Lisa Dunn www.TwinCitySeller.com

I have a quick quiz for you to take and I hope you'll leave some feedback. Here's the dilemma:

Let's say you go to Target to buy a shirt. The sales tag says the price is $50. You hand the clerk behind the register $50. When the sales clerk scans the sales tag, the price comes up as $25. There the clerk stands with your 50 dollars in hand. Should the clerk tell you the real price and refund $25 to you, or pocket the profit with no mention of what the shirt truly costs? Is $25 that big of a deal?

That's exactly the position Hennepin and Ramsey county are in, and THEY AIN'T TELLIN!

To see the rest of the article and to join the conversation, join us at the Nokomis Longfellow Real Estate Guide

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow wrote "The Song of Hiawatha" which is where many of the nomenclatures of the East Nokomis Neighborhood come from. I learned about this while snooping around on the Nokomis Neighborhood website. It referenced the poem, but didn't tell me much about it.

You can see the original post at www.minneapolisnokomis.com.

The following table references the meaning of some of the names we find in the Nokomis and Longfellow neighborhoods in South Minneapolis.

Being a REALTOR who blogs somehow seems to force me out of my shell. I've started to carry my camera with me everywhere so I can make a point to grab pictures of the amenities of my neighborhood in Minneapolis. I love the Longfellow Nokomis area. There's SO much to write about!

I've driven by the Longfellow Gardens a million times and never stopped to look at them...until today. It seems there are always a million things to do and not enough time to do them in. Today I made it a point to spare 15 minutes to stop, and literally, smell the roses. What a great way to start the day.

If you're selling or buying a home it's so easy to get caught up in the emotions of it all. I encourage you to take a 15 minute break today and find a way to rejuvinate yourself. Your mind, body and spirit will thank you for it!

Get more information about the Minneapolis Longfellow and Nokomis Real Estate Market at the Longfellow Nokomis Real Estate Guide

Yeah, We Know...

• It's long over due
• No one else is doing it
• It will be helpful to our neighbors in Longfellow and Nokomis

I've partnered with other REALTORS at Edina Realty that live and specialize in the Nokomis and Longfellow area of Minneapolis. Our mission is to become the ultimate Nokomis Longfellow Resource for real estate, entertainment, and community information.

It was just launched today. We hope you'll join us in this new venture!

Longfellow Nokomis Real Estate Guide

It's astonishing to me the number of homes listed on the MLS that are without photos. Perhaps even worse are homes that are listed with poor photos. We know from the National Association of REALTORs statistics that homes with a LOT of pictures are looked at more often and more closely by potential buyers. Let me show you what I mean:

Compare these photos:

With these:

The pictures in the first row are dark. The close up of the wood floor is, well, BORING! The pictures in the second row are bright and really show how large the rooms are (the second row of pictures are a house my husband and I rehabbed). Which house would you be more likely want to see?

In addition to pictures being used to market to buyers on the internet, they are also used to market to the REALTORs. As a seller you want the buyer's real estate agent to WANT to show your house over the hundreds of others that are on the market.

When I work with sellers I ask for to have the house for a couple of hours to take pictures and a virtual tour. I take up to 250 photos of the house while I'm there, and I only use the best ones. I use photos of the house on brochures, the MLS (which only let's put post 10 pictures), my TwinCitySeller.com website, my RealEstateWellDunn.com blog, Craig's list, Edgeio, Google, Yahoo, and 10 other websites I use to advertise listings.

In this market you have to put your home in the best light. Are you?

If you haven't explored the Grand Rounds in Minneapolis, put it on your list of "must-do's" this summer. The Grand Rounds are 50 miles of paved bike and walking paths that essentialy make a circle around the city. There are seven by-way districts; i) dowtown/riverfront, ii) the Mississippi River, iii) Minnehaha, iv) Chain of Lakes, v) Theodore Wirth, vi) Victory Memorial, and vii) Northeast.

Who needs to go up north when we have so much green space right in our backyards? Ask anyone who just got back from a vacation near water and they'll tell you--water has restorative properties. Save your money on air fare and get out and enjoy what Minneapolis has to offer you!

Feeling inspired, I got out and took some pictures of the Minnehaha district of the Grand Rounds which includes the Minnehaha Creek, Lake Nokomis and Lake Hiawatha. Lake Nokomis is literally in my backyard, so of course is the Minneapolis Lake I consider to be "my lake". These pictures can't capture the energy that's in the air in Minneapolis when we finally get to come out of hibernation. This spring weather is going to make this year particularly memorable.

I met with a first time home owner last week, I"ll call her Amy.

Amy was approved for a loan from $130,000-$150,000. She's more comfortable with the monthly payment at $130,000. She has a friend who is selling a home and once the home is sold (in this market that could be one month from now, or six months from now), they plan on being roommates. Of course having a roommate would make the $150,000 payment much more comfortable for Amy. Amy would prefer to be in a single family home vs. a condo in Minneapolis or St. Paul. Of course, she'll want to be in an area where property appreciation looks promising.

Instead of hurrying and buying a condominium in Minneapolis or St. Paul, I encourged Amy to wait to see if things work out with her friend so she can more comfortably afford the $150,000 payment. With that loan amount we could find a single family home that might need some cosmetic work, but will have solid mechanicals which will reduce the chance that she'll have some expensive home repairs to make. Of course, I told Amy there's a chance interest rates might go up over the next few months which would reduce her buying power, but it makes sense to wait a few months so you can get what you really want and stay there for at least 5 years than to hurry and get something that's just mediocre.

It's easy to be in a hurry when you're buying your first home. Emotions are running high, and you naturally have a sense of urgency to get moved into your new home. Don't let a real estate agent hurry you into something unless its something that fits into your overall lifestlye goals for at least the next five years or so.

Happy House Hunting!

As a real estate agent who lives and works in Minneapolis, I like to play sociologist--look at what is happening around me and think about how it will impact our local real estate market. This morning I found a potential doozy. The Minneapolis Star Tribune published an article about the protected status of Liberians in Minnesota expiring this October. Thousands of Liberians have been in Minnesota under a temporary protected status since 1991 when that status was granted due to a Liberian civil war. There are teenagers that were brought here when they were infants, grew up here, and now face the possibility of being sent "home" to a country they don't know anything about. I'll refrain from expounding on my views of immigration, politics or the dilemma this presents from a humanitarian point of view. What I would like to mention is how this has the potential to effect our local real estate market.

Let's start with what we know.

• The real estate market has been on a downturn
• There are more houses on the market this year than there were last year
• Average days on the market for the Twin Cities Metro have increased to 80 days.
• Due to amazing interest rates and a glut of inventory buyers have "bought forward" meaning those that were going to buy, and even those were thinking of buying, have. We have to wait now for new buyers to enter the market, because we "used up" our buyers faster than we anticipated.
• Due to mis-managed consumer debt and an influx of "exotic" mortgages, we are entering an uncertain time with a record number of foreclosures
• We started the year with about 60,000 homes on the market
• If we use previous housing trends over the last 2 years to predict this years housing trends, we can reasonably expect somewhere around 75,000-80,000 houses on the market in late August when inventory usually spikes.

Hypothetical Case Study:

Brooklyn Park has the largest population of Liberians. Officials estimated there are potentially 3,000-5,000 who may be pulling up stakes to return to Liberia. After 16 years of living here, many will have houses and mortgages that will be left behind. In a city the size of Brooklyn Park, even an extra 50 houses on the market will have a huge impact. Simple laws of supply and demand say if the inventory goes up, demand goes down, prices drop. If this happens, you can bet the number of days on the market will increase not only for Brooklyn Park, other surrounding NW suburbs such as New Hope, Golden Valley, Brooklyn Center, and others. You see, if a buyer is looking for a home in a nearby suburb, and is able to buy the same house for signficantly less in Brooklyn Park (because of lower prices) this will effect the number of buyers purchasing in neighboring suburbs. Nothing happens in a vacuum. We will all be effected by this mass exodus if it does occur.

I posted about the importance of getting your home on the market early this year. With this news it makes it even more important to act early. Below is a quote from the Star Trib article:

"We anticipate a spike of houses for sale," Joel Spoonheim, Brooklyn Park economic and redevelopment director, told city officials in a recent memo. "Our fear is that this may result in a significant increase in rental property or vacant homes as the ownership market may not be able to absorb this abrupt influx."

Hey Joel, the "ownership market" can't absorb the inventory we have right now!

When I start working with a first time home buyer, I like to schedule an initial meeting to go over common questions like: How long will it take me to buy a home, How do I know I won't pay too much?, I've been to 5 open houses, and I haven't seen anything I like, How do I know how much I can spend?, Where in Minneapolis or St. Paul should I buy?

If you're a first time home buyer, or even if it's been a while since you've purchased a home, you're familiar with this endless list of questions.

If you've found this post, you're also very likely aware of the endless amount of information on the internet. There's a ton of it, and it's growing every day. By the way, some of it is good information, much of it, not so good--and some of it not even applicable to Minnesota Real Estate. So how do you know where to start?

Starting the home buying process need not be an overwhelming Internet research project. It's simple.

HIRE A PROFESSIONAL

• Ask your friends and family who they've used as a real estate agent. Get a referral from someone you trust.
• Sit down with that agent and ask your questions. Ask all of them. Ask them twice if you need to. Decide if that agent is someone you'd like to work with.
• Work with your real estate agent throughout the process. Ask for information and guidance.

A great real estate agent can walk you through the home buying process, and remind you to breathe. An agent can help you get the butterflies in your stomach from going haywire by offering you good solid up to date information on the real estate market that may be out of date by the time you find the information on the internet.

All my best to you in your homebuying process!

Lisa Dunn is a REALTOR with Edina Realty in Minneapolis/St. Paul.
www.TwinCitySeller.com

Curious to see what the Minneapolis St. Paul Real Estate Market has done over the last year? See this post on the last year's real estate statistics for Minneapolis, St. Paul and surrounding suburbs.

This report report is a great way for you to get a feel for what's happening in your local real estate market.