Portsmouth NH Homes Condos Real Estate » Selling Real Estate in the Seacoast

Selling Your Portsmouth NH Home During The Holidays

Ann Cummings — Sun, 29 Nov 2009 02:18:56 +0000

Home and condo owners in Portsmouth NH…

and elsewhere, always ask questions about what to do during the holidays with regards to their decorations. That’s a great question and one that should be taken seriously, by both the agent and the sellers, whether you’re selling a condo or a home.

Less is best, as the saying goes. Not all potential buyers will appreciate a heavily decorated home, nor will all potential home buyers have the same taste you have in decorations.

The goal is to get your Portsmouth home or condo sold…

….and you want all buyers to be able to see your home and not be caught up in looking at your decorations. Some fresh greens in a few areas, and maybe some holiday-colored candles would be something festive and simple to use. Some nice white lights add a nice touch, and also serve to light the outside of your house as a welcoming gesture.

A recent article in the Portsmouth Herald has some great tips for holiday decorating – “Selling Your Home? Go Easy On Holiday Decor”. Use this as a professional guide to help you with your holiday decorating.

Would you like information on the New Hampshire or Maine real estate market? Do you have questions about the buying or selling process? Give me a call at 1-888-349-5678 x 3839 or send me an email and let’s talk Portsmouth NH real estate!

Servicing the New Hampshire towns of Portsmouth, Newcastle, Rye, North Hampton, Hampton, Stratham, Exeter, Greenland, Newington, Dover, Durham and surrounding areas, and the Maine towns of Kittery, Kittery Point, Eliot, South Berwick, York, and surrounding areas.

Sell Your Portsmouth NH Home Faster and For More Money

Ann Cummings — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 21:50:00 +0000

Trying to sell your Portsmouth NH home or condo?

If you are, then you know competing for today’s buyers is quite challenging, to say the least.

Want to increase the chances of those buyers wanting to make your Portsmouth home theirs!

You need to go the extra step or two to make your house as welcoming and inviting as you can, and that means from the curb to the inside.

In a recent article in the Portsmouth Herald, an article “Staging Helps Home Sale Speed and Price”, the author talked about the benefits of making sure your home is properly presented to potential buyers, and ways to go about doing that. Be sure to check out that article for more detailed information on the staging process and how it can help in the home-selling process.

Getting your Portsmouth NH home sold in today’s real estate market….

….means working with your experienced professional NH REALTOR – setting the proper price and setting the right presentation of your home.

For buyers in today’s market, it’s the EXPERIENCE they feel when they view your home, and you want that to be the very best it can be, from the first moment they lay eyes on your home from the street. That exterior curb appeal has to be such that it makes them want to come see the inside of the home. Once they’re inside, you want your entryway to speak to them and beckon them in further.

Getting things right from the start – price and presentation – will help your home sell quicker than the competition and typically for the most money the market will bear. It’s all about attention to detail and the experience!

Selling Your Portsmouth NH Home – Three Times Or More

Ann Cummings — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 13:20:00 +0000

Did you know it takes at least 3 times to sell your Portsmouth NH home to get it SOLD??

Yes, you read that correctly!

The first time you sell it is to other agents working with buyers. When you have your home on the market, you want the agents who are showing it to really try to sell YOUR home and not your competition.

The second time you sell it is to the buyer. Typically most homeowners think the buyer is the only one they have to sell to, but if the agents aren’t sold it, the buyer may never get a chance to see it.

The third time you have to sell your house is to the bank or mortgage company’s appraiser. Appraisers today are pretty conservative and their appraisals are being scrutinized like never before. They really have to make sure they can justify and support the value they come up with.

Recently, we’ve found ourselves having to deal with second appraisals. Some banks and mortgage companies have been ordering a second appraisal to be done, oftentimes after the mortgage commitment date has passed. So, that means homeowners could be subjected to having to sell their homes four times.

There’s so much competition on the market in many areas and in most price ranges that it’s imperative you price your home to sell right from the start. You might reach an agreement with a buyer on a price you’re both happy with, but that price must also pass muster with the appraiser, and then perhaps a second appraiser.

Get your Portsmouth NH home or condo SOLD!!

Your local Portsmouth NH REALTOR who has the knowledge and experience to give you the best advice on pricing and getting your home show-ready is doing just what you’ve hired them to do – help you to reach your goal of getting your home or condo sold. Your best sold price is likely to happen in the shortest amount of time if you’ve priced your home correctly in the beginning and if you’ve taken extra effort to make sure your home creates a great first impression on the buyers and their agents who are interested in seeing it.

If you’re thinking about selling your Portsmouth NH area home, I’d welcome an opportunity to show you how I can put my proven track record of success to work for you!

Would you like information on the Portsmouth New Hampshire real estate market? Do you have questions about the selling process? Give me a call at 1-888-349-5678 x 3839 or send me an email and let’s talk real estate!

Top 7 Reasons To Put Your Home on The Market During the Holidays

Ann Cummings — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 00:08:54 +0000

Should you or shouldn’t you put your home on the market during the holidays?? Here’s a list of 7 reasons to really think about going forward!

New Hampshire and Maine Homeowners

Should I put my home on the market during the holidays?

I get asked this question frequently, and it seems to the top question for NH and Maine Seacoast homeowners when I talk to them this holiday season. My answer is, “if you’re serious about selling your home, then by all means let’s go ahead and put it on the real estate market for sale!”

If a homeowner isn’t really serious about selling, then this is certainly not the time to ‘test the market’, not that there ever is a good time to do that. If you’re not serious about selling, why go to all that effort and hire an agent to expend time, effort, and money trying to get your home sold when you don’t really care whether it sells or not?

Buyers need to buy homes, and they don’t aways get to choose the optimal time of year to do so. Those buyers who are out looking during the holidays are serious buyers.

Here are the top 7 reasons to seriously consider putting your home on the market for sale during the holidays:

– Buyers looking during the holidays are very serious buyers and they usually have to make quicker decisions about buying.

– There are fewer homes on the real estate market during the holidays, so your competition is less, which means there aren’t as many homes for serious buyers to choose from.

– Buyers who are buying during the holidays usually have that specific time off to look and buy.

– Your home is beautifully decorated and therefore shows warmth and happiness to those looking at your home.

– Residential real estate is all about emotions, and buyers’ choices on a home to pursue is typically based on the home that gives them happy and warm feelings.

– Many job transfers and relocations take place at the end of the year or during January, and by having your home on the market during the holidays, you can tap into those buyers who have to buy for job transfers.

– There are buyers who want/need to buy before the year ends for tax purposes and financial reasons.

If you’re a homeowner in the New Hampshire or Maine Seacoast area and you’re thinking about seling your home, give me a call and we can talk further about getting your home on the market.

Are you thinking about making the Portsmouth New Hampshire area or any of the surrounding Seacoast towns your home? Call me today at 888-349-5678 x 3839, or send me an email at ann@anncummings.com, and let’s talk real estate!

Pricing Your Seacoast NH Homes and Condos Correctly for Todays Market

Pricing Your Home To Sell

Portsmouth NH Homeowners – Thinking About Selling Your Home?

Ann Cummings — Fri, 31 Oct 2008 18:32:56 +0000

Portsmouth New Hampshire Homeowners – Ready to Sell Your
Home?

If you’re a Portsmouth New Hampshire home or condo owner, and
you’re thinking about selling your home or condo, you already
know that a good amount of work goes into preparing for the real estate
market.

Picking your REALTOR, preparing the inside of your home,
creating great curb appeal for the outside of your home, pricing your home or
condo properly, planning for showings – all of this takes careful planning
because you want to have your Portsmouth home or condo be in
the best position it can be in when it comes on the market for sale.

Make your home be the best it can be. Have it say on the outside, “come on
in and see the rest of me”. And once on the inside, have your home or condo
really welcome potential buyers.

This quick video will give you some ideas about getting the inside of your
home to look just fabulous for those potential buyers who might just want your
home to be their new home -

Fall Selling Tips for Portsmouth NH Homes and Condos

Ann Cummings — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 06:37:01 +0000

Selling Tips for Homeowners in Portsmouth New Hampshire

If you’re
thinking about selling your home or condo in Portsmouth
NH, what a great season to help enhance the beauty of your
home!

Fall colors and scents are glorious here in New Hampshire and Maine. Embrace
them and use them to help showcase your condo or home to potential Portsmouth
homebuyers.

Fall here in the Seacoast is just gorgeous, and these tips will help you
incorporate that beauty into your Portsmouth NH home to help
potential buyers see that beauty as well!

Some of these tips are common sense, and some add a really nice welcoming
feeling to potential buyers and their agents, and they all offer homeowners easy
things to think about doing if their home is for sale.

– “Curb Appeal” – never forget to think about
those all-important ‘first impressions’. With the gorgeous colors of fall
leaves, this can add to a home’s already existing appeal, however all those
leaves laying around on the ground certainly don’t. Clean them up!!

–
“Celebrate the Season”
- this is one that I have to admit I wouldn’t have given much thought
to. Embrace the fall and have fall decorating items–hang a nice
fall wreath, arrange some pumpkins & corn stalks – what a nice way
to greet people at the front door. Nothing says ‘welcome’ like a
nice display of seasonal things at the entry of a
home!

– “Let the Light In” – oh how important
this one is!! If you have heavy curtains or drapes, open them up and let the
sun shine in!! Turn on lamps and make your home exude a warmth and welcome for
showings.

– “Your Fireplace” – if you have a fireplace, this
is a lovely time of year to show it off. Place a log or two in the fireplace,
or if you have a gas fireplace, flick the switch and have a nice fire
burning/glowing to welcome potential homebuyers. You can place a nice candle
holder in the fireplace that holds several candles. What a great way to say
welcome to those looking at your home or condo!

– “Scents of the Season” - the sense of smell is
the strongest sense to appeal to. Most people are greatly enticed by the scents
of cinnamon and apples. Bake a fresh apple pie and/or cinnamon cookies – what a
great way to welcome potential homebuyers! Leave a plate of these fresh-baked
goodies with a note to have buyers enjoy a treat while viewing your home – a
very nice touch that they won’t forget.

These tips
were inspired by an article in Realty Times written by Michele Dawson.
They are just as timely today as when they were written several years ago. To
read the full article and see more tips, click
here….

If you’re thinking about selling your Portsmouth NH home or
condo, give me a call! We can set up a time to meet and discuss the
current Portsmouth
area real estate market and ways to get your home
S-O-L-D! Call me today at 888-349-5678 x 3839, or send me an email at
ann@anncummings.com, and let’s talk
real estate!

Ann Cummings, New Hampshire REALTOR

RE/MAX Coast to Coast
Portsmouth
NH
ann@anncummings.com
888-349-5678 x
3839
Servicing the Coastal
Areas of NH & Southern Maine

Portsmouth NH Homes – Make Your Home Easy to Show And Easy to Sell!

Ann Cummings — Fri, 04 Jul 2008 16:44:37 +0000

It’s Showtime For Your Portsmouth NH Home or Condo!

One of the most important conversations we’ll
have after the correct pricing of your home, will be the showing instructions
of your Portsmouth home for sale. You’re
weighing a lot of factors like commission, marketing, and staging. I want to
talk about a couple of very important aspects of selling Portsmouth homes and condos.

Accessibility of your home for sale

More simply put, showing instructions. These
instructions can make or break the showings of your Portsmouth NH
home for sale. As an experienced New Hampshire REALTOR,
I know that many times requests for showings happen at the last
minute. Many things can create that last minute urgency
for a showing of your home for sale:

– A woman
drops by an Open House that an agent is hosting; based on your
conversation the REALTOR remember a particular home that might be
perfect. After a quick check with a
pre-qualification, the woman’s REALTOR attempts to book a last minute appointment
for your home.
– Many times
I decide on several homes for a client based on their criteria, yet in the
second home they show the criteria changes. That is when a good agent
adjusts course and tries to show homes within the new criteria. And many times this causes a
need to make appointments with short notice.
– A client
gets an MLS listing automatically from the agent, and absolutely has to see
it because they love the way it looks.
– You are
driving to an appointment and the client yells “STOP the car – that is my
dream house”. A quick check, sign in the yard, a call to find
out information, and try and get in.
– Your
listing just came up on the MLS in the morning before the agent goes out
with their clients, and they want to add your home to their list.

Portsmouth NH Real Estate – Ready to Sell Your Home or Condo?

Ann Cummings — Thu, 29 May 2008 04:36:30 +0000

Portsmouth New Hampshire Homeowners and Condo Owners

Have you been thinking about selling your Portsmouth home or
condo? Not sure where to start to get it ready for the real
estate market? You want your home or condo to look its best right from
the start, so taking care of these things BEFORE you list your home. Our real
estate inventory is a little on the high side, making this a very competitive
market right now. You want YOUR home or condo to outshine the competition,
right?

Here’s a checklist to help you do just that:

Create a great first impression!

Walk around the outside of your house, and look at it with a critical
eye.
Check your mailbox – make sure the number is clearly legible and make sure
the box is firmly attached.
Get your lawn fertilized, and keep that grass looking great with regular
mowings.
Plant some pretty flowers for nice splashes of color.
Freshen up your mulch.
Buy new ‘welcome’ mats to welcome your potential buyers.

Read Also:
Home
Selling Tips – Part 1

Make the inside of your home shiny
and spacious!

Go through your home and get rid of unwanted and unused items.
Have a yard sale – get rid of things you no longer want or need, and make
some money while at it.
Clean off the counters in your kitchen and bathrooms.
Remove all the artwork, lists, magnets, etc. from the refrigerator.
Make sure all lightbulbs are working – proper lighting makes everything look
better.

To get your Portsmouth New Hampshire home ready for
sale, I found a great
checklist put out by Lowe’s that will help you get organized and really
ready to put your home on the market. I found this list to be a big help even
if you aren’t thinking about selling, and you just want to be better organized
in your home or condo.

Thinking about selling your Portsmouth New Hampshire home or
condo? Call me today at 603-431-1111 x 3839, or send me an email at ann@anncummings.com, and let’s talk
real estate!

Ann Cummings, Maine and New Hampshire REALTOR
RE/MAX Coast
to Coast
Portsmouth NH
  ann@anncummings.com

888-349-5678 x 3839
Servicing the Coastal
Areas of NH & Southern Maine

Portsmouth NH Real Estate – Absorption Rates and Why They Are Important

Ann Cummings — Fri, 02 May 2008 06:04:56 +0000

Portsmouth New Hampshire Real Estate Absorption Rate Information

If you’re a property owner in the
Portsmouth New Hampshire area, or anywhere for that matter, one of the
things that’s really important to know in today’s real estate
market is the absorption rate for your area.

What is that, and more importantly, why should you care about
it?

The real estate absorption rate tells you
just how long it would take for the buyers out there in the market to absorb the
current inventory of homes or condos with no more new listings coming on the
market. We start with the number of sales that took place within a specific
period of time, and then we look at the number of properties currently for sale,
and come up with amount of time it would take to sell every property currently
on the market.

I’ll show you how we figure it out. Let’s take Portmouth New
Hampshire homes as an example:
In the last 5 months, we had 42 homes
sell, and we currently have 80 homes for sale. If you divide 42 (homes sold)
by 5 (months – the time period I used in this example), we get 8.4, which is the
average number of homes sold per month in the last 5 months. So, if we’ve got
80 homes currently on the market for sale, it will take almost 9 1/2 months to
absorb that amount of inventory, assuming no new listings come on the market to
increase that inventory.

So, now why is knowing that number important to you?

Portsmouth New Hampshire Real Estate – 5 Mistakes To Avoid When Selling Your Home or Condo

Ann Cummings — Sun, 27 Apr 2008 19:50:09 +0000

Portsmouth New Hampshire Homeowners – Do You Want to Sell Your Home or Condo?

Homeowners in the Portsmouth NH Seacoast
areas are lucky to be in an area where the interest in living in such a
gorgeous area hasn’t caused our market to drop as much as some real
estate markets in other areas around the country.

Our sales are off a little compared to the fast-paced markets of just a few
years ago, and because of that, if you have a home or condo that you need to
sell fairly quickly in todays market, you need to be aggressive in several ways
to bring about a sale.

Here are 5 mistakes to avoid when selling Portsmouth NH homes and
condos in todays real estate market: