Is It Time to Replace Your Furnace Filter?

It’s time for another installment in our home maintenance series. Today I’ll be talking about a particularly important, and particularly easy, project: replacing your furnace filter.

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I’m back today with the fifth installment in our eight-part series on home maintenance projects you shouldn’t put off. This time I’d like to talk about cleaning your HVAC unit. 

This is one of the simplest, least expensive projects you can undertake when it comes to maintaining your home. A furnace filter costs just around $3 and can be purchased from a number of other stores including Target, Walmart, or your local hardware store.

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Changing out your furnace filter is as important as it is easy.

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Changing out your furnace filter every 30 days is as important as it is easy. So make sure you don’t put it off. Regularly replacing your furnace filter will increase the lifespan of your HVAC unit and also help to prevent fires.

If you have any other questions or would like more information, feel free to give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you soon.

A Cure for the Flue: Chimney Maintenance Tips

For today’s installment of my home maintenance series, let’s talk about chimneys.

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Welcome back to the fourth part of my series on things that you should be doing to maintain your home. These are all items that you should not put off until later when they could cost you more.

Today, let’s talk about chimneys. If you have a chimney in your house and it hasn’t been recently cleaned, here’s what you need to do. 

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Allowing creosote to build up, birds and bats to nest, or foliage to creep inside your chimney is putting you at risk of fire.

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Clean your chimney out. Don’t let creosote build up, don’t let birds or bats nest in there, and don’t allow foliage to creep inside. These are all ways to potentially start a fire, which can be avoided with regular maintenance.

Ideally, you should have it cleaned out once a year, just to know that it’s safe for you and your family.

If you have any questions about chimney maintenance, home maintenance in general, or real estate, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us. The Anderson Group is here to make your life better.

Do You Need to Sell Before You Buy in Our Denver Market?

Our team has a step-by-step process we use to help our clients buy and sell a home at the same time.

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If you’re looking to move, how can you sell your current home and buy a new one at the same time? How can you find the right house with so little inventory and so much competition among other buyers?

This situation pops up all the time, so relax—it’s doable. Here’s the step-by-step process we typically use with our clients to buy and sell a home simultaneously. 

First, put your current house on the market. Second, get it under contract. Third, make sure your buyer is flexible with your schedule, will allow you to close quickly (within 30 days or less), and will let you stay in the property for an extended period of time while you look for your next home. 

Another option is to do a bridge loan, but that’s typically harder to finance. 

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We specialize in finding properties that aren’t on the market yet.

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How do you find that next property in our market? That’s where we come in. We specialize in finding properties that aren’t on the market yet. We have people on the phones every day cold-calling and circle-prospecting everyone from previous homeowners in the area you’re interested in, other Realtors, friends, family, and everyone else in our sphere. We find needle-in-a-haystack homes and put you in front of their owners. Whether it came on the market through the MLS or we found it first, we can find the exact right property for you. 

If you have any other questions about this or any other real estate topic or you’re thinking of buying or selling a home in the Denver market, don’t hesitate to reach out to us. We’d be glad to help you. 

How Can You Use Your IRA or 401(k) to Invest in Real Estate?

By using your IRA or 401(k) to invest in real estate, you can increase its annual 
growth by a considerable margin.

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Have you ever heard of a self-directed IRA or 401(k)?

Like many of us, you probably have a healthy 401(k) or IRA that’s been built up over the years and you’re now letting the market go to work on it. That’s totally fine, but here’s the exciting part: you can direct that money into a self-directed plan and use it to buy investment properties. 

Think of that IRA or 401(k) money as funds to be used for investments. There are some restrictions, but if that money is producing a return for you, you can use it for any vehicle.

How would this benefit you?

Imagine you had $200,000 in an IRA or 401(k) and you wanted to use that to buy a $200,000 condo. You’d be able to buy that condo free and clear, and then rent it out and start collecting rents checks. If you charged $2,000 a month, that’s $24,000 per year that would go back into your IRA or 401(k). 

As that investment appreciates over time, you could sell it down the road for—say—$400,000. That’s on top of the $24,000 you’ve been collecting on a yearly basis from your renter(s). Additionally, you’re allowed to contribute to your IRA or 401(k) every year. Some allow as little as $5,000, but some allow a contribution as high as $55,000. 

This way, you can almost quadruple the growth of your IRA or 401(k) instead of just letting it sit on the market. 

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You can quadruple the growth of your IRA or 401(k).

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If you’d like to learn more about using your IRA or 401(k) to invest in real estate or you have any other questions, please don’t hesitate to give me a call. We’d be happy to help.

The Balancing Act Involved with Multiple Offers

So you’ve got multiple offers on your home after just listing it. Should you wait for more offers, or accept one that you’ve already received? A lot of my clients have been asking me this question. They obviously want to get the highest possible price, but they don’t want to lose out on potential buyers. It’s a tough balancing act.

A lot of people looking for homes right now are looking from moment to moment. You also have the buyers who wait for a good home to be listed on the market and make an offer as soon as one does. The ones who don’t come to your house right away probably aren’t as eager to buy right away.

In real estate, your first buyer is usually your best buyer. Whether you’re in California, New York, or Denver, a good rule of thumb is that your first accumulation of offers will yield the best offer. So do I advise my clients to wait for more offers? No. We try to work with what we have.

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Your first buyer is usually your best buyer.

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Try to take those initial offers you get and make the best of them. Don’t wait too long to respond, though, as you could lose out on an urgent buyer. We want you to be able to make a profit on your home, first and foremost.

If you have any questions for us or would like our help negotiating on your behalf and sifting through offers, give us a call or send us an email. We would love to hear from you.

What’s Our Home Selling Secret Weapon?

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Today I wanted to share something with all of you that is going to become more and more important as we continue to transition into a buyer’s market. I’m talking about our 151-point marketing guide, which is something we give to all of our clients who ask us to market their home. We wanted to go through some of it with you today, so you can see what all the fuss is about.

Our 151-point marketing system is great, and details every step of the process. However, the secret weapon we really want to share with you is our blueprint. It’s a flowchart of our entire sales cycle. If you are wondering what and how we are going to sell your home. When someone asks us what we are going to do differently to get their home sold quickly and for more money, this is what we pull out. We can tell you, with confidence, that our 151-step marketing system takes an active approach to marketing your home, which is what you want in this market. 

If you have any questions about our 151-point marketing plan or our blueprint, please give us a call or send us an email. We would be happy to send you a copy of the 151-point guide free of charge, just let us know!

What Simple, Inexpensive Updates Can You Make on Your Home?

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If you are looking to sell your home, your goal is to get the most money possible in the shortest amount of time. One of the best ways to add value and appeal to your home is through home staging. You have a lot of options for how you want to go about it. You could hire a professional staging company, but that comes with a hefty price tag. Most of the time, a few simple fixes is all it takes to transform a living room.

Today we are going to go through some of our most favorite, inexpensive home staging tips or you. We hope these will help you save both time and money when it comes time to sell your home.

A fresh coat of paint is always a good idea. Neutral, warm colors work best for highlighting the natural light in your home. This will make it easier to punch up the room with some colorful accessories and pull everything together.

A common design problem facing many homeowners is that they have no real entry way, as their front door opens up to the living room. To fix this, you can add a table, some lighting, and a rug to "fake a foyer" and make it feel like the living room and entryway are two different spaces.

A patterned rug, some pillows, or bright curtains add a ton of texture and an eclectic layer to the space, which is essential to a well-designed room.

In some cases, a "make-under" is just what you need. In the case of most fireplaces, taking some accessories and clutter away enhances the look and feel of the room greatly.

You could spend well over a few thousand dollars with a staging company, or you could do these fixes yourself for around $500.  That's a small investment considering the value that you add to your home by adding those pieces.

If you have any questions of us about staging your home or anything else real estate related, give us a call or send over a quick email. We are always here to help, and would love to hear from you!

How Does Our ISA Improve Our Business?

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Hey everyone, thanks for joining us today. We are happy to be joined by Jamie, our ISA (Internal Sales Associate) here at The Anderson Group. 

As a team, we believe in active marketing. We don't just put a sign in the yard and hope it sells, we believe in an active approach to real estate. The reason we have an ISA is so we can have someone actively calling and looking for buyers while we are out doing work in the field. 

She is strategically on the phone calling entire neighborhoods, expired listings, FSBO's, and every other type of buyer or seller lead out there. We just wanted to introduce you to Jamie today to let you know that this is who is representing us when you call, and she always does a great job helping our buyers and sellers get in touch with the right people. 

If you have any questions about the Anderson Group and how we can help you, give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to speaking with you!

What Are the Pitfalls of Buying a New Home in Denver?

In today's video, Ryan Anderson discusses why you need a real estate agent, even when you are building new.

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Hey everyone, welcome back. Today I wanted to share with you some important information if you've been thinking about buying a new home. A lot of people in Denver have been purchasing brand-new homes lately. This is a great idea for a lot of buyers, but there are some drawbacks you should know about before purchasing. We want to help you avoid these pitfalls. 

We highly encourage our clients, our friends, and our family to use a real estate agent when buying a new house. Here are a few reasons why working with the Anderson Group is essential to a successful transaction:

• We are your advocate in the transaction. We only have your best interest at heart, and we want to give you the best advice possible so you can get the best price and best terms on a purchase. 
• We help choose the right lot location.
• We advise you on lender selection. Builder's lenders tend to have higher rates than normal.
• We help you negotiate your deal the right way, so you don't overpay, and you get favorable terms.
• Biweekly walkthroughs are the norm for us, whereas some don't do them at all.
• We can help you set a strict budget, so you don't spend more on a home than you are comfortable doing. 
• We can advise you on the best resale options for maximum value.
• We help keep track of your costs.
• We arrange for a home inspection prior to the home closing, as well as an inspection 11 months after closing.

Buying a new home in Denver is like buying a FSBO. The builder, and the builder's agent, don't have your best interest at heart, so you need someone who does. If you are thinking about buying or selling a home in the Denver area, give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to hearing from you!

How Can We Weather the Storm?

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Hey everyone, thanks for joining our blog once again. Today I want to share a story with you about a recent experience I had and why it got me thinking about customer service. 

One of my clients, Mike, is a captain at United Airlines and regularly makes the flight from Denver all the way to China. A few weeks ago, Mike invited me to take a test ride in United's flight simulator here at DIA. It was so cool sitting up there in the cockpit, it felt like I was really in a 747. The number of controls was mind boggling to me. The hardest part for me was just getting the plane started! I crashed a few times, but thankfully, no one was hurt. 

It was an amazing experience, one that gave me a lot of perspective about what I do. I think there are a number of similarities between my job and the job of a pilot, so much so that today we want to share with you one of our most useful documents when it comes to getting our clients ready to sell, the 88 types of turbulence. 

Just as you may experience turbulence in an airplane, a real estate transaction isn't always smooth sailing. Our 88 types of turbulence is simply a list of things that may go wrong in a transaction. It's surprising the amount of people who don't think decisions like this through and end up getting burned because of turbulence. 
Home inspections, loan approvals, pre-approvals - there are a lot of things that can go wrong in a real estate transaction. We can't guarantee these things won't happen, but we can guarantee you that we are not going to bail out on you. That's what a good pilot should do, right? As your real estate expert, we want to be problem solvers and avoid as much turbulence as we can.

If you want a smoother transaction or if you have any questions for us, feel free to give us a call or send us an email. We look forward to speaking with you soon!

The Importance of Yard Signs in Denver

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Yard signs are often overlooked because they're simple. Some people may even see them as an archaic way to market homes. However, this is not the case.

I'm at a home we're trying to sell, and we have three different yard signs in the lawn. They all have different purposes, and they help us to sell homes quicker and for higher prices. One of these signs is letting people know that there is an open house every day, another is an informational sign, and the last one is our big branding sign. 

What we've noticed is that just our large branding signs are ineffective. However, the informational sign and the open house sign can draw in ten times as many buyers. 

This particular home I'm in front of is in Observatory Park, and it sold in 3 days with multiple offers. Our signage, our 151-point marketing plan, and our other methods of exposure helped to sell this home quickly and for top dollar. 

As always, please consider us your #1 resource for real estate in Denver. 

Please contact us soon if you're thinking about buying or selling. The market here is red-hot!

How to Handle Mold In Your Denver Home

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I'm here at a listing that's dealing with some mold. We're currently remediating the mold in the property that stemmed from a leak when a refrigerator was swapped out. The ice bucket hadn't been emptied. When the ice melted, water seeped down into the wood floors, warped them, and caused the mold to grow.

This video is meant to remind you to empty out your ice bucket and even turn off your water if you're leaving your home for vacation or any other extended period of time. 

The buyer came in two weeks later and found a very unpleasant surprise. In fact, insurance companies tell me that that is the #1 reason that flooding happens in a kitchen. So, please be sure to empty your ice buckets and turn off your refrigerators when you leave. Make sure your fittings are on correctly, and consult with your plumber to ensure that your refrigerator is hooked up correctly. 

You can see how big of a mess this is, so please be sure to take the proper measures in order to prevent something like this from happening. 

As always, please don't hesitate to contact me if you're looking to buy or sell in Denver. The market is hot, and now is the time to take advantage of it!