Westchester Real Estate Talk

High Ranch on 1/2 Acre, cul-de-sac location.  This home is in the Ardsley School District with Town of Greenburgh Recreation and you can park at the Hartsdale Train Station.  The home has a Scarsdale (mailing address).  There are 4 bedrooms, three bathrooms.  One bedroom/bath is on the lower level and this would make a great apartment for the parents or au pair.  There is a living room with a wood burning fireplace that is ceiliing to floor brick, a formal dining room, eat in kitchen.  Two car garage, central air conditioning.  If you are interested in seeing links to the schools, Town of Greenburgh or further information please visit www.MiriamBernstein.com.

$675,000

You are welcome to call me with questions as well at 914-907-1922 or come visit at the Open House on Sunday.

Did everyone notice?  Am I the last to the party?  At some point today Active Rain membership slid past the 40,000 member mark.  Isn't that amazing.  The rankings are rising.  On several search criteria in my area my Active Rain posts are popping up.  Its' way cool.  Even with all the agents I speak to who are not receptive to the whole blogging concept, don't know where to start and haven't a clue what AR can do for them, AR is over 40,000.

Congtratulatons to all the people who post, inform and educate this community and the public.  I think this is a really great community.

 Just released by the Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service are the housing statistics for Westchester County, New York.  The median price for a single family home in Westchester County is now $700,000 which is down 2.1%.  The number of homes sold increased to 1363, which is 1.3%.

From the Journal News this this afternoon, their article.

I have been on Active Rain for a few months now.  I find the participation amazing, the quality of the posts, the amount of information that is available and for the most part the wonderful attitude and sense of community.  The individuals who started and watch over us do just a wonderful job.  It is not perfect but it is really quite good.  This morning something new was added, it is around 6:15am in New York the system went down for maintenance and up poped a new section called "Referrals".  I would guess that those in the inner circle on this site were aware of this but I was surprised.  We can now post our overview of what our clients who are moving to other areas are looking for and be contacted by individuals who can take on the referral.  What a nifty idea.  I will be curious to see how this works.  Now there are many sites where I go when I need a referral, the RE/MAX site for one and the CRS site.  It will be interesting to see how this integrates into that, whether I will come here first once it gets going.  It's cool.  By the way it does say that eventually there will be a flat monthly fee.  I believe that the powers that be deserve compensation for all this work.  We shall see.

I am being asked often what the market is like in Westchester County, so I thought I would take a look at some of the reports from Westchester-Putnam Multiple Listing Service, a historical look to see what has happened over time.

YEAR             SINGLE FAMILY #OF SALES   MEDIAN PRICE       CONDO #OF SALES      MEDIAN PRICE

1991                      3680                           $288,700                     583                    $167,350         

1992                      3949                           $285,000                     617                    $165,000

1993                      4252                           $280,000                     693                    $160,000

1994                      5192                           $277,740                     868                    $163,000

1995                      4561                           $280,000                     790                    $158,000

1996                      5211                           $285,000                     993                    $158,500

1997                      5783                           $300,000                     1115                   $162,000

1998                      6701                           $320,000                     1387                   $162,500

1999                      6551                           $345,000                     1423                   $162,000

2000                      5857                           $407,000                     1198                   $183,000

2001                      5447                           $449,900                     1152                   $220,500

2002                      5546                           $525,000                     1118                   $266,000

2003                      5601                           $564,000                     1404                   $305,000

2004                      6157                           $645,000                     1438                   $439,450

2005                      6072                           $675,000                     1428                   $375,000

2006                      5069                           $680,000                     1419                   $375,000

 Today I had a very nice new Client, first time buyers. We have spent some time on the internet previewing listings.  Go over how the taxes and the STAR program in New York State works. We narrowed the list down to 15 houses and as we went from house to house and I spoke to them further we started to eliminate some of the propertes because they no longer met the requirements.  It is a process.

But here is the thing. Trying to map out locations and calling to schedule appointments can be tiring.  Out of 15 calls, how many individuals that I spoke said to me "please wait, my computer just crashed" 4.  That's right 4 out of 15 calls the computers crashed.  So you wait while the computers come back up, 1 minute, 2 minutes, 3 minutes.  Really annoying.  One of the offices made me wait for the computer to come up, then wait until the secretary was available - there were a lot of calls, wait while she found the information about the listing I wanted to show, wait while she called the listing agent because it wasn't clear.  UGH!  Then try calling when the offices open at 9am.  They open at 9am but are not really ready for business until 9:20-30 after coffee and computers being turned on. UGH!

Now comes feedback requests.  I received one call and three emailed requests before I even showed the property.  Now come the requests with questions they want you to answer but it doesn't work.  You can't click or type on the request.  UGH!

I spent one hour showing the houses, two and a half hours making the appointments and now I am deleting numerous duplicate requests for feedback.  There just has to be a better and less annoying process. Cheers to the offices that use the Centralized Showing Service.  They are not perfect, make mistakes but are far better than this other way.

This was absolutely great. It is Saturday evening.  I am sitting at my computer and something came to me that is really quite amuzing.  This morning I was watching some of the morning shows. Clicking around and trying to find something that could hold my interest for more than three minutes.  Finally, I believe on NBC Weekend Today there was s segment that I watched mainly because it was a segment with Barbara Corcoran who is a Real Estate Maven.  I love her attitude, some of the stuff she says is really funny and I enjoy.  So I watched.

The segment was about FSBO's.  They showed a very happy couple who had sold their home on their own.  They said it was work but not too difficult and they found a buyer relatively quickly and if they can do it anyone can. I believe they stated that 12 % of homes are sold FSBO.  They bring a big mucka mucka agent on the show to explain how to sell FSBO.  The public needs a broker to explain to them how to sell by themselves.  What is wrong with this picture.

The segment was short and Ms. Corcoran obviously had more to say but was cut off but not before she explained to the viewing public which internet sites people should go to. ????????

I can't find the video yet or a link to this piece but will search further and post.  I repeat they brought a broker on the program to explain how to sell FSBO.   The public needs brokers to explain how to sell their homes themselves. OK. 

 Well, I guess this blogging thing is not always as innocent as one would like or think.  It seems that the CEO of Whole Foods has been lurking on various web sites around the internet anonymously for the past 8 years.  He has made comments about his own company and disparaging comments about other companies that he may want to buy.  I guess that the motivation of bloggers, the motivation of people who comment and the identies of those you meet on line is not always what you think.  This is something that Zillow and other sites should consider when having the public discuss properties on line.  PS:  Should I still shop at Whole Foods?

From Marketwatch, the Whole Foods Lurker.

I was just reading a post by Lynn Pope about realestate.com vs realtor.com.  She is now in a bad situation with realestate.com.  This leads me to write this post because I have been where she is now and she may have a long battle in front of her to straighten this out.  A few things come to mind.   First of all why do these third party lead generators behave this way.  They are getting really bad feedback amongst the real estate community, here on Active Rain, word of mouth and on other sites.  Everytime they persue an agent in this way it makes their public relations that much worse.  Personally I am glad because hopefully it will shut them down, at least some of them.

Since the market turn down I get at least 3-4 calls a week from companies who want to improve my rankings.  They want to make me a millionaire.  When I say No, Thanks they rant at me "What, you don't wnat to make a million dollars".  It is so completely obnoxous.  I wish all agents would say No, thanks.  Then maybe the calls will stop.

My absolute favorite marketing technique is the following.  I get calls and the individual on the other end says
"I spoke to you a couple of months ago and you told me to call again in a couple of months"  LIARS!!!!  How do I know they are lying? Because I TELL EVERYONE I AM NOT INTERESTED AND DO NOT WANT TO BE CALLED AGAIN, EVERYONE WITH NO EXCEPTIONS"

Here is the original blog that got me started on the subject, click here. 

Ardsley, New York is a small Village in the very southern part of Westchester County, New York.  Affordable housing, great schools, parks and a sense of community, proximity to New York City by car with easy access to loads of highways and parkways, 35 minute train commute from Hartsdale, New York.  Elsa Brenner from the New York Times does a series of articles called "If You Are Thinking of Living Here..." and this week profiled Ardsley, New York so please check it out.......

If You Are Thinking of Living in Ardsley, New York

Available Homes in Ardsley, New York