Westchester Real Estate Talk

In case you coiuldn't make it to New York for the 100th dropping of the Times Square New Year's Ball here is a link to a live web cam where you can see it happening.  In case you are home you can watch from the comfort of your home.

 Join Panasonic and EarthCam on December 31st for a LIVE webcast of the 2008 New Year's celebration in Times Square. Enjoy streaming video and audio from multiple webcams and watch as the world ushers in the New Year!

From Panasonic, click here.

If you have a pet, a dog, cat, bird or domestic animal and you want to move into a co-op building that approves any/or the above there are few things that you should know.  First I have had buyers who have wanted to buy in buildings that do now allow pets and think that they can "sneak" their cat into the apartment because the cat is an indoor cat and nobody would know.  The building will and or other owners will eventually find out.  I had one buyer who put the kitty litter out in the garbage and the superintendant discovered it because the bag broke. f you try to sneak a pet in and it is against the co-op rules the c-op will be within their rights to ask you to either give up your pet or ask you to move if you don't want to give up your pet.  Trust me I have seen this happen more than once.

Next you should know that co-op;s that allow pets, can vote in a new Managing Board and the rules can change. I had this happen in a building that I lived in.  Unfortunately the owners of certain pets did not clean up after the pet, the pet got older, the pet ruined hallway carpets and infuriated residents of the building not to mention cost them additional money to keep the building clean and presentable.  It was also hard to keep a superintendent who was willing to deal with this problem.  So, the co-op changed the buylaws, the pets in residence were photographed and grandfathered but the pets parents could not replace the pet if anything happened to them.  Trust me on this one too, I have seen it several times as well.

So, if you thinking of buying into a building and you have a pet have your agent verify that the building still allows pets, what types of pets, the size of the pets and any other requirements.  It is possible that a building that allowed pets, that you see pets in the lobby, might not allow any new pets in the building.  It is a good idea to check this out before you start bidding on an apartment you like and go through the process and find out that a rule has changed.

Historically, pre buyer brokerage, agents all worked for the seller.  If they had the buyer they were working as sub-agent's of the seller and the seller's agent.  In this scenario if an agent was a sub-agent they would be able to call the listing agent and ask for informaiton, such as have there been any offers?, where is the seller going?, and because the agent was working for the seller the listing agent would "fill in the agent" and give them the information they needed to go back to the buyer and solicit an offer.  If the sub-agent and asked "have there been any offers?" it was perfectly acceptable.

Now we have buyer's brokerage.  Now we an agent working for the seller's interests and an agent working for the buyer's interests.  If the buyer's broker calls and asks "have there been any offers" the listing agent would be within their rights to not discuss what is going on with the offers, if there were offers and the offers were.  The listing agent is ow attempting to get as much money for the seller as possible but the buyer's agent is trying to get the best deal for the buyer that they can.   While both agents are trying to sell the house each is trying to do the best they can for their "client".

This past year I have had both scenarios.  When I have interest in a property the first thing that I do is call the listing agent.  The buyer usually has questions that they need answered prior to putting in an offer. Usually they want to know how long the seller has lived in the house, why the seller is moving, have their been any offers and for the most part the buyer is trying to understand about the property these pieces of the puzzle seem to matter.  It gives the buyer something to digest and helps them in the process of deciding what to offer.  If for instance an owner has lived in a property for  only a few years the buyer will want to know what they paid.  Pieces of a puzzle that helps them formulate their offers.

Most listing agents don't even ask if I am representing the buyer or if I am a sub-agent when I call but I would think that the question is pertinent to any response.  If I am a sub-agent it would seem that answers to my questions cvould be forthcoming as I am trying to get a really good offer for the seller.

There is a dance that goes on pre-offer between agents.  It is amazing that most of the time, 99% of the time, the listing agent doesn't even ask who I am representing.  I get pat answers "the seller will consider the asking price" when as a sub-agent if I have more information I might be able to do a better job for the seller.

It has been over a year since I started blogging.  I started because I saw a need for day to day postings and fresh content for both my clients/customers and for the Googles of the world who love and rank fresh content and give rewards to bloggers for ongoing content.  I wanted to talk about the hot topics of the day, like market reports and what is going on in Westchester County and this was the venue.  I am not an expert but know what I see around me.  Have my own opinions and I was willing to put them out there in the hopes that people would comment and agree or disagree and that a dialog would be started.

At the beginning it was difficult to think of things to write about. So I started to search out stories that I thought would be interesting and discovered that this could not be just my opinions but would need to be informed, educated, well read and researched content to be of interest to other bloggers or the public.  So every day for the past year in the early mornings I read online all the sites that might have pertinent real estate content, Bloomberg, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, our local newspapers, Newsday, and many more.  If I found an article that I thought would be of interest then I needed to start studying and researching the topic and developing my own spin so that I could write an original blog.

I found that first of all this is an amazing amount of work. It can take hours of reading and searching to study a particular topic.  I was told that it is necessary to have three or more original blogs per week to keep people coming back to see what is posted.  This was a committment of time that I underestimated.  What started out with me thinking that I could just sit and throw a couple of paragraphs out there has evolved into something else entirely.

Then I was invited to join Active Rain.  My little blogging project now took on formal rules of the road and I tripped a few times and read the rules and learned what to do and what not to do.  My blogging evolved.  Active Rain is over 60,000 agents, stagers, mortgages brokers and other related fields all doing what I had started to do with thinking up topics and researching, learning and then writting a blog for the public.  The content is amazing.  If you think of being in a Real Estate office with 60,000 agents you have all sorts of bloggers, funny bloggers, crabby bloggers, nasty bloggers and bloggers who are not in it to provide information to clients.  As many bloggers as are on Active Rain are as many reasons people blog.

I have learned a lot from this experience; I have learned from the stories of other agents, from the feedback and comments received, from the research and studying I have done and I believe that I have become a more informed agent with expanded knowledge about all sorts of subjects. I can see where this is not for everyone - it is a hugh time committment.  I wouldn't trade it -

                       GOING LIVE January 1, 2008

 "At last the real estate industry gets its own, large, objective wiki that focuses on the real estate industry and the home buying and selling process. With real estate being such a huge industry you would think a free-standing real estate wiki would already exist but alas only a few small, in-house attempts have been tried.

When you realize how complicated and extensive it would have to be to truly be a meaningful and valuable resource it's no surprise that the task hasn't been undertaken - at least up until now.

This real estate wiki is the combined effort of more than 20 people that have worked on creating quality content over a very broad spectrum for almost 15 months and will launch with thousands of definitions, terms, articles, statistic's and information on items such as:

 Please go to site RealEstateWiki.com

Yesterday I read a post from about whether agents can sell anywhere in their state and whether they should or not by Charles McDonald. That post lead me to thinking a bit about this topic. SO...

Historically agents stayed in their areas.  All agents worked as sub-agents of the seller whether or not you had the buyer and if a buyer wanted to look in another area the agents would refer them and receive a 25-30% referral fee.  Seniors agents had referral networks throughout Westchester County and knew that if they referred out they would receive the referrals coming in.  An income stream.  An income stream to be protected at all costs. New agents were "helped" and referred their buyers to agents who would then refer back to the senior agents. The income stream was protected.  The newer agents really didn't understand what the game was.

In the past few years the internet has emerged as the main resource of information for buyers.  Previewing properties now is not controlled by the real estate agent.  The buyer's find the properties they want to see themselves.  Buyer brokerage has also emerged as a shift from the status quo.  Buyers can now hire a buyer's broker to represent them.  Sub-agency while not entirely a thing of the past is more and more vanishing.

More and more I see agents from other areas travelling all over Westchester County. To be an expert in an area means what?  Learning about the transporation, schools, train parking, zoning, taxes, etc.  All of which is on the internet, a visit to the Village Hall or Town is a way to learn quite a bit about any property.  As buyer's agents verification of all information is necessary whether you are in a familar area or not....It is necessary to do your homework.  Since I have moved to a new area I have had to learn everything about a lot of communities and I know how, what and where to learn.

The Real Estate community is very territorial.  Agents in the business for many years are trying very hard to hold on to how things have always been.  They don't  want anyone infringing on their turf and are often not very nice.  One agent even insinuated to me that because I didn't know who owned a particular beauty parlor before the current owner that I would not be able to sell in that area. Is that something that a buyer moving into a community would want to know?  Don't think so.

So, which is worse.  An experienced agent learning a new area, studying and verifying informayion and knowing which questions to ask and who to ask or a new and inexperienced agent staying in their area but not having any experience about how to negotiate a contract or how to analyize and troubleshoot engineering issues.

You can't stop progress.  Agents throughout Westchester County are working all over the county.  They are working as buyer's agents and going with their buyers and selling in various communities, more and more.  The times they are a changin.......

Last October I was driving past a local middle school.  I was driving in a caravan of cars all going about 35 miles per hour in a 30 miles speed limit.  All of a sudden we come around the corner and there is a sign that says 15 miles/hour with flashing yellow lights.  We call immediately slow down, but not quickly enough, and I got a ticket for speeding.  My first.  I am the type of person who follow all the rules about everything or I can't sleep at night.  I mailed in my ticket, pleading not quilty and waited for a trial date.

This week I appeared before a judge to explain my ticket.  I have never appeared before a judge before, I follow rules, speeding rules, pay my taxes, turn in money when I find it, follow driving rules  so for me to appear before a judge was unnerving.  I didn't like it because I am not a reckless driver, I have taken the Defensive Driving Course twice and I believe that speeding or talking on a cell phone is dangerous. I often see real estate agents at Open Houses or showing properties to buyers and getting in their cars with cell phone in hand.  Sometimes I see agents on cell phones in cars with clients in their cars.

Coordinating showing appointments, cancelling showings when we drive up and the client doesn't want to go in, driving past a Lawn Sign and the client says I want to see that - agents picking up their cell phones and not paying attention to the road and their driving.  Very dangerous.  In my car I have bluetooth that works perfectly. I can enter and exit my car hands free and my bluetooth is on,  The screen to answer calls and to hang up calls is large and easy to read and does not necessitate my taking my eyes off the road to talk. 

This particular ticket was unrelated to real estate but made me think about what I see around me.  I appeared before the judge, paid my fine and will have to take the Defensive Driving Course again to eliminate the points I received.  In New York State taking this course gives a discount of 10% on your auto insurance premium and can reduce up to 4 points off your license.  What is also interesting is that I have been driving over 25 years and the laws have changed since I got my license.  Taking this course updates the laws that have changed.  I recommend it for all.

This is Max my beloved Cavalier King Charles Spaniel.  He weighs about 25 lbs which is large for the breed and large for a lot of buildings throughout Westchester County that will allow dogs but have weight restrictions.  Some buildings will interview your dog as well as you to incure that your dog isn't a barker that will annoy neighbors. There are buildings available throughout Westchester County that will allow dogs, larger dogs are permitted in a limited number of buildings.  More buildings will allow pets, but not dogs.  Unfortunately not all dog lovers do the right thing in cleaning up after their pets or in general being courteous to their neighbors which makes it difficult for pet lovers who do the right thing.

I have a new listing and am still working on the many sites that I use to market my listings. Single web sites, virtual tours both branded and unbranded, uploading to 15 sites with Trulia, Google Base, Zillow, New York Times website, Harmon Homes, Yahoo Directory, as well as Realtor.com.  RE/MAX has a site that is now 2nd in search rankings nationally amongst homebuyers, Craig's List, The Real Estate Book as well as many more.

This new listing is in the Ardsley School District.  A Charming Stone Front two step Ranch with a Living Room with Fireplace, Dining Room, Kitchen, 3 Bedrooms, Powder Room, 1 Full Bath all on one level.  Downstairs is a laundry room and office/au pair/playroom for the kids.  This property is located on a quiet, private lane in the Village of Ardsley with beautiful flat back property.

This property can be expanded or is perfect for an empty nester who does not want to move to a building, wants a house but no longer wants a large house.  Property is perfect for the kids/grandkids.

MLS#2737090

For more information, Westchester County Real Estate Online

A Direct link to this listing, 4 Capt Honeywell listing information

Ardsley Real Estate Blog

Westchester Real Estate Blog

The Westchester County Library System has a new interactive website. There are 38 libraries throughout Westchester County serving 940,000 residents.

You can locate libraries, search for books, movies, audio books, music, large print, and magazine articles.  You can reserve books.  There is a link to the Health Advocacy Resource Center for Seniors and you can see which were the 10 Best Books for 2007.

                                          Westchester Library System