Letters and Lawsuits, Travel, and a Charlottesville Micro Market
Note from Jim for November 2023
This month: Buyer letters, lawsuits & value, first time homebuyer journey, micro markets, and fair housing. If you like this note, please share with a friend.
Which year felt longer, 2020, 2021, 2022, or 2023? Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, as I’m here to write what I know, learn every day, represent clients, and aim to make tomorrow better than yesterday.
This month, as we head into the holiday season, and conversations heighten about whether to buy, sell, move, or not, please let me know if you’d like to grab coffee or beer and chat about how I might be able to help. Questions? Comments? I am here.
Letters and offers.
I’ve written for years about buyer love letters, and how I came to the conclusion that they are in a word, bad. I expanded on this recently in a great Reddit conversation.
When representing sellers, I ask them to allow me to state “no buyer love letters” in the agent remarks. Maybe it’s time to put that in the public remarks.
When representing buyers, I advise against writing buyer love letters — they are rife for misunderstandings and fair housing violations.
I noted the following in 2021 and thought it would be fun to note it again.
I was representing the seller. As I recall, we received an offer or two. One of the offers (at least, the one I’m referencing) came with a letter from the buyer. I remember nothing about that letter. But that letter came with another letter — a letter from the buyer’s cat to the seller’s cat.
A letter from the buyer’s cat. To the seller’s cat.
I remember thinking that if my clients accepted the offer, things would not work out.
They didn’t. We eventually terminated and sold to an offer without a cat letter, and my clients were happy.
Lawsuits, Value, Commissions
Unless you’ve been living under a proverbial rock, you’ve heard about the lawsuits that Realtors have been losing all over the country.
We don’t know yet how the changes are going to shake out, but we know that things have changed, and will change. I wrote about this exact change in 2009, and updated that post recently.
I wrote in 2009:
Step one is demonstrating value.
That is still true.
Amen. I’m more competent now than I was in 2001. I can demonstrate that value.
My thoughts continue to evolve, and this is one change that I will speculate/forecast: there will be far fewer agents in the US in 18 months.
Nearly 2023 Market Wrap - coming in December. This month, a focus on a micro-market.
The Charlottesville City single family home market, with at least 3 bedrooms, at least 2 bathrooms, at least 1,200 above grade square feet, between $800K and $1.5M.
Let’s take a look.
First, context: from 1 January to 26 November, 282 homes have been listed in the Charlottesville MLS. Last year, that number was 388. In 2019, that number was 408.
At least 3 bedrooms and 2 baths — 197.
At least 1,200 above grade square feet — 156.
$800K to $1.5M — 50.
Right now — 3 pending, 8 active, 39 sold.
Let’s dig in.
1 was new construction.
2 sold off MLS and were entered as comps — side note, the MLS is one of the most important tools in the US residential real estate market.
22 of the 50 sold with cash — “cash” ≠ cash. Of the cash, average days on market were 8, and median were 4. 17 non-cash — average DOM was 12, median was 4.
Of the 8 actives, average and median are 72 and 75. The three pending days on market? 7, 17, and 88.
Price matters, folks. Were I doing this for a client — buyer or seller — I’d pick the three to six best comps, and evaluate each to see which one(s) were most similar, in which ways — functionality, location, and how they fit in the gap of the market segment. I’d also narrow the timeframe to the past three or four months.
Shorter insight: price matters; so does the quality of the product. And price per square foot is not a worthwhile metric in this use case — the average $/foot was $347, and the low and high were $224 and $550, respectively.
I’m curious — was this useful to you? For me, it sharpened my look at this particular micro-market and reaffirmed that price + location + first impressions matter.
Newsday Fair Housing
Many years ago, I was talking to a local business owner. (Coincidentally, I ran into him two days after I wrote this segment.) One of the things he said then still resonates with me. He said that Realtors are like gatekeepers for the community; he said it in the context of keeping out people who weren’t nice (he used a different word). He was right. The responsibility that agents have is a big one, and it is our responsibility to continue to better ourselves.
The Charlottesville Area Association of Realtors had one of the authors of the Long Island Divided investigation visit; he discussed the investigation, fair housing, tacit and implicit discrimination, and the lack of consequences faced by the discovered agents. I wrote about this astonishing investigation a few years ago, and it remains an eye-popping piece.
It was a compelling conversation and discussion. There are over 1,000 agents in the Charlottesville area and only 40 agents attended in person; many were from Nest.
The following applies to many things in this life: If you’re not learning and trying to get better, the status quo will win out.
Travel and Infrastructure
It’s easy to get complacent and accept our substandard infrastructure as bad, but as good as we’re going to get. It doesn’t have to be that way. Build it, and they will use it.
Traveling with my wife is infectious; seeing new places and perspectives, reading different news, and hearing and smelling new things. While we are empty-nesting grandparents now, here’s hoping for more travel in the near future.
My wife and my trip? Paris. It was amazing, and 25 years in the making.
First-time home buyer journey
I’ve long told first-time homebuyers that they need to have a couple thousand dollars available immediately after they purchase a home. I’m now working with a first time homebuyer and they are sharing with me their list of “things they need/want.” This is going to be a recurring part of this note for the next few months.
Already on the list: Toolkit/box, first aid kit, ladder, yard tools, security system, washer/dryer, curtains/blinds, pillows, towels/linens, trashcans, fans, cookware/silverware, rugs.
It’s going to be a big list.
Reddit AMA
This was a good conversation. I’ve started doing these quarterly; I enjoy doing them, as I’m forced to study, answer quickly and accurately, and appreciate the questions. I’m already looking forward to the one in January.
What I’m Reading
Privacy is dead. Court rules automakers can record and intercept owner text messages
Impacts of parking and accessibility on retail-oriented city centres. “Results of a spatial regression indicate that public transport stops, pedestrian zones, and public parking garages nearby increase the attractiveness of retail locations. On the contrary, much on-street parking capacity in the immediate vicinity reduces retail rents.”
An influence or a trap? - one of the many reasons I like riding my bicycle solo sometimes.
Accidental Spies: Amazon Ring Owners May Be Unknowingly Emailing Police. We will never have a Ring camera.
What small upgrade made a huge difference at your house? Some great answers here. Shower head, curved shower rod, soft close toilet seats …
Listing without buyers agents & The Sky is Falling; I’ve known Todd for a long time — his stuff is worth reading.
Americans ditched big cities during the pandemic. Now many are regretting it.
What I’m Listening To
House Music - HBR After Hours.
Should we quit social media? - We Can Do Hard Things. I’m struggling with Twitter and the owner’s support of hate and antisemitism, and I’m struggling with Threads being owned by Facebook, and Roxanne Gay says it succinctly, “I don't really want to have my presence on Twitter, for example, make people feel like that's an endorsement of the space anymore. So, I'm struggling with it, because I really do or did love Twitter before it became what it is now.”
Costco’s story on Acquired — one of the only podcasts I’ve ever listened to that’s more than an hour.