I was supposed to be leaving for New York tomorrow morning to spend Thanksgiving in the city. I have always wanted to see the Macy's Day parade and watch the crews blow up the big balloons the night before. It is part of my bucket list!
Unfortunately, my mother got sick again and I really was concerned that she might have pneumonia. I couldn't imagine leaving her in DC, possibly needing hospitalization. My dreams of watching the balloons being blown up Wednesday night blew away and now we are going to spend the holiday at home - just my husband, daughter, me and possibly my mother.
Not the holiday I planned, but definately one to celebrate. I have been really busy - as I am sure you have been too. I have been doing this long enough to realize that when you are busy, you are very very lucky, so I definately am NOT complaining, but....
My daughter and I sat together with the November Bon Appetit and picked out recipes to make for dinner Thursday. We have picked a sage roast turkey, stuffing with pancetta, a beautiful pumpkin cake with cream cheese frosting, onion marmalade, winter greens and wild mushrooms, and my standby scalloped potatoes. Time permitting might even allow corn bread with bacon crust. Sounds good doesn't it.
I am really looking forward to cooking with my daughter. She is turning 16 next month and she is becoming interested in cooking. This weekend seems like a time to make memories together - not the ones I had planned for New York City, but I suspect they will be even better than what I had expected.
After all, that is what this holiday is all about - family, memories, good food, and a chance to relax and enjoy each other. Besides, the parade will be on TV!
May you all have a blessed Thanksgiving filled with love and friends and family - wherever you are.
This one comes with with its own apple tree, a large dining room for entertaining, a gracious living room with fireplace, and an updated kitchen with brand new appliances!
Close to the Beltway and downtown Silver Spring, this lovely colonial in Indian Spring Club Estates is ready to move into just in time for the winter solstice or even a New Year's Eve Party! Champagne and Party Hats Optional! At $484,900, there will be enough left over for good champagne!
9702 Hastings Drive, Silver Spring MD
If you would like to arrange a private showing of this special home with 3 to 4 bedrooms, 2.5 baths, a family room on the first floor, and a finished rec room in the basement, then just call Lise Howe of Coldwell Banker Residential Brokerage, Chevy Chase, at 240-401-5577. Lise can show you homes in DC, Bethesda, Kenwood Forest, Chevy Chase, or anywhere else you would like to look!
I am so excited that I finally got my buyer the house that he wanted - even with the difficulties of negotiating with the seller's expectations in this market. Now the fun truly starts - seriously!
My buyer will be putting his home on the market in Kenwood Forest, my favorite market area in all of Chevy Chase and Bethesda. His home is a Rosewood model with 3 bedrooms upstairs and 2 full baths. On the main level is a gracious living room with fireplace, a dining room with french doors opening to a deck overlooking trees, and a table space kitchen. On the lower level is a true MAN CAVE! The large family room with a walk out to a patio, the smaller office, and full bath offer lots of flexibility and the promise of enjoyable times.
We haven't priced it yet, but it will definately be open on the Sunday after Thanksgiving!
Please keep an eye out for the listing on my new website, www.kenwood-forest.com. There will be pictures and disclosures, and video tours too!
I am an agent in Darrin's office and I want to provide an update on the office progress. We are all using the work table and really enjoying the community aspect of the new arrangement. The lounge chairs are gorgeous - suedes, zebra stripe, and a wall for webinars, HGTV, news - The lighting is definately spectacular and the coffee bar is perfect. If you wonder if this vision of Darrin's works - it does -it is really fun. Come check us out in Chevy Chase DC !
"What do you mean you won't have any desks" Part 2
THE DETAILS!
Well, first I want to thank everyone for their patience. The support you have shown me based on my obvious anxiety was tremendous, and Active Rain people are the best people there are so I want to thank you.
Second of all, I am going to try and explain the exact vision as best I can. I am still debating whether I should try this using video, but I'll give it a start using those things we call words first, so here we go.
The Vision:
To create a transformational space that not only emphasizes functionality using the latest technologies, but inspires all that are associated with it by combining form and function with aesthetic. (While doing so on a shoe string budget of course!) Why? Because the industry has changed and so has the way we work. Creating a space that is dedicated to that premise is vital to the success of the Chevy Chase office. Therefore the result I am seeking is to create something no one in the Real Estate industry has seen anywhere.
The Components:
1) Idea Central:The nerve center of the office, Idea Central is the very heart and soul of the office and is meant to encourage all staff and associates to grow. The largest part of the office, this open space takes over where the traditional bullpen used to be. No longer are there rows of desks, empty and void of production and life. Now it is the lifeblood of the space - where agents share, laugh, learn. Now Idea central has two parts: the functional and the lounge.
The functional partis where an agent will bring their laptop, plugin, and get to work. There are two crescent shaped tables, like at a library, where the agent will work, print, create, write, market, and do everything else they would do in a traditional office setting. The only difference is there is no assigned seating and it has tremendous style! This is for the mobile professional who comes, does their business, and leaves.
The lounge section is the other part of the large room. Like a Starbucks, it encourages people to hang out, share, and do work in a much more casual setting. The space is strewn with comfortable furniture, soft lighting, and even a wii. The point is, if you are the type that enjoys sitting on the couch, with your laptop and a cup of coffee, Chevy Chase's Idea Central lounge will allow you to do that. Idea Central will be completed in Phase 1.
2) Agent Alley:This is where the best may still have a place to call their own. Though you must earn your way to a spot that is dedicated to you, production is not the only prerequisite. An agent must also USE the space.
3) Home Rooms: The home room is the answer to unused space! There is nothing more frustrating than staring at an empty conference room, or seeing two agents want the same conference room when one can easily see only 1/3 of the space used. The homeroom is the answer to that. Small, private, and comfortable, these rooms will emphasize the intimacy one must have when they are speaking with their clients. It's not about old antique furniture, it's about privacy. The home room will provide that. Unfortunately, the home room build out will be a year or so away :( but I'm working on it.
So, there's the idea. Construction should begin on Wednesday, and at this point I feel like I'm giving birth. What do you think? I have some drawings but I'll have to add those later. So patience my friends!
By the way, I actually came up with those names so if you steal them, send me royalties! LOL
4336 Halley Terrace SE, Washington DC offered at $279,000
Can you say "Moo"? We've just listed a 4 unit-multi-family apartment building. It's an excellent investor opportunity- 3 units are currently rented - two slightly below market rate.
Here's your chance to start your commercial apartment investment with existing cash flow. The current tenants are long term and want to stay - you can raise the rents to bring them up to market rate. Not too shabby, eh?
Investor Opportunity
Property Features
4 2-Bedroom Units Central Heat Yard Living Room Dining room Basement Stove/Oven Refrigerator , 3 Units Leased Great Cash Flow-Allows You to Live for Free
It's an excellent long term investment. Call me if you have any questions about operating expenses, current rental income or even financing opportunities. I'd love to discuss it with you.
If you are looking for a home someplace else, like Bethesda or Chevy Chase or DC, just give me a call. Sincerely,
Joy Jackson, a former exotic dancer who became president of the Metropolitan Money Store, was sentenced yesterday to more than twelve years in jail. She was convicted of stealing millions from Washington area homeowners trying to avoid foreclosure. She used the cash to buy jewelry, fur coats and vacations, and to cover a lavish wedding at the Mayflower Hotel, where Patti LaBelle serenaded guests who feasted on lobster and drank Cristal.
The Metropolitan Money Store advertised on gospel and R&B stations and promised to help people keep their homes and repair their credit. Instead, Jackson and several co-conspirators, including her husband, Kurt Fordham, took titles to properties and drained them of equity. The company directed owners to transfer title of their homes to third-party buyers for a year. During that time, Metropolitan said it would borrow against the value of the home and use that money to pay the mortgage and repair homeowners' credit ratings. It also promised to help owners obtain better interest rates.
Instead, Metropolitan siphoned off the equity and Jackson and others spent the cash. The company also stopped making mortgage payments on the houses.
Prosecutors said they have found 117 victims in the scam, but hundreds more have been identified in a related civil lawsuit.
The Judge who sentenced Jackson to 12 years and seven months in prison and ordered her to pay more than $16 million in restitution, called mortgage fraud "a fever that seems to be spreading around the country.... A sentence in this case is going to be noticed by those out there who think of doing this kind of behavior," the judge said.
Jackson wept during her apology to a courtroom full of her victims. She said, "I opened the company out of true love. I opened the company to help," Jackson said. "I know I have good in me, but I allowed greed to overcome me."
Prosecutors said Jackson and her co-conspirators left a trail of devastated homeowners in Maryland, Virginia and the District who thought they were digging out of financial problems, only to find they had been cheated. One woman lost the home her great-grandmother had purchased years earlier, according to court records. A man who was the first in his family to own a home said he was swindled by the company and is fighting to keep the house.
Margaret Neal, one of the victims, told the judge that her husband worked three jobs to keep their Annapolis home. After going to Metropolitan for help, they lost the home to foreclosure. The family ended up sleeping in a car and needing a food pantry.
"Joy Jackson Fordham took our American dream and turned it into a nightmare," Neal said. "Joy Jackson Fordham lived the life. Now my home is gone. There is no going back. Gone. Sold. Remodeled. You, Joy Jackson Fordham, did that to me."
At least the bad guys get punished once in a while.
If you are facing foreclosure, be sure to seek the advice of a reputable Realtor and attorney. Please don't go to these storefront fly by night organizations. Check them out and never transfer your home to a third party! If you need help in the DC metro area, call Lise Howe with Coldwell Banker at 240-401-5577 or email her at lise@lisehowe.com.
My New Year's Resolution - (I am either early or very late) - is to institutionalize EVERYTHING - to systemize my workload. Monday is for following up with new buyers from open houses; Tuesday is to contact all the sellers; Wed. is .... You get the point.
I decided to include the following in my report to sellers each week.
1. Who Showed the House and comments
2. What has sold in the neighborhood and new listings or new price changes.
3. What we did this week and how it worked.
4. What we are going to do next week.
5. Mortgage Update.
6. Hits on Realtor.com and my company's website.
7. Link to Video Tip of the week on Coldwell Banker's You Tube site. (Sorry for all you non-CB agents!)
So, what else do you include in your reports to sellers? What do sellers want to hear from their agents. Obviously, the number one complaint people have about their agents is lack of communication. If I institutionalize this report for myself, maybe I will stand out from other listing agents! Here's hoping at least!
If you are thinking of selling your home in DC, Bethesda, Chevy Chase, or Northern Virginia, and you want an agent different from the rest, call Lise Howe of Coldwell Banker at 240-401-5577. lise@lisehowe.com
After a detailed search of homes in Bethesda and Chevy Chase, my clients found a townhouse that they liked enough to make an offer on. After a lot of back and forth, they agreed to pay top dollar for the property, subject to a house inspection.
My clients had not really planned on moving. Indeed, they had just paid $8000 for new hardwood floors upstairs in their current home, but suddenly, they had found this new townhouse, and they had decided to make the offer.
When we did the inspection, we discovered that the air conditioner was not 2 years old as the seller had promised, but actually was 11 years old. The hot water heater was electric, not gas, as the Multiple Listing printout said. (The seller had said it was electric in the seller disclosure, but the listing agent didn't pay any attention to that when inputting the listing into the MLS.)
The marble floor in the foyer wasn't marble; it is ceramic tile, despite what the listing agent had said in the multiple listing service printout. My buyers weren't too disturbed about that since they could see with their own eyes that it wasn't marble. Thedisturbing issue discovered at the house inspection, however, was that the MLS prepared by the listing agent clearly states that there is hardwood under the carpet in 3 bedrooms, and a wood floor in the family room downstairs (although it is obviously carpet.)
Given that the buyer paid top dollar for this property, in part because it had a new air conditioner and hardwood floors, the buyer is a little upset. The seller is willing to give a credit for repairs, although not enough for a two year old air conditioner, and nothing for new hardwood floors. The seller's explanation is that the information contained in the multiple listing service is deemed reliable but not guaranteed, and they are SORRY about the confusion.
While I understand that, I am a bit confused about the effect of the buyer's reliance on representations in the multiple listing service by the listing agent as to the nature of the property being sold. This was the only place that the buyer could get information about the house on which to base his decisions on the value of the house. The buyer did not feel comfortable pulling up the carpet which was securely glued down before negotiating for the purchase of the property since the elderly owner was still living there with all her furniture.
Now it seems that the options are (1) suck it up and buy the house that now appears to be really overpriced or (2) walk away from the house that they really want.
I remember learning as a young agent to NEVER EVER NEVER promise hardwood floors if you didn't absolutely know that there was hardwood there. I remember the story of the agent who promised that there was hardwood in the dining room, but it turned out the hardwood was just around the perimeter of the dining room rug, but under the rug was plywood. The story was that the mistaken agent gave the new buyers hardwood floors in the dining room as a house warming gift.
Similarly in the DC metro area, we never promise square footage, so that we don't have to give that extra 10 or 100 square feet of living space as a house warming gift.
So, is that all mistaken? Can I promise anything with impunity and let the buyer hold the bag? Is it caveat emptor still? So I can promise the buyer an elevator in a house, a two car garage, an acre of land, gas fireplace, seaside view - all in a studio apartment in South Dakota?
Can someone explain the rules of the game to me so I can explain them to my buyer? Because I thought an agent had to exercise due diligence to ascertain the correctness of what is said about the property being sold.
Kenwood Park is a community in Bethesda Maryland built in the late 1950s along River Road between Goldsboro Road and Wilson Lane. It is slightly less than 600 homes with values ranging from the high $700's to the mid $2 millions.
Currently there are 4 homes on the market for sale.
6004 Lenox Road, Bethesda, MD 20817
6004 Lenox Road is an elegant residence on a corner lot in Bethesda. With 5 bedrooms, 5 full baths and 2 half baths, this home has all the amenities you could need. There is a garden room with soaring cathedral ceilings, two fireplaces, a terrace, butler's pantry, billiards area, spa, table tennis room, office, gift/craft room. Easy commute to DC and surrounding suburbs. Est. taxes: 16,700. Asking $1,649,000 (reduced from $1,900,000.) Listed by WC&AN Miller.
6264 Clearwood Road, Bethesda, MD 20817
If you don't need such a large home as Lenox Road, then perhaps 6264 Clearwood Road is the answer. This brick rambler is an easy walk to Walt Whitman High School & Thomas Pyle Intermediate School. Downtown Bethesda, the C&O Canal, & Kenwood Country Club are just minutes nearby. RideOn Bus 1/2 Block Away. Easy Convenient Access to Beltway, DC & VA. Updated Kitchen with Granite Countertops & New Appliances. Est Future Tax & Non-Tax Charges 1st Fiscal Year of Ownership $8996.89 With 5 bedrooms, 3 and a half baths, it is listed for sale for $850,000 by Long and Foster.
There are several other homes for sale in Kenwood Park, and if you would like more information about them, just give Lise Howe of Coldwell Banker a call at 240-401-5577. She is the perfect realtor to find a house for you in Bethesda or Chevy Chase
I start each morning by checking my email messages and a few posts on Active Rain while I am waiting for the coffee to drip. This morning I read an blog by Dean Jackson which gives four great topics to blog about from www.realestateblogideas.com. Dean noted that 1 person in 20 plans to buy a new house next year.
I confess that my day brightened when I read that 1 person out of every 20 plans to buy a new house. I imagined myself walking through a mall this afternoon surrounded by potential buyers - Every 20th person I saw was going to be a candidate to buy a house. I was definately ready to start my day with such a motivating image.
Intrigued by the website, I clicked through to it and saw that the title of article he had referenced from MSNBC actually was ONLY 5% PLAN TO BUY A HOME NEXT YEAR. The first paragraph reads as follows:
NEW YORK - Just one in twenty Americans say they plan to buy a home within the next year, and they're most likely to be 34 years old or younger and living in the South or West, according to a survey released Wednesday.
WOW - that's depressing. Only 5% plan on buying a home next year. How do you find that needle in a haystack?
Oh, wait. I passed 5th grade math, and am in fact smarter than a 3rd grader. 1 in 20 is the same as 5%, but somehow, 1 in 20 sounds better for some reason.
As always, and particularly in Washington, DC, presentation is everything. Spin over substance. But when you are self employed like we are, it is so important to keep up beat - to live on the peaks rather than mope in the valleys. So, I may in fact go to a mall this afternoon and look at all those 1 in 20 people walking around that will buy a house from me in 2010. That is the thought that I am going to hold on to, rather than the 95% of the population that won't!
If you are that one of the twenty looking for a new home, be sure to call Lise Howe at 240-401-5577 or check out her websites, www.dchomenews.com, www.homesinchevychasebethesda.com, and the newest addition, www.kenwood-forest.com to find that dream house! Lise will make sure that your purchase or sale is the easiest you have ever experienced! Put Lise and her team to work for you!
As an full time and very active Realtor in the DC metro area, I love to write about the DC market, special communities within the market, and new listings, and to connect with other agents in ActiveRain on ways to improve our service to the public and our marketing abilities.
Disclaimer: ActiveRain Corp. does not necessarily endorse the real estate agents, loan officers and brokers listed on this site. These real estate profiles, blogs and blog entries are provided here as a courtesy to our visitors to help them make an informed decision when buying or selling a house. ActiveRain Corp. takes no responsibility for the content in these profiles, that are written by the members of this community.
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