Yorktown is a large town in northern Westchester County served by both the Yorktown and Lakeland School districts. It is one town over from our office and in the heart of our company coverage area. I have heard it characterized as idyllic suburbia, and I agree. We have just helped a buyer put a house under contract in Yorktown and they are scheduled to close next month.  

This data is for the Yorktown school district only and is taken from the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service. It compares the sales of single family homes from September of 2010 to September of 2009.

Last month, I wrote the following: 

…prices are on a downward trend in Yorktown. When prices do fall, transactions will bounce back. We just got an accepted offer in Yorktown this past week, and it was a tough time getting the sellers to accept the buyer’s offer. There is still some resistance to the downward pressure on pricing. Human nature I suppose, but when sellers adjust they’ll move. Until then, they wait.

After a poor showing last month, Yorktown bounced back with 15 closings, doubling last month and higher than September 2009 by 3. Values are down $70,000 from a year ago, which is to be expected, but at least the public responded to the lower prices- witness the 19 homes under contract at a median price of $350k. As prices drop, buyers are acting, as I conjectured.  

To check out the 137 available properties Yorktown has to offer, register yourself for a free Listingbook account. 

Croton on Hudson is the village directly north of Ossining. It is a very charming locale on the Hudson with parks, great neighborhoods, and a large train station hub on the Metro North Hudson Line. My older brother and his family also live there. I used to camp at Croton Point Park as a Boy Scout, and I have many happy memories of the place. In the near future I’ll blog about some great places to dine in Croton.  

This market report is for single family homes in the Croton-Harmon school district. All data is from the Westchester-Putnam MLS. Last month stunk. This month was much better. 

Croton had 8 closings in September at a median price of $459,000, doubling the number of sales from a year before, and at a $84,000 higher median price. Very strong. 13 homes are under contract, and 65 are available for sale. The disparity between asking price of the contracted homes ($420,000) and those available ($598,000) speaks to some lofty expectations of the unsold. If asking prices come down some, watch for even healthier numbers. 

To find your dream home in Croton, get yourself a free Listingbook account. 

Previous posts on Croton on Hudson

There is one rather immutable truth to real estate: if you write a commission check, you are at a closing table selling your property. 

Which, I believe, is the point. Closing. 

Often, when listing a For Sale By Owner (most end up listing), I am asked what happens if someone who expressed interest while the home was a FSBO buys after I list the home. My answer is that if they didn’t buy then, but do buy now, then I have done my job. 

Getting them to buy is what the agent is paid for. If the seller could get them to buy, they wouldn’t need me. Just because they saw it with the owner first it doesn’t mean anything. We aren’t paid for getting people first, we are paid for getting people to the closing table. 

In other words, outcome. Results. 

Upon occasion, I will grant a seller an exclusion on certain buyers– it can be a neighbor, it can be someone who is trying to sell their place so they can buy now, or any other sort of buyer. My exclusions are not an exemption from commission, and here’s why: an offer is just a beginning. It is work and skill to affect a closing. If I gave my seller client a 0% commission for an excluded buyer, a complete exemption, then it is THEY who will have to be the agent, not me, because I can’t hold that buyer’s hand for 2-3 months for no compensation. 

If the seller client wants to handle pre-qualification, offer, negotiation, contracts, inspection, mortgage process title and closing alone on their own, they invite disaster. I never want to be in competition with a client, nor do I want to wait unpaid on the sidelines while they engage in a Do It Yourself project on the biggest transaction of their life to save a few points. A saved line item is often at a cost of a lower net, and that is not conjecture- it is a fact. I’m better than someone selling their own house. 

Exclusions make sense when a predetermined buyer comes in early in the process, saving the listing agent time and marketing resources and all parties can just do the work from offer forward to closing. There is no buyer agent to pay, and a reduction in fees can be negotiated. However, an elimination of fees altogether is penny wise and pound foolish- too much can go wrong. You want a professional working for you, and no professional can work for free. What good is “saving” the commission if it doesn’t close?  

I know I’ll hear dissent on this post, but it is my belief that the buyer agent (or listing for that matter) attending an appraisal is a waste of time in most cases. I have had situations where the borrower themselves wanted to go, and after they were ignored by the appraiser, who left 10 minutes after arrival, they turned to me and wondered aloud why the event was so, well, uneventful. 

We don’t play a part. 

I received a phone message today from a listing agent telling me that she was upset that I did not accompany an appraiser to their inspection this morning. I don’t want to ruffle her feathers, but other than opening the door, I serve no purpose. As a matter of fact, most appraisers would like to be left alone to do their job without me to contend with. In New York, appraisers are licensed and insured. They are MLS members and do not need supervision. They take pictures, measure, and leave. On average, appraisals I have attended for a regular starter home of 1500-2000 square feet take about 15 minutes or less. 

I have nothing against attending if nothing else is scheduled, but I don’t see how it helps except in rare cases, such as in a short sale. Given their rather mundane nature compared to a home tour or home inspection, I would characterize appraisals as more of a “back of the house” thing than something for public consumption. For example, a diner at a restaurant would not be very helpful in the kitchen (the back of the house), nor would they be viewed as welcome. They would pretty much get in the way. That is how I see my presence at most appraisals. There might be instances where my attendance is helpful or at least not hurtful, but being there for the sale of just being there strikes me as unneeded busy work, and I am busy enough. Appraisers don’t need me to tell them where the basement is. 

Given the local nature of our business, other areas may differ, and there are times when it can make sense. As a general practice in most of my own cases, however, I find that the only beneficiary of my trip is the gasoline companies. 

Would you as listing agent be upset if the buyer agent did not attend the appraisal?

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

There was nowhere to go but up after a very poor August, and we may be looking at a “new normal” for this charming little city on the Hudson. The median price is up from last month but down over $160,000 from September of 2009. Transactions totals are higher, which is a good thing, but the volume of available properties- 81- means there is almost 2 years worth of inventory available, which will suppress prices. 

With 8 pending sales last month, and 4 pending sales this month after the 4 September closings, nothing new has gone into contract in the last month. When your median sales price is less than $200,000 and the median asking price is $279,000, it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that the buying public is still waiting for prices to decrease. I am working on a deal that will add a sale to the hopper and greatly increase the median price, and that is because I have clients who know and love the area. They have good reason- Peekskill is a great place to live and work, and when the buyers wake up to what they can get at these low prices, you’ll see a spike. All markets are cyclical, and I think we are witnessing the calm before a storm of activity. 

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.  

Your business IS our business if you wish to do business. 

Buyers in today’s market are in many ways in the driver’s seat in the purchase of real estate. However, they answer to a lender prior to closing, and in the case of cooperatives in New York, they also have to pass the board application process. Since a co op transaction typically lasts 90-120 days in our market, sellers are rightfully cautious about tying their home up in contract with a buyer who either can’t get financing or pass the board. Therefore, they do more homework than usual; a pre approval is just a start. 

Co op boards often have requirements that are above the procurement of financing. Buyers can expect many standards to meet, such as: 

• Minimum down payment
• Minimum income
• Minimum credit score
• Debt to income ratio threshold
• Post closing liquidity requirement

Therefore, there is plenty that must be ascertained about a buyer before singing contracts and waiting for them to get financing and board approvals over a period of months. Mistakes can cost a third of a year. The seller has a vested interest in the buyer getting approved, and has every right to ask for asset and income statements, credit scores, and even tax returns along with the lender pre approval.

Here’s one from the other side of the closing table, where I represented buyers on a 5-month odyssey to purchase a short sale in Yonkers. It made me appreciate the waiting game that buyers must endure, and how valuable status updates are to home purchasers of a short sale in order to stay engaged and committed to the purchase. Buyers need to be updated to, among other things, time their mortgage application, appraisal, and rate lock.

Note that I did not say anything about ordering title work. Title work in a short sale MUST be ordered by the seller’s attorney in the beginning to ensure there are no 3rd party liens that might scuttle the sale later on. 3rd party judgments and liens are common in default properties because when there is financial hardship, there are other bills than the mortgage that go unpaid.

The home my clients sought to purchase was perfect for them- a recent build on a dead end street with a good location for their commute to work. Things on the seller’s side were not organized from what I could see, until I made substantive contact with the seller’s attorney, who entered negotiations later in the game when a private 3rd party hired to negotiate the short sale was sacked mid-process. I can’t judge their circumstances, only the scenery from our point of view. From contract signing in May until August, everything seemed to be in limbo.

In early August, the seller’s attorney spearheaded negotiations. The short sale was approved in late September with terms the seller could live with. We closed September 29, which was a nice anniversary gift. His communication with me was crucial to my buyer clients’ management of their mortgage financing. When they were ready, we were ready. No delays, no snafus, minimal drama.

This was a unique file in that I had a direct line of communication with the seller’s attorney, which brokers seldom have. Typically, I would deal with a listing agent, but that agent would be the conduit to their attorney. But the bottom line here is that the attorney’s involvement was indispensable, and the communication with our side affected a successful outcome. New York is different from many states where an attorney is not part of the process. But in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey, it is clear to me through experience that without an attorney closely involved in the short sale, the closing may not succeed.

(originally posted at New York Short sale Blog)

Yonkers is the largest city in Westchester County with a population hovering near 200,000. It borders the Bronx to the south, Mt Vernon and Bronxville to the east, and Hastings and Scarsdale to the north. It has some fantastic Hudson waterfront all along the western border. It is also the former home of my parents, who both lived on McLean Avenue when they were dating in the 1940s. My father graduated from Roosevelt High school on Tuckahoe Road in 1938.

What does 550,000 buy in Yonkers these days? We recently had a buyer close on a 2004-built 2 family brick home on a cul de sac for $555,000. It originally went on the market in 2005 for $900,000. How times have changed. The home has separate utilities, including heat, two 3-bedroom 2 bath apartments, each with its own balcony with a stunning view of the city, and a finished basement. Other nice characteristics include central air conditioning, hardwood floors and Andersen windows. It was a short sale and took 5 months to close, and we’ll most likely help the owners grieve their taxes to a lower amount given the high assessment. 

The home is located near Sacred Heart and Gorton High School, with North Broadway and many other city conveniences in close proximity. 

If you’d like more information about Yonkers real estate, remember it is a family affair with us, and we have deep ties there. I actively sell there and a free Listingbook account will allow you to search the MLS for Yonkers homes.

I got an email this morning from a well meaning associate about a draconian tax on real estate transactions supposedly due to start in 2013, and of course the editorial message of the email decries President Obama, Speaker of the House Pelosi, Harry Reid,and the rest of the Democratic leadership. The email has an image of a newspaper story from a paper I never heard of (The Spokesman-Review of Spokane, Washington) which must be included, I guess, for legitimacy.  No liberal am I, but if we are going to decry any politician on the right or left, I think it should be for something that is true. 

Here is the link to the Snopes.com entry on the email, which specifies that there will be no 3.8% tax on real estate transactions in 2013 or any other year for that matter. A federal tax on transactions in this age of short sales and negative equity would result in the storming of the Bastille and is antithetical to anyone who wants to remain in office. You just can’t do it. Guess what? They aren’t. 

Currently, New York state has one of the absolute highest transfer taxes in the nation: .04%, or $1,600 on a $400,000 sale. Yes: less than half of 1%. For the federal government to impose a tax that is on a scale of a real estate commission it would mean they are increasing the New York transfer tax by almost tenfold. Absurd, and untrue.

Snopes indicates that a tax is proposed on high earners on investment income over extremely high thresholds, I wouldn’t be in favor of that tax either, but if you are selling your $250,000 home in Pflugerville or Shamokin, you will not have to pay Uncle Sam an additional $9,200. 

Update: The National Association of REALTORS has published clarification on why the myth is misinformation. 

I still love helping buyers. I don’t do it as much as I used to because I am running the company and most buyer requests are given to my very good team of agents who give great service. Our buyers get their own Listingbook account for MLS home searches, automatic email updates when a home that fits their criteria hits the market, and of course many of my buyers look on other websites also.  

There is one thing that perplexes me about some buyers that I haven’t been able to quite figure out. In speaking with colleagues I am not alone in this. I am not sure if they do this exactly on purpose or not, but it seems like they do: While searching for a home online, they find a home of interest. So far so good. Then, they must immediately turn their computers off without writing anything down or bookmarking the property and call me with sparse information on the house they just saw, and I have to triangulate the sketchy details they vaguely recall to figure out what listing it is, often in my car! They might remember a town, a price, maybe a street, or even a physical description. But no address or MLS number, and certainly no email to the link. 

Now it seems to me that just about every home search site out there has a means of bookmarking a favorite property or emailing it to your agent. And if it doesn’t you can always write down the address or MLS number. But all too often, I’ll get a call on my mobile phone while I am driving from a buyer who wants to see the green house in Thornwood by the church near that big rock with all those trees in the yard. I’m exaggerating of course, but the ID of a property should never be that hard if you just saw the thing online. Write it down, email it, get a photo of your computer screen with the digital camera, whatever it takes, but help me help you! If you email it, even by right clicking and copying the link in an email to me, it will get me the needed information without having to reconstruct what you did to find it. And the less detective work I have to do, the better I can help.

So, to all you buyers that call your agent (often in their cars) with less than full information on the property as if we are wizards (we do have the MLS after all), please just do us this one teensy favor: write it down or email the thing to us so we can do less detective work, keep safe in our cars, and devote more resources toward advocating for you. 

If you get a free Listingbook account you can notify me of the properties you like effortlessly!