0 - 2018 - Mandich Property Group

Finding A Reputable Company That Buys Houses

These days you have to be concerned with scams everywhere. On Craigslist, Facebook and everywhere you turn. Unfortunately the same thing applies to “we buy houses” companies. So how do you ensure you are dealing with a legitimate company? That’s what we are about to cover 🙂

Legitimate We Buy Houses Companies

You have probably seen all of the signs on the side of the road “We Buy Houses”. But how do you know if that company is really legit? The first thing – is it a hand written sign? If so, if they don’t have the money to pay for a nice custom sign do they really have the money to buy your house??

Do An Internet Search

Can you easily find them on the web? After you call one of those we buy houses signs and get their information, do yourself a favor and Google them. Do they have a website? Can you find who the owners are of the company? If not, you may want to think twice about using them.

The next thing is reviews and do they answer the phone? This was covered in a good article from Active Rain:

Tip #2 – Reviews from past clients

If you can’t find any reviews or only find bad reviews online for a company, this is another red flag. Check Google, check Facebook, and even look at a company’s website for customer testimonials. If you can’t find those, what is the company hiding? If the reviews are bad, read through them to see what went wrong and what people didn’t like. You might end up saving yourself lots of time and money….

Tip #3 – Does the company answer the phone or call you back quickly?

Bad companies are impossible to reach on the phone and never return your call. They might have a working phone number but their reluctance to talk to people on the phone is a read flag you should be wary of. Legitimate companies will answer the phone or call you back quickly. They ar eeager to talk to you and answer questions. If you do get a company on the phone, ask them questions about how it works or their company.

Read The Full Article “Avoiding we buy houses scams” Here

A couple notes on reviews. Customers with a bad experience are 10 times more likely to leave a bad review than a satisfied customer. Also, even with careful monitoring, some companies pay for reviews, so always take them with a grain of salt.

Reputable Companies That Buy Houses For Cash

Now are they really cash buyers? And are they giving you a written Purchase And Sale Agreement, or is it just a verbal offer? Susan Jones has some good info on this:

Unrealistic high offers. We have found out that amongst other tricks is that sometimes the property organisation, company or person who claims to want to buy your house fast will make you an un-realistic high offer to get your initial interest. Then they will try to reduce the amount they will pay at the last minute or near completion (when you are most vulnerable – and need to sell your property quickly or facing home repossession).

Are they real cash buyers? You should also be aware that there are only a handful of real cash property buyers operating in the market (our buyers being one of them!) which means that many advertsing here on the internet and within your local paper for example dont have the financial means to purchase your property as quickly as they say they can, or to provide you with the professional service you deserve and demand.

Read The Full Article “WARNING: Watch out for The Buy My House Scams!” Here

We have had customers in the past that have run into the first problem of unrealistic high offers only to try and drive down the price before closing. This is a real problem when someone needs to sell in a hurry and either has to sell the property to them for a lower price or has to hold on to the property longer. This is why we always recommend that no matter who you are dealing with, you get a signed Purchase And Sale Agreement when selling your house.

Summing It Up

When ever you have to sell a house quickly and are looking for a legitimate “we buy houses” company, do your homework and make sure you know who you are dealing with. The two biggest things is search the web and make sure when you do find one that they give you a written Purchase And Sale Agreement and not just a verbal offer.

If you are searching for a reputable we buy houses company in Metro Atlanta, be sure and contact us, Mandich Property Group for a free, no obligation to you offer on your house at (770) 756-8680. We would be more than happy to speak with you and buy your house! 🙂

Proven Techniques to Sell Your House Quickly

Having to sell your house and move can be a real headache. Add in having to sell your house fast – that can add even more stress. Unfortunately people do find themselves in situations where they need to sell their home quickly, usually because they have a new job in a different area. If you are one of these people and are looking for some tips to help you sell your house quickly, keep reading 🙂

How To Sell Your House Fast

The first thing you need to be concerned with is how the house shows. Is it clean? Is everything put away in it’s place so that the house doesn’t look cluttered? We covered some of this in a previous post “How To Sell Your House Yourself Fast” about making sure your house is clean and de-cluttered, so check that out.

But what your really need to pay attention first is this – how does the house look when you first drive up to it?

Besides making sure your house is clean, how your house looks from the outside is extremely important. You only get one chance to make a first impression. We have heard that people make up their mind if they like a house or not within the first minute of looking at it when arriving.

Laura Adams wrote an excellent article concerning “curb appeal” and much more in an article on Quick And Dirty Tips:

Selling Tip #1: Improve Your Curb Appeal

Nothing is more important than a first impression. So consider what a potential home buyer may think as he or she drives up to your property for the very first time.

Walk out into your street and look–and I mean really look–at your home to see its shortcomings. Is it attractive, clean, and well-kept, or does it need maintenance that you’ve been putting off?

After you’ve been in a home for a while, it can be difficult to see it objectively. So take suggestions from a real estate professional, friends, or prospective buyers about how to make it show better.

When your home is on the market, it’s critical that your landscaping is well-groomed and your lawn is mowed 24/7. Plus, your driveway, exterior porches, and exterior walls must be clean, too.

If you put money into cleaning up the outside of your home, I can guarantee that buyers will be more likely to take a tour of the inside. Curb appeal is what draws buyers in, helps maintain their interest, and sets your home apart from the competition.

Continue Reading The Full Article “6 Tips to Sell a House Fast in Any Market” Here

Really good advice from Laura! We especially like the tip of asking your friends and anyone you can to look at your house from the outside to see what they think. They may spot some things that you haven’t.

Getting Your Home Sold Quickly

Once you have the property cleaned up on the inside and outside it’s time to get the place sold. So just how do you go about that? Of course you can list your house with an agent, but that may take longer than you have. You might want to try and sell it yourself, or maybe even try and do both. Just make sure that if you decide to do both that in your contract with your realtor that you don’t owe them money if you sell it yourself.

Elise Sole wrote a great article with some tips to help in getting your house sold quickly:

Set a hard deadline

Want to bring buyers out of the woodwork quickly? It’s easy: Set a deadline for offers.

You can make this clear in your listing by saying you will be accepting offers only until a certain date—even as tight as one to two weeks after your home is listed for sale. That said, you should probably not announce why you need to sell quickly due to a new job or other circumstance, because buyers will smell desperation and take advantage of that. Just state your deadline without further explanation, and watch the offers roll in.

Selling your house to a flipper

There’s no faster home sale out there than to a flipper. These buyers enable you to usually sell the home as is—often for cash—removing the burden of costly home repairs.

“These situations usually appeal to homeowners who just need to get a property off their hands,” says Benuska. But there are downsides: Flippers may demand below-market price, so they can resell it later for a larger profit. So just be sure your flipper isn’t fleecing you up the wazoo; at the very least, compare offers from two or more investors so they can’t steamroll you.

Continue Reading The Full Article “How to Sell Your House Fast Without Losing Your Shirt” Here

Setting a hard deadline is a fantastic way to bring in buyers really fast! However we think that no matter what when selling to a conventional buyer and setting a hard deadline will tip them off that you need to sell quickly and will want to force negotiations for a lower price.

We really like her last tip of selling to a flipper – probably because that’s what we do 🙂

Summing It Up

Getting your house sold fast can be stressful, especially all of the prep work that you need to do just to get it ready to sell. As a reminder, if you need to sell your house fast, contact us, Mandich Property Group for a free, no obligation offer on your house. The plus side is that you don’t even need to clean up or worry about curb appeal!

Packing & Moving Tips When Selling Your House

When it comes time to sell your house one of the most important things is to clean and declutter for showings. You will have a much harder time trying to sell your house, either with or without an agent, if your house is dirty or cluttered. One of the best things you can do is to go ahead and pack some things away and store them to help give your house a more spacious feeling. But just how do you go about that? We are going to give you some good tips for packing and putting things away in this short article.

Packing Things Up

An important thing to remember when selling your house is that you want to de-personalize it as much as possible. Put away family photos and nick knacks so that a potential buyer can visualize their own belongings in the house. You do want to leave your furniture and properly stage the house to further help the buyer visualize the house as theirs.

When it comes to packing things up, a lot of people make things harder on themselves than it has to be. You want to be able to unpack in your new dwelling to go as smoothly as possible, as well as being able access things that are already packed just in case you need too.

The Denver Post gives some really good tips:

6. Don’t pack air

Many folks empty dressers and chests before they move. Don’t. This adds to packing time, and wastes usable truck space. Leave dressers full. If a chest is empty, fill it with linens, said Howell. You will also get less load shift. Likewise, don’t pack empty suitcases. Fill them.

7. Trash bags are treasure

Boxes are great because they stack, but so are sturdy trash bags, because they squish. Fill large trash bags with soft nonbreakables. They can be stuffed into trucks and morph into shapes that boxes can’t.

8. Hang ’em high

Don’t pack hanging clothes. Keep them on hangers and put them in the back of your car. flat. Then hang them back up in the new place.

9. Pad, stack, and pack

Don’t pack blankets or beach towels; use them as pads and save on boxes. Wrap and tape blankets around artwork and lamp bases. And stack and pack lampshades; they often take a beating in a move. Remove each shade; stack them small to large, then put them together in one box to ensure that they arrive intact.

10. Label on two sides.

Mark every box with its contents and destination (kitchen) on more than one side. Also note if contents are fragile. Though movers likely won’t care, you’ll know to go easy on them.

Read The Full Article “Home design: Pack fast, move fast, with these 12 tips” Here

Really good tips there. Some people may frown on using trash bags, but they do have a point about how they squish. This would be great for clothes that are out of season and can be stuffed in between things in storage. We also like their advice for using blankets and towels for wrapping things. Moving places, and truck rental services usually charge for extra blankets.

One word of caution though, some dressers are extremely large these days and if you leave them full of clothes, you will make it much more difficult to lift and maneuver into the truck and storage.

Putting Things In Storage

Have you had things in a storage unit before, need them and practically have to complete move everything out to find it? That’s a real pain! Houzz gives some excellent advice for making the most out of your storage unit :

Make sure clothing and other fabric items are clean.

Put heavy items in small boxes and light items in large boxes.

Put clothing in wardrobe boxes.

Put the heaviest stuff on the bottom of the unit and distribute weight evenly.

Put anything you need to access often at the front of your unit.

Leave a pathway to the back of the unit.

Elevate things off the floor.

Store mattresses, protected with a cover, upright along the side of the unit for short periods only; for long-term storage, keep them flat with nothing on top.

Wrap mirrors and pictures with bubble wrap and store them upright along the side of the unit.

Disassemble weak or heavy pieces of furniture.

Cover furniture with sheets, not plastic, which could trap moisture.

Store sofas (except sofa beds) on an end to maximize space.

Clean refrigerators and freezers, drain water supply lines, vacuum coils, fill with other kitchen items and store with doors slightly ajar.

Read The Full Article “A Guide to Self-Storage: Packing Tips” Here

There’s a lot more good information for you. We have to admit, some of those things we have never thought of, especially about covering furniture with sheets instead of plastic. That’s a really good tip, especially if your storage unit is not climate controlled.

Summing It Up

We don’t know anyone that likes to move. It can be a real headache. However, with some proper planning it can go a lot smoother. Important take aways are you need to de-personalize your home and put away as many things as you can. Not only will this make your home more appealing for potential buyers, but will also give you a head start when you do sell your house and it’s time to move.

Another thing to remember, here at Mandich Property Group, you can leave all of your belongings in the house and get an all cash offer from us. We have the ability to look past the clutter and see your properties true potential. Contact us anytime at 770 756-8680 for a hassle free sale of your property 🙂

Key Tips for a Successful FSBO (For Sale By Owner) Home Sale

It’s time to sell your house and you are thinking about doing it yourself. Maybe you have a new job in a new city, downsizing or the opposite, need a bigger home for a growing family. Whatever the reason you need to sell your house, you can do it yourself without hiring an agent, thus saving yourself some money in realtor commissions. However you must take some careful steps to make sure the process goes smoothly.

Getting Your House Ready For Sale By Owner

You may think that all you need to do is put a sign in the front yard “for sale by owner” and you will have a buyer for your house in no time. However, without some careful planning it may take some time to get the right buyer, or even a buyer for that matter, to put your house under contract.

In reality there are a few things that you must do to get your house ready to sell. People are going to want to look at your house. So a dirty or cluttered house most certainly won’t entice any would be buyers. Getting the house ready to sell should be at the top of your list. For Sale By Owner has a great article that explains this and more:

1. Make Your Home Look Great
Presentation is everything. Home buyers are attracted to clean, spacious and attractive houses. Your goal is to dazzle buyers. Brighten-up the house and remove all clutter from counter tops, tables and rooms. Scrub-down your house from top to bottom. Make it sparkle. Simple aesthetic improvements such as trimming trees, planting flowers, fixing squeaking steps, broken tiles, shampooing rugs and even re-painting a faded bedroom will greatly enhance the appeal of your house. Also, make sure your house smells good. That’s right, clean out the cat box and light mildly scented candles.

Invite a neighbor over to walk through your house like a buyer would. Get their opinion on how it “shows.” The stuffed donkey in the family room may have to go to your in-laws for a while.

2. Price Your Home Right
Careful not to over price your home. Over-pricing when you sell a home reduces buyer interest, makes competing homes look like better values, and can lead to mortgage rejections once the appraisal is in. Over-pricing when selling a home is the single biggest reason why many “for sale by owner” (FSBO) home sellers don’t sell their homes successfully. The home selling market dictates the price (not what you think it should be worth).

One of the best ways to correctly price your house when selling is to find out how much other homes, similar to your own, recently sold for in your neighborhood. Talk to home sellers, buyers and check out the real estate listings in your local newspaper.

Typically, if you set the price of your home at 5 to 10 percent above the market price, you are likely to end up with an offer close to your home’s true value. Also, you may try calculating the cost per square foot of your home compared to the house selling prices in your area (divide list price by square footage of livable space). If your house has more features or other desirable qualities, you may want to set a slightly higher house selling price.

The easiest way to accurately price your home is to contact your local home appraiser.

Finally, set your house selling price just under a whole number, such as $169,900 rather than $170,000.

Read The Full Article “8 Easy Home Selling Tips” Here

All good stuff. Your house HAS to be kept clean when you are trying to sell it, whether you use an agent or not. Some more good advice is to go ahead and pack some things and put them in a storage unit before you start to show the home to make it less cluttered. You don’t want potential buyers to think the house doesn’t have enough storage.

Also pricing is another big point. Over price your property and you won’t get any interest. When you are trying to determine the price make sure you are comparing “apples to apples”. You can’t expect to get as much for your home that was built in the ’70’s and never updated to one that was built around the same time frame and has a brand new kitchen and bathrooms with granite counter tops.

Please read the full article as there are a lot more good tips on getting your house sold.

Closing The Deal And Getting Your House Sold

So you have cleaned the house top to bottom, put the sign in the yard, maybe done some internet marketing and ready to start showing the property. What next? US News has some good info on that:

4. Be available

Once your listing is up, potential buyers will likely come to you. Are you ready?

Udelson says being available in multiple ways is essential for good marketing. In other words, potential buyers should be able to reach you by email, phone or in person. Some prospects will email first and won’t want to meet in person until later. That’s OK. Your goal is to engage prospective buyers in conversation, and try to get them to look at the home in person eventually.

Also, be sure to welcome calls and interest from agents. “Just because you elect to sell without an agent,” Udelson says, “doesn’t mean that the buyer should be expected to go without.”

On this note, be prepared to work with a potential buyer on arrangements for showing the home. If the buyer is coming with an agent, you can most likely leave the home, allowing the agent to take his client through. But if you’re showing directly to a buyer, you’ll need to be there to highlight the best points of your home, and answer any questions the prospect might have.

5. Get ready for closing

Before you even start marketing your home, it’s important to know what you’ll need for closing. This can be a complex process with lots of paperwork. You’ll need to stay on top of the paperwork, and make sure your buyer is on top of things, especially if the buyer doesn’t have an agent. Closing is one good reason to use a FSBO sellers website, since many of these sites have helpful information to walk you through the closing process.

Read The Full Article “5 Tips for Going the For Sale By Owner Route” Here

Great advice. We would add that you might want to go ahead and schedule a few Saturday’s & Sunday’s for showing to tell people about when they call or email about your property. That way it will be a little easier on you to have the house spic and span when a buyer is looking at the property and not just have people popping in.

You may also want to contact a closing attorney to check and see what documents you need to sell your house. They may have a template that you can use and make the selling process that much easier.

In Conclusion

Selling your home by owner can be a lot more involved that just putting a sign in the front yard. As long as you clean your house well, do some marketing and make sure you contact an attorney to help you with the closing, the entire process should go smoothly.

As a reminder, one of the best ways to sell your house by owner is to contact a real estate investor like us. We have a streamlined process to purchase properties. In fact you don’t even have to worry about any of the things we have listed above, not even clean the house because we buy houses as is. You can contact us at 770 756-8680 for a free, no obligation offer any time 🙂

Should I Sell My House As Is

There is a lot to consider when it comes time to sell your house. One question that pops up quite often is “should I sell my house as is?”. This is a great question, but really needs some careful thought and consideration. You have to ask yourself how much are you willing to invest in your property, do you have the money you need to make all the repairs and lastly will you recover that money you invest getting your house in tip top condition. These are just a few of the things you need to consider. If you are wondering if you should sell as is – keep reading.

Who Will Buy Your Home As Is?

This is really important and depends on how extensive the repairs are that need to be done. The balance wrote an excellent article that covers some of this:

Do Home Buyers Want Fixers or Fixed Up Homes?

Some home buyers want to buy a fixer upper home, but generally these buyers want a home that will require light cosmetic repairs. Buyers who gravitate toward fixers are those who either don’t qualify to buy a more expensive home or those who want to make a profit by fixing the home themselves.

I’ve yet to meet a novice first-time home buyer who says, “Give me a home I can tear down to the studs.” Most fixer buyers are willing to do simple repairs such as paint the walls, put in new carpeting or replace light fixtures. They typically don’t want to rebuild a foundation or move walls.

Fixer-upper buyers will discount the price of the home to allow for the repairs and, for the inconvenience, a bit more. Say, a home is worth $100,000 fixed up, but it needs a new roof. A new roof might cost $10,000. A buyer most likely will not offer $90,000 for this home. Otherwise, they could buy an identical home with a new roof for $100,000 and not have the hassle.

A buyer for this type of home might offer $75,000, or even less. In this scenario, a seller would be smarter to pay for a new roof and sell the home for $100,000.

Moreover, many buyers will not buy a home that needs a new roof. They will worry the work involved will cost more than what they anticipated. Perhaps replacing the roof would involve tearing off the sheathing and repairing rafters, which could add to the cost. Most buyers want a home that is in move-in condition. By not making repairs, you will limit the number of buyers who may be attracted to your home.

Read The Full Article “Should I Fix Up My Home or Try to Sell As Is?” Here

This is generally the case when you put your house on the market and are trying to attract your regular home buyer that is purchasing the property through conventional loans. But what if you don’t have the 10k that is required to put a new roof on?

What If You Don’t Have The Money To Make Repairs?

Unfortunately this is often the case for a lot of homeowners that are living from pay check to pay check. Furthermore you may be in a position where you need to sell your property very quickly. In this situation you can always sell your property to real estate investors. You can always go to the internet and perform a search like “sell my house fast as is” to find investors that will do just that, buy your property in it’s present condition.

This is a good option for anyone that needs to sell quickly. But if you are not in a rush you can always list your property with an agent and market the property as “handyman special” or “fixer upper” to make sure you attract the right kind of buyer.

The next thing you have to consider is the cost of the amount of repairs that need to be performed on the property. You may actually end up spending more money on your property than what you will be able to sell the house for. Just because you have 150k in your house doesn’t mean that it will sell for that, especially if all the properties surrounding you are selling for 100k. This scenario is another good reason to consider selling to an investor.

You Must Be Truthful When Selling As Is

The last thing we want to cover about selling “as-is” is what you have to be careful about. Selling your property as is doesn’t mean that you don’t have to disclose problems with the property. While a good inspector will pick up on many things for the buyer, you still have to disclose things like foundation issues and the like that you are aware of, or asked about.

This was emphasized in this article:

What Selling As-Is Does Not Mean

Unfortunately, many homeowners are under the mistaken impression that selling as-is relieves them from all the general obligations that come with the sale of a home. They imagine that they can unload the property for whatever price they can get while avoiding the need to talk about or disclose any issues with the home.

Selling as is does not relieve you from your legal obligation to answer questions honestly concerning the existing problems with the home per the rules of your state.

Read The Full Article “Pros and Cons of Selling a Home As Is” Here

The writer of that article goes on to explain in more detail about disclosure, but for the state of Massachusetts. However Georgia has a lot to say about disclosure when selling your property:

Although Georgia law does not require a seller to fill out a specific disclosure form, the law does require a seller to inform a buyer about any known material (important) defects in the condition of the home. There’s an exception if the defect would be discovered by the buyer upon a reasonable inspection, but that’s meant to cover fairly obvious things – for example, you don’t need to point out, “the porch roof has collapsed,” if anyone looking at the property can see that the porch roof has collapsed.

The Georgia seller must also honestly answer a buyer’s questions about the home. Buyers might ask about anything from what repairs you’ve done in the past to how your dealings with the neighbors have been. Attempting to obfuscate can lead to lawsuits later, so it’s best to be honest and open.

Again, however, you are not supposed to wait for questions if a defect is “material” and not readily visible. Georgia courts have generally held that a defect is “material” if the buyer would consider it material; that is, if known to a prospective buyer, it would cause that person to not buy the property, or to pay less for it -– such as, for instance, the fact that it was built on unstable ground.

As a general rule, in order to prevent later accusations of misrepresentation or fraud from a buyer, as a seller in Georgia you should be upfront, answer the buyer’s questions, and tell the buyer about any problems you are aware of regarding the condition of the home (most likely by filling out the optional standard form described below).

Read The Full Article “Selling a Georgia Home: What Are My Disclosure Obligations?” Here

We agree that it’s much better to disclose any problems with the property that you are aware of to the buyer. In the long run it could save you a lot of headaches and a long drawn out law suit that could cost you thousands.

Summing It Up

There are a few factors that you must think about when it comes to selling your house as is. Really you are the only person that can decide if it’s right for you. If you have the money to have the repairs made and have the time, then no – go ahead and have them done so you will bring a higher price for your property. But if you are short on cash and don’t have the time, then selling as is may be the route you need to take.

How We Buy Houses For Cash Works

You may have heard of the “We Buy Houses For Cash” people and wonder what it’s all about. You may be wondering who they are and just exactly how does it work. In this short article we will give you the answers to these questions.

Who Are The We Buy Houses People?

Just who are these companies? Typically they are local companies that want to buy houses that are in need of repairs or updates, or more familiarly know as “we buy houses”. They want to purchase your property, make the needed repairs and updates, then turn around and sell it to another buyer at full retail price. Sometimes they purchase properties where there is a landlord that is tired of renting out a property, nicer homes where couples are getting divorced or even have to sell because of a new job in another city.

Typically these companies do pay with cash. As we covered in our previous article “Who Will Buy My House For Cash?” we explained that no matter how you sell your property, rather it be to an investor or conventional buyer, whatever equity you have in the house you will walk away with cash. Whatever loans, mortgages or liens you have against the property will be paid out first. Whatever is left, you get, usually in the form of a wire transfer to your bank. The nice thing about these companies is that by paying with cash there is no waiting on mortgage approvals, so they have the ability to close in a fraction of the time that it takes with a conventional buyer.

You may have seen their signs on the side of the road “we buy houses” or “we buy houses any condition”. Before you choose one to do business with we highly suggest that you research them online first and make sure they are a legitimate company.

How Does We Buy Houses For Cash Work?

Down to the nitty gritty 🙂 Just how does it work? Instead of making you take our word for it we found a good article from The Truth About Realty that explains it very well, and then some:

How We Buy Houses Works

I checked out their website, read their FAQ, and think I have a pretty good understanding about how the process works. It seems fairly straightforward.

Basically you ask them to make an offer on your home and they’ll show up to take a look at the property. They’ll conduct a walk-through, and probably do some appraising once they get back to the office to better understand the property market where your home is located.

After all, the property itself is just one piece of the pie – its location is also key to valuing it properly, especially since the home’s current state will likely be improved before it is resold by the company.

From there you’ll receive a “no-obligation all cash offer” to purchase your home that you can consider, accept, or reject. If you agree, they will apparently pay “most normal closing costs” and you won’t have to worry about things like real estate commissions or make repairs.

So the upside here is that if you need/want to sell your home ASAP, you might be able to with a buyer like We Buy Houses with little or no work…

They also offer to buy homes when the mortgage financing isn’t ideal, perhaps because of a high interest rate and the inability to refinance, or an adjustable-rate mortgage that becomes too expensive. Someone facing the prospect of foreclosure could also potentially own an ugly home…

They also seem to target homes with problematic renters, or homes that were inherited that the family doesn’t want to deal with.

Read The Full Article “We Buy Houses Review: Should You Sell Them Your House?” Here

A lot of good information there.

Pros And Cons Of Using We Buy Houses Companies

It’s important to note that there are some real pros and cons to selling your property this way. As we stated earlier you have to do your homework and make sure you are dealing with a reputable company.

Some real pros and cons were covered in a good article from The Money Advice Service:

Pros

Quick house sale companies can provide a useful service for homeowners who need to unlock cash in a hurry. Some companies are able to buy your house within days and pay all fees (such as for solicitors and searches) for you.

For example to:

Avoid repossession, clear debts or sort out financial issues

Dispose of inherited property

Move for age or health related reasons

Sell as a result of divorce or relationship breakdown

Relocate due to a change of job or to emigrate

Try a different route if unable to sell through a traditional estate agent – get around issues that have made a property hard to sell, for example with a short lease or if a property has a high risk of flooding

Cons

Some companies agree to buy a house, but then reduce the price at the very last minute

Fee structures are not always made clear to the customer

Some companies make false property valuations

Some contracts tie customers in, preventing them from selling to anyone else who might come along with a better offer

Read The Full Article “Quick house sales” Here

Again, it’s really important to do your homework and make sure you know who you are dealing with and they have simple to understand contracts.

Summing It Up

Selling your house to one of these companies may be of interest to you, especially if you haven’t kept up with repairs and maintenance. Most “we buy houses for cash” companies are legit. However there are a few out there that give the industry a bad rap. Just make sure you know who you are dealing with. Research them on the web and make sure they have an established presence and no bad reviews.

Getting Your Kitchen Ready To Sell

Getting your house ready to sell can be a daunting task. You may know that you need to do some things to get your house ready to put on the market and have a huge list of things to do. If your house is older you know that you have to perform some updates to compete with other properties in your neighborhood that are for sale. So where is the best place to put your money? Kitchens and bathrooms. In this short article we will cover the first – kitchens.

Spruce Up Your Kitchen To Help Sell Your House Fast

The kitchen in your house is usually the most used room in the house (unless you eat out for every meal). For many families it’s where they unwind and talk about their day. Having a functional kitchen is a great way to spark interest in buyers looking for a new home.

So how can you spruce up, or bring new life into your kitchen? Bank Rate gives some great suggestions:

1. Make your kitchen really cook. The kitchen is still considered the heart of the home. Potential home buyers make a beeline for this room when they first view a home for sale, so make sure your kitchen looks clean and reasonably updated.

For a few hundred dollars, you can replace the kitchen faucet set, add new cabinet door handles and update old lighting fixtures with brighter, more energy-efficient ones.

If you’ve got a slightly larger budget, you can give the cabinets themselves a makeover. “Rather than spring for a whole new cabinet system, which can be expensive, look into hiring a refacing company,” says serial remodeler Gwen Moran, co-author of “Build Your Own Home on a Shoestring.”

“Many companies can remove cabinet doors and drawers, refinish the cabinet boxes, then add brand-new doors and drawers. With a fresh coat of paint over the whole set, your cabinets will look like new.”

If you’re handy, you can order your own replacement cabinet doors and door fronts from retailers like Lowe’s Home Improvement or The Home Depot and install them yourself.

Read The Full Article “10 cheap fixes to boost the value of your home” Here

Great tips, and ones that we actually follow. Many times when we renovate a property we keep the cabinet boxes and replace the doors and drawer faces. With that we also replace handles, lighting fixtures as well as the faucet. Something we also do is replace formica counter tops with granite, but this isn’t for everyone because this can really run up the cost of updating your kitchen. After you do all of these updates you may stand back and look at it, like it and think twice about selling your property 🙂

Kitchen Colors

This is something that you must consider carefully. The one thing that we always look at first is the size of the kitchen as well as it’s natural lighting. If the kitchen is small and doesn’t have much natural light the last thing you want to do is have dark cabinets and dark walls. It will make the kitchen more gloomy and feel smaller. Instead if it’s small and not much natural light consider painting the cabinets white and stick to lighter earth tones on the walls.

On the other hand, if you have a large and well lit kitchen you can have darker cabinets and walls.

We found an interesting article from Zillow about kitchen colors that really surprised us:

2. Blue kitchens and blue bathrooms

Beyond America’s obsession with lawns and all-around “curb appeal,” what’s inside your house counts a lot, too — especially the colors you’ve painted the rooms (particularly the kitchen).

According to Zillow’s 2017 Paint Color Analysis, which examined more than 32,000 photos from sold homes around the country, homes with blue kitchens sold for a $1,809 premium, compared to similar homes with white kitchens.

Blue is also a popular bathroom shade. The same analysis found that homes with light pale blue to soft periwinkle blue bathrooms sold for a whopping $5,440 more.

Walls painted in cool neutrals like blue or gray can be signals that the home is well cared for or has other desirable features.

Read The Full Article “4 Surprising Things That May Increase How Much Your Home Is Worth” Here

We never would have thought that about using blue. However we’re not that brave to jump on that band wagon just yet. We have seen trending for some time now the use of light gray throughout the home.

Summing It Up

The condition and look of your kitchen will most certainly affect how fast you bring in a buyer for your house. The biggest thing we can recommend is pay attention to the size and natural light in the kitchen before you make any decisions about the colors that you choose.

Remember, if you don’t want the hassles of cleaning or updating your kitchen, bathrooms or any part of your property, we buy houses in any condition and buy them as is. You can contact us for an offer on your property at (770) 756-8680.

Getting Bathrooms Ready To Sell Your House

If you are getting ready to put your property on the market one of the best things you can do to help increase your properties selling value is some maintenance or upgrades to your bathrooms. In this short article we will cover a few things that you can do on a budget as well as things you have to take into consideration when making updates.

Simple Touch Ups and Maintenance To Increase Value

Almost everyone knows that kitchens and bathrooms are what really set off one property from another. A bathroom can be a relaxing oasis for many housewives and mothers to escape a hectic day. For this reason you need to pay specific attention to the bathrooms before you put your property up for sale.

Surprisingly enough there are some things that you can do to help breath new life into your existing bathroom to help sell your house faster. Most people think that they have to do a complete gut and remodel. However, if you bathroom has “good bones” you will be able to save yourself a few bucks.

A few of those things were covered in an article by This Old House:

Brokers, one and all, say spiffing up the kitchen and bath is a sure bet for adding value to your home. Surveyed brokers say these kinds of improvements can get expensive. It may not be economical to do a major renovation if you are trying to spend as little as possible before putting a house up for sale. But some upgrades are cheap, easy, and fast…especially in the bathroom.

Replace frosted glass for clear glass, clean the grout, remove rust stains, apply fresh caulk, update doorknobs and cabinet pulls, replace faucets, and install a low-flush toilet. Even buying a new toilet seat can make a difference. Bailey says, “You can spend $500 on a bathroom, and it’s totally tuned up.”

Read The Full Article “Brokers Tell All: 10 Ways to Boost House Value” Here

Great tips, especially for being able to spend $500 or less to breath new life in to a bathroom in a house that you are getting ready to sell. However, if you do plan on replacing the toilet make sure that it is something that you feel comfortable with, or higher a professional. If a toilet is not installed correctly – well it can be a real mess and end up costing you much more!

Things To Take Into Consideration For Major Remodels

Your bathroom might just be to outdated to just “put some lipstick” on to make it appealing to a potential buyer. Your bathroom may have green or pink tile from the 60’s or 70’s and you need to perform a major renovation before putting the property on the market.

It can be a real hassle, and the last thing you want is to get it all done and not end up with a product that is NOT functional. Some things that you have to think about before starting your project was covered by Zillow in a short article:

Mistake 1: Ignoring proper spacing and layout

Bathrooms may seem straightforward, but a lack of spatial awareness in the renovation planning stages can lead to problems down the road.

Remember: Just because you can fit something into the bathroom design doesn’t mean it can function within that space. Always keep function in the forefront of your mind and in your design.

For example, if you choose a shower with a door, your bathroom layout should leave plenty of room for it to fully open. No potential home buyer will want to squeeze out of a partially opened shower door every morning. Other considerations include providing enough space to comfortably get on and off the toilet, open cabinet doors, etc.

Spatial considerations also include making sure elements of the room are close enough together to function. For example, the toilet paper holder should be within a child’s arm’s reach of the toilet, and outlets should be easily accessible from the counter.

Mistake 2: Choosing the wrong materials

Because of the sink, toilet and shower, bathrooms deal with more moisture than any other room in the house. Homeowners also use many of the strongest cleaning products on bathroom surfaces. Both of these factors, if not taken into consideration, can lead to significant damage if you don’t select the right materials for the job.

Go with materials that can stand up to harsh cleaners and are not highly susceptible to mold, warping or distortion. Avoid porous materials that will retain moisture and allow hidden mold to grow.

Read The Full Article “What NOT to Do When Remodeling Bathrooms” Here

Great tips. The last thing you want is to finish your bathroom after spending thousands of dollars on it only to find that it’s hard for more than one person to use it at a time. Also choosing the wrong materials can really make things bad. Have you ever seen a bathroom that had carpet in it around the toilet and bath tub? We have and we can tell you from experience that it is GROSS! Also, your house may have hardwoods throughout, but real hardwoods won’t be able to hold up against the added moisture from a tub. Now days you can find actual tile that looks like hardwood if that is the route you want to go.

Summing It Up

If your bathroom isn’t to far gone, or if your house is newer, say 15 years old or so – you can just do a little maintenance and have your bathroom looking new again. If however you have an ugly bathroom you will have to do a little more to get it ready to go on the market. Just remember to do some prior planning and use the right materials.

If all of this is too much for you, remember, here at Mandich Property Group we buy houses in any condition. We don’t care how old or rough looking your bathroom is, we will buy it as is.

How To Sell Your House Yourself Fast

How To Sell Your House Yourself Fast Without An Agent

You may be in a situation where you need to sell your property quickly to raise capital, and don’t want to lower how much money you will walk away with from the deal by listing the property. You know that it can be as much as 6% of your selling price that is paid out by selling with realtors. So you may be thinking of trying to sell your house yourself without an agent and need to sell it quickly. Good news – it can be done.

How To Get Your House To Sell Quickly

Whatever the reason that you need to sell your property quickly, there are a few things that you have to do first to make sure that it does just that. You can’t just wake up one day and decide that you are going to put a for sale sign in the front yard and hope that a buyer comes in (unless you plan on selling to investors who buy houses in as is condition).

The first and most obvious thing that you need to do is to put things away and clean the house. Nobody is going to buy a house that is cluttered and dirty. Then you need to look around the house and see the things that are obvious and that need to be repaired, like leaking faucets and even burned out light bulbs.

Here is more along those lines about making repairs prior to marketing your property from Wiki:

3 – Have your home inspected. Many standard real estate contracts are going to give the home buyer the right to inspect the property, so be prepared. Have your home inspected before you advertise. Under a general inspection you might be obligated to make major repairs to appliances, plumbing, septic, electrical and heating systems, etc. You can expect your home’s roof and foundations to be inspected, as well. Follow the recommendations and make necessary repairs. Additional inspections requested by the buyer are customarily at their expense.

4 – As much as possible, get your home in move-in condition before you put it on the market. Buyers of homes are inherently lazy. If they feel like they’ll need to do extra landscaping, plumbing, appliance and electrical work before they can enjoy the house, they’ll balk when it comes to buy, even if the rest of your house is an absolute steal. So make it easy for them. Hire a handyman or general contractor to get the home as ready to move into as possible.

Read The Full Article “How to Sell Your Own House” Here

That’s really good info, especially about buyers being kind of lazy. The reality of it is that if it’s a family moving into the property with small children, they really aren’t going to have the time to make repairs. Soccer games, band practice, swimming, you name it – they are just to busy being involved in their kids lives to spend a lot of time making little repairs. However, if you don’t have the money to make the repairs you can always advertise the property as “Handyman Special” which will then hopefully attract the right buyer and they know from the get go that they need to work on the property.

Start Marketing Your Property

Now you have the property presentable. It’s time to put that for sale by owner sign in the front yard! It can be an anxious time, but try to relax. Here are a few more things to help you to get people to call or come by to check out your property:

3. Market Your Property
In addition to listing the home on the MLS, advertise by putting up “for sale” signs, creating brochures, putting ads on Craigslist, and building a web site to market the property. FSBO.com offers home-selling packages for homeowners that begin at $69.95. The marketing packages include items like brochures and yard signs. There will be some costs involved in advertising the sale of your home, but they will be a fraction of an agent’s commission. The real cost is the amount of time and energy you will need to put into selling your home.

4. Hold an Open House
You can also hold an open house to advertise the sale of your home. Advertise for the open house by posting signs in your neighborhood. Have some light refreshments available and set out brochures about the home that visitors can take with them as they leave.

5. Know Your Property’s Selling Points
When writing your ad copy for websites or brochures, make sure to include basic information about the house, including the price, number of bedrooms, number of bathrooms, lot size, location, and of course the specific details that make the house special to potential buyers.

Take a look at other listings on Craigslist, Realtors’ websites, and Yahoo! Real Estate to get a sense of what sort of details sellers and agents are including in their listings. You’ll quickly find out that features like granite countertops, stainless steel appliances, and oversized windows entice buyers. Determine what’s special about your home and highlight those features in your marketing efforts.

Continue Reading “How to Sell Your House by Owner – Without a Realtor” Here

Great tips and we especially like the thought of having brochures for your property that potential buyers can take with them when they leave. Also listing your property on the numerous online website listing services is a great idea. Don’t forget about using social media as well like Facebook and Twitter. You may not know it and one of your friends maybe looking for a house. The more eyes that see your property online, the faster you will bring in a buyer.

In Conclusion

You can sell on your own. It will take some doing though. No matter how you choose to sell, either with or without an agent, you will have to clean and make repairs to the property. Once everything is in order, market your property as many ways as you possibly can and afford.

If you want to sell your property without all the headaches, and you are in the Metro Atlanta area, you can always contact us for a free, no obligation offer on your property at (770) 756-8680.

How Do I Sell My House For Cash?

You may or may not have heard of selling your house for cash. You may be wondering just how to go about it and what the possible advantages could be. While it is true that when you sell your house your existing mortgage will be paid off. So what is all the hoopla about selling for cash. If you are one of the people wondering about it – keep reading because that’s what we are about to cover.

Why Selling Your Home for Cash Might Make Sense For You

First, why would you need to sell your house for cash? Typically people that want to sell their property for cash need a fast closing. When a buyer is paying cash there are no buyer mortgage contingencies to be concerned about. When a cash buyer puts your property under contract, which is usually a real estate investor, your house is as good as sold.

This was covered in an article by Steve McLinden:

Tops in the “pro” column are speed of sale and convenience. Once you accept a cash offer, you can often get your money in days. For folks facing a relocation, foreclosure or bankruptcy, this can be a life saver.

Fewer sales fall through

A cash sale also removes the all-too-familiar drill of accepting an offer only to lose the buyers at the last minute when they can’t qualify for a loan. Once the cash is passed along, there’s no backing out or last-second cold feet. Such cash sales typically close in 1 to 3 weeks compared to about 4 to 7 weeks on a conventional sale. Also, cash sales are typically “as is,” so there’s usually no major repainting and repairs needed.
Cash is king in a real estate deal … You’ll probably get a little less money out of the house, but you can avoid costly repairs and other complications.

Read The Full Article “There are plenty of good reasons to sell your home for cash” Here

Steven also goes on to advise that you should get professional advice for pricing your home. With all of the tools on the internet it’s a whole lot easier these days. You can go online and check many house buying and selling sites like Zillow, Redfin and Trulia and find what comparables are selling for in your neighborhood. The important thing here is to make sure you are comparing apples to apples.

So why would someone need to close fast? Job relocation, trying to avoid a foreclosure on their credit, divorce and many other reasons. A cash buyer will help you achieve a fast sell with little chance of the sale falling through at the last minute.

How To Go About Selling Your House For Cash

The great thing about selling your property to investors is that they will buy the property in “as-is” condition. No need to make any repairs, and many times, you don’t even need to clean up the property like you would if you were selling to a retail buyer.

However you may just be looking for any cash buyer, and they are out there. There are parents out there that buy houses for their children. In this case you will have to do some clean up and make the house look presentable.

Some other things you might want to do were covered in this article:

Step 1

Gather up all of the pertinent information about your house. Make sure you have flattering pictures (taken in the spring or in the summer) plus the statistical information before you try to sell your homes online. Be sure that you have the square footage, the year the roof was replaced, the foundation type and everything else that might be in a listing. The more information the better. Unless it’s a dump. Then you might want to be creative.

Step 2

List your home on ebay. There should be a clickable link on this page. give your listing a precise title, not a cutesy title. No-one will be searching for a cute title, they search for things like “House for sale in Cambridge” or “Quick Sale in Moorpark.”

Read The Full Article “How to Sell Your House for Cash” Here

In addition to listing your property on Ebay you can also list it on the other sites that we mentioned above to get it in front of more potential buyers. You may want to put in your listing that you are looking for “cash buyers only” to help keep down on the amount of buyers that are looking to purchase a property through a bank or mortgage company.

Summing It Up

The biggest advantage to selling your property for cash is that you don’t usually have to worry about the sale falling through at the last minute. You can also do it yourself without hiring an agent, just be sure and do your homework prior to advertising to make sure you price it right. Also, when you sell for cash the closing can usually happen in days compared to months that it sometimes takes when selling to a regular buyer that gets a mortgage.

Lastly, you can perform a search online like “cash buyer for my home” and a lot of investors should show up in your search. Contact them and if you like their offer – your done. You should have your property sold in just a few weeks.