January Steve & Jack's Home News

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! We hope, as we are nearing the final stretch before Christmas, that you have your shopping finished (or almost finished) and are about ready for the big day. Whether you are spending the holidays at home or away, or even if you don't celebrate Christmas, we hope this time of year is filled with joy, laughter, love, and some time off to spend with family and friends.

THANK YOU to everyone who packed the house a couple of Saturdays' ago to watch The Penguins of Madagascar! We had a fantastic time seeing everyone and hope you enjoyed the movie. We look forward to seeing everyone next year, so save the date-the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

We also had a great time seeing everyone for Cookies with Santa a couple of weeks ago. There were some fantastic pictures and the kids loved the treats and art projects. We hope you will join us again next year.

This year, we are looking forward to everyone staying home and have family come visit us for a change. It will be nice attending our own church and continuing our family holiday traditions. Some of our traditions are visiting Reynold's Farm Equipment and seeing their impressive lights display. If you haven't seen it, it is a must. We also get chocolate advent calendars for the kids each year. It is a nice treat for 24-days to which they look forward each year. We usually celebrate Christmas Eve at Mary Anne and Jack's house and then Christmas afternoon at Brigid's aunt & uncle's. What are some of your family traditions and customs?

The market continues to improve each month and we are seeing an unusually busy December. If you are thinking of selling your house soon, give us a call so we can consult with you and give you specific ideas on how to get the most money out of your house.

Thank you for your continued loyalty and support! We are extremely grateful for you and your trust in us and look forward to helping you and those you care about in 2015.

Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!!

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December Steve & Jack's Home News

We hope you enjoyed a relaxing and fun Thanksgiving holiday with friends and family. We hosted this year and enjoyed seeing family and watching football amongst some amazing food!

We have had an overwhelming response to our VIP Client Appreciation Event THIS Saturday. If you have RSVP'd already-thank you!! We are saving a seat for you. If you have not RSVP'd yet, we only have a few more seats left. Due to the response, we upgraded to the largest theater and have a few seats remaining. So, if you have been meaning to RSVP, but haven't done so yet, please e-mail Bob Clidinst at Bob@Welcome2Indy.com with the number of adult and child tickets you would like. Our hard cut-off is tomorrow at noon. We would love to see you and provide a light breakfast as well as the movie, The Penguins of Madagascar. It just came out last weekend and I have heard is really funny.

Thank you for all of the entries for the Colts tickets!! Our winner has already been contacted and is excited to attend. We hope you enjoy the game and bring back a Colts' win!! If you didn't win this year, don't worry, we plan to have another drawing next year!

Thank you, also to everyone who attended our Photos with Santa on November 23rd. We had a fantastic turnout! If you had the professional photographer take some photos, they just came in and we will be sending those to you in the next day or so.

Merry Christmas to you and your family. We are so grateful to each of you for your business and friendship. We are truly blessed to do something we love and with people with whom we love to spend time. Thank you for another fantastic year and we look forward to helping more of you and those you care about in 2015!

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Steve & Jack Rupp

November Steve & Jack's Home News

Happy November and a not-so-welcome polar vortex showing us signs of an early winter. As I write this, I am sitting in a hotel room in sunny San Diego for a real estate conference learning how to better run our business and provide an even higher level of service to our clients. Of course, I had to send the obligatory video of me at the ocean today to Brigid to rub it in a little before our conference starts this evening. We are big believers in continual education that never ends. We are excited about what we will learn over the next 3 days and bring back to implement into our business.

Last month for Fall Break, we went to visit Brigid's parents in Tampa and see Steve's good friend from college. While there, we attended Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween-a first for us. It was so much fun and the girls absolutely loved it. The best part is that a limited number of guests are allowed in and lines for rides are much shorter. If you have never been to Disney during the Fall, I highly recommend going to this special event. It is worth the time and money...and the parade is the best of any all year!

Here are some housing stats for September as reported by MIBOR. These compare September 2014 to September 2013.
• New listings-UP 8.4%
• Pending sales-UP 13.6%
• Closed sales-UP 13.1%
• Median Sales Price-UP 5.1% to $141,900
• Average Sales Price-UP 2.9% to $172,319
• % of Original List Price Received at Sale-UP 1% to 93.2%
• Total Active Listings Available at Month End-DOWN 0.1% to 13,882
• Months Supply of Inventory-UP 3.3% to 5.7%
Basically, house prices are going up, interest rates are staying low, but are predicted to be at 5% by this time next year, and inventory is going up and is nearing a balanced market shifting from a sellers' market. If you are thinking of selling or buying your window is closing to take advantage of our very favorable market. Please contact us if you would like specific numbers on your house so you can make an informed decision.
Veteran's Day was yesterday. A huge THANK YOU, especially to all of our clients who have served our country. Jack is a Navy Veteran and served aboard the USS Essex. We honor and give thanks to each of you for the sacrifices you have made for us and our families.

Thanksgiving is just around the corner. We certainly hope you have plans to spend it with friends/family and to truly be thankful and grateful for how fortunate we all are. We are extremely grateful and thankful for our wonderful family and friends, but also for our amazing clients...like you! Thank you for your continued trust and confidence. Without you & your continued referrals, we wouldn't be in business. We are honored & privileged to be a part of such an important time in your lives.

A few reminders and fun things coming up for you to put on your calendar.

1) Pictures with Santa is coming back!! They will be at our office at Keller Williams at 11550 N. Meridian Street, Suite 450 in Carmel. The time is 12-2PM on Sunday, November 23rd and we will have punch & cookies. Please RSVP to Bob@Welcome2Indy.com by Friday, November 21st at 5PM if you plan to attend so we can have an accurate head count for refreshments.

2) You should be receiving your formal invitation any day now, if you haven't already for our 2nd annual VIP Client Appreciation Movie Day. It is on Saturday, December 6th at the Hamilton Town Center Movie Theater. We rented out the entire theater for you and your family to watch the new Disney movie, The Penguins of Madagascar. For those of you who attended last year for the blockbuster movie, Frozen, you know how much fun it was. We will begin with a coffee, juice, & donut bar at 9AM and the movie will start promptly at 10AM. Reservations are required by 5PM, Wednesday, December 3rd with the number of adult & child tickets requested to Bob@Welcome2Indy.com. We hope you can join us for both of these fun events!

Enjoy the newsletter and Happy Thanksgiving!!!

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Steve & Jack Rupp

October Steve & Jack's Home News

Welcome to Fall!! We love this time of year with cooler temperatures and the beautiful colors (although our summer has been very mild)! We can't forget about football!! Our Irish and Colts are faring quite well so far. We hope you are having fun at some festivals and enjoying nature's pallet changing as well. We have some family traditions during this time of year we would love to share with you. What are your Fall traditions? Here are some of ours:

Headless Horseman at Conner Prairie-Adults are $10-$14 depending on the day, except if you are a member and then admission is FREE! In addition to the feature attraction of the haunted hayride with the headless horseman (non-scary version from 6:30-7:30PM and scary from 7:30-11PM) 10/16-10/19 and 10/23-10/26. There are lots of food tents as well as the Apple Store (our favorite) full of delicious apples and the amazing gourmet apple! There is a catapult launching various things, costume contest, karaoke, mad scientist tent, scary movies being played, play ground is open, slide, instrument play along, and the famous Steven's Puppets Legend of Sleepy Hollow (a must-see, trust me). Hayride time slots usually sell out by 7PM, so get there by 5:30PM at the latest and stand in line until the gates open at 6PM.

Pumpkinfest in Zionsville on 421-open every weekend in October. Tickets are $10/adults and $9/kids. We have gone every year for the past 10 years. The great thing is that almost everything is included in your ticket price, except for food, of course and the pony rides, which are only $5. There is live bluegrass music, a huge slide, milking & lassoing areas, face painting, corn kernel box, petting zoo, hay rides, pumpkin patch, corn maze, a craft and farmer's market, blacksmith & wood carver, trikes, train, and a free pie pumpkin you can take and decorate in the tent. Of course, the absolute BEST thing to get is the famous apple cinnamon donuts! Yum!

Oktoberfest at Traders' Point Creamery-only open one day (last Saturday). Tickets are $8/adults in advance and kids 10 & under are FREE. They have live bands (Polkaboy is outstanding!!), games and crafts, a Biergarten, Sun King truck, Artisan market, hog roast, hayrides, pony rides (extra $), and live milking demonstrations. Very fun!

Renaissance Faire-This is held one weekend in October (the 4th & 5th this year) in Saxony in Fishers and is the largest single weekend event of its kind in the nation! Tickets are $10/adults & $4/kids in advance. There are costumed denizens wandering about, tons of tents with all kinds of period wares to sell, puppet shows, acrobat acts, live music, jousting, sword play, lots of food booths and lots more.

The real estate market continues to change with strong movement in sales price and trailing closed sales. New listings have declined along with pending sales. Sustained job growth, lower mortgage interest rates and slow rise in homes for sale appear to have unleashed some pent-up demand. It is encouraging to see second quarter GDP growth revised upwards to a 4.2 percent annualized rate and stronger-than-expected job growth. Improvements are still needed in wage growth and consumer confidence, but recovery continues. Figures below are taken from MIBOR's August 2014 Market Overview Report:

• New listings DOWN 5.8%
• Pending sales DOWN 0.8%
• Closed sales DOWN 2.9%
• Median sales price UP 5.8% to $146,000
• Average sales price UP 6.7% to $183,433
• Percent of original list price received at sale UP 1.1% to 93.8%
• Total active listing available at month end UP 0.8% to 13,921
• Months supply of inventory UP 4.4% to 5.8 months

Finally, we are so excited to bring back two of our favorite events from last year. You should have already received a postcard in the mail regarding our extremely popular Colts' Ticket Giveaway. We are drawing one lucky winner for 2 Colts tickets 4 rows from the field!! The tickets are for the final home game of the season with division rivals the Houston Texans on December 14th at 1PM. The drawing will take place on December 1st. If you are interested in being entered, please e-mail or call us at Steve@Welcome2Indy.com or 317-573-1880. It should be a great game and fantastic seats!! Good luck!!

Our second event is our annual VIP Client Appreciation Event. Last year was a HUGE success and we are doing it again. You will be receiving a Save The Date card in the next few days and an invitation next month. We are renting out Hamilton Town Center movie theater again on Saturday, December 6th where we will be showing the newly released The Penguins of Madagascar. Our donut & juice bar will open at 9AM followed by the movie screening at 10AM. This is a fun, family-friendly event, so bring the entire family and enjoy a hilarious movie on us. Please RSVP to Steve by December 1st with the number of adult and child tickets requested.

Both of these events are our way of saying THANK YOU for being such fantastic clients, business partners, and referral sources over the years. We are extremely grateful for you and know we wouldn't be where we are without your continued support.

Enjoy the rest of October and we hope to see you at the movies on December 6th and wish you the best of luck in the Colts' tickets drawing.

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September Steve & Jack's Home News

Welcome to Fall (unofficially) and back to school! Ana is now in 4th grade and Tali is in Pre-K, both of whom are at Maple Glen Elementary in Westfield, which we absolutely love!! With the cooler temperatures we have experienced this summer, it hasn't felt like a hot, humid and oppressive Indiana summer. We hope you have been able to take some time off to wind down and enjoy a vacation or two, or maybe even a 'staycation'. For our family vacation this summer we traveled to Boston to see Brigid's brother, wife and daughter whom we haven't seen in a while. We traveled by way of the Canadian side of Niagra Falls, which I haven't seen since I was a kid. What an awesome sight! I wouldn't recommend going to the Canada side, however-far too much traffic and hassle with Immigration.

Boston was a LOT of fun and so full of history. We had both been there previously, but it was great going with the kids and following Freedom Trail, celebrating our niece's birthday, seeing where Uncle Jimmy & Aunt Steph work, and enjoying walking around Harvard and other parts of Boston. On the way back, we stopped at Hershey, PA and took tours of the Chocolate Factory, which the girls absolutely loved! Highly recommend, if you are there.

The real estate market has been rather unpredictable lately. Normally, June & July are rather robust, but this year, they have been lackluster, to say the least. Fast-forward to today and it has picked up, but is still gaining steam. Here are some stats courtesy of the July MIBOR Monthly Indicators Report:
• New Listings-UP 2.2%
• Pending Sales-DOWN 3.6%
• Closed Sales-DOWN 8.5%
• Median Sales Price-UP 0.1% to $145,000
• Average Sales Price-Up 2.2% to $183,449
• Percent of Original List Price Received at Sale-UP 0.7% to 94.2%
• Total Active Listings Available at Month End-UP 2.7% to 14,165
• Months Supply of Inventory-UP 4.8% to 5.9 months
As you can see, real estate values are going up, but so in inventory and at the same time closings are down. We expect to see a more robust Fall and have already seen an uptick in activity.

If you or anyone you care about has any questions at all about where our market is or where we predict it is going, feel comfortable giving us a call. We are always happy to share information so you can make informed decisions. Enjoy the start of the football season, and if you are in the Indy-area, we hope you are enjoying the calendar magnets so you don't miss any Colts, ND, IU, or PU football games. Go, Colts!!

Thank you for all of your trust and support over the years! We are extremely grateful for our amazing clients! Enjoy this month's newsletter!!

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Your Personal Real Estate Consultants...for Life!
Steve & Jack Rupp

August 2014 Steve & Jack's Home News

Can you believe summer is almost over? Some schools have already started and the rest are starting in about 2-weeks. Where has the time gone? We hope you have enjoyed some family time and some time away in a vacation or even staycation and just take a break from the hectic lives we all lead.

At the end of June, we took a family vacation to Colonial Williamsburg and a short two-day stop in DC. We saw many of the monuments there as well as the original Constitution, Bill of Rights, & Declaration of Independence. Our highlight was getting a tour of the White House. We all really enjoyed touring it room by room and seeing where so many of our Presidents live and work. Secret Service agents are in each room to answer questions and make sure all visitor 'behave'. Apparently, the rooms are used 2-3x/week by the President and First Lady, which made seeing them even more meaningful.

Colonial Williamsburg was very hot, but the kids really loved seeing all of the buildings and talking with the actors. A really neat game they encourage kids to play is called RevQuest where you are shown a movie and given a booklet and sent on a quest to decipher codes and solve clues. I think the adults had as much fun as the kids had playing it! What a fantastic resource we have available to us only a few hours away...and for an even closer destination, Conner Prairie, while much smaller is such a great asset to our very own community. If you haven't been to Williamsburg, we can't recommend it highly enough!

Here are some notable numbers collected by MIBOR for its June Monthly Indicators Report. As stated by MIBOR, “Central Indiana has all of the right ingredients including a diversity of housing stock and prices. Builders are active again for the first time in a few years and that adds new product to our market every month.
“Housing experts say sales are inching up, price growth is becoming more sustainable and housing inventory is increasing slowly. The market continues to stabilize overall, but a need for more people participating on both the buyer and seller side is evident.”
•New Listings-UP 6.5%
•Pending Sales-DOWN 2.5%
•Closed Sales-DOWN 1.4%
•Median Sales Price-UP 3.5%
•Average Sales Price-UP 6.9%
•% of Original List Price Received at Sale-UP 1.4% to 94.3%
•Total Active Listings Available at Month End-UP 1.9%
•Months’ Supply of Inventory-5.6 months-no change

Thank you, again for your continued support and introductions of new clients! Referrals and repeat clients are how we stay in business! Enjoy the rest of your summer, which always concludes for us with a visit to the State Fair!

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Steve & Jack

Steve & Jack's July 2014 Newsletter

Welcome 'officially' to summer! We hope you survived the storm last night unscathed. That was pretty scary! I happened to be checking up on a vacant listing right in the path of the storm and took shelter in their basement. Scary! We hope that the start of summer has been a good one. Changing routines is always difficult, especially when children are involved. Our bedtime has continually become later as we all take advantage of the great weather and sunlight.

We are excited to take our summer vacation this year to Washington, DC and Colonial Williamsburg. We even scored tickets for a White House tour! We will be joining Jack & Mary Anne and spending the week in Williamsburg with them and celebrating Independence Day there as well. Ana has been studying Colonial America this summer so she appreciates what she is seeing. It should be a very fun trip and a very educational one as well. We will let you know how it went in next month's newsletter.

The real estate market has been a little nutty lately. After a slow start due to the severe winter, it took off with impressive numbers, until the end of May when it took a breather. Showings and closings are both down right now leaving sellers to question the market at a time, which is usually quite robust. Please know that this slow down is city-wide and is not expected to last. Activity is already slowly picking back up, but summer always brings vacations, so many buyers take a break, especially in June.

Here are some quick housing numbers you will find interesting:
These numbers are comparing May 2013 to May 2014 according to MIBOR's Monthly Indicators Report:
• New listings are down 1.0%
• Pending sales are down 6.8%
• Closed sales are down 9.0%
• Median sales price is UP 1.4% to $140,000
• Average sales price is UP 2.1% to $175,903
• Percent of original list price received at sale is UP 2.1% to 94.4%
• Total active listings available at month end is down 1.7%
• Months supply of inventory is down 5.4% to 5.3 months
We hope you enjoy your summer and are able to take a vacation or two and enjoy some fun time! As always, thank you for being such great clients!! We truly are blessed and continue to be grateful for your on-going trust and support. We would love to help someone you care about with their real estate needs, so please give us a call when the next person you know is talking about buying, selling, or building a new home. We would love to learn about their specific situation and consult with them about their options.

Enjoy the July newsletter!!

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Steve & Jack Rupp

June Steve & Jack's Home News

Welcome warmer weather and the month of May, which is always a race theme in Indy. We have the Pacers in the playoffs and the IMS is busy as usual. Busy time in the city. It also continues to be a very busy time in the real estate market. Many houses (although certainly not all) are selling in under 30-days and with multiple offers. Interest rates continue to drop (one lender quoted me a 4.125% rate today!)

Here are some notable statistics you may find interesting (all are from the April 2014 Monthly Indicators Report, courtesy of MIBOR, comparing April 2013 to April 2014):
• New listings-UP 1.2%
• Pending sales-DOWN 6.8%
• Closed sales-DOWN 8.3%
• Median sales price-UP 4.6% to $136,000
• Average sales price-UP 5.5% to $172,291
• Percent of original list price received at sale-UP 2.3% to 93.7%
• Total active listings available at month end-DOWN 3.3% to 12,349
• Months supply of inventory-DOWN 10.4% to 5.0 months
We are excited for school to be out next week and both girls will enjoy another fun-filled summer with their favorite baby-sitter, Kayla, including a week-long overnight Girl Scout camp for Ana (daddy is a little scared here). Ana only has two more soccer games left in the spring season and has been really playing well. Talia is enjoying swimming still as well as gymnastics, at which she really seems to excel.
Our BIG news is that daddy finally caved and we got a puppy! His name is Duke (Ana's choice after English royalty) Marley (his shelter name) and we adopted him two weeks' ago Sunday from a shelter that rescues dogs from high-kill shelters in southern Indiana. He was with a foster family waiting for his 'forever' family. Apparently, he was waiting for us! He is 3/4 Yellow Lab & 1/4 Shepard and was 7-weeks' old when we adopted him. Daddy had both Ana & Tali sign a contract and talked extensively about the responsibilities of being a pet owner as well as the life-cycle they will most likely see full circle. They both were accepting of my terms and here we are.

Duke, it seems is very intelligent. He is fun and has lots of energy, but, like all puppies likes to nip and chew on everything. We have done our best to quell that as quickly as possible, but it will take time. He is mostly potty-trained, but not entirely. Brigid got him to ring a bell on the door when he has to go out and that has worked great! 5AM seems to be a pretty consistent wake-up call time for him, so we are missing some sleep, but other than that, he is making it through the night.

All-in-all, Duke is a great puppy and Tali, who was afraid of dogs before this, has gotten much better. She still runs when he runs to her, making him run even faster as he thinks she is playing a game with him-quite funny to watch! We are excited that the girls have a life-long friend, protector, & loyal companion who will teach them more than they know and in a different way than we can. We hope they will come to appreciate Duke and all the values and emotions he will instill in them as the newest member of our family.

I'm curious, do you currently have a pet or did you have one growing up? If so, what was the single greatest lesson your pet taught you?

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Steve & Jack Rupp

May 2014 Steve & Jack's Home News

Welcome, Spring!!

Ahhh, soccer season has begun. It MUST be spring. If you have kids in school activities, you know the spring is extremely busy-sports, Scouts, music, swimming, and that is just the kids. We adults are staring down yard work, including the first cut of the season and spring cleaning. This also means allergy season-ugh!

The last time I wrote this newsletter, we were in Tampa visiting Brigid's parents. We had a great time! If you have never been to the Museum of Science & Industry (MOSI), trust me, you will LOVE it, including the 4-story ropes course. We also made a trip to Naples where we had a blast...and saw more Bentley's, Rolls-Royce's, & Maserati's in my life! Wow!

The real estate market has continued to explode. Here are some numbers from March courtesy of MIBOR, as compared to March 2014 from March 2013:
New listings UP 3.8%
Pending sales DOWN 7.3%
Closed sales DOWN 8.5%
Median Sales Price UP 6.5%
% of Original List Price Received at Sale UP 2.5% to 92.4%
Total Listings DOWN 6.0%
Months Supply of Inventory DOWN 14.9% to 4.7 months

As you can see by the pending and closed sales were definitely impacted by the harsh winter we had, however activity has picked up significantly again.

We hope you are enjoying the beautiful spring weather and are as happy as we are that winter has finally released its grasp. As always, if there is anything we can do for you or anyone you care about, please contact us. We are always happy to help. Here's to Spring!!!

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April Steve & Jack's Home News

Welcome Spring!!! While Mother Nature may not cooperate entirely, it is nice to see temps consistently above freezing. Let's see how long that lasts!

While Mother Nature is making up her mind as to whether it is time to heat up or not, the real estate market sure isn't. In many cases (certainly not all), houses are selling in days or even hours! It is most certainly a sellers' market. See the stats below (courtesy of MIBOR):

New listings-DOWN 19.9%
Pending sales-DOWN 12.5%
Closed sales-DOWN 12.9%
Median sales price-UP 7.8% to $124,900
Average sales price-UP 4.1% to $153,772
Percent of original list price received at sale-UP 3.5% to 91.6%
Total active listings available at month end-DOWN 11.1%
Months of available inventory-DOWN 21.3% to 4.3 months

From January 2013 to January 2014, Indianapolis housing appreciated 3.8% according to MIBOR.

This is a great time to sell a house, so if you have been on the fence, this might be the time to seriously give it another thought.

As I write this, our family is in Tampa visiting Brigid's parents for our spring break. Enjoying the warm sun certainly is nice and very therapeutic after one of the most awful winters I can remember. Hopefully, you have been able to escape from the strong grasp winter has had on Indy.

After the holidays, Brigid and I made a commitment to each other that we would start and finish the Extreme Home Workout program P90X. For those of you who have tried/completed it, you know how hard that is. For those of you who don't know much about it, it is quite a commitment of 60-90 minutes of intense workouts 6-days/week for 13-weeks. It is VERY hard. Friday evening marked our successful conclusion of this program and we are now P90X graduates! We couldn't be happier-and more fit. We both agreed that having each other to go through the program and push us to keep going was the key to finishing each day without missing one, even though there were many days we were sick as a dog, too busy, too late, too early, or just plain 'dogging it' that day. There was always an excuse NOT to exercise each day, but the commitment we made to ourselves and each other was stronger and we promised each other we wouldn't let us down. It was therapeutic for us far and above the physical improvements we noticed.

In an age when family members and spouses are many times passing in the night, when was the last time you and your spouse actually set a lofty goal together and worked together as a TEAM to accomplish it? If it has been awhile, may I suggest doing just that? You might find it has a multitude of benefits over and above the obvious.

Talia started gymnastics this month and absolutely LOVES it! Ana has already started spring soccer. She is now playing at Grand Park in Westfield. If you have never seen Grand Park, take an afternoon/evening and check it out. It is already booked for the entire year and has had over 31,000 visitors in the past 30-days and it isn't even officially open or fully functional! It is being touted as the best sports facility in the US and every team who has visited agrees. We are honored to call it our home field. By the year 2020, it is expected to have brought 1 BILLION dollars to the central IN economy!

We hope you enjoy your spring and are looking forward to the warmer weather it inevitably will bring.

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Your Personal Real Estate Consultants...for Life!

Steve & Jack Rupp

March 2014 Steve & Jack's Home News Newsletter

Happy March!!! While we were certainly hoping that the weather would be more conducive to spring, we are holding out hope that Mother Nature will release her winter grasp and allow warmer temperatures to find their way back to Indy. As you probably know, we have unfortunately surpassed an all-time record for most snow this season. That is not a record we were looking forward to breaking. Like you, we have hit our limit on winter and are experiencing spring fever like never before.

Speaking of spring fever, the real estate market has already started to heat up, however the weather has certainly put a damper on activity. Check out the following stats:

• New listings-DOWN 23.9%
• Pending sales-DOWN 22.6%
• Closed sales-DOWN 13.8%
• Median sales price-UP 4.8%
• % of original list price to sales price-UP 3.1%
• Total active listings available at month end-DOWN 6.7%
• Months supply of inventory-DOWN 19.3% to 4.4 months

As you can see, houses are appreciating nicely, inventory is WAY down and the terrible winter has most definitely impacted activity. What this means is that in many cases, houses are selling in DAYS, with multiple offers for at or above listing price! Quite frankly, we are desperately in need of inventory, as you can see from the statistics above. Buyers have very few options from which to choose, and we speak from experience when we say, we don't have enough houses to show our many buyer clients. When buyers find a house they like, many times it has already accepted an offer or will very soon. Buyers don't have the luxury to think about whether to make an offer. If they like a house they see, they need to make an offer immediately or risk losing the house. It is an exciting market for sellers, but extremely nerve-wracking for buyers and their agents.

If you are considering selling your house this year, please do yourself a favor and give us a call so we can share with you specific information so you can make an informed decision about whether putting your house on the market now is right for you. In many cases, it is. Interest rates are predicted to keep rising, so the sooner you lock in a low rate, the better.

On another note, have you checked out our BRAND NEW website? Check us out and let us know what you think. Please visit www.Welcome2Indy.com. It is updated, sleeker, has more information, and better searches.

Finally, we are so proud, once again to have been awarded by you, our clients for the 3rd year in a row as a Five-Star Real Estate Professional!! Check us out in the May edition of Indianapolis Monthly magazine. This coveted award is only bestowed to the top 7% of all real estate agents in Indy based on surveys of clients for quality service. On top of that, we have been fortunate to maintain our 'A' rating on Angie's List and have been nominated for Pages of Happiness and the Super Service Award. We couldn't be happier and more grateful to you, our loyal clients. THANK YOU!!

We hope you have a great St. Patrick's Day & Mardi Gras. Come on spring!!!

Click here to read our March Newsletter.

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Steve & Jack Rupp

February 2014 Steve & Jack Home News

Welcome 2014 and the Arctic Vortex that has rushed in with it! Like us, you are probably fed up with the frigidly cold winter we have had along with the snow, accidents, and seemingly never-ending school delays & cancellations. At this rate, our kids won't get much of a summer as they will be making up snow days into July!

We hope you had a fantastic, relaxing, enjoyable, and fun holiday break. As is customary, we drove down to Tampa, FL to spend the week between Christmas and New Year's with Brigid's family. Although it was cold by Florida standards (low of 40s in the evening), it certainly was better than here!

Jack and Mary Anne were able to see all of their grandchildren on Christmas day and all of the presents they opened. It sure is nice to have family in town to spend holidays together.

As mentioned in last month's newsletter, our new Director of Marketing & Client Service Bob Clidinst continues to shine. We are so fortunate to have him as part of our team. He is fine-tuning systems, adding new ones and is a natural at preparing all of the marketing (we have become known for our extensive marketing for listings throughout the Indy-area) we do for all of our listings. We hope you have a chance to meet Bob soon! His e-mail is Bob@Welcome2Indy.com if you want to drop him a note.

As for the real estate market, it has certainly been somewhat hurt by the weather, to be sure. Some areas are seeing more activity than others. Here are some quick numbers for reference (source: December MIBOR Monthly Indicators Report):

Closed sales are UP 4.3%
Median sales prices are UP 4.8% ($134,900)
Average sales prices are UP 10.5% ($176,622)
% of Original List Price received at sale is UP 2.3% (91.3%)
Months supply of inventory DOWN 19% (4.5 months)

As you can see, our market is still posting some impressive numbers. The forecast for this year is that 2014 will continue to post some strong numbers, but they will be tempered a bit compared to 2013. Interest rates are projected to increase to 5.5% by the end of the year and refinances will all but dry up forcing lenders to relax a bit on lending guidelines, however new laws/rules just went into effect on 1/10/14 limiting how much relaxed lenders can get-not a bad thing!

As always, if you have any questions/comments/concerns at all, please let us know. We are always here to help. Speaking of help, if you have bought, sold, or built a new home with us in the past 3 years and are a member of Angie's List, would you do us a HUGE favor and leave us a positive review? Angie's List is so powerful and we could really use some more good reviews. Thank you for helping!!!

Here's to a warmer and drier February and a great Valentine's Day. Enjoy the SuperBowl, too!!

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Your Personal Real Estate Consultants...for Life!

Steve & Jack