"e-Lies"

As professionals, real estate agents are not always perceived as being pillars of guilelessness, probity and honesty.

Unfortunately, there is good reason for this stereotype, although the majority of hard working brokers do their best to be honest and forthcoming.

Let's look at one of the most "stretched" assertions made by well meaning but ignorant, (and some neither well meaning nor ignorant) brokers...

"Our website gets 25,000,000,000 hits a week!"
"We have the second most viewed real estate website in the entire United States"
"Behind Google, Yahoo! and ebay, our website gets the most hits on the planet!"

What they're asserting is almost certainly false. Claims like this are made because buyers, sellers and renters are abandoning traditional print media in droves, and going online to transact their business. These brokers are trying to represent that they have a significant online presence.

Technology, professional web design and massive online marketing is very expensive, and none but the largest firms can realistically put forth a first class website that actually draws visitors and qualified customers to their content (i.e. your listing). It is simply too expensive for small and medium sized companies to create, maintain, and most importantly, continuously promote a first class website.

Your property will sell faster and for more money when more buyers are exposed to the property. If you don't know why this is true, you can review the reasons here. Since almost 80% of New York buyers begin their search on the Internet, it behooves you to put a professionally produced webpage of your property in front of those eyeballs.

This is really the big-time. I can't stress it enough. "Part 1" of the real estate business is now conducted on the Web in New York City. Don't be fooled by the fact that listings are shared among all the firms electronically. This is true, but it has nothing to do with your web exposure to the buyers themselves. (Exposure of your listing to the most qualified people is what I mean by "Part 1" of the real estate business. "Part 1" is everything that happens up until contact is made between a qualified buyer and the broker. "Part 2" is the actual sales process, and make no mistake; this is where the quality of the individual broker you use comes into play.)

So how do you separate the wheat from the chaff about website traffic claims?

1. Go to the website yourself and poke around. You don't need a lesson on what looks schlocky.
2. Carefully read the literature the broker gives you, if any. Web "hits" and "visitors" are two different things. One "visitor" can "hit" the website hundreds of times and it's still only one person.
   
3. Ask about international Web exposure and statistics. In New York, there are many buyers in other countries.

Summary:
Real estate today is most effectively promoted on the Web. Roughly 4 out of 5 qualified buyers begin their search on the Web, and during the buying process more than 90% of buyers use the web at some point in their search. As a seller you want to be on that Web, and you want to be in the most likely place those buyers will find you. If you want to find out more, let me know.

Reach me at: michael.sussilleaux@gmail.com

"Skin"

In the context of real estate, "skin" means commitment.

Here's an example to clarify the concept. Put yourself in the position of the owner of a small but successful 50 seat restaurant. Money comes in from your customers, but don't forget that you have expenses as well. Expenses like food, staff and overhead. If your restaurant is full, you make money; if it's empty you lose money.

You receive a phone call in the middle of the week from someone who says they are having an event for 50 people two weeks from Saturday, and want to reserve the whole restaurant from 7:00 p.m. through 10:00 p.m.

There are some things to consider. If you have a full house, you are guaranteed to make a lot of money. On the other hand, what if the alleged party of 50 does not show up at all? Your restaurant will be empty! You can't accept regular dinner reservations for that Saturday, because you need to keep all your tables available for the big party. You will be in a position where you will not have any "Plan B", and you will lose a lot of money.

In real life any successful restaurant would require that a substantial deposit be paid in advance for such a big party to protect the restaurants' interests against exactly this circumstance. In other words, the customer has to put some "skin" in the deal to demonstrate their commitment to the transaction and to provide some insurance to the other party.

In legitimate real estate transactions, no one gets something for nothing. A while back I represented a Seller who was selling a small $2,000,000 mixed-use building on a major Avenue. ("Mixed-use" means there's retail space on the street level and apartments above) One day I received the following offer:

The Buyer offered $10,000 down on the full price of $2,000,000 and would finance 500,000 of the purchase price with a third party lender. The Buyer wanted the Seller to finance the other $1,490,000 and provide a $600,000 cash credit at closing to cover the Buyer's closing costs. Yes, you read that correctly; a $600,000 cash credit, which simply means "give me $600,000".

Let's go through this fascinating proposition step by step.

1. The Seller owned the building outright, so there was no outstanding mortgage.
2. The Seller would have to pay the Buyer $600,000 to cover the Buyer's "costs".
3. The Seller would have to finance $1,490,000 for the Buyer.
   
4. If the Buyer defaults on their loan payments, the Seller would get control of the property, but there is still the $500,000 stake that the third party lender now holds in the building plus the $600,000 the Seller gave the Buyer plus all the closing costs on the Sellers' side.
   

On the other hand the Seller receives a $10,000 down payment.

Were this proposal accepted, the Buyer would in essence "buy" the $2,000,000 building for $10,000, or 1/2 of one percent of the asking price, AND receive $600,000 in cash to cover "expenses"! Can you see that there's no "skin" put in the deal on the Buyers' side?

Needless to say the Seller rejected the offer in its entirety.

Summary:
Simply put, "Skin" is akin to the risk of personal loss. The best transactions are when both parties have something to lose should the deal not go through. If only one party has capital, time and/or resources at risk, it makes for an ugly scene. Protect yourself. Whether you're buying or selling you want to have experienced representation that really knows their stuff.

Reach me at: michael.sussilleaux@gmail.com

The Commode of Gold

A commode of gold! The ultimate decorating statement. You are special! No, you're more than special ... you're regal!

New Yorkers don't have a lot of space and perhaps that's the reason they go to extreme lengths to put their personal stamp on their homes. Whatever the reasons may be, people tend to think their place is nice. More than "nice" in fact, and certainly nicer than the other 35 apartments that are exactly the same size and layout in the very same building.

Loving your own taste is easy, but recognizing that other people love their own sense of style more than they love yours may be a hurdle.

What's the best strategy to maximize the appeal, and therefore the selling price, of your home?

The goal in preparing your home for sale is to make it as "neutral" as possible. You want to create a minimalist canvas upon which potential buyers can fill in the blanks with their own things. The measure of success is the extent to which your home looks like a model home, or perhaps a very nice hotel room. When a buyer asks "Does anyone really live here?", that is the ultimate validation that you've succeeded.

How do you achieve this effect without moving out?

Tone everything down a few notches.

However boring you may find it, white walls work the best. Specifically an off-white, or antique white color for the walls, and a brighter white for the ceiling. Address the rest of the colors in the room; paintings, fabrics, rugs, furniture ...etc. Avoid excessive blue and gray tones, they're depressing. Warm colors and tones work best. This is a nest, not a hospital.

Put away your personal items. Family photos should be removed. Why? Family photos identify this as your home, not mine. I am visiting your apartment and not envisioning it as my future place. Secondly, when there are family photos, people tend to make a beeline straight to them to see if they know you, or to see if your sister is pretty, and they completely take their attention off the property.

Religion and politics are never good things to advertise to strangers. If a potential buyer shares your beliefs or views, it doesn't serve to further strengthen the appeal of the apartment, and if they don't share your views, it alienates them. I once took some buyers to see a multimillion dollar apartment which was very tastefully decorated save for a gigantic Confederate flag above the bed. My buyers couldn't stop talking about it, and that was the only thing they subsequently identified an otherwise great apartment with.

Light is better than dark -- much better than dark. If you have a bright space, open the shades, wash the windows and let the light stream in. Whether your apartment is light or dark, but especially if it's dark, make sure you have enough artificial lighting in the apartment. (Even light apartments are sometimes shown in the evening.) Ideally the lighting will be bright, but soft, and come from a variety of sources; table lamps, recessed lighting, wall sconces ...etc.

Clean your space top to bottom. Better yet, have a professional service come in and do it for you.

Finally, we get to the most ignored advice of all: NO CLUTTER! Get rid of most of your stuff! Really! I mean it. Rent a storage unit if you have to, but less is more. Closets shouldn't be packed to the gills. (You should be able to easily see the back wall through the clothes.) Get rid of your toaster, coffee maker, juicer and all the rest of your kitchen appliances. Yes, real people make toast and coffee, but people showing their homes for sale don't. Your counter tops should be clean and barren with the exception of a bowl of fruit or a vase with flowers. Remove your doll collections, CD collections, scanners, fax machines, magazines, and remove your superfluous furniture too!

SUMMARY:
Yes, what your place looks like really matters. Yes, you have control over your space. Yes, it's inconvenient and an expense to paint, rent a storage unit and clean up. Yes, you have every right to display your artwork, family and interests, but it's still a bad idea. No, the average buyer does not like your golden toilet, and only looks at it as a future expense to rip it out and replace.

Reach me at: michael.sussilleaux@gmail.com

"Inside the Meltdown"

It seems to me that every day the news is filled with stories about the growing financial crisis in the United States. Many of these stories are long on hyperbole and short on substance. Almost all of them offer "insight" that is unsurprisingly tainted by political, commercial or social agendas that only serve to cast doubt upon the veracity of the "news" reports.

The other night my wife and I caught an outstanding documentary on PBSs' "Frontline" that cogently chronicles the events leading up to the first Wall St bailout in a simple, factual presentation unclouded by blatant ulterior motives.

I highly recommend that you take an hour out of your day and watch the episode online.

Here is the link: FRONTLINE: Inside the Meltdown

Reach me at: michael.sussilleaux@gmail.com

Views, Vistas and Cityscapes

Gazing down upon the city from an apartment high in the sky in New York City is a truly amazing experience. One can't help but marvel at the sheer magnitude of the city and of the multitude of people out there living separate yet connected lives working and playing in the sprawl below your urban aerie.

Or you could be facing a brick wall less than an arm's length beyond your sooty window pane.

Views matter. They directly affect how much a space is worth. Two similar apartments across the hall from each other in the same building can vary in price by hundreds of thousands of dollars if one of those apartments overlooks a river or Central Park, while the other apartment overlooks the walls of a neighboring building.

Equally important as the view itself is the notion of how much sunlight an apartment receives. People overwhelmingly favor southern exposures that are "light & bright" over plain old "dark" whatever direction that may be facing.

If you are in the hunt for an apartment, expect to pay a premium for a great view or a space "bathed in glorious sunlight". On the flip side, if you're a person who isn't concerned with a view or who would actually prefer something darker, you're in luck. Great spaces can be had on the cheap compared to comparable apartments in the light & bright category. (One word of caution: Don't lose sight of the fact that when it's your turn to sell the apartment down the road, you too will have to price it attractively compared to the sunnier competition)

Summary:
The amount of sunlight an apartment receives as well as the quality of the view have a direct and tangible effect on the price of an apartment. If you're buying, consider that a compromise in one or both of these criteria can save you a lot of money, but consider too that when you put it up for sale you will face the same "visionary" challenges that the current seller is facing.

Reach me at: michael.sussilleaux@gmail.com