Year Over Year Permit Fees Take Huge Jump

According to information reported in the Dakota County Tribune, Lakeville building permits for the month of January were for a total valuation of just over $6.6 million, compared to about $2 million in January, 2011. Most of the increase was in single family homes, and that adds support to the sentiment that we may be beyond the bottom of the housing depression.

Sold homes data also suggests that we are rapidly exiting the worst of the housing depression in Lakeville. According to the Regional Multiple Listing Service of Minnesota, there were 55 January closed residential sales in Lakeville, which compares to 37 in 2011. With a year over year increase of almost 50% in January, it's hard to imagine anything but good days ahead for the housing market.

For anyone considering buying a home in Lakeville or the surrounding area, it is time to take action. Even if there are no price increases and reasonable listing inventory, there is only one best buy in Lakeville. Miss it and settle for second best. If you're thinking about declaring your independence from Mr. Landlord, now is the time to act. Call me for help and a free homebuyer orientation and strategy session. It's the best hour you could invest in your future. Call now.

Yesterday I posted about an email I had received regarding a Home Staging Consultation where the subject line was : "Your Expertise Helped Us Get an Offer In Five Days After Listing!" Well, I got up this morning and found this in my email:

"Hello Shar,

Just wanted to say a big THANK YOU for helping us with staging our townhome a couple months back. After 6 weeks of de-cluttering, moving, cleaning, shopping, and rearranging, we put our home up for sale last Saturday. Our Open House was on Sunday, we had 8 showings by Thursday and 2 offers on Thursday night. We accepted an offer that ended up being above our asking price!

Your advice was so valuable to us. I just wanted to let you know that we couldn't have done it without your help! We close at the beginning of April, and we will definitely be calling for help with our new home :)"

Okay....I mentioned I don't normally hear how Home Staging Consultations end up as so much time may elapse between when I meet with a homeowner and when they may list and I don't hear back. But here I got two emails in a few days! And did you see that part that said..."above our asking price".

More proof that Home Staging can and does make a difference!!

Need some assistance getting your home sold? Call Rooms With Style Home Staging and Redesign to book a Home Staging Consultation Appointment! 952-567-1124

www.roomswithstyle.com

There's a lot of discussion in America about the definition of marriage and who should have the right to marry whom. There are alternative suggestions like making all marriages legal partnerships, and perhaps allowing the word marriage to exist only in churches which could set their own criteria. Of course, many folks live together with personal and individual understandings about their relationships.

...take your relationship with your domestic partner, Mr. Landlord. You honor and obey him by following his rules. He forbids you to have a dog or to paint the walls your favorite color, and you can't park the boat in the driveway. You always do what he says because you need a place to sleep. In turn, you share with him your income, and you promise to remain living in his house for a period of time, usually a year or more. When the term ends, you can renegotiate the partnership by offering to share a little more of your income with him. He expects that.

His end of the partnership allows him to deduct much of the cost of allowing you to live in his house from his taxes. Of the money you share with him, he gets to deduct property taxes and the interest on the home loan. While you are helping him pay down the home loan, he continues to own the place with the right to kick you out at the end of the agreed term, or if you misbehave before then. Aren't domestic partnerships wonderful?

Perhaps it's time for you to stop driving down this one way street and declare your independence from Mr. Landlord. Many of the benefits he has derived from your partnership could just as easily be yours. If you would like to explore the possibility of divorcing Mr. Landlord and taking back some of the freedom you gave up to him, now is the time to act. Call or email for help.

Your Minnesota Real Estate Agent May Not Be YOUR AGENT

Most home buyers have never bought a home before, and many others have not bought a home in a fair number of years. There are a few elements in the buying process that can make a huge difference in the degree of success in your buying experience.

At your first face to face meeting with a real estate agent, Minnesota Statute requires that you be presented with an agency relationship disclosure. It will define the different types and levels of ways real estate professionals will interact with you, and you will be asked to verify your receipt of the disclosure by signing a copy. This disclosure may seem boring, but it is important to understand just who does what for whom.

When you are shopping for a home, your relationship to the agent in front of you will be either as a customer, or a client. Thinking that they are your agent does not make them your agent. There are formal definitions set by Minnesota statute, and agents are required to perform differently in each relationship. If you are a customer, the agent can't lie to you and must use reasonable skill in the performance of any service rendered. The agent needs to be careful not to break stuff when the door is unlocked for you, and, if you want to buy something, the forms should have correct information like the address of the home and the price you're offering. That's about all the agent has to do to comply with the law with one exception. If the agent's broker has a written agreement to represent the seller of the home you want to buy, the agent then must do all possible to get you to pay the highest possible price and at the most favorable terms for the seller. It's very easy for an agent to work with a customer because the required level of performance is so low.

If you are a client, the agent has prepared and signed a written agreement to perform at a much higher level. By statute, the exclusive buyer broker agreement adds a much higher standard of performance. The agreement allows and requires the agent to work on your behalf and in your exclusive interest to assist you in finding the best properties, determining their value, and doing everything possible to negotiate the best price and terms of purchase for you. Throughout the entire process, your agent is required to work exclusively on your behalf.

Although it is much easier to work with customers to whom I have made no written commitment, my personal ethics preclude my participation in a transaction in which I do not make a formal pledge to the buyer. It would be much easier to work with people to whom I owe no loyalty, have no obligation to follow their lawful instructions, have only a standard of reasonable skill rather than responsibility to use my best efforts to protect client from foreseeable risks or harm. Yes, it would be much easier, but easier is almost never better.

If you're thinking about buying a home any time in the next year, it's time to start collecting information. Call or email with questions or to arrange a convenient time for a home buying orientation and strategy session. It's free and could save you a pile of cash. Call me now.