"We'll Sell Your Home or We'll Buy It Ourselves"

Who wouldn't want to have this assurance that their home will be sold? If you are attracted to this type of service, make sure you read all the details. All homeowners should be interested in how these type of services are offered because most end up not actually having to buy 99+% of the homes in their programs. How are they so successful in selling a home??

Let's look at one of these services that is currently being offered by a Brokerage. Their program does the following:

1) Makes the homeowner get the home in move-in condition, plus get a home inspection and fix what needs to be before the home goes on the market. This makes perfect sense. Having a home ready for move-in will make it show better and prevent any unpleasant surprises when the inspections are done.

2) Price the home right.
The service requires the Seller to pay for an appraisal. Then, the home has to be priced within 5% of the appraisal. This particular Brokerage's program has set times when price reductions will happen over the 6 month period the Brokerage has to sell the home. Any valid offer within 5% of the current asking price must be accepted by the Seller.

If the home isn't sold within 6 months, the Brokergage will pay 10% lower than what the home was appraised at.

The better description of this service should be
"We'll Sell Your Home or We'll Buy It Ourselves (at 10% lower than the appraised price)"

With the price appreciations in the area, an appraisal that was done 6 months ago is probably well under the market price already!

www.ScanUSA.com launched a new service where they will notify you if there is an alert in an area. The alerts you can enable range from knowing if a registered sex offender has moved into your neighborhood, to amber alerts, to weather alerts. You can enter up to 5 zip codes to receive alerts on.

Milliion-dollar homes nearly doubles since 2000

Article here:
http://money.cnn.com/2005/05/24/real_estate/home_values/index.htm?cnn=yes

The new upscale clothing stores are about to open in downtown San Luis Obispo. I got a good chuckle yesterday when I heard a radio ad on KVEC for the upcoming grand opening of Talbots. They mispronounced San Luis Obispo (San "Luey" Obispo) about 5 times.

With all the recent talk about how the Marketplace would effect local businesses, it would be nice if the chains that are coming into downtown would at least know how to pronounce the city. I'll be keeping my ears open for the ads from Ambercrombie & Finch and Banana Republic to see if they get it right!

There are some new features now available with the MLS Search #1 (available from the MLS Search page on SloCountyHomes.com).

Here are some of the new features:
- Sort listings so the ones with photos are at the top.
- Change how long before your HouseTrack new listing notification service will expire and change the expiration.
- Ability to save more searches and have more active HouseTracks.
- Phone number is now optional when registering to save searches, listings, or define HouseTrack notifications.

About 21.6 million Web surfers, or 15 percent of the active Internet population, visited a real estate or apartment Web site in April, up 26 percent from six months ago, according to Nielsen/NetRatings.

If you're going to be needing the assistance of the Morro Bay Planning Department, make sure you're not in a hurry. The Morro Bay City Council voted 4-1 to not replace the two (out of three) planners that are leaving in mid-summer. Waits for permit reviews, counter assistance, and phone assitance will be longer. The city council is waiting for the budget to be approved before it looks to replace the planners.

I enhanced the neighborhood home price on my site so it's easier to use.

Check it out!
http://www.slocountyhomes.com/home_price_page.htm

I know of no other agent that offers a free automated home sold price report!

In 2000, only 28% of home buyers surveyed by the California Association of Realtors (CAR) said they used the Internet as a significant part of the homebuying process. The latest survey reported 62% of home buyers said they did, an incredible jump just in a few years! What will it be in the next few years, more than 80%?

There's no question now that the Internet is the #1 place Buyers go when looking for a home. Real estate magazines and newspapers are all trying to figure out how to move their business to the Internet. The next few years should be interesting to see how these other business react to how the Internet has changed the way homes are marketed.

There doesn't appear to be any signs of a slow down in the real estate market. Here's a link to the first quarter report on markets around the country. http://money.cnn.com/pf/features/lists/nar_1q05/

The "student-city" proposed for Cal Poly is moving forward. If approved, it will provide housing for 2700 students and be the biggest dorm city in the State University system. The first phase is targeted for 2008 with full build by 2010. Cal Poly is expected to add over 2000 student spots by 2020. Until then, the local rental market in SLO and other cities where students rent in are expected to be impacted.

Some properties that are delinquent in tax payments are going to be auctioned off on May 10th. You can find information here: http://www.slocountytax.org/taxsale/internetauction.htm

I'd appreciate to hear what you think of SloCountyHomes.com and if there is anything else I can add to the site to assist you. Just click on "Contact Us" and fill out your comments. You can be anonymous if you like. But, if you'd like a response, be sure to include your email address. Those of you that have registered on the MLS search #1 to save listings or to get daily notification of new listings know that I don't use your email address unless you ask about something.

Thanks in advance for your comments and suggestions!

Some interesting findings about limited-service (reduced commission) Brokers can be found here- http://www.inman.com/hstory.aspx?ID=46077

Here is one paragraph from the article:

"While all real estate commissions are negotiable, there are real costs to marketing a home, said RELO CEO Pam O'Connor. If real estate professionals are not compensated accordingly, shortcuts will be taken that can affect the home's exposure to potential buyers, she added, and ultimately, its marketability and/or the price it commands. When home sellers focus on saving commission dollars by working with a limited-service broker, that discount may in fact cost them much more in the overall transaction."

If you want my opininon on the subject...I see shortcuts being taken when homes are being marketed by agents taking the larger commissions too!

SloCountyHomes.com had a record 18,056 visitors in April. This averages out to be 582 visitors a day!

The most popular pages on SloCountyHomes.com are:

1) MLS Search
2) Real estate blog
3) City statistics

Check out the article in this week's New Times about SloCountyHomes.com new real time MLS search capability!!!!! (5/5-5/12 issue, page 60)

Fastest growing California cities (2004-2005)

This is also taken from today's state report. Thought you might want to see what communities are growing the fastest. The value next to the city name is the population growth percentage from Jan 04 to Jan 05 on cities with 6% and higher growth rate.


GRASS VALLEY 6.0
PERRIS 6.1
NATIONAL CITY 6.2
RIPON 6.8
KERMAN 6.9
HERCULES 7.1
SANGER 7.2
WHEATLAND 7.5
HESPERIA 7.6
DESERT HOT SPRINGS 7.7
MURRIETA 7.7
EMERYVILLE 7.8
PALM DESERT 8.0
MCFARLAND 8.2
AMERICAN CANYON 8.6
SUTTER CREEK 8.7
SAN MARCOS 8.7
RIO VISTA 8.7
LA QUINTA 9.2
NEWMAN 9.2
RIVERBANK 9.2
COACHELLA 9.3
ADELANTO 9.5
BRENTWOOD 9.8
INDIO 9.9
WESTMORLAND 10.0
ELK GROVE10.6
VICTORVILLE 10.7
WILLIAMS 12.1
HUGHSON 12.9
PATTERSON 13.4
YUBA CITY 13.5
BEAUMONT 14.1
LINCOLN 16.8
COLMA 21.0

The California Department of Finance released population statistics today. Following is both SLO County and Santa Barbara County. Santa Maria has the highest yearly growth rate of 4%.
(population 1/1/04, popluation 1/1/05, percent change )

SAN LUIS OBISPO (county) 258,127 260,727 1.0
ARROYO GRANDE 16,577 16,537 -0.2
ATASCADERO 27,681 27,596 -0.3
PASO ROBLES 27,207 27,964 2.8
GROVER BEACH 13,248 13,228 -0.2
MORRO BAY 10,519 10,511 -0.1
PISMO BEACH 8,716 8,644 -0.8
SAN LUIS OBISPO 44,163 44,519 0.8
BALANCE OF SLO COUNTY 110,014 111,728 1.6


SANTA BARBARA (county) 415,131 419,260 1.0
BUELLTON 4,461 4,552 2.0
CARPINTERIA 14,374 14,340 -0.3
GOLETA 30,773 30,679 -0.3
GUADALUPE 6,317 6,296 -0.3
LOMPOC 42,292 42,320 0.1
SANTA BARBARA 90,569 90,518 -0.1
SANTA MARIA 85,416 88,793 4.0
SOLVANG 5,440 5,429 -0.2
BALANCE OF SB COUNTY 135,485 136,333 0.6

Statistics from the Central Coast MLS for the month of April 2005

New listings - 796
Back on market - 128
Price changes - 328
Contingent - 127
Pending- 663
Sold - 521