From our team to your family, we want to wish you a happy holiday season.
We are so excited about the holiday season, and we are so thankful for you. So much of our business comes from friends like you who refer business to us and who do business with us. For that, we are so very grateful. We love helping people make their real estate dreams come true, so thank you for supporting our business.
This may be a busy time of year, but we are always here to help you and answer any questions you may have. Call or email us, and we’d love to help you. We wish you a merry Christmas, happy holidays, and a happy new year.
The market may have shifted, but savvy sellers can still get top dollar.
What could this shifting market really mean for you as a seller? While real estate and many other financial markets are changing, the sky has not fallen. It’s really not that bad. It certainly might feel like the end of the world, but keep in mind that this really is just a normalization and not a crash. What it does mean, however, is that you will have to deal differently with buyers.
For example, you might have to make some concessions to the buyer, like paying some of their closing costs. It might also mean that you don’t get multiple offers on your home or find yourself buying down the interest rate. Remember, because the buyer is dealing with those high interest rates, you will have to negotiate differently.
We’ve seen a lot of success with sellers who, rather than come down on their price, are offering to buy down the interest rate for the buyer. It makes the payments a little easier for the buyer to swallow.
“You might have to make some concessions for the buyer."
You might also want to consider staging. You’ll want to have your house ready and in the best condition possible to make it attractive in this market. This is especially true for sellers who want to see top dollar for their house.
Some offers are coming in over the asking price, but this is definitely not the norm. It’s possible, but you need to be working with an agent who knows how to negotiate this kind of deal for you, and nobody does it better than the Charlotte Mabry Team.
If you’re thinking of selling in this shifting market, please call or email me. I’d be delighted to help you with any questions you may have.
The national news may sound grim, but there are positives to this market.
Is the sky falling in real estate? With all of the bad news, you might be wondering if there is any good news at all. I have all the latest numbers for the Tennessee and North Georgia markets, and I’ll help you understand some of the positives and negatives we’re seeing in the current climate.
To begin with, pending home sales are down by 35%, which is a little scary. That’s the lowest level we’ve seen in seven years. It’s important to remember, however, that things are a trade-off in real estate. A year ago, we saw very few homes available for sale, and buyers had to pay well above asking price to get them. Yes, interest rates are hovering in the range of 7% to 8%, but there are homes available, and sellers are paying concessions. That means there is finally room in the market for negotiation, which is a blessing for homebuyers. Among those concessions, sellers are paying for buyers to buy down the interest rate, which can ease some of those concerns.
“With all of the bad news, you might be surprised to learn there are bright spots in our market."
Mortgage applications are down to the lowest levels since 2014, which is
another blessing in disguise. Remember that this allows buyers to competeon their interest rate and negotiate with lenders.
On the other hand, listings have been on the rise, with roughly a three-month
supply nationally and in our local market. That means buyers have more
options and more room to negotiate with sellers. Homes that were selling
in one week are down about 30% from last year but are still selling quickly,
so sellers need to be prepared for their homes to spend 30 days on the
market rather than 30 minutes.
Speaking of sellers, it’s also important to note that homes are closing for
98% of their list price recently. The days of selling for 104% of list price are
gone, so sellers should be prepared for that as well.
If you are a buyer or a seller looking to make a move in this market,
you need to have someone in your corner from the Charlotte
Mabry team. We have the expertise to help you navigate the current market.Reach out to us by phone or email, and we’ll be delighted to help you out.
Five questions to ask yourself when creating your business plan.
I’ve got some great information for agents that I am excited to share today. Have you ever thought about business planning? For many people, it’s not a fun topic to consider. However, I believe it’s essential. Just like you wouldn’t go on a road trip with no map or sense of direction, you shouldn’t continue your business without an idea of where you want to go.
Having a plan for how to get from where you are to where you want to be is
extremely formative, so I have created a list of five questions to ask yourself
in order to make that plan:
1. How much money do you want to make? In the next year, how much money do you need to make to cover your bills and live the life you want to live? It’s important to quantify these things.
2. How are you going to get real estate business? Are you going to focus on buyers, sellers, or have a blend of both? Have a specific goal to target.
“Having a plan will completely change your business for the better."
3. What is your cost of sales? For example, know specifically what it costs for the overhead of your real estate company.
4. What are your expenses? You can’t know everything that will happen, but there is a lot you can predict. What do you plan to spend on marketing? Do you want to hire an assistant? Be prepared for how much money that will cost, and know if it’s in line with what it should be.
5. What is your plan for taxes? Many people forget about this expense, but you should be setting money aside to prepare.
All this to say, are you an agent living off of cash flow, or are you running a business that has a profit? To be the latter, you have to create a plan, and you can do that with those five questions. I admit that I used to be the former, but becoming the latter has completely changed my business for the better.
If you have any questions about this, or if you need help creating your business plan, I would be honored to help you! Email me anytime; I look forward to talking with you.
There are three key things to consider when pricing your home today.
So you’re selling your home: How do you price it in today’s market? That is the question of the hour right now. Even we agents are asking that question. Here are some things to consider when pricing your home in today’s correcting market.
1. Don’t price your home too high.Over the past couple of years, it felt like we were getting away with murder as sellers. We could price our home however we wanted to. Today, though, it is crucial that our pricing isn’t too high. That’s where your agent will be spending a lot of their time.
2. Price under the market.You want to be just under the target price to attract more buyers and get bid up to where you ought to be. If buyers perceive that the home is going for a good deal, they’re more motivated to bid on it quickly out of fear of missing out.
“It felt like we were getting away with murder as sellers."
3. Work with a professional.You need an agent who really understands that the market has changed. When agents and appraisers are looking at the value of a home, they’re only looking back around two months because that’s when the market began to shift. While it’s tempting to look at homes that sold a year ago for comparison, it’s just not an accurate way to get a price.
At the Charlotte Mabry team, we’ve got the professionals for you to partner with to get top dollar for your home in this shifting market environment. Please reach out to us via email, and we’ll help you get your home sold for the most money and in the quickest time possible. Make it an awesome day.
Six ways you can help protect yourself against wire fraud and other threats.
As you near closing, you’ll probably get a lot of messages about sending money towards the transaction. If you’re not careful with these, you may end up a victim of fraud. How can you verify these emails and ensure you’re not sending your money away? Here are a few ways to protect yourself:
1. Speak with your agent and learn about the process. Ensure these emails are from the right person and coming at the right time. Don’t just wire money because they’re asking about your closing; that’s one of the biggest frauds we see today.
2. Confirm the numbers and call them. Don’t just communicate by text or email—pick up the phone and call.
3. Beware of any last-minute changes. These can happen, but make sure you call and confirm before you act on any change you hear about in an email.
“When thousands of dollars are on the line, you have to verify everything."
4. Check your wiring instructions. Your wiring instructions will come to you via email, but again, call and confirm that these are the correct instructions.
5. Never email your financial information. Even if the email seems legitimate, never share your financial information. You might have noticed a theme here, but I would advise you to call and give them the information over the phone.
6. Confirm callers’ identities. If someone calls you, ask some questions and confirm their identity.
You might hate being too suspicious, but when you’re spending thousands of dollars, you have to verify everything and make sure your money is secure. If you have any questions or need help closing, call or email us. We’d love to hear from you.
What you can do to sell your home before purchasing a new one.
One of the toughest things in the real estate world over the past couple of years has been trying to purchase another home while you're stuck with one you've got to sell. That's just been impossible in the market we've had. However, I'm seeing the market change a little bit.
Let's talk today about how you can buy a home before you sell your current one. It is easier in today's market. You do have to have it ready to go on the market quickly. You are most likely able to make an offer today subject to selling your current home, and you have a much better chance of getting that offer accepted, but you can't dilly-dally. You can't wait around. You have to have your house ready to go.
You should get pricing ready, maybe even have photographs ready. Have a plan in action and ready to go, but don't pull the trigger until you make that offer. When you make an offer subject to selling your home, you're probably not going to be able to make any other concessions. If you want a cheaper price, for the seller to pay your closing costs, and would like their firstborn in the car, those things probably won't happen because they're going to give you the concession of waiting a little bit or giving you an opportunity to make an offer without selling.
“Planning on the front end will help you down the road."
Get with your agent ahead of time and work through inspection issues and anything you might have on your current home that you might need to address so that when you do put it on the market, it will go under contract without problems. Planning on the front end will help you with this offer as you go down the road.
If you don't want to go to all that trouble, there are some other options. You could get a bridge loan and bridge from your current house over to the new one until it can be sold. There are companies out there that will actually buy your home, myself included. We will buy your home so that you can go ahead and purchase another one.
If you'd like information on how to make this process go more smoothly, I'd love to talk with you. Look around on our blog page for information and links that could help you. If you can’t find anything there, feel free to do the old-fashioned thing: Pick up the phone and call me at (423) 593-5588. I'll be glad to give you more information about getting your home sold so you can buy a new one. Have an awesome day.
Four tips for beginners getting started in investing with real estate.
Have you ever thought about investing in real estate? If you haven't, maybe you should. Investing in property is a fantastic way to secure long-term wealth, but where do you start? Today I’ll share my best tips to help you begin investing in real estate:
1. Buy a duplex, not a single-family home. If you’re a first-time buyer, this is a great place to start. You can live on one side and rent out the other. After living there for a few years, you can buy a single-family home while keeping your duplex. This way, you’ll have a home all to yourself and a great investment property.
“Flipping properties is great, but it’s not a way to build long-term wealth.”
2. Start simple. When you buy your first single-family home, don’t go way over budget. Instead, stick to a simple, three-bedroom, two-bathroom house with a garage in a decent area. Once you upgrade from this property, you can keep it and rent it out, just like the duplex.
3. Short-term rentals are great for beginners. You can rent out part of your current home as an Airbnb, or you can turn an inherited property into a short-term rental.
4. Flipping homes is not a long-term investment. Buying distressed properties, fixing them up, and selling them for a profit can be a great way to invest in real estate. However, it is not a good way to build long-term wealth.
If you need more information, please call or email my team. We’d love to help you start investing in real estate!
Three actions to prioritize so you can thrive as the market shifts.
As a real estate professional, I’m sure you’ve noticed that the market is changing. This is the time to make sure you’re doing things correctly so you thrive instead of flounder. That is why I have narrowed down three priorities that are the most important actions an agent should be taking right now:
1. Check on your systems. Do you have systems, and are they in order? You should have an ideal system for all your processes that does the same thing every time. These systems will give you consistency in this shifting market.
“Who you align yourself with matters.”
2. Update your tools. My advice as someone who has been through downturns in the market before is you should be more careful to make sure you're spending wisely. For example, your marketing pieces — are they giving you a return on your investment? Also, are they reflecting the market? This all has to do with making sure your tools are updated to reflect the current climate.
3. Align yourself with a leader. Who you align yourself with matters, and you should be getting coaching from someone who has experience. If you don’t have anyone like that in your life, I would love to have a conversation with you.
If you would like to know more about our experienced team and how we work well during change, send me an email. I hope to hear from you soon!
Four aspects of your real estate business you should be tracking.
We’re in the middle of a changing market, so there’s a lot to manage! Then the question is, which systems are vital to focus on? In my opinion, the most important thing you can do is keep up with tracking your business’ metrics. Here are a few things you should keep track of, especially in a tough market:
1. Expenses. Do you have a system to track how much you spend on advertising, staff, marketing, etc.? You need something to help you track your expenses in this market.
2. Lead sources. Where are your leads coming from? This will change, so you need to look at your lead sources and the money you’ve spent on them to see if you’re getting a good return on your investment.
“You can’t improve what you aren’t tracking.”
3. The ratio of buyers to sellers. A good business has half buyers and half
sellers. If you’re skewed one way or the other, I have a solution on my team
that I’d love to share with you.
4. Lead-to-appointment ratio. How many leads does it take to get one
appointment?
You can always improve these things, but you don’t know what to improve if you
aren’t tracking it. On the Charlotte Mabry Team, we have an automatic system to
track it all.
If you want to build a team around you or grow in a down market, I would love to
help you put some tracking systems in place. Just email me. I look forward to hearing
Why the Chattanooga real estate market is not falling apart.
Is the real estate market falling apart? There has been a lot of bad news about real estate lately, but it’s like they say: There’s no news like bad news. Since I got my license in July 1986, I’ve been through lots of cycles like this. The market will always go up and down, and you need to keep that in mind as we discuss its future.
There is good news: The average home in Tennessee and Georgia has appreciated between $60,000 and $65,000 over the last year. I think this change is a return to normal. We typically see 2% to 4% appreciation every year, and that is what we should expect going forward.
Higher interest rates are here to stay, and they will make it a little harder to afford a home. If you’re thinking of buying, experts predict interest rates to climb further this year, so it might be better to buy now rather than later.
“There are no bad headlines for the Chattanooga market.”
We still have incredibly low inventory. We used to carry 4,000 to 6,000 homes
per month, but at the beginning of this year, we only had 400 homes for sale. Right
now, we have around 1,600 homes available, so we are seeing more inventory,
but it will take us a long time to catch up.
I don’t think prices will go down, and I don’t think the market will fall. We
still have a long way to go before everyone who wants a house gets one. If we
head into a recession, that might mean something different for our market.
However, the real estate market doesn’t create a recession; it just reacts to
inflation.
Bad headlines make people look at the news, but there are no bad headlines for
the Chattanooga market. If you’re thinking of buying or selling, there couldn’t be
a better time. Just call us at (423) 593-5588 or send us an email. We’d love to
Here are my tips if you want to start a career in real estate.
Between January 2021 to January 2022, many people left their traditional jobs and began looking at real estate as a new career. The No. 1 trending career search entry during this time was "How to become a real estate agent?" Throughout my 36-year career, I've learned much about what it takes to succeed in this industry. Here are two of my best tips if you're thinking about joining:
1. Surround yourself with people who will help grow your business. You have to be around people who can help you not just sell houses but also grow your business. Here at the Charlotte Mabry Team, we work hard to provide each other with a wealth of knowledge and skills to succeed as agents and individuals. If you're considering joining a team or growing a business, I would love to talk to you.
“At Charlotte Mabry Team, we work hard to help our agents succeed as agents and individuals.”
2. Go to real estate school for free. We partnered with Keller Williams so you
can have an opportunity to go to real estate school for free and get your license.
Starting a career in real estate is not easy, but it's lots of fun. If you're interested,
I'd love to have an opportunity to work with you. Reach out to me by giving me a
call or sending an email. I hope to hear from you soon!
Here are a few items you should order in advance when improving your home.
We’ve all been hearing about supply chain issues throughout our economy. How do these problems impact your home purchase or sale? Today I want to answer that question and share the top four hard-to-get items you might need when you buy or sell:
1. Kitchen and laundry appliances. If you think you’ll need these appliances in your new property, I suggest you buy them now. You can still find the expensive ones, but they’re hard to find if you’re looking for a deal.
2. Lumber. It is not as expensive as it has been in the past few years, but it still costs a lot and is hard to find. If you’re planning to build a deck or start another project that requires lumber, put in an order right away.
“Start ordering these items 90 days ahead of time.”
3. Flooring. Whether you want carpet or hardwood flooring, it’s hard to come
by. Solid wood floors are particularly tough to find because of the lumber shortage.
If you’re thinking about remodeling before you sell, you should start buying the
flooring now, even though you might not need it for a few months.
4. Adhesives and glues. If you’re changing out insulation or anything else that
requires an adhesive, be aware that adhesives are hard to find.
5. Drywall. Maybe you want to fill in, change, or finish a room in your house. You
can still get drywall, but it will take a bit of time.
If you’re thinking about remodeling or buying a home, you should start ordering
these items 90 days in advance so that you have them when you need them.
If you want some help finding these materials or have any real estate questions,
feel free to call or email us. We’d be happy to help!
Here’s why it's not so crazy to inspect a home on a rainy day.
Should you look at a home you want to purchase while it’s raining? I know it sounds crazy, but it might actually be a good idea. Today I want to talk about the different reasons why you should inspect a home on a rainy day.
Water is often the No. 1 problem in any given house. Water eating away at foundations or cultivating mold in your new home are huge problems, so check a property thoroughly before moving forward with your purchase.
When you visit a property in the rain, check the gutters, downspouts, and drainage. In our area, landscaping often keeps water up against the house, which causes the water to drain towards the property. This can lead to major issues over time, so watch out for water pooling around the home.
“Basements are common in our area, so check for standing water in them.”
Your inspector will certainly check for these problems, but if they do their
inspection when it’s dry, they’ll have no way of knowing about them. If you
check for these issues, you can tell your inspector about them so that they
can investigate further.
Make sure you visit the crawlspace or basement during your rain visit to look
for standing water. This is a red flag for mold and other issues.
If water is seeping through into the basement, it could lead to foundation
issues down the line.
I know it doesn’t sound fun to visit a property in the rain, but I highly recommend
it. The agents on my team can help you with this visit and anything else involved
in buying a home, so reach out to me via phone or email if you have any questions.
