Selling Your Home Series - Part 4 - Tips for Using a Real Estate Agent

TIPS FOR SELLING YOUR HOME USING AN AGENT

The traditional way to buy or sell a home is with an agent. The agent is there to facilitate the process and to offer advice if needed. They make suggestions but it is the seller who has the ultimate say in how the selling plan is to be carried out.

Hiring a Listing Agent

Choosing the agent to represent you is the first step in a long process that will ultimately result in a buyer for your home. It goes without saying that just any listing agent won’t do. Research the agents in your area and get advice from friends or coworkers who have sold a home or other property in the past.

The last thing you need is a bad agent. How can you avoid that? Look at what they have done and not what they say. There are agents who will sell you the moon if you let them. The question you have to ask is: Are they telling the truth? All that flash could be hiding the fact that they haven’t sold a home in two years.

A good agent is experienced. They have sold houses in many price ranges and have done so without the home staying on the market for very long. These people are accredited by real estate organizations and are members of local and national associations for real estate agents.

Talk to a few agents. It is hard to judge their true character from a resume only. How do they communicate? Is their manner open and honest or closed? It is alright to tell them a little bit about your situation and ask for suggestions for marketing. A good agent will use their expertise to offer tips off the top of their head.

Getting the Home Ready

An agent can provide a checklist of what needs to be done to consider your home ready for sale. The obvious things are to clean up from top to bottom and remove any unnecessary items. We all have clutter but buyers don’t like to see it.

Don’t forget curb appeal. The outside of the home should look as great as the inside. Staging is one option for beautification after you have cleaned, mopped, dusted, and vacuumed. Stagers are professional artisans who bring out the worth of a home. Their work includes dressing the outdoor areas also. Your agent can suggest stagers in your price range to assist in getting the house ready.

Staging involves small or large changes in the appearance of the house to draw the attention of buyers to certain features. It could be as simple as adding throw pillow to the couch or mirrors on the walls. They will try to accentuate the positive using the furniture and accessories in the home. Sometimes sellers opt to use the extensive inventory available to the stager which includes: pillows, flowers, plants, rugs, loveseats, mirrors, and baskets.

Certain inspections may be required for your area. It is a good idea to have a home inspector do a preliminary inspection of your home. Agents advise on how to prepare for the home inspection so it is as painless as possible. Remember that all repairs don’t have to be completed but any structural damage should be fixed as soon as possible.

Advertising

Let the agent take the lead on this one. Their extensive experience with marketing strategies will benefit you. An agent who is competent and worth their salt, will have all bases covered. A marketing plan needs to include:

• Newspaper ads
• MLS listing exposure
• Flyers
• Direct mailing
• A minimum of two open houses
• Signage in the yard
• Internet marketing
• A virtual tour

You can suggest inclusion on a local real estate show and real estate magazines. Depending on the market, this could be a plus or a poor use of time and money. Stay in the loop on all decisions. It is okay to let the agent do what they think is best as long as you are involved in the final decisions.

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Retirement Strategy #435: Buy Million Dollar Junk at Garage Sales

Sometimes the best, and most solid retirement strategies are overlooked because of their simplicity. Like Retirement Strategy #435, for instance. All you have to do- it’s so simple it’s hardly worth mentioning- is buy cheap pictures and picture frames and other junk at garage sales, and then later accidentally discover that your sparkling new $1 painting is actually worth $100,000, or a million. Or maybe that old picture is hiding behind it an original copy of the Declaration of Independence. Then cash in, and head for the Bahamas. This retirement tip is offered for no charge, although a 10% commission of all loot is strongly suggested. Here are a few true stories of people finding valuable things at garage sales, to get you motivated.

#1 - $2 File Cabinet Containing Old Stock Certificates

Fred Pietrowski was at a garage sale a couple of weeks ago, and he picked up a real deal. A strong, sturdy old file cabinet for $2. The deal turned into a steal, though, when he found at the very back behind the top drawer some old papers. They were a stack of stocks and bonds from 1988, of AT&T and other companies. The stocks had a purchase value of $50,000, but have accrued more than eight percent interest since 1988, making their estimated value well over $100,000. Fred and his wife Linda are looking for the owners of the money. “What goes around comes around. You do the right thing, it balances out”, Fred said.

#2 -  $5 Painting a Joseph Decker Original

A Los Angeles actor who decided to remain anonymous bought a painting for $5 at a garage sale. It turned out to be a Joseph Decker original, worth over a million dollars. There’s now one less actor waiting tables in L.A.

#3 -  $200 for an Original E.J. Hughes Painting

Paul Martin paid top dollar for a yard sale painting- $200. There was something he liked about it, and the purchase just felt right. It sat on his wall for four years, before Paul got curious about it’s actual value. It turned out his $200 wasn’t quite top dollar. He was able to sell the work, by the respected British Columbia artist E.J. Hughes, for $100,000. Plus an extra $3 for the picture frame.

#4 -  $4 Picture Frame that Contained a Certain Historical Document…

Then there’s the true story we all heard of, of the man who bought a picture frame for $4. at a Philadelphia flea market, and discovered a copy of the Declaration of Independence in it. It was one of the original copies and it sold for 2.42 million dollars. The winning bidder was able to turn it around and sell it again for over $8,000,000, to TV producer Norman Lear (Rumors that he then sold it to a garage sale for $4 have not been substantiated).

In another thrift shop last year, in Nashville, a man bought a copy of the declaration of independence for $2.50. It was a copy from 1820 and is estimated to be worth around $300,000.

#5 - Pablo Picasso Painting for $1 

And last but not least, Pete Pivens paid a hard earned buck for a painting at a yard sale. He took a good look later and kinda recognized the name on the signature. Some dude named Pablo Picasso. One expert has already authenticated the signature, and they are getting a second opinion to make sure. It could easily be worth over a million dollars. Not a bad return on his investment, over all, even when the cost of gas for driving to the garage sale is taken into account.

Okay, now that you’ve been motivated, go out there and simply look for some invaluable masterpieces that look exactly like every other piece of garage sale shite. Happy Hunting!

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Hiding Money and Valuables at Home: Tips and Tricks

I remember my grandmother used to keep three $100 bills in an envelope, and she’d put three marks on the outside, and keep it in a drawer. I never was convinced that was the best way to hide money in your house. But what are the best strategies for hiding valuables in your house, to keep them burglar-safe?

Over at Personal Finance Advice.com , there was an article some months back about the best place to hide money, based on a conversation with a burglar. The article had a few tips I wouldn’t have thought of:

1. Burglars want to get out ASAP, but they’ll generally keep looking till they find something, so the most ingenious hiding place could also result in more of your house being torn up. The burglar suggested hiding your real valuables and cash in a good place, but leaving somewhere more obvious, like in a drawer, $100- $300, so that the burglar gets enough to convince them that’s probably about all there is, and it’s enough to leave feeling like they’ve had not too bad of a haul.

2. Leave in an obvious drawer a fake list of Safety Deposit Box items that includes things like cash, jewelry, deeds, etc. make it appear there isn’t much left that could be in the house.

3. Don’t hide cash inside things that are themselves valuable. The burglar once robbed a house, and found no cash but did take an old stereo. The stereo didn’t work- and a look inside showed why not- it had a big wad of cash stuffed inside it.
Another blog with some tips about where to hide cash at home is Thesimpledollar.com.

They offer some good suggestions, including:

1. In an envelope taped to the bottom of a kitchen shelf
2. In a watertight plastic bottle or jar in the tank on the back of your toilet
3.  In an envelope at the bottom of your child’s toybox
4. In a plastic baggie in the freezer
5. Inside of an old sock in the bottom of your sock drawer
6. In an empty aspirin bottle in the bathroom (bundled up with a rubber band around it)
7. In the pocket of a particular shirt in your closet
8. In a “random” folder in your filing cabinet
9. In an envelope taped to the bottom of your cat’s litter box
10. In an envelope taped to the back of a wall decoration

The burglar from the first blog might well disagree with at least one of the recommendations above: inside a DVD case. Burglars might grab that case, especially if it’s a movie they like.

If you do decide to keep some cash hidden at home, two common tendencies are 1. to keep using it, and not getting around to replace it for a while, and 2. to completely forget about it. So you might want to have a note on the fridge that says $1000 cash is hidden in toilet. Or maybe take a trick from my grandmother and have the note say III toilet.

Happy hiding.

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The 111th Carnival of Personal Finance: Wrap-Up

As a new writer for this site, I was very happy to have one of my articles selected for the 111th Carnival of Personal Finance! The quality of writing and the knowledge dispensed through the Carnival is truly staggering. Please visit the Carnival if you haven’t already.

The theme of this Carnival was the Glastonbury Music Festival, and articles were grouped into various “stages” as follows:

• The Pyramid Stage for the “headline acts” — i.e. the best articles of the Carnival. My favorite: A Year’s Worth of Weekly Cheap Dates.
• The Kidz Field for articles relating to children and families (i.e. 529 College Savings plans).
• The John Peel Tent for writers “trying out something different” (i.e. ING Direct’s electric orange “send paper checks” feature).
• The Sacred Space for “counter-culture hippies” who appreciate the “bigger picture.” Check out It’s Okay to Shop at Wal-Mart (Sometimes); a really good article.
• The Crafts Field for learning to “make things” — i.e. money. As a Prosper lender and borrower myself, I liked this article on Prosper, the person-to-person lending company.

My article on budgeting made it to the Acoustic Stage — i.e. “back to the basics.” I am happy with that placement because I was definitely in some good company. Check out some of these stellar personal-finance articles:

• Why I Only Pay $10 for My Cell Phone
• Five Ways to Automate Your Finances
• What to do When You Have an Unknown Charge on Your Statement
• Operation Garage Sale: Successfully Selling Clothes
• and my favorite: Ten Tips to Save Money on Golf
  

Yes, I linked to a lot of articles in this posting, but they’re all honestly worth your attention. What’s more, there are even more great articles up at the 111th Carnival of Personal Finance. Do yourself a favor and check it out!

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Reading List

		Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything by Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner			Becoming a Category of One: How Extraordinary Companies Transcend Commodity and Defy Comparison by Joe Calloway My Review
		Trading For a Living - Psychology - Trading Tactics - Money Management Dr. Alexander Elder			The Successful Business Plan Secrets & Strategies by Rhonda Abrams
		Take On The Street What Wall Street and Corporate America Don’t Want You to Know By Arthur Levitt			The E-Myth Revisited Why Most Small Businesses don’t work and what to do about it. By Michael E. GerberMy Related Articles

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Is Your Car Spying on You?

65% of all cars made in the last two years [2004 & 2005 models] are fitted with ‘Black Box’ style information recording systems. This raises a couple of concerns.

The obvious one is the privacy consequences. The manufactures insist that is minimal, since the recorder overwrites itself every 5 seconds if the car isn’t involved in an accident. Also, if you bought a car in the last 2 years, were you told that it had one of these recorders in it?

The second concern is what happens with this information if you do get into an accident:

Information gathered on black boxes — typically everything from speed, brake pressure, seat belt use and air bag deployment — has already been used in determining guilt in criminal and civil cases across the country.

This quote from Fox news. The car insurance companies must have some kind of serious lobbying talent [$$$] to get something like this implemented. A black box for an airplane, yes I can see the need, but for an insurance company or civil suit, I just don’t see the mass breech of privacy being worth a couple thousand bucks. Also you can bet those boxes aren’t tracking information that could be used against the car companies in the cases of faulty parts or manufacturing errors that cause accidents.

The last thing that occurs to me is, since these boxes are unlikely to be cheap, who do you think is paying for them? The insurance companies? Doubtful, most likely you and I are paying to spy on ourselves.

Here’s some places where you can follow up with this issue:

Popular Mechanics: Be Careful Big Brother is Watching
Wired: Driving Big Brother
KDKA: Bill Puts Vehicle “Black Boxes” in Hot Seat a story about a recent congressional bill requiring car manufacturers to inform car buyers of the Black Box devices.

This also reminds me of the recent stories of people getting fines for speeding from car rental companies because they were wired with GPS and the company had tracked their speed while driving the rental car.

This from a car rental contract:

Buried in the fine print of the rental contracts was a clause stating that “Vehicles driven in excess of the posted speed limit will be charged $150 per occurrence. All our vehicles are GPS equipped.”

Scary, when businesses implement strategies like these which are pure cash grab and offer zero value to their customers.

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Getting Rich and Not Being Poor

This past weekend I took a one-day course called Financial Crash Course, So You Don’t have To. It was a whirlwind financial tour that touched on everything from self-examination of your personal values to Warren Buffet’s investing strategies.

There was one basic concept that I liked that I want to pass on. It was that you should have two financial plans:

1. Plan A - Is the plan for becoming rich.
2. Plan B - Is the plan to keep you from becoming poor.

Plan B is focused on defensive measures, so it covers: budgeting, debt reduction, life insurance, having a will, disability insurance and having an emergency fund in case you lose your job.

The goals in this plan focus on risk mitigation and putting yourself in the best possible situation should anything unexpected occur.

Plan A is your offensive plan. It is where you craft and execute a plan to get wealthy. It involves a commitment of time and energy to educate yourself financially and then apply your knowledge to the creation of a sizeable net worth. It can be applied in areas like: investing, building a business, real estate or even mlm.

The goals of this plan are the fun ones; financial freedom, to not need to work anymore, and to have the means to enjoy the finer things in life.

Overall this is an excellent approach and one that I generally follow. Even though I think I could accelerate my wealth building if I didn’t do it, I still make my regular RSP [that's about the same as a 401k for US readers] contributions and invest them in dividend stocks or other ’safe’ investments. I have life insurance that will pay my wife some money in case I die and my government job pretty much covers all the rest of Plan B.

The rest of my energy goes into Plan A as much of what I write about on this site will demonstrate. Somehow having Plan B taken care of allows me more ease and freedom while executing Plan A. Plan A doesn’t always feel good and can get downright scary. Knowing that the worst case scenario is covered allows me to sleep a lot better at night and ultimately increases my chance of success.

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Dark Underbelly of Internet Business

In the last few days I’ve seen three examples of the shadiness that exists in the world of online business that I felt compelled to pass along for your entertainment and enlightenment.

The first is from Wired magazine and was about a criminal attack on a competitor’s website. The guy is, in essence, the online equivalent of a hit man.

An Ohio computer hacker who served as a digital button man for a shady internet hosting company faces prison time after admitting he carried out one of a series of crippling denial-of-service attacks ordered by a wealthy businessman against his competitors.

These are the same type of attacks that took my sites down for 8 days last month and they can do considerable damage. Not only the immediate loss of sales, but damaged reputation of reliability and the damage to search engine positioning - site uptime can affect search engine ranking. Overall the opportunity to do serious damage to your competitors online with relatively simple techniques, is very real.

On that topic I came across this site which has coined a new phrase called “Google Bowling“. The name comes from the idea that if your site is #6 on the Google results page, you just bowl down the top 5 and voila, you’re in the big money. The stats I’ve seen indicate that the #1 spot in Google gets about 70% of the clicks, with #2 getting about 10%, #3 getting %5 and the rest on down from there. You can see that to get to the #1 spot can be the equivalent to winning the lottery for some businesses.

The practice is like proper search engine optimization, turned on its head and aimed at your competition. Essentially you break every rule in Google’s webmaster guidelines and make it look like your competition did it. You do it enough and eventually you will trigger one of Google’s punitive filters and get your target’s site banned from the Google index.

I even saw these guys who offer their services as Google Bowlers for hire [despite their leanings towards the dark side, their site does have some pretty good info]. According to their blurb it will cost you about $10,000 to take out 4 or 5 above you on Google, but don’t worry they have presented a complete business analysis which clearly demonstrates, with facts and calculations, why that is money well spent. You gotta love covert operators who are also marketing pros!

The last shade of grey for tonight is basically an automated program that allows you to create massive numbers of inbound links to your site [in its simplest form the number of backlinks it the leading determination of your position on the search engine results pages]. This program [BlogSubmitter] allows you to set up automated scripts that will go out and spam blog comments in order for you to get enough keyword targeted backlinks to get you on top of the search engines.

The first of the three “techniques” for getting ahead in online business is illegal and will land you in jail, but the other two are certainly not illegal, but probably immoral at the very least.

Although, I have to say, that there have been plenty of times that I have thought of the internet as just this big video game where anything goes but if these practices become more common it could create a pretty wild environment to do business in.

Since they are the ones in power, it all comes down to Google and the other major search engines, to not create rules that can be used in these ways.  As Google becomes more and more interested in dictating policy on the web, I fear that loopholes which “encourage” these kinds of strategies will become more common.

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Branding & Business go to Church

Churches have begun to re-invent themselves by using big-business models. ‘Franchising’, ‘branding’ and ‘the bottom line’ are becoming just as popular at the chapel as they are in the boardroom.

This year, the 16.4 million-member Southern Baptist Convention plans to “plant” 1,800 new churches using by-the-book niche-marketing tactics. “We have cowboy churches for people working on ranches, country music churches, even several motorcycle churches aimed at bikers,” says Martin King, a spokesman for the Southern Baptists’ North American Mission Board.

Evangelicals’ eager embrace of corporate-style growth strategies is giving them a tremendous advantage in the battle for religious market share…

These quotes are taken from BusinessWeek.com.

In a way this whole thing is more honest than churches have been when they pretended to be above all things material. They have always been about money and power, and now that their political immunities have mostly been revoked, they are forced to play the money game like the rest of us.

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Frames of Reference - Review and Recharge

>>This series is based on Michael Gerber’s excellent book The E-Myth Revisited and the article The Business Plan That Always Works from E-Myth.com

Once you have an emotionally exciting picture of what you want, it is essential to create a series of ‘Frames of Reference’ within which you achieve the goal, over a specific time period.

These are the sweet tasting rest and recognition points of milestones achieved. They are places to celebrate, recharge, refocus and adjust plans and strategies going forward. They are the base camps on the climb up Mount Everest. Each frame of reference renews you as the enjoyment of where you have come from the excitement of moving closer to your end goal, both increase.

For me the frames of reference would look like this [I will come back and add the time component of the goals once I get clearer on what the business will look like]:

• $50 a day gross revenue average over a one month period
• 100 mailing list subscribers
• quitting my day job [consistent $70 a day revenue] <– by September 2006.
• to successfully outsource a project to lower the business’ dependency on me
• $500 a day gross revenue average over a one month period
• unsolicited online media coverage
• unsolicited offline media coverage
• hire a full time employee
• hire a full time professional manager on a profit sharing plan
• $1000 a day gross revenue average over a one month period
• 5000 mailing list subscribers
• $1,000,000 gross revenue in one year
• $350,000 net income in one year

At each of the points, it will be a time for reflection, enjoyment and renewing the vision towards the final goal. Once they are all checked off, then it is time of a major review of the company.

If you are a going to create a list like this, take it, as well as the declarative statement from part 4 and pin it on the wall of your office. That’s where mine is and it helps to move me in a straighter line to see it in front of me every day.

In part 6 of the business plan that always works I learn that how to make the business reflect who am. Only by knowing who I am can I know what I really want.

Business Plan Series: Intro, part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7

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