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 (more…)
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 (more…)
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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. (more…)
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. (more…)
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.) (more…)
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(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 (more…)
Choosing real estate agent means asking quesions
May 22, 2013Another one that I recently came across is from a publication at which I once worked, Money magazine, which headlined the piece “7 question for your next real estate agent.” (Using a number is supposed to increase readership.)
The first question either buyers or sellers are supposed to ask is this: (more…)
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Tags:real estate brokers, The Big Apple, New York City, Money magazine, Real estate agents
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