General Info • October 18, 2024

Volunteering In Our Community

by Darren Upp

Fall has arrived and we are nearing the Holidays quickly. You’ve undoubtedly noticed that everything is now flavored with “Pumpkin Spice” and the tastes, smells and sights are getting everyone into the Holiday spirit.

Inside my real estate business, I’m involved with a Mastermind Group of agents all over the country that try to give back to our individual communities as much as possible. Especially around Thanksgiving time, we’ve always looked at this as a time to reflect on how fortunate we are, what great families we all have and the love we should embrace for our fellow neighbors.

Unfortunately, we still have poverty in America. As a matter of fact, we have it right here in our area. This Thanksgiving, there will be families as well as single Mom’s and single Dad’s that can’t provide a bountiful feast for their loved ones. As you can imagine, nothing could be more disheartening or humiliating for the provider of a family, so we try to help out wherever possible.

Happiness, love and gratitude are things that are extremely important to me here in our community. I would encourage anyone that wants to create good will, good feelings and good examples for your children to just find a family or two that could use a little bit of cheer and help them out with a big family dinner or anything else that may be of assistance.

We’ve found these families by checking with local churches & charities, food banks and even running a few ads online to ensure we find good families that are simply down on their luck.

If you’d like to talk about this a little more, simply give me a call. Otherwise, help out anywhere you can!

Building Wealth • October 10, 2024

This Won’t Last Forever

by Darren Upp

I’ve been very happy to see that over the past few years, the mortgage lending guidelines have relaxed a good bit which makes homeownership more achievable for a larger number of people.

With those more normalized guidelines, also comes opportunity for those that are interested to break into the investing world with very little cash out of pocket.

We all know that nearly ALL massively successful and wealthy people have given credit to real estate for a large percentage of their empire. It seems that every time you read an article about a multi-millionaire, they’ll talk about how they started with just one or two rental properties and leveraged off of that to generate a huge portfolio of properties and millions of dollars. I’m sure you’ve seen those articles yourself.

The problem is that it can be scary if you are venturing into something you’ve never done before. After all, you certainly don’t want to make a mistake or get into something that costs you money.

That’s why you use a professional advisor! As a licensed real estate pro, we look at these things all day – every day. We’ve worked with new investors as well as seasoned pro’s so we know what makes the most sense and how to get started in the right direction. One thing I’ve always leaned on when discussing real estate investments is that absolutely EVERY SINGLE ONE of the wealthy individuals I’ve spoken to or learned from said that the one regret they have is that they didn’t start earlier. All of them let fear stand in the way of them acquiring their first transaction.

Many times, I hear that people simply didn’t realize that investments were so attainable. They thought that they’d need a huge down payment and a 750 credit score or some other unknown requirements that would keep them from qualifying. That’s not the case.

Lending guidelines change all the time, but it’s always been exciting to me to see that someone can acquire an investment property with a minimal down payment and nearly “average” credit. Best of all, they can earn a positive cash flow each month to give them some extra money but in the meantime, that tenant is buying down the mortgage so that you’ll eventually own that home free and clear!

We’ve heard from some families that are just looking to acquire a couple of rental houses so that they can leave something for their children once they pass on several years (hopefully decades!) down the road. It’s a nice little surprise for your children to find out that you left a house to them that’s owned free and clear and is consistently bringing in a large rental check every month!

Fortunately, these are things that can be done in a far away distant area and they require NONE of your own labor or time. Remember, it’s always smarter to use a property manager so you never have to lift a finger.

Let the professionals handle it and you just cash the checks each month while watching your equity position grow!

My job is to help your family in making smart moves in real estate. Want to chat about it?

Homeowner Tips • September 12, 2024

To Improve or Not To Improve

by Darren Upp

One of the biggest common misconceptions when it comes to your home is that all improvements will give you the value back and then some.

This is TOTALLY untrue.

I’ve met with homeowners that believe their home is worth $4,000 more than the others because they just replaced the air conditioner. No, your home is worth exactly as much as the others because it now has a working air conditioner. You’ve simply brought it up to par. Nobody would buy it at all when it wasn’t working and the only reason you replaced it is because it was broken or near broken.

It’s ridiculous to think I would get $6,000 more for my used car because the engine blew up and I spent $6,000 on a new one. No, now it’s worth the same as everyone else’s working car of similar specs.

If you spend $5,500 to put a beautiful deck on the back of your home, of course that increases the marketability and it increases the desirability. But that doesn’t mean you’ll get an additional $5,500 for the home. You won’t in most cases.

To be clear, you may get a little bit more money for the house, but you’ll also be getting your own enjoyment while you are living there.

I recently read a story about an owner that spent $13,000 for a privacy fence in his huge backyard and he was shocked to learn when he sold the next Summer that the home would be MUCH more desirable than the others, but he will only get an additional $5,000 for the home based on the beautiful fenced yard.

When you replace a roof or a hot water tank or any other mechanicals in a home, of course that’s an outstanding improvement. They would choose your home over those that have NOT done that improvement. But the fact is, you didn’t replace it to increase the value. You replaced it because the last one was bad, meaning the home was in ill repair. Yes, the buyers would choose yours, but they wouldn’t pay you dollar for dollar as to what you’ve invested.

On the flip side of that coin, most generally you’ll find that nearly ALL cosmetic or minor repairs will pay back huge dividends and may actually pay you back a multiple of what you’ve invested.

You already know that fresh paint and carpet goes a LONG way in creating more value within the home. I don’t know that I’ve ever seen one case where they didn’t get their investment back in terms of price and marketability.

The same is usually true for countertops, window repairs, punch-out items and many other minor issues. That’s why we often recommend a pre-market home inspection so you can knock out any minor issues to avoid scaring off the buyer when they have their inspections done.

Be sure you get with me on any improvements so that you can have a bit of professional advice before you pull the trigger on the project. There are two things to look at. One is resale value and the other is your own enjoyment of those items which is really your main goal to begin with, even if you won’t get your investment back. But remember, there are several things you can do to INCREASE the value and get a multiple of what you’ve invested in repairs or upgrades.

Building Wealth • August 15, 2024

Could YOU Really Own A Few Rental Houses?

by Darren Upp

I speak to dozens of area residents that say they’ve always thought about investing in a few rental properties, but they had no idea where to start and more importantly, they don’t want to make a mistake.

We all know that wealth is created every single day through the ownership of rental houses (or an apartment building) and fortunately, these days you don’t need much money for a down payment to get your first investment.

Some people have thought about picking up a couple of houses just to have the extra cash flow each month while the tenants pay off the mortgage for you. Others have goals of getting the home paid off with 100% of the rent money each month so that they’ll have a small real estate portfolio to hand down to their children. You may be interested in the tax benefits, the diversification or even the ability to finally have a REAL passive income.

The one recommendation I always give is to NEVER try to handle it yourself. This is true for the acquisition of the home, as well as the monthly management and rental collection. It’s incredibly cheap to have a professional handle all of this so that all you need to do is look in your bank account and see that the money was deposited every month. Management can be a mess unless you are a professional.

The one thing I hear over and over is “I’ve always had real estate investing in the back of my mind but I’ve never pulled the trigger”. They’ve considered this in their 20’s, in their 30’s and beyond, yet haven’t taken action yet. Heck, if they would’ve bought a couple of properties way back then with a very small down payment, they’d all be paid for by now and you’d have a net worth over a million dollars!

There are many factors that allow you to get into investing these days, you may want to do some research on it. Give me a quick call and let’s chat about ideas.

Homeowner Tips • August 10, 2024

Does Curb Appeal Really Matter THAT Much?

by Darren Upp

You probably have a friend or two that’s working on some upgrades or repairs inside their home this month. It’s very common for us to want to improve the area in which our family lives. Everything from carpet to hardwood to fresh paint and sometimes even room additions or kitchen upgrades.

Many times, these small little additions can make it feel like a new home and can really brighten up the mood each time you walk into the room.

From a real estate value perspective, these upgrades can also increase your equity in the property if done correctly. As you push up the value of your home and make it more marketable, you not only get to enjoy it while you live there, but may also sell it for more money when the time comes to move.

It’s common to fix up the inside, but far too often, I see that people forget about the outside of the home. When you look at this from a resale perspective, you quickly notice that all home buyers shop online and they are generally choosing homes to look at or completely skip altogether simply based on the curb appeal. The picture is EVERYTHING so that front photo really matters.

With you and your family living in the home day to day, it can be a pretty good feeling to just paint the front door a different color or add a little bit of landscaping around the entrance. It gives you a fresh feel each time you come home and it helps you in enjoying the pride of homeownership.

As far as overall home value is concerned, the exterior can mean as much or more than the interior. Since marketability is a key factor in real estate, you want to make sure the curb appeal attracts as many people as possible. If you’ve casually browsed homes for sale online, you’ve undoubtedly skipped the ones with a bad looking front picture while you showed interest in those with a gorgeous snapshot of the front.

When the grass is green, the paint is fresh, the roof looks nice and the landscaping accentuates the home, there is something magnetically attractive about the property. And as you know, more interest in a home can mean more money!

All of my clients deserve to have as much equity as they can possibly create within their home. Even if you have no intentions of EVER making a move, it’s nice to know that your net worth is increased and you have something more valuable for whenever you decide to sell the place or hand it down to a loved one.

Coupling that with the fact that you get more enjoyment out of the property with some fresh digs, it makes home improvements (even basic cosmetics) a fun project to consider.

One key factor to remember is that these repairs, upgrades or improvements should all look professionally done. Nothing is worse than poor work in home repairs. It can be fun to take on a do-it-yourself project but most generally, you are better off getting a few quotes from professionals and getting it done by them. You can sit back and relax while the manual labor is dedicated to someone that loves their craft!

Client's Corner • July 19, 2024

How’s Your Social Media This Summer?

by Darren Upp

Many of my past clients stay in touch with me regularly and with social media exploding on the scene over the past decade or so, it’s never been easier to keep up with what our friends are up to.

Now that Summer is here, many families are considering vacations or staycations and spending some quality time together. When the kids are out of school and the weather is nice, it’s a great time to get back to our roots and enjoy our families in an unfamiliar environment or possibly even safely at home.

Just a few short years ago, it was considered an amenity for hotels, resorts or destinations to have Wi-Fi. Some even offered it at no additional charge and promoted it in all of their marketing. That’s not the case today.

Now, several families are seeking a REAL getaway! They are looking for places where they CAN’T be reached and there’s limited or even no internet connection at all.

It seems weird to see teenagers looking at each other and talking and playing games together like it was in the old days. Some teenagers are uncomfortable because they don’t know what to do with their hands!

Some of these destinations are promoting that there’s no Wi-Fi connections and they assure us that the world won’t end and nobody will die simply because you can’t check your social media or email for two days. I couldn’t agree more!

As I follow several of my clients on their social media page, I’m seeing a trend where rather than them posting what’s going on with their vacation every 26 minutes, they are spending all of their time with their family, then posting their best pictures once they get home and their quality time with their loved ones is finished.

Personally, I’d rather it be this way. I love seeing their “highlight reel” and great comments about the trip they had together.

Since I’ve seen this dozens of times over the past year or so, I’d feel confident in saying the photos look like they are genuinely having more fun together, rather than posing for the pictures that will be posted on social media.

I’m curious from a marketing perspective to see how these destinations and resorts promote themselves when it comes to internet access in the coming years. I’ve wondered if they’ll charge us a premium to block the internet, rather than a premium to access it.

Which would you choose if you were spending a few days on vacation? Internet or no internet? Email me and let me know which you would choose. Maybe we’ll do an informal survey here and I can report everyone’s answer totals back next month!

So shoot me an email and let me know where your DREAM vacation would be and if you had the option, would you accept WiFi or block it?

I know what my option would be as I enjoy the freedom I feel with being “disconnected” from the outside would, but I’m interested in your perspective, thoughts and comments.

I’m giving away a $20 Starbucks card to the best answer!

Building Wealth • General Info • July 11, 2024

The Coming Recession!

by Darren Upp

You’ve undoubtedly seen that there’s a recession and market adjustment looming again. Many say it’s already here. This is all part of the natural cycle and after you’ve been through a few, you start to prepare for them and profit from them in several different ways.

While the last bubble burst was real estate related due to sub-prime loans and questionable lending practices, this one is much different due to massive inflation and supply chain issues like never before.

Since I work with so many real estate clients, I always try to keep up to date on stats and predictions to ensure my clients are prepared for any changes they may want to make with upcoming economic changes. This upcoming market correction is different and I must say, I’m feeling pretty confident about it.

I’ve seen articles from NAR as well as other respected economic authorities and it appears that the ONE safe investment people will have in America with the down turning market is housing. That’s great news for me and great news for your family too! While they DO expect the real estate market to cool off and slow, that doesn’t mean we will see a “crash”. This certainly beats the massive depreciation we all experienced starting in 2008!

So of course, we are all hoping these economic indicators are right and if so, real estate may be the only safe investment to consider! The stock market has dropped, the bond market will take a hit and consumers will slow their spending in the retail environment but real estate can keep a steady and healthy base as we push through to begin recovering from whatever losses the market sees.

I’m certainly no economy genius myself, but I trust the respected and proven “higher ups” that have always been right in the past. They study this stuff all day, every day and they have a pretty good read on the market.

We are already talking to investors that are pulling their money out of other markets and creating a real estate portfolio. It’s nice to know you can MAKE money in a shrinking economy! If you’ve considered buying a rental home, lets chat!

Uncategorized • June 18, 2024

When Is Best Time To Sell A Home?

by Darren Upp

This is the question of all questions when it comes to real estate. As a professional agent and marketing specialist, I talk to homeowners during every month of the year that are hoping to “time the market” to sell the home for as much as possible.

The common misconception is that you will sell a home for more money during one season as opposed to another one. Unfortunately, we’ve never found any data whatsoever to support that in this area.

In some areas of the country, there are more buyers in the Summertime and in other areas, the Wintertime is the big season. But guess what??? When there are more buyers, there are also more sellers trying to sell. As a matter of fact, most of those buyers also put their current property on the market so that they can make the move.

The most ridiculous thing anyone can do when making a move for their primary residence is to try to “time the market” in lieu of making the move when the family needs change.

In real estate, we know that most people have a housing need change when they go through a life change. In other words, a birth or death in the family, a job promotion or a job loss, children heading off to college, a marriage or divorce and other things of this nature. When there’s a life change, it creates a housing need change. The last thing you’d ever want to do is wait until “the hot market” time in the area. The truth is, everything is based on supply and demand and your home won’t sell for more money when there are 5 times as many homes available for sale in your neighborhood.

As a matter of fact, due to the competition, I’ve personally witnessed this having a negative effect on home prices because after all, you probably don’t really NEED to sell your home so someone will always be a heck of a lot more motivated to unload their home than you are. That creates a downward pressure on asking prices.

In reality, if you are going to be utilizing a mortgage when buying your next home, you want to time the market by timing YOUR expenses which is the interest rate. Since rates are going up and it appears that will continue to happen for the next several years, the absolute BEST time to buy a home was 3 months ago. The next best time is right now. Waiting a year or two can cause you to pay several hundred dollars per month more in the form of a higher interest rate.

While nobody can precisely predict the future of the economy in any country, it’s safe to say that rates will never go any lower than they’ve been lately. After all, for all of us still living and breathing, we’ve never seen anything like this before throughout our adult lives.

It may be wise to find that new place sooner, rather than later. If you feel like your family deserves a bigger home and could really utilize the extra space, now is the time for us to start casually looking around with no commitment of officially making a move. But for my clients, I want to ensure they don’t wait until rates are way up again and it prices them out of the ability to secure a larger home for the same monthly payment they have now.

General Info • Sellers • June 10, 2024

How Far Is Starbucks From You?

by Darren Upp

Lately, stats have proven that your home’s value can be dependent upon your proximity to the local Starbucks, Trader Joe’s or any other local grocery store as well as fast food locations. According to Zillow, things that increase your home’s value are good school districts and neighborhoods, larger square footage and its closeness to these local retailers.

Recent research shows major increases in value for homes that are “in the thick of things” as opposed to those that are out of the way a bit.

Of course, we’ve heard this our whole life. Location, location, location.

The most recent data we’ve found shows that homes within a quarter mile of Starbucks had value appreciations nearly double that of homes that are further away. Meanwhile in Detroit, homes near a brand-new opening of a Whole Foods have nearly DOUBLED in price!

A RealtyTrac study showed that homes in the same zip code as a Trader Joe’s went up by an amazing 40% during a period when the average growth for the nation was only 34%.

In all fairness, what happens in other areas around the nation doesn’t necessarily apply here in our area all the time, but it certainly makes sense when there’s a definite connection between property values and it’s closeness to these new or popular retail locations around the country.

There are many factors that go into what you are looking for when considering a possible move.

First and foremost is always about finding the perfect home for your family’s needs.

However, a very important second factor to consider is location to popular retail locations even if it’s not establishments that you would frequent yourself. You have to keep resale value in mind anytime you are buying a home for your family, or for investment purposes. If you have questions about any of these thoughts, just give me a quick call here. I’m always happy to speak with you!

Homeowner Tips • Sellers • May 16, 2024

Increasing The Value Of Your Home

by Darren Upp

When it comes to one of the largest assets you’ll ever own, it’s important to ensure that you keep the value on par with where it should be in relation to other homes in the area. As you start seeing other homeowners doing upgrades to the inside or outside of their property, it’s important to keep up with the revitalization of your own home.

Sometimes a simple landscaping upgrade can make it feel like you live in an entirely different house each time you pull in the driveway. A fresh coat of paint or new flooring also makes the inside feel new and can keep your home on par with other properties that have done the same improvements.

We are all aware that your property’s overall value has a lot to do with comparable home sales within your area. But remember that any upgrades they have which seem superior to yours will certainly shine through with Realtors and Appraisers that are looking at the comps.

A few months before you plan to sell your home it’s best to first declutter as much as possible. Since we live in our homes every day, things can start to accumulate and before you know it, there’s clutter stacking in various places. Anytime a potential buyer is looking at a home it’s often because they are looking for more space. You want your property to look like it has ample space which can easily be done by taking things out of the home to make it look more open and spacious.

Each home is unique. There are generally a few items that your specific home could have done to increase the overall value by $10,000 to $20,000 yet it doesn’t cost much money to create that value. As a real estate professional, I offer to meet with my clients once every year or two to take a quick tour of the home see what they’ve done and provide some professional advice on things they COULD do to increase the value and marketability of the home. We’ve found that this works much better than waiting 5 or 6 years until it’s time to move again and then dealing with everything at once.

If you’d like some professional advice on how you can increase the value of your home, just give me a call and I can swing by. Being a Realtor, I’m always driving around town so it’s no problem at all to stop by. That’s also a good time for us to catch up for a moment! You know how to reach me!

Volunteering In Our Community

This Won’t Last Forever

To Improve or Not To Improve

Could YOU Really Own A Few Rental Houses?

Does Curb Appeal Really Matter THAT Much?

How’s Your Social Media This Summer?

The Coming Recession!

When Is Best Time To Sell A Home?

How Far Is Starbucks From You?

Increasing The Value Of Your Home

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