Sequim roofing repairs are often needed when buying a home, but buyers face a potential dilemma on this issue.  Once you and the seller are done negotiating the price, and you have a firm contract (mutual acceptance), you’ll want to hire a home inspector during your due diligence period.  What if the roof needs to be replaced at a cost of $14,000?  Who will pay for that–you as the buyer or the seller?

Sequim Roofing Repairs for Buyers

A home inspector cannot tell you if the roof needs repair.  His liability insurance carrier prohibits him from making specific recommendations or drawing ultimate conclusions about things like roofing, the foundation, the heating system, and so on.  So if he thinks the roof might need repair or replacement, he will recommend you bring in a roofing contractor to tell you.

Sequim Roofing Inspections

Here’s the challenge.  There are roofing contractors who will tell you the roof needs to be totally replaced even if the roof has many years left.  They make their living replacing roofs, not giving fee advise.  But this kind of advice can literally kill your real estate transaction, because if you as a buyer present an estimate for a Sequim roofing job in the amount of $18,000 to the seller and ask him to reduce the price or give you a credit, the seller is likely to freak.  In this market the seller may have already reduced his price a couple of times over the past year, and then he agreed to a further reduction in the negotiations with you, so he already feels he is below what he is entitled to. He may be wrong, of course, but the point is he is not going to buy you a new roof at this late stage in the negotiations.  But what if the roof really did not need to be replaced?

Sequim Roofing Solutions

An honest professional opinion on a Sequim roofing job is absolutely critical to the successful negotiation of your purchase. If the roof really has 10 years of life left, you don’t need to get into a knock-down-and-drag-out fight with the seller and risk losing the home.  If the roof has 5 years left, perhaps you just replace it in 5 years, because you already negotiated a very good price on the home.  I’ve personally interviewed a number of Sequim roofing contractors and I know their work.  When I act as a buyer’s agent, I help my clients work through any Sequim roofing issues, and when appropriate, we can negotiate a partial reduction in the price.  But that is a delicate issue with a seller, and it takes some negotiating finesse to resolve serious Sequim roofing issues.

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The largest Sequim Real Estate Blog has received an upgrade, and this is good news for buyers from outside the Sequim area. If you enjoy sports, you’ll appreciate this analogy.  A great athlete makes his moves look easy, but behind his extraordinary athletic feats are years of blood, sweat, and dedication.  A great basketball player navigates the court gracefully, dodging and weaving his way to the key, and then suddenly explodes with a series of powerful moves punctuated by a dramatic slam dunk. This Sequim Real Estate Blog makes navigating the Internet seem easy, but it will guide you to your goal with content rich information about buying Sequim real estate.  Under the hood of this site is powerful programming, rich information for buyers, and organization that is designed and constantly improved to meet buyers’ needs and preferences.  This site has taken many years of blood, sweat, and dedication to create and to maintain. Yet all of this is absolutely free for buyers.

Sequim Real Estate Blog

Sequim Real Estate Blog – What Info?

You’ll love the “MLS Search” site, which I believe is the most powerful Sequim MLS and Port Angeles MLS site online.  Like the great athlete who looks like a normal guy, this site looks like a normal MLS site, but it is so much more powerful than its simple appearance.  There’s a lot under the hood that you’ll never know about, but you’ll love the site.  You’ll love the “Featured Listings,” which will show you some of the most beautiful homes on the market.  These are also Chuck Marunde’s listings.  You’ll see that our graphics on the Sequim Real Estate Blog are looking better than ever.  While we focus on content and tools for buyers, a little eye candy can’t hurt.   Read the rest of this entry »

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I act as a short sale agent representing buyers from time to time, and it’s the toughest job I have.  Short sales are very difficult to get through the bank approval process in the Sequim and Port Angeles area.

Short Sale Agent on Hold

I wrote an offer for buyers from Washington D.C. as their short sale agent 293 days ago, and we are still waiting for the bank to approve the offer that was accepted by the seller.  A big part of success in any short sale is the experience and competence of the short sale agent for the seller, or the short sale negotiator. If a listing agent acts as the negotiator, he or she better know what they are doing.  Few agents ever acquire specialized short sale experience necessary, and that is why I recommend a full time experienced short sale negotiator. In this case where we are still waiting after nine months, I asked the seller’s agent to get her seller to approve bringing in a short sale negotiator, but that did not happen.  There are other variables as to why a short sale can drag out, but I always bring in one of the best negotiators in the country.  I pay the negotiator out of my commission, but it is well worth it.  Read the rest of this entry »

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Is a backup offer a good idea?  If you’ve searched for your next home for many months before coming to Sequim, and you go out with your Sequim Buyer’s Agent and look at 6 to 12 homes and find your ideal retirement home, you would be quite disappointed to find out your perfect home just sold.  So the question you may ask your buyer’s agent is, “Should I make a backup offer?”

Sold – The Backup Offer

A backup offer can be submitted when there is an accepted offer in first place.  If the backup offer is at least as good or better than the first offer, the seller will be inclined to accept your backup offer.  If the buyer in first backs out or if the appraisal or underwriter kill the transaction, your backup offer automatically steps into first position.

The Backup Offer – Waiting Impatiently

A backup offer could be a waste of time, and 95% of the time, it would be.  In Sequim sellers are not accepting offers unless the buyer is pre-qualified with a loan officer and has a good story about their job and their (retirement) income. Read the rest of this entry »

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Buying Sequim real estate is a challenging process, and there are a number of traps for the unwary.  Your goal most likely includes finding your ideal retirement home, negotiating the best possible price, and negotiating the best terms.  Today I want to share something that is very important for buyers, something that will help you understand what may happen during the due diligence period.

Sequim Real Estate Inspections

The home inspection is very important, because the inspector’s job is to find any and all problems in the house or even potential problems.  The inspector will find out if there is standing water in the crawl space, and he will tell you if the composition shingles need to be replaced.  Of course, most homes will not have major issues of concern, but what if your home does?  What if the Sequim real estate you are buying has a problem that is fixable but would be expensive?  Will the seller reduce the price or will he pay for it?  Read the rest of this entry »

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Sequim homes are selling at a substantially increased pace. I’ve compiled data for the first quarter of every year since 2003 to get an accurate picture of how Sequim homes sold so far in 2013 compares with past years.  Here’s a nice visual aide that makes the point better than words.

Sequim Homes Sold – Visual Aide

Sequim Homes Sold – The Interpretation

The peak of the real estate market in Sequim was 2005, and for Port Angeles it was 2007.  Sequim homes sold started a steady decline from 2005 to 2009 with a burst of activity in 2010, and then 2011 and 2012 maintained lower but level sales numbers.  As the tall blue bar shows so clearly, in the first quarter of 2013, Sequim homes sold took a huge leap to 96. That is a 100% increase over last year at this time.

Sequim Homes and The Real Estate Market

While this is generally good news for sellers, it may not be for buyers.  Some buyers are having some difficulty finding their ideal retirement home, and that is precisely because the best homes in the best areas are selling.  That segment of the inventory is shrinking.  Will this momentum in home sales continue throughout 2013?  That remains to be seen, but we certainly are off to a good start for 2013.  Sequim homes are selling in a surprisingly strong market right now. 

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Sequim real estate transactions are never boring.  No two transactions are alike.  Buyers rarely see all the excitement behind the scenes, so today I’ll share some of the excitement of the last two days of Sequim real estate transactions. 

Sequim Real Estate Transactions – Sold

Yesterday I listed a beautiful three bedroom single level home on an acre of landscaped Heaven.  I took photos, uploaded the listing data and photos to both MLSs, and installed my signage and a lockbox.  The owner, my client, was looking to downsize and had a sweet condo in mind.  I drafted the offer on the condo subject to the sale of her own home.  That was yesterday, and it was yesterday that I learned a cash offer came in on that condo from another buyer, and the seller accepted that other offer.  That was a disappointment for my client.

Sequim Real Estate Transactions – Quick Offer

Yesterday evening an offer came in on my client’s home.  That was very encouraging, because she listed the home and received an offer on the same day.  We scheduled time to get together the next day, which was today.  Little did I know the excitement had only just begun for these Sequim real estate transactions. Read the rest of this entry »

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The Sequim real estate market is in a very interesting phase right now. We have an apparent contradiction in the market.  We have homes that have been listed for sale for over 1,500 days, and we have 77 homes that have been on the market for more than one year.  And yet we have homes that are selling as soon as they hit the market in the first few days, and buyers are bidding some of those homes above the listed prices. 

Sequim Real Estate Market

The Sequim Real Estate Market Heats Up

I recently submitted a full price offer for a buyer, and the offer addressed the fact that the roof would have to be replaced, asking that the seller share that cost.  Normally, the seller would respond with a counteroffer, but in this case the listing agent reported back to me that the seller had accepted one of three other offers that all came in at the same time.  I’ve written many full price offers in the past six months and one above listed price.  From this perspective, the Sequim real estate market is recovering nicely.

Sequim Real Estate Market Recovering?

At the same time we have many homes that have been on the market for two or three years or more.  And we have other homes in between that have been on the market for quite a while, but then sell to the perfect buyer who comes to Sequim at the right time, like the home in this photo.  What is happening is really no surprise.  Retirees are looking for nice homes in nice areas, and they want a good floor plan, a newer home with quality construction, and they want a great location with a nice view of water or mountains.  These are the homes that are selling nicely in the Sequim real estate market.  The homes that are less appealing are left sitting on the market for long periods of time. This creates an apparent contradiction in the market so that one person might say the market is still in a serious recession, and someone else might say the Sequim real estate market is heating up and in recovery.

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