Archive for October, 2009

I’ve posted before about condo fees and the benefits of living in a condo community. I hear from some people that they “heard” that every year the communities raise the monthly fees and theres nothing that can be done about it. Well I can say first hand this is certainly not the case. I serve as Secretary on the Bridle Club condo board in Bridgewater. I’ve been in my position for roughly 2 years and I get to see what goes into making these decisions. We just passed our 2010 budget last Weds and we didn’t raise the rates one penny. You know why? We spend a lot of time looking through the budget to make sure every dollar is where it should be. This attention to detail from both the condo management firm and the condo board hopefully allow rates to stay the same. They were raised by 5 dollars a month the first year I was on board but it had not moved before that for years. We still pride ourselves with having some of the best amenities with some of the lowest rates.

Whats the point anyway? As your Realtor to check into these things. If a condo community is constantly every year raising rates, thats a RED  flag. Do your homework and if you do it will pay off big time.  I can help you with this homework because of my background on such boards. Give me a call and lets get you moving.

As you can see from the title of this blog post, I’m a bit angry that this program didn’t exist when I bought my condo 2 years ago. With that being said, if you’re looking to buy your first place this is a pretty sweet deal. Not only can you write off the mortgage interest you pay for the first 3 years but you also get this $8,000 tax credit on top of that? Looks like someone’s going to get the tile they wanted for the kitchen.

Seriously though, this program is over very soon but by all accounts it looks like it will be extended. I even included a link from businessweek that points out why. Check it out. Read all you can about the tax benefits of home ownership and it will make your decision much easier.

http://www.businessweek.com/blogs/money_politics/archives/2009/10/expanded_home_b.html

Lets get this out of the way first, I don’t have kids but when I bought my place I made sure I looked into the school system. The bottom line when you selling your place down the road, you want to attract as many buyers as possible. Having a town with a great reputation is extremely important in reaching that goal. With there being so many towns to choose from in NJ there has to be a few thing that set town apart from each other. In many cases this the school system. Rest assured the schools in Bridgewater is top notch. They’ve won many awards and a lot of the graduates go to top schools.

With this being said, do your homework. I’ve attached the link below so you can read all about the schools and draw your own conclusions. Ask around, and I’m sure you’ll hear good things about the system and in turn about the town in general. Enjoy the reading and after your done give me a call and I can get you moving on either buying a new condo or selling your current condo.

http://www.brrsd.k12.nj.us/

I had a meeting at my Weichert office today and we went over the benefits of a home warranty and I wanted to share my thoughts on the issue. For those who don’t know if you purchase a home warranty it provides a safety net so that if any appliances break you should be covered. If the dish washer breaks then you call your policy holder and they send someone out for 100 bucks and they hopefully fix the issue. It’s a decent deal but the real beauty of the deal comes in when you’re selling.

If you’re listing your place, you pick up a home warranty policy and it will cover you while you’re living there. Something breaks during the selling process it will pick up the tab. The real draw to the policy is when you sell the place the policy is then transferred to the buyer for another FULL YEAR. Never want to hear from a buyer 3 months down the line because the refrigerator broke? This is a great way to make that happen.

In the practice of full disclosure the policy is not a cure all. There are things that are exempt from any policy and it’s important to read the fine print. If you’re informed and know what you’re covered for then you should be in great shape. A potential buyer may be put at ease by the warranty and you in turn sell your place.

With that being said lets get moving on selling your place.

I always look around some top real estate websites to keep up to date on the current trends. I cam across an interesting article today about how to declutter your home before you move. The one stat that jumped out at me was that a person can get rid of over 30% in their place and not miss it for a second. That may sound like a lot of stuff to get rid of but if you really think about it’s not. Go into each room and your house and I bet you see 30% of each room you could get rid of EASILY.

So have a read of the article below and see if you agree. Looking around my office I can see around 50% that could be parted with. Have a great day!

I can get rid of 30% of this I figure!

http://realestate.msn.com/article.aspx?cp-documentid=22240513

If you thought anything like me while looking for your first place you would be too scared to even look. How can I afford this? I rather just rent! Maybe I’ll try in a couple years? These were all the ideas that came to mind when I thought about buying my first place. I wanted to touch upon one major benefit of home-ownership this evening. TAX BENEFITS!!!!

For the first three years of ownership you can write off the mortgage interest. As you know, during the first years of your mortgage it’s mostly all interest and very little principal. This means, when you visit your accountant you can expect a healthy tax return. It more than makes up for the short term gain you may get from renting.

I live in a condo in wonderful Bridgewater and I can tell you from experience that I get back around 300-400 back a month at the end of the year. That’s just from the mortgage interest! Needless to say it really helps you understand that owning a home is not out of reach. Your accountant or even your mortgage broker can really go into this much more in depth but I hope you get the idea.

Thats all from now make sure you think about what I wrote and let me know if you have any questions!

I just took a quick look through the September Sales in the Bridgewater Condo market and I wanted to provide my take. For a reference check out the main page at http://www.bridgewater-condos.com/

Now that you have both windows open you can dive into the data I put together (by the way I do this every month so check this out).

Now what I see is some very positive signs for sellers. The average days on market is around 89 days but the properties put on the market recently were only there for less than a month. The other properties that had over a 100 days on market were placed on said market back in the horrible first part of the year. So having these newer properties selling quickly and these older properties going fast as well shows that you can get your place SOLD!

The whole process takes a bit of time so if you’re thinking about selling then give me a call today and we’ll get a plan together.