There is more than one way to win ‘bidding war’

Escalators here would serve an important purpose. (Flickr photo by zoetnet)

There is more than one way to win what homebuyers insist on calling a bidding war.  (I call it “competition.”)  But at least two of them are shunned here in New York.

Of course, conventional tactics include raising the price and stripping the contract of any contingencies such as financing and home inspection or otherwise improving terms such as settlement date.

One of the out-of-the-box idea that no one here endorses, however, demonstrates a buyer’s high motivation to close the transaction.  The concept is to offer

Out and About: The allure of Hamilton Heights

View of a Hamilton Heights from top floor of a nicely renovated 4,400-sf townhouse that is offered for $2.695 million.

For buyers accustomed to neighborhoods farther south, Hamilton Heights may represent challenges with respect to convenience, amenities and street life.

Yet on a recent tour of an even dozen open houses, I was struck anew with how vibrant the area is and how great is the value of properties in contrast to more popular parts of Manhattan.

As the New York Times has noted, the massive Columbia University development now rising to the south suggests that Hamilton Heights is on the verge of a boomlet:

. . . Hamilton Heights, largely unknown to those who have never cracked the 100s on the No. 1 train, is preparing for an influx of teachers, students and support workers. It is also anticipating the higher real estate prices that usually come with proximity to an Ivy League institution.

The Heights

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The High Road: Best and final offer is illusory

There is normally no magic involved in choosing a best and final offer. (Flickr photo by Emz.watson)

We are told early in the week that the listing broker already has two offers in hand.  All other offers are due by Friday at 5 p.m., she says.

Fair enough, but then she adds that best and final offers have a deadline of the following Monday at 5 p.m.

A double-deadline in advance is strange, indeed.  What usually happens is that a listing agent has several offers in hand, doesn’t see a clear winner and only then, in concert with the seller, asks for best and final offers.

That’s the typical procedure.

No one wants even to think about insurance

Few topics relating to real estate are less scintillating or more critical than homeowners insurance.  Remember Sandy?

Even if a terrible storm doesn’t ruin your home or its contents, anyone who has experienced a loss will vouch for the importance of homeowners or renters insurance.

If your eyes haven’t already glazed over, here in a nutshell are items in a homeowners policy that merit attention:

• Exclusions.  Don’t take for granted

Out and About: Victims of their own excess

Squash anyone? Kitchen of brownstone listed for $10 million.

They closed on the brownstone on Aug. 20, 2008 for $7.85 million.

It happens that Lehman brothers collapsed less than a month later, causing our housing markets to swoon.

While the markets in Manhattan and Brooklyn in particular have made great progress since then, we still have a way to go before reaching the peaks of days gone by.

Unfortunately, the sellers — I’m sure, a very nice family — have overestimated the demand for properties that can accommodate a big family easily.

Auction set for vacation place with great security

Two houses in Manhattan also are available to bidders

If security is paramount, the happiness will be hard to contain of whoever is the winning bidder at the auction of a property in Northern Adirondack Park this summer.

On 27.3 acres in the hamlet of Lyon Mountain in Dannemora, the property includes several acres of undeveloped land and 23 buildings totaling 90,676 square feet.

New York State is selling the former minimum-security correctional facility as surplus property on July 10, and the minimum bid is a mere $140,000.

(If a second prison might prove to be of interest, the former Arthur Kill Correctional Facility on the southern tip of Staten Island is for sale as well, but not at auction.)

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Sellers must avoid biggest mistake they can make

Sellers often fail to ask a vital question when interviewing potential listing brokers. (Flickr photo by David Davies)

When interviewing brokers to list their apartments for sale, prospective clients ask a lot of questions.

In many instances, the question that property sellers often want answered is how much of a fee the broker will demand.  (Many a listing presentation and meeting could be spared if sellers with commission as their sole criterion simply asked for the percentage before a meeting is scheduled.)

Among the other bits of information that sellers may seek relate to a broker’s track record — for example, how many sales the agent achieved in what amount of time and in which neighborhood or apartment building.

But the most critical query centers on

The High Road: I broke every smart broker’s rule

(Flickr photo by litherland)

I have no one to blame but myself after I took on a new buyer.

Cindy is an acquaintance who e-mailed me one Friday saying that she was toying with the idea of moving out of her nearly $4,000-a-month rental to purchase an apartment on the Upper West Side.  Could we chat sometime? she asked.

I spent a couple of hours with her the next day explaining the process to someone who had lived overseas for decades and, like any first-time buyer in Manhattan, knew little about co-ops and condos, let alone what she needed to do to buy one.

It was a good conversation, in the course of which I went on at some length about steps that Cindy hsf to take to obtain a mortgage, retain an attorney and make an offer before going to contract.

She indicated as we talked that there was some urgency to get moving because