Maria Mak. Burnaby Realtors. BC Websites for Home Buyers

Technology has been a driving force behind the transformation of many industries. While real estate remains a people business, consumers today have access to scores of information that can help them find an property, a REALTOR® and connect all the dots in between.

Purchasing a home will likely be the most important buying decision you’ll ever have to make so it is important to do your own research, understand your rights and find professionals that you are most comfortable working with.

If you’re deciding whether to buy or sell a home, it’s critical that you understand and properly assess your personal and financial circumstances against current housing opportunities.


The REALTORS® of Canada and other real estate professionals have provided a wealth of information online to help you understand what opportunities are out there for you and your family to consider.
www.realtor.ca

Formerly mls.ca, this is the most comprehensive and popular real estate listing website in the country.

In 2008, the Canadian Real Estate Association rebranded and re-designed mls.ca to become realtor.ca. This change brought upgraded search functions and capabilities, which provide a streamlined experience for people using the site.

If you’re looking for a property in BC, you can search by area or MLS® number. If you’re looking for a REALTOR®, you can search the province by name, company or area of specialty.

www.realtylink.org


Learn about the real estate market and homes for sale in Greater Vancouver and the province.

The online version of this publication, the Realtylink website is an excellent resource for consumers looking to buy or sell a home in BC. The website contains a vast range of home listings for properties across the province and features indepth walkthrough-style information that everyone should know when dealing in real estate. If you’re buying, you can find a REALTOR® in your community or learn more about the mortgage process and details regarding offers and completion.

If you’re selling, you can learn about establishing your home’s value and how to prepare it before it goes on the market.
The site also features links to market data and online versions of the Realtylink In Print newspaper produced for each geographical area in Metro Vancouver.

www.rebgv.org

A wide-ranging, one-stop website for real estate information. The Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver’s website offers visitors a 360-degree look at local real estate, providing detailed MLS® statistics, monthly podcasts, consumer guidance and other information and links related to local real estate.

On the site, you can track home prices in your area, search for a REALTOR®, read about government initiatives that impact local real estate, and learn about the various cost-savings programs available for homebuyers and sellers.

The site also features a wealth of consumer information related to buying and selling a home, from checklists and FAQ’s to market data and community profiles. One of the most important measures of home value in real estate is the MLS®Link Housing Price Index (HPI), and this website contains the latest HPI data as well as a comprehensive breakdown of home values across the region.
www.recbc.ca

A site for consumer protection and industry regulation.

The Real Estate Council of British Columbia is the body responsible for licensing and regulating REALTORS® in BC. Their website is full of valuable consumer protection information, as well as information on how to become a REALTOR®.

One of the most important features of this site is the Complaints and Discipline section, which allows consumers to file complaints against REALTORS® and inform themselves about recent disciplinary decisions.

www.howrealtorshelp.ca


Built and maintained by the Canadian Real Estate Association, this site is filled with good information for those looking to buy and sell a home.

The site offers information for buyers and sellers on a variety of topics and includes brief videos to illustrate examples.

You can also find handy tools like checklists for buyers and sellers and mortgage calculators.

For all your premium real estate services, please contact Maria Mak @ 604.839.6368 or visit her website www.mariamak.com, You'll be smiling too.

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Maria Mak . Burnaby Realtor. When someone asks how house prices are doing...

When someone asks how house prices are doing in a particular neighbourhood, the question seems easily answered.

The big real estate boards all issue monthly price reports that spell out what the average selling price was in the previous month and how that compares to the month, and the year, before.

But there's a problem with trying to divine market direction from average price data. It's just too blunt a tool.

If real estate — as the saying goes — is really about "location, location, location," then average prices frequently don’t capture the reality of what's going on in a particular city or neighbourhood.

Calculating the average house price is as simple as adding up the prices realized for all home sales in a particular month and dividing by the number of sales. The problem with that metric begins to emerge, however, when one or more parts of the housing market don't act in tandem with all the other segments, as they seldom do.

Average price:
The average price is the figure obtained by dividing the total dollar volume of sales in a given period by the number of sales.
For instance, what happens if the percentage of really expensive homes sold drops more than it does for other types of homes? That could lead to a big drop in the average selling price, even though the price of more moderate homes may be little changed.

That exact scenario played out with the release of the June sales figures from the Canadian Real Estate Association. Among the ocean of figures CREA released was the fact that the average resale price across the country that month was down 0.8 per cent from the same month a year earlier.

It left the impression that prices in the Canadian housing market had dropped compared to the previous year.

Median price:
After ranking all sales in a given time period in numerical order, the median price is the statistical mid-point where half the sales represent cheaper homes and half are more expensive
It turns out that the national average price dropped only because Vancouver's pricey real estate market had 28 per cent fewer sales this June than it did in June 2011.

Exclude Vancouver from the national figures and CREA says the average national selling price last month actually rose 3.2 per cent. In fact, CREA reports the average home price in June was higher year-over-year in 70 per cent of the local markets it looked at.

Average price data within cities are also vulnerable to a shift in the sales mix.

What if a huge batch of low-priced condos are snapped up one month? That would send the average price lower, even though the resale market for other types of housing may not have budged at all.

So it comes as no surprise that economists who analyze the real estate market hate averages.

"Averages are a horrible place to go," says Tsur Somerville, who heads up the Centre for Urban Economics and Real Estate at the University of British Columbia.

Toronto is in the midst of a major condo-building boom, which experts say makes the sector more vulnerable to future price drops. (John Rieti/CBC)
Gregory Klump, the chief economist at CREA, agrees. Using average prices is "like looking in a funhouse mirror," he warns.

Finding the median price, which involves ranking all sales from top to bottom and finding the sale price that's in the middle, is a bit better, Somerville says, but it's still flawed methodology. Like average prices, the median fails to take into account changes in buying patterns.

Economists say there are more sophisticated methods that give a better sense of market trends than either averages or medians.

1. The hedonic approach
More than 15 years ago, the MLS developed its own home price index to get a clearer picture of price trends. It uses a complex statistical model to measure the rate at which housing prices change over time by tracking price changes in "typical" homes in each market. Each neighbourhood has a typical benchmark home.

CREA, in addition to providing average home price data, also releases MLS home price index data for five major markets: Greater Vancouver, the Fraser Valley, Calgary, the Greater Toronto Area and Montreal. Sixteen additional markets are slated to be added in the future.

"If you really want an accurate measure of what's going on with home prices, you've got to keep the quality of the homes constant," says CREA's Klump. "That's what the [MLS home price index] does. It compares apples with apples over time. It's not subject to a change in the sales mix the way average and median prices are."

What difference do the different approaches make? In Vancouver, for instance, the average selling price in June was $701,141, down 13.3 per cent from last year. But using the MLS home price index methodology, Greater Vancouver prices actually rose year-over-year by 1.7 per cent.

2. The repeat sales method
This method of tracking home prices looks at how the price of the same house changes over time, so that only properties with at least two sales are entered into the mix. The assumption underlying this process is that each selected property's overall quality remains constant.

Given the high rate of renovations, that can be problematic, but the statistical models attempt to account for that.

The Teranet-National Bank home price index is the best-known example of the repeat sales method in Canada.

"The statistics work out the problem that not every house sells every year," says Somerville, who uses data from both the MLS and the Teranet-National Bank home price indices to track market trends.

In the U.S., the widely tracked Case-Shiller home price index uses the repeat sales method, too.

3. Other methods
Somerville cites a couple of other indicators to track housing price trends.

The Royal Lepage house price survey is a quarterly look at seven types of housing in dozens of neighbourhoods across Canada. The values are estimates of fair market value in each of the surveyed locations, based on local home price data and knowledge of local housing market conditions provided by Royal Lepage real estate agents and brokers.

"In theory, it should be problematic, because it's a survey," says Somerville. "It's not based on actual data. But it moves very well with the higher quality statistical data."

Some market watchers also look at the sales-to-new-listings ratio. Currently, it's at 51.7 per cent nationally and has been trending down. Anything over 60 per cent is considered a sellers' market, with anything below 40 per cent being a buyers' market.

Somerville also looks at sales activity. "Changes in sales tend to lead market conditions," he says. "So when sales are declining, that's the best sign of a weakening market, although price declines don't have to follow. You can get prices flat-lining; they don't have to decline."

Cooling market
Currently, the number of sales in most markets in Canada is slowing. Overall, CREA reports 4.4 per cent fewer sales in June than a year earlier.

At the same time, year-over-year prices aren't retreating in most markets, at least yet. But the recent tightening in mortgage regulations could change that and it could show up as early as August, when sales and price figures for July are released.

"We do anticipate that some first-time buyers will be priced out of the market," Klump says.

These days, the operative words among Canadian housing market watchers seem to be "slowing" and "cooling."

"The cycle of eroding affordability followed by softening home prices has begun in some regions and will be felt in many parts of the country by year-end," Royal Lepage CEO Phil Soper forecasts. "Home prices cannot grow faster than salaries and the underlying economy indefinitely."

Somerville says that of all the housing markets in Canada, Toronto is the one that bears watching. "If I was concerned about a market, I'd be more concerned about Toronto, because the level of building activity has been very, very high there," he says, referring to the the boom in condo-building.

"You see supply levels being very high by historic standards in terms of construction," he says. "I'm not saying things have to go sour; I'd just be more concerned [about Toronto] than elsewhere."

% change in home prices year-over-year
(June 2011 to June 2012 unless indicated otherwise)
City Average price
MLS Home Price Index

Teranet-National Bank HPI (May data) Royal Lepage House Price Survey (Q2)
Vancouver -13.3% +1.7% +4.4% +3.3% to +5.5%
Calgary +2.5% +5.6% +3.5% -0.8% to +5.0%
Toronto +7.3% +7.9% +9.9% +5.5% to +8.3%
Montreal +3.7% +2.7% +4.5% + 0.5% to +3.9%
Sources: CREA, MLS, Teranet-National Bank, Royal Lepage

For all your premium real estate services , please contact Maria Mak @ 604.839.6368 or visit her website www.mariamak.com, you'll be smiling too .

Maria Mak. Burnaby Realtor - Chasing my paper moon...

crunched,

tossed
in the bin,

bewildered,

lost,

not a clue;

with the grace of your pull,

and the gent of your push;

rebounced,

refurbished,

re-enlightened,

will you follow me
chasing my paper moon?

Drawing and written by Maria Mak. Burnaby Realtor

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Maria Mak. Burnaby Real Estate Agents - 16 ways to sell your home faster

When selling a home , the marketing effort must be coordinated on all fronts. It also must be superior to the competition. This is especially true in a buyers’ market where the homes sitting on the market seemingly outnumber the potential home buyers. In such an environment, you must lift your home out from this crowd and highlight it in the best way possible. You must out-think the competition.


All good marketing efforts begin life as a sound, basic plan and then evolves to fit the particular property and situation. Cut from whole cloth and then tailor-made, such a plan will incorporate innovative new ideas and “rearrange” old ones.



1. Select a Quality Realtor . There are some realtors who are little more than “order takers” who literally can’t properly write out a contract, much less have the hard-won knowledge needed to position your home in the most appropriate and effective way for your particular market. So how do you find such an experienced, market aggressive realtor? Ask around. Check with friends and get some names. When selling in today’s market, you need to be in the hands of a practicing “doctor” and not someone eager to practice on you.


2. The market evaluation should compare your home with at least 10 currently active competitive listings, 10 recent competitive sales and 10 expired listings which didn’t sell. Drive over and check out these benchmark properties yourself to ensure the realtor has put your home in the right “ballpark”. If you disagree, find out the reasoning as to why the realtor has so placed your home. The reasons could be good ones indeed. (Or vice versa.)


3. Once you’ve vetted all three choices, go with the realtor whose combination of experience, proven performance and action-plan for your home is the most impressive. But be careful not to confuse impressive with unattainable.


4. Ensure your home is listed on the realtor’s personal website and other media like ethnic newspaper and magazine. The more exposure, the better.



5. Underline to the realtor that you wish to be kept informed of the sales progress at least once a week during the entire listing period. Every time the home is shown to prospective buyers, ensure the realtor informs you in advance and also gives you a feedback as to the viewer’s reaction to the home. On the other hand, don’t overdo it. Be courteous and be careful not to nag the realtor. When dealing with a professional, be professional.


6. Price Your Home Right: Yes, we all need and want the best price. But be realistic. It might do wonders for the ego and daydreams, but a high price tag does little if it doesn’t come accompanied with a sale. If anything, it has kept your home effectively out of the market. Once you and your realtor have agreed upon an asking price based upon the aforementioned market evaluation, bring in a reality check. Based on your understanding of the competition, is the pricing realistic? This is particularly important in a market where prices are falling.

7. Create a “Benefit and Feature” Sheet For Your Home: Reach back in time and remember why you bought the home in the first place. What caught your eye, what appealed to you? Write these reasons down; more often than not, new buyers will also be attracted to these same features. List every good point, every benefit, your property and your neighborhood enjoys. Today, people want information. Lots of it. Think about the basics and spell them out. A good agent will know the answers already, but nonetheless, these basic features should be highlighted in your feature sheet.


8. Place Your Home on the MLS: If a home is to sell, it must have maximum exposure. The Multiple Listing Service will give it that exposure. As well, ensure your home is put on the Agents Open or MLS Agents Tour so as to educate other realtors as to the home’s potential. But two months is all you need to get on.


9. Buy Some Extra Enthusiasm: Human beings almost always act in their own self-interest first. Take advantage of this to promote some extra interest in your own property. Offer something special to encourage realtors to bring in those offers. Depending upon how hard it is to sell your home (higher price, tough area, unique features that appeal to few, future potential versus today’s reality), offer extra commission to the realtor who brings in the sale…but only if he or she brings it in at the full asking price. As most offers are invariably lower, it’s unlikely you’ll actually end up paying the extra commission, but it does work as an incentive.


10. Advertise: Consider a cost-effective advertising campaign and review such a plan with your realtor. How big an advertisement? Placed where? How often? Review the ad itself with the realtor and test-market it past a few unbiased friends, associates and so forth. Keep your ego out of it.


11. Let Nothing Escape the Net: Insist that the realtor presents to you all and any offers that come in, no matter how low or seemingly impossible. If someone is willing to write an offer, be considerate enough to see it. Besides, it gives you a better idea of just how the market is reacting to your property.


12. First Impressions Do Count: Fix up your home but do it with “resale” in mind: take care of the eye-catching areas and don’t waste the effort (and money) on the rest. The first thing a potential buyers sees is the front porch or entrance. Fix that wobbly front step or squeaky door. Repaint the front door, bathrooms and kitchen. Use off-white or general neutral colors only. If the rug is frayed or stained, consider removing them and going with hardwood floors (assuming you’ve got them and they’re in reasonable shape). Again, sell the “idea” of the place’s renovation potential but don’t waste the effort to carry it through and do the actual doing. Let the new owners do it. But with that said, there are certain largish renovations which may add more cost-effective resale value than others.


13. Spread the Word: Hand out the feature sheet and unique offer/special commission information to everyone you know, including your secretaries, part-time staff and whomever. You never know who the information will get passed on to next.


14. Don’t be afraid to be Different: Agents regularly send out “I Just Listed” flyers to other homes in the neighborhood in the hope of engendering new business. Fine, but check out the flyer and make sure he or she lists the special features and special incentives of your home and not just the standard ubiquitous “vanilla-flavored” preprinted card. Be different. Again, you never know who ends up reading this detailed information. And again, nothing succeeds like success.


15. Declutter and then declutter again. Depersonalize and neutralize. The first items that should go in those packing boxes: family photos, collections and just about anything else that says “you.” Show the home from its best possible side. Have people see how they would feel if they owned the home. Developers have show suites and show homes for a reason.


16. Stage your home! Have a professional come in and help. Stand in the doorway to find each room’s focal point, and use furniture placement to highlight that. The back of your sofa shouldn’t block the view of the fireplace, for example. Remove any extraneous pieces of furniture. “Re-position” them into another room … or into storage altogether. A wingback chair that’s crowding the family room might help create a nice reading nook in the master bedroom. There are a number of reasons why homes don’t sell: overpriced, poor location, poor condition, intense competition as many similar homes similarly priced are all fighting for attention. Homes that do sell are those that are tended diligently by the professional realtor, are priced right (as in just below the competition) and have something unique about them that attracts the buyer’s attention in the first place. You have the right to demand an attentive, professional, upbeat realtor, a person who creates a solid, comprehensive action plan (in writing) and does so in a measurable way (number of showings, numbers of interested buyers, etc.). A good realtor keeps you informed all the way. Be focused. Insist that your realtor be equally as focused. There is no such thing as accidental success. It’s always earned and always comes with a price.




***For all your real estate services, please contact Maria Mak and my team at Sutton Centre Realty at 604-839-6368 or visit my website @ www.mariamak.com, you’ll be smiling too!


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