It’s only January and we are already seeing hand-wringing in our neighborhood about property taxes and the companies that will protest on your behalf. Protesting your property taxes in Williamson and Travis Counties will be even more challenging this year.

Just a reminder, if you engaged one of the tax protesting companies last year you probably signed a form giving them authorization to protest for you every year. That means if your plans are to protest on your own this year or you plan to hire a different company you will want to cancel the service with the company you previously hired. Otherwise they will protest on your behalf and you will get billed if they are successful.

Something new this year is at least one of the protesting

I’ve attended a couple interesting economic updates in the last few weeks and I wanted to share a few of the interesting and perhaps unexpected slides.

Can you believe the average household income for 20% of the people in our area is now almost $250,000, and that is from 2017? Many people talk about the rush of Californians to our area and how that is causing home prices to go up. This demonstrates it’s not just the number of people but also that many of those transplants have higher incomes than residents who have been living here for years.

Where we have seen this impact real estate is prices are being pushed up as our real estate is still affordable for someone earning this type of income.  In addition, more buyers are skipping the

Home values are tricky at this time of the year. 2020 is going to be challenging to both buyers and sellers with a low number of homes for sale and prices going up. If you are planning to buy or sell a home in particular at this time of year you deserve to have an expert Broker helping you and here’s why.

If you are selling a home, you’re at risk of pricing your home too low. Particularly if you sell your home off market. Although our market is not as seasonal as you might expect for certain floor plans that may not sell very often there may be much more demand than supply that has built up a backlog of buyers over the winter. It is important to work with a Broker that won’t just price your home based on what sold almost a year ago. You

As we begin 2020 we want to thank everyone for your business and your referrals in 2019. We hope 2019 was a great year for you and wish you a happy and prosperous 2020!

Be Careful Listening To Predictions And Interpreting Data

This is the time of the year when everyone wants to make predictions about the real estate market and the economy. Do you remember this time last year? Everyone was predicting the Federal Reserve would increase interest rates 3 times and a recession was almost guaranteed to happen. Both of those predictions couldn’t have been any more wrong!

We will also see more end of the year statistics and projections for next year. Inside this issue we talk about one particular company using statistics to influence your behavior. In

This is a great story about how being afraid of low-ball offers when selling your home winds up attracting low ball offers. The figures in this post have been changed to protect the innocent.

Whenever we talk with someone about selling their home, we go over the 3 strategies to price your home. We emphasize that it is YOUR home because we will give you professional advice, the same advice I would give a member of my family, and the final decision is up to you.

Occasionally we have a client who wants to price their home above the recommended market value. When we are in that situation, we do everything we can to get that price and the truth is sometimes the owner of the house is right and a buyer pays a higher price than expected.

What

Open Door is a house flipping company that buys homes at a low price and then re-sells the homes at a higher price. I think it’s great that consumers have more choices today when it comes to selling their homes.

It’s great as long as consumers are informed and not being misled about the real estate market and the true expected sales price of your home. What I’ve found when testing an offer for my own properties is the offers were very low. Because I’m working in the real estate business I know their offers are low. My fear is Open Door is preying on people who are less financially savvy and the people who can afford to lose money the least.

Because I previously requested an offer, yesterday I received this email from Open Door saying the Austin

Because we hold so many open houses, we see the same potential buyers over and over. They often tell me their struggles and frustrations about their home buying process.

Many of these struggles and frustrations are self-inflicted due to how they choose their Realtor. Buyers often think all Realtors are the same. As a result, when buying a home they will work with their friend (everyone has a friend in real estate) or hire an agent based on which agent gives you the largest rebate.

Especially in a low inventory real estate market like ours this is a huge mistake because you are not getting the most important things you need from a Realtor which are perspective and advice.

The average Realtor only sells about 1-2 homes per year. As a

Are you planning to sell a home with a solar system in the Austin area? Follow these tips to maximize the sales price for your home.

1. Put Together A Package Of Information About Your Solar System

Think back to when you purchased your solar system. What information was important to you? Chances are the buyer of your home will want to know the same things.

When we are selling a home with a solar system we will put together a package of information including…

• Original cost of the system
• Age of the system
• KW size and number of panels
• Warranty
• Current utility bills compared to before solar system
• Is the system owned or leased

It is important to have this information in the document section of the MLS as

In our neighborhood everybody talks about the ways in which home values are affected in the community. Maybe it is new apartments being built, sometimes it’s cars parked on the street, many people are concerned about cars being broken into, for others the hot button is landscaping and how the community is maintained.

When I talk to our neighbors the conversation often turns to some of these issues and how they are affecting our property value negatively. They talk about all the visible things that may potentially affect home value in a neighborhood.

In reality there is a hidden killer of home values that very few people know about. The hidden killer is the average agent that listed your neighbor’s house.

Let me tell you why.

Because when

If you would like a more accurate timeline of when your home can sell for and how long it will take contact me directly at 512-791-7473 or eric@koparealestate.com.

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