SELLERS! Limit Surprises - Get a Pre-Sale Home Inspection

You can count on the savvy homebuyer making his or her offer to purchase your home contingent upon a satisfactory professional home inspection report.  As a home seller, worrying about what that inspection may reveal can be a nerve-wracking experience. You can minimize your anxiety and the last-minute appearance of any potential deal-killing surprises by obtaining your own pre-sale home inspection.
The home inspector will visually examine your home’s physical structure and systems from top to bottom including: the heating and air conditioning systems, plumbing and electrical systems, roof, walls, ceilings, floors, windows, doors, foundation, basement and attic, and other visible structures. The inspector won’t give your house a passing or failing grade, but will evaluate its physical condition and report on what you may need to repair or replace.

Taking this extra step has several benefits. Most importantly, it will provide you with an objective look at your home and call attention to any problems. It’s in your best interest to have a good understanding of your home’s condition and to address any small issues.  The home sale/purchase transaction is a heady deal that is fraught with emotion and relatively small problems like an air conditioning unit that needs service or a fireplace that needs minor repair potentially can turn into deal-killing issues.

A pre-sale inspection report also can be used as a marketing tool that may highlight some of the home’s positive attributes, which may help alleviate some of the homebuyer’s anxieties about the property and the thoroughness of your disclosures.
While no home seller wants to learn of major problems, you’re much better off knowing about such issues early on.  Being informed will help you more accurately calculate your asking price, which can circumvent stressful defect-related price reduction negotiations later on. It also will give you an opportunity to calmly decide whether you’ll choose to remedy the problems. If you decide to sell the house “as is,” full disclosure of the problems will weed out the potential homebuyers who wouldn’t consider buying a home that needed repairs.
Copies of the pre-sale home inspection report and receipts for any subsequent repairs must be provided to the homebuyers.  They really appreciate full disclosure and being able to follow up with the same service providers if needed after they purchase your home.  IN HOUSTON, these are two inspection companies that are highly recommended. 

•  http://www.texaninspection.com/houston-home-infrared-thermography.php - these guys use infrared technology to review the condition of material behind your walls and ceilings!
• http://www.redstarinspections.com - competitive pricing!

CLIMATEGATE??!! WOW, I wonder what ya'll are thinking now!

Wow!  Folks are warning "green" followers to dump stocks in alternative energy companies, everyone has just felt a punch in the stomach!  So here is a dirty laundry list of actions taken by the "scientific team":

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  The Climate Research Unit at East Anglia had profited to the tune of at least $20 million in “research” grants from the Team’s activities.
  
  
  
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  The Team had tampered with the complex, bureaucratic processes of the UN’s climate panel, the IPCC, so as to exclude inconvenient scientific results from its four Assessment Reports, and to influence the panel’s conclusions for political rather than scientific reasons.
  
  
  
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  The Team had conspired in an attempt to redefine what is and is not peer-reviewed science for the sake of excluding results that did not fit what they and the politicians with whom they were closely linked wanted the UN’s climate panel to report.
  
  
  
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  They had tampered with their own data so as to conceal inconsistencies and errors.
  
  
  
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  They had emailed one another about using a “trick” for the sake of concealing a “decline” in temperatures in the paleoclimate. 
  
  
  
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  They had expressed dismay at the fact that, contrary to all of their predictions, global temperatures had not risen in any statistically-significant sense for 15 years, and had been falling for nine years. They had admitted that their inability to explain it was “a travesty”. This internal doubt was in contrast to their public statements that the present decade is the warmest ever, and that “global warming” science is settled.
  
  
  
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  They had interfered with the process of peer-review itself by leaning on journals to get their friends rather than independent scientists to review their papers.
  
  
  
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  They had successfully leaned on friendly journal editors to reject papers reporting results inconsistent with their political viewpoint.
  
  
  
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  They had campaigned for the removal of a learned journal’s editor, solely because he did not share their willingness to debase and corrupt science for political purposes.
  
  
  
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  They had mounted a venomous public campaign of disinformation and denigration of their scientific opponents via a website that they had expensively created.
  
  
  
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  Contrary to all the rules of open, verifiable science, the Team had committed the criminal offense of conspiracy to conceal and then to destroy computer codes and data that had been legitimately requested by an external researcher who had very good reason to doubt that their “research” was either honest or competent
  
  
  

More on the issue:  Apparently, the new term "climategate" was Googled more than 20 million times Nov 30th! I wonder what 20 million people are now thinking about "climate warming."

http://www.climate-gate.org/

http://www.infowars.com/climategate-for-dummies/

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100017393/climategate-the-final-nail-in-the-coffin-of-anthropogenic-global-warming/

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,578990,00.html

COOL METAL ROOFS save you up to 40% in Energy Costs

Metal roofs and walls help reduce energy consumption. They can be finished with heat-deflecting coatings to lower energy usage by reducing cooling loads. "Cool metal roofs” can reflect up to 70% of the sun’s rays, resulting in less heat transfer to the interior of the building and saving owners up to 40% in energy costs.  Doesn't that sound great?!

Moreover, metal has a low thermal mass, meaning that it dissipates heat very quickly once the sun goes behind a cloud or sets for the day. Other construction materials such as concrete or asphalt shingles have greater thermal mass and will continue to radiate captured heat into the structure, even when the sun is not shining.

Metal roofs and walls also contribute considerably to the “green” building movement because of their high recycled content, recyclability, sustainability and energy efficiency.  The recycled content for steel used in metal roofs and walls, for example, is at least 25%. This level of recycled content reduces both the cost and environmental impact of making new steel, as it conserves energy and other natural raw materials. 

A well certified company that can help you with additional information including installation of metal roofs is http://www.texaseliteroofing.com/.  See their certification at: http://texaseliteroofing.com/Roofing_Certifactaions.html.  This is a family owned business and they give you free estimates! 

Buyer asked me about HOUSTON'S EAST END - here's my take....Oak Forest and Timbergrove Instead

Dear Young-Savvy-Information-Hungry Buyer,

There is a rule we Realtors® generally follow in real estate.  Sell clients what they want not what they need. You are one of the few recent potential buyers that have asked the question, “What real estate would be a better value?” Do you believe that?!!!! It’s true.  Rarely do we get this question.  Breath of fresh air you are!

Most people want what they want and don’t ask.

EAST END
You get more value for your dollar in terms of space for the price per SF. HOWEVER, this type of purchase would only be a BETTER value IF YOU ARE going to buy and hold for over 10 years versus less than 10 years! Your generation will eat this area up alive in the next 10 -15 yrs. BUT it will never have the appreciation that say a TH in Rice Military or Upper Kirby will have because of the proximity to central Houston and Galleria, Highland Village and Memorial Park. Remember homes are built on top of land values. The reason those homes in the East End are cheaper is because their land value for the developer was cheaper. That is why homes inside the Inner Loop (WEST of 145 of course) are so much more expensive.  Land value is high. $40-70 PSF versus $10-30 PSF. The new residential product inside the East End pocket also seems to be similar, too similar, TH’s 3/2’s, 2/2’s with two car garages no yard or very little yard. There is not much differentiation yet and the inventory for homes built now will be too many, to sell themselves with a very large upside in the future.  If you can spend 250K, I would not advise it to be spent on the East End.  Not for the savvy buyer with appreciation and holding for short term as primary goals. Here's the East End Chamber of Commerce website for more local information:  http://www.eecoc.org/index.php?pid=1

Other than the future TH developments, the East End is not getting anything new.  It will continue to benefit from proximity to Downtown convention center, stadium, and Discovery Green. But there are no plans for any HEB’s or other grocery stores. Folks are still petitioning for a grocery store. http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/BringqualityandhealthyfoodtotheE/  If say a Star Bucks (big determinant in telling residents that their property tax base has increased) comes in, that is a VERY GOOD SIGN, their demographic projections and studies are rigorous. But they don’t come in until AFTER new retail and commercial are already in or are in the works.  So we are a few years out still for the East End……………..More roof tops are STILL needed to bring in the new retail and commercial.  Mayoral candidates talked about what they wanted to develop in the East End…. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iW7bq6XrB4o and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SapqxYO43UQ and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OFLXAzMccY0

Townhomes are a dime a dozen. Saturated market, in my opinion, especially three story TH's.  This is one of the reasons I bought a two story TH in Rice Military WITH a back yard.  Much fewer of these units than the 3-story and you know the Law of Economics - Supply and Demand. 

OAK FOREST and TIMBERGROVE
The way to go in the future for appreciation and a shorter term hold - min 3-10 years - older single family with renovation on lots ranging from 5000-10,000 SF within 10-15 minutes of the Galleria and Downtown. Some don’t even have garages. But land is precious, so THAT is the BEST value in Houston right now if you want to see a steady climb in appreciation across time. Price range is 210-350K. Those without renovations are being picked up for lot value around 140-220K and McMansions worth 650K plus are being built in their stead because folks are tired of commuting. Two neighborhoods – Oak Forest and Timbergrove.

1301 Martin St (short sale) and 1803 Woodcrest are two great deals in Oak Forest.  I know the builder who renovated Woodcrest.

1124 Wynnwood (motivated seller) and 6738 Kury Ln (they are ready to negotiate down down!) in Timbergrove – good deals.