I just love final walkthroughs! Why is it that Buyers and their Realtors sometimes try to spoil the elated feeling I get, knowing that we finally made it to day of closing?

I get the call this morning, telling me they did the walkthrough and everything is OK, except for the hole in the living room wall. What? A hole? How can that be? I was just in the house last week and it was fine. No holes! I don’t want to hear about holes two hours before closing. I mean the house is vacant. No one has been in the house but the appraiser. Then they spring the big one on me. “What’s the Seller going to do about it?”

Personally, I think that’s a pretty good question. “What’s the Seller going to do about it?” Well, my answer is “I don’t know”. I am still trying to digest the fact that there is hole in the living room wall. Well I got lucky, the other Realtor had a call beeping in on him and decided to take it and call me back.

So, I get myself out of bed (not sleeping mind you, but diligently “working” on reading all the ActiveRain posts from last night), anyway, I get myself out of bed, hop in my SUV and burn $10.00 worth of gas to go check out the hole in the living room wall. Now I’m a pretty observant guy and would probably notice a hole in the living room wall, but I don’t. No hole. Well, maybe they meant the family room. So I go look and again, no hole. Wait a minute, what’s that? Let me see, if I get down on my knees and squint just right I can see a tiny indentation in the wall about the size of my pinky fingernail. This my friends must be the culprit. The all elusive hole!

I call the Realtor back and tell him I have been at the house to look at the “hole” and asked him if he had actually seen it, or did he just allow the Buyers to go over by themselves to do the walkthrough? Do I need to even tell you his response? Of course he hadn’t seen it! It was too far for him drive to so he just gave the buyers the code so they could do their own walkthrough! The Buyers told him there was a hole in the wall, and asked, “What was the Seller going to do about it”. Anyway, I remained calm and politely told him to show the Buyers the definition of “hole” in the dictionary and that we would give them compensation of 50 cents. After all that, the Realtor told me to not worry about it, that he would take care of the Buyers.

I tell you, you got to love this business. The things people try to get away with. And the Realtor……….well that’s good material for another post.

The Moral is: Never, ever, take the other party’s, to a transaction, word on anything. Check, double check and check again. Look out for your own customer’s or client’s interest or that “hole” may be in your wallet.

By the way………..Does that 50 cents have to be on the HUD?

Yesterday, I did a Blog post that contained a comment about another Realtor, giving the code to my lock box to a buyer so the buyer could do his own final walkthrough. I received quite a few comments about reporting the Realtor to his Broker or filing an Ethics complaint. Let me explain, why I didn't take those steps, even though, I agree, what the Realtor did was wrong.

First, I list homes "For Sale". That's what I do. I rarely work with buyers. Therefore, my business depends on other Realtors showing and selling my listings. With that in mind, my business plan has always been to "market" my listings to other Realtors and to give them as much incentive as I can to want to show my listings. My reputation with Realtors is how I make my living. My listings get showings, because over the years, Realtors have learned that they can trust that properties will be priced right, clean and easy to show. No surprises.

The Realtor, in question, had actually done a pretty good job up to the point of giving out my lock box code. I had a discussion with him about this and it will not happen again. I complemented him on the good job he did in getting the deal closed and hope to have many more deals with him in the future. Would this had turned out this way if I reported him to his Broker or filed an Ethics complaint against him? No. Absolutely not. He would never had showed my listings again and my future Sellers would suffer because of that.

So, here is a short list of the things I do to ensure that my listings are getting shown. Not only shown, but shown constantly by other Realtors.

My listings are:

1. Priced right, always. I am an expert on pricing.

2. Clean. Very clean.

3. Easy to show. No appointment necessary and always on a lock box.

Realtors can count on me to:

1. Answer the phone. If not, return their call quickly. 8-8 seven days a week.

2. Always be professional.

So remember, treat your fellow Realtors with respect. Help them if necessary. Be patient with "newbies", we were all one once. And most important, never forget…………Real Estate is about people, not money!

….and you want it to be less than 7 years old with over 1500 sq ft of living area. Maybe this will help:

Based on current market statistics, properties similar to the ones you are requesting are selling for $35 to $37 per sq ft living and 110% of the asking price. In order to stay under $60,000 you need to focus on properties with 1700 sq ft or less. 185 Conch and 1966 Michigan both fit.

The stats that are below show that since 10/1/2009 there have been  29 sales. There are 21 pendings and only 9 actives in this price range. I eliminated the short sales and the properties that are priced too low (based on market data) and that left the 2 properties mentioned above.

The average days on market are 23 and that of course includes the time it takes to get bank addenda signed. This tells me most are selling quickly and with multiple offers.

CMA 60-

Do NOT be foreclosed on! Avoid foreclosure. Short Sales DO close.

Want to find out more? www.CentralFloridaShortSales.com

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