There's a lot of opinions out there, and some of them make it into the 'news.'

Someone told me today that they'd read that a seller should never sign with a realtor for more than 30 days.

Changing agents every 30 days is just foolish.

How hard is someone going to market your property if their chance is up in 30 days? Sure they'll put out a yard sign and hope they get lucky, but why would they invest any more time or money?

The determination of how long to list with a company should have much more to do with your comfort level with the agent's professionalism AND with the average number of days homes are on the market.

If the average time on the market for homes in your area is 187 days with another 30-45 days in escrow before closing, maybe you should sign a 9-month listing.

The only reason to change your agent is if you feel your agent isn't advising or representing you well.


Big secret:

Buyers Do Not Care What Color The Yard Sign Is

No buyer gets up in the morning and says, "Today we're only looking at houses with blue signs in the yard."

Three things sell a home, and only three.

Condition, Location, and Price.

YOU the homeowner are in control of two of those variables and the third you can't do a darn thing about.

The only thing your agent can do is provide you with the broadest exposure possible, and give you ongoing feedback, market research, and advice.

It's an uncomfortable truth, but the only person in control of whether or not your home sells is you.  Bring your condition and price into alignment for your location and your home will sell. All the marketing in the world won't make a bit of difference otherwise.

Monday morning I attended the Economic Forecast Breakfast hosted by the Salt Lake Board of Realtors at the Little America Hotel.  700-odd realtors and a newspaper reporter were in attendance to listen to Representative Rob Bishop and Professor James Wood from the Bureau of Economic & Business Research at the UofU Eccles School of Business tell us how bad things are and how really bad they're going to get.

Yesterday the Salt Lake Tribune published an article about the event: http://www.sltrib.com/ci_11611462?IADID=Search-www.sltrib.com-www.sltrib.com

Congressman Bishop was clear and convincing on why he had not voted for the bailout or for the stimulus package - and funny,  "It started with the Treasury Secretary telling us to just give him the money and go away.  Then they kept telling us the world would end if we didn't pass the bill by Friday.  But it didn't pass, and the world didn't end.  Then they told us we had to pass it before the financial markets opened on Monday, but it didn't pass, and again the world didn't end.  Pretty quick I started to not believe what they were telling me."  He also made a very convincing case for why tax  cuts work better than government spending (for one thing, there's less cash out of pocket...).  In the end Rep. Bishop was optomistic.  He seemed genuinely pleased with the willingness of the Obama administration to work with both parties, and felt that a better bill would come out of the Senate.

Dr. Wood, who spoke first, was more disturbing.  Dr. Wood specializes in construction and housing industry issues and has addressed the realtor community many times in the past.

He felt, absolutely, that we are going through the worst recession in Utah in over 50 years.  He said that the construction industry hasn't contracted this severly since WWII.  2007-2008 we saw the most dramatic drop in home sales in the last 40 years.

Most disturbing to me was his chart showing the change in Utah employment month-by-month since October 2007.

Still, Dr. Wood's forecast was similar to what I have been saying for the last 2 years:  we'll see bottom in 2009 and will start to level out in 2010.

It's been interesting to me to read the comments online for the Tribune article.  Many of the commenters have blamed realtors for the market run-up in 2005-2006!  Strangely enough, in 16 years I have never had to talk a seller into listing their home at a higher price...

Selling a house is just like selling a used car or a used bicycle, for that matter.  The seller has an opinion of price, the realtor has an opinion of price, even an appraiser has an opinion of price (opinion only - not information sent from on high), but the ONLY opinion that matters is the BUYER'S opinion.

It is only ever the buyer who makes a decision to purchase a home.  Could any realtor talk you into buying a home you didn't want?  A realtor's legal and ethical obligation is to work in their client's best interest - whether I am working for a buyer or a seller my job is to get my client the best possible price we can possibly negotiate.

Remember, real estate is a supply and demand market.  In 2005-06 when home sales were at their highest some parts of town had literally 2 weeks of active inventory available for sale - if there were 15 active listings in a neighborhood there were 30 under contract with buyers.  And guess what, lack of supply drove prices up.

That same neighborhood today has 5 months of active inventory - 82 active and only 17 under contract.  The good news?  Inventory levels have dropped dramatically from a year and a half ago.  3rd quarter 2007 active listings in SL County topped 10,500 when they should have been around 7,200 - 45% higher than they should have been.  Back then that same neighborhood had 11 months of active inventory.  And, not surprisingly, prices declined as inventory levels rose.

Truly, things are better than they have been.  31% of the active listings in SL County are now selling - up from 23% a year ago.  (At the peak, in 4Q'05, 71% of listed homes sold.)

The national news scares everyone, but Utah is just, as always, behind the curve.  Parts of the national market are starting to improve.  Utah's housing downturn will be shorter and shallower than the rest of the country.  Most of our homes were purchased by people who actually lived in them, not by investors.  The national real estate bubble popped in 2005, our market didn't downturn until 2007, so the national recovery effort has a jump on us.

Don't worry.  It'll be good.  Buy a house - get a great deal and a great interest rate.  Raise your kids.  Be part of your community.  In 3-5 years everything will be different.

This time of year everyone takes a look back.  And this year everyone in real estate has had the time to take a good LONG look back.

Anyone who knows me knows that I'm a statistics girl, and it's been pretty interesting to take a closer look at the numbers this year.

In 2005-2006 our local real estate market appreciated almost 30% in just 10 months.

That summer of 2006 inventory levels in Salt Lake County climbed to unheard of levels - 16% higher than they should have been.  The general assumption was that most of the overstock was generated by casual sellers trying to take advantage of the upsurge.  Of course, the glut of inventory and ‘let's make a killing' prices simply drove buyers away.

By the fall of 2006 we'd started to advise clients to price their homes aggressively and get while the getting was good.  Real estate is a supply and demand market, and with supply at record highs and a declining demand, we felt prices would soon begin to drop.

Around the 3^rd week of May, 2007, the real estate bubble in Utah popped.  Unfortunately, it's the sort of thing you only realize in retrospect - there was no audible "POP" to cause us to sit up and take notice, but by the end of the summer we could tell.  One of the side benefits of doing so many transactions is that you can feel the boat rocking beneath you.

By the end of 3rd quarter 2007 inventory levels in Salt Lake County were 45% higher than the historic high for any previous 3rd quarter, and the number of buyers was at its lowest point since 2004.  This unfortunate inventory problem was exacerbated by the mortgage industry meltdown which began to make itself evident in August, 2007, when Countrywide - who was writing 1 of every 5 mortgages in the United States - got down to 11 days of working capital.

During 2008 our market has been largely in a holding pattern.  Inventory levels have declined, though they're still 10% higher than they should be, and the number of buyers has continued to dwindle. Prices have dropped, more in some neighborhoods than others.  We're beginning to see a number of short sales and foreclosures.  Everyone is concerned about job security and the future of the economy, and everyone is being careful in how they spend.

So, is there a silver lining?

Interest rates are around 5%.  If your mortgage is at 5 ¾% or higher, consider refinancing!

Utah never experienced the kind of real estate investor activity that places like California, Florida, Arizona, and Nevada did, and our economy is far more sound.  We fully expect that our downturn will be shorter and shallower than the rest of the country.  At this point, we're pinning our hopes on the spring of 2010 for a turnaround, though it may take a couple more years to bring prices back up.

If you ARE in a position to purchase a home, it's hard to imagine a better time.  Prices have dropped, sellers are negotiable, and loans are available for qualified buyers.  Just like the bubble bursting at the top of the market, it's hard to identify the bottom except in retrospect.  Any purchase you make during 2009 is likely to be a good buy.

Call and ask about our commission rebate program for buyers!

The government is making some concrete efforts to ease things for buyers and sellers:  first-time homebuyers can receive a $7,500 tax credit if they purchase prior to July 2009, and sellers who have to negotiate a short sale with their lender will no longer owe income taxes on the write-off.

If you do have to sell your home, at least you have the option to sell without the burden of a 6% commission.  Our low flat-fee commission gives sellers the ability to offer better deals to entice buyers.  Because marketing times are now so much longer, many conventional real estate companies these days are actually charging more - 7% or even 8% - to market a home.  You have to pay more because they're not selling as much?  Honestly.

So try to stay put for the next couple of years and, if you're able, maybe pick up a good buy on a rental property.  Either way, give us a call.  Overcoming assumptions has been our biggest challenge with Assist-2-Sell Professionals:  we really do provide full-service real estate brokerage, we really do charge a lot less than the usual 6% listing commission, and we really do give a commission rebate to buyers.  Seems simple enough, but we still run into people - past clients included! - who mistakenly think they're going to have to do some of the work.  In spite of the downturn, in 2008 our office has ranked consistently among the top 10% of Assist-2-Sell offices nationwide for sales volume.

We'll soon be offering our clients free access to RealtyTrac®, the largest internet search engine for foreclosed, bank owned, and pre-foreclosure properties.

‘While we breathe, we hope.'  On January 20^th change will finally come, and we hope for better times.  As Bob Dylan once said:

"Oh the seas will split and the ship will hit,

and the sands on the shoreline will be shaking.

Then the tide will sound and the waves will pound,

and the morning will be breaking."