At Better Homes And Gardens Real Estate Innovations, we’ve got a great recipe for success when it comes to house hunting in the coming fall.

Today, we’re adding a little incentive for you to come out and see what we mean.

If you come to any of our open houses in October or November, you will be entered to win the latest edition of the Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook.

What better way to take your family into the holidays than by cooking up a recipe from this classic cookbook’s 16th edition.

We’ve got a great recipe for success.

And who knows, you might even find the home of your dreams while you’re at it.

If you’re considering making a change with your home, we would love to help.

If you have any other questions or would like more information, feel free to give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you soon.

A lot of Central Iowa homebuyers are frustrated right now. Certain segments of the market are on fire, and they aren’t able to get into homes fast enough. As a result, they feel they don’t have very many homes to choose from.

There may still be hope if you use the backup offer strategy.

In the past, once a home went under contract, there’s very little chance for a competing buyer to get their foot in the door. Once the seller had chosen another buyer’s offer, typically they made it to the closing table with no problems.

However, in those super hot segments of the market, we are seeing a higher fallout rate. Why is that?

First of all, many buyers feel like they need to make a quick decision in those market segments or they will lose the home. As a result, it’s very common for people to make offers on a home without fully vetting the property to make sure it’s the right home for them.

If the first deal falls apart, the seller has your offer to fall back on.

Secondly, multiple offer situations really drive up the price of a home. Buyers then have very high expectations of how that home will perform during the inspection. Buyers and sellers have a hard time agreeing what condition the property should be in, which has led to a number of deals falling apart after the home inspection.

Having a backup offer in place puts pressure on that first offer. If for any reason that deal falls apart, the seller would much rather go to your offer than go through the hassle of putting the home on the market again. Plus, since you have a backup offer in place, the seller may be more willing to let the first deal fall apart.

Not all agents can navigate the ins and outs of the backup offer, but we work hard at honing our skills in order to give our buyers the edge in this competitive market.

If you have any questions about this strategy or anything else, just give us a call or send us an email. Remember, if we choose your question for one of our upcoming videos, you’ll get a free subscription to Better Homes and Gardens magazine.

We look forward to hearing from you!

The Iowa Finance Authority is holding a great sweepstakes right now. You could win $2,500 in cash or in down payment assistance!

The Iowa Finance Authority is a state-sponsored entity that promotes homeownership, which is so important to my team and I. The IFA also has a number of great programs available for down payment assistance and mortgages.

Write my name in as your Realtor to get an extra chance at that $2,500!

If you want two chances to win, simply write my name in as your Realtor. You can enter the contest HERE.

Don’t wait too long—the contest only runs through the month of August!

Whether you are buying a home for the first time or making a change, this is a great chance to win some money towards your dream home.

If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us. In the meantime, go ahead and enter. We hope that someone who knows our team wins this opportunity. Good luck!

As a home seller, how do you know which offer to pick in a multiple offer situation? 

If you're moving, these three tips should help you out quite a bit:

1. Don't pick a peak day to move: In the central Iowa market, Fridays and Saturdays are the peak days, as well as the 1st, 30th, and 31st of each month.

2. Pack smart: You can read about some great moving hacks here. They'll help you plan, organize, and execute the process of getting all your belongings together efficiently. On top of these hacks, you should try to take the emotion out of packing. It's hard to avoid taking a trip down memory lane when you pack your stuff, but try to save it for when you're in your new place.

Avoid moving on peak days if at all possible.

3. Use our moving truck: This is a big advantage to working with us. We'll even give you the manpower to help you move things. Our truck isn't some rickety old truck either; it's shiny and new!

If you're thinking about making a move and need to buy and or sell a home, give us a call or send us an email. We'd love to help!

My team is on the lookout for a good Home Selling Specialist. Joining us comes with many advantages and opportunities.  

Today I have some important news to share—my team is in the process of hiring a Home Selling Specialist.

Home Selling Specialists are a highly valued member of my team. In this position, your job is to meet face to face with our sellers and help them strategize pricing, value, what kind of marketing approach is appropriate to take for their goals, and guide them through the process of a successful sale and closing.

There are three tremendous advantages of being a Home Selling Specialist with my team.

The first is our unparalleled marketing. With exposure on radio, television, and many Internet enhancements, our sellers have the exposure to help them get top dollar for their home in the shortest amount of time.

The second is our amazing operations team. Instead of spending your time as a courier putting up signs or as an administrative assistant filling out forms, we provide that service for you so that you’re able to leverage your time for the highest-producing activity—selling!

There are tremendous advantages to being a Home Selling Specialist on my team.

The third is a guaranteed, steady flow of highly qualified seller leads.

We’d love for our ideal candidate to have a real estate license and some real estate experience. However, we’re open to candidates who have experience in related industries, such as insurance or mortgage. It’s extremely important that our Home Selling Specialist enjoys working with numbers, analyzing data, and coming to conclusions to give our sellers good advice.

It’s also important for them to have the ability to have both happy conversations about retaining equity and tough conversations about changing the seller’s expectations, especially when they have a life-changing need such as a death or a divorce that require them to get their home sold in a timely fashion.

If this sounds like something that would be of interest to you—to be able to leverage your time, our amazing marketing machine, and 17 years of real estate sales experience, I’d love to talk. Just click on the “Join Misty’s Team” button on my website to get started.

As always, if you have any real estate questions, I’d love to answer them. We’re here to help!

Before you decide to downsize from your current home, ask yourself these three questions. 

One question we are asked on a pretty regular basis by clients is, “How do I know when the right time to downsize is?” There are some very important questions you need to ask yourself in order to determine this.

1. Can you really live with less space? A lot of empty nesters realize that they don’t need as much space or as many rooms but when it comes down to it, a lot of them aren’t ready to give things up to fit in a smaller space. If you’re not ready to give up some of the luxuries of having a large home, downsizing doesn’t make sense right now.

Can you really live with less space?

2. Are you ready for a truly lower-maintenance lifestyle? Going from a large home to a condo or townhome leaves you with less yard work, less maintenance, and less square footage to take care of. If that sounds like an exciting change in your life, it’s something for you to consider.

3. What kind of equity position do you have on your home? If you are in a great market, the timing might be perfect for you to maximize the equity you will pull out of the home. It might be time for you to talk to us if that is the case.

If you have any questions for us or are looking to buy or sell in Des Moines, give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you.

There tend to be a few common costs that buyers overlook when they purchase their home. Today, I have a full list of these items that will help buyers avoid getting surprised by extra costs. 

When you buy a home, there are some hidden costs that you should be aware of.

While the home shopping process can be exciting, certain costs tend to sneak up on buyers. Here are some key tips to help you be fully informed when buying:

Property taxes. Of your monthly house payments, property taxes are the item that can fluctuate the most during the lifetime of your mortgage. That's why it's important to pay attention to the assessed value of your home and the tax rates in the area you chose. If the seller you're buying from did a great job with home renovations but they're not reflected in the assessed value, be prepared for the potential of your property taxes jumping up in the next year or so.

Insurance costs. Many people have a general idea of homeowners insurance based on the value of the home they buy, but some special considerations can greatly affect the costs. For example, acreages that are long distances from a fire station can cause the cost to go up exponentially. Another would be having an in-ground swimming pool. If you have any special circumstances, be sure to check what your insurance agent's rate is.

Many buyers forget to consider extra costs for a new home, like window treatments and installing landscaping.

Utility bills. Here in Iowa when we go from five below to 105 degrees over the course of the year, we really use our heating and cooling systems. It's important to get a sense of the cost of running and maintaining them, and it's very easy for us to get a 12- to 24-month average from a provider. Having that knowledge up front really helps you prepare.

Maintenance costs. We all know there will be maintenance involved—it's part of the fun of owning a new place. There are, however, some things people don't think about as much. Older homes, for example, will have a great, mature landscape with lots of trees and plants, but it can be costly to maintain with watering and other maintenance costs. With newer homes, people often overlook things like the cost of window treatments, landscaping installation, and all the things you need to buy because no one has lived there before.

All these items are very easy to overcome; it's all about having the knowledge up front instead of getting surprised down the road.

If you have any other questions about the costs of homeownership or you're thinking about buying or selling a central Iowa home, just give me a call. I'd be happy to help you!

There is no “right” time to sell your home; however, there are certain factors you can look at to determine what’s best in your specific situation.  

When is the best time to sell your home?

Unfortunately, there’s no straightforward answer to that question. Truthfully (and against a lot of conventional wisdom that suggests a seasonal market), we see homes sell every month of the year in central Iowa.

In cold weather months, there might not be as many active buyers looking at homes, but the buyers that are out there are far more serious. This is because they’re usually driven by life events like a job relocation or the birth of a new baby. Hence, as a home seller during these months, you may not get a higher volume of buyers, but you will get a higher quality of buyers.

"We see homes sell every month of the year in central Iowa."

Another factor to consider in deciding when to sell your home is your level of competition. If you’re deciding between spring, summer, fall, and winter, what will you be up against during those different seasons?

If your house is in a newer neighborhood (e.g., the majority of the homes in the neighborhood were built in the last five to 10 years), one thing you need to be specifically mindful of is how much construction is happening in that area. There are some real advantages for a seller in a newer neighborhood when the builders have slowed down because of weather.

When it comes to helping you make the best decision regarding your home sale, we don’t deal in speculation—we strategize based on many different concrete factors. If you have any questions, feel free to reach out to us. We’re here to help!

One thing that really sets our team apart is that we offer our sellers different listing options when they go to sell their home. One of the most popular options that have been well-received by buyers is the certified pre-owned home program. 

What exactly does that involve? With a certified pre-owned home program, you have your home pre-inspected before you hit the market. We sit down together, go through the inspection, and look at the targeted items that need to be addressed to make your home the most marketable and most appealing to get top dollar. Along with that inspection, we offer a home warranty through HWA for the first 13 months after the buyer has purchased. 

This program has provided amazing peace of mind for our sellers. We find over and over again that one of the most stressful parts of the home selling process isn’t having your home on the market or obtaining that accepted offer; on the contrary, it’s actually all the stuff that happens afterward. This is because after you hit that inspection period, there’s really a second negotiation that occurs. 

"Our program provides peace of mind and negotiating power to our sellers."

We put you as a seller in a position of power instead of weakness when it comes to these negotiations. We have you armed with information in order to eliminate all of these different questions. 

As a buyer, it’s advantageous to know that you’re working with a seller who is diligent enough to take on this expense and all these different projects before they even put the home on the market. The seller, in effect, is presenting you with a move-in ready home. 

We’re the only real estate company that offers this program, and we’re thrilled that it’s been so successful for our clients. If you want to check out some of our certified pre-owned homes, be sure to visit our website.

As always, if you have any other questions, please feel free to give me a call or shoot me an email. I look forward to hearing from you! 

When the time comes to close on your home, your agent will work with many other people to complete the transaction. 

Here in Central Iowa, we see different options that are customary for the closing on your home. Your agent will have a relationship with an escrow company or an attorney’s office that will help with the legal and financial details of the settlement of the home.

What these other people do is assist in calculating the tax proration, assist in verifying that all of the fees have been done correctly on both sides of the transaction, and check if there are any clouds in the title that occur when we get the abstract updated and get the title opinion. They also help coordinate legally what needs to be done in order to clear that up.

"There are many hands involved in determining your closing fee."

These other people assist in calculating the tax proration and verifying that all of the fees are done correctly on both sides of the transaction. They will also check if there are any clouds in the title that occur when we get the abstract updated and get the title opinion." They also generally just make sure that everything was completed legally and in a way that’s going to protect you as a seller.

Whether it’s an attorney or an escrow company that does this, there are similar fees in our market that usually cost anywhere from $250 to $500, depending on who does the service. It’s something to note as an additional cost to anticipate.

If you have any other questions about how this closing fee works, feel free to reach out to me by phone or email. I look forward to hearing from you!