Some towns have notable native sons who leave us and make us proud. My hometown of Ossining, NY has a special one-Peter Falk.  “Just One More Thing” is not just the title of the late Peter Falk’s autobiography, it was his classic tagline in his signature role of Detective Columbo. Sadly, the world said goodbye to […]

Straight talk for home sellers who really want to sell.  One of the misconceptions among consumers about real estate is that when they hire an agent to sell their home that the agent isn’t doing their job unless they are in “motion.” Most people can’t relate to the idea that we are paid for something […]

In my travels, I have run across a number of home sellers who price their home based on sentiment. Market activity, comparable sales and competing listings don’t influence their price as much as “their number.” “Their number” is not justified by empirical fact, market data, or realism, and they believe that their buyer will be […]

I got a call from a producer at CBS this afternoon asking if I had a client willing to go on the national news broadcast this evening and speak about the proposed QRM rules for home loans. I did. Evidently, the producer found my Active Rain profile in a Google search. Not bad.   The […]

This is a “driveway.” I call it a “lawn.” The “garage.” I call it a “shed under a deck” or “a garage for a lawnmower.” This is a “3-year-old furnace.” I call it a “furnace the agent never saw and took the owners word that the new reconditioned gizmo= new furnace.” This is a Christmas […]

I just got off the phone with the listing agent of a home I showed a buyer client this past weekend. Wow. I feel like I got mugged.  After the initial salutations and memory jogging of who the agent was and the address of the property in question, she went into this rapid fire, question-answer-rebuttal […]

I hope all you dads out there had a great Father’s Day. Mine was, by design, uneventful, spending the morning watching Star Wars on the iPad with Luke and Catherine draped on me, then pretty much being a couch potato the rest of the day. Ann gave me a hall pass from lifting a finger, […]

I’ll be happy to show you the listing.  Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent?Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent?Do you have an agent? Do you have an agent? Do […]

I have seen some REALLY incredible kitchens in my time.  Some of them were in foreclosed homes. The poor slob who spent $20,000-$30,000 on an amazing kitchen simply primed the pump for the next guy. Sad.  And this leads me to the question: how many people who are pondering a new, renovated kitchen have a […]

Excuse me while I delve a moment. Under politics is the land…. I do not live in Anthony Weiner’s congressional district, but as a New Yorker and a business owner I have a say in matters regarding my state’s delegation to Washington. And like the majority of Empire State folk (except, regrettably, the majority of voters in his […]

Last week, I published a market report for Ossining which had the median price of a single family home in Ossining schools at $382,000. While Westchester is one of the more expensive counties in our state, Ossining is actually one of the more affordable places to buy from a price point of view.  Today, Coldwell […]

There is a real estate axiom I was reminded of recently by Bill Lublin that goes like this: every piece of privately owned property in the country is for sale. It might not be listed, but it’s for sale. If you knock on the owner’s door and offer them market value plus enough of a premium, you […]

It is no exaggeration that getting transactions to close is far more work in this climate than it was 5 years ago. The most onerous pitfalls in my experience are related to title and compliance issues on the property. Old school agents often gloss over illegal bathrooms and decks, but title companies and lenders do not. […]

We see quite a bit of weird stuff in this business, which isn’t surprising when you mix home, large sums of money and the inevitable stress. It sometimes brings out a side of people that is unfamiliar, even to them. I have often said that you’ll see the best and worst of people  in what […]

I’ve never taken a staging class. I know little about staging and think it best left to the stagers by and large. But there are a few basics that it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out.  You tidy up. You shouldn’t leave dirty dishes in the sink. The dog that loves to bark or just, […]

Prospective clients (and occasionally, colleagues) often ask how, if I am in Briarcliff Manor, I will be able to sell their home in <not Briarcliff>. We sometimes aren’t even in Westchester, but in Rockland or Dutchess.  While I like to keep the tone of my blog more on the informative side, I have to admit […]

There have been several thought provoking articles written recently on open houses and why some agents really do them. The point that agents would offer to hold a listing open while surreptitiously using them to just prospect for buyer clients is actually a rather old modus operandi; however, my experience has been different. I have […]

I am posting this in response to a blog that suggests that the NAR misrepresented the truth when they lobbied against QRM initiatives. No apologist for the NAR am I, but I disagree that the NAR was wrong here. I am re-posting a PDF of the email the NAR sent all brokers in support of […]