Sprungtime is here!

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Or Springtime? I get confused sometimes. Like the time I opened a real estate newsletter that headlined Record Sales Predicted, when the  text of the article was about how the market was still in the doldrums, with weak but steady improvement. Turns out the record sales were simply that month was better than the same month last year. Is that a record? I’m sorry but I guess when I hear “record” it leads me to think of some all time high or the best ever, or at least the best in the last 20 years.

Being a baseball fan, I might be twisted by the record keeping that is part of baseball lore. So should real estate sales have a very different RECORD way of measurement?  And it was not one isolated headline. Over the last 2-3 months, I have seen and read as many as a hundred such newsletters, posts, articles, news reports, etc. all proclaiming the end of the real estate crisis and that we are all are about to embark on a record-setting year.

Allow me to state the obvious. We are well on our way to having the best real estate sales year (in Santa Fe, NM anyway) of any of the last 5 years. That is fantastic. That is wonderful. That is super news and a super sized result of hard work and seller’s taking their motivation to new levels in order to sell their homes. But is it record-setting?

I know, it’s all a matter of degree and semantics. But since many never get past the headline when reading about something they are interested in (but do not directly work in), then they are misled by those flowery messages. The facts are the facts, and each of you has the right and the duty to get those facts straight.

Ask a professional Realtor to show you the statistics for your neighborhood.  How many similar homes are on the market now? How long has it taken for those 4 homes to sell that you are studying? Don’t make a huge decision to buy or sell based on some blogger’s headlines. So it’s now Sprungtime here in the Rockies. What exactly does that mean? Go ahead and ask questions so you can put it all in perspective.

Now, should we discuss the phrase Now Is The Time To Buy? Or do you know something we don’t that allows you to proclaim that in a relevant manner? Given market pricing and conditions, now might be the time for a segment of people who have certain parameters and needs.

Later might be the time for other people. What is accomplished by the blanket statement Now Is The Time To Buy? Is someone really hoping that the reader of said phrase will rush out and buy a home without asking for more information?

I know; I am missing the point. It’s just a marketing ploy, right? OK, but please stop presenting the marketing effort as news or fact-based posts about real estate. You could give us all a bad reputation.

Posted in Posts & Updates.

The writer is a 68 year-old young man engaged as an active REALTOR (associate broker) with Keller Williams, in real estate sales and management in the Santa Fe NM market area. My career has been in and around the real estate industry for more than 35 years, ranging from mortgage lending (interim, commercial, residential); residential property management and leasing; shopping center development and leasing; real estate sales; sales training; title insurance as an executive and an escrow officer; various management positions; consulting and other related activities. That plus a bunch of banking experience including our family-owned Bank of Santa Fe in the 1980s. Where has the time gone?
My background means you have my working knowledge of the entire transaction process at your disposal. That comes with honesty and no bullshit.