Seattle Housing Buzz

With the $8,000 First Time Home Buyer’s Tax Credit set to expire tomorrow (April 30th), Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC is launching its own buyer incentive program. Starting May 1st, participating sellers listed with Coldwell Banker, nationally, will be offering up to 3% of the accepted offer price, up to $8,000, to buyers who contract by July 31, 2010. There is no deadline for closing. Additionally, Coldwell Banker’s program is not limited to first-time home buyers.

According to the company, “while 34 percent cite the current tax credit extension (expiring April 30) as the primary reason their customers are currently for searching for a home, 28 percent said that they feel the limitations of this credit will prohibit some buyers from taking advantage of the credit.”

“The Buyer Bonus Sales Event will allow participating Coldwell Banker home sellers to essentially extend the benefits of the credit,” said Jim Gillespie, president and chief executive officer for Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC. “Without restrictions such as household income caps, the Coldwell Banker Buyer Bonus Sales Event allows for greater participation for all homebuyers. And our sellers have a unique opportunity to allow their home to stand out from the competition in their marketplace.”

While it’s fantastic to see Coldwell Banker take the initiative in continuing the velocity produced by the government tax credit, good real estate agents may very well negotiate better pricing values and contract terms for their clients, with or without the carrot.

Related: Coldwell Banker press release

Tags: Coldwell Banker Buyer Bonus Event

Redfin announced yesterday that they’ve overhauled their listing program throughout their service areas.

Redfin agents will now offer in-home listing consultations, provide pre-listing recommendations, host open houses & private tours, post a personalized agent “for sale” sign, print flyers, aggregate listings on 3rd-party websites and implement on online system for agent feedback. Essentially, Redfin services have been revamped to match those offered by traditional full-service companies.

As a result of the expanded services, Redfin has modified its fee structure. The new listing fee is 1.5% (4.5% when factoring in a 3% buyer agent commission) with a minimum of $5,500. Previously, they charged either $5,000 or $7,000 depending on the level of service provided.

I think this is a positive move on Redfin’s part. Though, as the scrappy upstart matures and grows, expanding its services and market areas (they just launched in Phoenix), they are seemingly morphing more and more into a traditional discount real estate company. On a cost side, Redfin’s fee is lower than what most brokerages charge. However, as fees are negotiable their advantage is less apparent than before since many full-service agents list for less than the norm as well. Redfin’s superior technology and customer feedback/reviews sets them apart, yet as other companies begin to follow suit, the lines of differentiation are becoming blurred.

Tags: Redfin

More John L. Scott news…

John L. Scott Real Estate Chairman and CEO, J. Lennox Scott, announced the company’s purchase of Real Tech LLC, a web-based technology solutions company. With this change in ownership, Real Tech will evolve into John L. Scott’s exclusive in-house technology provider. Scott says that the decision to purchase Real Tech was made in order to support John L. Scott’s aggressive technology needs.

“We have a voracious appetite for technology,” said Scott. “The purchase of Real Tech provides John L. Scott with the ongoing, real time resources that we need to meet our ambitious technology goals.”

Real Tech has been John L. Scott’s technology partner collectively for five years and has been responsible for providing the development behind some of John L. Scott’s most notable web-related achievements, including the launch of Microsoft Virtual Earth, Neighborhood Wizard with Microsoft’s polygon drawing tool, and the integration of comparable sold home information with Microsoft’s interactive mapping system. Scott says that the successful partnership between John L. Scott, Real Tech, and Microsoft will continue to produce new innovations for the real estate industry in the coming months.

Real Tech General Manager, Adam Jundt, says, “John L Scott has a serious commitment to delivering cutting-edge technology solutions to their agents and the real estate consumer. Combined with Real Tech’s expertise, this enhanced partnership will fuel the next generation of products and services, continuing our role as technology leaders in the real estate industry.”

Real Tech’s nine team members will now operate within John L. Scott’s marketing and eStrategies department which is headed by Pat Giles, Vice President of Marketing and eStrategies. Giles recently joined John L. Scott, bringing a diverse technical and management background that blends together more than twenty years of experience in marketing, IT, and internet strategies.

Tags: John L. Scott Real Estate, RealTech

Buyers, sellers and real estate enthusiasts can now receive up-to-date sold property information via email. John L. Scott Real Estate, the first company to publish sold property data, has added a sold email feature.

Users can now easily keep track of Seattle’s housing activity. Whether you’re a buyer or seller you can sign-up to receive notification when a property has closed and at what price it sold for. Since the information comes directly from the NWMLS it’s the most up-to-date available.

To utilize the feature, sign up for a John L Scott’s Property Tracker account and create a search using the Interactive Map search option.

Related:
Improved search information on John L Scott
Neighborhood Wizard search feature

Tags: John L Scott, Seattle Real Estate

Ok, so I’ll weigh in here. Redfin recently announced their updated buyer-side performance statistics. Redfin agents, they say, beat other companies by negotiating 1.015% off the list price compared to .087%. Locally, Redfin states they’re able to negotiate more off the sales price for their buyers compared to all other agents, 98.89% to 99.38%. And, when combined with buyer rebates, they save their buyers $12,262 on average. This amounts to 2.45%…what they call the Redfin Advantage. Very commendable, indeed.

So, how did my buyers fare? Would they have done better with Redfin?

Over the same period, on average, I negotiated 2.76% off the list price saving my buyers $15,666 off the top. This figure does not include subsequent seller concessions such as seller paid closing costs (not wrapped into the sales price) and credit for repairs and so forth, which amounted to an additional $3,833, on average.

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Redfin buyers save on average: $12,262 which include the buyers rebate.

Ben’s buyers save on average: $19,499.

Tags: Buyers Agent, Redfin, Seattle Real Estate

John L. Scott has also launched an enhancement to its interactive mapping tool on www.JohnLScott.com. Now, visitors to John L. Scott’s website can view sold home information right along side homes for sale (see below). John L. Scott originally launched comparable sold property information in 2006 which appeared on its own mapping interface, but with this latest enhancement, consumers can view all homes for sale as well as those that recently sold on one interactive map.

Sold properties will now show along side active properties; solds in red and actives in blue.

In addition to the map, a list option is available:

By default, the sold listings are included in the search results. Users can remove the sold listings by unchecking the “Show Sold Properties” box:

In fact, I would suggest unchecking the box before viewing the listings in the Gallery view otherwise the solds will be included:

Tags: Home Search, John L Scott, Sold Data

Soon home buyers will be able to view home search listings right on their computer desktop. John L. Scott Real Estate is launching a Desktop Delivery tool that’ll enable home buyers access to the most up-to-date home search results. Users who download the gadget will receive new listings that meet their home search criteria on their desktop. The tool updates every two hours and works only with Vista.

According to Lennox Scott, John L. Scott’s CEO, “Visitors can download a gadget for any (and every) saved search, enabling them to have the most current, relevant home search information right on their desktop. Scott said “It’s like having a miniature slide show of your favorite homes for sale right at your finger tips.”

In the past six months, John L Scott has seen a 14% increase in its Property Tracker home search accounts. With over 100,000 accounts, the company notes that home buyers want to receive new listings as soon as they hit the market. The desktop tool provides a simple and immediate means of delivering the information to home buyers.

John L. Scott Real Estate has been an industry technology leader introducing many innovative internet tools and features for buyers and sellers, including high-definition and bird’s eye view images, the neighborhood wizard mapping tool and sold comparable data.

Tags: Home Search, John L Scott

I thought this was an amusing little tidbit of real estate news. While conducting a home search real estate agent Beau Betts noticed that Deborah Arends, the antagonist on 60 Minutes’ Redfin piece, took over a property that was previously listed with Redfin for nearly 100 days. Sometimes experience and service do matter.

Tags: Redfin

Inman News, a real estate media site, recently spotlighted a series feature several innovative Seattle-based real estate related companies at InmanTV.com. The interviews were conducte at Zillow’s office by Joel Burslem and provides some interesting insights.

Click on the links below to view the interviews:
Zillow

Redfin

John L. Scott

Estately

Tags: Inman, John L Scott, Redfin, Zillow

The Sellisius Blog Tour USA made a quick stop in Seattle on Wednesday, the latest on their zig zagging cross country real estate blogging trek (view route) which started in New York eons ago. Their final destination is the Inman Blogger Connect in San Francisco.

During their one-day visit, Rudy & Joe of Sellsius, plus a handful of local and Canadian real estate bloggers, toured the headquarters of Zillow and Redfin and hung out at the Pike Place Market.

I tagged along on the Zillow and Redfin office visits. I enjoyed the time at Zillow, meeting Drew and DavidG, listening to the lively debate between Joe and DavidG on Zillow’s tactics and partaking in their fantastic views high atop the Wells Fargo Center in downtown.

From the polished offices of Zillow we hiked over to Redfin in Pioneer Square. Claiming they’re in the process of moving to the Dexter Horton Building…cluttered, cramped & shabby chic came to mind walking around Redfin. They were friendly folk and I had the opportunity to meet Matt of urbnlivn.com fame. Plus, I scored a Redfin mug and toy plane (which doesn’t fly very well BTW).