Kopa Real Estate Blog - Market Tips

Buying or Selling a Home? Here’s what NOT to say on Facebook

People today use Facebook to share all of life's little ups and downs with friends, often forgetting that good friends are not the only ones who might be looking at their Facebook page. When you’re buying or selling a home that could be dangerous.

If your home is for sale, you want the world to know, so do post good photos. Do tell your friends how to reach your agent to make an appointment for a tour. You can even state the list price.

After that, you can talk about your favorite features in the home – how the sun comes in the kitchen window in the morning, or how you enjoy your outdoor kitchen.

If you’re buying, you can tell your friends that you’re looking for a home in a specific neighborhood and even describe the perfect home.

What…

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4 Types of Homes You Should Sell Before Next Year

 Ever since the beginning of the year when the inventory of homes reached an all-time low we have been noticing an important pattern with the homes we are selling. Homes that have some type of condition that in a normal market would have sold at a significant discount are selling for record prices right now. This is one of the few times in real estate you may be able to time the market.

Although the inventory of homes is increasing, we are still in a strong seller’s market which means buyers don’t have many choices. Motivated buyers who would pass over a home if they had 3 other homes to choose from are paying market price for these homes in today’s market.

Many of our savvy investor clients are taking advantage of this market and selling…

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Austin Real Estate Housing Market Update July 2021

I’m going to talk about changes we are seeing in the Austin real estate market, review the most recent real estate statistics and talk about what we expect to see in the near future.

We do know why prices have risen so dramatically this year. It’s because there have been so few homes for sale, that’s no secret. When a home is called “Active” it means it is not under contract, you can actually buy that house. If we go back 2 years there were 7,133 Active homes for sale in June, 2019. In June, 2020 we dropped to 5,300. By January of this year, we were barely over 1,000 but slowly the inventory of homes is increasing. In June, 2021 there were 2,265 Active homes.As I shoot this video in mid-July there are over 3,000 Active homes on…

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Success Story – 15804 Dink Pearson Ln

If you listen to the media or friends your impression of the real estate market is that every home will sell no matter what you do. You’d also think your home will sell for the same price regardless of the condition, marketing or Broker you hire. These are some of the biggest lies in real estate today. Sometimes I think people believe the government is putting a limit on their home and you’re only allowed to sell it for $600,000 regardless of what they do.

I sold the home next to 15804 Dink Pearson last year. The owners of that home had hired another agent to sell their home but it didn’t sell. After…

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How I Hired A Broker To Sell My Aunt’s House

One morning last September I received a call from the Arlington, VA police department informing me that my aunt passed away. Although she was 82 it was pretty unexpected because I spoke with her only a few days before then and she seemed to be doing great.

My aunt was one of the earliest women to receive a law degree from Georgetown University and had a distinguished career working for the US Customs Office. Right until the end her mind was sharp as ever.

For years I had been encouraging her to sell her home and move into one of the independent living options nearby because in my opinion she would have benefited from being around more people. Understandably my aunt was set in her ways and wanted to remain on her own until the end.

Because…

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Your Home Is Probably Worth $125K Over Tax Value!

The Williamson County Appraisal District just mailed out the Notice of Appraised Value for 2021. Look for your notice in the mailbox or search your address on the WCAD website.

Prepare yourself before you open the envelope because you are going to be shocked by the value. Especially for those who own rental properties with no Homestead Cap you will see huge jumps in the value you will pay taxes on this year.

When you see your value if you think to yourself “If someone would pay that much for my home, I would sell it” let me tell you something even more surprising…Your tax value is probably $125,000 or more below what your home can sell for in today’s market. That’s a conservative estimate because there’s a home we will be selling that I…

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What We Are Seeing In The Market - February 2021

I’m going to review some of the important housing statistics for the Austin real estate market for February 2021. 

Before I get into the stats there are a couple things I want to talk about. Because real estate prices have been appreciating rapidly when I talk with sellers some will often make statements starting with “The market is so hot that XYXZ.”

"The market is so hot I can sell off market."

"The market is so hot presentation doesn’t matter."

"The market is so hot the Broker I hire doesn’t matter."

It’s as if there has been some government executive order that says you can only sell your home for $600,000 no matter what you do.

In reality, we are seeing sellers sell off market telling me they sold for $50,000 above the…

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How Accurate Are Online Home Value Estimates?

If you own a home you probably have looked at some type of online home value estimate. Even I like to look at mine as a curiosity to see how far off they are from reality.

I’m the type of person who orders the exact same meal every time from restaurants so I own 2 of the EXACT same houses right around the corner from each other.

Here are the online home estimates I received on the same day for the 2 homes. These homes are exactly the same with a $36,000 difference is estimated value. How can this happen? I have no idea. The homes are the same size, same finishes, same builder, same floor plan, same schools with the same neighborhood amenities.

I can’t explain the $36,000 difference with these homes. In general, we don’t…

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To Sell A Home With Water Damage...For Top Dollar

We’re coming out of the worst storm I have experienced in over 30 years of living in Texas. We are hearing of pipes bursting and water leaks all over the Austin area.

Many homeowners will be worried about home values being affected when selling a home with previous water damage. Whether you are planning to put your property on the market next month or in 5 years here are a few helpful tips to make your real estate transaction easier and let you sell for top dollar.

No Discount For Homes With Water Damage In Today’s Market

When you search for how to sell a home with water damage, you’re going to find hundreds, maybe thousands of blog posts written by companies that want to make a low-ball offer for your home.

For anyone planning…

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What Will Cause The Housing Market To Crash?

Everywhere I go people want to tell me the housing market is about to crash. Maybe the market will crash, maybe it won’t. If it’s true we are in a bubble and we will see a crash here are some of the reason we may see real estate prices pop.

Inflation and Interest Rates Going Up

There’s no doubt homebuyers are motivated by the historically low mortgage interest rates we are seeing. Many buyers are able to lock in 30-year fixed rate mortgages at 2.5% or better allowing them more buying power to stretch the price range of their home search.

Interest rates typically rise when inflation increases. With all the money being pumped into the economy it isn’t not hard to imagine we will see inflation once we see the pandemic coming to an end.

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