March 2006

Doug and His Friends

March 31, 2006

A couple of weeks ago Sylvia and I found ourselves standing in a homeless encampment off of South Congress with her two brothers, her neice, her ex-sister-in-law, and the homeless residents of this location, who were most gracious hosts. We were there mainly seeking closure. It was 2 days after the death of Sylvia’s oldest [...]

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How Active-to-Pending Ratios define a Hot Market

March 11, 2006

When talking with buyers and sellers lately I spend a lot of time explaining the “Hot Market Factor”. What this means is that when doing a market analysis for a buyer or seller, we are looking at Sold data, but we give much more weight to Active and Pending listings than we would in a [...]

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Austin MLS Sales Stats for January 2006

March 11, 2006

Austin sales continue to be hot in many areas. The graph below shows citywide stats for January Sales. The Average Sales Price for homes in Austin is up 15% from January a year ago. The Median Sales Price is up 12% from a year ago.

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Married 15 Years Today!

March 9, 2006

Sylvia and I have been married 15 years today. She woke me early this morning with the tender, romantic words “sweetie, you need to get up and take out the garbage”. And so I did get up and drag the trashcan to the street. Now isn’t that what marriage is all about?! In 1989 when [...]

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Phone Bills, Newspaper Delivery and Real Estate Commissions

March 8, 2006

I recently received a $700+ phone bill from SBC. About $600 of this was long distance charges for calls to one of our buyers in Germany. SBC billed me $4.99 per minute for these calls. I called to protest and the girl on the phone cheerfully removed all the charges and changed my account so [...]

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Does Typing “Hurry” in MLS Remarks Result in Faster Sale?

March 7, 2006

I came across a listing tonight that has “Hurry! Won’t Last!” typed into the listing remarks. The listing has been on the market 299 Days. Wow, you’d think after a couple of months the agent would remove the comment, since the market has rendered it false. This made me curious. Do comments like these help homes sell faster or [...]

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