Category Archives: Home selling process

Are You Going To Challenge Your Property Tax Re-Evaluation?

Posted on 10/05/2011 | Leave a comment

Have you received your county’s Property Tax Re-Evaluation? Delaware County has been sending them out the past week. I believe Franklin County sent theirs a little earlier. Most values are expected to decline based on the housing market declines the past three years. I received my letter yesterday which had a “tentative” decline.

So how do you feel about the new valuation?

Since I’m not planning to sell, I don’t care about the value so much and am willing to hopefully lower my property taxes. I also know that the floor plan being used by the Auditor understates the sq ft because it doesn’t reflect two 2-ft bump-outs along the side and entire back of the home. I’ve refi’d once and am in the process of doing so again, so I have the more correct measurement from those appraisers that I can use if/when I sell. The appraisal that was done for my current refi was on target and 6% higher than the Auditor’s new assessed value.

Market Value Really Reflects Assessed Value

What bothers me most is that Auditors tend to use the term “market value”. When we’ve had meetings with Auditors at the Columbus Board, we challenged them on the use of that term because it has no bearing on what a buyer would pay for the home. It’s merely a value used to assess taxes. Let’s face it, two homes can look very similar from the outside and be entirely different on the inside for condition and amenities offered.

When You Might Want A Lowered Value

There is a possibility that a homeowner might want their value to be even lower. Auditors do not use short sales or foreclosures when calculating the reassessed values. Some newer subdivisions have been hit hard with these type of sales because those new-build buyers often paid top dollar with little money down. Having too many of those sales can bring down the selling price of “regular” homes. It’s possible that the Auditor’s value might need to be reduced further to reflect the short sales/foreclosures if there have been a lot of them.

Hire An Appraiser Or Realtor® For Help

If you need to gather specific housing stats to challenge your assessment, you can hire an appraiser or ask your favorite Realtor®. Both have access to the MLS and can identify which homes were “arms length” transactions and which were short sales or foreclosures. Plus, the MLS data allows you to compare the inside of the homes, assuming the listing agent took interior photos.

Schools Can Challenge Your Value

Did you know school districts can challenge your lower value? The lower home values may result in fewer tax revenues for the schools. Schools are allowed to challenge the value, although I’m told they “tend” to do that more so for commercial property rather than residential because homeowners are voters.

So, will you be challenging your new assessed value?

Copyright © 2011. Elaine Reese, Real Living HER. Reproduction of any portion of this blog post or the images is prohibited by the Digital Millennium Copyright Act. If this post is being viewed on any site other than www.ReesesPiecesOfRealEstate.com then the material has been stolen without permission. Violators will be reported.

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Posted in Central Ohio, Delaware County, Delaware Ohio, Home prices, Home selling process, Homes, Sellers

Tagged central ohio real estate market news, real estate property taxes, tax reevaluation

Fall Home Sales in the Olentangy School District

Posted on 10/02/2011 | 4 Comments

The last Quarter of 2011 is upon us. What might we expect in the real estate market? I’m seeing a lot of price reductions as home sellers hope to get their home in contract this month. I’ve seen homes priced in the $200′s reduce their price by $20- 30K. The decreases are even heftier for higher priced homes. With interest rates hovering around 4%, if you’re ready to buy, now may be the time to act. Doing so will mean you can be in your new home by the holidays.

I pulled the numbers from the Columbus Board of Realtors® MLS system for seasonal sales for just the Olentangy school district area of southern Delaware County. I suspect other areas might be similar.

This first chart shows the average price of the homes sold Jan-Sep (green bars) vs Oct-Dec (orange bars) since 2006. It really illustrates the severity the downturn in the housing market had on prices. 2010 was propped up somewhat by the Gov’t Tax Credits which may have allowed buyers to afford slightly higher priced homes. Of course, 2011 has been a crazy year, so it appears buyers became a little more conservative with their spending.

Fall 2011 Avg $ for homes sold in Olentangy school district, Delaware County Ohio

Click graph to enlarge

Same type of info but the chart below illustrates the NUMBER of homes sold. The small percentage of homes sold in the 4th Qtr is the reason I’m seeing so many price reductions now as home sellers hope to get their home in-contract during October, knowing there is less chance of that happening during the holiday months of Nov-Dec or the snow months of Jan-Feb.

Fall 2011 for homes sold in Olentangy school district, Delaware County Ohio

Click graph to enlarge

As for the number of homes currently for sale in the Olentangy area, there are 601 homes with an average price of $429,153. (Houston, we have a $100K problem!) Of those homes that are currently in-contract today, there are 135 with an average price of $348,618, which is closer to the average price of the homes sold so far this year. Historically, around 200 homes have been sold in the fall period so it’s likely there will be some disappointed sellers. Perhaps it’s time to sharpen the pencil.

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Posted in Buyers, Central Ohio, Delaware County, Home buying process, Home prices, Home selling process, Homes, Homes for sale, Housing stats, Lewis Center Ohio, Powell Ohio, Sellers

Tagged central ohio real estate market news, Olentangy school district, seasonal home sales

I’m curling up into my prenatal position now … tell me when it’s over.

Posted on 08/12/2011 | Leave a comment

Failing economy On Monday of this week, I wrote about the possibility of future mortgage rates rising in the wake of the S&P downgrade. Well, as we all know the stock market went down - up – down – up - that left many of us feeling like we had vertigo.

The experts told us that this market is different from 2008 because it’s being triggered by a lack of confidence in our Washington politicians whereas 2008 was a problem with the banks. So much is uncertain with what policies or programs the folks in D.C. will come up with, that companies and regular citizens can’t plan for their future.

Apparently in an attempt to assuage some portion of the uncertainty, Bernanke made a statement that the mortgage rates would be held low until mid-2013. (Read CNN’s article)

So-o-o … “maybe” it’s OK to disregard what I said on Monday … except that it still may be a good time to buy a home if you have a good credit rating, have a job, and have some down payment savings. But then again, I could be wrong … I’m not really certain. GEESH!

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Posted in Buyers, Central Ohio, Home buying process, Home selling process, Homes, Homes for sale, Sellers

Tagged Bernanke gives up on economy, Low mortgage rates

What Happens If Mortgage Interest Rates Increase

Posted on 08/08/2011 | Leave a comment

What a week we had last week in the stock market, and with the S&P downgrade, this week is likely to be just as disconcerting since Moody’s just announced they are watching this Administration’s actions carefully as well. The full ramifications for us “average citizens” is yet to be determined, however, there is concern that interest rates might rise for mortgages, car loans and credit cards.

What difference can a mortgage rate rise mean to you?

The average interest rate for a 30-yr fixed loan in June 2011 was 4.5%. If that average increases only 1.4% (to 6.5% interest) that can equal a 25% increase to your payment amount or it can mean that you’ll have to shop for a lower priced home if maintaining a certain mortgage amount is critical to you being approved for the loan.

Homeowners, who have a home for sale, may want to consider lowering their price to get their home in contract now, so they can buy at the lower interest rates we have now. A price decrease on your current home may cost you less than the interest rate increase on your next home.

**Impact of Mortgage Payment for 3 Home Prices @ two interest rates**
	$200,000	$300,000	$400,000
Loan @ 20% down	$160,000	$240,000	$320,000
4.5% rate	$811.20	$1,216.80	$1,516.80
6.5% rate	$1,011.20	$1,516.80	$2,022.40
Extra Paid/Yr	$2,400	$3,600	$4,800
Extra Paid/5 Yrs	$12,000	$18,000	$24,000

Now’s a good time to buy

OK, you often hear that phrase from Realtors® and from the National Association of Realtors® TV ads. If you doubt it, take a look at this chart of the mortgage rates since 1972. Notice that the average rate for 1972-2010 was 8.92%. Think about how much more home you can purchase at today’s current rates vs how much you might have to drop down in price if rates were to return to the nearly 9% average rate. I’ve purchased homes in ’72, ’76, ’85, ’95, and ’97 so I know what a difference the higher rates can mean.

Click to enlarge

If you want to see if you can afford to buy now, call Pam Mahon, Home Mortgage Consultant with Real Living Mortgage at 614-273-6366. She’ll walk you through your options to tell you what price of home you can be approved to buy.

Other news you need …

As Washington tries to work us out of this mess, keep a watch on their discussions about cutting the mortgage interest deduction (often referred to as MID) that we currently can take on on Fed Tax Forms. Some politicians want it to be eliminated completely while others suggest elimination only on more expensive homes ($500,000 has been bantered about). “Washington-speak” may call that a “loophole”, but it’s a tax increase for us citizens. The National Association of Realtors® is working hard to fight this elimination because it removes even more money from people’s wallets.

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Posted in Buyers, Central Ohio, Home buying process, Home prices, Home selling process, Homes, Sellers

Tagged central ohio real estate market news, historical mortgage rates, mortgage interest deduction, rise in interest rates impact on home buying

Are you a client or a file?

Posted on 03/08/2011 | Leave a comment

manila files As real estate agents, we usually refer to our clients as ‘clients’ in order to protect their identity. Frequently we may say ‘my buyers’ or ‘my sellers’ … again protecting their identity. Once they go into contract, we may personalize it somewhat and refer to them as ‘The Smith’s’ to the coop agent as we move through the transaction.

Recently I heard a member of a real estate team refer to their client as “that FILE” … as in, Susie is handling “that FILE” now. This team moves their “FILE” along like a conveyor belt in a factory assembly line depending on what stage of the transaction the FILE is in.

The more I thought about it, the more bothered I was. By calling their client a “FILE”, they had removed all humanness. How cold! Now, if the team member had said “Susie is handling that client’s FILE now”, that would be a more acceptable statement, but that’s not what was said. Using the term FILE, their mentality is that they are working with a ‘process’ not a person.

Do you think they care about the client’s emotions? or their anxieties? or their excitement of the new promotion? I’ll bet they’ve never given a hug in the FILE’s kitchen as the FILE packs up 30 years of memories after the death of a spouse. They probably haven’t consoled the FILE if they were having to move due to a divorce. They may not have celebrated with the FILE when able to move to a larger home due to a well-deserved promotion. In fact, it’s doubtful the team members have even been in the FILE’s home.

Real estate agents are self-employed businesses, free to set up our business as we please (as long as it meets our laws). Some choose to become the mega-agent who has FILES. Some choose to become the agent who gets hugs from past clients when shopping at Giant Eagle. Life is too short to be anything but in the latter group.

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Posted in Buyers, Central Ohio, Home buying process, Home selling process, Homes, Homes for sale, Sellers

Tagged central ohio real estate market news, what do you call your clients

To Faux or Not To Faux … that is the question

Posted on 01/30/2011 | Leave a comment

There is something that real estate agents see all too often … and it’s not pretty!

I suspect it starts with the cable network’s home fix-up shows. Now that wallpaper is no longer in favor – because people learned how hard it was to remove – people are turning to other ways to add “interest” to their walls. Thus, the FAUX PAINTING concept was born.

We often see examples of homeowners who have taken an hour-long course at their local home improvement store to learn how to do faux painting. I think they must decide to “practice” on a kid’s room and choose Cookie Monster blue as their choice of colors. I’ve seen the Cookie Monster blue way too often in the kid’s room or their bath.

MOM: YOUR KID CAN “GO BLIND” WITH THAT!

While I’ve not tried faux painting, judging by what I see when showing homes, it must be difficult to paint in the corners and against the ceiling. Those areas are where there is usually too much paint compared to the rest of the wall.

When the painters were doing my home, out of curiosity, I asked them if they did faux painting. They don’t. If a homeowner wants it, they call in a faux professional. That should be a clue to DIY’ers that if the professional painters call a faux painting expert, it must not be that easy.

Faux painting can be quite attractive – when done properly. When selling your home, it’s not a deterrent to buyers as wallpaper is, but it must be done very well or it can be a turn-off. So practice, practice, practice until you are skilled to do an entire wall and especially the corners. That way your Realtor® won’t make you paint over it when you decide to sell your home. GOOD LUCK!

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Posted in Central Ohio, Fix-ups, Home selling process, Homes, Sellers

Tagged central ohio real estate market news, faux painting