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Greenville SC Realtor Home Page

Rollover for a Younger me!

864-335-8490

Easter:

Happy Easter!

Good Friday:

Good Friday:


April 6:

Another beautiful day in Greenville SC, should be close to 80!  So what's happening in the real estate market today!

Let's open up the Greenville MLS and see:.

In the last two days we had:

119 New Listings
116 Price Changes
41 Closed Transactions
21 Listings Expired

There are 618 pending transactions not included transactions marked contingent on inspections and financing which are really pending!

Of these numbers most folks are really interested in the homes that just got listed so......

Click Here for Greenville County Homes that came on the market over the last 3 days or 

Click Here for Greenville County Homes that came on the market over the last 6 days.  Hey folks, bookmark those pages cause that is a great way to stay up with the market without getting on auto email updates!

Downtown Greenville SC Marriott Courtyard

April 4:

Wow,

What a week.  I had 5 different couples in either buying or considering relocating to Greenville!  Greenville SC Real Estate is really picking up.  I helped a nice family from the New Jersey area put one under contract in Simpsonville.  Again, folks the real estate taxes people pay from these areas are unreal.  They own a modular home and pay around.....now get this....$4,000 in real estate taxes per year.  They've put a great home with over 2,300 sq. feet less than 10 years old in a great neighborhood, with many amenities for.....priced in the $170,000's.  And their taxes will be around....are you sitting down.... $900 a year.  You do the math.

So, what's up, hey I've got a few days to catch up and get my taxes done.  Thank goodness it's in the 70's, that will keep me in good spirits!

Ya'll take care and come see me some time.... 864-335-8490.

Black Lab Puppy Came to Visit Yesterday!

March 30:

                Have a wonderful day and enjoy the beauty around you! 

March 28:

Hey, I've got some nice folks in from New Jersey and will be showing them around this week.  Also got some more people from up North coming and some nice folks from Florida who want to relocate to the Greenville SC Area.

Gosh, I wish this rain would let up though!  What the hey, got to show rain or shine, ya'll take care and call me if you need help 864-335-8490!

Look What flew over the Back Yard! Must be heading to the Lake!

March 26:

Good morning, hey had a past buyer ask about pricing in their neighborhood so I thought I'd copy you in on the email I sent after doing a comparative market analysis for them.  They had asked me how accurate Zillow is on pricing.

 

March 21:


March 19:


March 18:

Good morning, hey it's been a busy week, thought I'd drop a quick post before the weekend.  It was just beautiful yesterday, about 75 or so. 

Anyway, real estate is a fun business to be in but even now I still get amazed.  Here's what happened.  About a week ago I had a nice lady contact me to help her and the family move to the Greenville area.  She was looking for a realtor who is a buyers agent and contacted me.  Well, of course I am always glad to help.  But, she asked if I work with so and so relocation company. Sorry folks, I can't name names.  I said I have in the past along with others but not now. So.....she contacted them to see if she could work with me.

The relocation company called me and said if I was willing to accept their referral fee I could work with the buyer.  Now, ya'll sit down, do you want to know what their "referral" fee was?  38%, yep you are reading that right.  38%!  Now first of all I thought a "referral" fee was for actually "referring" someone.  This nice lady found me on the internet, on her own, wanted to work with me and her "relocation company" wants 38% of my company's commission to do what?  Nothing, I mean absolutely nothing!  I agreed because the buyer seemed really nice and was moving her kids down and was really concerned about areas, school, etc. 

Well, then I get the relocation company's agreement.  And don't get me started but I just wish you could see the terms.  So let me sum it up, they didn't do anything..... are asking for 38% of my commission, expect me to do all the work and my company to have all the liability for the transaction and want an agreement that let's be cordial and say is slightly slanted!!!!

I have to pass, now way am I going to put my time and expertise to work and have to give up so much, and be bound to an unreasonable agreement. 

Ticks me off just thinking about it!  If it wasn't so sunny out, I'd probably pout a bit then go off and help some nice folks find some great Greenville SC Real Estate!

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!




March 14:

I hope you had a wonderful weekend.  Talk about some nice weather, mid to upper 70s, that's right 70s.  Can you believe it.  Got a bunch of yard work done yesterday.  Anyway, pretty busy week with some people coming in considering Greenville SC!  Gotta run so I hope you have a wonderful day!


March 11:

Good morning! Hey with spring on the way let's take a look at what's happening in Greenville this weekend!  Things should be picking up.

Easter Strolling Tour at Bob Jones University up to when the Living Gallery is presented.  Mediterranean Nights at the Gunter Theatre.  At The Chef's Table Culinary Tour-meet executive chefs at 5 restaurants and eat!  Return to The Green-Family celebration of Irish culture.  Arenacross at the Bi-Lo Center.  That's mainly downtown event folks, there's a lot more going on in the area though!

36 degrees out now but should get up to about 57 today and up to 70 this weekend.  Hey Tom what do you think about that?  Tom has about 3 feet of snow still hanging around....

Folk, I'm getting ready to do some more video tours and extensive pictures of the Upstate for you.  I get a lot of compliments on them and just usually drop a lot of that through the winter.  But as the weather warms, look for a lot of area pages to be updated and some new videos and even new image galleries to be added.

I hope you have a wonderful weekend!



March 10:

So what's going on in the wide world of real estate this morning?  Man, we've been getting the rain here lately in Greenville.  But hey, I'm not complaining, got my grass seed out and my fertilizer, which reminds me.  I've got a nice fellow and his wife coming down in a few weeks and I asked him if he still had any snow up there (he is from up north).  He emailed me on the 3rd and said he still had about 3 feet of snow in his yard!  WOW, ya'll got to get down here!

I meant to tell you a story about a fellow I showed a home to a month or so ago.  Now you're not going to believe this but I've been showing him homes off and own for years now.  You see he transferred here and had a home to sell, so we started looking.   Well, that took about a year, no problem.  Then he wasn't sure about his job, but we kept looking.  Then he'd find one he really wanted to make offer on, then I wouldn't hear from him. 

Finally, he felt good about making an offer but couldn't find quite the "right" home, or he'd wait too long and it would go under contract.  Actually, 3 homes got away from him because he waited too long.  R U getting the picture?

Anyway, a few weeks ago he called and said he had a home he wanted to look at, so I met him there.  Folks, now I'm going to tell you something.  If I don't like a home you will be the first to know, but if I like it....well you'll be the first to know, if I tell you it's a pretty good value and there's probably nothing else like it you will ever find....well...um....you might    want    to    think    about    making    an    offer   on   it!

Yep, there it was right in front of him, smacking him in the face, saying "buy me".  It was an investor property that had been almost totally redone, and it was nice, and it had been reduced significantly, and it was in a good area, and ,and, and it was in his price range!  They had one offer on it and I told him if he was serious he needed to offer list or a little over if he really wanted it.  Well, here's where the problem with his thinking is and with a lot of people.

He didn't want to give list, even though in my opinion the home was probably worth at least $20,000 more than they were asking for it.  By the way, it was listed at $150,000.  See, here's the thing, if the seller would have offered the home at $160,000 my buyer would have had no problem offering $150,000.  But....now it's about ego, you know I'm not going to give anyone list for a property.  Well, folks real estate around here really doesn't sell at list as a matter of fact very few homes sell for list, but it does happen, especially when it is a tremendous value!  So get over it man, you've been looking for years an up comes a property that is exactly what you've been wanting and YOU DON'T MAKE AN OFFER?   Say what?  Yes, it ended up with two other offers and yes you may not have got it but, YOU DON'T MAKE AN OFFER? 

Hey, I think it's more to it, don't you?

Very truly yours,

Don, your Greenville SC Realtor and what?  Yep, Exclusive Buyers Agent...


March 9:

Good morning!  I certainly hope your week is going well.  Update on one of the transactions I've got going.  We got the repair request back from the sellers and it was pretty much what I expected.  There's one stickler though. 

In an inspection there are generally some things that a home inspector can't inspect.  Alarm systems are one of them.  Why?  99% of the time the seller isn't there for the home inspection and the inspector doesn't have the instructions to see if the system operates properly.  Usually same thing with sprinkler systems.

Anywho, if it can't be inspected we just ask for demonstration of the system prior to closing or at "walk through".  I asked for this on the alarm system and the response was that they "never used it and never were given the codes".  Problem is folks, the alarm system is show in the MLS information as a "feature". 

That means that it's supposed to be operable.  Well, I'm not saying it's not operable and most likely it works, but.... if a company has to come out there and reprogram it, it is going to cost money, and really my buyers shouldn't be responsible to put the system in "operation". 

Hey, I hope you have a wonderful day! Call me if you need some help finding some great Greenville SC Real Estate!


Don


March 7:

Good morning!  I hope you had a wonderful weekend.  So what's happening with Greenville SC Real Estate today? 

Let's check the Greenville SC MLS:

Over the last 3 days we had....

109 New Listings, now let me write about this a bit.  They may not be really new because some of the listings could have expired or been relisted.

32 Listings Expired 

113 Price Changes, I'm sure 99% of these went down.

31 Listings Sold, that means that 31 listings were changed to sold status in the MLS.  They could have actually closed more than 3 days ago. 

555 Pending Transactions.  You would think this is all that is under contract, well not quite.  There is a lot more real estate under contract than this.  But what a lot of listing agents like to do is keep the status of a property contingent for as long as they can, many times till it closes. 

You see there are different status in the MLS.  Active, contingent, pending and closed transactions.  Active listings show active, but also do contingent listings.  Why, well the seller is allowed to continue to market the property because there are "contingencies"...like inspections, financing, appraisal, etc.  That's fine but just know unless you carefully look at the notes then you may think a property is active while in fact it is under contract. 

That's why I give you option in my Advanced Real Estate Search to return only really active properties! 

I listen to feedback and am always trying to improve my site to help you the buyer!

Don Wessel your Greenville SC Realtor and Exclusive Buyers Agent!

Sunday:


April 3:

Hey, I'm getting pretty good feedback on my just listed reports.  Don't know if you've seen them yet but it's a real good way to check in every so often and see what's new in Greenville SC Real Estate!  I've got it set up two ways.  If you want to check what has come on the market in the last 3 days click:

Just Listed Report 3 days

If you haven't visited Greenville SC Real Estate in a few days and want to check in then click:

Just listed report 6 days

This is a great way to see new listings without getting on auto email updates.


April 2:

Hey, I told you I was going to walk you through a transaction last week or so...Here's an update.  Did the home inspection, termite inspection and appraisal last week.  Termite inspection was "clean".  Home inspection, we had a few items and have made a request to the seller.  Oh, by the way, we did do a radon test too and that came back low.  And the appraisal came in more than the buyer paid!  So that's good.  So, at this point, we are just waiting for a response from the seller on the repair request.

How do you know spring is almost here..... SOCCER!


February 28:

Hey the word is the weather!  You talking about beautiful..... put all my windows up yesterday and actually got to sit by the pool.... Daffodils are blooming!  And business is really picking up.  I helped a couple who relocated their family from the New York area write a contract for new construction yesterday.  In the $450,000 range.  The onsite agent said they had 8 new contracts going just in that neighborhood and another 5 going in a sister neighborhood. 

I promised Jim I'd answer my question from last week about the number one reason that a home doesn't sell....

drum roll...

PRICE!, PRICE!, PRICE!, that's always the problem.  Now sure, if it was a crack house, that will have something to do with it too.  But even crack houses sell if the price to buy them and destroy and rebuild is less than what the buyer will make on it.

Another thing, most good listing agents will tell you if a home is not getting at least two showings a week, then it is time for a price reduction.  Two a week.  If it's not showing two times a week then it's probably over priced.

Gosh,  I'm going to enjoy the weather today and try and get caught up. 


February 26:

Hey folks, I've got to run but I had a nice fellow email me with a great idea.  He suggested that I put a link to new listings as they come on the market so it would be easy for people to check in and see what just got listed.  Hey, I hear ya!  Here is the link folks with past 3 days new listings!  It rolls every day so you can check in to see what's going on in Greenville SC Real Estate!

Click Just Listed to see!!!

February 24:

You know folks, I've said it before and I'm going to say it again.  There are very few exclusive buyers agents in the area.  Just saw another fellow advertising himself as Greenville's buyers agent, well is that so.... thought I'd check to see if he has any listings...ummmm, let's see MLS says 6 active listings, now I though you were a buyers agent? 

See, not really you are a listing agent who happens to work with buyers....

So what happens if your buyer wants to buy your listing, I bet you don't refer it away do you?  No, cause then you might lose the buyer and sale.  Folks, I don't list, period... I am an exclusive buyers agent.  I only work for buyers in the buyers best interest.  I am not tied to any seller or listing, period.

Ya'll have a good one....

D

February 23:

Good morning!  Got some showings with a nice couple this afternoon who want to move to the area, then I've got another fellow coming in looking from just out the Washington DC area.  Looking forward to it cause it is BEAUTIFUL outside! 

Question for you.  What is the number one reason a property doesn't sell?


February 22:

Folks, I tell you it is really picking up.  How do I know?  Well got 4 inquires just yesterday from people interested in relocating to Greenville!

Hey, thought I'd do something a little different.  Just put a home under contract with a very nice couple from IL that are retiring to the area.  Thought I'd let you follow it through the transaction.

Well, they came down on the 7h of February and we spent about 4 days looking for homes in the Greenville area.  Finally on the last day, found something they liked in Simpsonville so we put an offer in and got a contract.  They have a home closing end of March so the contract will be contingent upon their home closing. 

Folks, like I've said before it's ok to write a contingent on closing contract when your home is under contract but not a contingent on sale.  So anyway, we have 15 days from last Friday to get all our due diligence done and make a repair request, if any.  By the way this is a cash deal.  And the contract is contingent on appraisal too.

All inspections and appraisal are scheduled for Thursday so I'll keep you posted how that goes.

Boy the weather sure has been wonderful around here.  70's!  I've got to get that fertilizer and weed killer out!

Hope you have a great day and please call me at 864-335-8490 or email me at donwessel@gmail.com if I can help!  Go get you some breakfast!



February 18:

Good morning!  I think it's going to be a beautiful day!  Anyway I've got a closing this morning with a first time homebuyer.  I really enjoy helping them get their first home.  They are so excited and they really need guidance.  So I'm off to do a final walk through then on to closing.  Ya'll have a good one and come see me some time.


February 17:

Good morning.  Gosh what a pretty day yesterday.  We've had days close to the 70's which is so nice....  Especially after the snow and really cold winter we had. 

Hey, I want to cut a paste an email I got the other day from a first time homebuyer.  I thought these were some pretty good questions.

Good afternoon Don,

We have done some house hunting over the weekend and have found some that interest us. But before we decide which agent to use we have a few questions that we would like you to answer. Since this is our first home-buying experience we are interviewing a few realtors to find which one suits us best. Just shoot an email back. Thank you!

1.       What type of agent are you (exclusive, non-exclusive, or designated)?  Exclusive, I have not listed any homes in years.  I'm only designated if you want that.   Never dual.

2.       How much experience do you have as a buyer’s agent?   I've been an exclusive buyers agent for most of my career. 

3.       What credentials/certifications do you have as an agent?  Accredited Buyers Agent.

4.       Are you a full time Realtor?  Yes. 

5.       How much experience do you have with short sales?   I do not work short sales, I can relate numerous horror stories regarding them.   

6.       When was your last transaction?  2 weeks ago. 

7.       What is your schedule like this week?   Flexible. 

8.       Could you give me three references of your most recent buyers?  Sure, if you want to meet in person, I'll be glad to. 

9.       Can you provide a recent list of homes you have helped a buyer with, showing the asking price and the final sale price?   Sure, if you want to meet in person, I'll be glad to. 

10.   How do you get paid?  by the transaction, no fee to you.

One thing I really want to highlight is this question here:

  How much experience do you have with short sales?

Folks, if you've followed my blog at all then you know how I feel about short sales.  The problem is though that I continually get asked about them.  People still think they are some kind of deal.  No, no and one more time no.  Now I suppose I could have answered that question "Why yes I'll be glad to help you with a short sale"  Cause I suppose some realtors would do that to get you to work with them. 

Ok, so here's another short sale story for you.  Realtor in the office spent 6 months helping his seller sell his home "short".  Now this is 6 months from the time they had a contract mind you.  I mean seriously what buyer would wait 6 months to buy a home???  Well one did, and guess what?  3 days before closing, the bank did what????  Guess.... no I mean really, guess.....

BACKED OUT, yep you heard that right they BACKED OUT

So I'm gonna say it one more time, ya'll want me to help you with a short sale, you need to get another realtor.  Foreclosure, yes, short sale, forget it.  So, that's my rant for the day.  Ya'll have a good one.

Don



February 16:

Folks, I am sorry I've been away for so long.  Lot happening and a lot of stories to relate!  I'm busy all day today updating my web site and will update this page later with a few stories and pictures!

                Greenville SC Real Estate and Updates for January 2010

Greenville SC Real Estate Updates and Blogs for September, October 2010

Greenville SC Real Estate and Blog Updates for August 2010

Greenville SC Real Estate and Blog Updates for July 2010

Greenville SC Real Estate and Blog Updates for June 2010
     
Greenville SC Blog and Real Estate Updates for May 2010

April 2010 Blog and Real Estate Updates  

 

March 2010 Greenville South Carolina Blog Updates
 February 10 Blog January 10 Blog  December 09 Blog  November 09 Blog 
October 09 Blog Updates September 09 Blog Updates 
August 09 Blog Updates July 09 Blog Updates
June 09 Blog Updates May09Blog  Updates April 09 Blog Updates 
March 09 Blog Updates   February 09 Blog Updates 
Jan 09 Blog Updates  December 08 Updates Past Real Estate Blog Updates