Poconos Real Estate Blog

Heroes Live Here!

All of us in Penn Estates are very proud of our resident, Christopher Hughes, for his brave rescue of a Blue Ridge Cable technician yesterday. Apparently, the tech's truck caught on fire while he was high up in his bucket working on a line. Thank goodness for good neighbors!!

Read the whole story here.

Here is a very short video taken with a cell phone at the scene (thanks Larry!). It does not show the rescue and it is a little pixelated, but it does illustrate the seriousness of the fire!

The Secret to Selling Your House in 36 Days: A Penn Estates Success Story

Yes, you can sell your home and, no, it is not all timing and luck. Sure some kismet is involved but if you don't prepare yourself to be open to good fortune, it can easily pass you by. So, what did the owners of this home do to sell their home quickly and for as much money as they needed to move on with their life plan?

They did their homework. As important as it is to do homework when buying, when selling it is critical.

Ok, maybe they did a lot of extra credit too but the point is, these folks were well-prepared to sell well in advance of the time that we met to discuss the listing of their property. They read everything they could get their hands on online about selling, staging, choosing an agent, and more, including every article on this blog, I believe. They talked to friends and family members about their real estate experiences, whether they occurred here in the Poconos or elsewhere, which prepared them for the process in general and for the trickier task of interviewing agents. And they took everything they learned and executed it in an efficient way as follows:

1) They kept current on real estate prices in the community and determined the price range that they thought their home would fall in to. So, they did not go in blindly expecting a certain price 'just because.'

2) They prepared their home for sale, making all necessary repairs, thoroughly cleaning the home and freshening up any painted areas that needed it. They followed the sage advice of many stagers 'One Room, One Use' and stored away the workout equipment that cluttered up certain rooms and, moved the children's items to the loft and made THAT the play room in order to control the inevitable spread of toys throughout the living areas. And of course they generally de-cluttered all of the rooms and closets and did everything they could to remove potential distractions for would-be buyers. Folks who visited this house were easily able to place themselves there and were 'sold' on the lifestyle the house had to offer.

3) They interviewed three (maybe more??) real estate agents that they knew/heard are active in the neighborhood. The interviews included a thorough discussion of marketing strategies and agent qualifications. They chose an agent based on these things, as well as based on how well the agent's style fit with theirs and based on their general sense of the agent's integrity.

4) They priced the property AFTER they chose the agent. This is important because it removed the temptation to list with the agent who 'offered' the highest price. They were not swayed by visions of grandeur and dollar signs and chose based on expectations of service, work ethic and experience.

5) They kept the home showing-ready at all times. Before showing appointments, they shined, polished, removed fingerprints, and hid the toys. And most notably, they made sure the house smelled good. Yes, this was the most oft commented feature of the home (besides the obviously striking nature of the style) cited by potential purchasers.

An aside and bonus tip: When asked the secret to the fresh, clean smell of the home, the seller claimed a combination of windex and Berry Patch candles from Pocono Candle This, combined with general cleanliness and regular airing of the rooms sure did the trick!

So, if you have to sell and have to sell now, go ahead and do it but do it right! Competition is fierce for buyers right now, and being well-prepared will help you stand out from all the other listings out there. You need to be ready for that *one* buyer to walk through your door and help you achieve your destiny!

If you are a homeowner, have done your homework and are thinking of selling, please contact me via email info at lisasanderson dot com or give me a call 888.794.5589 to discuss your prospects for good fortune. =)

Bought! Arrowhead Lakes Vacation Investment Property With Instant Income

A family from Lansdale closed on their new vacation home on Friday - a lovely little contemporary, fully
furnished & equipped, and only a block from the Minisink Pool and Tennis Complex. The house is in great condition, is very clean and boasts three generous bedrooms, two full bathrooms and the obligatory Pocono screened porch. We were able to negotiate a very fair price for the home at 8 Moshannon Drive, $162,000.

These folks contacted me late last year as a result of them reading the Poconos Real Estate Blog, and we have worked to find them just the right place. We began by looking at several different communities within reasonable distance from the Northeast Extension of the Turnpike, as that is the route they take to the Poconos. We visited Towamensing Trails, Indian Mountain Lakes, Locust Lake Village and other amenity-rich communities. After evaluating their options they settled on Arrowhead Lakes because of the fact that it is a gated community, and because it has three pools. This appealed to them because they figured the pools would be less crowded.

The greatest thing about this buy for them is, in my opinion anyway, that the property came with a tenant for the summer, so there is instant cash flow of a few thousand dollars! According to the listing agent, the previous owner had rented the property so often that after awhile he had to purchase ANOTHER property in order to have something available for his own personal use once in a while. Lucky for my Lansdale buyers, the seller decided now was the time to liquidate an asset!

Arrowhead does quite a brisk business in the short-term, vacation rental department. My source tells me that this past Saturday, which as the last Saturday in June officially kicks off 'the season', there were 86 groups checking in to their rented homes in the community. The community is becoming very well known to summer tourists from the Philadelphia and New York areas as an affordable alternative to destinations reached by air.

To begin your search for the perfect second home or vacation investment property in Arrowhead Lakes or in other communities in the Poconos, email me at info@lisasanderson.com, or call me at 888.794.5589 x103.

Who Says Social Media Doesn't Pay?

Check out the snazzy new t-shirt that came in the mail today!

It's from THE Jeff Turner, founder of Real Estate Shows.   I started following Jeff around on Twitter on the recommendation of a mutual friend, went on to friend him on Facebook and have been in awe of his photography skills ever since (you really have to check out this pic). He has a lot of diverse interests which make him a real interesting guy to stalk er I mean, know. And now I find he also designs t-shirts.

Sarah told me he was a genius and I am beginning to believe her.

Thanks, Jeff, for making my day!!

Just the Facts, M'am : Market Statistics for Monroe County, Poconos, PA

There are a lot of opinions out there about the real estate market and most of them, unfortunately, are based on the national news stories which do not nearly illustrate local intricacies. I am not here to paint a rosy picture where one may not exist, but I am offering some facts for folks to generate their own opinions about our market here in Monroe County.

I will, of course, offer my opinion about these statistics near the end of this article, but all the numbers are factual and not distorted in any way.

To clarify what these numbers represent: I gathered statistics from the Pocono Mountains Association of REALTORS Multiple Listing Service (MLS) on June 3, 2008. The information, while deemed accurate, is not guaranteed, as the MLS system relies upon information being inputted by many different individual users, and does not include statistics for non-MLS sales. The statistics cover single family residential home sales for the time period of January 1 to June 3 of each year specified, only in Monroe County.

Our MLS overlaps over several counties but I felt that the data would be skewed by including them because of the changing dynamic of MLS coverage. More real estate companies are opting to join nearby MLS's in order to expand their marketing reach across regions. So today, for example, there are more listings from Lehigh, Carbon or Pike County than there were a few years ago. To keep it simple, and to make the comparisons fair, I limited the area.

Market Statistics for Monroe County, Poconos

* Info not available

For those of you for whom this basic data is not enough, I encourage you to download the latest Supply and Demand Report which offers more in-depth figures for all of the different municipalities in the County. For each municipality you will find details such as current active listings, under contract listings, year to date closed sales, and list and sale price averages. This info is very useful in determining what the local markets look like - realistically. After all, markets ARE local and even the statistics posted in the above chart will not accurately reflect what is going on in your neighborhood.

So What Does It All Mean?

There is no denying that we are experiencing a slow down. Fewer homes are being sold (although if you add the current Pending Sale inventory of 302 homes to the # of sales this year, things look a lot better), and the higher price ranges are feeling this particularly so. Buyers are bargain hunting and they are buying up the foreclosures and homes that are priced and marketed correctly. I have sold several homes in the past few weeks to savvy buyers who shopped the market and found the houses that are fair buys. They are out there. But there is a lot of inventory out there that is NOT priced and marketed correctly, unfortunately, and of course that is not selling.

What impact does THIS have on our market? The glut of under-marketed and over-priced inventory? I don't know for certain but my guess is that Buyers (and others who choose to focus on the negatives ;) ) see all this excess inventory and make the assumption that they are going to steal a home. This couldn't be further from the truth as I do not see many sellers being desperate enough to accept low-ball offers. I see banks choosing from multiple offers on foreclosure listings, and I hear 'regular sellers' threaten to take their properties off the market and wait until Buyers get off the fence about making a move.

Honestly, I wish they would do just that. The inflated inventory of unrealistic listings is not helping matters any.

Overall, though, we are doing ok: No drastic price decines, a foreclosure rate that is nowhere near that of some other areas of the country, and a market that continues to attract commuters, vacationers and second-home buyers, retirees, and investors.

Slow and steady wins the race!

Further Reading:

The Pennsylvania Association of REALTORS published an article about the PA housing market in it's latest issue of PA REALTOR Magazine.