A home insurance policy won’t cover every thing that could possibly go wrong with a home. The details are all in the fine print within the policy.“Insurance policies are like snowflakes; no two are exactly the same,” Ashleigh Cloud Trent, an insurance adviser with Swingle Collins and Associates in Dallas, told realtor.com®.Many standard policies do not include a few things that homeowners may assume they cover. Homeowners may need to inves
Many real estate professionals have become keenly aware of targeted wire fraud scams that include email impersonation tactics. A growing avenue cyber criminals are using to get highly sensitive financial data is known as spear phishing, according to Asaf Cidon, vice president of content security for Barracuda Networks, a data protection company.Spear phishing is a highly targeted and researched personal attack that is difficult to detect. Ha
Improved educational performance, higher civic participation, lower crime rates, and improved health remain the biggest social benefits linked to homeownership, according to a new research paper by NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun and research economist Nadia Evangelou, which appears in The Journal of the Center for Real Estate Studies. Some findings from the latest research cited in the paper include:Health. Children of homeowners tend to b
Painting can be one of the most cost-effective ways to spruce up a listing. But homeowners can also make a lot of mistakes with this common DIY job. Realtor.com® recently spoke with staging and color experts to find out some of the most obvious mistakes that they see most often.1. Choosing the wrong finish.Homeowners need to select a paint finish that correlates with the room’s purpose. "Many homeowners are nervous about using shiny semigloss
Step out of your box, and give it a tryWhen Myrtle Beach-based agent Abe Safe was newly licensed, he started out purely cold calling for a few months. As a new agent, he had little else to do, so he was committed.After he got comfortable making cold calls, he started on expireds and FSBOs. His goal was to make a minimum of 40 contacts per day.By the end of his first year, he closed 40 transactions, and roughly a quarter of those deals came from
Inexpensive fixes tend to offer the highest returnsKey Takeaways Sellers often lose money making high-cost renovations. Inexpensive renovations tend to offer higher ROI and present less risk than costly projects.Can you list the home renovations that get the best returns for sellers? If not, can you honestly claim to get top dollar for sellers’ homes?Tracy McLaughlinOn a podcast with Pat Hiban, Tracy McLaughlin shared her expert advice on home
Your sweat equity will pay dividends when the home sellsKey Takeaways The key to staging a home on a budget is manual labor with a detail-oriented focus.Staging a home on a budget isn’t as hard as you may think. As a real estate agent, you can advise sellers on how to instantly boost the appeal of their home using tricks of the trade that cost little or no money and bring a huge return on investment.Small changes add up to create buyer-friendl
Keeping a home warm during the colder months of the year can prove to be expensive. With energy costs on the rise, many households are facing higher energy bills each year.Fixr.com, which provides "Cost Guides" of estimates to common household remodeling projects, highlights five projects to help increase a home’s energy efficiency and keep utility bills lower. (Fixr.com also provides cost estimates below of the projects listed.)1. Find unor
The changing of the season brings several household tasks you should perform to keep your home safe as colder temperatures approach. Realtor.com® recently featured several chores to do for fall and winter preparation. Clean the dryer vents. Excess lint in a dryer can pose a fire risk. “A key indicator of a dryer vent needing to be cleaned is if clothes aren’t drying as fast as they usually do, or if it takes multiple cycles to get them com
Major natural disasters, such as hurricanes, floods, wildfires, and earthquakes, have made headlines recently, and your clients may be considering taking extra precautions to protect their homes against extreme weather events. Pass these tips along to homeowners. Know your risks. Preparation is key before a disaster strikes because emergency supplies dwindle quickly after such an event. And know what types of threats your area is most vulnerable
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