas for comps and everything is either active short contingent or pending. The sellers who have the homes for sale rule. People think it's a buyer's market but it's not. It's definitely a seller's market in many areas of Sacramento right now.
Because it's a seller's market, sellers can define how and when they want to sell. It doesn't matter if the home listed is a … (7 comments)
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mls: A Sacramento Lawyer Might Not Want to Hire Herself as a Client to Buy or Sell a Short Sale - 12/09/11 09:42 AM
Some people are so busy being a pompous ass that they can't listen when you try to tell them good news. They want to hear the sound of their own voice and not yours. If they would just quiet down for a moment, they might find out important information about a Sacramento short sale.
But this is the thing about talking to people from the public. Odds are some of them are jerks. They are the kind who will cut in line at the grocery store and then ram the cart into your back. They can't win with you because if … (4 comments)
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mls: Is Everybody Drinking the Same Kool-Aid? - 10/06/11 11:01 AM
There are some days that seem to be filled with stupidity. There's just no other way to put it. I expect a little stupidity here and there because that's how life is. You take the good with the bad. The smart with the stupid. The honest with the liars. But it can get a little overbearing at times and make an agent wonder: Is everybody drinking the same Kool-Aid?
An agent in my office told me about her experiences after a recent closing. She represented the buyers. Buyers who thought she should give them $2,000 of her commission because that's what … (11 comments)
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mls: The Single Most Important Thing for Selling That Home - 09/29/11 09:42 AM
A client implied a few days ago that I have other sources of income primarily because I am a real estate broker. It occurred to me how little the public knows about the real estate profession. They talk to friends who feed them misinformation. Being a real estate broker means I am held to a higher standard of knowledge, which can result in a higher level of personal liability, actually. But it doesn't equate to a higher commission check. I still work for Lyon Real Estate, which has its own broker.
Moreover, sometimes sellers think that we real estate agents have … (6 comments)
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mls: Why Would Bank of America Hire a BPO Agent Without the Tools to Work in Sacramento? - 07/09/11 10:34 AM
I will do just about anything to sell a Sacramento short sale. Some days, I feel like Cal Worthington. I would eat a bug. Did you know that Cal Worthington just got remarried for the third time? Ha. I thought he was dead. I would stand on my head to sell a Sacramento short sale. Whatever somebody needs, I'll do. I want the transaction to close. You can't be a Sacramento short sale agent without working extremely hard and doing unseemly things that you would never in a million years have to do in a regular real estate deal.
So, yesterday, … (16 comments)
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mls: What Am I Supposed to Tell My Buyer? - 03/22/11 10:56 AM
It doesn't matter to me whether a buyer's agent agrees with my belief that buyers should wait for short sale approval. Every so often one of them will call and try to read me the riot act. But I don't care. The only person I care about is my seller. I care whether the seller will close escrow on that short sale, and sellers tend to close when they have a dedicated, committed and patient buyer who wants to buy that Sacramento short sale.
Not every buyer's agent in Sacramento will advise a buyer to wait for approval. Some tell buyers … (7 comments)
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mls: A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to a Sacramento Short Sale Approval - 03/10/11 11:00 AM
Not every Sacramento short sale agent processes a file in the same manner. Heck, some of the agents in Sacramento who list a short sale have no idea what they're doing and have never negotiated a shorts sale before but, regardless, there are certain rules everybody must follow. One of those rules is when an agent receives a short sale approval letter, that agent must send the letter to the buyer's agent within 3 days.
More important, if the commission has been reduced from the compensation offered in MLS, the listing agent must also send page 1 of her listing agreement … (9 comments)
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mls: It's One Thing to Say "Up Yours," It's Another Not to Try at All - 02/06/11 11:10 AM
Just as I was about to settle down to a cozy Saturday night dinner with my husband, I received an offer on one of my Sacramento short sale listings. You've got mail! Oh, how I miss that AOL sound. Don't you? My email these days just dings. The email was forwarded to me by my team member, Linda Swanson, which immediately tells me the buyer's agent did not read the MLS instructions about how to submit an offer. That's always a bad first sign. Because if they don't read my listing in MLS, then they probably don't read the attached MLS … (16 comments)
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mls: When You've Got to Climb the Fence to Get That Lockbox - 01/26/11 10:00 AM
If you think that by locking your gate you are keeping intruders out of your yard, think again. Maybe you're keeping the deer and the antelope at bay, but if somebody really wants to get into your yard, say, even a gym-challenged, almost 59-year-old, 5-foot woman, anybody can probably scale that fence, if she was smart about it. Well, yeah, determination counts, too. I am typically a pretty determined person.
A client asked if I would withdraw her listing from MLS last week. We had sold her home for $15,000 over list price because at the time we received an offer, … (7 comments)
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mls: Have REALTORS® Lost Their Right to Free Speech? - 11/06/10 12:30 PM
My faith in the National Association of REALTORS® (NAR) has been shaken. My faith in the California Association of REALTORS® (CAR) has been shaken. My faith in the Sacramento Board of REALTORS® (SAR) has been shaken, too. I have adopted and work by the REALTOR® Code of Ethics. That link takes you to an article on About.com where I have defended the differences between agents and REALTORs®, especially for those readers who believe there is no difference.
The National Association of REALTORS® advertises to home buyers and home sellers on the pages I am paid to write for the Homebuying site … (59 comments)
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mls: Should They Ban Chewing Tobacco in Major League Baseball? - 10/21/10 11:10 AM
I picked up the Sacramento Bee from the porch and there is a photo on the front page of Giants' Pat Burrell looking like somebody had socked him in the mouth. But, no, it is a story about chewing tobacco and how many Major League players do it. Further on in the story, it says 1 out of every 5 white high school boys chew tobacco. How totally rude is this? For starters, I guess one doesn't exactly chew it except to moisten it. You take a wad of tobacco and stuff it in a pouch of your cheek. How icky.
… (11 comments)
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mls: It's a Short and Sweet "Betty White Day" in Short Sales - 10/14/10 11:13 AM
Do you believe it? Nearly 21% of all of the foreclosures in the county for the third quarter of this year are in California. Those two words: California and foreclosure go hand-in-hand. You can't pick up a newspaper or turn on the news without seeing those headlines. We're not the land of milk and honey anymore. We're the land of foreclosures.
Equally ubiquitous is Sacramento and short sale. It's one of the reasons that HGTV producers from Pietown came to town a while back to film a Sacramento House Hunters show about short sales. I spent 3 days filming in Natomas.
… (6 comments)
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mls: How Much is That Short Sale Listed For Sorta Depends - 08/31/10 10:31 AM
Because I receive so many phone calls throughout the day, it's sometimes difficult for me to answer my cell when it rings. This means callers often end up having to leave a message. I'm only one person and can't be on two phones at the same time. To deal with this situation, I have my team member's name and phone number listed first in MLS. This way she can talk to buyers and buyer's agents for me, freeing up my time to deal with other Sacramento short sale business.
However, every so often, I get a buyer's phone call. The first … (11 comments)
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mls: How to Find a Sacramento Short Sale Agent and Buy a Home in Crocker Ranch - 08/12/10 10:11 AM
Sellers in Sacramento who are looking for a Sacramento short sale agent should be very careful whom they choose because there are "fake it till you make it" agents out there. These are novices who are erroneously calling themselves a short sale specialist. How do I know this? Well, some attend a 3-hour class down at the Board and slap the title of certified short sale agent on their business cards. A seminar doesn't replace experience. It seems like everybody and their grandmothers are hopping aboard the short sale wagon these days.
I also know it because a website entrepreneur contacted … (10 comments)
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mls: Here is Why Sacramento Real Estate Prices Are Falling This Summer - 07/21/10 10:04 AM
A reporter called yesterday morning to ask me about the rising real estate prices and market recovery in Sacramento. After all, our Trendgraphix reports show a 42% increase in pending sales for June. That's the message delivered by Lyon Real Estate. However, inventory is up about 8% and sales are down by 2%. The average per-square-foot price also dropped by 2% to $125. The reporter asked me to comment on our market stabilization in Sacramento.
Much as I would like to paint a rosy picture of the real estate market in Sacramento, I have to call it the way I … (11 comments)
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mls: An Elk Grove Short Sale Awaits the Perfect Dance Partner - 07/09/10 10:25 AM
One of the main duties a Sacramento short sale agent performs when listing a short sale is to match that seller with the perfect buyer. Because not every buyer who writes an offer on a short sale is really a buyer. I'm not sure what you call those people, but they aren't buyers. One buyer's agent took offense the other day when we asked his buyer to deposit funds into escrow, but that's what buyers do. They submit an earnest money deposit. So, eventually, the buyer relinquished the check.
I'm not in the business of playing house. When I was a … (5 comments)
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Elizabeth Weintraub, Sacramento Short Sale Agent, Land Park, East Sac, Lyon RE
Sacramento,
CA
More about me…
Top 1% at Lyon Real Estate #00697006
Address: 2801 J Street, Sacramento, CA, 95816
Office Phone: (916) 233-6759
Cell Phone: (916) 233-6759
Email Me
Broker-Associate at Lyon Real Estate, midtown Sacramento. Selling since 1974. Home Buying Columnist at About.com. Sacramento short sale agent.
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