Welcome to March and Happy St. Patrick’s Day!!! We wish you the ‘luck o’ the Irish’ and hope you are looking forward, like us, to some spring weather!
As you should have heard via our video we sent out a couple weeks ago, the social media announcement and the letter we mailed about a week ago, there are some BIG changes coming to our team. We are extremely excited for some new opportunities for each of us that change is bringing. Thank you to everyone who has reached out via social media, text, phone call, e-mail, or in-person for the extremely supportive words of encouragement. One thing I want to be absolutely clear on and that is I am not retiring! In case you missed our big news, here is a breakdown.
Thea, as most of you know had her first child last May and has decided that staying home to raise her son is what she is being called to do. We are so excited for her and her family and know that she will love spending more time with Parks. Thea will continue to work with our buyers currently under contract and buyers currently looking for homes. We will ensure all of our buyers continue to receive the same outstanding service they have become accustomed to receiving!
Kylie is going to start a health company. This has been a dream of hers for over 10-years and we are excited she is following that dream and wish her all the best in her next chapter. If you have worked with our team in the past 10-years, you have experienced Kylie’s work and know just how detailed and systematized she truly is. She has been such an amazing asset to our clients for the past 10-years.
Our virtual assistant Mark helps Kylie behind the scenes working on reports, social media posts, video editing, website work and communications. He has been given the opportunity to get into management at his company. Mark has been such a great addition to our team and we are so fortunate to have been able to work with him for the past 3-years.
So, that leaves me! I have been called to coaching and training. It is something I have wanted to do for the past 3-years and many people have encouraged me to be a coach. I developed a curriculum that doesn’t exist anywhere that will help real estate agents provide a higher level of service to their clients, while making quite a bit more money; clients get a much better experience; and the vendor partners involved in the transaction get more work and provide a higher level of service as well being a part of this program. It is truly a triple win! I am excited to teach this on a national level!
So, our team is going to partner with The James Embry Team and combine forces. I will be a Senior Partner. You will still hear from me regularly and I will still be available to answer questions, provide insight on the market, and be involved in real estate. I just won’t be directly selling. Again, I am NOT retiring! I have known James for over 20-years as he and I worked at my dad’s company CENTURY 21 Realty Group I and then at Keller Williams. James and his team are outstanding and are the #1 team in our office. We have shared the high expectations our clients have become accustomed to and they are committed to ensuring those are met.
Our official transition date is April 1st. Like Thea, I will continue to work with our pending transactions as well as sellers who are active and going on the market before April 1st. I will also be helping a few sellers with whom I have been helping prepare to go on the market. We have been planning this transition for over 3-months to ensure it is as smooth as possible.
I will still be sending out our monthly newsletter and video and will look forward to celebrating your birthdays and anniversaries with you as well! You know those are my favorite calls to make! I will share how things are going in our new ventures in those monthly communications.
The one thing I am happiest about most is that all of us are following our dreams. Truly, I wish that for everyone. Every single person deserves to follow their dreams. We absolutely adore our clients and are so protective of them…some for 3 generations! When you, or someone you care about is thinking about buying a new home, selling your current one, building a home, investing in real estate or need to find an excellent agent outside of Indianapolis, please call me!! We will continue to take great care of you/them.
Please do call and stay in touch-317-339-7698. I always love hearing from you!!!
Finally, we sure hope you will come to our March Happy Hour sponsored by Walla Painting. We are moving it up a week this month to the 2nd Thursday of March, the 14th from 5-6:30pm due to March Madness starting on March 21st. Please RSVP to Kylie@Welcome2Indy.com. This will be an opportunity to say farewell to Kylie and Thea and we hope you will stop by. I will still be hosting our Happy Hours and will look forward to seeing you the rest of the year!
As always, here are the MIBOR stats for the 16 counties around Indy comparing January 2024 to December 2023:
Median Sales Price=$280,000 UP 0.4%
Closed Sales=1,589 units DOWN 23.6%
New Listings=2,052 units UP 30.5%
Pending Sales=2,343 units UP 38.6%
Median Days on Market=31 days DOWN 1.6%
Average Days on Market=57 UP 4.6%
Price per s.f.=$148 NO CHANGE
% of List Price Received=97.2% DOWN 0.2%
Active Inventory=3,325 units DOWN 21.2%
Months Supply of Inventory= 2.1 months UP 3.1%
These numbers are all indicating that our market is heating back up from winter and we are already seeing some very big numbers in new listings, showings and multiple offers. The biggest wild card is The Fed and if they will hold steady on the rates or if they will start cutting them as was expected a couple of months ago. Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are predicting 30-year fixed conforming mortgage rates will hit 5.8% by the end of this year. We will see if that plays out. Hold on tight as this spring is gearing up to be very busy!!
Click here to read our St. Patrick's Day edition of our newsletter.
Happy St. Patrick’s Day!!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please continue not keeping us a secret!!!
Showing posts with label real estate update. Show all posts
Showing posts with label real estate update. Show all posts
Saturday, February 24, 2024
Wednesday, October 04, 2023
October 2023 Newsletter
Welcome to October and Fall! Whether you love or hate pumpkin spice everything, Fall is filled with festivals, activities, beautiful colors and crisp air. We hope you will take some time to enjoy what Fall has to offer.
For our family, it means football and cheer!!! We have been big Notre Dame fans since birth, so we always follow our Irish, who are actually playing pretty well this year, except for that heartbreaking loss to Ohio State. We also have been attending some IU football games since Ana is a freshman at IU this year and have enjoyed those as well. coming from a tradition of only seeing a Notre Dame football game live, going to an IU football game is an entirely different experience! The tailgating is the main event, not the game itself, which is so foreign to us. They are still fun to watch and we love seeing Ana while we are there, if only for a brief while.
Speaking of Ana, she is doing very well in her first year at IU. She is getting accustomed to college life, classes, ‘adulting’, and of course the social scene. We are very proud of her and loved seeing her when she came home for the first time a couple of weeks ago.
Tali is doing great in 8th grade. Her school cheer season for football ends this week with their final home game. Her competition season for school ends at the end of October with State. Fingers crossed for a good finish! They finished 2nd last year and are hoping for 1st this year. Her ICE All-Star cheer team has been practicing all summer and fall and is gearing up for the start of their season at the beginning of November. We love traveling with the other families and getting away for a night.
Brigid is doing great at work and still travels to Philly about once/month for a few days for meetings. She still loves working from home and managing her team.
Jack and Mary Anne just finished a long, almost 3-week trip to see family in down south and are glad to be home. They have been able to see Tali cheer, which is great!
Kylie was off for about 2 1/2 weeks as she took care of her son Jackson who had back surgery. He is recovering well and is already back at school!! It is amazing how quickly kids heal!! We are so happy he is doing well and that Kylie is back with us again.
Thea is doing great with Parks and her husband Michael is enjoying paternity leave to spend time with him. Thea is able to work from home and spend quality time with him as well as help our buyer clients.
Thank you to Jeff Lazar with Lazar Insurance for sponsoring our September Happy Hour!!! We enjoyed seeing friends and clients and hope you will join us for the 2nd Thursday this month due to Fall Break the following week.
Please join us for Happy Hour on October 12th this month from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. Note the date. Jonathan Walla with Walla Painting is sponsoring this month. He is our go-to painter for all of our clients and our personal needs.
Be on the lookout for our Save The Date card for our Thanksgiving Pie Pickup again this year, which will be on Tuesday, November 21st. Look for our annual Photos with Santa info on the post card as well. We hope to see you there!!!
The real estate market has been absolutely bonkers lately! As of this writing, 30-year mortgage interest rates hit 7.75%, which is the highest in decades. Homes prices have hit their highest ever recorded, making housing affordability the lowest ever. The bright side is that mortgage interest rates are tied to inflation. While it hasn’t continued to tick downward as quickly as we would like, we are optimistic it will continue downward and mortgage interest rates will follow. Keep a keen eye on this as interest rates go down, buyer activity will pick up and sellers will start putting their houses on the market. We are bracing for another circus in the real estate market when mortgage rates dip below 6%. The question is when??
Builders are making up for low inventory, which is sitting at 1.4 months right now in Indy. A balanced market is 6-months. This is keeping prices high. If you are thinking about buying, this would not be a bad time to do so as there isn’t as much competition and we are not expecting housing prices to retreat for the foreseeable future. The key is locking in your housing price now, so you can take advantage of the appreciation down the road and build wealth. There are some good tools out there such as 2/1 buy downs, that can make the mortgage payment more affordable and then you re-finance when rates go back down. Rates are not expected to go below 5% again in our lifetimes!
We have fielded LOTS of questions from clients, so feel free to call and we will happily share info so you can make an informed decision.
Below is an updated list of market stats from MIBOR and its 17-county service area from July 2023 to August 2023:
Median Sales Price-$300,000-no change
Closed Sales-2,790 units-UP 0.8%
New Listings-3,354 units-UP 5.7%
Pending Sales-2,789 units-UP 3.7%
Median Days on Market-10 days-UP 11.1%
Average Days on Market-30 days-DOWN 4.8%
Price per s.f.-$155-no change
% of List Price Received-98.8%-DOWN 0.3%
Active Inventory-3,976 units-DOWN 2.1%
Months Supply of Inventory-1.4 months-DOWN 2.9%
We hope you have a wonderful Fall!! Enjoy this month’s edition of the newsletter, which includes some fun stories including an elephant on a rope, some funny jokes, computer stretches, and a doorbell for a fish!
Enjoy!! Click here to read our October newsletter.
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
For our family, it means football and cheer!!! We have been big Notre Dame fans since birth, so we always follow our Irish, who are actually playing pretty well this year, except for that heartbreaking loss to Ohio State. We also have been attending some IU football games since Ana is a freshman at IU this year and have enjoyed those as well. coming from a tradition of only seeing a Notre Dame football game live, going to an IU football game is an entirely different experience! The tailgating is the main event, not the game itself, which is so foreign to us. They are still fun to watch and we love seeing Ana while we are there, if only for a brief while.
Speaking of Ana, she is doing very well in her first year at IU. She is getting accustomed to college life, classes, ‘adulting’, and of course the social scene. We are very proud of her and loved seeing her when she came home for the first time a couple of weeks ago.
Tali is doing great in 8th grade. Her school cheer season for football ends this week with their final home game. Her competition season for school ends at the end of October with State. Fingers crossed for a good finish! They finished 2nd last year and are hoping for 1st this year. Her ICE All-Star cheer team has been practicing all summer and fall and is gearing up for the start of their season at the beginning of November. We love traveling with the other families and getting away for a night.
Brigid is doing great at work and still travels to Philly about once/month for a few days for meetings. She still loves working from home and managing her team.
Jack and Mary Anne just finished a long, almost 3-week trip to see family in down south and are glad to be home. They have been able to see Tali cheer, which is great!
Kylie was off for about 2 1/2 weeks as she took care of her son Jackson who had back surgery. He is recovering well and is already back at school!! It is amazing how quickly kids heal!! We are so happy he is doing well and that Kylie is back with us again.
Thea is doing great with Parks and her husband Michael is enjoying paternity leave to spend time with him. Thea is able to work from home and spend quality time with him as well as help our buyer clients.
Thank you to Jeff Lazar with Lazar Insurance for sponsoring our September Happy Hour!!! We enjoyed seeing friends and clients and hope you will join us for the 2nd Thursday this month due to Fall Break the following week.
Please join us for Happy Hour on October 12th this month from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. Note the date. Jonathan Walla with Walla Painting is sponsoring this month. He is our go-to painter for all of our clients and our personal needs.
Be on the lookout for our Save The Date card for our Thanksgiving Pie Pickup again this year, which will be on Tuesday, November 21st. Look for our annual Photos with Santa info on the post card as well. We hope to see you there!!!
The real estate market has been absolutely bonkers lately! As of this writing, 30-year mortgage interest rates hit 7.75%, which is the highest in decades. Homes prices have hit their highest ever recorded, making housing affordability the lowest ever. The bright side is that mortgage interest rates are tied to inflation. While it hasn’t continued to tick downward as quickly as we would like, we are optimistic it will continue downward and mortgage interest rates will follow. Keep a keen eye on this as interest rates go down, buyer activity will pick up and sellers will start putting their houses on the market. We are bracing for another circus in the real estate market when mortgage rates dip below 6%. The question is when??
Builders are making up for low inventory, which is sitting at 1.4 months right now in Indy. A balanced market is 6-months. This is keeping prices high. If you are thinking about buying, this would not be a bad time to do so as there isn’t as much competition and we are not expecting housing prices to retreat for the foreseeable future. The key is locking in your housing price now, so you can take advantage of the appreciation down the road and build wealth. There are some good tools out there such as 2/1 buy downs, that can make the mortgage payment more affordable and then you re-finance when rates go back down. Rates are not expected to go below 5% again in our lifetimes!
We have fielded LOTS of questions from clients, so feel free to call and we will happily share info so you can make an informed decision.
Below is an updated list of market stats from MIBOR and its 17-county service area from July 2023 to August 2023:
Median Sales Price-$300,000-no change
Closed Sales-2,790 units-UP 0.8%
New Listings-3,354 units-UP 5.7%
Pending Sales-2,789 units-UP 3.7%
Median Days on Market-10 days-UP 11.1%
Average Days on Market-30 days-DOWN 4.8%
Price per s.f.-$155-no change
% of List Price Received-98.8%-DOWN 0.3%
Active Inventory-3,976 units-DOWN 2.1%
Months Supply of Inventory-1.4 months-DOWN 2.9%
We hope you have a wonderful Fall!! Enjoy this month’s edition of the newsletter, which includes some fun stories including an elephant on a rope, some funny jokes, computer stretches, and a doorbell for a fish!
Enjoy!! Click here to read our October newsletter.
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Thursday, February 23, 2023
March 2023 newsletter
Happy almost spring!!! By the time our next newsletter comes out, it WILL be spring, at least officially on the calendar, and longer daylight due to Daylight Saving Time. Whether you like DST or not, it IS nice to have more daylight at the end of the day so if you have kiddos they can play longer after school and even later throughout the summer. Not sure why this winter has seemed so long, but I am ready for it to be over and get on with spring. So, here’s to spring!!!
Steve’s family has kept busy this spring on a lot of different fronts. The spring market is picking up and keeping me extremely busy, which is good. More on the market later…Ana is taking, likely her last finals of her high school career and is so excited! If she keeps A’s in all of her classes last trimester senior year, she doesn’t have to take finals. Whoo hoo!!! She also starts her internship with The Westfield Chamber of Commerce helping with marketing and communications. This should be an incredible opportunity to learn more about the business world as well as marketing, which is what she intends to study at IU. She leaves tomorrow with 2 of her good friends for St. Pete, FL to stay with Brigid’s parents for a few days and get some sun before the last trimester starts.
Tali is still neck-deep into competitive cheer. Next competition is this weekend downtown at the Convention Center. Then, a couple of weeks later, we head to Chicago and then a few weeks after that, we finish at Grand Park in Westfield. Finally, is Nationals in Orlando in May. We are still chasing a bid for her two teams she is on and expect to get them at one of these competitions.
Spring Break is next month and after Ana heads to Anna Maria Island with a significant part of her senior class (Brigid is going with her along with parents of her friends and they are all staying in a big house together for the week), then Brigid flies to Whistler, Canada to meet up with Tali and me to ski for our spring break for the week. So, from sun and sand to snow! I haven’t skied in over 25-years and Tali and Brigid haven’t ever skied, so this will be interesting. Send us good thoughts for no broken bones!!
Brigid just returned from Charlotte with Merck for a meeting for the week. She always enjoys spending time with her team, but also enjoys coming home!
Thea is doing great with her pregnancy and her due date of May 11th is rapidly approaching! We are excited for her and Michael and have made arrangements with an agent in our office to fill in for Thea while she is on maternity leave. She anticipates being out for 2 months. We welcome Helena Hoen to our team to help us with buyers while Thea is out. Helena comes from a background of data analytics in the corporate world. She will fit in well with our team and we hope you will get a chance to meet her.
Kylie has had her hands full with lots of work to catch up on as well as juggling kids, planning team events and her side hustle of Reiki. I was unfamiliar with Reiki until I met Kylie. It is starting to be taught alongside traditional medicine as its benefits are well-documented. She has worked on our team as well as several of our clients who swear by it. Feel free to call Kylie and she would be happy to tell you more and see if it is a good fit for you.
As usual, we have lots of upcoming events and we hope you can join us for all or some of them.
Happy Hour-Thursday, March 16th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s in Carmel. Day before St. Patrick’s Day, so come in your green and party a day early!! We had a nice group at the February Happy Hour and would love to see YOU in March. RSVP to Kylie@Welcome2Indy.com.
Tuesday, March 14th from 10:30-4:30 is our next Vacation Giveaway!!! All you have to do is call in that day to 317-975-1511 between the hours above and we will register you to win a $5,000 vacation gift card. You can use that money however you like and it doesn’t even have to be for a vacation. Who doesn’t like FREE money??? For every referral you give us, we will put 3 additional entries in the drawing. Drawing will be shortly after 5pm on Facebook Live.
Now, onto the real estate market. There has been a LOT of coverage in the news and social media about it for awhile now. Please understand that all real estate is local. What you hear on the national news is NOT what is happening in the Indy area. Bottom line, Indy was ranked as the most affordable city again this year as well as one of the best places to live…again. We fully expect interest rates to continue to fall (it won’t be a straight-line drop), to around 5% by June. There is a LOT that can happen between now and then, but the inflation data is fully supporting this so far. That will flood the market with buyers…and sellers. Our market is NOT depreciating either. We are seeing modest appreciation in the 3-5% range. Inventory is still woefully short of demand and we are at 2.2 months of supply. A balanced market is 6-months. In Indiana, we are short over 30,000 housing units to meet demand. This number is growing every month as homeowners are not putting their houses on the market to the extent needed and builders aren’t able to build enough product. FHA and VA just reduced their funding fees as well. FHA reduced theirs by 30 bps. For a $400,000 house, that means a $100/month savings. Contact us for more info.
Check out the stats below courtesy of MIBOR comparing January 2023 to December 2022:
Median Sales Price-$272,000-DOWN 2.9%
Closed Sales-1,519 units-DOWN 37.3%
New Listings-2,037 units-UP 20.2%
Pending Sales-2,399 units-UP 52.5%
Days on Market-59 days-UP 18.0%
Price per s.f.-$156-DOWN 2.5%
% of Ask Received-96.8%-DOWN 0.9%
Active Inventory-3,388 units-DOWN 8.7%
Absorption Rate-2.2 months-UP 46.7%
You will notice that this is starting to be much more buyer-friendly. If you or someone you care about has been sitting on the sidelines to buy, this would be an excellent time to have a conversation with us about the pros and cons of taking action sooner rather than later.
We hope you have a great start to spring and enjoy the longer daylight hours in the evening. Please know how thankful we are for you and those you introduce to us to help. Please contact steve@Welcome2Indy.com if your plans for 2023 involve buying, selling, or investing in real estate. Also, keep in mind that we have a huge referral network of the Top 5% of agents in the US and if you or someone you care about are thinking of moving out of the Indy area, give us a call and we will match you with a perfect agent who is one of the best in their field.
Click here to read our March newsletter
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret. The best way to introduce us to someone you care about is e-mail or call Steve at steve@Welcome2Indy.com or 317-573-1880. Thank you!
Steve’s family has kept busy this spring on a lot of different fronts. The spring market is picking up and keeping me extremely busy, which is good. More on the market later…Ana is taking, likely her last finals of her high school career and is so excited! If she keeps A’s in all of her classes last trimester senior year, she doesn’t have to take finals. Whoo hoo!!! She also starts her internship with The Westfield Chamber of Commerce helping with marketing and communications. This should be an incredible opportunity to learn more about the business world as well as marketing, which is what she intends to study at IU. She leaves tomorrow with 2 of her good friends for St. Pete, FL to stay with Brigid’s parents for a few days and get some sun before the last trimester starts.
Tali is still neck-deep into competitive cheer. Next competition is this weekend downtown at the Convention Center. Then, a couple of weeks later, we head to Chicago and then a few weeks after that, we finish at Grand Park in Westfield. Finally, is Nationals in Orlando in May. We are still chasing a bid for her two teams she is on and expect to get them at one of these competitions.
Spring Break is next month and after Ana heads to Anna Maria Island with a significant part of her senior class (Brigid is going with her along with parents of her friends and they are all staying in a big house together for the week), then Brigid flies to Whistler, Canada to meet up with Tali and me to ski for our spring break for the week. So, from sun and sand to snow! I haven’t skied in over 25-years and Tali and Brigid haven’t ever skied, so this will be interesting. Send us good thoughts for no broken bones!!
Brigid just returned from Charlotte with Merck for a meeting for the week. She always enjoys spending time with her team, but also enjoys coming home!
Thea is doing great with her pregnancy and her due date of May 11th is rapidly approaching! We are excited for her and Michael and have made arrangements with an agent in our office to fill in for Thea while she is on maternity leave. She anticipates being out for 2 months. We welcome Helena Hoen to our team to help us with buyers while Thea is out. Helena comes from a background of data analytics in the corporate world. She will fit in well with our team and we hope you will get a chance to meet her.
Kylie has had her hands full with lots of work to catch up on as well as juggling kids, planning team events and her side hustle of Reiki. I was unfamiliar with Reiki until I met Kylie. It is starting to be taught alongside traditional medicine as its benefits are well-documented. She has worked on our team as well as several of our clients who swear by it. Feel free to call Kylie and she would be happy to tell you more and see if it is a good fit for you.
As usual, we have lots of upcoming events and we hope you can join us for all or some of them.
Happy Hour-Thursday, March 16th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s in Carmel. Day before St. Patrick’s Day, so come in your green and party a day early!! We had a nice group at the February Happy Hour and would love to see YOU in March. RSVP to Kylie@Welcome2Indy.com.
Tuesday, March 14th from 10:30-4:30 is our next Vacation Giveaway!!! All you have to do is call in that day to 317-975-1511 between the hours above and we will register you to win a $5,000 vacation gift card. You can use that money however you like and it doesn’t even have to be for a vacation. Who doesn’t like FREE money??? For every referral you give us, we will put 3 additional entries in the drawing. Drawing will be shortly after 5pm on Facebook Live.
Now, onto the real estate market. There has been a LOT of coverage in the news and social media about it for awhile now. Please understand that all real estate is local. What you hear on the national news is NOT what is happening in the Indy area. Bottom line, Indy was ranked as the most affordable city again this year as well as one of the best places to live…again. We fully expect interest rates to continue to fall (it won’t be a straight-line drop), to around 5% by June. There is a LOT that can happen between now and then, but the inflation data is fully supporting this so far. That will flood the market with buyers…and sellers. Our market is NOT depreciating either. We are seeing modest appreciation in the 3-5% range. Inventory is still woefully short of demand and we are at 2.2 months of supply. A balanced market is 6-months. In Indiana, we are short over 30,000 housing units to meet demand. This number is growing every month as homeowners are not putting their houses on the market to the extent needed and builders aren’t able to build enough product. FHA and VA just reduced their funding fees as well. FHA reduced theirs by 30 bps. For a $400,000 house, that means a $100/month savings. Contact us for more info.
Check out the stats below courtesy of MIBOR comparing January 2023 to December 2022:
Median Sales Price-$272,000-DOWN 2.9%
Closed Sales-1,519 units-DOWN 37.3%
New Listings-2,037 units-UP 20.2%
Pending Sales-2,399 units-UP 52.5%
Days on Market-59 days-UP 18.0%
Price per s.f.-$156-DOWN 2.5%
% of Ask Received-96.8%-DOWN 0.9%
Active Inventory-3,388 units-DOWN 8.7%
Absorption Rate-2.2 months-UP 46.7%
You will notice that this is starting to be much more buyer-friendly. If you or someone you care about has been sitting on the sidelines to buy, this would be an excellent time to have a conversation with us about the pros and cons of taking action sooner rather than later.
We hope you have a great start to spring and enjoy the longer daylight hours in the evening. Please know how thankful we are for you and those you introduce to us to help. Please contact steve@Welcome2Indy.com if your plans for 2023 involve buying, selling, or investing in real estate. Also, keep in mind that we have a huge referral network of the Top 5% of agents in the US and if you or someone you care about are thinking of moving out of the Indy area, give us a call and we will match you with a perfect agent who is one of the best in their field.
Click here to read our March newsletter
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret. The best way to introduce us to someone you care about is e-mail or call Steve at steve@Welcome2Indy.com or 317-573-1880. Thank you!
Wednesday, February 08, 2023
February 2023 Newsletter
Happy Valentine’s Day! We hope your year is off to a great start and if you have a significant other, that you are able to do something special for Valentine’s Day. Now that the holidays are over and interest rates are coming down, we are seeing a resurgence in the real estate market. More on that below.
We enjoyed our first Happy Hour of the year last month and loved seeing many of our clients and friends. We hope to see you at an upcoming Happy Hour. They are usually the 3rd Thursday of the month from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. The next one is Thursday, February 16th. RSVP to kylie@Welcome2Indy.com
Four lucky clients won a Valentine’s Day dinner reservation at Season’s 52 with a bottle of wine on us! Whatever you do for Valentine’s Day, we hope you can do something special.
Workshops! Are you or someone you care about thinking about selling or buying a home this year? If so, jump on a quick Zoom workshop with us and we will cover all of your questions, including what is the current state of the real estate market and what do we project happening this year and how will that affect you? Steve walks his clients through the entire home selling process starting from 1-year out to putting your house on the market and covers the Top Ten Dumb Mistakes Smart People Make When Selling Their House. Thea walks buyers through the Top Ten Things to Know before Buying Your Next Home as well as the process. Steve’s next Seller Workshop is on March 14th from 7-8:30pm. E-mail steve@Welcome2Indy.com to register. Thea’s next buyer workshop is February 22nd from 5:30-6:30pm. E-mail thea@Welcome2Indy.com to register. Both are via Zoom only.
Ready for some warm weather? Wanna get away? Wanna have someone else pay for it?? Look for more information on our next $5,000 Vacation Giveaway on March 14th. All you have to do is call in to register. More info is coming soon…
Big news for Steve’s family!!! Ana who is a senior at Guerin Catholic just accepted a direct admit to The Kelly School of Business at IU Bloomington in the Fall!!! She applied to a lot of great universities all over the country and had many acceptance letters and chose IU. Brigid and I couldn’t be happier!!! She will be close, attending the 8th-ranked Business School in the nation and can we say in-state tuition?? Score!!!
Tali is in the middle of competitive cheer season. Earlier this month she was in French Lick competing and both teams for which she cheers came in first place! We are still looking to win a bid to Nationals in May and have 3 more competitions left this season to earn one. Fingers crossed!!
Kylie is continuing to grow her Reiki business. If you are familiar with Reiki (or even if you aren’t), feel free to give Kylie a call at 317-573-1818. She does a phenomenal job and already has several regular clients.
Thea is working hard to keep up with the spring market that has already started. She celebrated a big birthday on February 7th and we were excited to celebrate with her!!! Her pregnancy is going great so far and we are getting closer and closer to her due date in May. Don’t worry, if you are working with Thea, we have a transition plan in place so we don’t miss a beat helping you or someone you referred to us find the perfect home. We will be excited to welcome Thea back after a couple of months of maternity leave.
The market…what is going on with it? After many months of sluggish activity, things have picked up already and we are expecting a busy spring market. Interest rates are coming down and have dropped already around 1% from their highs just a couple of months ago. They are projected to keep dropping to around the 5% mark by summer, which is awesome news! As a result, buyers and sellers who were on the sidelines the past several months are entering the market. Mortgage applications are up 28% already and new listings are down, keeping for a tight market, which is pushing the median sales price up to $280,000. We still only have 1.6 months supply of inventory and with a healthy level at 6-months, you can see why we don’t expect to see this changing anytime soon. We are seeing multiple offers on houses again, although not nearly as many as last spring and only in certain areas and price points.
See some numbers below courtesy of MIBOR comparing December 2022 to November 2022:
Median Sales Price-UP 0.8% to $280,000
Closed Sales-DOWN 4.3% to 2,414 units
New Listings-DOWN 27.2% to 1,706 units
Pending Sales-DOWN 10.3% to 1,878 units
Days on Market-UP 31.4% to 46 days
Price per s.f.-no change-$160
% of Ask Received-DOWN 0.1% to 97.7%
Active Inventory-DOWN 12.3% to 3,816 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 5.9% to 1.6 months
While these numbers can look pretty ugly, keep in mind this is during the holidays, which is the slowest month for real estate sales and also some of the highest interest rates we have seen in years. Things are getting better. In fact, if you are a buyer, jumping in the market right now will be to your benefit as we expect a lot of competition again this spring, and as stated above, we are already seeing it.
We hope to see you at some of our upcoming events. As always, THANK YOU for keeping us in mind for all of your real estate needs AND for introducing us to people you care about who are thinking about buying, selling, or building a new home. We will treat them like family!! This is how we stay in business.
Finally, if you or someone you know is moving out of the area, CALL US. We have a vetted referral network of the TOP 5% of real estate agents nationwide. We would be happy to connect you or someone you care about to ensure you get the absolute BEST agent to help with your next home.
Click here to read our February newsletter.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
Please don’t keep us a secret!
We enjoyed our first Happy Hour of the year last month and loved seeing many of our clients and friends. We hope to see you at an upcoming Happy Hour. They are usually the 3rd Thursday of the month from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. The next one is Thursday, February 16th. RSVP to kylie@Welcome2Indy.com
Four lucky clients won a Valentine’s Day dinner reservation at Season’s 52 with a bottle of wine on us! Whatever you do for Valentine’s Day, we hope you can do something special.
Workshops! Are you or someone you care about thinking about selling or buying a home this year? If so, jump on a quick Zoom workshop with us and we will cover all of your questions, including what is the current state of the real estate market and what do we project happening this year and how will that affect you? Steve walks his clients through the entire home selling process starting from 1-year out to putting your house on the market and covers the Top Ten Dumb Mistakes Smart People Make When Selling Their House. Thea walks buyers through the Top Ten Things to Know before Buying Your Next Home as well as the process. Steve’s next Seller Workshop is on March 14th from 7-8:30pm. E-mail steve@Welcome2Indy.com to register. Thea’s next buyer workshop is February 22nd from 5:30-6:30pm. E-mail thea@Welcome2Indy.com to register. Both are via Zoom only.
Ready for some warm weather? Wanna get away? Wanna have someone else pay for it?? Look for more information on our next $5,000 Vacation Giveaway on March 14th. All you have to do is call in to register. More info is coming soon…
Big news for Steve’s family!!! Ana who is a senior at Guerin Catholic just accepted a direct admit to The Kelly School of Business at IU Bloomington in the Fall!!! She applied to a lot of great universities all over the country and had many acceptance letters and chose IU. Brigid and I couldn’t be happier!!! She will be close, attending the 8th-ranked Business School in the nation and can we say in-state tuition?? Score!!!
Tali is in the middle of competitive cheer season. Earlier this month she was in French Lick competing and both teams for which she cheers came in first place! We are still looking to win a bid to Nationals in May and have 3 more competitions left this season to earn one. Fingers crossed!!
Kylie is continuing to grow her Reiki business. If you are familiar with Reiki (or even if you aren’t), feel free to give Kylie a call at 317-573-1818. She does a phenomenal job and already has several regular clients.
Thea is working hard to keep up with the spring market that has already started. She celebrated a big birthday on February 7th and we were excited to celebrate with her!!! Her pregnancy is going great so far and we are getting closer and closer to her due date in May. Don’t worry, if you are working with Thea, we have a transition plan in place so we don’t miss a beat helping you or someone you referred to us find the perfect home. We will be excited to welcome Thea back after a couple of months of maternity leave.
The market…what is going on with it? After many months of sluggish activity, things have picked up already and we are expecting a busy spring market. Interest rates are coming down and have dropped already around 1% from their highs just a couple of months ago. They are projected to keep dropping to around the 5% mark by summer, which is awesome news! As a result, buyers and sellers who were on the sidelines the past several months are entering the market. Mortgage applications are up 28% already and new listings are down, keeping for a tight market, which is pushing the median sales price up to $280,000. We still only have 1.6 months supply of inventory and with a healthy level at 6-months, you can see why we don’t expect to see this changing anytime soon. We are seeing multiple offers on houses again, although not nearly as many as last spring and only in certain areas and price points.
See some numbers below courtesy of MIBOR comparing December 2022 to November 2022:
Median Sales Price-UP 0.8% to $280,000
Closed Sales-DOWN 4.3% to 2,414 units
New Listings-DOWN 27.2% to 1,706 units
Pending Sales-DOWN 10.3% to 1,878 units
Days on Market-UP 31.4% to 46 days
Price per s.f.-no change-$160
% of Ask Received-DOWN 0.1% to 97.7%
Active Inventory-DOWN 12.3% to 3,816 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 5.9% to 1.6 months
While these numbers can look pretty ugly, keep in mind this is during the holidays, which is the slowest month for real estate sales and also some of the highest interest rates we have seen in years. Things are getting better. In fact, if you are a buyer, jumping in the market right now will be to your benefit as we expect a lot of competition again this spring, and as stated above, we are already seeing it.
We hope to see you at some of our upcoming events. As always, THANK YOU for keeping us in mind for all of your real estate needs AND for introducing us to people you care about who are thinking about buying, selling, or building a new home. We will treat them like family!! This is how we stay in business.
Finally, if you or someone you know is moving out of the area, CALL US. We have a vetted referral network of the TOP 5% of real estate agents nationwide. We would be happy to connect you or someone you care about to ensure you get the absolute BEST agent to help with your next home.
Click here to read our February newsletter.
Happy Valentine’s Day!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
Please don’t keep us a secret!
Monday, October 31, 2022
November 2022 Newsletter
Happy Thanksgiving!! From our family to yours, we hope that you are able to take some time this holiday season to pause and reflect on all of the positive things in your life. Too often, we let ourselves focus and dwell on the negative. Here is an interesting fact: We can’t control the first thought that comes to our mind, but we CAN control the second thought. Our wish for you is for peace, gratitude, comfort, and thankfulness this holiday season. We sure do appreciate you!! If you are reading this newsletter, it is because you are an important part of our lives either as a client or a referral partner. We are grateful to be part of your life and we appreciate you!!
A few updates from our team:
Steve and his family returned a couple of weeks ago from a bucket-list vacation to Italy and Switzerland. We visited Milan (took a fashion tour, saw the Last Supper painting and toured the Duomo), Bologna (we saw the Ferrari and Lamborghini factories and museums), headed to Lake Como and took a boat ride around the lake and saw George Clooney’s house as well the house where a James Bond movie was filmed as well as a Star Wars movie. Then, we took the Bernina Express to St. Moritz in Switzerland and toured the city center as well as took a couple of funiculars and a gondola to the top of the mountain for some amazing views during lunch. Long travel time to and from Milan, but worth it for some amazing memories.
Ana has been accepted to Ole Miss and IU and is waiting on more letters from colleges over the next couple of months. Fingers crossed for more acceptance letters (as well as scholarships!).
Tali just ended her school cheer season. She enjoyed cheering on the sideline as well as the competition team, which placed 2nd in state on Saturday! They are so excited! Now, she focuses on her club team ICE, which starts competing in 2-weeks. No rest for the weary!!!
Thea and Michael are looking forward to a fun vacation to enjoy some downtime starting Thursday. They will be gone a little over a week. I am on duty for all buyers while Thea is gone, so if you or someone you care about needs anything, give me a call. Happy to help!
Kylie celebrated a birthday a couple weeks ago and took a long weekend to celebrate. Thea and I treated her to a birthday lunch upon her return. She is looking forward to Trick-Or-Treating with her youngest Jax.
Thank you to everyone who attended our October Happy Hour. We had a great time and Shellie Law was the lucky winner of the gift card drawing. Thank you to our sponsor 360 Tours who is our real estate photography company for sponsoring this month! Please note, due to Thanksgiving, the November Happy Hour will be December 1st from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. This will be the last Happy Hour of the year. We hope you can join us!! Check your e-mail to register.
Don’t miss Steve’s Home Seller Workshop on Tuesday, November 8th from 7-8pm. This is an awesome, low-pressure workshop for you or someone you care about thinking about selling in the next year. We talk about the market, common mistakes we see sellers make, and offer FREE Staging tips and tricks to get the highest price out of your house. E-mail steve@Welcome2Indy.com to register.
Photos with Santa is Saturday, November 19th from 12-3pm at our office. Don’t forget to register with kylie@Welcome2Indy.com Your kiddo can tell Santa what they would like for Christmas, write a letter to Santa (Santa WILL write back), enjoy treats, and get a professional photo with Santa to use for your holiday cards.
Annual Thanksgiving Pie Giveaway is scheduled for Tuesday, November 22nd from 11AM-6pm at our office. Please let kylie@Welcome2Indy.com know what type and flavor of pie you would like. You can order gluten-free cherry or Steve and Mark’s Perfectly Peach pie or a regular pie and those flavors are apple, cherry, or pumpkin. Our gluten-free pies are coming again from No Label at The Table here in Carmel. That is a small, family-owned bakery that employs young men and women on the autism spectrum. We love to support them and all of the good they do! We hope to see you!!! Thank you to Mark Kuchik and CrossCountry Mortgage for partnering with us!!
Finally, on the event front, I hope you saw the e-mail I sent a few days ago about the Holocaust Survivor presentation featuring Frank Grunwald. Frank is a friend of my father Jack. He survived 3 concentration camps and is the subject of a documentary about his experience as well as having several artifacts in the National Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. We have arranged for Frank to speak at Westfield Intermediate School and Guerin Catholic High School last year. This year, we have arranged from him to speak to the Westfield Chamber at a special presentation. I have the honor of being the Title Sponsor for the event and have purchased 2 tables for clients and a 3rd table for Guerin Catholic students. Frank is a master story-teller and will move you when you hear his story and see his photos. This event is open to the public and will sell out. If you are interested in hearing Frank’s chilling story, please register for this event here
Please join us on Thursday, December 1st from 11AM-1PM at IMMI in Westfield to hear this amazing man and his incredible story of survival. It is powerful, moving, and incredible to hear.
This market has been nutty lately, hasn’t it? Interest rates are above 7% and housing has certainly taking a break from the crazy pace of the past 3-years. This isn’t a bad thing. We will be talking more about this at my Home Seller Workshop, so sign up to get more details then. We do expect interest rates to start falling starting in November. Expectations are that they will be back in the 5% range within 6-months. Time will tell. If that happens, there will be another crazy spring market as buyers and sellers rush to take advantage of the lower interest rates. If you or someone you care about is thinking or buying, selling, or building a new home in the next 12-months, give us a call. We are happy to consult with you/them about your options.
Here is the latest housing data comparing August to September in Metro Indy courtesy of MIBOR:
Median Sales Price-$285,000-No change
Closed Sales-3,216 units-DOWN 8.6%
New Listings-3,407 units-DOWN 10.1%
Pending Sales-2,940 units-DOWN 9.4%
Days on Market-28 days-UP 27.3%
Price per s.f.-$162-DOWN 2.4%
% of Asking Price Received-98.7%-DOWN 0.5%
Active Inventory-4,357 units-UP 8.8%
Absorption Rate-1.4 months-UP 27.3%
You can quickly see effect of the mortgage rates more than doubling in 6-months. Housing has certainly slowed, however we are NOT expecting house prices to depreciate. We do expect them to appreciate at a slower pace of 3-5%, which is normal for our market. Housing inventory is still extremely low with a balanced market being 6-months of inventory and we are at 1.4 months! Bottom line, if you are thinking of selling, there is still very little competition and there is still buyer demand.
If you are a buyer, use a 2/1 rate buy-down until interest rates come down next year and then re-finance. Don’t wait until the spring rush with lower interest rates when you will have a ton of competition again like this spring. Buyer have more leverage now than they have had in 3-years. Take advantage of it while you can!
Click here to read our November newsletter.
Happy Thanksgiving!!
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!!
P.P.S. Don’t forget to register for all of our upcoming events we have planned for you!
A few updates from our team:
Steve and his family returned a couple of weeks ago from a bucket-list vacation to Italy and Switzerland. We visited Milan (took a fashion tour, saw the Last Supper painting and toured the Duomo), Bologna (we saw the Ferrari and Lamborghini factories and museums), headed to Lake Como and took a boat ride around the lake and saw George Clooney’s house as well the house where a James Bond movie was filmed as well as a Star Wars movie. Then, we took the Bernina Express to St. Moritz in Switzerland and toured the city center as well as took a couple of funiculars and a gondola to the top of the mountain for some amazing views during lunch. Long travel time to and from Milan, but worth it for some amazing memories.
Ana has been accepted to Ole Miss and IU and is waiting on more letters from colleges over the next couple of months. Fingers crossed for more acceptance letters (as well as scholarships!).
Tali just ended her school cheer season. She enjoyed cheering on the sideline as well as the competition team, which placed 2nd in state on Saturday! They are so excited! Now, she focuses on her club team ICE, which starts competing in 2-weeks. No rest for the weary!!!
Thea and Michael are looking forward to a fun vacation to enjoy some downtime starting Thursday. They will be gone a little over a week. I am on duty for all buyers while Thea is gone, so if you or someone you care about needs anything, give me a call. Happy to help!
Kylie celebrated a birthday a couple weeks ago and took a long weekend to celebrate. Thea and I treated her to a birthday lunch upon her return. She is looking forward to Trick-Or-Treating with her youngest Jax.
Thank you to everyone who attended our October Happy Hour. We had a great time and Shellie Law was the lucky winner of the gift card drawing. Thank you to our sponsor 360 Tours who is our real estate photography company for sponsoring this month! Please note, due to Thanksgiving, the November Happy Hour will be December 1st from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s. This will be the last Happy Hour of the year. We hope you can join us!! Check your e-mail to register.
Don’t miss Steve’s Home Seller Workshop on Tuesday, November 8th from 7-8pm. This is an awesome, low-pressure workshop for you or someone you care about thinking about selling in the next year. We talk about the market, common mistakes we see sellers make, and offer FREE Staging tips and tricks to get the highest price out of your house. E-mail steve@Welcome2Indy.com to register.
Photos with Santa is Saturday, November 19th from 12-3pm at our office. Don’t forget to register with kylie@Welcome2Indy.com Your kiddo can tell Santa what they would like for Christmas, write a letter to Santa (Santa WILL write back), enjoy treats, and get a professional photo with Santa to use for your holiday cards.
Annual Thanksgiving Pie Giveaway is scheduled for Tuesday, November 22nd from 11AM-6pm at our office. Please let kylie@Welcome2Indy.com know what type and flavor of pie you would like. You can order gluten-free cherry or Steve and Mark’s Perfectly Peach pie or a regular pie and those flavors are apple, cherry, or pumpkin. Our gluten-free pies are coming again from No Label at The Table here in Carmel. That is a small, family-owned bakery that employs young men and women on the autism spectrum. We love to support them and all of the good they do! We hope to see you!!! Thank you to Mark Kuchik and CrossCountry Mortgage for partnering with us!!
Finally, on the event front, I hope you saw the e-mail I sent a few days ago about the Holocaust Survivor presentation featuring Frank Grunwald. Frank is a friend of my father Jack. He survived 3 concentration camps and is the subject of a documentary about his experience as well as having several artifacts in the National Holocaust Museum in Washington DC. We have arranged for Frank to speak at Westfield Intermediate School and Guerin Catholic High School last year. This year, we have arranged from him to speak to the Westfield Chamber at a special presentation. I have the honor of being the Title Sponsor for the event and have purchased 2 tables for clients and a 3rd table for Guerin Catholic students. Frank is a master story-teller and will move you when you hear his story and see his photos. This event is open to the public and will sell out. If you are interested in hearing Frank’s chilling story, please register for this event here
Please join us on Thursday, December 1st from 11AM-1PM at IMMI in Westfield to hear this amazing man and his incredible story of survival. It is powerful, moving, and incredible to hear.
This market has been nutty lately, hasn’t it? Interest rates are above 7% and housing has certainly taking a break from the crazy pace of the past 3-years. This isn’t a bad thing. We will be talking more about this at my Home Seller Workshop, so sign up to get more details then. We do expect interest rates to start falling starting in November. Expectations are that they will be back in the 5% range within 6-months. Time will tell. If that happens, there will be another crazy spring market as buyers and sellers rush to take advantage of the lower interest rates. If you or someone you care about is thinking or buying, selling, or building a new home in the next 12-months, give us a call. We are happy to consult with you/them about your options.
Here is the latest housing data comparing August to September in Metro Indy courtesy of MIBOR:
Median Sales Price-$285,000-No change
Closed Sales-3,216 units-DOWN 8.6%
New Listings-3,407 units-DOWN 10.1%
Pending Sales-2,940 units-DOWN 9.4%
Days on Market-28 days-UP 27.3%
Price per s.f.-$162-DOWN 2.4%
% of Asking Price Received-98.7%-DOWN 0.5%
Active Inventory-4,357 units-UP 8.8%
Absorption Rate-1.4 months-UP 27.3%
You can quickly see effect of the mortgage rates more than doubling in 6-months. Housing has certainly slowed, however we are NOT expecting house prices to depreciate. We do expect them to appreciate at a slower pace of 3-5%, which is normal for our market. Housing inventory is still extremely low with a balanced market being 6-months of inventory and we are at 1.4 months! Bottom line, if you are thinking of selling, there is still very little competition and there is still buyer demand.
If you are a buyer, use a 2/1 rate buy-down until interest rates come down next year and then re-finance. Don’t wait until the spring rush with lower interest rates when you will have a ton of competition again like this spring. Buyer have more leverage now than they have had in 3-years. Take advantage of it while you can!
Click here to read our November newsletter.
Happy Thanksgiving!!
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!!
P.P.S. Don’t forget to register for all of our upcoming events we have planned for you!
Wednesday, September 28, 2022
October 2022 Newsletter
Happy Fall!!! Like it or not, pumpkin spice lattes, football, Fall festivals, and hot apple cider are here!! Fall is also usually a time for the real estate market to make its final push before winter. More on that later…
We hope that you are enjoying the cooler temps and watching football again after a long break. It is hard to believe that soccer is almost over and sectionals are only a couple of weeks away. Ana is looking forward to the end of this season and having more time for pursuing other interests. Tali only has two more football games for which to cheer the first week of October and then that season is over. Her school competition cheer team had their first competition a couple of weeks ago and they placed first! The next one coming up will be MUCH harder!
Brigid just got back from a business trip to Philly and then leaves again for another trip to Denver in a week. She will be able to see her aunt and uncle and maybe cousins who live out there now and is looking forward to that.
As a family, we are looking forward to Fall Break next month. We have been anxiously awaiting this trip for 3 years since we had to cancel it due to the pandemic. We are headed to Italy! We have never been before and are SO excited! We will be touring Milan, Lake Cuomo, as well as part of Switzerland and the Alps. If you have traveled to any of these places and have some must-do experiences, please let me know.
Thea is staying extremely busy helping buyers in this shifting marketing. Making sure you have an extremely strong advocate who is knowledgeable about not only the market, but also the mortgage environment is crucial right now.
Kylie is keeping very busy with keeping up with the team paperwork and reports as well as marketing (with Thea’s help as well). She is doing a great job, as always keeping everything organized so we and our clients don’t miss a beat!
Lots happening for our clients over the next few months!!! Thank you to everyone who attended our September Happy Hour. We had a great turnout and really enjoyed hearing from our sponsor Sarah Snarr with Journey Injection Lounge-309-621-5797. If you have thought about cosmetic injections or need to address joint pain, give Sarah a call. She is a Nurse Practitioner who puts her clients first and achieves great results.
Our October Happy Hour is being moved back one week due to Fall Break. Please join us on Thursday, October 27th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s in Carmel. Our sponsor this month is Susie Chamberlin with 360-Tour Design. They do all of our photo and video shoots for our listings and do an amazing job!! As always, we will cover the food and drinks. Come relax, meet some new friends and maybe some old ones and share a smile with us. You are welcome to bring a friend as well!
I hope you were able to join us for Thea’s Home Buyer Workshop on the 28th. She covers what is going on in the market right now as well as what the home buying process looks like and how to position yourself to be successful. She also answers all of your questions. If you or someone you care about are thinking of buying a home in the next year, please sign up for this awesome workshop. Guarantee you will learn something new! You can text Thea at 440-862-1118 to register for the October workshop on the 26th.
Thank you to those who attended my Home Seller Workshop on the 13th of September. We covered the Top Ten Dumb Mistakes Smart People Make When Selling Their House. We also covered the current shifting market, what specifically that means for each participant, what the future is likely to hold (our crystal balls are a little cloudy right now as well!) and how you can make your house stand out in this market when homes are not typically selling in a day anymore. The next workshop will be on October 11th from 7-8:30pm via Zoom. Contact Steve at 317-339-7698 to get registered.
Mark your calendars now for November 22nd for our annual Thanksgiving Day Pie Pick-up. We will again be supporting No Label at The Table this year and provide gluten-free pies AND we will also be providing regular pies for those who prefer those. You will have several flavors from which to choose and we will have your pie ready to pick up on the 22nd. Look for more info in the mail and e-mail soon!
Also, mark your calendars for our annual Photos with Santa on Saturday, November 19th at our office from 11AM-3PM. The first hour is for sensory-sensitive children only. It will be on the 4th floor of our building this year. Photos will be sent to you within a week so you can include them on holiday cards whether they are printed or digital. We will have a Santa’s workshop and your children can write a letter to Santa and he will be responding to each one!!!
Due to Thanksgiving, we are moving our November Happy Hour back two weeks to December 1st from 5-6:30pm. We hope you will join us for our last Happy Hour of the year!!
Also, a bit of sad news to report. Your calendars for 2023 will be the LAST ones you will receive from us. We have provided calendars for our clients for over 40-years!!! Sadly, like so many print materials, they have become obsolete for so many of our clients. After talking with many of you, we made the decision to make 2023 the final year. As you can imagine, they are very expensive for us to send and have only gotten more expensive over the years. With so many people (including our families) only using electronic calendars to keep track of everything, we felt this was the right decision. Thank you for understanding!
Finally, the real estate market. It. Has. Shifted. Houses are not selling in hours. Most houses aren’t even selling in days. Most houses are taking weeks to sell now and 41% of houses have needed a price reduction in order to sell. Builders are offering nice incentives again, such as $20,000 Design Center credits and $10,000 toward closing costs. Things have drastically changed in 6-months, however we are still extremely short of housing supply. It is trending up, but we are a long way away from being in a balanced market defined as approximately 6-months of inventory. We have 1-month of inventory right now! Interest rates continue to climb to the high 6% range, which is still below the 40-year average of around 8%. We do expect them to come back down next year. If you are thinking of buying/selling/building/investing in a house, give us a call TODAY so we can walk you through your options as you have many right now. Below are some stats from MIBOR comparing August 2022 to July 2022:
Median Sales Price-DOWN 3.1% to $285,000
Closed Sales-UP 1.0% to 3,461 units
New Listings-DOWN 8.4% to 3,761 units
Pending Sales-UP 2.0% to 3,486 units
Days on Market-UP 35.3% to 23 days
Price per s.f.-DOWN 1.2% to $166
% of Ask Received-DOWN 1.4% to 99.3%
Active Inventory-UP 3.9% to 4,010 units
Absorption Rate-9.1% to 1.2 months
Happy Fall!!! See you soon at an upcoming event!!
Enjoy the October newsletter (click here) and let us know what you think!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
We hope that you are enjoying the cooler temps and watching football again after a long break. It is hard to believe that soccer is almost over and sectionals are only a couple of weeks away. Ana is looking forward to the end of this season and having more time for pursuing other interests. Tali only has two more football games for which to cheer the first week of October and then that season is over. Her school competition cheer team had their first competition a couple of weeks ago and they placed first! The next one coming up will be MUCH harder!
Brigid just got back from a business trip to Philly and then leaves again for another trip to Denver in a week. She will be able to see her aunt and uncle and maybe cousins who live out there now and is looking forward to that.
As a family, we are looking forward to Fall Break next month. We have been anxiously awaiting this trip for 3 years since we had to cancel it due to the pandemic. We are headed to Italy! We have never been before and are SO excited! We will be touring Milan, Lake Cuomo, as well as part of Switzerland and the Alps. If you have traveled to any of these places and have some must-do experiences, please let me know.
Thea is staying extremely busy helping buyers in this shifting marketing. Making sure you have an extremely strong advocate who is knowledgeable about not only the market, but also the mortgage environment is crucial right now.
Kylie is keeping very busy with keeping up with the team paperwork and reports as well as marketing (with Thea’s help as well). She is doing a great job, as always keeping everything organized so we and our clients don’t miss a beat!
Lots happening for our clients over the next few months!!! Thank you to everyone who attended our September Happy Hour. We had a great turnout and really enjoyed hearing from our sponsor Sarah Snarr with Journey Injection Lounge-309-621-5797. If you have thought about cosmetic injections or need to address joint pain, give Sarah a call. She is a Nurse Practitioner who puts her clients first and achieves great results.
Our October Happy Hour is being moved back one week due to Fall Break. Please join us on Thursday, October 27th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s in Carmel. Our sponsor this month is Susie Chamberlin with 360-Tour Design. They do all of our photo and video shoots for our listings and do an amazing job!! As always, we will cover the food and drinks. Come relax, meet some new friends and maybe some old ones and share a smile with us. You are welcome to bring a friend as well!
I hope you were able to join us for Thea’s Home Buyer Workshop on the 28th. She covers what is going on in the market right now as well as what the home buying process looks like and how to position yourself to be successful. She also answers all of your questions. If you or someone you care about are thinking of buying a home in the next year, please sign up for this awesome workshop. Guarantee you will learn something new! You can text Thea at 440-862-1118 to register for the October workshop on the 26th.
Thank you to those who attended my Home Seller Workshop on the 13th of September. We covered the Top Ten Dumb Mistakes Smart People Make When Selling Their House. We also covered the current shifting market, what specifically that means for each participant, what the future is likely to hold (our crystal balls are a little cloudy right now as well!) and how you can make your house stand out in this market when homes are not typically selling in a day anymore. The next workshop will be on October 11th from 7-8:30pm via Zoom. Contact Steve at 317-339-7698 to get registered.
Mark your calendars now for November 22nd for our annual Thanksgiving Day Pie Pick-up. We will again be supporting No Label at The Table this year and provide gluten-free pies AND we will also be providing regular pies for those who prefer those. You will have several flavors from which to choose and we will have your pie ready to pick up on the 22nd. Look for more info in the mail and e-mail soon!
Also, mark your calendars for our annual Photos with Santa on Saturday, November 19th at our office from 11AM-3PM. The first hour is for sensory-sensitive children only. It will be on the 4th floor of our building this year. Photos will be sent to you within a week so you can include them on holiday cards whether they are printed or digital. We will have a Santa’s workshop and your children can write a letter to Santa and he will be responding to each one!!!
Due to Thanksgiving, we are moving our November Happy Hour back two weeks to December 1st from 5-6:30pm. We hope you will join us for our last Happy Hour of the year!!
Also, a bit of sad news to report. Your calendars for 2023 will be the LAST ones you will receive from us. We have provided calendars for our clients for over 40-years!!! Sadly, like so many print materials, they have become obsolete for so many of our clients. After talking with many of you, we made the decision to make 2023 the final year. As you can imagine, they are very expensive for us to send and have only gotten more expensive over the years. With so many people (including our families) only using electronic calendars to keep track of everything, we felt this was the right decision. Thank you for understanding!
Finally, the real estate market. It. Has. Shifted. Houses are not selling in hours. Most houses aren’t even selling in days. Most houses are taking weeks to sell now and 41% of houses have needed a price reduction in order to sell. Builders are offering nice incentives again, such as $20,000 Design Center credits and $10,000 toward closing costs. Things have drastically changed in 6-months, however we are still extremely short of housing supply. It is trending up, but we are a long way away from being in a balanced market defined as approximately 6-months of inventory. We have 1-month of inventory right now! Interest rates continue to climb to the high 6% range, which is still below the 40-year average of around 8%. We do expect them to come back down next year. If you are thinking of buying/selling/building/investing in a house, give us a call TODAY so we can walk you through your options as you have many right now. Below are some stats from MIBOR comparing August 2022 to July 2022:
Median Sales Price-DOWN 3.1% to $285,000
Closed Sales-UP 1.0% to 3,461 units
New Listings-DOWN 8.4% to 3,761 units
Pending Sales-UP 2.0% to 3,486 units
Days on Market-UP 35.3% to 23 days
Price per s.f.-DOWN 1.2% to $166
% of Ask Received-DOWN 1.4% to 99.3%
Active Inventory-UP 3.9% to 4,010 units
Absorption Rate-9.1% to 1.2 months
Happy Fall!!! See you soon at an upcoming event!!
Enjoy the October newsletter (click here) and let us know what you think!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Mark
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Saturday, June 25, 2022
July 2022 Real Estate Update
Welcome (officially) to summer!! We hope you are enjoying this more relaxed time of year with warmer temperatures, kids out of school, summer concerts, vacations, sports, and the longer daylight hours. While it certainly poses its unique challenges, we hope you are able to spend some fun times making memories with those you care about.
We have some sad news to report in that Patti who was our Director of Marketing resigned abruptly a couple of weeks ago. She will be missed and we wish her nothing but success as she turns a new page in her next chapter. In case you didn’t know, we hired a Virtual Assistant name Mark to help Patti with marketing. She did a great job training him and he will be taking over most of her responsibilities. We will be looking for a replacement for Patti in the coming months, so if you know of a ROCKSTAR person who would make a great Director of Marketing for a high-producing team who is extremely adept at social media and video editing, please send them my way: Steve@Welcome2Indy.com.
Steve is getting ready to leave on a family vacation with Brigid’s family from July 3-10. They will be taking a Norwegian cruise from NYC to Bermuda. Should be a fun time to unwind. Ana is continuing to look at colleges and took a 2nd tour of Clemson in June. She still loves it and it is her #1 choice so far. She toured Auburn at the end of June and it is her #2. She also took a Teen Driving Safety Course at the BMW Performance Center in Greer, SC while looking at Clemson an absolutely loved it!!! If you have a teen driver, we highly recommend this (or similar course). It just may save someone’s life!!!
Brigid has hired her first two employees since being promoted to an Assistant Director position. She loves what she does and that she can work from home. Tali is neck deep in cheer after making the next level team as well as her school cheer team and then also their competition cheer team. She will have 3 cheer teams for which she is cheering. That is a LOT of cheer, but she wouldn’t have it any other way!
Thea is keeping extremely busy with buyers at the moment and is enjoying the summer months. She is the Chair of the Young Professionals Group of Westfield and is busy planning events for the rest of the year, including a parade and a Young Professionals Summit this Fall.
Kylie is keeping busy with her family and two kids trying to keep them busy with summer camps and activities. She really is enjoying the pool and taking the kids to play there.
This real estate market has brought an onslaught of phone calls, texts and e-mails. Know that we constantly stay up-to-date with the latest information so we can pass that along to our clients. Besides reading white papers from Lawrence Yun who is the Chief Economist for NAR, Shelley Specchio who is the CEO of MIBOR, we have recently listened to Steve Lains who is the CEO of BAGI (Builder’s Association of Greater Indianapolis) and Dr. Elliot Eisenberg who is an internationally-acclaimed economist who specializes in real estate.
Along with our own research, every one of these industry experts have steadfastly said there is no real estate bubble. Period. We have the soundest real estate financial fundamentals in history right now and the tightest supply with incredible demand in history. We have an inflation problem. Dr. Eisenberg said we are about at the apex of inflation and should start to see is tick downward soon. A recession will happen, likely next year and will not be bad, but a typical 8-10 month inflation period (which we need). Our recovery will be slow, but steady. We are already seeing goods start to rebound from their trough of supply, but labor is a continued problem. Quite a few people are re-entering the labor market after retiring due to the stock market falling. This should help.
Interest rates have dropped from their peak of around 6.3875% to around 6%. We hope and expect them to continue to fall during the course of the rest of the year. Housing prices will NOT depreciate, but rather decelerate the appreciation we have seen the past few years. We expect to see appreciation rates in the 7-8% range this year, which is down from the 18% we saw last year, but that was not sustainable.
Fun news!!! We hope everyone enjoyed our July Happy Hour at Matt The Miller’s this pas month. Thank you to Keith Pemberton with Pemberton Insurance for sponsoring it!!! We hope to see you at our July Happy Hour on Thursday, July 21st from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s.
Don’t miss two really great workshops coming up!!! Thea’s Homebuyer workshop is from 5:30-6:30pm on July 12th and she will answer all of your questions about buying a home in this shifting market. It is Zoom only. contact her for log-in info at: Thea@Welcome2Indy.com. Our second workshop is for home sellers and it is also on July 12th from 7-8pm hosted by me. We will be discussing the Top 10 Dumbest Mistakes Smart People Make When Preparing Their House for Sale along with market updates and what to expect in this shifting market. This is live only. Contact me for more info: steve@Welcome2Indy.com
Finally, mark your calendars for our first ever Party in The Park!!! It will be on Sunday, August 14th from 1-4pm at Cool Creek Park in Westfield. You do not want to miss this FREE event! We will have snacks, beverages, a LIVE band, magician, face painting, photo booth, caricature drawings, games, Kona Ice truck and professional photographer and MUCH more!! Look for your invitation in the mail and register via the Eventbrite link to make sure you are on the list. There is limited space, so RSVP early to ensure you get a spot!!! We are grateful to our co-sponsors Mark Kuchik with CrossCountry Mortgage!!!!
Enjoy your July and remember to keep us in mind for people you care about considering making a move. We would love to help them!!!
Here are the market stats from MIBOR comparing May 2022 to May 2021:
Median Sales Price-UP 12.8% to $287,625
Closed Sales-DOWN 2.9% to 3,336 units
New Listings-UP 6.1% to 4,217 units
Pending Sales-UP 2.4% to 3,960 units
Days on Market-DOWN 13.3% to 13 days
Price per s.f.-UP 15.9% to $168
% of Ask Received-UP 0.8% to 102.4%
Active Inventory-UP 29.8% to 2,295 units
Absorption Rate-UP 40.0% to 0.7 months
You will notice that the median sales price is the highest on record. We expect this to keep climbing, but inventory will as well as days on market.
Have a great July!!!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, and Thea
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret! Click here to read our July newsletter
We have some sad news to report in that Patti who was our Director of Marketing resigned abruptly a couple of weeks ago. She will be missed and we wish her nothing but success as she turns a new page in her next chapter. In case you didn’t know, we hired a Virtual Assistant name Mark to help Patti with marketing. She did a great job training him and he will be taking over most of her responsibilities. We will be looking for a replacement for Patti in the coming months, so if you know of a ROCKSTAR person who would make a great Director of Marketing for a high-producing team who is extremely adept at social media and video editing, please send them my way: Steve@Welcome2Indy.com.
Steve is getting ready to leave on a family vacation with Brigid’s family from July 3-10. They will be taking a Norwegian cruise from NYC to Bermuda. Should be a fun time to unwind. Ana is continuing to look at colleges and took a 2nd tour of Clemson in June. She still loves it and it is her #1 choice so far. She toured Auburn at the end of June and it is her #2. She also took a Teen Driving Safety Course at the BMW Performance Center in Greer, SC while looking at Clemson an absolutely loved it!!! If you have a teen driver, we highly recommend this (or similar course). It just may save someone’s life!!!
Brigid has hired her first two employees since being promoted to an Assistant Director position. She loves what she does and that she can work from home. Tali is neck deep in cheer after making the next level team as well as her school cheer team and then also their competition cheer team. She will have 3 cheer teams for which she is cheering. That is a LOT of cheer, but she wouldn’t have it any other way!
Thea is keeping extremely busy with buyers at the moment and is enjoying the summer months. She is the Chair of the Young Professionals Group of Westfield and is busy planning events for the rest of the year, including a parade and a Young Professionals Summit this Fall.
Kylie is keeping busy with her family and two kids trying to keep them busy with summer camps and activities. She really is enjoying the pool and taking the kids to play there.
This real estate market has brought an onslaught of phone calls, texts and e-mails. Know that we constantly stay up-to-date with the latest information so we can pass that along to our clients. Besides reading white papers from Lawrence Yun who is the Chief Economist for NAR, Shelley Specchio who is the CEO of MIBOR, we have recently listened to Steve Lains who is the CEO of BAGI (Builder’s Association of Greater Indianapolis) and Dr. Elliot Eisenberg who is an internationally-acclaimed economist who specializes in real estate.
Along with our own research, every one of these industry experts have steadfastly said there is no real estate bubble. Period. We have the soundest real estate financial fundamentals in history right now and the tightest supply with incredible demand in history. We have an inflation problem. Dr. Eisenberg said we are about at the apex of inflation and should start to see is tick downward soon. A recession will happen, likely next year and will not be bad, but a typical 8-10 month inflation period (which we need). Our recovery will be slow, but steady. We are already seeing goods start to rebound from their trough of supply, but labor is a continued problem. Quite a few people are re-entering the labor market after retiring due to the stock market falling. This should help.
Interest rates have dropped from their peak of around 6.3875% to around 6%. We hope and expect them to continue to fall during the course of the rest of the year. Housing prices will NOT depreciate, but rather decelerate the appreciation we have seen the past few years. We expect to see appreciation rates in the 7-8% range this year, which is down from the 18% we saw last year, but that was not sustainable.
Fun news!!! We hope everyone enjoyed our July Happy Hour at Matt The Miller’s this pas month. Thank you to Keith Pemberton with Pemberton Insurance for sponsoring it!!! We hope to see you at our July Happy Hour on Thursday, July 21st from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s.
Don’t miss two really great workshops coming up!!! Thea’s Homebuyer workshop is from 5:30-6:30pm on July 12th and she will answer all of your questions about buying a home in this shifting market. It is Zoom only. contact her for log-in info at: Thea@Welcome2Indy.com. Our second workshop is for home sellers and it is also on July 12th from 7-8pm hosted by me. We will be discussing the Top 10 Dumbest Mistakes Smart People Make When Preparing Their House for Sale along with market updates and what to expect in this shifting market. This is live only. Contact me for more info: steve@Welcome2Indy.com
Finally, mark your calendars for our first ever Party in The Park!!! It will be on Sunday, August 14th from 1-4pm at Cool Creek Park in Westfield. You do not want to miss this FREE event! We will have snacks, beverages, a LIVE band, magician, face painting, photo booth, caricature drawings, games, Kona Ice truck and professional photographer and MUCH more!! Look for your invitation in the mail and register via the Eventbrite link to make sure you are on the list. There is limited space, so RSVP early to ensure you get a spot!!! We are grateful to our co-sponsors Mark Kuchik with CrossCountry Mortgage!!!!
Enjoy your July and remember to keep us in mind for people you care about considering making a move. We would love to help them!!!
Here are the market stats from MIBOR comparing May 2022 to May 2021:
Median Sales Price-UP 12.8% to $287,625
Closed Sales-DOWN 2.9% to 3,336 units
New Listings-UP 6.1% to 4,217 units
Pending Sales-UP 2.4% to 3,960 units
Days on Market-DOWN 13.3% to 13 days
Price per s.f.-UP 15.9% to $168
% of Ask Received-UP 0.8% to 102.4%
Active Inventory-UP 29.8% to 2,295 units
Absorption Rate-UP 40.0% to 0.7 months
You will notice that the median sales price is the highest on record. We expect this to keep climbing, but inventory will as well as days on market.
Have a great July!!!
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, and Thea
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret! Click here to read our July newsletter
Saturday, April 30, 2022
May Home News
Happy spring!!! We made it! Grass-cutting season is officially upon us along with seasonal allergies…however that also means warmer weather, long daylight in the evenings, schools are getting close to ending for the school year and summer activities are drawing near. The housing market is also in full swing!!!
Happy Mother’s Day to all moms!! Thank you for everything you do for your family!!! We hope you enjoy your special day.
We hope this month’s newsletter finds you well and looking forward to the spring season. For many of us, we have returned recently from spring break, which usually means going somewhere warm. Brigid and I made a promise to Ana and Tali several years ago that we would take them to Hawaii before Ana goes to college and we are running out of time!! So, we went to Kona on the Big Island for spring break and had a great time. So beautiful out there…but so far! Don’t have any plans to go back anytime soon, but we enjoyed our week there.
Last week, Brigid, Tali and I traveled to Orlando for a few days as Tali’s competitive cheer team made it to Worlds. This was their first time and they did great, accomplishing all three of their goals they set for themselves. Practicing for next season has already begun and Tali couldn’t be happier. Tali is also cheering for her Middle School in Westfield this year and hopes to also make their competitive cheer team.
Ana has prom on April 30th with Guerin. She has been looking forward to this for years and is excited to get all dressed up. She is going with a group of 18 friends-9 couples. We are excited for her and the opportunity to take some beautiful photos before their big evening.
So proud of Brigid for getting a promotion at Merck! She has been working hard for this for 2-years now and is excited at this new opportunity. We are very happy for her.
On a not-so-good note, my dad Jack who has managed to evade COVID for two years finally caught it. While he is not feeling great, he is starting to get better and is taking the new medicine to reduce the symptoms and severity of it. Hopefully, my mom Mary Anne will be able to avoid getting it and stay healthy. We sure do hope those you love are staying healthy and keep those we have lost in our prayers.
Kylie has been kept very busy with all of the spring listings we have put on the market. Her family is doing well and her kids are looking forward to the end of the school year and enjoying some time off for summer break.
Thea has been keeping very busy with buyers in this crazy market and is doing a great job in getting offers accepted in the most competitive sellers’ market in history. She is managing to enjoy some down time and loved having her family in town for Easter.
Patti has been working very hard on all of our activities and events we have had and are looking forward to this spring. They are looking forward to a vacation later this year to relax and not focus on events for a week!!
Speaking of events, we have had quite a few lately. Our April Happy Hour was a huge success and we so enjoyed seeing so many of you as we celebrated spring. We hope you will join us for our May Happy Hour on Thursday, May 19th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again. As always, we provide the drinks and appetizers and you bring the conversation. Always a good time!
Thank you to everyone who stopped by our FREE Shred Day last Friday (Earth Day). We securely shredded thousands of pounds of documents and responsibly recycled hundreds of pounds of electronics. Look for information on our next Shred Day this summer.
We sure hope you have your calendars marked for this Tuesday, May 3rd from 10:30am-3:30pm for our Mother’s Day Giveaway!!! Call us during these hours at 317-426-6108. We are giving away a prize package of pampering worth over $800, including a massage, mani-pedi, dinner for two, prize gift basket, flowers, and much more!!! Thank you to JW Restore for co-sponsoring this with us!! The winner will be announced at 4pm via Facebook Live. For every person who calls in, they get one entry and if you call in with a referral, you get FIVE additional entries with no limit on the number of referrals you can give us. We look forward to hearing from you!
The real estate market continues to be super hot, however we are seeing signs of a shift upon us. Buyer traffic is down, number of offers received is down, amount of offer price above asking price is down and units sold is down from this time last year. Bottom line, we are in a shift. We expect a recession to follow. We do not expect it to be more than 6-9 months, nor will it be nearly as bad as the Great Recession. There is just too much of an imbalance of supply and demand for that to happen. If you are remotely considering selling your house, do it now. Interest rates are around 5-5.25%. Give us a call at 317-573-1880 so we can give you data specific to your situation and help you make an informed decision. It is our job to Guide, Lead, and Protect you through this uncertain time right now. Call us today!
Below are stats from MIBOR comparing March 2022 to February 2022. Note that these stats are trailing indicators and are from all areas MIBOR services, which is 16 counties.
Median Sales Price-UP 5.2% to $265,000
Closed Sales-UP 21.1% to 2,780 units
New Listings-UP 43.9% to 3,577 units
Pending Sales-UP 38.5% to 3,609 units
Day on Market-DOWN 13.0% to 20 days
Price per s.f.-UP 2.0% to $155
% of Ask Received-UP 1.1% to 101.2%
Active Inventory-UP 2.4% to 1,560 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 14.3% to 0.6 months
Keep in mind this is coming off of the winter market, so we do expect to see these numbers accelerate from February. January was the best January in history for MIBOR in terms of units sold.
Thank you for being great clients and referral partners! We couldn’t do what we love to do without you!!!
Happy Mother’s Day!!
Click here to read our May newsletter
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Patti, Thea
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret.
Happy Mother’s Day to all moms!! Thank you for everything you do for your family!!! We hope you enjoy your special day.
We hope this month’s newsletter finds you well and looking forward to the spring season. For many of us, we have returned recently from spring break, which usually means going somewhere warm. Brigid and I made a promise to Ana and Tali several years ago that we would take them to Hawaii before Ana goes to college and we are running out of time!! So, we went to Kona on the Big Island for spring break and had a great time. So beautiful out there…but so far! Don’t have any plans to go back anytime soon, but we enjoyed our week there.
Last week, Brigid, Tali and I traveled to Orlando for a few days as Tali’s competitive cheer team made it to Worlds. This was their first time and they did great, accomplishing all three of their goals they set for themselves. Practicing for next season has already begun and Tali couldn’t be happier. Tali is also cheering for her Middle School in Westfield this year and hopes to also make their competitive cheer team.
Ana has prom on April 30th with Guerin. She has been looking forward to this for years and is excited to get all dressed up. She is going with a group of 18 friends-9 couples. We are excited for her and the opportunity to take some beautiful photos before their big evening.
So proud of Brigid for getting a promotion at Merck! She has been working hard for this for 2-years now and is excited at this new opportunity. We are very happy for her.
On a not-so-good note, my dad Jack who has managed to evade COVID for two years finally caught it. While he is not feeling great, he is starting to get better and is taking the new medicine to reduce the symptoms and severity of it. Hopefully, my mom Mary Anne will be able to avoid getting it and stay healthy. We sure do hope those you love are staying healthy and keep those we have lost in our prayers.
Kylie has been kept very busy with all of the spring listings we have put on the market. Her family is doing well and her kids are looking forward to the end of the school year and enjoying some time off for summer break.
Thea has been keeping very busy with buyers in this crazy market and is doing a great job in getting offers accepted in the most competitive sellers’ market in history. She is managing to enjoy some down time and loved having her family in town for Easter.
Patti has been working very hard on all of our activities and events we have had and are looking forward to this spring. They are looking forward to a vacation later this year to relax and not focus on events for a week!!
Speaking of events, we have had quite a few lately. Our April Happy Hour was a huge success and we so enjoyed seeing so many of you as we celebrated spring. We hope you will join us for our May Happy Hour on Thursday, May 19th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again. As always, we provide the drinks and appetizers and you bring the conversation. Always a good time!
Thank you to everyone who stopped by our FREE Shred Day last Friday (Earth Day). We securely shredded thousands of pounds of documents and responsibly recycled hundreds of pounds of electronics. Look for information on our next Shred Day this summer.
We sure hope you have your calendars marked for this Tuesday, May 3rd from 10:30am-3:30pm for our Mother’s Day Giveaway!!! Call us during these hours at 317-426-6108. We are giving away a prize package of pampering worth over $800, including a massage, mani-pedi, dinner for two, prize gift basket, flowers, and much more!!! Thank you to JW Restore for co-sponsoring this with us!! The winner will be announced at 4pm via Facebook Live. For every person who calls in, they get one entry and if you call in with a referral, you get FIVE additional entries with no limit on the number of referrals you can give us. We look forward to hearing from you!
The real estate market continues to be super hot, however we are seeing signs of a shift upon us. Buyer traffic is down, number of offers received is down, amount of offer price above asking price is down and units sold is down from this time last year. Bottom line, we are in a shift. We expect a recession to follow. We do not expect it to be more than 6-9 months, nor will it be nearly as bad as the Great Recession. There is just too much of an imbalance of supply and demand for that to happen. If you are remotely considering selling your house, do it now. Interest rates are around 5-5.25%. Give us a call at 317-573-1880 so we can give you data specific to your situation and help you make an informed decision. It is our job to Guide, Lead, and Protect you through this uncertain time right now. Call us today!
Below are stats from MIBOR comparing March 2022 to February 2022. Note that these stats are trailing indicators and are from all areas MIBOR services, which is 16 counties.
Median Sales Price-UP 5.2% to $265,000
Closed Sales-UP 21.1% to 2,780 units
New Listings-UP 43.9% to 3,577 units
Pending Sales-UP 38.5% to 3,609 units
Day on Market-DOWN 13.0% to 20 days
Price per s.f.-UP 2.0% to $155
% of Ask Received-UP 1.1% to 101.2%
Active Inventory-UP 2.4% to 1,560 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 14.3% to 0.6 months
Keep in mind this is coming off of the winter market, so we do expect to see these numbers accelerate from February. January was the best January in history for MIBOR in terms of units sold.
Thank you for being great clients and referral partners! We couldn’t do what we love to do without you!!!
Happy Mother’s Day!!
Click here to read our May newsletter
Your Friends in Real Estate,
Steve, Kylie, Patti, Thea
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret.
Monday, January 31, 2022
February Real Estate Update
Happy Valentine’s Day! We hope that 2022 is off to a good start and that this finds you happy and healthy. I think we are all hoping that 2022 is much healthier that 2020 and 2021 and we can finally start to move past this pandemic. Only time will tell…
The spring market arrived early this year and is in full swing already! Sellers are enjoying crazy good offers and buyers are seeing the continuation of a very competitive market. According to a report by REALTOR.com, Indianapolis is ranked #2 behind Seattle as expecting the biggest increase in sales from 2021 at 14.8%!! Seattle being 15.3%. While we do not know when this wild seller’s market will come to an end, we do know we are closer every year. My prediction is that we will see a noticeable slow-down in 2023, but will still move at a good clip for the next 3 years or so. Builders have increased production to the highest amount of new builds since 2008, but even with that, the National Association of Home Builders states we are still about 5-7 years away from being able to satisfy demand!
With all of this being said, knowing your home’s equity in a reliable manner (Zillow is NOT reliable) is more important now than ever before. You should have received an e-mail from me and a post card within the past couple of weeks encouraging you to schedule a quick 30-minute Equity Analysis. Many clients have taken us up on our offer. There is still time to schedule a quick Zoom consultation by clicking: https://calendly.com/steverupp/30min
Steve and his family are doing well and Tali is in the middle of cheer competition season and having a great time at competitions. Ana is preparing for her next Indianapolis Children’s Choir concert and keeping up with her studies and getting ready for her first ACT and SAT exams. She is enjoying driving her new car and the freedom that comes with it (and so are we!) Steve is looking forward to attending Keller Williams’ annual convention called Family Reunion in Orlando in the middle of February and then heads to Greer, SC to participate in a 2-day BMW M-School where he will be taking a course on racing BMWs. He takes Ana to a 2-day Teen Driving School at the same track in June.
Thea is keeping extremely busy with helping lots of buyers right now win competitive offers. She is enjoying driving a new car for the first time in many years and is putting lots of miles on it already!
Kylie, along with her family has avoided getting COVID…until last week. She has been working on getting better and we are anxious to have her back in the office again.
Patti has been working extra hard while Kylie has been out and finalizing our marketing calendar for the year as well as brand new client guides that incorporate all of the changes our industry has seen in just the past 2-years.
Speaking of changes, you have likely received calls/texts/e-mails/mailings regarding ‘instant offers’. They have even made it to TV commercials. While there is certainly a demographic that can benefit from these types of programs, on average after repair costs, fees (yes, they have some stiff fees) and a profit margin, people are leaving about 15% equity on the table by using these services just to avoid a day or two of showings. Know that if this is an option you would like to explore, we have a program called Keller Offers that is a competitor to these other instant offer services. It is very transparent and efficient and we can get you an offer within 48-hours of viewing your house and you can stay in your house for up to 6-months. This is not the best option if you are trying to maximize your cash at closing, but it is an option if you need to sell very quickly and don’t want to make any preparations for sale or have any showings.
We also have a new product called Keller Concierge. Simply put, this is a short-term (up to 12-months) loan based on your credit that advances you money in order to prepare your house for sale, so you don’t have to use any money out of pocket or liquidate any investments. The terms are VERY attractive. The loan is repaid when you close your house. This is perfect for people who want to make some repairs/updates to their house in order to maximize their sales price, but don’t have or want to spend their own money. Call us if you are interested in either of these programs and we can give/send you more info so you can see if they are a good fit for you.
Thank you to everyone who attended Happy Hour in January! We had a great turnout and lots of laughter and smiles were found throughout the evening. Thank you to 2-10 Home Warranty for sponsoring the evening! Please join us Thursday, February 17th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again for FREE drinks and appetizers. Thank you to Chris Odle with JLK Financial for sponsoring this month’s Happy Hour. Chris is a client and an experienced financial advisor.
Hope you have seen some info lately on our very first Quarterly Prize Giveaway of 2022 taking place on Tuesday, February 1st from 10am-4pm. All you have to do is call us at 317-426-6108. We will ask you a few questions and that is it!!! If you have someone that is thinking of buying, selling, or building a new home soon, give us their name/number and we will give you FIVE more entries. You are entering to win a luxury weekend at French Lick worth over $1,500!!! Thank you to Rojas Roofing and Walla Painting for co-sponsoring this amazing prize package!! You do NOT want to miss this contest!
We have mentioned how competitive the housing market continues to be and here are some stats from MIBOR comparing December 2021 to November 2021:
Median Sales Price=$255,000 >UP 1.2%
Closed Sales=3,323 units >DOWN 4.3%
New Listings=2,162 units >DOWN 29.6%
Pending Sales=2,510 units >DOWN 19.3%
Days on Market=26 days >UP 23.8%
Price per s.f.=$151 >UP 1.3%
% of Ask Received=100.0% >no change
Active Inventory=2,094 units >DOWN 13.7%
Absorption Rate=0.6 months >DOWN 14.3%
Keep in mind, these numbers are for the slower winter market. Expect to see inventory and sales increase dramatically as we transition into the spring market.
Finally, watch your e-mail and social media for a SPECIAL surprise on February 9th. This is something we have never done before and are SO excited to announce it. Be prepared to call us as soon as you see the e-mail/social media post at 317-426-6108.
Thank you for reading!!! We have so many fun events and contests planned for this year and love seeing you!! Hope to see you at one of them soon!!!
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Click here to read out February newsletter
The spring market arrived early this year and is in full swing already! Sellers are enjoying crazy good offers and buyers are seeing the continuation of a very competitive market. According to a report by REALTOR.com, Indianapolis is ranked #2 behind Seattle as expecting the biggest increase in sales from 2021 at 14.8%!! Seattle being 15.3%. While we do not know when this wild seller’s market will come to an end, we do know we are closer every year. My prediction is that we will see a noticeable slow-down in 2023, but will still move at a good clip for the next 3 years or so. Builders have increased production to the highest amount of new builds since 2008, but even with that, the National Association of Home Builders states we are still about 5-7 years away from being able to satisfy demand!
With all of this being said, knowing your home’s equity in a reliable manner (Zillow is NOT reliable) is more important now than ever before. You should have received an e-mail from me and a post card within the past couple of weeks encouraging you to schedule a quick 30-minute Equity Analysis. Many clients have taken us up on our offer. There is still time to schedule a quick Zoom consultation by clicking: https://calendly.com/steverupp/30min
Steve and his family are doing well and Tali is in the middle of cheer competition season and having a great time at competitions. Ana is preparing for her next Indianapolis Children’s Choir concert and keeping up with her studies and getting ready for her first ACT and SAT exams. She is enjoying driving her new car and the freedom that comes with it (and so are we!) Steve is looking forward to attending Keller Williams’ annual convention called Family Reunion in Orlando in the middle of February and then heads to Greer, SC to participate in a 2-day BMW M-School where he will be taking a course on racing BMWs. He takes Ana to a 2-day Teen Driving School at the same track in June.
Thea is keeping extremely busy with helping lots of buyers right now win competitive offers. She is enjoying driving a new car for the first time in many years and is putting lots of miles on it already!
Kylie, along with her family has avoided getting COVID…until last week. She has been working on getting better and we are anxious to have her back in the office again.
Patti has been working extra hard while Kylie has been out and finalizing our marketing calendar for the year as well as brand new client guides that incorporate all of the changes our industry has seen in just the past 2-years.
Speaking of changes, you have likely received calls/texts/e-mails/mailings regarding ‘instant offers’. They have even made it to TV commercials. While there is certainly a demographic that can benefit from these types of programs, on average after repair costs, fees (yes, they have some stiff fees) and a profit margin, people are leaving about 15% equity on the table by using these services just to avoid a day or two of showings. Know that if this is an option you would like to explore, we have a program called Keller Offers that is a competitor to these other instant offer services. It is very transparent and efficient and we can get you an offer within 48-hours of viewing your house and you can stay in your house for up to 6-months. This is not the best option if you are trying to maximize your cash at closing, but it is an option if you need to sell very quickly and don’t want to make any preparations for sale or have any showings.
We also have a new product called Keller Concierge. Simply put, this is a short-term (up to 12-months) loan based on your credit that advances you money in order to prepare your house for sale, so you don’t have to use any money out of pocket or liquidate any investments. The terms are VERY attractive. The loan is repaid when you close your house. This is perfect for people who want to make some repairs/updates to their house in order to maximize their sales price, but don’t have or want to spend their own money. Call us if you are interested in either of these programs and we can give/send you more info so you can see if they are a good fit for you.
Thank you to everyone who attended Happy Hour in January! We had a great turnout and lots of laughter and smiles were found throughout the evening. Thank you to 2-10 Home Warranty for sponsoring the evening! Please join us Thursday, February 17th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again for FREE drinks and appetizers. Thank you to Chris Odle with JLK Financial for sponsoring this month’s Happy Hour. Chris is a client and an experienced financial advisor.
Hope you have seen some info lately on our very first Quarterly Prize Giveaway of 2022 taking place on Tuesday, February 1st from 10am-4pm. All you have to do is call us at 317-426-6108. We will ask you a few questions and that is it!!! If you have someone that is thinking of buying, selling, or building a new home soon, give us their name/number and we will give you FIVE more entries. You are entering to win a luxury weekend at French Lick worth over $1,500!!! Thank you to Rojas Roofing and Walla Painting for co-sponsoring this amazing prize package!! You do NOT want to miss this contest!
We have mentioned how competitive the housing market continues to be and here are some stats from MIBOR comparing December 2021 to November 2021:
Median Sales Price=$255,000 >UP 1.2%
Closed Sales=3,323 units >DOWN 4.3%
New Listings=2,162 units >DOWN 29.6%
Pending Sales=2,510 units >DOWN 19.3%
Days on Market=26 days >UP 23.8%
Price per s.f.=$151 >UP 1.3%
% of Ask Received=100.0% >no change
Active Inventory=2,094 units >DOWN 13.7%
Absorption Rate=0.6 months >DOWN 14.3%
Keep in mind, these numbers are for the slower winter market. Expect to see inventory and sales increase dramatically as we transition into the spring market.
Finally, watch your e-mail and social media for a SPECIAL surprise on February 9th. This is something we have never done before and are SO excited to announce it. Be prepared to call us as soon as you see the e-mail/social media post at 317-426-6108.
Thank you for reading!!! We have so many fun events and contests planned for this year and love seeing you!! Hope to see you at one of them soon!!!
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Click here to read out February newsletter
Monday, July 26, 2021
August 2021 Newsletter
Welcome to the ‘dog days’ of August! The temperature has finally reached what we expect during the summer and school is about back in session. Where did the summer go? We hope you were able to take some time away and enjoy a vacation or two to get a change in scenery. In my last newsletter, I mentioned we travelled to Jackson, WY to see Yellowstone National Park, which was gorgeous. Later this week, I travel to Cleveland to see my three college roommates from Xavier. Last summer was our 25-year college reunion, which was cancelled and we had all agreed to meet at Xavier to celebrate together. When that was cancelled, we agreed to meet in Cleveland this summer, which is where one of the roommates lives. It has been about 20-years since we have all been together. A LOT has changed since we graduated, but our friendship has remained strong…and we are grateful for that. Hope you are able to reconnect with some old friends, too this year!
Ana is going to be a junior at Guerin this year and is already back in summer soccer practice. She did very well at her first exhibition tournament this weekend not losing one game. Tali is still practicing cheer and moved up in teams so the practices and stunts are getting harder, but she loves it! Brigid is still working from home and will be for the rest of her Merck career. She is grateful for that.
Our team has had a lot of distractions this summer. Kylie’s babysitter has had a death in the family causing Kylie to have to work from home quite a bit lately. Thea had a death in the family that took her home to Cleveland for awhile along with many weddings this summer and fall. Patti was rear-ended in a car accident and has been going to the doctor and dealing with her car and insurance companies. All-in-all, we have had our challenges, to be sure. However, we work so well as a team and have been supporting and covering for each other. We are a strong work family.
We hope you were able to join us for our July Happy Hour. We had a great turnout again and really enjoyed being outside on the patio. Thank you, again for Keith Pemberton with Pemberton Insurance for being our gracious sponsor. He is outstanding if you are looking for a new insurance company. Our August Happy Hour is on Thursday, August 19th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again in Carmel. If the weather cooperates, we will be back outside on the patio as that is a crowd favorite. Bill Maki with The Kaveri Group is back to sponsor again this year-thank you, Bill!!! Bill is an IT and video expert. We have used Bill for our own team work as well as clients and he does an amazing job!! Give me a call if you would like to learn more about Bill and how you might be able to hire him.
Shred Day is back!! Mark your calendars now for Thursday, August 19th (same day as our Happy Hour) from 10AM-noon in our office parking lot. We will also take your recycling items. This is always popular…and it is absolutely FREE.
The real estate market is taking its usual July slow down. We don’t know if this is going to be long-term or short-term, but it is cooling off a bit. Houses are staying on the market longer, we are seeing price reductions for the first time in a LONG time and buyers are appearing more fickle. Check out the stats below from MIBOR. Bottom line, if you are still on the fence about selling, NOW is the time to talk to us. Interest rates have also dropped to below 3% again. Lumber prices, while still high are lowering. Change is coming. Talk with us today to see if the time is right for you to make a move.
Data from MIBOR comparing June 2021 to May 2021:
Median Sales Price-$250,000-DOWN 2% from $255,000
Closed Sales-3,897 units-UP 13.8%
New Listings-4,357 units-UP 11.1%
Pending Sales-4,130 units-UP 5.6%
Days on Market-14 days-DOWN 6.7%
Price per s.f.-$146-UP 0.7%
% of Ask Received-101.9%-UP 0.4% (this is an all-time record!)
Active Inventory-2,018 units-UP 17.3%
Absorption Rate-0.5-No change
This has been an absolutely BRUTAL market this past couple of years. Thank you for your continued trust and confidence in us to GUIDE, LEAD, and PROTECT you through this unprecedented time. Know we are always here for you and those you care about. Who is the next person you know who needs our help?
Enjoy this month’s newsletter! Some fun articles in there about a cool time capsule, employee safety, some great book suggestions, and great info on sunscreen. Let us know what you think!
Click here to read our August newsletter
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
The Zulu Group, P.C.
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Ana is going to be a junior at Guerin this year and is already back in summer soccer practice. She did very well at her first exhibition tournament this weekend not losing one game. Tali is still practicing cheer and moved up in teams so the practices and stunts are getting harder, but she loves it! Brigid is still working from home and will be for the rest of her Merck career. She is grateful for that.
Our team has had a lot of distractions this summer. Kylie’s babysitter has had a death in the family causing Kylie to have to work from home quite a bit lately. Thea had a death in the family that took her home to Cleveland for awhile along with many weddings this summer and fall. Patti was rear-ended in a car accident and has been going to the doctor and dealing with her car and insurance companies. All-in-all, we have had our challenges, to be sure. However, we work so well as a team and have been supporting and covering for each other. We are a strong work family.
We hope you were able to join us for our July Happy Hour. We had a great turnout again and really enjoyed being outside on the patio. Thank you, again for Keith Pemberton with Pemberton Insurance for being our gracious sponsor. He is outstanding if you are looking for a new insurance company. Our August Happy Hour is on Thursday, August 19th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again in Carmel. If the weather cooperates, we will be back outside on the patio as that is a crowd favorite. Bill Maki with The Kaveri Group is back to sponsor again this year-thank you, Bill!!! Bill is an IT and video expert. We have used Bill for our own team work as well as clients and he does an amazing job!! Give me a call if you would like to learn more about Bill and how you might be able to hire him.
Shred Day is back!! Mark your calendars now for Thursday, August 19th (same day as our Happy Hour) from 10AM-noon in our office parking lot. We will also take your recycling items. This is always popular…and it is absolutely FREE.
The real estate market is taking its usual July slow down. We don’t know if this is going to be long-term or short-term, but it is cooling off a bit. Houses are staying on the market longer, we are seeing price reductions for the first time in a LONG time and buyers are appearing more fickle. Check out the stats below from MIBOR. Bottom line, if you are still on the fence about selling, NOW is the time to talk to us. Interest rates have also dropped to below 3% again. Lumber prices, while still high are lowering. Change is coming. Talk with us today to see if the time is right for you to make a move.
Data from MIBOR comparing June 2021 to May 2021:
Median Sales Price-$250,000-DOWN 2% from $255,000
Closed Sales-3,897 units-UP 13.8%
New Listings-4,357 units-UP 11.1%
Pending Sales-4,130 units-UP 5.6%
Days on Market-14 days-DOWN 6.7%
Price per s.f.-$146-UP 0.7%
% of Ask Received-101.9%-UP 0.4% (this is an all-time record!)
Active Inventory-2,018 units-UP 17.3%
Absorption Rate-0.5-No change
This has been an absolutely BRUTAL market this past couple of years. Thank you for your continued trust and confidence in us to GUIDE, LEAD, and PROTECT you through this unprecedented time. Know we are always here for you and those you care about. Who is the next person you know who needs our help?
Enjoy this month’s newsletter! Some fun articles in there about a cool time capsule, employee safety, some great book suggestions, and great info on sunscreen. Let us know what you think!
Click here to read our August newsletter
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
The Zulu Group, P.C.
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Sunday, June 27, 2021
July 2021 newsletter
Welcome officially to summer…and Happy Father’s Day to all of you dads!! This year, both events fell on the same day, June 21st. We hope you enjoyed summer solstice celebrating dad. For us, it was pretty relaxing and was enjoyed by having the family around and also Jack and Mary Anne stopped by for a little celebration as well.
The week prior, we were on our trip to Jackson Hole, WY. We had great weather and really loved being in nature. That is truly God’s country. We saw elk, deer, bald eagles, bison, moose, and bears to name a few. Weather ranged from snow flurries to 90-degrees! Whitewater rafting, swimming, hiking, dirt buggying, ropes courses, and Alpine slides to name a few were enjoyed over the week.
The BIG part of this past month was getting to celebrate Thea’s wedding last year with her reception last week. While delayed a year, we had a grand evening at The Scottish Rite Cathedral eating, drinking and dancing the night away, with both a DJ and Greek musicians. It was a LOT of fun and our team was so incredibly excited to finally celebrate with Thea. She even had a fun open house at her ‘new home’ the next day full of Greek food. Congratulations, again, Thea and Michael!!! We are so incredibly happy for you both!
Summer is here and school is out, so social activities are in full swing. Our kids are enjoying spending more time with friends and relaxing. School will be here before we know it and back to the school year grind we go! Ana is already in soccer practice getting ready for the fall season with Guerin. Tali moved up a level in competitive cheer and is practicing throughout the summer. It never seems to stop.
We truly hope you are able to take some time off this summer to relax and enjoy some downtime. That is truly important.
We had another amazing turnout at our June Happy Hour. Thank you to Shellie Law with Wheaton Van Lines (shellie.Law@WheatonMoving.com) for sponsoring this month and also to Scott Hodgin for winning her drawing for an Amazon gift card! We hope you will join us in July on Thursday, July 16th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again. FREE food and drinks! Feel free to bring a friend.
Thank you to everyone who called in for our FUN quarterly prize package, which was laps at the IMS in a race car and a day of fun at SIK. Look for our 3rd quarter prize giveaway in the coming weeks!
Are you or someone you know thinking about buying, selling, or building a new home? Now, more than ever is critically important to talk with a real estate expert who can guide, lead, and protect you in this absolutely CRAZY market. We have proven tactics, systems and processes to help you navigate these dangerous waters. Call us today!
The real estate market continues to be white-hot. Our inventory shrank again and we only have 0.5 months (two weeks) of inventory! We are starting to see listings stay on the market a little longer and many have had price reductions as well. Is this a sign the market is finally showing signs of a shift back to a buyers’ market? Too soon to tell, but most real estate experts are still predicting a strong sellers’ market until 2023. Below are the most recent stats from MIBOR comparing May 2021 to April 2021.
Median Sales Price-UP 7.2% to $255,000
Closed Sales-UP 9.7% to 3,386 units
New Listings-DOWN 4.4% to 3,889 units
Pending Sales-UP 11.5% to 4,061 units
Days on Market-DOWN 16.7% to 15 days
Price per s.f.-UP 4.3% to $146
% of Ask Received-UP 0.9% to 101.5%
Active inventory-DOWN 8.3% to 1,704 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 16.7% to 0.5 months (2-weeks)
As you can see, our market keeps getting tighter and tighter. We are seeing lumber prices finally coming down, which will hopefully and eventually ease pressure from out-of-control builder pricing. The summer usually sees a bit of a pull-back in buyer demand as buyers take a break from house-hunting and go on vacations. We will see if that holds true this year or not.
Don’t forget to check out this month’s newsletter which has some interesting articles on Hershey, how to protect your pet, what Sesame Street can teach you about public speaking, and some interesting stats on high school seniors. Please tell us what you think and share your thoughts.
Click here to read our July newsletter
Click here to access coupons and discounts at stores you shop every day
Click here to read what our clients are saying about us
Click here to download the best real estate app available
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
The week prior, we were on our trip to Jackson Hole, WY. We had great weather and really loved being in nature. That is truly God’s country. We saw elk, deer, bald eagles, bison, moose, and bears to name a few. Weather ranged from snow flurries to 90-degrees! Whitewater rafting, swimming, hiking, dirt buggying, ropes courses, and Alpine slides to name a few were enjoyed over the week.
The BIG part of this past month was getting to celebrate Thea’s wedding last year with her reception last week. While delayed a year, we had a grand evening at The Scottish Rite Cathedral eating, drinking and dancing the night away, with both a DJ and Greek musicians. It was a LOT of fun and our team was so incredibly excited to finally celebrate with Thea. She even had a fun open house at her ‘new home’ the next day full of Greek food. Congratulations, again, Thea and Michael!!! We are so incredibly happy for you both!
Summer is here and school is out, so social activities are in full swing. Our kids are enjoying spending more time with friends and relaxing. School will be here before we know it and back to the school year grind we go! Ana is already in soccer practice getting ready for the fall season with Guerin. Tali moved up a level in competitive cheer and is practicing throughout the summer. It never seems to stop.
We truly hope you are able to take some time off this summer to relax and enjoy some downtime. That is truly important.
We had another amazing turnout at our June Happy Hour. Thank you to Shellie Law with Wheaton Van Lines (shellie.Law@WheatonMoving.com) for sponsoring this month and also to Scott Hodgin for winning her drawing for an Amazon gift card! We hope you will join us in July on Thursday, July 16th from 5-6:30pm at Matt The Miller’s again. FREE food and drinks! Feel free to bring a friend.
Thank you to everyone who called in for our FUN quarterly prize package, which was laps at the IMS in a race car and a day of fun at SIK. Look for our 3rd quarter prize giveaway in the coming weeks!
Are you or someone you know thinking about buying, selling, or building a new home? Now, more than ever is critically important to talk with a real estate expert who can guide, lead, and protect you in this absolutely CRAZY market. We have proven tactics, systems and processes to help you navigate these dangerous waters. Call us today!
The real estate market continues to be white-hot. Our inventory shrank again and we only have 0.5 months (two weeks) of inventory! We are starting to see listings stay on the market a little longer and many have had price reductions as well. Is this a sign the market is finally showing signs of a shift back to a buyers’ market? Too soon to tell, but most real estate experts are still predicting a strong sellers’ market until 2023. Below are the most recent stats from MIBOR comparing May 2021 to April 2021.
Median Sales Price-UP 7.2% to $255,000
Closed Sales-UP 9.7% to 3,386 units
New Listings-DOWN 4.4% to 3,889 units
Pending Sales-UP 11.5% to 4,061 units
Days on Market-DOWN 16.7% to 15 days
Price per s.f.-UP 4.3% to $146
% of Ask Received-UP 0.9% to 101.5%
Active inventory-DOWN 8.3% to 1,704 units
Absorption Rate-DOWN 16.7% to 0.5 months (2-weeks)
As you can see, our market keeps getting tighter and tighter. We are seeing lumber prices finally coming down, which will hopefully and eventually ease pressure from out-of-control builder pricing. The summer usually sees a bit of a pull-back in buyer demand as buyers take a break from house-hunting and go on vacations. We will see if that holds true this year or not.
Don’t forget to check out this month’s newsletter which has some interesting articles on Hershey, how to protect your pet, what Sesame Street can teach you about public speaking, and some interesting stats on high school seniors. Please tell us what you think and share your thoughts.
Click here to read our July newsletter
Click here to access coupons and discounts at stores you shop every day
Click here to read what our clients are saying about us
Click here to download the best real estate app available
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, and Patti
P.S. Please don’t keep us a secret!
Wednesday, December 23, 2020
January 2021 Steve & Jack's Home News
Welcome to 2021! For many, if not most of us, we are happy to get 2020 in our rearview mirror, especially since a vaccine is here and being rolled out across the globe. Time will tell how effective it is, but it is a great start and a light at the end of a very long, dark tunnel. We mourn those we have lost, including loved ones, friends, neighbors, businesses, and non-profit organizations. No one seemed to be immune, however we have to believe that we will rise stronger than ever and fresh new opportunities will arise as a result of the struggles and pain we have endured. We truly hope and pray this is true and that 2021 will start to return to our 'new normal'.
We hope you are able to enjoy some downtime safely with family for the holidays and recharge for the coming year. Our family is staying home this year. Usually, we go see Brigid's family in St. Pete, FL or they come here, but with COVID they are staying put and so are we. Jack and Mary Anne are coming over for Christmas Eve dinner and then present opening from each other. Christmas morning will be a Zoom call with them as well as Brigid's parents watching the girls open their presents. While not ideal, we will make it work and enjoy time together, even if it is virtual. We hope you are able to include family virtually as well this year to continue your traditions, even if they look a little different.
Thea & Michael are traveling back home to Cleveland for Christmas and enjoying time with family.
Patti & Ron are staying home as well with Ron enjoying his newly-found retirement. Patti took last week off to finish getting things ready for Christmas and spend time with Ron.
Kylie and her family will spend Christmas together as well and enjoy some much-deserved downtime with her taking the last two weeks of the year off.
The housing market has continued to get tighter and tighter with prices climbing every month. In fact, they climbed 19.6% since last November, which is an all-time record. Indianapolis has been identified as one of the top ten major metros in the US to have weathered and continue to weather the COVID and post-COVID markets the best. We are expecting a super-busy 2021 with home sales. If you are thinking about making a move, give us a call! We would love to hear about your goals and plans and how we can help make them a reality.
Here are some stats comparing November 2020 to October 2020, per MIBOR for the 16 counties it serves:
Median sales price-UP 1.8% to $224,900
Closed sales-DOWN 15% to 3,191 units
New listings-DOWN 28.2% to 2,707 units
Pending sales-DOWN 11.6% to 3,057 units
Days on market-UP 24% to 31 days
Price per s.f.-DOWN 0.8% to $128
% of ask received-DOWN 0.2% to 98.6%
Active inventory-DOWN 12.4% to 2,870 units
Absorption rate-FLAT at 0.9 months
As you can see, activity has dropped, but that is expected at this time of the year. We expect activity to pick up again as we approach spring.
May you enjoy the holidays with your family and take some downtime. We are grateful you are part of our tribe and look forward to continue serving you into 2021.
If you are thinking of selling your house, come to our Home Seller Workshop on 1/12/21 at 7pm. We would love to have you. It is a small group and socially-distanced. We will be providing tips and tricks on how to best prepare your house to sell and maximize your value. RSVP to me at 317-339-7698 or Steve@Welcome2Indy.com. We would love to have you!!!
Also, if safe, we will having our first Happy Hour of 2021 on Thursday, January 21st from 5-6:30pm. Check your e-mail in the coming weeks for more info and updates.
Check out our January newsletter below along with links to other resources. Happy New Year!!
Watch Steve's January video intro here
Read our January newsletter here
Download the most powerful real estate app here
Grab coupons and discount at places you shop every day here
Read and watch what our clients have to say about our service here
Watch a 1-minute video about the real estate market here
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Patti, Thea
P.S. Please don't keep us a secret!
We hope you are able to enjoy some downtime safely with family for the holidays and recharge for the coming year. Our family is staying home this year. Usually, we go see Brigid's family in St. Pete, FL or they come here, but with COVID they are staying put and so are we. Jack and Mary Anne are coming over for Christmas Eve dinner and then present opening from each other. Christmas morning will be a Zoom call with them as well as Brigid's parents watching the girls open their presents. While not ideal, we will make it work and enjoy time together, even if it is virtual. We hope you are able to include family virtually as well this year to continue your traditions, even if they look a little different.
Thea & Michael are traveling back home to Cleveland for Christmas and enjoying time with family.
Patti & Ron are staying home as well with Ron enjoying his newly-found retirement. Patti took last week off to finish getting things ready for Christmas and spend time with Ron.
Kylie and her family will spend Christmas together as well and enjoy some much-deserved downtime with her taking the last two weeks of the year off.
The housing market has continued to get tighter and tighter with prices climbing every month. In fact, they climbed 19.6% since last November, which is an all-time record. Indianapolis has been identified as one of the top ten major metros in the US to have weathered and continue to weather the COVID and post-COVID markets the best. We are expecting a super-busy 2021 with home sales. If you are thinking about making a move, give us a call! We would love to hear about your goals and plans and how we can help make them a reality.
Here are some stats comparing November 2020 to October 2020, per MIBOR for the 16 counties it serves:
Median sales price-UP 1.8% to $224,900
Closed sales-DOWN 15% to 3,191 units
New listings-DOWN 28.2% to 2,707 units
Pending sales-DOWN 11.6% to 3,057 units
Days on market-UP 24% to 31 days
Price per s.f.-DOWN 0.8% to $128
% of ask received-DOWN 0.2% to 98.6%
Active inventory-DOWN 12.4% to 2,870 units
Absorption rate-FLAT at 0.9 months
As you can see, activity has dropped, but that is expected at this time of the year. We expect activity to pick up again as we approach spring.
May you enjoy the holidays with your family and take some downtime. We are grateful you are part of our tribe and look forward to continue serving you into 2021.
If you are thinking of selling your house, come to our Home Seller Workshop on 1/12/21 at 7pm. We would love to have you. It is a small group and socially-distanced. We will be providing tips and tricks on how to best prepare your house to sell and maximize your value. RSVP to me at 317-339-7698 or Steve@Welcome2Indy.com. We would love to have you!!!
Also, if safe, we will having our first Happy Hour of 2021 on Thursday, January 21st from 5-6:30pm. Check your e-mail in the coming weeks for more info and updates.
Check out our January newsletter below along with links to other resources. Happy New Year!!
Watch Steve's January video intro here
Read our January newsletter here
Download the most powerful real estate app here
Grab coupons and discount at places you shop every day here
Read and watch what our clients have to say about our service here
Watch a 1-minute video about the real estate market here
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Patti, Thea
P.S. Please don't keep us a secret!
Saturday, April 11, 2020
Thursday, March 26, 2020
Maintaining your mental well-being
Things are pretty scary at the moment. When you turn on the news, read a paper or just scroll through your social media feed, most likely you’re seeing one person or another talking about the COVID-19 pandemic. It can have a profound negative effect on your mental health, even if you live in an area where there hasn’t been any local sickness. How do you handle it, when it seems like there’s just so much to bear?
For at least one possible answer, let’s look back a few decades. Fred Rogers, better known as the one and only Mister Rogers, gave some advice that had been passed down from his mother: “Look for the helpers.” We’re all in this together, and with a slightly different mindset you can remember this even in the darkest of times.
Look for the Helpers
Mr. Rogers is highly quotable, but his comment about looking for the helpers is probably one of his more famous quotes. Though there are a few different versions from different things he’s shared over the years, one of the most poignant and relevant to our current situation comes from a newspaper piece he wrote back in 1986:
There was something else my mother did that I’ve always remembered: “Always look for the helpers,” she’d tell me. “There’s always someone who is trying to help.” I did, and I came to see that the world is full of doctors and nurses, police and firemen, volunteers, neighbors and friends who are ready to jump in to help when things go wrong.
If you’re tempted to give into despair, just think of all the doctors, nurses, police officers, volunteers and everyone else who are still out there and still doing their jobs. Remember that they’re not doing it just because they need a paycheck; they’re doing it because friends and neighbors in their community need them to. They’re doing it to help.
Nobody Is Alone
Everywhere we turn, the message seems to be about social distancing and self-imposed isolation to try and slow the spread of COVID-19. This is good and noble advice, but it can also be very lonely. Even if you have a family there with you at home, seeing only the same people day in and day out is difficult when you know that you’re not supposed to interact with others. It’s okay to feel that way, though… everyone else does.
It’s easy to forget that other people are feeling the same fear, the same sense of isolation and the same uncertainty. They are common emotions that unite us all, even if we don’t realize it. A great way to fight these feelings is to reach out over the phone or a video chat and check in on friends in town, across the country or around the world. Talk about what you’re feeling and encourage your friends and family to talk about it as well. Confronting this fear is the first step in overcoming it.
Everyone Is Enough
If you watched Mr. Rogers on TV as a child, you’re familiar with his recurring mantra that “you’re special just the way you are.” In the current situation, this means acknowledging that you still have worth, even if the best that you can do right now is to stay indoors. You don’t have to be a doctor or deliver meals to the elderly in your neighborhood; if all that you can do is stay out of the way and ensure that you aren’t spreading the virus, then that is more than enough.
Not everyone has to give their all with each part of this: You’re special just the way you are, doing just as much as you’re able to do. Take care of yourself and encourage others to take safe steps as well. If you can get out there and help firsthand then do so, but don’t despair if you can’t. Look for the helpers, and you’ll remember that there are a lot of ways to help. We can do this together, and you’re an important part of that effort.
For at least one possible answer, let’s look back a few decades. Fred Rogers, better known as the one and only Mister Rogers, gave some advice that had been passed down from his mother: “Look for the helpers.” We’re all in this together, and with a slightly different mindset you can remember this even in the darkest of times.
Look for the Helpers
Mr. Rogers is highly quotable, but his comment about looking for the helpers is probably one of his more famous quotes. Though there are a few different versions from different things he’s shared over the years, one of the most poignant and relevant to our current situation comes from a newspaper piece he wrote back in 1986:
There was something else my mother did that I’ve always remembered: “Always look for the helpers,” she’d tell me. “There’s always someone who is trying to help.” I did, and I came to see that the world is full of doctors and nurses, police and firemen, volunteers, neighbors and friends who are ready to jump in to help when things go wrong.
If you’re tempted to give into despair, just think of all the doctors, nurses, police officers, volunteers and everyone else who are still out there and still doing their jobs. Remember that they’re not doing it just because they need a paycheck; they’re doing it because friends and neighbors in their community need them to. They’re doing it to help.
Nobody Is Alone
Everywhere we turn, the message seems to be about social distancing and self-imposed isolation to try and slow the spread of COVID-19. This is good and noble advice, but it can also be very lonely. Even if you have a family there with you at home, seeing only the same people day in and day out is difficult when you know that you’re not supposed to interact with others. It’s okay to feel that way, though… everyone else does.
It’s easy to forget that other people are feeling the same fear, the same sense of isolation and the same uncertainty. They are common emotions that unite us all, even if we don’t realize it. A great way to fight these feelings is to reach out over the phone or a video chat and check in on friends in town, across the country or around the world. Talk about what you’re feeling and encourage your friends and family to talk about it as well. Confronting this fear is the first step in overcoming it.
Everyone Is Enough
If you watched Mr. Rogers on TV as a child, you’re familiar with his recurring mantra that “you’re special just the way you are.” In the current situation, this means acknowledging that you still have worth, even if the best that you can do right now is to stay indoors. You don’t have to be a doctor or deliver meals to the elderly in your neighborhood; if all that you can do is stay out of the way and ensure that you aren’t spreading the virus, then that is more than enough.
Not everyone has to give their all with each part of this: You’re special just the way you are, doing just as much as you’re able to do. Take care of yourself and encourage others to take safe steps as well. If you can get out there and help firsthand then do so, but don’t despair if you can’t. Look for the helpers, and you’ll remember that there are a lot of ways to help. We can do this together, and you’re an important part of that effort.
Monday, February 10, 2020
Debt Consolidation
If you’re carrying around a lot of debt, the number of payments and the various interest rates you have can make managing it quite difficult. Some people choose to get this under control through debt consolidation. By consolidating your debts, you can reduce multiple items to a single payment with a single interest rate, making your finances easier to manage. Before rushing into debt consolidation, though, it’s important that you take the time to understand exactly how it works and what its benefits are.
Consolidating Your Debt
As its name implies, debt consolidation is the process of combining multiple debts into one that is (theoretically) easier to make payments on. Debt consolidation can even combine different types of debt such as loans and credit cards into a single debt. At its most basic, debt consolidation establishes a new loan or line of credit and then uses that to make payments against the other debts to pay them off. This leaves you with a single remaining debt. Depending on how you manage your consolidation, though, there may be a few differences in your experience.
Consolidation Loans
Taking out a loan to consolidate debt is one of the most common forms of debt consolidation. These loans are typically pretty straightforward, since the borrowed money is used to pay off existing debts and you simply need to pay off the loan after that point. In some cases, you may even be able to piggyback debt consolidation on top of a loan taken out for a purchase, borrowing extra to pay off existing debt. Just be sure to check with your lender to make sure this sort of use is okay before borrowing the money for it.
Credit Card Consolidation
Credit card consolidations typically occur when taking out a new card, using balance transfers to consolidate your existing balances to a single card. This is especially useful if the card has an introductory interest rate such as a 0 percent APR for six months or some other promotion. The theory remains the same, however; instead of having balances across multiple cards, you have only one balance to focus on and pay down.
Debt Management Programs
Though not necessarily a true “consolidation”, debt management programs are another way to get debt under control. These programs can negotiate with debtors, allowing you to make payments on a negotiated schedule without worrying about late fees and other costs piling up. You may have restrictions placed on you such as not being able to take out additional loans, but you will have the advantage of not having to work through getting your debt under control by yourself.
The Effects of Consolidation
Debt consolidation can have a major impact on your financial health, both improving your credit score and helping you to pay down your existing debts faster. It can also save you time and money, since you’ll only have one set of interest charges instead of multiple to keep track of. Best of all, most forms of debt consolidation won’t have a negative impact on things like buying a house since there isn’t a special classification to the loans or transfers in most cases. Even debt management won’t necessarily interfere, since its restrictions are usually focused on unsecured loans instead of secured ones like a mortgage.
What to Watch Out For
There are a few things that you should be careful of when looking into debt consolidation. Perhaps the most important is to avoid getting yourself even deeper in debt once you pay off the balance of your credit cards or other lines of credit. The goal is to pay off what you owe, so hold off on using your cards again until you’re more financially stable. You should also watch out for predatory lenders and fraudulent debt consolidation companies that will charge you a significant amount for things that you could manage on your own for free.
Is Consolidation Right for You?
If you aren’t sure whether debt consolidation is right for you, HomeKeepr may be able to help. Sign up today for free and get in touch with loan experts who can advise you on getting your finances in order without having to sacrifice your big dreams like owning your own home.
Consolidating Your Debt
As its name implies, debt consolidation is the process of combining multiple debts into one that is (theoretically) easier to make payments on. Debt consolidation can even combine different types of debt such as loans and credit cards into a single debt. At its most basic, debt consolidation establishes a new loan or line of credit and then uses that to make payments against the other debts to pay them off. This leaves you with a single remaining debt. Depending on how you manage your consolidation, though, there may be a few differences in your experience.
Consolidation Loans
Taking out a loan to consolidate debt is one of the most common forms of debt consolidation. These loans are typically pretty straightforward, since the borrowed money is used to pay off existing debts and you simply need to pay off the loan after that point. In some cases, you may even be able to piggyback debt consolidation on top of a loan taken out for a purchase, borrowing extra to pay off existing debt. Just be sure to check with your lender to make sure this sort of use is okay before borrowing the money for it.
Credit Card Consolidation
Credit card consolidations typically occur when taking out a new card, using balance transfers to consolidate your existing balances to a single card. This is especially useful if the card has an introductory interest rate such as a 0 percent APR for six months or some other promotion. The theory remains the same, however; instead of having balances across multiple cards, you have only one balance to focus on and pay down.
Debt Management Programs
Though not necessarily a true “consolidation”, debt management programs are another way to get debt under control. These programs can negotiate with debtors, allowing you to make payments on a negotiated schedule without worrying about late fees and other costs piling up. You may have restrictions placed on you such as not being able to take out additional loans, but you will have the advantage of not having to work through getting your debt under control by yourself.
The Effects of Consolidation
Debt consolidation can have a major impact on your financial health, both improving your credit score and helping you to pay down your existing debts faster. It can also save you time and money, since you’ll only have one set of interest charges instead of multiple to keep track of. Best of all, most forms of debt consolidation won’t have a negative impact on things like buying a house since there isn’t a special classification to the loans or transfers in most cases. Even debt management won’t necessarily interfere, since its restrictions are usually focused on unsecured loans instead of secured ones like a mortgage.
What to Watch Out For
There are a few things that you should be careful of when looking into debt consolidation. Perhaps the most important is to avoid getting yourself even deeper in debt once you pay off the balance of your credit cards or other lines of credit. The goal is to pay off what you owe, so hold off on using your cards again until you’re more financially stable. You should also watch out for predatory lenders and fraudulent debt consolidation companies that will charge you a significant amount for things that you could manage on your own for free.
Is Consolidation Right for You?
If you aren’t sure whether debt consolidation is right for you, HomeKeepr may be able to help. Sign up today for free and get in touch with loan experts who can advise you on getting your finances in order without having to sacrifice your big dreams like owning your own home.
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Looking for a 'deal' on your next home...
When you’re shopping for a new home, it’s not uncommon to face a little bit of sticker shock when it comes to price. This often leads to buyers trying to find a good balance between what they want and what they can afford. However, if you’re smart (and maybe a little lucky), you may be able to find some really great deals if you know what to look for.
One of the keys to finding a good deal is to look for properties that have qualities that might seem unappealing at first but that can be corrected fairly easily. Some of these things can drive prices down significantly but won’t require a major renovation to fix. If you’re hoping to find a bargain, here are a few things to look out for.
Ugly Paint
Even though there’s a lot of damage that can make your paint look ugly, sometimes the paint is just ugly because someone chose to bring together colors that should never coexist. It could be awful colors, it could be cheap paint that’s faded over time or it could even be an amateur paint job that never got touched up. Regardless of the reason for the ugly paint job, it can drive the price of the property down by thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. It doesn’t even have to be the entire house; one ugly room can give you an opportunity to find a good deal on an otherwise nice property.
Landscaping Issues
A property’s yard is one of the first things that potential buyers see. If it’s obviously been neglected or has bald patches and overgrown flower beds, this can make a negative first impression because it suggests that the house itself might not have been taken care of either. That isn’t always the case, though. Even if the house is in good condition, a yard that needs some TLC can usually shave some money off the asking price and help you to net a great deal.
Fixtures and Accents
There are a lot of cosmetic elements in houses that can start looking rough over time. Handles and knobs can come loose or become tarnished, shutters can get loose, bathroom tiles can become cracked… the list goes on. While updating these issues won’t break the bank, many sellers will drop their asking price quite a bit due to how these little things make the house look.
Bathroom Concerns
A lot of buyers shy away from houses that have obvious bathroom problems, causing those sellers to bring the price down significantly in many cases. Depending on the extent of the issues in the bathroom, though, there could be a real opportunity here. If the problem with the bathroom is mostly cosmetic, then you may be able to fix it on the relatively cheap side and save a lot of money in the process. Just be sure to keep an eye out for signs of water damage or mold, since that could indicate problems that would be much more expensive to fix.
Previous Foreclosure
One other strategy for finding a deal is to look for bank-owned properties that were previous foreclosures. These properties are often sold at a discount because the bank isn’t necessarily trying to sell the house at market value, it’s simply trying to recoup the money it lost when it had to foreclose. The amount you can save will depend on both the bank and the amount of equity that was in the home when it was foreclosed, but you may luck into a great deal on a nice house this way. Just be aware that while there are legitimate programs that can help you find a foreclosed property, there are also some scammy ones out there as well.
Call in the Experts
Having your Realtor help you with your search is another way to find hidden gems and get a bargain on your next home. They can find you properties that need some of these little fixes and give you an idea of what sort of updates the property could need.
One of the keys to finding a good deal is to look for properties that have qualities that might seem unappealing at first but that can be corrected fairly easily. Some of these things can drive prices down significantly but won’t require a major renovation to fix. If you’re hoping to find a bargain, here are a few things to look out for.
Ugly Paint
Even though there’s a lot of damage that can make your paint look ugly, sometimes the paint is just ugly because someone chose to bring together colors that should never coexist. It could be awful colors, it could be cheap paint that’s faded over time or it could even be an amateur paint job that never got touched up. Regardless of the reason for the ugly paint job, it can drive the price of the property down by thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars. It doesn’t even have to be the entire house; one ugly room can give you an opportunity to find a good deal on an otherwise nice property.
Landscaping Issues
A property’s yard is one of the first things that potential buyers see. If it’s obviously been neglected or has bald patches and overgrown flower beds, this can make a negative first impression because it suggests that the house itself might not have been taken care of either. That isn’t always the case, though. Even if the house is in good condition, a yard that needs some TLC can usually shave some money off the asking price and help you to net a great deal.
Fixtures and Accents
There are a lot of cosmetic elements in houses that can start looking rough over time. Handles and knobs can come loose or become tarnished, shutters can get loose, bathroom tiles can become cracked… the list goes on. While updating these issues won’t break the bank, many sellers will drop their asking price quite a bit due to how these little things make the house look.
Bathroom Concerns
A lot of buyers shy away from houses that have obvious bathroom problems, causing those sellers to bring the price down significantly in many cases. Depending on the extent of the issues in the bathroom, though, there could be a real opportunity here. If the problem with the bathroom is mostly cosmetic, then you may be able to fix it on the relatively cheap side and save a lot of money in the process. Just be sure to keep an eye out for signs of water damage or mold, since that could indicate problems that would be much more expensive to fix.
Previous Foreclosure
One other strategy for finding a deal is to look for bank-owned properties that were previous foreclosures. These properties are often sold at a discount because the bank isn’t necessarily trying to sell the house at market value, it’s simply trying to recoup the money it lost when it had to foreclose. The amount you can save will depend on both the bank and the amount of equity that was in the home when it was foreclosed, but you may luck into a great deal on a nice house this way. Just be aware that while there are legitimate programs that can help you find a foreclosed property, there are also some scammy ones out there as well.
Call in the Experts
Having your Realtor help you with your search is another way to find hidden gems and get a bargain on your next home. They can find you properties that need some of these little fixes and give you an idea of what sort of updates the property could need.
Wednesday, November 27, 2019
December Steve & Jack's Home News
Happy Thanksgiving!!! We hope you are looking forward to spending some quality time with friends and family this holiday weekend and that, if you are traveling, you return home safe.
Steve and his family are hosting Thanksgiving this year and Jack and Mary Anne will be joining them. The rest of Brigid's family will be staying put this year as we will get together over Christmas. Steve's sister Michelle is heading to her sister-in-law's house in Kentucky for a couple of days, but her husband Steve will be staying here as he is an RN at Community North Hospital and has to work Wednesday and Thursday evenings.
Thank you to everyone who joined us for our last Happy Hour of 2019 last Thursday!! We had a great group and had a lot of fun!!! Please mark your calendars for our first Happy Hour of 2020 on Thursday, January 16th from 5-6:30PM at Matt The Miller's in Carmel. We would love to see you!!!
Also, thank you to everyone who attended our 6th Annual Photos with Santa on Sunday! We had a record-breaking crowd of over 400 people join us and kick off the holiday season. If you did get your picture taken, look for your photos next week. It isn't too early to plan to attend our 2020 event on Sunday, November 22nd. Come join us!!!
Finally, we hope you have RSVP'd for our 7th Annual VIP Client Appreciation Event next Saturday, December 7th at 8:30AM. If not, please e-mail Patti TODAY at Patti@Welcome2Indy.com with the number of adults and number of children attending. We will be showing the newly released blockbuster Frozen 2. Coincidentally, Frozen was the first movie we showed 7 years ago! We will have food and drinks, photo opps, a caricature artist, and fun trivia before the movie starts. We truly hope you can join us as we thank you for your business and friendship over the years.
The real estate market has definitely slowed down a bit for the holidays, however there is more activity than usual for this time of the year. We are still in a severe housing shortage and will be for the foreseeable future. Interest rates are hovering around 3.75%. Winter is a great time to buy a house as there aren't nearly as many buyers in the market and competition isn't nearly as fierce as it will be again in the spring. Thinking of buying or selling?? Give us a call at 317-573-1880!! We are working through the holidays and would be happy to help!
New market stats haven't been released for November yet, so here are the stats from October 2019 comparing them to October 2018 for the Greater Indy area:
Median sales price UP 6.2% to $190,050
Closed sales DOWN 1.3% to 30,024 units
New listings DOWN 2.2% to 37,333 units
Pending sales FLAT at 31,684 units
Days on market DOWN 8.5% to 43 days
Price per s.f. UP 5.7% to $112/s.f.
% of asking price received DOWN 0.1% to 97.7%
Active inventory DOWN 5.8% to 6,499 units
Absorption rate DOWN 8.7% to 2.1 months
Happy Thanksgiving, once again to you and your family! We hope to see you on December 7th!
Click here to read our December newsletter
Click here to download the most powerful real estate app available
Click here to read what some of our clients are saying about us
Click here to watch a short 1-minute market update video
Click here to read about our Senior Advantage Program
Click here to access coupons and discounts at places you shop every day
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Jack, Kylie, Patti, & Thea
P.S. Please don't keep us a secret.
Steve and his family are hosting Thanksgiving this year and Jack and Mary Anne will be joining them. The rest of Brigid's family will be staying put this year as we will get together over Christmas. Steve's sister Michelle is heading to her sister-in-law's house in Kentucky for a couple of days, but her husband Steve will be staying here as he is an RN at Community North Hospital and has to work Wednesday and Thursday evenings.
Thank you to everyone who joined us for our last Happy Hour of 2019 last Thursday!! We had a great group and had a lot of fun!!! Please mark your calendars for our first Happy Hour of 2020 on Thursday, January 16th from 5-6:30PM at Matt The Miller's in Carmel. We would love to see you!!!
Also, thank you to everyone who attended our 6th Annual Photos with Santa on Sunday! We had a record-breaking crowd of over 400 people join us and kick off the holiday season. If you did get your picture taken, look for your photos next week. It isn't too early to plan to attend our 2020 event on Sunday, November 22nd. Come join us!!!
Finally, we hope you have RSVP'd for our 7th Annual VIP Client Appreciation Event next Saturday, December 7th at 8:30AM. If not, please e-mail Patti TODAY at Patti@Welcome2Indy.com with the number of adults and number of children attending. We will be showing the newly released blockbuster Frozen 2. Coincidentally, Frozen was the first movie we showed 7 years ago! We will have food and drinks, photo opps, a caricature artist, and fun trivia before the movie starts. We truly hope you can join us as we thank you for your business and friendship over the years.
The real estate market has definitely slowed down a bit for the holidays, however there is more activity than usual for this time of the year. We are still in a severe housing shortage and will be for the foreseeable future. Interest rates are hovering around 3.75%. Winter is a great time to buy a house as there aren't nearly as many buyers in the market and competition isn't nearly as fierce as it will be again in the spring. Thinking of buying or selling?? Give us a call at 317-573-1880!! We are working through the holidays and would be happy to help!
New market stats haven't been released for November yet, so here are the stats from October 2019 comparing them to October 2018 for the Greater Indy area:
Median sales price UP 6.2% to $190,050
Closed sales DOWN 1.3% to 30,024 units
New listings DOWN 2.2% to 37,333 units
Pending sales FLAT at 31,684 units
Days on market DOWN 8.5% to 43 days
Price per s.f. UP 5.7% to $112/s.f.
% of asking price received DOWN 0.1% to 97.7%
Active inventory DOWN 5.8% to 6,499 units
Absorption rate DOWN 8.7% to 2.1 months
Happy Thanksgiving, once again to you and your family! We hope to see you on December 7th!
Click here to read our December newsletter
Click here to download the most powerful real estate app available
Click here to read what some of our clients are saying about us
Click here to watch a short 1-minute market update video
Click here to read about our Senior Advantage Program
Click here to access coupons and discounts at places you shop every day
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Jack, Kylie, Patti, & Thea
P.S. Please don't keep us a secret.
Friday, July 26, 2019
August 2019 Steve & Jack's Newsletter
Welcome to August!! It is hard to believe that school starts in just a few weeks and that summer is almost over. It seems like it just started!! We hope you have enjoyed time with your family and took a vacation or two.
If you haven't met our two newest team members, we hope you will stop by an upcoming Happy Hour soon and meet them. We are so excited to have Patti Sircy and Thea Charnas join us over the past month!!! Patti is our marketing specialist and has extensive experience in retail management and customer service. Thea came from another KW office and is our Buyer Specialist. Some of you have already met Thea and worked with her. She brings experience with the medical field, management, and client service. We are so excited to have them as part of our team and can't wait for you to meet them! Our prior buyer's agent Julia has moved on to pursue other opportunities.
Steve's family just returned from a dream vacation that had been planned for years. They went to Munich, Germany to pick up their daughter Ana who participated in a tour with The Indianapolis Children's Choir on a Danube River cruise. They went to Salzbourg, Austria after a few days in and around Munich and then flew to Athens, Greece to see the Acropolis and other sights and then boarded a boat to travel to several islands. It was an amazing experience!
Jack & Mary Anne are on a European adventure as well seeing France and Germany on a tour with a pre-trip to Switzerland. They are having an amazing time with friends enjoying sightseeing, including castles and monuments.
The market at this time of the year takes a little 'breather' as the new school year approaches and vacations are finishing up. It usually starts around July 4th and runs mid-August. This is a good time to look for houses as you won't have quite as much competition. If you are looking to put your house on the market, being ready to go by mid-August would be a good target.
The most recent market stats from MIBOR are from June 2019 vs. June 2018:
Median Sales Price-UP 4.7% to $188,000
Closed Sales-DOWN 3.4% to 16,377 units
New Listings-DOWN 2.7% to 21,524 units
Pending Sales-DOWN 0.8% to 19,015 units
Days on Market-DOWN 9.8% to 46 days
Price/s.f.-UP 5.7% to $111
% of Asking Price Received-DOWN 0.2% to 97.7%
Active Inventory-UP 5.1% to 5,731 units
Absorption Rate-1.6 months
We hope you enjoy the remainder of summer and that you can make our next Happy Hour on Thursday, August 15th at Matt The Miller's. See you there!
Click here to read our brand new August newsletter
Click here to read what our clients have to say about us
Click here to read about our Senior Real Estate Program
Click here to watch a 1-minute video about what is happening this month in real estate
Click here to access coupons at places you shop every day
Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, & Patti
If you haven't met our two newest team members, we hope you will stop by an upcoming Happy Hour soon and meet them. We are so excited to have Patti Sircy and Thea Charnas join us over the past month!!! Patti is our marketing specialist and has extensive experience in retail management and customer service. Thea came from another KW office and is our Buyer Specialist. Some of you have already met Thea and worked with her. She brings experience with the medical field, management, and client service. We are so excited to have them as part of our team and can't wait for you to meet them! Our prior buyer's agent Julia has moved on to pursue other opportunities.
Steve's family just returned from a dream vacation that had been planned for years. They went to Munich, Germany to pick up their daughter Ana who participated in a tour with The Indianapolis Children's Choir on a Danube River cruise. They went to Salzbourg, Austria after a few days in and around Munich and then flew to Athens, Greece to see the Acropolis and other sights and then boarded a boat to travel to several islands. It was an amazing experience!
Jack & Mary Anne are on a European adventure as well seeing France and Germany on a tour with a pre-trip to Switzerland. They are having an amazing time with friends enjoying sightseeing, including castles and monuments.
The market at this time of the year takes a little 'breather' as the new school year approaches and vacations are finishing up. It usually starts around July 4th and runs mid-August. This is a good time to look for houses as you won't have quite as much competition. If you are looking to put your house on the market, being ready to go by mid-August would be a good target.
The most recent market stats from MIBOR are from June 2019 vs. June 2018:
Median Sales Price-UP 4.7% to $188,000
Closed Sales-DOWN 3.4% to 16,377 units
New Listings-DOWN 2.7% to 21,524 units
Pending Sales-DOWN 0.8% to 19,015 units
Days on Market-DOWN 9.8% to 46 days
Price/s.f.-UP 5.7% to $111
% of Asking Price Received-DOWN 0.2% to 97.7%
Active Inventory-UP 5.1% to 5,731 units
Absorption Rate-1.6 months
We hope you enjoy the remainder of summer and that you can make our next Happy Hour on Thursday, August 15th at Matt The Miller's. See you there!
Click here to read our brand new August newsletter
Click here to read what our clients have to say about us
Click here to read about our Senior Real Estate Program
Click here to watch a 1-minute video about what is happening this month in real estate
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Your friends in real estate,
Steve, Kylie, Thea, & Patti
Thursday, April 18, 2019
Thinking about installing a pool? Read this first...
With the sunny days of summer just around the corner, it’s hard to not let your thoughts turn to the cool, refreshing blue waters of a backyard pool. Maybe you’ve been considering putting a pool in for years or maybe it was just how hot it was last summer that has prompted your interest in being a pool owner. Either way there are likely aspects you’ve not considered.
A pool is hard to undo, which is why we’re going to address the top five need-to-know things about pool installation and ownership right now.
Pool Installation is Awful
Pools are cool. They are. But only when you go into the whole process and future ownership with open eyes. A pool build is not for the faint of heart, for starters. In urban and suburban neighborhoods with yards that are measured in square feet instead of acres, the process may literally destroy your entire back yard while the mess is being made. Grass will grow again, but in the meantime, it can seriously be the worst.
Taking the dog out means getting the leash and pants, he’s not going to be able to go out into the back yard. You may also have to take part of the fence down to allow the trucks and other equipment access, depending on the size of the pool and your yard’s configuration. If you’ve ever had to replace a sewer line, think about that and then multiply it by about a hundred. That’s the mess you’ll have until your pool is done.
If you can handle the stress, great. If not, your local gym or YMCA might have a pool you can use. They’ll take care of everything and it’ll spare your grass. For homebuyers thinking they can save money by building their own pool rather than buying a house with one, this may be true. But this is a big project requiring a lot of dirt work, you may be happier to buy a house with a pool already installed.
A Few Less Obvious Points to Ponder
That digging a giant hole in your yard is going to be a serious pain may be a no-brainer, but there are other things that aren’t as obvious. That’s what this is really about, after all. We want to be sure you’ve considered all the angles before taking the plunge.
Splish, Splash, You Don’t Want to Take a Bath
Real estate agents and appraisers get the same question about pools over and over again: “How much will this increase my home’s value?”
The Devil, with this question at least, is in the details.
What kind of pool?
Is it inground or above ground?
What kind of neighborhood are you living in?
Do a lot of homes in your market have pools?
How long will you live in your home?
What kind of equipment are you installing?
Of course you don’t want to take a bath on your pool, but it’s one of those items that you should consider to be a luxury purchase and not give a lot of care to whether or not it’ll pay for itself. Unfortunately, whether or not your pool can increase the value of your home is such a loaded question that it’s really impossible to answer.
A pool can simultaneously attract and terrify buyers, especially in the middle to low upper buying ranges. For a family with no small children, a pool might seem like a needed asset due to physical therapy that’s on-going or just to shake the frustration of swimming in a club pool without interruption. But for a family with small children, it might be the single thing about your house that’s so wrong it can’t be made right.
Ask Permission, Not Forgiveness from the HOA
A lot of people go through life asking forgiveness for something they did that they knew was questionable to begin with. We’re not saying that’s you, just that this is a common practice among humans. The problem with this approach to pool building in a neighborhood with an HOA (which is most neighborhoods these days) is that if the HOA doesn’t like what you’re doing, you’ve spent a lot of money for a big muddy hole in the backyard.
Find out if your HOA allows pools. Do it even if your next door neighbor has one because the HOA rules can be changed by the membership. If enough people voted for a “no new pools” rule, well, the ayes have it. If they are allowed, there may still be rules about how and where they must be installed in your yard. Learn the rules now before you end up learning a costly lesson.
Pools Change Your Homebuyer Profile
This was already touched on in the section about taking a bath, but it bears repeating. Installing a pool, unlike building a garage or putting in a fence, changes the kind of buyer who will be looking at your place. If your neighborhood is largely made up of the kind of people who like pools and aren’t worried about the safety aspects involved for children and pets, then when you go to sell, you may not notice a lot of difference in buyer traffic.
But, if your neighborhood is full of starter homes or just a lot of small children because you happen to be a half mile from the local elementary school, adding a pool will do you no favors if you want to sell your home. Other families with young children will be the ones looking at your house, more likely than not. Unless you get lucky and find some retirees who want to be around elementary kids, that pool might make it really hard to sell your home.
Budget Pool Buying is Worse Than No Pool
A lot goes into the decision to install a pool, including the cost of that cement pond. While you should be budget-aware, if budget is your driving factor you will not be happy with your pool. If you’re not happy with a purchase that can start around $20k and go up from there indefinitely, you might as well have not put it in.
Pools are needy and have ongoing care and maintenance. They require you to constantly interact with them to keep them working properly, as well as input from the pros now and again. If budget is your first concern, the yearly costs may not figure in, either. Plus, there’s the bump in your insurance rates to consider.
Having a pool is like having a sports car. Some people buy them and love them and can’t get enough. Some people want them, but realistically understand they can’t keep them in tip-top shape, so postpone the purchase. Some people buy the cheapest Porsche 911 they can find and then get frustrated that it’s constantly in the shop.
Your pool priorities should begin with the purpose for the pool, the site location and appropriate equipment. Then you can start price comparing. There’s no reason to miss out on a deal, but buying the cheapest pool because it’s the only one you can fit in the budget is only going to end in disappointment.
Need More Help Deciding if a Pool is Right For You?
Look no further than your HomeKeepr community. Your real estate agent can recommend pool professionals and landscaping artists that will make your pool project unlike anything else. You don’t have to wade through tons of reviews that might be biased or bought when you can get real life recommendations for home pros from people you actually know and trust. Recommendations beat reviews every time. Log in today to see what companies are the favorites for pools in your area.
A pool is hard to undo, which is why we’re going to address the top five need-to-know things about pool installation and ownership right now.
Pool Installation is Awful
Pools are cool. They are. But only when you go into the whole process and future ownership with open eyes. A pool build is not for the faint of heart, for starters. In urban and suburban neighborhoods with yards that are measured in square feet instead of acres, the process may literally destroy your entire back yard while the mess is being made. Grass will grow again, but in the meantime, it can seriously be the worst.
Taking the dog out means getting the leash and pants, he’s not going to be able to go out into the back yard. You may also have to take part of the fence down to allow the trucks and other equipment access, depending on the size of the pool and your yard’s configuration. If you’ve ever had to replace a sewer line, think about that and then multiply it by about a hundred. That’s the mess you’ll have until your pool is done.
If you can handle the stress, great. If not, your local gym or YMCA might have a pool you can use. They’ll take care of everything and it’ll spare your grass. For homebuyers thinking they can save money by building their own pool rather than buying a house with one, this may be true. But this is a big project requiring a lot of dirt work, you may be happier to buy a house with a pool already installed.
A Few Less Obvious Points to Ponder
That digging a giant hole in your yard is going to be a serious pain may be a no-brainer, but there are other things that aren’t as obvious. That’s what this is really about, after all. We want to be sure you’ve considered all the angles before taking the plunge.
Splish, Splash, You Don’t Want to Take a Bath
Real estate agents and appraisers get the same question about pools over and over again: “How much will this increase my home’s value?”
The Devil, with this question at least, is in the details.
What kind of pool?
Is it inground or above ground?
What kind of neighborhood are you living in?
Do a lot of homes in your market have pools?
How long will you live in your home?
What kind of equipment are you installing?
Of course you don’t want to take a bath on your pool, but it’s one of those items that you should consider to be a luxury purchase and not give a lot of care to whether or not it’ll pay for itself. Unfortunately, whether or not your pool can increase the value of your home is such a loaded question that it’s really impossible to answer.
A pool can simultaneously attract and terrify buyers, especially in the middle to low upper buying ranges. For a family with no small children, a pool might seem like a needed asset due to physical therapy that’s on-going or just to shake the frustration of swimming in a club pool without interruption. But for a family with small children, it might be the single thing about your house that’s so wrong it can’t be made right.
Ask Permission, Not Forgiveness from the HOA
A lot of people go through life asking forgiveness for something they did that they knew was questionable to begin with. We’re not saying that’s you, just that this is a common practice among humans. The problem with this approach to pool building in a neighborhood with an HOA (which is most neighborhoods these days) is that if the HOA doesn’t like what you’re doing, you’ve spent a lot of money for a big muddy hole in the backyard.
Find out if your HOA allows pools. Do it even if your next door neighbor has one because the HOA rules can be changed by the membership. If enough people voted for a “no new pools” rule, well, the ayes have it. If they are allowed, there may still be rules about how and where they must be installed in your yard. Learn the rules now before you end up learning a costly lesson.
Pools Change Your Homebuyer Profile
This was already touched on in the section about taking a bath, but it bears repeating. Installing a pool, unlike building a garage or putting in a fence, changes the kind of buyer who will be looking at your place. If your neighborhood is largely made up of the kind of people who like pools and aren’t worried about the safety aspects involved for children and pets, then when you go to sell, you may not notice a lot of difference in buyer traffic.
But, if your neighborhood is full of starter homes or just a lot of small children because you happen to be a half mile from the local elementary school, adding a pool will do you no favors if you want to sell your home. Other families with young children will be the ones looking at your house, more likely than not. Unless you get lucky and find some retirees who want to be around elementary kids, that pool might make it really hard to sell your home.
Budget Pool Buying is Worse Than No Pool
A lot goes into the decision to install a pool, including the cost of that cement pond. While you should be budget-aware, if budget is your driving factor you will not be happy with your pool. If you’re not happy with a purchase that can start around $20k and go up from there indefinitely, you might as well have not put it in.
Pools are needy and have ongoing care and maintenance. They require you to constantly interact with them to keep them working properly, as well as input from the pros now and again. If budget is your first concern, the yearly costs may not figure in, either. Plus, there’s the bump in your insurance rates to consider.
Having a pool is like having a sports car. Some people buy them and love them and can’t get enough. Some people want them, but realistically understand they can’t keep them in tip-top shape, so postpone the purchase. Some people buy the cheapest Porsche 911 they can find and then get frustrated that it’s constantly in the shop.
Your pool priorities should begin with the purpose for the pool, the site location and appropriate equipment. Then you can start price comparing. There’s no reason to miss out on a deal, but buying the cheapest pool because it’s the only one you can fit in the budget is only going to end in disappointment.
Need More Help Deciding if a Pool is Right For You?
Look no further than your HomeKeepr community. Your real estate agent can recommend pool professionals and landscaping artists that will make your pool project unlike anything else. You don’t have to wade through tons of reviews that might be biased or bought when you can get real life recommendations for home pros from people you actually know and trust. Recommendations beat reviews every time. Log in today to see what companies are the favorites for pools in your area.
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