Kevin Warmath's Blog

Fall 2008 Real Estate Market Analysis for Alpharetta

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 09:00:38 -0800

Local pundits want you to believe that there is a light at the end of the tunnel for Atlanta real estate. They cite statistics showing that the number of closings year over year has stopped declining for the first time in 18 months.

What's the real story? Read about it here in my other blog about Alpharetta Real Estate: Spin Doctors Give Atlanta Real Estate Data a Good Yank

PS: pls let me know if you like my charts and graphs...i think they are pretty cool with flash technology.

Buyer Being Retroactively Held Responsible for Building Permits Not Obtained by Seller

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 13:15:46 -0700

Here is a crazy situation. I was curious is anyone else has run across this and how they handled it.

Location: Cumming , GA (suburb of atlanta)

My client the buyer purchases a house a year ago. House had a finished basement. Seller's disclosure says that any required permits have been obtained.

Last week, the doorbell rang. It was the building inspector, who had been called by a nosy (and I'll add asinine) neighbor who had seen painters at the house.

Inspector explaines that they have to respond to all calls. My client shows him the basement, which has clearly been finished for a while and is being very lived in. Inspector then says he has to check to see if the proper permits were filed to finish the basement and if they were not that my client, the current owner, would be responsible for paying for the permit and that the inspectors would have to "open the walls and ceilings" to inspect the plumbing and electrical. My client would then have the cost of repairing the walls, etc.

First of all: Can the County do this after the fact? Secondly, what sort of recourse does my client have against the previous owner if indeed the county does come in and do the "destruction inspection."

Try Peel Away ads to attract traffic to your Blog

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Wed, 10 Oct 2007 12:38:17 -0700

I like to play around with different widgets and recently stumbled on peel away ads...you may have seen them lurking in the corners of websites. They are a less annoying way of appealing to visitors.

I added one to my personal website, which is really just a sandbox to try things in, to see how they work and how easy they are to use. Check it out at http://www.kevinwarmath.com/. The idea is to drive traffic to my blog, which is on my main real estate website.

Reply back to this post and tell me what you think...is this appealing to you. If you want to try it yourself, goto http://www.easypeelads.com/ and buy and download. I can help with the install if you need it. The software is $37 and my humble opinion is that it would cost you 3x that or more to figure out how to do all this on your own...money well spent.

Stay away from FSBO Trac

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Fri, 23 Feb 2007 16:42:54 -0800

I subscribed recently to FSBO Trac. That was a mistake. I signed up for the 3 month subscription for about $100. The software to manage the contacts looked pretty good and i was looking for a service to supply me with fsbo data.

The software and the data turned out to be pretty lousy...I'm being polite. I contacted the company a couple of days later after I'd really given the product a try to see if they would refund my money, but of course, they wouldn't. What a terrible customer service policy.

Beside the fact that the software is pretty marginal, the data is the real problem. You must select the data by area code, which is just way too broad of a selection criteria in a place like metro atlanta. You'd maybe get one or two leads that were anywhere near you and the rest would be all over tarnation.

Anyway, it was only a $100; I just wanted to save the rest of you the expense. Try other products; only try ones that offer a free trial period. DO NOT use FSBO Trac. I'm not just bitter here. I know a thing or two about software and this stuff was junk. They couldn't even get all the typos out of it.

Happy prospecting.

Does blogging generate leads? Here's proof.

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 20:09:11 -0800

I see posts regularly asking if blogging has resulted in leads or closed business. Well, i had an interesting blog related experience three days ago that i feel compelled to share so that others see the value in blogging.

I showed a house to a client; it wasn't a planned showing. We just happened to be in the neighborhood looking at another house and saw this one, so we went in. It turned out my client didn't like the house...no big deal.

Later that night I got a call from the listing agent asking for feedback. I told her that it wasn't the house for my client and she explained that the seller was motivated and moving "out west" and had called her that day and said "move my house." The listing agent encouraged me to bring another buyer. I robotically said "I'll do my best." because she seemed like a nice lady.

Then i got to thinking. I had blogged another listing i had see a couple of weeks ago; why not blog this listing and see what happens. I'm still wondering about the value of blogging specific listings and would be interested in other agents' experience with that sort of thing.

Anyway, i posted a short entry on my blog (you can take a look here). Two pictures and four short paragraphs. That was about 9PM the other night.

At 10AM the next day, my phone rings and a young woman on the other end says: "My girlfriend who knows I'm looking for a house just emailed me a link to a house on your blog and said i needed to call you."

I laughed OUT LOUD and explained to the caller that (1) i can't believe that people actually read my posts, (2) that they are actually useful and (3) that she actually called.

I showed her the house that afternoon. She may or may not make an offer on that one, but I have a new client for my blogging trouble.

A good leading - or moving - indicator

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 14:44:05 -0800

Lisa Dunn wrote earlier this week in AR that things were different on "her planet". She was closing a lot of businees and was a little chagrined at all the negativity in the general media.

I appreciated this little pep talk from Lisa. All the "woe is me" water cooler talk can take its toll. Pragmatism and fundamental business practices are the call of the day...my business is ticking right along.

I still maintain that good houses, priced right in this market can and do sell. To prove this, my most recent listing went under contract in 9 days. Now I do have a couple that aren't selling as fast, but then I didn't go to such lengths to price them exactly right.

One of my clients in one of the homes that has not sold yet would really like to move and, out of the blue, she called a moving company the other day. Perhaps wishful thinking, but what she reported to me is that the moving company says they are busier than thay have been for a while.

This isn't something that you read in the paper, but it does tell me the sky is not falling - at least in Atlanta.

Is anyone using MyBlogLog?

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Tue, 31 Oct 2006 07:12:06 -0800

Stumbled upon mybloglog.com while reading the most recent Carnival of Real Estate. I signed up, but notice that it is only a three day trial and then $25/year. Three days isn't that long to evaluate, so i thought that I'd bounce it off the AR community and see what the experience of others has been and if there are competing services that might rival or be better than mybloglog. I have to say, that the first impression i got from mybloglog was positive.

thx, k.

"I sell your house or buy it" - How does it work?

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Tue, 24 Oct 2006 08:38:06 -0700

There are a few realtors in town who run these "guaranteed home sales" campaigns. I'm confident that i'll sell a client's house, but don't necessarily want to buy it if it doesn't sell for some reason ;->

What is the catch with this program? I know that the fine print reads "at and acceptable price." This sort of program has to be more than a gimmick, right?

Anyone familiar with the program, I'd appreciate any insights. The marketing proposition is very attractive to prospective sellers, as you can imagine.

thx, k.

Section 8 rent rates vs. increased landlord costs

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sun, 22 Oct 2006 08:30:39 -0700

Tenants are getting kicked out of houses in the Atlanta market not because they aren't paying their rent, but because the landlords are not paying the mortgage. I've seen it over and over again in the last 5-6 months.

With interest rates going up many landlords are being squeezed on their payments and ultimately losing the house. Some landlords/investors are losing multiple houses.

Not only are the landlords getting squeezed by higher mortgage payments but also by shrinking rents, particularly for Section 8 rents. In the last year, the local housing authorities have actually REDUCED what they will pay for rent. The fair market rents have also decreased; a year or two ago, i used to be pretty easy to rent a 3-4 bedroom house in Decatur, GA for $1000-$1200. Today, the vast majority of propsective tenants i talk to say they are willing to pay $800-$900.

I'm curious to know what other people are seeing in their markets.

Looking for Photography tips

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sat, 21 Oct 2006 20:44:20 -0700

I take all my own photos when listing a house. I have a 28mm-50mm zoom lens on my digital camera, but it is still hard to get decent shots of smaller rooms with the 28mm lens. I recently compared photos i'd taken of a house with those of another agent and hers were better because i think she was using an 18mm lens.

What equipment/lens are you all using? I've always thought that an 18mm lens would fisheye and distort, but maybe that is what i need to be using.

thx, k.

http://www.liveinalpharetta.com/ | http://www.northfultonblog.com/

Unrepresented buyers asking/demanding 3% discount

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sun, 15 Oct 2006 20:21:48 -0700

How do other agents handle the situation where an unrepresented buyer asks/demands/threatens for a 3% price reduction right off the top?

The conversation goes somthing like this: "I like this house. I want to make an offer. I don't have an agent. I want you to reduce your commission to 3% to make my offer more attractive or I'm going to get my friend who is an agent to come write the offer."

Curious to get some war stories.

thx, k.

Must have application for your TREO

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Thu, 12 Oct 2006 19:12:55 -0700

If you're a realtor and you're using a TREO, which i recommend, at least in Atlanta becuase the Supra Key will run on your fon, you MUST get a copy of google maps for the TREO. Do not go to bed tonight without getting it. Open a browser on your fon and goto www.google.com/gmm.

It will connect to google, download the .prc file and you'll be up and going in literally minutes. The great thing is that you can "pan" the map with your stylus, among other thing.

You'll never look stupid being lost in front of a client again.

www.LiveInAlpharetta.com | www.NorthFultonBlog.com

Make a lot of pots

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sun, 08 Oct 2006 09:14:08 -0700

In Gary William's Millionaire Real Estate Agent book, they tell the story about a study of school children given the task of making clay pots. One group of students was told to make one pot as perfectly as they could. The other group was told to make as many pots as they could no matter the quality.

The first group was told it would be graded on how good the one pot was. The second group was told it would be graded on the number of pots it produced.

You guessed it. The second group won. They not only produced more pots, but the pots they did produce were better than the first group who was striving for perfection.

In Williams' book, the lesson is applied to Real Estate and telling us to just get out there and have activity and the quality is a natural by product of doing the activity. Don't want until you have the perfect listing presentation or website because you never will.

I think the lesson can also be applied to blogging. A lot more shorter quicker blogs hones your blogging (writing) skills. Some bloggers will never push the Publish button because they don't think they have the perfect post. Go ahead, push the button.

Buyers Not Budging

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sat, 07 Oct 2006 18:46:41 -0700

Recently, I've had three negotiations that have come to screetching halts...actaully they never really got started. Three times now (on homes that are resonably priced), I've had buyers make offers and then essentially refuse to negotiate off their initial offer. I realize that most people think the market has swung in favor of buyers, but do they expect the sellers to just say "YIPPEE, I got and offer, where do I sign?" Do they not expect the sellers to counter?

The third time this happened the buyer was an AGENT. I asked her if she did not expect the seller to counter her offer? She said she offered what she thought the house was worth and that there were 29,000 other homes for sale in Atlanta. I told her to go buy one then. Crazy

What have the experiences of other agent's been and what sort of negotiation tactics/strategies do you use in situations like this.

thx, k.

www.LiveInAlpharetta.com | www.NorthFultonBlog.com

Plug for Angel Walker - Home Stager

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sat, 07 Oct 2006 15:04:15 -0700

I recently listed a home that needed a real "pick me up." It is an 11 year old house with furnishings much older than that. As part of my marketing package I offer a staging consultation. Angel Walker, an Atlanta-based stager went in and made a real improvement, but most importantly, she was able to get my client to actually take her advice.

The house is now on the market and shows sooooo much better because of Angel's consult. Angel is also a new user of Active Rain. Please welcome her and use her services if you are in Atlanta.

thx, k.

www.LiveInAlpharetta.com | www.NorthFultonBlog.com

Milton Candidates Face Off for First Seats

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 22:41:33 -0700

Don't worry, I'm not going to endorse any candidates here as much as I might like to. I don't think I have to. To anyone who attended tonight's Candidate Forum, it was pretty clear who the viable candiates were. That is for any contested district that is less than or greater than 3. There are probably two candidates for district 3 who would do the best job, but you can figure that out on your own.

What I wanted to share here were just some observations, not necessarily political commentary:

1. About half way through the meeting, I had this "wave of belonging" wash over me. Here on stage were five people talking about issues and places in my forty square miles. Talking about things that actually affect me daily. Our city is almost here and we are small enough that the election finally matters. We are no longer selecting cannon fodder to go downtown only to be an afterthought to the rest of the county. We are selecting people who will make decisions that will directly impact our quality of life and property values. I liked the feeling; I haven't gotten the bill yet.

2. George Ragsdale was the only candidate to extend his hand to his opponent after the questioning. These are people who are supposed to be able to work with others and they can't even show a little sportmanship?

3. The questions everyone was asked were pretty lame. Many of the questions were really hard to answer given that we won't know the budget and cash flow situation until a few months or even a year into the new government. There was almost no disagreement among the candidates on the topics. The only thing you could really judge was the candidates' thoughfulness, composure and articulation.

4. Clearly it is not enough to say that you want to preserve the rural flavor of the community and that what qualified you is that you enjoy living here. I don't think there is any room for feel-good candidates when clearly the stakes have been raised for self determination as a community.

5. $17MM to run a city the size of Milton (20k souls and 40 sq miles) is really not very much. Granted the county can't tell us our cost per capita now (just because they can't -- need I say more about why we incorporated?), but I have to figure that the $850 per capita that we have to spend is going to go pretty darn fast, particularly when you start talking about addressing some of the traffic issues. I suspect that White Columns or Crooked Creek country clubs may have budgets greater than the City of Milton is going to have. Can you say agenda item: bond issue?

I did have one more idea when i was sitting in the meeting wondering how we are going to pay for all the road repair needed in years to come. People in North Fulton have been subsidizing someone for years with the tollbooth on GA-400. That highway is long since paid for. But how about toll booths on Batesville and Hopewell Roads where you enter Miton from Cherokee and Forsyth Counties. Those people aren't coming to work or shop in Milton. They are simply passing through on their way to Alpharetta or Roswell. I say tax 'em or put the new Milton Police out there every day and pull over about 40 of them for speeding. I digress.

Last Thought: VOTE. VOTE. VOTE.

thx, k.

http://www.liveinalpharetta.com/ | http://www.northfultonblog.com/

Brutal Honesty

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Wed, 04 Oct 2006 10:21:19 -0700

Brutal Honesty. Only your friends can be brutally honest with you, so they say. One of my problems, I’ve always been told, is that I’m too honest, that I don’t sugar coat my opinions enough, even it they are “right.”

In real estate it is hard to be honest, particularly with sellers. No one wants to tell you your house is ugly, dirty, stinks, outdated, obsolete, poorly decorated, will never sell in a hundred years to a blind buyer. Yet, some one has to tell you don’t they; or is that the job of the “market?”

I’ve lost a few clients because I’ve probably been a bit more forthcoming in my consultation than perhaps I should or than other realtors. However, my mantra is that I’m going to tell my clients what they need to hear, not what they want to hear. Heck, that is why they are hiring me, right? … for my knowledge of the market and my ability to make their home appeal to the greatest number of buyers? If they don’t want an honest relationship, then the whole sales process with them is going to be stressful - for both of us.

There are agents out there who want your listing - any listing - so badly, particularly in a slow market, that they aren’t going tell you the challenges in selling your house. They just want a sign in your yard because they will get buyer leads from it. They are less interested in selling your house than selling another house to someone who calls off the sign in your yard.

What I’ve always wanted to do is be as honest with my client as the buyers coming through their house are going to be - at least amongst themselves. If you’re a buyer’s agent you know exactly what I mean. Buyers can be as honest as a kindergartner and say exactly what’s on their mind. As an experiment, I’ve always wanted to put listening devices in the houses I’m selling just so that I could let the seller hear exactly what the buyer’s think. Sometimes they’d be horrified.

In my life, I’ve always respected the people who could (and would) give me honest and constructive feedback. These people were true professionals and it is this level of service and sincerity that I believe sellers (and my clients) deserve.

If you search for tenderness
It isn’t hard to find
You can have the love you need to live
But if you look for truthfulness
You might just as well be blind
It always seems to be so hard to give
–Billy Joel, Honesty

www.LiveInAlpharetta.com | www.NorthFultonBlog.com

Property Taxes are Out

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Tue, 03 Oct 2006 21:01:48 -0700

I've always maintained that if income taxes were due the Friday before the November general election that we would have a totally different government in this country - at all levels - than we do today. In fact, if I could make only one change to our governmental process, that would be it.
As it is, tax day and election day, I mean revenue day and expense day, are about as disconnected as they can be on the calendar. My cynical side says: Politicians want to give you every opportunity to forget how much you paid in April before you vote in November.

It’s a little different with property taxes. Each county is different in Georgia, but most have mailed out there property tax bills for 2006. In Fulton County, we received them a few weeks ago and they are due on October 15. Most property owners are escrowing their property taxes with their mortgage company, so we all pay a little bit each month towards taxes. It’s not like we’re writing $4,000 checks three weeks before an election. That wouldn’t be the American Way.

I get a lot of questions from prospective buyers in this area regarding property taxes. In summary, our property tax burden is pretty darn light compared to most other major metropolitan areas in the US, particularly the Northeast. But it is really hard to compare and contrast property tax rates across states because local governments use so many different ways of raising revenues: Some municipalities have high sales taxes because they are heavily touristed and they want to “export the tax” to the non-residents. Some local governments don’t have a property tax at all. You really have to look at your overall tax burden (sales, property, fee, income) when comparing one place to another.

What I can tell you is that this year I’ve seen the smallest increase in my own property tax in the last six years. My property tax only increased $33 over last year…my assessed value didn’t increase for the first time. Now, maybe this is because the entire Fulton County Tax Assessors office was fired about six months ago, but that is material for another post.

The general rule of thumb that I use when estimating property tax is that it will be about 1% of the sales price, give or take.

My wife has been reading some of the posts about the Atlanta area on City-data.com and mentions to me that people are interested in what our local taxes are, so I compiled a little data to compare local cities in the North Fulton and adjacent counties. Roughly speaking, it is about $37 per $1000 of assessed value to live in this area. That is significantly cheaper than Atlanta and just slightly higher than our neighbors to the west in Woodstock and Marietta and to the east in Lawrenceville and Duluth. I haven’t been able to break down what accounts for that marginal difference, but I suspect that it is in the school related part of the property tax. (If anyone knows, please post a comment.)

Some wise cracker on city-data.com will usually chime in and note how much cheaper Forsyth County (Cumming) is than North Fulton and that they would never live in Alpharetta or Roswell because of the taxes. It is absolutely true that taxes are less in Forsyth; The City of Cumming doesn’t even have a property tax.

My clients always ask me how much cheaper Forsyth is than Fulton and the answer is about $16/$1000 of assessed value. Doing the math, that would be about a $1000 per year difference on a $400,000 house. But when you figure the differences in the services that you receive in the two places, maybe it is worth it. For instance, I can’t name a single park in Forsyth County. I know that there must be one somewhere … Plus there are only three high schools in the WHOLE county. There are six in North Fulton alone.

Just remember all this when you vote in November!

Kevin Warmath

http://www.liveinalpharetta.com/ | http://www.northfultonblog.com/

Milton City Council Candidate Forum

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Sat, 30 Sep 2006 07:22:29 -0700

The League of Women Voters is hosting a Candidate Forum for the Milton City Council election on Wednesday October 4, 2006 in the Milton High School Auditorium.

The time is 7:30PM. There is a "Meet and Greet" to follow the forum.

For a list of candidates see this post.

Kevin Warmath

www.LiveInAlpharetta.com | www.NorthFultonBlog.com

Milton at-large

Kevin Warmath (Warmath Real Estate @ Keller Williams North Atlanta) — Fri, 29 Sep 2006 21:20:02 -0700

Orange and green; blue and red; green only for the cost conscious: That's the kind of govenment we want, right? These are the colors of the candidates' sign that decorate our roadsides as we wind our way to our first local elections.

It pretty exciting, actually. This time we are selecting six people (seven if you count the mayor) from our neighbors, tennis partners and fellow shoppers at Kroger to represent us in our 40-mile patch of rolling dirt rather than one person to represent us downtown where no one ever goes.

But here is what I don't understand. We have six city council districts, but yet each seat is an at-large seat. That's right; I didn't believe it when I first heard it either, but check the enabling legislation. I'm not even sure the candidates, except for Julie Zahner Bailey and George Ragsdale, understood at first that each seat was elected at-large, but maybe I'm wrong. What I'm certain about, though, is that Milton residents don't understand that all the seats are at-large.

Why is each seat at-large? I have studied a lot of public policy and political science and I've never heard of a city being setup like this.

In the election three of the seats (Districts 2, 3 and 4) are heavily contested and the other three are uncontested. There are six people running in district 4 and five people running for district 3. Any two of them might be more qualified or run better campaigns than the shoe-ins for districts 1, 5 and 6, but that won't be the outcome we will get. Will this process produce the best outcome for us?

Besides, even though we are only a city of forty square miles, there are certainly differences in the districts aren't there? If I live in district 2, and I do, I certainly care about how Birmingham Crossroads is developed and what happens at the intersection of Birmingham Hwy and Providence Road, not just from a development perspection but from a safety perspective. Someone is going to die at that intersection.

First, I urge someone to comment here any sort of rationale as to why the election is organized like it is.

Second, depending on the strength of that rationale, I'd like to see the first council resolve the issue. My suggestion would be that we elect one person from each district and you vote for the people running in your district. The mayor would be the only at-large representative.

I think this would produce the most "intimate" government. It is entirely possible for a candidate to knock on every door in their district (except for district 2, which just covers much more area). A candidate may even personally know a good number of the residents in their district or only have one degree of separation.

My second choice would be to get rid of the districts and just elect six people at-large. I guess that would be like having seven mayors!

Kevin Warmath

http://www.liveinalpharetta.com/ | http://www.northfultonblog.com/