To Stage or Not to Stage?

To Stage or Not to Stage?

Posted inReal Estate
I belong to and sporadically participate in a Facebook group for (mostly) local Realtors, and the topic of home staging comes up fairly often, and whether it's worth what it costs. For the uninitiated, what I'm referring to is the interior design that goes into preparing a home for sale, to make it as marketable as possible. There are a few different ways to skin this cat: having a staging company take over and bring in their own furniture and decor…
Buyer’s Market? Seller’s Market? Which is It?

Buyer’s Market? Seller’s Market? Which is It?

Posted inReal Estate
Real estate is full of old saws, pithy aphorisms, rules of thumb, and the like. One measure-- months of inventory-- has historically been used as a barometer for deciding whether it's a buyer's market or a seller's market. Months of inventory is a calculation in which the number of currently active listings is divided by the past month's closed sales, so if there are 3000 active listings in a region and 1000 recent sales, there are three months of inventory on…
Getting Your House Ready to Sell? How.

Getting Your House Ready to Sell? How.

Posted inReal Estate
The net. Let's talk about the net, and I don't mean the 1995 Sandra Bullock movie. The net is, when selling your house, almost certainly what matters the most to you. At the end of the process, how much money did you net. How much did the buyer pay. How much were your closing costs. How much did you have to concede during inspections. How much did it cost to prep the house. All of those factor into the net, and…
The “A” in Zillow Stands for “Accurate”

The “A” in Zillow Stands for “Accurate”

Posted inReal Estate
You're shopping for a house and your dealbreakers are that it has to be at least 2500 square feet, not be in an HOA, and feed into a specific school. Zillow has filters for all of those things, so you're good to go, right? Consumer-facing third-party sites like Zillow (or Redfin, or realtor.com, etc.) are a great tool for buyers to launch their search, but it's worth knowing where their limitations lie and when it's best to double-check data or ask…
Portland Home Prices: Still Cheaper, Believe it or Not

Portland Home Prices: Still Cheaper, Believe it or Not

Posted inReal Estate
Yeah, houses cost a lot. I know. I assure you, it's not my fault. That being said, it could be worse. How do I know that? Because I've lived places where houses cost a whole lot more than they do here. I also know because I look at statistics and studies, so you know it's not all anecdotal. Portland is, generally and unofficially, considered a HCOL (that's high cost of living) city. There is such a thing though as a VHCOL…
Portland Real Estate in 2025: What Happened?

Portland Real Estate in 2025: What Happened?

Posted inReal Estate
About this time last year I wrote about my predictions for Portland real estate in 2025. If you want the tl;dr digest, here's what I predicted for 2025: Interest rates would end the year in the 6% range, but wouldn't be a meaningful drop from where we ended 2024 (just under 7%). New listings and sales, which had essentially bottomed out in 2024, would show some incremental increase. Prices wouldn't meaningfully change. I also closed that post by saying I'd be…
50-Year Mortgages? No Thank You

50-Year Mortgages? No Thank You

Posted inReal Estate
Betting on the financial illiteracy of Americans has historically been a profitable endeavor for the powers-that-be, so it should come as no surprise that an idea to introduce 50-year mortgages is being talked about right now. It has been proposed as a way to make home buying more affordable, which is a dubious assertion at best. I shouldn't have to tell anyone it's a bad idea, but here we are. It's a bad idea. Here's why. Math. Assume you're buying a…
The Ultimate First-Time Homebuyers Guide

The Ultimate First-Time Homebuyers Guide

Posted inFirst-Time Home Buyer Guide, Real Estate
Rerun! Since I couldn't think of a decent topic this month for the newsletter, I'll bump my six-part Ultimate First-Time Homebuyers Guide. This is a great resource for anyone dipping their toes in the water of homeownership for the first time, or even if it's just been a while. The guide lives here, or you can read on. Here we go! Part 1: The Money Let’s start with the biggest question. Can you afford it? The best way to tackle this…
Don’t Wait For Mortgage Rates to Drop in September, Because They Probably Won’t

Don’t Wait For Mortgage Rates to Drop in September, Because They Probably Won’t

Posted inReal Estate
At their latest annual conference, the Federal Reserve made it pretty clear that they intend to drop their short-term rates this September, likely by a quarter of a percent. This isn't unexpected, as the bond market has been betting on this happening for a little while now. As (sort of) a result, mortgage rates right now are as low as they've been since last October. Before I make the point I came here to make, I'll offer a brief reminder of…
So, How’s the Market?

So, How’s the Market?

Posted inReal Estate
Realtors get that question quite a bit. The answer, which nobody likes, is "it depends." Are you a buyer or seller or both? What kind of home are you trying to buy or sell? Where is it? What price range? All of those things can change the answer you get, since there isn't just one answer to the question. When I'm asked the question, there are a number of pieces of data that I rely on to start my answer, while…