Howard Sobel posted recently on the FHA program to refinance people who have negative equity. I think the idea is brilliant, and opens up possibilities other than a short sale for people who are underwater and want to keep their home. I’m sure there is small print, but if it helps 3-4 million people in the next 2 years, that should make a huge difference. 

The guidelines strike me as very reasonable as presented. Time to Google the program and get more information. I seldom re blog, but this is an important development. 

Chappaqua is a beautiful hamlet located in the town of New Castle in north central Westchester County. It is known, nominally, as the adopted home of the Clintons and Reader’s Digest, and for being a idyllic, bucolic setting. New Castle abuts the Town of Ossining, and it is time to give the place a little more ink. 

Vanessa Williams is a product of Chappaqua schools, and hails from nearby Millwood. (Ms. Williams, by the way, is THE most talented creature to ever wear the crown of Miss America, and is an extremely nice lady. She still lives in the area as far as I know, and when I was tending bar during my sabbatical way back when she was one of the patrons at Mediterraneo. I did not fix her a drink; she was nursing. If you ever see a re run of the 1984 Miss America pageant, Miss Williams promised to star on Broadway. She did. That is calling the shot on the level of Babe Ruth, another adopted New Yorker. But on to Chappaqua.)

Chappaqua is served by the Chappaqua school district, and includes parts of the town of Mount Pleasant. It is located on the Harlem Line of the Metro North railroad and is about a 50-minute train ride to Grand Central Terminal. 

This market information is for single family homes in the Chappaqua school district. All data is from the Westchester-putnam Multiple Listing Service. 

Prices are up from 2009 and the transaction total is up a tick as well. 22 homes are under contract, another healthy total, and there are mega options for buyers with 124 active listings, or roughly 7 months of inventory on the books. The vastness of the price range of available homes opens the doors to a wide variety of budgets. 

This is the market data for August of 2010 for single family homes in Peekskill, and all information is sourced from the Westchester-Putnam MLS.

OK- here goes:

Prices are way down. Only 1 home sold, so all statistics are at the mercy of a number too small to be considered a representative sample. Median price last month was $65,000 and August of last year was $289,500. There are 77 homes actively for sale- the balance is out of whack, with only 7 homes under contract at a median price of $247,500.

So sales are way down and pending sales are low. Here’s the deal: Peekskill is a nice place- low taxes, affordable homes, a vibrant downtown, and proximity to Manhattan, points upstate, and all the amenities of Westchester County. You could buy a pretty nice joint here for not much money. The law of supply and demand is immutable- someone is going to get some good deals, and that someone should be you. 

Yeah, you. Or someone you know. 

Get yourself a free Listingbook account and check out homes for sale in Peekskill. It is absolutely a buyer’s market here.

Previous posts about Peekskill are here.  

ReBarCamp Rye was held today at the Rye Town Hilton, and it was my first ever BarCamp. I am typically rather cynical about seminars, camps and such, due mainly because I am tired of being recruited and I abhor being sold to. However, like Raincamp, there was no “product.” The sponsors weren’t hawked, and the subject matter was enlightening, relevant, and helpful. I also connected with a number of people in the offline world for the very first time and caught up with others. 

Lucky Strikers was prominent in the organization of the event, which was held ahead of the annual NYSAR meeting, also in Rye the next 3 days. If you have never been to a REBarcamp, you should go. It is a very fluid day, and the format is ad hoc- the participants are often the purveyors. I gave a session on short sales and anther on blogging, which was dubbed “BLUGGING- Putting the U in Blogging.” Michael Daly coined the phrase, and I love it. Chris Smith, author of Tech Savvy Agent gave a fantastic session on advanced social media, and I was floored by how much I do not know. 

Among those I met up with were 

• Marilyn Katz, and Active Rainer from Connecticut.
• Steve Hubbard, a Remax broker whom I knew from my days selling real estate in Rochester, NY 
• Sonja Lovas, author of Westchesterisms, a wonderful tagline for a blog
• Dawn Bricker, who presided over a lively session on managing your online reputation
• Debbie Gartner, queen of Westchester Flooring and prolific contributor here on Active Rain
• Suzanne Welch, a broker in nearby Croton on Hudson. 

Ann announced today that she’d like us to get a iPad for Gregory. She emailed me a link of 10 apps for iPad which can help children on the Spectrum. Looking over the apps, they strike me as excellent, and right down Gregory’s alley. He responds to interactive, and just mastered the mouse a few weeks ago- what a difference in our lives. 

We have a teacher supply store in a nearby city with tons of ABA sorts of toys, and Gregory is also progressing on NickJr.com’s more rudimentary interactive activities, but the big breakthrough was his recent grasp of the mouse. Prior to that it required our full-time assistance. 

Ironic, as I understand that iPad does not use a mouse. Regardless, the outcome is crucial to us, and anyting that will develop and enrich is a welcome thing. 

Oh, and we can use the thing too, which certainly doesn’t suck!!!

There are many fellow New Yorkers (and New Jerseyans- they might have even had a better view) who might have a more up close and personal recollection of September 11, 2001. I think there is value in sharing our memories. 

Ann and I were in Rego Park Queens. Our wedding was 18 days away, and her parents were in the air on their way to NY from Korea. I was going to drive her into Manhattan to work on the Upper East Side and then head up to Westchester. When the first plane hit, we all thought it was a horrible accident- I thought it was like some private guy who had a Thurman Munson-like accident. On the way in to work, we could see the smoke coming from the towers from Queens Boulevard, and it honestly looked like a big chimney a few hundred yards away (That’s how large the WTC was- dominated the skyline), billowing a big black cloud of smoke. 

When we got to Ann’s office at Rockefeller University, I accompanied her upstairs, which was something I never did before. Everyone was watching TV, in shock. We saw the second plane hit on live TV. I remember the commentators not saying anything initially, and then another talking head describing it calmly, I think even saying the word “apparently.”

This went from a terrible accident to realizing I was on the edge of a war zone. We were in a war, and worse, in a battle zone. They are flying effing airplanes into the effing world trade towers. We have to get out of here. Then word comes that the Port Authority is closing bridges into Manhattan. Ann  wanted to stay at the office- she was afraid for her parents’ plane and wanted to be where she could be reached by phone. 

I wanted no part of sticking around. If the bridges were closed, we could be stranded. 

What would happen next? 

What would they do to the subways? What if the destruction continued uptown? Were there planted agents with suitcases of gas ready to blow in buses or crowded buildings? I remember thinking about these things. 

The very first (and last) time I ever gave Ann a direct order was to get out of the building with me. I suddenly wondered if this was the feeling my dad felt when he was a GI overseas. I think what convinced her to come was that she couldn’t reach her aunt in Chinatown on the phone- maybe they had already sabotaged the phones. And she wasn’t going on the subway after this. Ann’s last protest was that the bridges were closed, but I told her the Port Authority bridges were closed, not all bridges. We’d take the 3rd Avenue Bridge and drive through the Bronx. 

Our cell phones didn’t work (it would take Verizon months to restore the phones in lower Manhattan as a matter of fact. I still remember those stupid trailers people had to use), and the highway driving north was empty- I felt like I was in a post apocalyptic movie. But it was real. And we didn’t know what was happening next. If the AM radio didn’t work I don’t know what I’d have thought. 

When we got home to my mother’s house in Ossining There was a test pattern on some channels. My Mom, who lived Pearl Harbor via radio in 1941, just shook her head all day. Ann’s parents, we learned from the airline, were grounded in Minnesota and in a high school gym. 

My older brother called to check in and all Farandas were OK. My nephew, who went to college in Manhattan, was also OK. We were lucky. 

Lucky. 

It was hellish, but not the hell some went through, and I am thankful my loved ones are all intact. 17 or so fellow Villanova alumni died that morning. My brother lost a client who was never found. So we cried with everyone else for weeks, and on September 29, got married in a subdued ceremony, all things considered. 2 days later we boarded a plane for Aruba, and that was strange as well. 

Today I will attend NYSAR BAR camp at the Rye Town Hilton, and live my life and work fully. But I will do it mindful of that day, and thankful that I got the rest of my life. I will never forget, and I hope we end the threat somehow. It still feels raw to walk myself through my memories of that time, especially those black clouds in the distance, framed against an idyllically blue sky. 

With a median home price hovering near $700,000, even a modest price reduction on a Westchester County home can be tens of thousands of dollars. I have to approach a reduction with the diplomacy of a funeral director but be as convincing as a physician imploring his patient to quit smoking. 

No one could predict after the stimulus where prices would go, but it is clear that what few buyers we have are skimming the absolute cream off the top and leaving the rest. They even fight over the good stuff, creating an illusion of urgency in isolated precincts. Overall, sadly, median home price is an illusion; it is a metric of the value of those few, unique sought after homes that people watch even when they weren’t on sale. They needed nothing. They were priced to the bone for their category. 

Money lost in a price reduction was never your money. It was an illusion. It didn’t exist. I find myself, more and more, explaining to mournful sellers that the $25,000 that went down the drain when they went from $624,900 to $599,900 was a paramour that never loved them. She never cared, Johnny. The baby wasn’t yours. She wanted to close the Copa and make sure you never worked in this town again. For God’s sake man pull yourself together, it was all an illusion. 

You know, that sort of thing they cover day 2 in licensing class. Or not. 

In 2005, 852 single family homes sold in Westchester County with a median price of $732,000.

In 2010, 424 single family homes sold in Westchester County with a median price of $715,000. 428 people got nothing. 

The pool of able buyers has shrunken by an absurd amount. Millions of prospects have vanished due to either their own disasters or the new draconian lender underwriting guidelines. What few buyers remain are skeptical, drunk with options, terrified of making a mistake, have no confidence in the future, and are heavily invested in the group think notion that they must get a steal or they will be exposed to grave financial risk. You know, all those happy things perspective home buyers have always focused on. 

Here’s the reality: If you are multiple listed, staged well, tidy, and have been on the market for 60 or 90 days with no offers or few lookers, the market has spoken; you need to reduce your price. You aren’t the McClotchkees down at the end of the cul de sac who sold in the first 30 days. They had something, or ten things, you don’t have. And the only adjustment you can make to the buying public is price. A feature ad won’t do it. A newspaper display ad won’t get it done. Busting your agent’s chops to chase down Gladys Pflarphlingston for feedback on a showing 2 weeks ago won’t do it. If you are on the MLS, I can show you how many people have clicked on you online and clicked off every week since we listed. You aren’t a secret. Quite the opposite: with public searches, serious prospects can tell me their opinion of your toothpaste.  

If we are in showing condition with my marketing and you aren’t sold, the faster we address price the faster we’ll sell. The money you are asking for is not on deposit in the bank of buyer opinion.

This market report is for single family home activity in the Ossining school district for August of 2010. All information is derived from the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service. 

The numbers are up, which is encouraging we we distance ourselves from the stimulus. The number of transactions is up 40% from August of 2009 and the median price is up almost $20,000. Encouraging stuff. 

Another fact from the data: For both 2008 and 2009, homes that sold in the first 90 days got a higher percentage of asking price than homes that took over 90 days- about 2% in 2010 and a whopping 4.5% in 2009. Moral of the story: price it right in the beginning and you’ll sell, and sell for more. 2% at a median price of about $400,000 is $8,000!!! There’s your stimulus! Who needs the government? In 2009 the market was awful, but aggressively priced homes still sold fast.

Available inventory is high (150), with lots of choices on the market. 22 homes are under contract, which has been steady since June and bodes well for the coming months. 

Previous postings on Ossining.  

You can search for a home in Ossining by getting yourself a free Listingbook account. 

We got word last week that a past client’s loan modification was approved. As happy and relieved as they were, my beleaguered clients had to swallow a rough pill: on the terms of the approved loan modification, their mortgage payment would be several hundred dollars higher than their original payment. 

It had been a long process. First, they had a job loss which resulted in their initial default. They were in arrears for almost a year before they could overcome the shock and paralysis and make any headway on a loan modification. All the while they worked like dogs at anything they could find before thankfully re entering the workforce. The trial payments, which were several hundred dollars less then their original payment, started immediately on application to the HAMP process.

It took 10 more months, and they made their trial payments religiously. They were issued a denial once because they allegedly missed payment, which the court referee threw back after given proof all payments were in fact made on time. When the approval came through, it was the same rate and term, and the arrearage was added to the principle, resulting in a higher payment than even their original loan. The bank basically negatively amortized the loan and hit the reset button. 

In their case, they were in a take it or leave it situation; ironically, getting a better job knocked them out of the HAMP program, and the modification was due to the lender’s largess, not the government’s. Since their issue was an inability to write a check for tens of thousands (50k+) of dollars to reinstate and not the amount of their payment, they are going to take it. The only issue they’ll have going forward is if they lose a job again, but that makes them no different than anyone else. 

A few observations:

• Even for sophisticated, educated people with college degrees, the loan mod process is complicated and grueling. 
• Bank staff does little to make the process understandable, probably because in large part the staff themselves don’t get it. 
• If the red tape and vagaries are this much of an ordeal for educated professionals, it must be UberHell for people who aren’t. 
• It is no wonder the re-default rate is so high. People stagger across the finish line and collapse, even in the best of scenarios. 

On the whole in this case however, my people will not lose their house. Disaster was averted. This is one listing I am glad to not get. 

I got this idea from Terry Hunnefeld from the old Goldrush program in the mid 1990’s. Terry was a Grand Rapids based broker who has since merged with By Referral Only. This was my first foray into Direct Response Marketing, and it does indeed make the phone ring, and that is the first step. 

A few things to note:

• The disclaimer is right on top, which is necessary for compliance. 
• The USP, or Unique Selling Proposition, is gutsy and radically different from what people are getting from other agents. 
• The card itself is not fancy, and almost looks handwritten and again, separates you from other mailers which try to be glitzy and impressive.
• If prices in your market area are lower than they are here, make the amount $500. 

 Here’s the small print, given at the listing presentation on company letterhead: 

1. Home has to be priced at a recommended 60-day market price mutually agreed upon by agent and seller. 
2. Home MUST be shown to all reasonable requests- denying a reasonable showing request invalidates the guarantee because it could lose the buyer we were supposed to have. 
3. If an offer that results in a closed sale is not promulgated within 60 days of going on market and the above 2 conditions are met, the amount will be deducted from the commission at closing when the house does sell. 

When I started in real estate in 1996, one of the things my mentor gave me was a dog eared book with a bald guy on the cover wearing a brown suit and pinky ring. 

The book was entitled “List More, Sell More,” and the author, Jerry Bresser, is a legend among real estate trainers. I did not judge the book by the cover; I read it and made the philosophy my mantra: if you want to make a high income in this business, you have to list more properties. The book is out of print; Bresser still sells it, and you can buy it used on Amazon for a lot of money. I own 2 copies. 

“List More, Sell More” was written in 1983, so it did not take into account the possibility of other business models, such as exclusive buyer agencies. If you run an EBA, my thoughts don’t apply. But if you work with sellers or want to, here’s the deal: You’ll make more sales, build a larger team, and build a bigger operation if you have a strong inventory of listings.The more listings you have, typically the more money you’ll make. And as Barbara Todaro (Thanks, BTW, for inspiring me to finish the draft) recently pointed out, if you focus on listings, your time becomes more your own. Working with a buyer means your time in that moment is singular. Working with listings duplicates your time and replicates income. 

I’m not knocking working with buyers; we need  them. I still work with buyers, but I have never made it my primary focus. If you like working with buyers, great. Work with buyers. And if you want to take your operation to the next level, you’ll get more buyers and make more sales if you increase your listing inventory. You can’t really have a store if there is nothing on the shelves, and the firms with the most signs in the yards around here have the largest market share. 

Imagine working with a buyer for 6 hours on a rainy Saturday. You get home tired and soggy. They found nothing worth buying, and you made nothing. You have hope, though, that you’ll sell them something. 

Now imagine working with a buyer for 6 hours on a rainy Saturday. You get home tired and soggy. They found nothing worth buying, and you made nothing. Or so you think- because on your fax are two offers on 2 different listings of yours. You now have more than hope! You have INCOME, 2 happy sellers, and lucrative work to do on converting the offers into closings. 

OK, let’s suppose there are no offers. You are still soggy. But believe me, there will be buyer inquiries on your listings! You work for buyers. But listings in many ways work for you. It is that simple. And you are protected for your commission, no matter what. Show me an agent with 15-20 listings, and I’ll show you a person who is not leaving the business anytime soon because they can’t make money. 

It might be difficult at first, and getting over the initial hump is always the rub for an independent, but let me tell you- when a prospective seller tells you that they’ve seen your sign before, you have reached critical mass. And there is no exhilaration like building your own brand. There is also no greater feeling of momentum than planting YOUR sign in the yard of a referral from a happy seller whose home you listed successfully. 

Feel free to contact me with any questions, and we have plenty of openings in my Expired Listing Mastermind group. 

Happy Labor Day. I’ll be working with a buyer later today, but all of my listings are working for me 24/7. 

This is for single family home activity in the Briarcliff Manor school district for August of 2010. All information is derived from the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service. I decided to mix things up a little this month and see if I could compare this past August with the previous Augusts going back to the peak of 2005. 

Compared to August 2009, Briarcliff Manor sales volume is down by 2 deals, but the median price, which had nowhere to go but up, grew by $118,000. 2008 must have been an anomaly, as the peak in 2005-2006 had median prices in the low 900’s. 

16 Homes are currently under contract with a median asking price of $839,000. 

There are 49 available home in inventory with a median asking price of $865,222. 

Well, no real trend. Days on market are longer, and prices are lower. No surprises there. But it is interesting to look back. 

Previous posts on Briarcliff Manor.  

If you’d like to search for a home in Briarcliff, get yourself a free Listingbook account and search the MLS like an agent. 

This is more for brokers and owners of independent firms like myself, but if others find it helpful, use it. 

Maybe I’m a total goober for not having fancy software to run my company, but that’s another post. Our setup is probably unorthodox; Ann is typically at home, Ronnie, my admin, is at the office from 9-5, and I’m…everywhere. I have a Netbook which enables access to the Internet from anywhere- my car, a client or prospect’s house, or a diner. 

Cloud computing, or utilizing web-based programs instead of saving everything to one hard drive, benefits our model immensely because we all have access to the same data. Our product of choice is FREE- Google docs. All Google docs are roughly analogous to Microsoft Office, and while they are not as robust, they are free. And they do the job. Better than Office, they have a great filing system. 

All you need is a Google account, and you have access to all word documents, spreadsheets, forms, and plenty of other applications. Here are a few of the things we use daily:

• All messages are recorded on a spreadsheet. Every phone call is recorded and we have notes and color codes to denote status of the matter at hand.
• All buyers and sellers have a spreadsheet checklist. 
• All company forms– memos, offers, and letters, are saved in documents.
• We track the status of all transactions in the Spreadsheet program.
• We track the marketing steps (MLS, photos, signs, lockboxes, syndication) in Spreadsheets. 
• All files can be organized by type, labels, stars, and personal folders. Personalize it as you wish.
• Every agent on the team has a file.  

There’s plenty more, but I think you get the drift. All documents are password protected and sharable between our respective Google accounts. If I create a file, you can’t read or edit it unless I share it with you. All changes occur in real time- I have been on the messages folder and watched someone edit it miles away.

The race goes to the swift. We might eventually get web based Top Producer or some other more feature-rich system but thus far, Google Docs have made a huge difference for us, and, I believe, put me on the same footing as any firm with it’s own proprietary software. We dropped Showing Desk years ago in large part because of it (and CSS). I can’t think of a time where a ball has been dropped because we weren’t organized enough. This has enabled us to track transactions, prospects and many other crucial operations smoothly. 

So, to all my fellow independent broker-owner managers out there, here it is. Google docs are free, can be personalized, and save automatically. You’ll love the ROI. 

In all the panic about the drop in sales nationally this past July, few news outlets made much mention of the fact that Westchester’s real estate market went up. Now that August is past, how did we do as a follow up? 

Good question. In short, the answer is “steady.”

In July 2010, there were 449 closings with a median sales price of $799,000. 

In August 2010, there were 424 closings with a median sales price of $715,000. 

In August of 2009, there were 430 closings with a median sales price of $644,250. 

From July to August of 2010, transaction totals were down 5.6%. That median sales price of $799,000 was utterly unsustainable; $715,000 is still remarkably robust.

Comparing this August to last August is more relevant in my view, as the business is cyclical. Transaction totals are down just 2% from a year ago at this time, and median price is up a whopping 11%. 

Overall, there has not been much of a drop in transactions worth speaking of, and values are steady if not healthy. But in historical terms were are still in a malaise. 

Some context: at the peak of the market locally in the summer of 2005, the August totals were 852 transactions (which is why we call it a “peak”) and the median sales price was $732,500. In August of 2000, there were 752 transactions with a median price of $447,000. 

Westchester is doing better than most areas, overall.  But there are still plenty of people hurting. Those 300-400 sales not being made are rough on the sellers, many of whom are distressed. 

Note: all information is taken from the Westchester-Putnam MLS and is for single family home sales only. 

Out of area phone calls could be anyone- a bank negotiator, out of town prospect, or a client on a business trip, so I answer. 

I saw something today I never witnessed before. It happened when I was covering a home inspection for one of my agents (Yes- I know. What a great guy I am).  A home inspector brought the buyer onto the roof to show him something. I was so surprised to see this that I snapped a picture of it on my phone. Now, this was the first time I ever met the inspector. He was a sharp guy, handled the buyer’s 3-year old son like a champ, and from everything I saw made a thorough, straight inspection. He even had one of those infrared thingies that can detect moisture and rodents in the walls. He really was very good in every other way. 

However, I know inspectors who wouldn’t go up on a roof themselves. It’s part of risk management. I have often said that New York is a shark tank of liability, and many inspectors don’t feel it wise to climb up there, opting instead to making a visual inspection , even using binoculars. But they don’t go up there. 

We can argue whether or not that is right or wrong, but I have never seen an inspector take a buyer up there with him. The buyer is a young guy, ostensibly fit, flexible, and coordinated. But gravity is gravity, and I really wonder if the inspector’s insurance, let alone the home owner, would be comfortable with such a thing. 

I am not trying to give the inspector a hard time, or impugn his judgement, but I really do have to wonder if that move is very wise. 

OK, maybe Nietzsche is a little bit heavy for breakfast, but the theme of many blog posts I have read lately from my colleagues around the country is that this industry, which was never a walk in the park, is a real test of endurance, strength, and fortitude on both a physical and mental level.

When I was on the college rowing team we had a race with Princeton University, which was a far higher calibre of program. They were Ivy League, which is the top of the heap in crew. We were a club. The race was at Carnegie Lake in Princeton, New Jersey, and we got pasted. This was not unexpected. What I recall even more vividly than the whooping we got was the message on the bright orange T-shirt every Princeton oarsman wore that day: 

That Which Hurts Me Only Makes Me Stronger

Our T-shirts said things like “Villanova Basketball” and “Nike.” Our coach was furious with us after my boat’s race, not because we lost, but because we didn’t row well. And instead of going straight back to campus, we stayed on that nice lake and had a rare, post race practice session. It hurt. Our boat made the finals of the Dad Vail Regatta (small program championships) later that spring, where we missed a bronze medal by a few feet. In doing so, we beat several other crews whom we lost to earlier in the season. Not bad for a club program. 

Hopefully, that is a lesson that will carry over. 

We work long hours, fight more buyer resistance, seller grief, and lender red tape than probably anytime in modern history. Transactions are mine fields, not the rocky, negotiable paths they once were. We are travelling that field of peril  while multi tasking with new regulations, new technologies, and unpredictable news which can scuttle the already fragile mindsets of those whose cooperation we desperately need. Some clients are unreasonably obstinate; other are paralyzed with fear; getting both buyer, seller, lender and two lawyers to cooperate in a transaction is like conducting a symphony on a high wire these days, yet we have to keep our cool. 

The industry was already one rife with rejection, competition,  and the odd unscrupulous agent. Now we have, thanks to layers of meltdowns, burst bubbles, collapse of massive institutions, recessions and a shell-shocked public to deal with an unknown frontier to conquer. And you thought getting a real estate license was a good idea. 

Anyone who can survive and thrive in this environment will prosper incredibly when stability (and, I’ll whisper: prosperity) returns. They also have my respect. 

If you are a consumer, consider these things when choosing your advocate.

If you are a licensee, take heart. 

This too shall pass, and we’ll be the better for it.