BILL CHERRY'S GREATEST DALLAS PARK CITIES REAL ESTATE BLOG: March 2008

Many have asked for and gotten the complimentary copy of my CD "A Realtor's Secret Weapons."  This is the list of 50 Questions we discuss during one segment of the program.  Meanwhile, your free copy of the CD is waiting for you.   All you have to do is email, write or call and we'll pop one in the mail to you right away.   -- Bill Cherry, Realtor. 

Financial Planner Doc Gallagher, Engineer Steve Simmons, Realtor Bill Cherry

Broadcasting a KAAM-AM "Money Doctor Show"

Saturdays, 10-11 AM  

THE 50-QUESTION POP QUIZ YOU'LL WANT TO GIVE ME - AND ANY OTHER REAL ESTATE AGENT - BEFORE YOU PICK WHO WILL REPRESENT YOU

By Bill Cherry

Bill Cherry, Realtors

214 503-8563

  Company Image and Statistics

1. How many years has your company been in business? How about you?

2. How many listings does your company have?

3. Where does your company rank in the Annual Amount of Closed Sales in the entire Dallas/Ft. Worth Metroplex?

4. How many families used your company's services last year?

5. Where does your company rate in the National Relocation Top 350 Power Brokers Annual Report?

6. Does your company have a relocation division? How much business is generated through that source? (Many people are "assigned" a real estate broker by their employer when they are moving them from one town to another)

7. Who are some of the companies and corporations your relocation division works with in relocating buyers?

8. Is your company a member of a world-wide and successful real estate network?

9. Which referral networks, relocation companies, pre-marketing and third party companies is your company affiliated with?

10. Does your company have a Web site that advertises the entire MLS inventory?

11. What is your company's current market share in my neighborhood?

12. What is your company's past market share in my neighborhood?

13. What is the "Law of Agency" and how does it affect me by using your company?

14. Does your company offer a comprehensive Seller's Disclosure Notice to help me reduce my liability as a seller?

15. Does your company have a real estate attorney specialist on staff or retainer who is available for legal guidance when needed?

16. Does your company have an in-house mortgage lending service and of what value would it be to me as a seller?

Agent's Competence

1. Are you a full-time Realtor?

2. What kind of real estate training have you had?

3. What is the difference between a Realtor and a licensed Real Estate agent?

4. Do you recommend pre-sale home inspections?

5. Do you recommend that I take out a Seller Residential Service Contract while my house is on the market for sale?

6. How would you guide me if a potential buyer has a home to put on the market and that he must sell before he can close on the purchase of my house?

7. What are today's insurance concerns and how can they affect me?

8. How do would you arrive at the listing price you suggest for my home?

9. Will you provide me with a written and current Competitive Market Analysis?

10. Will you be honest with me in what you feel the market will truly bear, or will you list my home at any price I ask you to try?

11. Will you share with me your educated opinion of the condition of my home?

12. Will you give me tips for better staging and showing my home to prospective buyers?

13. Tell me about your negotiating skills?

14. What is your personal list price to sales ratio? Your company's?

15. Will you pre-qualify prospects before showing them my home?

16. What will you do to assure my home will appraise for the contract price for the buyer's lender?

17. What will my closing costs be?

18. Will you provide me with an itemized statement of my approximate closing costs PRIOR to my signing the contract?

19. What services will you provide me once a contract has been negotiated?

20. Will you attend the closing at the title company with me?

21. Once I list my home with you, how often will you communicate with me?

The Marketing of My Home

1. Who will be putting the information and pictures of my home on the multiple listing service, and when?

2. What will you offer as a Buyer's Agent Commission?

3. Will you be furnishing property picture brochures and mail-outs in the marketing of my home, and how and where will they be distributed?

4. What feature of my home will you emphasize in the marketing?

5. Do you have the ability to photo gallery (at least 10 pictures) my home on-line?

6. Do you have a "precise and customized" marketing plan for my home?

7. Will you be doing a virtual tour of my home?

8. What special marketing programs does your company have to offer in helping to get showings on my home?

9. How often and where will you advertise my home in the media?

10. Who will write the ads, and who pays for the advertising?

11. Do you use "target marketing?"

12. If your company has a Web site, what tools are available on your site to market my home?

13. How many "hits" does your Web site get a month?

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

Carl Sewell owns a bunch of car dealerships here in Dallas and some elsewhere, too.  And the cars his salesmen sell at his car stores are the luxury lines - Cadillac, Lexus, Infiniti, Hummer, etc.  You know the ones.

And year after year his dealerships set records, and often times they do it when their competition - dealers who are selling the very same brands - struggle to meet their expenses. 

Let's make this even more complex:  Mr. Sewell's sales people tell their prospects up front that if they are looking for the cheapest price, they should go to one of the Sewell competitors. 

What's going on here?  Well, by way of explanation through a supposed example we'll quickly reduce it to the absurd.

Let's put two Lincoln dealers next to each other, and let's give them identical inventories of new cars - same colors, same features.  We'll even line the cars across their lots in the same configuration.

The dealer on the left follows the Carl Sewell format:  All of the cars are sparkling clean; there's not a bunch of slogans lettered across their windshields.  The lot is immaculate.  There are no holes or water puddles.  The sales building is clean and neat and comfortable.  The salespeople are dressed conservatively.  No multiple gold chains hanging around their necks with the nugget surrounded by chest hair showing through the half- unbuttoned Hawaiian shirt.

Now let's see the dealership next door.  The lot is full of pot holes, the cars have not been detailed since they arrived from the factory, there's a salesman sitting in one of them with the door open, and he's smoking a cigarette.  The sales office is a mobile home with a set of temporary steps going to the door.

Who's going to sell the most cars?  Does price matter?

The lesson here is one that home sellers should consider.  Your home needs to look like one Mr. Sewell would have for sale if he were your joint venture partner, and it needs to look like that until it sells.  Detail it like the guy does who cleans-up and waxes your car.

I have a check list that you're welcome to have.  It'll help you spiff your house up so that your Realtor will have the best opportunity to sell it.  Email or call and I'll send you one.  Unless you follow Mr. Sewell's selling logic, you can be sure you'll leave money on the table at closing.

BILL CHERRY, REALTORS

DALLAS

Our 43rd Year Selling Texas

214 503-8563

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

All rights reserved

<<My First Company Sign 

Today I renewed my Texas Real Estate Broker's license so I can begin my forty-fourth year of service selling Texas real estate. 

Dallas' famous Ebby Halliday was my mentor.  She was a bit past fifty then and with only one office, and I was twenty-four with a full-head of black hair and unending enthusiasm in front of me.

When I first started, the Multiple Listing Service was a rather new thing, especially in Galveston.  Most of us sold our own listings, and most buyer prospects called several Realtors before they found the home they would buy.  Rarely did any prospective buyer work with just one agent.

So the ones of us who didn't get the sale would pout for days, but try not to show it.  After all, real estate is the one business where if you don't get along with your competitors, you can't succeed.

As co-oping became more of the thing to do, we made appointments with our competitors' offices, then drove by and picked up the keys so we could show the other companies' listings to our prospect.  Soon the MLS book was developed, and it began as a loose-leaf notebook with a page for each listing.  Hours were spent auditing the thing as houses were added, went into pending, and were sold.  It was a nightmare.

More than once my book had become so hopelessly behind that I pitched the whole thing in the trash and bought a new, up-to-date one from the Board office.

Houston was one of the first Texas towns to put its MLS on a computer program.  Since I had a company in Houston as well as Galveston, our Houston Montrose office was one of the first to "go modern."  Even though the program and system were full of bugs, it still outdid the old manual system.

Soon I asked the Galveston Board if they would be interested in the computer system.  A big meeting was held in the club of the old Seahorse Hotel.  We gave what we thought was a great presentation showing all of the benefits.  But the Galveston old timers didn't want to change.  A motion was made by Joe Schlankey that was seconded, that said not only would we not change to the computer system, but with the added caveat that we would never vote on it again.  The motion carried by a wide margin.  (Years later, Galveston did adopt a computer MLS system.)

Real estate marketing has come quite a ways since it became my profession.  Most of the road has been good, and most of the bumps have been overcome.  I still bristle, though, at the carpetbaggers who show up with their fast-track licenses in good times, turn the market and the business upside down, and then leave it for us serious old timers to try to get back on track.

Finally, it seems only right that I give credit to Sandy, who was my wife at the time.  She designed and drew that wonderful sign and we had it built and lettered by a very talented sign painter named Darlene.  Darlene had a tattoo of the Texas star on her wrist and was seriously investing every penny she could get her hands on, with the vision of becoming a millionaire.  And she did.

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

All rights reserves

 BILL CHERRY, REALTORS

DALLAS, TEXAS

Our 43rd Year Selling Texas

214 503-8563

I'm not certain when the gated community concept began to take a hold in Texas, but the first time Patty and I owned a home in one was about ten years ago.  It was in South Shore Harbour, a community near Houston.

Ours didn't have a guard at the gate, but rather a box that allowed coded access and also for visitors to be able call their host so they could be allowed entrance.

We hadn't bought our home because of the gated community concept, but rather because the builder had done an exquisite job of executing the plans of a very talented architect.  However, the more we lived there the more opinionated I became - issues for and issues against - so I took out my legal tablet one day and did the debit and credit bookkeeping.  It produced interesting results, results I could have never gotten had we not had a couple of years living there under our belts.

What I did learn and observe was that the gate restricted weekend drivers searching out For Sale signs.  So not only did it keep those just beginning their "new city driving around" from getting a feel for our neighborhood, but it also kept them from having an idea as to which agents and companies had listings there.  Intuitively I didn't think that was a good thing.

And I then began to notice that homes behind the gates and walls sold substantially slower than those in subdivisions without those restrictions even though both sets were comparably priced. 

So, at least in our area, the homes in the gated communities not only didn't bring a premium because of the perceived safety, but they sold slower.  So I proposed to our homeowners association that the gates be left open on, say, Saturdays and Sundays.  No soap.  I was never sure why.  There was little to no crime in our city and the police were sure anyone caught speeding was on a crime spree so they would all but follow them around night and day. 

I don't know what an acceptable solution is, but I do know that before a prospective home buyer considers purchasing within the seclusion of walls and gates, he might want to take out his legal tablet and enter the debits and credits, and then realistically evaluate what it will mean to him as well as his family's lifestyle, their ability to be gracious to their arriving visitors, how they will handle access by service people, and how their Realtor will be able to market their home should they decide more elsewhere.

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

All rights reserved

Bill Cherry Realtors

Bill Cherry Wikipedia Biography

When my friends Martin Bowers and Erben Schuldt and I were having lunch together last week, we began talking about how we had managed to get our college degrees here in the State of Texas.

<<Martin Bowers                Erben Schuldt>>

When we graduated from Galveston's Ball High School in 1958, each of us was assured that we could enroll in any Texas state supported college or university in the fall, including the University of Texas at Austin.  That was because we had successfully completed the required College Preparatory Plan at the high school.  No SAT.

And the tuition was no more than $100 per semester, a fee almost any student could handle, and a part-time job plus working in the summers would take care of the living expenses.

The University of North Texas in Denton, where I enrolled as a graduate student six years later charged $75 per semester.  Part-time jobs were plentiful.  In addition to money sent me from home, I worked at a restaurant and as a radio announcer.  I lived well, and when I completed my degree, I left with no student loans to have to repay.

Many public school teachers were able to get their advanced degrees there within a few summers.  In those days beginning public school teachers made less than $6,000 a year.

So Texas taxpayer supported colleges and universities in Texas were affordable.  And that was because Texas lawmakers understood a basic principal:  taxpayers are supporting Texas higher education so that those who meet the academic admissions requirements can advance their learning without the financial cost to the students being a serious consideration or prohibitive all together.

After all, society works best when everyone is able to maximize his ability and chances of contributing to the whole. 

In recent years, things have changed in Texas, and perhaps in many other states as well.  The cost of admissions in state supported colleges and universities has been stretched from $100 to, in some case, many thousands of dollars.   Over and above the generous taxpayer support, these schools are demanding higher and higher contributions from the students.

A friend told me his daughter paid $7,000 per semester at Texas A&M during her senior year.  Required textbooks were outrageous.

Now we learn that the following rule is preventing most applicants from admission to the University of Texas.  That's because it gives first priority to students who graduated in the top 10 percent of their high school class.  In fact less than 20 percent of students who apply and are not in the top 10% are admitted.  Here's the rule:

Top 10 Percent Rule for Admissions

"Students who are in the top 10 percent of their graduating class are eligible for automatic admission to any public university in Texas.

"To be eligible for automatic admission, a student must:

• Graduate in the top 10 percent of his or her class at a public or private high school in Texas, or
• Graduate in the top 10 percent of his or her class from a high school operated by the U.S. Department of Defense and be a Texas resident or eligible to pay resident tuition;
• Enroll in college no more than two years after graduating from high school; and
• Submit an application to a Texas public university for admission before the institution's application deadline (check with the university regarding specific deadlines).
• Students admitted through this route may still be required to provide SAT or ACT scores, although these scores are not used for admissions purposes. Students must also take the THEA test, unless exempted from the test requirement. Check with the admissions office regarding THEA, SAT, and ACT requirements.

"After a student is admitted, the university may review the student's high school records to determine if the student is prepared for college-level work. A student who needs additional preparation may be required to take a developmental, enrichment, or orientation course during the semester prior to the first semester of college.

"Admission to a university does not guarantee acceptance into a particular college of study or department, however."

Private schools can have these admission requirements.  However, one has to wonder how it can possibly be constitutional for public-funded schools to be able to artificially restrict admission to the sons and daughters of most Texas taxpayers, and further, why Texans continue to vote for state representatives who support this kind of foolishness.

I'm personally not going to vote for any Texas state politician who supports the Top 10% Rule.  If you live and vote in Texas, I hope you won't either.

GOD Blesses!

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

All rights reserved

The announcement came in last week's mail.  It was from the South Texas College of Law in Houston.

On March 14, 2008, my life long friend, E. Douglas McLeod, was named the college's Dean for the Day.  That's quite an honor, but it's very definitely one that's properly placed and noted.

<<=== E. DOUGLAS MC LEOD

I've written before about Doug along with my friends Victor, J.E. and Ward.  We've been a support team for a long time.  Far more than fifty years.  Here's that story.

In real life Doug is the Director of Development for the billion dollar Moody (Charitable) Foundation.  And he's an officer and director of many of the insurance companies that are owned one way or the other by the Moody Family, all descendants of William L. Moody, Jr., who built a fortune in cotton, insurance, banking, ranching and hotels, and then with his wife, Libbie Shearn Moody, gave most of it to the Moody Foundation for the purpose of making life better for the people of Texas.

Doug's sister Ann is the wife of the current family patriarch, Robert L. Moody.  Mr. Moody has exercised an uncanny ability to pick the right people as the caucus for taking the foundation's assets and exponentializing them.  Doug was one of his choices.  Forget he's Ann's brother.  I assure you that was nothing more than a coincidence.

Doug has overseen the building of the very famous Moody Gardens in Galveston, a multi-million dollar investment that includes a botanical garden, hotel and conference center, water park, and on and on.  It's Galveston's most famous and popular tourist attraction.  Hundreds of thousands come there every year.

But here's what's interesting.  Doug decided a couple of years after joining the Moody Foundation that he ought to have his own profession; one that would allow him to stand apart, stand alone and stand on his own laurels. Through night school and studying during the lunch hour in a law firm's library, Doug attained his law degree and followed it up with a Masters of Laws in international economic law. 

After getting the law school's announcement, I Googled Doug's name, and nowhere did I find anything that really told about him or listed his accomplishments.  So I decided I'd not only write about him, but list his affiliations.  Here are some of them:

• Former State Legislator - Texas House of Representatives
• South Texas College of Law - Member of the Board of Directors and Executive Committee and Distinguished Fellow
• Phi Delta Phi International Legal Fraternity - Member and Past Inn Magister
• College of State Bar of Texas - Member of the Board of Directors
• State Bar College - Honored Endowment Fund Scholar

Epilogue:  Just before Thanksgiving in 2000, my book Bill Cherry's Galveston Memories was put in bookstores.  I was very apprehensive when my publisher insisted that I do the obligatory book signings in the stores.  I had never figured the book had any merit in the first place, much less that very many people would actually buy a copy.  In fact I had seriously speculated that VanJus would be lucky if they could dump 500 of them.  Interestingly, the thing has sold many thousands.

The first book signing was on a Saturday, and the rain was coming down very hard.  The streets were flooded, and Patty and I, trying to be troupers, made our way to the store for the signing.  We knew no one would show up, and we would be horribly embarrassed.  Interestingly a lot of people did come, but the ones I remember the most were Doug and our friend Victor.  They both weathered the storm to make sure I wouldn't be there alone. That's friendship that's the result of personal character; it can't be bought or affectively encouraged.

So congratulations, Dean Doug McLeod.  The South Texas College of Law Board of Directors along with Mr. Alfini the president and dean, and Mr. Jordan the school's chairman, made a superb choice.

GOD Blesses!

By Dallas Realtor-Broker Bill Cherry

BILL CHERRY REALTORS

Our 43rd Year Selling Homes for Texans

I want to speak with you today - home sellers and Realtors - about spring time and home sales.

Irrespective of the other blips in the real estate market that come throughout the year, the season that always brings the most bounty is the spring.  It's when buyers and sellers are, for the most part, more amenable about making a deal and moving forward.  It's when sellers are more likely to get higher prices for their homes.

There is no need for me to list the reasons here because you all know them.  But this year, it is reasonable to believe that the market is going to be more cautious, although there is really no need to be.  Nevertheless, you must address the reality.  This time it is especially important for your home to be comparable to the excitement of a shiny new car with its new car smell.

In the southern part of the country, and most certainly the Dallas area, grass is preparing to become green again, trees are beginning to add new leaves, and shrubby and flowers want to move from the nursery to your yard.

Addressing those events of nature is very important to home marketing.  Now - right now - is the time to add fertilizer to your yard, turn and mulch your flowerbeds, and to beginning adding new shrubs and flowering plants.  And then make certain that all is maintained on no less than a weekly basis.

As far as the interior is concerned, do two things:  Listen and follow the advice of your Realtor, and immediately have your home staged by a professional stager.  The stager part can become a bit tricky since currently apparently anyone can call themselves a stager whether they have talent or not.  But by investigating a stager's previous work and talking to several of the clients, you'll be able to zero-in on the right choice.  I use Barie Pinnel, ASPM.  She serves the Dallas area.  You can reach Barie at 214 227-6482.  I also recommend Karen Ott.  She's another who's light on her feet when it comes to turning dreary into sparkle.

Finally, the price your home eventually brings on the market will be determined in exactly the same way it did when you were the home buyer.  Pricing a home too high, not properly preparing it to look sparkling and not keeping it that way, will not normally bring a quick sale.

So let's recap.  Follow your Realtors professional advice, get your grass green, flower beds colorful, house clean and uncluttered, and staged.  Your check will be there shortly.

I've been selling homes for a very long time - this is my 43^rd-year.  And boy have I learned a lot about how to get the job done, very often when a prior agent was unable to.  Call me, and I'll send you the valuable CD of the radio program I did as a guest of Dr. W. Neil Gallagher, Dallas' famous "Money Doctor," titled "A Realtor's Secret Weapons."  It's free and without any obligation whatsoever.

If you're selling a home in Dallas, I think you'll find I'm your man.  If you're selling a home elsewhere in the U.S. or Canada, this CD will go along way in helping you pick the perfect Realtor.  And remember,

GOD Blesses

BILL CHERRY, REALTORS

SERVING DALLAS, TEXAS

OUR 43RD YEAR SELLING HOMES FOR TEXANS

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

All Rights Reserved

Old habits are frequently hard to break.  One that often shows up is the idea that one or two real estate companies or one or two real estate agents have all of the clients for a particular neighborhood.

So rather than intellectually evaluate what they have to offer and how well it will benefit a prospective seller, the seller will default to "they sell all of the property around here," then list with one of them.

If you're getting ready to go down that road, or if you already have and your home is sitting there unsold, you might get better results if you considered breaking that habit.  Interview several agents.  Pick the one who's enthusiastic about representing you, and who does not personally have a long portfolio of listings.  This is how you get the attention you'll need in this rather lax market.  Chances are you'll get a quicker sale and a higher return.

I have a CD that addresses the subject of how to list a home and how to pick the agent to do it.  It's a copy of an hour-long radio program interview I did a few months back for KAAM-AM's "The Money Doctor," W. Neil Gallagher, Ph.D.

I'll send you one free -- I'll even pay the postage -- if you live anywhere in the U.S. or Canada.  Just email your name and address and tell me you want the CD "A Realtor's Secret Weapons."  You'll learn a good deal of what I learned to provide my clients over my 43 years as a Realtor.

GOD Blesses!

BILL CHERRY, REALTORS

DALLAS, TEXAS

214 503-8563

My 43rd Year Selling Texas

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry, Ph.D.

BY BILL CHERRY, REALTOR 

Dallas

Selling Texas for 43 Years

214 503-8563

One of the unchangeable rules of real estate is this:  Real estate is normally a poor short term investment, whether it is a home, a hotel or a commercial tract of land near the entrance to a major subdivision.

So in reality, buying real estate for the short term, whether planned or dictated by a life changing event, is enormously speculative.  If for no other reason, to make a profit or even to break even, in addition to the net value at the time he purchased it, the prospective seller will have to recover:

• The closing costs of the person who sold the property to him
• The closing costs he incurred when he bought the property from the seller
• The closing costs he will incur when he sells the property to the next person

So in reality, that is normally a huge burden to overcome, a burden that must be completely overcome before the investor makes the first dime of return. 

I point this out because this investment reality is what is causing the market to devaluate in areas where homes were overbuilt, and sold to those who, for whatever reason, could not continue the investment for at least five years. 

If you, on the other hand, own a home in one of the "settled" neighborhoods within the inner-city of Dallas, and have owned it for a few years, your chances of being burdened by what's happening outside of those neighborhoods is remote. 

Should you want to sell your home now, you can feel comfortable that choosing a real estate agent who has expertise in pricing and marketing homes in your neighborhood will bring you a quick sale and at an honorable price.

Throughout my more than forty years as a Realtor, I have specialized in listing and marketing homes.  Call me if you think you may want to sell your home now.  I'll be glad to tell you what you can expect your home to bring in price, and then you can decide which avenue to take.  There's no charge for our visit.

GOD Blesses!

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry

By Dallas Realtor, Bill Cherry

Our 44th Year Selling Texas

http://www.billcherrybroker.com

214 503-8563

 My daddy, W.W. Cherry, was a thinker.  And interestingly, once he had reasoned something out, he was comfortable with his conclusion, and he was no longer afraid of the unknown.  That method was one he followed and taught to all who would listen. 

Most of us never seem to be able to teach our minds to not automatically race toward a negative, albeit, fatal conclusion when we are unable to assure ourselves what answer the passage of time will provide.

That one frailty makes us miserable when we don't have to be.

Claire called me last week.  Charlie passed away last year, and for the first time she's been left to make most decisions by herself.  And she's very scared.  Fortunately if she picks the "My decision is to continue the status quo," as her answer, her financial and comfort risks are as close to zero as even Warren Buffett could formulate.

But she's still afraid.  She's afraid because people are reenforcing her fear.  The political candidates are talking about how bad things are now and how their plan will correct them.  The newspapers and magazines and the Internet and the commentators on the radio and TV news and talk shows blab more and more, and that reinforced her uneasiness.

So I said to her, "Claire, do you remember Daddy?"  Of course she did, she told me.  She worked for him from the day she graduated from high school until he retired.

"What would he tell you?" 

She started a nervous laugh, "He'd tell me that I haven't lost money or made money until I actually sell."

"That's right," I said, "And he'd also ask you how many people do you know who have their homes for sale right now, and you'd say what?"

"One," she said in a somewhat weak voice.

"And do they or you have to sell now if you don't want to?

One more weak voice reply, "No."

"Well, you and your friend are like a huge majority of the homeowners throughout the United States.  You've been living in your home for a number of years, you like where you live, and there's no reason that you have to move now."

Let me assure you that like they are for Claire and her friend, the chances are there is no real estate crisis for you or anyone you know, and there probably won't be. 

The status quo remains your answer just like it is for Claire.  Before Robert Young played the part of Jim Anderson, I had already learned that Father knows best.

GOD Blesses!

Copyright 2008 - William S. Cherry