Open Letter to Seattle Homeowners in a Buyer’s Market:
My Dearest Homeowner,
Those of you who spent money doing a tasteful, unified, down to the studs, architect-involved remodel of your home after living there for a couple of years, I’m begging you, please, please put your home up for sale. I will buy it. If you live in a nice neighborhood with a fenced backyard I will pay you my first born (well okay, up to $1,000,000). Just put it up for sale. Maybe you could look into a job transfer. I hear California is a lot cheaper these days.
For those of you whose homes are currently for sale - I’m sorry you have to sell your home. I hope it is not the result of a nasty divorce, putting your aging parents in a home, or shilling out $20,000 for aesthetic updates and expecting a $200,000 return (Flippers).
But odds are - you are one of these.
So, hey there, homeowner. Just take a look around at all the homes that have come back onto the market after being UNSOLD for an entire year. Even new listings that come back on the market after a week of being Subject to Inspection. Note the plethora of For Sale signs growing cobwebs. Yep, the days of 30% profit on a house owned for four years of less with no updates are over. The days of 200% returns on cheaply remodeled Ballard, Green Lake, Magnolia bungalows are gone, gone.
What’s selling in today’s market is what will sell in ANY market. A house with a decent floor plan, enough square footage to turn around in, and a yard for Fido or Baby. Oh, in a good neighborhood. Generally these are noted by the absence of whispering neighbors fixed to sidewalks or front windows scoping out all the potential buyers. For your home, yes, some updating is expected (like 2 full bathrooms or a kitchen that doesn’t have a backdoor that opens into your refrigerator) but you should start with a foundation free of cracking, support posts free of water damage and rot, a basement, attic or crawl space free of rodents, pests and asbestos.
Human hands should have touched the plumbing in the last 50 years. Likewise that relic of an electrical panel pulsing out 125 watts should meet its maker and be replaced with a 200 watt panel from this century.
And that abandoned oil tank you claim was removed years ago but have no documentation for ~ yeah, that’s gonna be a problem. It takes one half cup of oil to pollute a entire swimming pool worth of ground water. You will spend $65,000 in cleanup costs only to be put on the EPA probation list for 2 years during which you are not allowed to sell your home. So homeowners do check into some PLIA insurance is you are still believing your trusty oil tank that hasn’t seen the light of day in 25 years is a safer (cheaper) alternative to modern gas. Likewise make darn certain the yokels who converted your oil furnace to gas got better than passing marks at the Gas Furnace School of Installation.
If you are still in the dark about your home’s ability to sell without losing the crapload of money you paid for it here’s a few pointers (aka Caveat Emptor):
1) If I step out of my car onto your curb in front of your home and put my foot into dog shit ~ you don’t have a nice house.
2) If I trip over broken pavement, uneven stairs and the handrail or doorknob comes off in my hand ~ you don’t have a nice house.
3) If I have to wrestle garbage and recycling bins out of the way to reach the front door at the top of several sets of stairs (with a stroller in tow) – your house sucks.
4) If I open the front door and see stairs, a brick wall, the dining area, or basically anything other than a foyer, hallway or coat closet ~ your house sucks.
5) If you only spent money painting each room a different “hip” color – your house sucks.
6) If you put your kitchen in the basement or attic or anywhere I can’t waltz into with a bag of groceries steps from my car – your house sucks.
7) If I find no room bigger than my car joined by series of twisting narrow hallways and your agent mentions “good flow” – your house sucks.
8 )If you converted your attic into a “stunning master suite” and shoehorned a bathroom and wardrobe into the crawl spaces a microbe couldn’t stand up in without bumping their teeny biomorphic head – your house sucks.
9) If the opposing walls of your house lean inward – your house sucks.
10) If you put the window into the master bathtub/shower overlooking the neighbors - your house sucks.
11) If the floorboards don’t quite meet the walls and the plaster on the ceiling that your agent listed as charming period detail falls in my eye – your house sucks.
12) If I have to take my life in my hands traversing a narrow set of steep stairs to a low ceiling basement to retrieve my laundry – your house sucks.
13) If the next door neighbors have installed a permanent basketball court with floodlights behind your house – your house sucks.
14) If your neighbors are senior citizens who spend a lot of time drinking and plotting against you - your house sucks.
15) If the neighborhood teens like to steal your lawn ornaments - your house sucks.
16) If your house is positioned onto the far back corner of your lot and the exposed yard is prey to passing cars throwing beer bottles onto your lawn – your house sucks.
17) If those “mature garden” trees and plants are filling your sewer lines with roots, lifting your foundation and pinching your gutters shut - your house sucks.
18) If your gutters empty out onto a concrete block 6 inches from your foundation –your house sucks.
19) If you spent $10,000 installing storm windows over those “charming” single leaded glass panes but ignored the frayed sash cords and crumbling sills – your house sucks.
20) If you’ve never fixed anything broken in your house (e.g. leaking plumbing) but live a fabulous neighborhood and want to retire to California - your house sucks and I hope you can never afford more than a yurt in San Jose.
21) If I stand outside and hear I-5, 520, 99, or your house fronts a major traffic artery please understand that delightful water feature you installed (but never cleaned) or that “Zen” outdoor room with Trex deck studded with rare potted plants – won’t save you.
22) If I stand outside and catch the diesel breeze of a passing freight train – your house sucks.
23) If you built your house in a slide zone but your never built a retaining wall or fixed that hinge crack in your basement or never heard of pin piling - your house sucks.
24) If you are a developer or builder and bought a shoehorn or transitional lot and constructed a $400,000 Craftsman on it that looks into every neighbor’s backyard down the entire block and you are asking $1,000,000 for it – your house sucks.
25) If I feel better standing outside your house than standing inside of it – your house sucks.
Thank you,
Tired of Looking at Crappy Houses in a Down Market for 2 Years Running