Another byproduct of the foreclosure mess across our Valley of the Sun is burglary. With every new headline that splashes across one of the local periodicals about the rise in foreclosed properties and vacant homes, it seems that the scavengers among us become more and more emboldened.
Targeting vacant houses is no new trick. A home with no one living in it is often perceived as an easy mark for appliances, air conditioning components, copper (wiring/plumbing), ceiling fans, etc. With the less desirable segment of our population reading the same papers and watching the same television reports, they simply know there are more bones to pick clean right now. I have no data to support this hypothesis, but I assume that a "For Sale" sign is much more likely to draw prying eyes to windows for a closer look than in years past.
This makes for quite the conundrum.
A Realtor's "For Sale" sign is the hallmark of advertising to the public that a home is looking for a new owner. While many will assert that the signpost is an antiquated dinosaur of advertising in the digital age, I maintain that it is still a vital beginning to a marketing campaign. Not so much as the piece that will actually sell the home, but a prerequisite if you will. Is the sign a tool to get the agent's name out amongst neighbors and future clients as much as a means of exposing the house? To be sure, but the relationship is symbiotic. Take your pick as to who is the shark and who is the remora, but it serves the interests of each. Those very neighbors constitute one of the most effective sales forces that an agent can employ as he/she endeavors to sell a house. Bob down the street has an aunt whose sister would love to move into the subdivision. Mrs. Richards in the house on the corner would love to entice her parents to move closer to their grandchildren. It's the same reason I tell my clients not to get upset when their neighbors take all of the flyers from the box. They help spread the word, and often have a specific person in mind when they do so. Sure there are those who are merely nosy, but Real Estate has always been a numbers game.
The additional values of the sign in the yard are self-evident. The buyers who drive specific neighborhoods looking for new listings. The agents who bring their clients to see the house look for their beacon to ensure they, in fact, have arrived at the right house. Even now, when most buyers will do the lion's share of their research online, there is a role for the traditional methods of advertising.
So what to do?
Do you place a sign in the ground as you endeavor to seek highest value and best terms for your home? Do you rely on other methods to attract buyers to your home while attempting to avoid painting the scarlet "V" (vacant) on your home?
In my humble opinion, as does everything in this world, it depends. If you live in a highly desirable, centrally located area with vigilant neighbors and relatively low crime, I think it makes sense to employ every tool at your disposal to market your house. There is a high level of traffic, both pedestrian and vehicular, that not only serves your advertising purposes, but as a possible deterrent to less savory activities as well. If you own a house in the far reaches of the Valley, in a neighborhood where there is not an active HOA or neighborhood watch program, you just might forego the sign.
Whichever route you choose, I urge you to either look in on the property regularly, or have someone do it for you. Explosive weed growth, an accumulation of door hanger advertisements, papers in the driveway and general lack of activity at the house sing the bridge in any thief's siren song. Just the daily appearance of a car in the driveway can discourage.
This goes for the banks that are the proud owners of newly foreclosed upon property as well.
I have a buyer who is scheduled to close on a bank owned property in far East Mesa a week from today. In the three weeks we have been in escrow, it has been burglarized twice. She is having serious reservations about moving forward with the purchase at this point. If we terminate the transaction due to safety concerns, the seller will have been doubly affected by the vandalism.
Food for thought.
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Paul - These are some excellent points, as usual. Speaking of explosive weed growth, papers accumulating in the driveway, etc., we have renters living next door who moved in sometime in March and have never spoken to us. The yard is now slowly dying, and they appear to be gone most of the week. Not helping values!