Athens Real Estate Podcast with Justin Woodall

.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; height: auto; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions.  As the spring selling season approaches here in Athens, I would like to share some tips with you on how you can best prepare your home for sale. Hopefully these tips will aid you in selling quickly and for more money.  Declutter: You want your home to be presentable to potential buyers. Instead of having them distracted by collections, antiques, or awards, allow them to see your home for what it is. Someone once proposed the idea to me that 50% of all the things on your shelves should be taken down and stored away when you're preparing to show your home. This is probably a good measure to follow, because you want your house as clean and organized as possible. Clean, Clean, Clean: This is pretty self explanatory. Buyers just like to see clean homes. I might even recommend renting a power washer for the outside of your home.Remodels / Update: There is a lot of new construction being built here in Athens, so to compete with these new homes you may need to spruce up your property a bit. You don't need to spend thousands of dollars, but you might want to consider getting granite counter tops in your kitchen or new hardwood flooring. Kitchen and bathroom remodeling is what buyers like to see, and money spent on those repairs is usually well worth it. New Paint: Repainting the inside and outside of your home is relatively inexpensive, and it usually has a big payoff. Shoot for more neutral colors like earth tones, or light and bright colors because they tend to be inviting to buyers.Landscaping and curb appeal: Curb appeal is still important although most buyers today are on the internet. You may want to plant some new flowers, trim bushes and trees, and perhaps even buy a new front door. A new entryway can really transform the whole look of your house, and it's also a relatively inexpensive project.Hopefully these tips can be valuable to you if you have decided to sell your home in Athens this spring. It's a great time to sell because affordability is on the rise, so we can expect a lot of activity from buyers. Please contact me if you need any assistance with getting your house ready to sell this spring.

.embed-container { position: relative; padding-bottom: 56.25%; height: 0; overflow: hidden; max-width: 100%; height: auto; } .embed-container iframe, .embed-container object, .embed-container embed { position: absolute; top: 0; left: 0; width: 100%; height: 100%; } Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. Today I'm going to be giving a recap of how the Athens real estate market fared in 2014. I know it's a bit late to do this, but we've been incredibly busy so far this year, which is a good sign for our local market. Overall, the market has been improving. Here are some specifics for you: The average sales price rose nearly 10%, and this may be due to the lack of foreclosure sales from a few years ago.  There were 47% fewer foreclosure sales, which is a great sign for our strengthening market. New construction has increased by 13% in 2014 compared to 2013.  Home prices rose by 5% in Clarke County, the numbers of transactions rose, and the amount of new construction went down. Foreclosure sales also fell by 42%.  Oconee County experienced a 4% growth in average sales price, transactions remained steady, and new construction has risen by about 9%. Prices for new construction have also risen by 8%. Foreclosure sales also dropped 41%, which is a good sign of market recovery. Overall we're seeing fewer foreclosures, more homes being built, and the market generally seems to be improving. Now is also a great time to buy with low interest rates and new loan products from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We can refer you to some great lenders if you'd like. If you ever have any questions or need any assistance with Athens real estate, please don't hesitate to reach out to me.

Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. It's come to our attention that many folks in our area don't know what the difference is between home inspections and appraisals. Today, we break these two real estate concepts down for you.Home inspections: These are recommended but not mandatory. An inspection is typically done by the buyer. They will hire an independent person, who does 2 or 3 inspections a day, to take a look at the house you're interested in and make sure there aren't any major problems. It's a thorough evaluation of the house - they will check the thermal and electrical, examine the attic, crawl spaces, under the kitchen sinks, and the roof, among other things. At the end, you'll get a report that tells you everything you need to know about the house. Inspections vary in price, but are typically between $300-$500. Before you get an inspection, ask what the particular company will include in the report. This is a great way to protect yourself from buying a defective home.Appraisals: These are mandatory if you are taking out a loan. An appraisal determines the value of your home or validates the value you want to sell it for. The appraiser will take notes about the various details of your house - such as the number of bedrooms and bathrooms, the size of the rooms, and the overall quality and condition of the home. They will then compare your home to other recently sold properties in your area and come up with a value. They will be sure to make adjustments for the size, age, and condition of your home to get a solid number. Banks order these when you apply for a loan. If you buy in cash, an appraisal is optional. There it is, the many differences between the appraisal and inspection processes. As always, if you need any help with real estate in the Athens area, don't hesitate to give us a call or shoot us an email. We'd be pleased to serve you!

Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. Last video, we talked about Zillow, Trulia, and other home search websites. These sites are great tools or aids in beginning your home search, but that is all they are. They are tools or aids to help you in the home search process and in no way take the place of a real estate agent.  A lot of great homes out there don't even make it to these websites before they go under contract. Just this past month, our team sold 3 of our listings to buyers we were already working with and didn't even have to bother putting them online. This benefits the seller because their home sells at or near list price and within a few days. It also benefited the buyer, as they had the first pick of the great homes we were selling.  If you are a buyer or seller, don't depend on a website to find you your perfect home. You need to contact a good agent so that you can make the most out of your real estate transactions. If you have any questions about these websites or why an agent is your best bet, please give us a call or send over an email. We'd love to discuss the topic with you. 

Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. Today, we want to talk about a few types of long term mortgages that most buyers use when they decide to purchase a house. There are a few different options out there, and depending on your situation, you could get a really nice loan and interest rate in this market. Conventional mortgages are probably the most popular kind. There are a lot of options on this loan as far as down payments go. You can choose to pay 3%, 5%, 10%, or 20% down. The advantage of putting at least 20% down is that you can avoid the private mortgage insurance that you would have to pay with a rate any lower than 20%. There are a few options for mortgages that don't require a down payment. VA loans are for active duty military or veterans. This loan comes with no down payment as a way to thank military members for their service. Another option for a no money down loan is a USDA loan. The catch with a USDA loan is that it has to go towards a rural development property.Nothing in Clark County qualifies, but there are properties close by that do qualify. Give us a call if you are interested in this type of loan and we can let you know where it will work.  One of the other most popular types of loans are FHA loans. They can be obtained with a little lower credit score and you can have this loan with only a 3.5% down payment, with closing costs being rolled in. If you've been thinking about buying, now is a good time. Interest rates are really low, and they will increase soon. Locking in a rate now could save you thousands down the road. If you have any questions at all about mortgages or anything else real estate related, let us know. We'd be glad to help. 

Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. If you have been paying attention to the news recently, you may have heard that Zillow has entered into an agreement to purchase competitor Trulia for $3.5B in stock. These companies make their money by charging Realtors, like us, to become premier agents on their site and to buy ad space. It will be interesting to see what this merger creates, because neither company is profitable, yet their stock prices seem to be high.  These sites are all well and good, but we have a few problems with them that we'd like to let you know about. The first thing to talk about is the "zestimate". The zestimate is a computer generated valuation of a property. The computer uses an algorithm to compute what it thinks a property is worth. We have seen zestimates be right on target, but more often than not we have seen them be way off. Another problem with these sites is that some of their information and data is inaccurate. It's not uncommon for us to get a call from a client about a property they are interested on Zillow, only to find that it has been sold for weeks and is no longer available.  If you want to have an accurate online home search experience, we have a few sites for you to check out. athenshomesearcher.com and athensareahomesearch.com are two sites that you need to visit. They feed directly from the Athens MLS and are more up-to-date and accurate than Trulia or Zillow. A home search website is simply a tool for looking at properties and is in no way a substitute for a real estate agent. The reason we say this is because most of the best deals we get for our clients often happen before a property is even listed. When you can sell a property for a client without having to put it on the market and at the same time help a client buy a property without having to compete with other buyers, it's a win-win for all parties involved. If we can do anything for you, a friend, family, or a co-worker, please feel free to give us a call. We would love to point you in the right direction!

Looking to buy or sell a home in Athens, Georgia? Click here to perform a full home search, or if you're thinking of selling your home, click here for a FREE Home Price  Evaluation so you know what buyers will pay for your home in today's market. You may also call us at (706) 621-6085 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation to answer any of your real estate questions. Why Homes Don't Sell You might have noticed that some homes in Athens seem to sell the second that they hit the market and others can take weeks or months to sell. A lot of this has to do with the real estate agent, and some of it has to do with the communication between the seller and the agent. Last year my team managed to sell 70% of our listings in less than two months, and 80% in less than three months. With this being said, here are a few reasons why homes don't sell: If a home does not show well, it will not sell well. You need to make sure that your home in Athens is in tip-top condition and that it is not in a state of disrepair. If your home is dirty or simply not in good condition, it will still sell, but not for top dollar. Be sure not to forget about landscaping either. The exterior of your home is what draws buyers inside. The price of your home is another crucial factor. You need to have a competitive and attractive price for your home to draw buyers to your property. You should consult an experienced real estate agent that can gauge an accurate price for your home that reflects it's true value and is also consistent with market conditions. If your home isn't marketed aggressively to a large amount of prospective buyers, then it will not sell well. You need a qualified agent with various systems in place to get your home seen by as many people as possible. Another aspect of marketing is hiring a professional photographer to capture great photos of your home. Staging is also important, but if your home looks great online, then buyers will likely come asking for more. These are a few reasons why your home in Athens may not be selling. Every case is different, but I have found that these are common factors for homes not selling. If you're having trouble selling your home in Athens, then please contact me via phone or email. I would love to speak to you personally and figure out what we can do to get your property marketed and sold.