The push is on to turn single-family rental homes into an asset class that can be bought and sold on Wall Street. Last week, the Journal reported that publicly traded home-builder Beazer Homes had teamed up with buyout firm KKR & Co. to launch a real-estate investment trust to manage its small portfolio of single-family homes as rentals. Beazer’s REIT is still private, for the moment, but has plans for an IPO to take the company...

Over the past year or so, “pocket listings” have become a more mainstream option for quietly marketing a home. If you haven’t heard this real estate term before, you probably will. This Zillow Article goes more in-depth into pocket listings, but here are the basics. A pocket listing is an unofficial, off-market listing Pocket listings are growing in popularity Pocket listings let sellers test the market Pocket listings have...

Last Thursday was Take Your Kid To Work Day, so my 8-year-old daughter, Jade, came with me.  Other than the big breakfast of eggs, bacon, and rye toast with lots of butter, I asked Jade what she thought of the day.  Jade said, “Dad, you work with a lot of stubborn people”.  I laughed, as I never thought of it that way. One example was a meeting we had with clients on an offer we had on their home. My reply to Jade was that the people...

Coast to coast, a much higher percentage of listings are (a) selling, period (b) selling, fast and (c) selling at or above the asking price than they have during any spring in recent memory. Pristine and staged. Photos should look like something out of a home decor catalog or design magazine — like no one lives there, even if someone does. Low prices. When buyers see a beautiful home listing online for less than they’d expect...

Whether you plan to put your home on the market next week or next year, here is a short list of  home maintenance items you should put on your Spring to-do list, stat, if you want to attract qualified buyers and let your home sweet-talk them into making a sweet offer: 1. Banish chips, scuffs and the like with a fresh coat of paint. 2. Brighten, polish and replace all trims. 3. Furry, drippy, noisy or broken HVAC systems. Maintain your...

Make sure your current clients and prospects know what to expect during the selling process and how they can help get their home sold with this free guide.   With Getting to Sold they’ll learn: The biggest selling mistakes to avoid How agents use comparables to find the right home price Open house dos and don’ts Click Here To Get Your Free...