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As licensed real estate agents, we estimate the fair market value of a property by doing a Comparable Market Analysis (CMA). With this method, we use the Multiple Listing Service (MLS) to locate the three (or more) homes that have sold in the last 3-6 months that are the most comparable to your home. Then we make adjustments for the ways in which your home is different from each of the others, and then average the adjusted values.
Yes and Yes!! When selling a home, the more exposure your home gets, the greater the chances the property will sell quickly. By using a yard sign, it gives your neighbors and everyone who drives by your residence that your home is for sale. Surprisingly, we get several calls weekly from prospective buyers about homes that have yard signs.
For a lockbox, we put your safety first, which is why we only use the most secure lockbox, known as the Supra Lockbox. Only licensed realtors have access to the Supra Lockbox through their Supra eKey, which is an app on their phone. As the listing agent, we get notification when a realtor enters and leave your home for each showing.
Unless it is absolutely necessary (such as in the case of an elderly family member who is not mobile), you should NOT be present when your home is shown to prospective buyers. A buyer chooses to purchase a home because they can envision themselves living in it. If you are there, even if you are outside, they feel like an intruder! Even if you just meet them at the door and graciously tell them to take their time while you walk around the block – it is still your house in their mind. We coordinate all showings with you and give 2-4 hour notice depending on your preference. If you have a pet, take them with you and go for short drive or a walk around your neighborhood.
Per Florida law, when property defects or environmental hazards are not disclosed to the buyer, the seller is guilty of misrepresentation if those issues are not readily observable by the buyer. The buyer may be able to rescind the sales contract or if the sale has already closed they can sue you for damages. However, Florida law does not require a seller to complete a formal property disclosure form. If you have nothing to disclose you are technically not required to complete the form. Nonetheless, completion of the form is highly recommended – it will jog your memory on past issues that you may have forgotten about and the absence of the disclosure might make potential buyers wary. You should consult an attorney if you have specific questions on what to disclose or how to disclose it.
At The Kendrick Team, we require that the prospective buyer provide a letter from their lender along with their offer. That letter should state a dollar amount, type of loan, and terms of the loan that they are qualified to receive. There are two types of these letters – one is called a “pre-approval” and the other is called a “pre-qualification”. While, the lender will check the buyer’s credit before issuing either of these letters, a pre-approval is better than a pre-qualification. Before issuing a pre-approval the lender will generally require the buyer to provide documentation of their sources of income, but with a pre-qualification they will just accept what the buyer tells them.
The answer to this question really depends on the circumstances. The purpose of continuing to show your home is to try to elicit a back-up offer that can be immediately enacted if the original sales contract falls through. If you aren’t living in the home there is likely not a downside to having it shown. However, if you are still living there, these showings may continue to disrupt your life. If it is imperative you sell quickly, it might be worth the aggravation to continue to allow your home to be shown. It may also be a good idea if you have reason to believe that your buyers may have difficulty obtaining loan approval or if you have concern that the buyers may back out after the inspection.
Sales contracts typically contain several “contingency” clauses, or stipulations that the sale is subject to. For example, with a mortgage contingency, if the buyer is unable to obtain financing within the specified timeframe, neither the buyer nor the seller is required to complete the purchase. Another common contingency is for the buyer to inspect the property. In this case, the buyer has a specified number of days from the date the contract is signed to back out of the contract if they are not happy with the results of the inspection.
That’s a strategy that sounds good; however, it is more likely to result in a lower price. The first two weeks a house is on the market is the most important and when it will have the most activity. If a house is overpriced, it will compete with houses at that higher price level, which are almost certainly larger or have newer or more luxurious features.
The overpriced home is unlikely to attract an offer. Worse yet, those first weeks are when real estate agents preview the house. If it’s overpriced, they may not even bother to show it to their buyers. Eventually, the seller will have to drop the price – and may end up with an even lower price because buyers will wonder why the house has been on the market so long and may factor that into their offer.
No one can tell you with certainty how long your home will take to sell. Many factors affect this: 1) the current supply of homes. 2) The desirability of your house compared to others available and 3) the price! In the end, the price is the most important factor. Just about any house will sell immediately if you lower the price enough. Our goal is to always sell your home for the most amount of money in the least amount of time without leaving a penny on the table.
Although it is best to make the showing of your home as easy as possible for agents and their clients, as the seller, you have the option of requiring appointments to be made and can specify when and how those showings will be done. The easier the home can be shown, the better the chances for it to sell quickly. Agents who are in the area may bypass a home which is not readily available to show, thereby curtailing the chances of that home being sold to their client.
The buyer may get out of their commitment to buying the house if it is due to a circumstance allowed for in the contract as a contingency. However, if a buyer refuses to purchase the home even though they are contractually obligated to do so, then the seller may be entitled to receive the deposit that was put in escrow at the time the purchase contract was signed.
We love back-to-back closings as long as it fits your schedule and all parties are in agreement. We work hand-in-hand with both the lender and the title company to ensure that we close on both properties simultaneously as smoothly as possible.
“MLS” stands for Multiple Listing Service. Homes that are listed with a REALTOR® are input into the MLS and then sent out for syndication to other websites. Then other sites such as Realtor.com, Zillow.com, Homes.com, etc., and even other sites owned by individual brokerages can display all the homes that are available in the county. So when you search on our website you will be able to find homes listed by any company, not just our company’s listings.
Recent sales of comparable homes, recent updates to the home, along with current supply and demand, are what determine the market value of a home. As your REALTOR®, we can do an analysis of the home you are interested in purchasing to see if it is priced appropriately.
Before looking at any homes you should contact a mortgage lender to determine how much of a home you can qualify to purchase. You will need to understand all the costs you will be incurring and how much your monthly payments will be (including taxes and insurance) for whatever price point of home you are considering. It is very depressing to see homes that you love just to find out they are out of your price range! After you’ve spoken to one of our preferred lenders and provided them some documentation, they will give you a letter stating that you have been pre-qualified/approved for a mortgage up to a specified amount. Sellers in Central Florida almost always require the buyer to submit this letter along with their offer. Some sellers require the buyer to have this letter prior to even seeing the home.
We highly recommend that you go with a local mortgage broker, not an internet lender and not necessarily where you bank locally. The reason you want to go with someone local is that you can count on better customer service because that lender gets their business from word-of-mouth not from advertising. If they don’t provide excellent service they will not be getting more business and they know that. The reason you may not necessarily want to go with the local bank where you keep your accounts is two-fold. First, the customer service representative at your local bank very likely does not deal in mortgages and the person they refer you to (especially with larger banks) may not be local. But also, by going directly to a bank you will not have the same number of mortgage options to choose from and you may miss out on a product that would be great for you. By contrast, a good mortgage broker will work with many banks and private money lenders, and therefore will be able to offer you more alternatives.
In almost all cases a seller will expect a buyer to put money into escrow to show they are serious about purchasing the home. However, the seller will want assurance that the buyer will not back out of the deal for no reason at the last minute. If that were to happen, the seller may be entitled to keep the deposit. Typically, the seller will expect a deposit equal to around 1% of the purchase price.
Ask your lender to provide you with an estimate of closing costs. When you purchase a home with a mortgage, the vast majority of closing costs that are traditionally paid by the buyer are related to the loan.
Sales contracts typically contain several “contingency” clauses, or stipulations that the sale is subject to. For example, with a mortgage contingency, if the buyer is unable to obtain financing within the specified timeframe, neither the buyer nor the seller is required to complete the purchase. Another common contingency is for the buyer to inspect the property. In this case, the buyer has a specified number of days from the date the contract is signed to back out of the contract if they are not happy with the results of the inspection.
Yes, you should get a home inspection. Depending on the home, numerous inspections may be advisable, such as a 4-Point Inspection WDO/Termite Inspection, Pool Inspection, Wind Mitigation Survey or Septic Inspection. Buying a home may be the largest single investment you will ever make. You should know what you are getting before you buy it. A home inspection will help identify the need for major repairs, as well as the need for maintenance to keep it in good shape. A good home inspector will not only point out major problems, but will tell you what to do and what to buy to fix minor issues after you move into the home.
You can start looking for insurance immediately upon identifying the home you want to purchase. We recommend that you know how much your insurance will cost prior to the end of the inspection period.
If you are working with a member of The Kendrick Team or another REALTOR®, do not approach the owner directly. Once you do that, you’ve cut your REALTOR® out of the process and they will no longer have representation to assist you if you choose to purchase that home. Most sellers are willing to work with a REALTOR®, but the REALTOR® must contact the owner first and work out the arrangements before you go to see the home.
A newly constructed home may be an option for you. Talk to us about the pros and cons given your particular situation. One frustrating thing about homes that are just now being built is that they are frequently not listed on the MLS and are therefore a little trickier to find. Ask your REALTOR® about neighborhoods currently being built that might be right for you. If you happen to come across a new neighborhood with a model home, don’t go in without a member of The Kendrick Team. Once you do that, you risk having representation. Let us contact the builder and register you and accompany you to the model home. This way, if you end up contracting to purchase one of that builder’s homes, we can continue to be an advocate for you throughout the process.
