Infotube.net: Homes for Sale - For Sale By Owner (FSBO) - Real Estate Listings

InfoTube.net homes for sale website, combined with a flat fee MLS listing places your property in front of millions of home shoppers each month.    But, in a difficult housing market with far to few buyers and far too many sellers, there is another way to reach millions of new buyers per month…Video.

Making a Video about the benefits of living in your home is easy and fun to do.   Dust off that digital camera you don’t often use, and put it to work selling your home to a whole new audience.   

Tips for Shooting a Good Video Home Tour without Editing:

1. Plan Your Tour and Your Shots:   Decide what property features are important and how you will highlight them visually.   Make sure you clean and stage the area’s that will be on video so your house looks its best.   Plan the order of the shot in the same sequence as someone would tour the home.  Start with the front walk up, entry, etc. to make your video easy for the viewer to follow.
2. Get familiar with your camera. The on-off switch, zoom and record buttons.   You can pause between scenes by touching the “shoot” button and resume filming by touching it again.  (Practice a little to see how the camera works inside your home.)
3. Use the video camera like a still camera.  You can walk with a camera, but the video will be shaky. Keep the camera as still as possible.  A tripod is an excellant tool used to steady the shot.  
4. Shoot 3 Basic Shots of each Feature:  Start with a Wide Shot to establish the location.  Zoom slightly to use a Medium Shot to follow action or frame a view or scene.  Use a Close Up shot to show off a detail or something special.
5. Watch how much you zoom.  The camera registers better if you move closer to the subject, versus just zooming in.  Also, avoid using the zoom if you are hand holding the camera.   You won’t be able to keep a steady shot.
6. Try to shoot at least 10 seconds for each shot.   If you are panning the scene, 10 seconds will produce a nice flow and the viewer won’t get sick trying to watch while the room spins.
7. Lighting is a must.   Do not shoot toward a bright window.  Lower the blinds and turn on all the lights, if you can’t get another angle.  Lamps or drop lights aimed at the subject and positioned behind the camera are an ideal way to light your space.  If shooting outdoors, try a cloudy day, early morning or late afternoon when harsh sun won’t wash out color and details.  Also when shooting outdoors, make sure the subject is facing the sun.
8. Plan to bring emotion and life into your presentation.   Include historical facts, neighborhood shots, nearby attractions, special views, street scene’s, neighborhood schools and parks, splashing hot tubs and roaring fires.   Add fresh flowers in the kitchen and dining room.  Set the dining room table.  Place candles around tubs and fireplaces.  Add color outdoors with inexpensive hanging baskets or pots of flowers.   You don’t need to plant them unless you want to.  You can hide the pots in the dirt or behind shorter plants. 
9. Time the Video.   The majority of viewers will not sit through a video longer than 3 minutes, unless it is really compelling.
10. If can have a lot of fun Editing, if you have a newer computer.  Movie Maker is Free on Microsoft software.  IMovie is free on Apple.  While you don’t have to edit to make a great video, editing is great for adding captions, music or voice overs, or selecting the best scene.  We will discuss editing and special effects later next week.

Video’s don’t sell a home all by themselves, but they certainly attract serious buyers.  Do yourself a huge favor and upload your home video tour to InfoTube.net today…we will put it on Youtube for you.

This video done by a home owner in Tybee Island, GA is a great example of using video to sell a home.   This video has been viewed more than 950 times.

The owner did a great job of giving the local flavor and outdoor activites in the area.   He also did a good job of showcasing his home and all it has to offer.

InfoTube.net invites you to upload a video of your home and neighborhood, today.   We will upload it to YouTube for you.

Thanks for visiting InfoTube.net and upload those video home tours today.  Buyers are waiting.

Real Estate

Asheville, NC - (August 5, 2008) –Crow Erickson Inc, the leading manufacturer of outdoor marketing materials for real estate agents, home builders and individual home sellers announced today that www.infotube.net has been enhanced to include “do-it-yourself” video tours of homes for sale. 

Today’s announcement is the latest example of how InfoTube.net is investing in new technology to assist home sellers in today’s market place. 

“Our new video service, with free uploads to YouTube.com, creates a fantastic opportunity for home sellers, real estate agents and home builders to expose their property to a world wide audience,” said Tommi Crow, Founder and President of Crow Erickson, Inc.   “Our technology, combined with the power of Youtube.com, makes it easier than ever to create a video home tour that is accessible from anywhere.”

While it is not news that 80% of would-be homebuyers start their search for a home on the internet, the practice of using video to view real estate is just beginning to boom.  Unlike still photographs or 360-degree tours, video clips add a personal touch that helps home shoppers decide which home might be right for them.  “Our videos are an actual walk-through of the property, just like you were walking through the home yourself,” said Crow.  “The content is user generated and often features scenes from the neighborhood and town, too.  Each video is unique and has a personality all its own, which can really make the task of home screening a lot quicker and more fun.”

Only a small fraction of home sellers and real estate agents take advantage of the marketing potential that video brings to an entirely new audience.   As Crow explained: “While video tours won’t replace seeing a home in person, they certainly provide an exciting opportunity to capture the attention of an elusive creature…today’s homebuyer.  InfoTube is excited to be a part of this powerful, new trend in marketing homes.”

 About Crow

The September issue of Consumer Reports magazine has some great news for home sellers.    Haggle on the real estate commission before you sign a listing agreement.  

The 3 year study released Monday by the respected, non-profit group found that:

• 71% of home sellers were successful in getting the agent to reduce their fee. 
• Seller’s who paid a 3% commission were just as satisfied with the job performance as those who paid the “traditional” 6% fee.  
• Seller’s who paid the most commission, ironically had the most regrets about their selling experience.  
• Nearly one-third of home sellers said they should have been more aggressive when negotiating the commission they were charged.
• Over half of the 9141 polled responders reported they paid less than a 6 percent commission to sell their home by agent.
• Re/Max and independant brokers were more willing to deal and lower their fee’s.   77 percent of sellers who listed with these firms reported that they cut the commission.
• 67 percent of Keller Williams, Prudential and Century 21 agents agreed to lower their fee’s, when ask.  While only 64% of Coldwell Banker agents lowered theirs in response to the seller’s request.
• According to Consumer Reports, “We found that paying an agent a lower commission rarely had any effect on the sales price.” 
• 82 percent of respondents sold with the help of an agent, and received an average price of $5000 below the asking price. 
• 17 percent of respondents sold their home without an agent, and they reported receiving roughly the asking price for their homes. 
• A shocking fact was also revealed in this report.  Only 46 percent of home sellers attempted to negotiate the fee at all. 

In conclusion, if cutting the costs of sell your home is important, it pays to haggle, negotiate or walk away if you are not successful in getting an agent to reduce their commission.    Nearly all Agents will cut their fee’s or you can easily find one who will . 

Another alternative for sellers in tough times, list on the MLS , act as your own agent and save a bundle of cash.

Thanks for checking in with www.infotube.net .  We appreciate your business, feedback and questions.

InfoTube.net launches “Do-It-Yourself” Home Video Tours starting Monday, August 4, 2008, as a part of our Featured Home Ad program.

Our goal with video is to drive buyer traffic and provide another avenue for seller’s to reach the largest audience possible.   We will also automatically distributed all video’s to YouTube.com, as a part of our service.

Grab your digital camera or phone this weekend and create a movie about your property, neighborhood and home town.   Video’s are easy to make and a lot of fun to watch.   Best of all, today’s tech savvy home shoppers love video’s!! 

Lights, camera, action, InfoTube.  Let’s Show and Sell.

Thanks for visiting www.infotube.net and best of luck on your home sale.

5 Tips that Home Sellers Can Not Ignore about Marketing to Home Buyers:

1. When you create your InfoTube home ad, remember that the “Headline” is the most important part.   If the headline grabs attention, the person will read your ad, which is what motivates them to call you for a showing.
2. When you write an ad, take the most powerful, effective selling point you can say about your property and move it to the beginning of your home ad.  
3. It’s all about the reader.  Tailor your ad “copy” to your customer by avoiding “I”, “me” and “we”.  Use “You” or “Your” Instead and speak to your audience.
4. Appeal to the Heart.  Buying a home is an emotional experience, which means your marketing should be benefit focused versus property or feature focused.   Try to provide a sense of what it is like to live in the property and stress the emotional benefits the buyer of the property will experience. 
5. Use Verbs, Not Adjectives when describing a property feature.   Instead of saying “large, custom deck,” the emotional approach would be to say “relax on your spacious deck and take in the view at the end of a long day”.

Review the copy in your InfoTube.net home ad and if it doesn’t “speak” to the heart of a buyer, rewrite until it does.   A powerful, well-written ad converts “hits” to “showings” in a buyer’s choice market.

Breaking News:  In order to provide our customers with the most exposure for their home listings, we have hot new feature that will bring your home ad to life, for real.   We are finalizing the testing now, so please check back for the details later this week.  It is really exciting and a lot of fun.

Thank you for visiting www.infotube.net and best of luck on the sale of your home!!!

Children or Not… A big part of determining “location, location, location”, is the quality of the school district. 

Often, a school’s report card, actually determines the locations a buyer would consider moving to.   And, for sellers living in a good school district, the schools are essentially an invisible upgrade can make the difference between For Sale and Sold.

With a new school year rapidly approaching, check out ratings for over 120,000 school districts at GreatSchools.net.

GreatSchools was founded by a former teacher, as a free resource for people concerned about education.   And, it has evolved into a great resource for real estate investors, too.

Greatschools offers comprehensive profiles for thousands of schools.  Profiles include exclusive ratings, parent reviews, powerful search and compare tools, helpful advise and an online library with hundreds of articles that help parents navigate the K-12 process.

Thank you for visiting www.infotube.net and best of luck on the sale of purchase of your property.

The National Association of Realtors reports that 30%-40% of all homes currently on the market are foreclosures, bank owned or distressed property.    For the average home seller, that means a lot of competition from banks and lenders when they sell their home. 

While this fact may seem dire on the surface, smart home sellers see the silver lining.  The successful have learned to use the vacant, abandoned foreclosure home as a tool to sell their well-loved and cared for home.  

Smart Sellers Know:

The Comparable Sales Data for all competing homes on the market in their area because banks don’t do give aways.   Sales facts can quickly dispell the misguided shopper who believes they can purchase a Mac Mansion for $50,000. 

• Contrary to the “Buy a Foreclosure and Get-Rich-Quick” late night infomercials, buying a foreclosure is usually no bargain unless the home is a dog, or medicore property at best.  
• Banks list homes that are in good locations and condition near the full market value, so the upside is extremely limited.  The lender typically recoops their investment and the costs of the foreclosure sale, when the property is sold.  Many buyers falsely believe that foreclosures are deals of the century.   For the most part, they are certainly not.

Smart Sellers Know:

To make all home information readily available to buyers because foreclosures are a crap shoot.   This includes warranties, guarantee’s for work done, appliance and equipment manuals, details about workmanship and home improvements.  Utility bills and a list of contractors who have performed work or maintanence should also be prominently displayed for the buyer on the first showing. 

• Foreclosures are sold as ”Buyer Beware” properties.  In other words, the Seller has no knowledge about the property or its condition, and full responsiblity for purchase lies with the buyer.
• Lenders are exempt from disclosure laws that alert buyers to home defects and problems.    Meaning that the lenders often have no knowledge about the property and have no duty to disclose major problems, even if they are aware of them.

Smart Sellers Know:

Their home should be “in move” in condition because foreclosures certainly aren’t.   All repairs and maintenance should be done before the buyers inspection.   The home is free of clutter, freshly painted, landscaped and shows a geniune “pride of ownership”.

• Abandoned, unkept foreclosed homes often sit vacant on the market for months.  They are overrun with weeds, dirt, vermin, and are as a whole, disgusting to imagine oneself living in.
• Foreclosures are sold “As Is”.  The buyer can not ask the lender to pay for basic repairs.
• Many foreclosures are complete wrecks.   The homes have been stripped, vandalized and abused.   Buying a neglected home is a gamble at best.
• Most foreclosures can’t be properly inspected, if at all.  The power and water is disconnected.  Hidden water pipes were probably exposed to freezing temperatures last winter.   Cluelessly buying anything , especially foreclosures that offer no legal recourse or seller responsiblity, are deals for those with experience and high risk tolerance only.
• Foreclosure buyers usually spend $400-$600 for a limited home inspection, just to find that the repair list is more terrifying than a late night horror flick.   When the lender refuses to fix problems, the buyer walks the deal.  The buyer is back on the street and the money paid for the worthless inspection is gone.

Smart Sellers Know:

To make the purchase of their home very certain, quick and easy for the buyer.   A “No Brainer”, if you will.  

• Only 1 in 10 offers made to banks and lenders ever makes it to the closing table.   If a buyer needs a home to live in, odds are, a foreclosure won’t work.
• There is always a problem getting accurate information about a foreclosure.  There could be liens, judgements or more than one note or deed of trust.   If buyers don’t know exactly what they are doing, they can lose their shirt.
• Buyers have to deal with mounds of paperwork when buying a foreclosure.  Most of the added legalise pertains to covering the tail of the lender.
• Buyer can not usually designate a closing attorney or title company to work with. 
• Buyers often wait months to close on a foreclosure.   Contrary to common sense, lenders are in no real hurry to get deals done.  Weeks can pass before questions are answered or contract terms are addressed.  Buyers can count on additional problems with legal work, title insurance, appraisals and financing.  If time to possession is important, buyers would be well advised to avoid bank deals entirely.

While competing against banks to sell your home can be a challenge, smart seller realize that the sword cuts both ways.   Home buyers are not investors.  They buy a home from the heart.   

If you need to sell your home, show a little love for the ole ”Home Sweet Home”.  The bank won’t stand a chance.

Thank you for visiting www.infotube.net.  

Finally, some good news for cash strapped home sellers.  InfoTube.net can help you sell your property and save thousands of dollars in fee’s and commissions during the process.

With average home prices down another 15% this year to date, few sellers can afford to lose any more of their home’s value.  Consider that closing costs generally run 2% and real estate fee’s take away another 6%, US home sellers lose 23% of their home value, if they sell through an agent. 

While the recent housing reports aren’t good for agents, we can’t stop home prices from falling.  We can, however, work very hard to help people learn that they can buy and sell homes without paying an agent, which means they keep more money from their sale.

Since 1999, InfoTube.net offers a FREE Home Listing to Anyone (including homes listed by agent) selling real estate.   If you have a property you need to sell, we invite you to take advantage of our services today. 

Additional FREE services for home sellers include:

•   A community forum to share and discuss housing news and sales information.
•  A blog loaded with tips, suggestions and real estate Q & A.
• Generic legal forms and contract templates.
• Current housing market data.
•  A fresh database of homes for sale.  No foreclosure listings or dead links.
• Home inspection and improvement articles written by Paul Bianchina
• Professional, Full color brochures to hand out and place inside your InfoTube or InfoBox.
• A unique web address for your listing that can be used in classified ad’s.
• Free Home Listing uploads to googlebase and other sites that accept “by owner” listings.

While InfoTube.net can not stop falling home prices, we can help you sell your home.   Post your home on our site today and join thousands of others who have saved money selling by owner on InfoTube.net.

Thank you for visiting InfoTube.net and please tell your friends and neighbors about us.

Unless you were alive when Herbert Hoover was sitting in the oval office, this is probably the worst home selling market you have ever experienced.   

Certainly, things are not horrible everywhere.  Charlotte, NC and Rochester, NY are holding on, but elsewhere, housing sales and prices are still falling, while inventories are growing.    

So, what should you do if life circumstances dictate that you MUST SELL your home in this market?  What actions can you take to beat out your competition??    Yes, the situation is painful.  But, if you have to sell, InfoTube can help.

5 Tips to Help You Sell, When you Have To Sell:

1. Don’t Spend Money.

Your house needs to make a good impression on buyers, but DO NOT spend money on big ticket items or home improvements.   Focus your attention and budget on a new paint job, deep cleaning and a lot of sprucing up.   But, absolutely, make all repairs.  

     2.    Don’t Sit on the Sidelines.

If you have to sell, now is the time.   Don’t make the mistake of hanging on, hoping prices will improve any time soon.   They won’t.   I expect another year to pass before we see any bottom in pricing.  Forget the market timing approach and put your home up for sale today.

     3.    Get Real.

Separate your emotional attachment to your home from your family’s financial best interests.  Selling a home is strictly business and should be treated as such.  

Don’t forget that smart home shoppers read the news.   Buyers expect a bargain, so give them one.  Don’t make the mistake of letting the house languish on the market.  Set a realistic price target for your home from the beginning.  Better yet, crush your competition and price your home 5%-10% below theirs.  Forget about pre-crash appraisals or the sticker price for those custom upgrades, those comparisons won’t fly, so don’t try it.

    4.    Early to Bed.  Early to Rise.  Advertise. Advertise. Advertise… Ray Crock

Whether your home is for sale by owner or by agent, you need to be active in the promotion of your property.   Your home should be advertised in the local classifieds, company newsletters, church bulletins, university or employee bulletin boards, bill boards or anywhere buyers are looking.

While local print advertising is important, don’t forget the power of the internet.   90% of all buyers begin their search for a home on the world wide web.    The internet is also the only means of effectively reaching out of the area shoppers and those from foreign countries.

Whether you are selling by agent or owner, take advantage of websites such as InfoTube.net, which offer a free home listing web page with photo’s.  Infotube.net also uploads its home listings to other websites and search engines, leaving a lot less work for you to do.   Other websites, such as craigslist also offer home listing services and should be utilized in your sales efforts.

Contact Why 6%.  Why 6% will guarantee that your home listing appears on all Realtor owned web sites, even if you are selling your home by owner.   The company also uploads home listing information to the local MLS, Realtor.com, Zillow, Trulia, Cyberhomes and others, in one easy step. 

     5.   Accept the Offer

If you need to sell now, you would be well advised to accept any reasonable offer from a qualified buyer.   It is easy to determine what “reasonable” is.  Ask your agent for comp’s or just review the asking and selling prices for your neighborhood on a website such as Zillow. 

If the first offer is low, but reasonable, you can negotiate, but remember the buyer has more power now.  Don’t blow a sale arguing over a few dollars.  Your home is only worth what someone will pay for it, which might be far less than what you think your home is worth. 

Best advise:  If the buyer makes an offer that is close, don’t counteroffer.  Sign the contract on the spot and congratulate yourself on nailing down one of the few buyers out there these days.  

   Thank you for visiting InfoTube.net.  Have a great weekend and best of luck on the sale of your property.

Average Days on Market

Source: Altos Research & Real IQ

In today’s tight credit market, obtaining approval for financing BEFORE shopping for a home is a crucial step that borrowers must take.   Sellers and buyers are familiar with the phrase Pre-approved” or “Pre-qualified” for a loan.  Many of us assume they mean the same thing.  They don’t.  There is a huge difference between the two terms. 

Pre-Qualification:  Pre-qualification is not a loan commitment, it is a quick indication of whether a borrower should qualify for a loan or not, based solely upon the opinion of a loan officer.  With a pre-qualify situation, the loan officer peeks at the borrowers finances, pay stub and credit report and estimates the approximate amount of a mortgage that the buyer should be able to qualify for. 

The loan officer will usually issue a “pre-qualification” letter or certificate which indicates the borrowers finances have been reviewed and that it appears they could qualify for a mortgage loan.   It is not a guarantee that the borrower will actually be able to get a loan.

• It is easy to determine if you have received a “pre-qualification” letter.  If you have not signed an application and/or you have just given information over the phone…your approval is nothing more than an estimate or opinion made by a loan officer.
• If you have not paid non-refundable fee’s along with the signed application, you have not received a loan commitment by the lender.
• Pre-Qualifications should not be taken seriously by borrower or seller.   Pretty much anyone can get the favorable opinion of a loan officer these days, as they are paid only on commission.

Pre-Approval:  In the case of pre-approval, the borrower actually applies for a loan.  Pre-approval is a written commitment by the lender, not a loan officer, which states the specific amount of money the applicant is qualified to borrow.  Pre-approval involves a loan underwriter and takes some time to complete.  The file contains a detailed credit report, income and down payment verification, along with a confirmation that the borrower has the ability to pay closing costs.   

• If you have met your lender in person, completed an application and paid fee’s, you have started the process to become pre-approved for a loan.
• A letter of pre-approval states a maximum amount of money the borrower can obtain financing for.
• The property address will be added to the loan application and the appraisal will be ordered, once the borrower locates a property.
• The borrowers’ bank and employer will be contacted and the information submitted on the loan application will be verified.

 In Conclusion:

Unfortunately for seller and buyer, the terms pre-qualified and pre-approved are not interchangeable.  The difference between the two terms causes a great deal of confusion and problems.  

Please keep in mind that neither is a guarantee that a mortgage will be issued.  The home must qualify, too.  But, a borrower that is pre-approved for a loan, is the only type of buyer a seller should take seriously.  

An interesting 2 minute video from CNN News offering a unique approach to selling your home FAST.  In 5 days, as a matter of fact.

Purchasing a home is a huge financial undertaking that requires organization and complex calculations before you begin your home search.  

We found a new website by HGTV named Frontdoor.com, designed to make home buying an easier task.    Frontdoor.com provides a user-friendly free toolkit for homebuyers and sellers that is packed with handy tools.  Check out the rent vs buy calculator, home selection tips, financial calculators, home tour check lists, how to advice and much more. 

If you are in the market for a home, take a minute to visit the HGTV Frontdoor website this weekend.  In our opinion, it eliminates a lot of the confusion about the daunting task of home buying and frees up your time for more house hunting. 

Be forewarned, that the evening news, websites, radio shows, TV programs and foreclosure bus tours that tout foreclosures can be purchased for a bargain, or worse, that they will make the purchaser wealthy in coming years are little more than “paid for” hype.    Don’t buy it.

In my 25 years of real estate experience, I have discovered that for the most part, foreclosures are no bargain.  They are laden with serious problems and lengthy delays, making them “deals” for only those pro’s with patience and a strong stomach.

Foreclosed homes are not wonderful, like the media would have you believe.   The large asset departments that handle foreclosures (REO’s) are managed by employee’s with hundreds of files and no incentive to help the sale close.  They don’t care if the property sells or not, they earn their paycheck, holidays and vacations, in either case.   The truth is that only one of every three offers made to a lender will actually end in closing and Buyers should expect to wait weeks to learn if their offer was accepted. 

In addition to the hassles of dealing with the “could care less” personnel at the lending institutions, getting these homes inspected is also a challenge.  In many cases, entry before the sale is not even possible.  No effort has been made to clean the homes or remove the abandoned trash.   The utilities have long been disconnected.  And, all lenders have a “as is” clause in the sales contract, which states that the lender is not responsible for the condition or repair of these homes, even if they are obvious and necessary.

Another problem with buying foreclosures is that the  owner who lost the home long stopped caring about the property, and in some cases, even retaliated in anger. 

• Always assume if something broke or stopped working, the owner didn’t spend money to fix it.
• Some angry people actually retaliate by attempting to destroy the house. They smash holes in walls and ceilings, plug the drains and turn on the water to flood the home, rip through the sheet rock to steal copper and wiring to sell as scrap.
• They steal the appliances, light fixtures, kitchen cabinets and HVAC units to resell.
• They leave anything and everything behind that they do not want.  In many cases, this even includes helpless animals which are discovered locked inside the abandoned homes.

Buying foreclosures is not for the faint hearted and it is a myth that bank-owned properties are a bargain.  In truth, REO’s are a messy hassle and the cost of repairs often exceeds the value of the home, after the repairs are done.  

I don’t care what commercial you watched or which seminar you attended, if you they haven’t told you this information, they did not prepare you for the reality of the purchasing a home lost to foreclosure.

Thank you for visiting InfoTube Homes for Sale.