You may or may not have heard of Radon Gas. Its a poisonous gas that seeps into basement from the foundation. I’ve seen several home inspections turn up harmful levels in homes in Utah. A simple Radon ventilation system can fix the problem though. In old friend of mine, Travis Jewell, runs a company called Radovent that installs these systems in homes.
If the only thing keeping you from buying a house right now is a down payment, you are in luck. Right now there are Grants available in parts of Salt Lake County for Down Payment Assistance. They will give you up to $10,000 for a down payment if you qualify. Currently they have Grant money available in the following cities:
Salt Lake City, Magna, Kearns, Sandy, Murray.
The Grants are processed through the Community Development Corporation of Utah. They offer a home buyer education class that is required to qualify for a grant but is a good idea for anyone considering buying a house in the future. The Grants are on a first come first serve basis until the money runs out each year. Give me a call if you’d like to find out more about how to qualify for a Grant or would like to take the Homebuyer Education Class (I am one of the instructors).
Here is the schedule for the Home Buyer Education Class: Home Buyer Education Flyer
This is great news for Utah. The more attractive we are to big companies, the more jobs they create for us here.
I’m balding, so I buzz my hair. I usually do it myself. My wife always tells me to just fork out $10 and get it done somewhere. Today I was in a hurry so I stopped in at the barber school for a $5 haircut. I got the rookie, hard to mess up a buzz right? It was his first haircut. After a few minutes of having my head manhandled an old gentleman with a nametag that said “Master Barber” came over to check on things. He took the clippers and started gently trimming around my ears. Immediately my shoulders unhunched and I sat back and enjoyed the rest of the haircut. He explained to the student that I can buzz the front of my head by myself, but when I sit in a barber chair, I can expect to have the back done expertly. He said the “Barber’s Area” is the lower 2 inches from the ears to the back of the head, its the part I can’t do well on my own.
I was amazed at how much more comfortable I felt knowing I had an experienced “master.”
It also made me think about real estate. There are many things you can do on your own when buying or selling a house. You can put your house up for sale all by yourself. You can view every listing on the MLS online all by yourself. You can even find your dream home all by yourself. But thats about all you can easily do on your own. What if it wasn’t just a buzz that would grow back in 2 weeks? What if it was a full blown cut and color for a woman? What if it was your largest single purchase or the sale of the most valuable asset you own? The rest is what I would call the “Realtor’s Area.”
The “Realtor’s Area” is the part that you can’t easily do on your own. Once someone makes an offer on your home, how do you know if they are qualified? How do you know if the 8 page contract is written in your favor, what contingencies the buyer has put in, or if their earnest money is even really on the table? Do you know the actual market value of the house you want to buy, can you negotiate the best deal possible with the seller or could you end up overpaying? These are things that an experienced agent can help you with. You can unhunch your shoulders, sit back and enjoy the transaction with confidence when you have an agent who has mastered negotiations, property valuations, contacts, marketing strategy, etc. I know my wife wouldn’t trust a rookie to cut her hair and I wouldn’t trust a newbie or part time agent to represent a client on a real estate transaction either.
The current Absorption Rate on the Wasatch Front is 9.68 months.
What that means, is that if we compare the number of homes currently for sale with the number of homes that have sold in the last 12 months in Utah, Salt Lake, Davis and Weber counties, we have 9.66 months worth of inventory. We are assuming that the number of sales in the next 12 months will be similar to the previous 12 months.
So let me put that into perspective, the National Association of Realtors reports that 6-12 months worth of inventory is a “normal” market, less than 6 months is a “seller’s” market and 12+ months is a “buyer’s” market. Lets be honest though, we are still in a buyer’s market here in Utah. There are currently almost 16,000 homes listed for sale on the Wasatch Front and last month just over 1,400 houses were sold. If you’re a seller, it means you aren’t “in” the market unless you are priced in the lowest 10% of similar homes. If you’re a buyer, it means you have LOTS of homes to choose from.
On a side note, in the $250,000 and below range, it really is more of a normal market. The median sales price has dipped under $200,000 in recent months and the majority of sales are in that market. The best ones go fast and you have to be quick to get them. The great thing for buyers is, the median sales price has come down in the last few years but the homes are still the same. So the $220k median sales home in 2007 is the same home that you can get for $190k today.
For those of you who want to see more numbers, look at the Sales per month on the Wasatch Front. Houses are still selling, people are still moving, couples are getting married and realizing that its cheaper to own your home than to rent someone elses.
In an effort to provide more valuable and applicable material to my real estate blog I have updated the look and feel of the site. My old blog is still active and you can see previous entries here. I have also discontinued the lame monthly email I have been sending out and I am replacing it with more personalized and useful information that I will be posting here on my website/blog. I will still only send out an email once a month, to avoid being annoying, but will post more often than that so you may have 2 or 3 blog posts to browse through everytime I send an email update. Hopefully I can provide you with good information about our real estate market and real estate in general. My goal is to be a useful resource for you for anything that involves houses, whether I get a sale out of it or not.