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Sizzling Stevenson Ranch and Valencia sellers market, buyers cinch it up to compete! · Connor with Honor: AI, Real Estate and Real Life

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: Everybody, it's Valentine's Day, February 14th, 2024.
• 0:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Connor with Honor.
• 0:05
  SPEAKER_00: Today's our Valencia and Stevenson Ranch real estate show, and I'm here to give you the latest intel for both of those cities.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: Both are within the Santa Cruz Valley, and I do weekly real estate shows.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: You can find those at ConnorWithHonor.com and a lot of other information.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: Today I'm also going to be going out to new housing, so stay tuned for that show later this week where I'm going to be speaking with a new home builder agent to maybe try to see if he can shed some light on how the price works, how those pricings work, the price increases when they go back.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: And if in fact you want to make an offer on the house that is less than what they're asking, how that mechanism works to just try to help those out there that are maybe looking for new housing.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, all new housing does build in the payment or a commission for the agent representing the buyer.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: So if you want some guidance in that whole process, make sure you hit me up and I'll give you that new home tour like we do for our clients.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_00: So let's get into this.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: So today's, of course, Valentine's Day, another Hallmark holiday.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Don't beat me up.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: And of course, as you can see, it's also Ash Wednesday.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: And uh so hence the ash on my forehead.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_00: Moving into what's going on here, I did pull up the information as I always do related to what's happening in our local markets.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_00: And first, what I want to do is start with Stevenson Ranch, because it happens to be one of the highest valued cities in Santa Cruz Valley with the highest price per square foot, even above Valencia.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: The reason this is is it has very limited inventory.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: So when I run all of the information for Stevenson Ranch and I pull not just the actives and the coming soon listings, but everything, the ones that are under contract, the ones that are pending, and then also the ones that have sold in the last seven days, you can see that there's not much activity.
• 1:50
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, 15 total results from that query within the local Board of Realtors website, the SRAR, the Southland Regional Association, which I'm a member of, so I do have access to the data.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: So we're looking, we have two coming soon listings, one on Bowie Bowie, one on Tennyson, and then we have five active listings, period, in Stevenson Ranch, have a couple under contract, a couple of the pending status, and a couple have closed escrow in the past seven days.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: So that's that intel.
• 2:20
  SPEAKER_00: You can go to Connorwithhonor.com to see more information on those listings.
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: What's happening in Stevenson Ranch, and I'll give you that right now.
• 2:28
  SPEAKER_00: A couple things I want to talk about here in a little bit as far as what's happening with regard to buyers and sellers.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: I do want to talk to sellers both in Stevenson Ranch and Valencia, those that are considering selling, talking about maybe what renovations could help you maximize the amount of money.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: And then I'll also talk about buyers and how you can make your offer better for those cities if you're considering writing offers just like I do with my clients.
• 2:54
  SPEAKER_00: And I explain to them these are the ways that we can make that offer even better without really even talking about the monetary aspect.
• 3:01
  SPEAKER_00: Of course, money wins a lot of cases, but in some, maybe it's not so much the money, but maybe terms that are going to be a better assistance to those sellers out there versus money.
• 3:12
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they want more time and so on.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_00: But we'll get into that in just a moment.
• 3:15
  SPEAKER_00: So let's look at Stevenson Ranch currently as of February 14th, 2024.
• 3:20
  SPEAKER_00: That is all the active real estate for sale, five listings, two coming soon.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: We have some under contract, some pending, not very many, and then a couple have closed.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to back this up now and go into Valencia as well, running that same criteria so we can see what happens.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: Again, a much larger market, 191 results from that query, for coming soon properties for Valencia.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_00: And as far as the actives go, quite a bit more.
• 3:48
  SPEAKER_00: I'll go ahead and let me uh let me label that down real quick so we can see exactly how many actives.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_00: So 88 current actives in Valencia, California.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: These are going to span the market from single-family residences, condominiums, townhomes.
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_00: So it's going to be all property types, but all residential.
• 4:05
  SPEAKER_00: So you'll be able to see that as you go to Connorwithhonor.com as well.
• 4:08
  SPEAKER_00: And if you want to get that intel or what property values are, or what you may expect to get for your home in Stevenson Ranch, Valencia, or somewhere else in Santa Clarita, hit me up as well.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: I do a MLS-based search for sold properties, try to match everything apples to apples as everybody should, and then I give you those numbers, and then we look at the market, which currently, for your news or for your ears, the market is very, very tight with very few listings as compared to the amount of real estate buyers we have out there.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: Now, I've seen some strange anomalies lately, property prices way higher than I would have expected price them.
• 4:46
  SPEAKER_00: Only in a couple cases, one in Canyon Country, one in Saugus, when I was doing my real estate report for Monday.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_00: Be wary of that if you are a home seller, and of course, you want to listen to your agent and take their advice.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: But in some cases, sometimes when you hit those high pricing, higher than the last sold comparables, if we're comparing the same types of property, it's going to get you into trouble.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to lag and delay your home selling.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: And then if you give it enough delay, it gives an appearance that potentially you have something wrong with the house.
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you're a difficult seller to deal with, maybe other things.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: Buyers will not approach that property if it's priced too high.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: And I know everybody wants to say, well, you know, if you price it high, a buyer will still put an offer.
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of times they believe that the seller is completely unrealistic.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: So on the buyer side of it, don't let a super high price, if you're even seeing the property, because maybe the search parameter is much lower.
• 5:42
  SPEAKER_00: But even if you're seeing a property and it's much higher than you might expect, have your agent pull that value to see where they are price-wise, and then start that negotiation.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: The worst they can, well, the worst thing you can do is really upset the seller so they don't respond to you at all.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_00: The best thing that can happen is maybe they come back with some kind of response because their whole motive has changed and now they want to get that property sold a little bit faster.
• 6:06
  SPEAKER_00: So maybe you're in the right spot when that happens.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: Let me talk a little bit about the sellers in Stevenson Ranch and Valencia, what you can do to make your residences even better.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_00: And when you're getting your home ready for sale, I tell all of my clients very simple changes really mean the most as far as clutter, organization, returning those rooms to their original intended purpose.
• 6:31
  SPEAKER_00: So if you have a bedroom, part of your house that's designated as a bedroom, and it was, it's not some kind of a conversion, but a real true on-the-record bedroom.
• 6:40
  SPEAKER_00: And you've maybe converted that to some kind of an office, maybe even pulled out a closet and put a computer and lay in there, or a computer desk, or whatever it may be.
• 6:49
  SPEAKER_00: Something to consider when it comes to resale.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Most people are going to be looking for that bedroom versus having that office.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_00: So to attract more buyers, it might be better for you to return that room back to its intended purpose as it was set forth by the builder when the house was new.
• 7:09
  SPEAKER_00: Look at those things.
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: Also, look at your resonance as you do a walk around.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I do this with my clients.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_00: I'll come out and I'll walk around their house and I'll point to things, take notes, and then I'll give them a report as to what things they should change to maximize their return on their home when it comes to me putting on the market and selling it.
• 7:27
  SPEAKER_00: One of the things that a lot of people ask is: should I put these massive upgrades?
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_00: Should I fix this or fix that?
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: It's going to depend on the price point and how the market is.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Currently, there's not a lot that sellers have to do to get their property moving and sold quickly.
• 7:43
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, a lot of times the changes in the current market that they're making, they're not going to get their money out of.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_00: So if somebody goes in and they have a particular change they want to do, I'll factor that in with what the competition looks like, which in Stevenson Ranch, there's probably zero.
• 7:59
  SPEAKER_00: Valencia may be a little bit more probability of having more properties that are somewhat dissimilar to yours on the market for sale.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: Those are the properties we want to compete against.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_00: But again, there's a big higher drive.
• 8:12
  SPEAKER_00: So a lot of the changes are really going to be from a seller standpoint, looking at the house, increasing that curb appeal.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_00: Fresh paint never hurts, but it depends on its condition and how clean it can be if somebody comes in and cleans it.
• 8:26
  SPEAKER_00: But the residence should be spot clean.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: All the gutters for the windows should be super clean.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_00: Every corner should be immaculately Q-tip clean.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_00: And then the house should be decluttered and depersonalized.
• 8:39
  SPEAKER_00: The depersonalized thing is something that people don't expect when they come to sell real estate.
• 8:44
  SPEAKER_00: And I know you've probably heard this, but when you have pictures in your residence, and I know you love, we love our families, we love those people that we're closest to, so sometimes we adorn them with photographs and we then put those photographs on our walls.
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_00: A lot of times buyers have difficulty seeing past that.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_00: You want your house to be staged or appear as a model home.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_00: And you can do a lot of this yourself.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, all of it in most cases can be done by you just by transferring a lot of the excess inside the residence, including the photos, and putting them away, or maybe putting them in the box, into the garage.
• 9:18
  SPEAKER_00: Now then people say, well, don't they want to see the garage?
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_00: Is it just a garage or is it a garage?
• 9:24
  SPEAKER_00: And there's a couple of examples.
• 9:26
  SPEAKER_00: I don't know in my world, I know a couple of fellas that have a fantastically well-appointed garage.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_00: In fact, I don't believe the garage floor in the circumstances I'm thinking of has ever had any oil spotted on it.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: The floor is beautiful, it's pristine, it's been coated with epoxy, and it's it's very fancy.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_00: Beautiful mirrored floors, gorgeous.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: They have all the walls redone, they have their own bar, and they have a massive TV out there with a great sound system.
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_00: So realistically, in those cases, that garage has become a cave of which you will, a person cave, man cave, woman cave, whatever cave you want to call it, but now it's a special space.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: That's a circumstance that I would not advise the seller to bring any excess property and clutter that garage.
• 10:17
  SPEAKER_00: We're gonna have to find somewhere on site, maybe a pod, maybe something of that nature.
• 10:22
  SPEAKER_00: But for the times of showing, you definitely want to declutter.
• 10:26
  SPEAKER_00: Now, if it's just a regular two-car garage, nothing super, nothing awesome, nothing special, try to keep it as open as you can.
• 10:34
  SPEAKER_00: But again, if it's the cost of you going and hiring, getting a storage unit versus putting it in the garage, put it in the garage.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: Just whatever excess you have.
• 10:42
  SPEAKER_00: If there's appliances on the countertops that you haven't used for a while, or even maybe even a daily appliance that takes up a super big space, probably good to get away so they can see all the counter space that's available.
• 10:55
  SPEAKER_00: Little changes like that in the front, the lawn, cleaning of the door, making it beautiful.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_00: And again, when it comes to showing, I'll give you one more tip as a seller.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure, like I educate my sellers, make sure you're preparing the house as it's going to be on a date.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: You want to make it beautiful, you want to make it clean, you want to have some nice music paint playing in the background for ambiance, you want to have all the lights turned on, all the windows open, and everything beautifully pristine and clean.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: All right, so here's your buyer tip now.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_00: For real estate buyers looking to purchase, they always ask me, you know, how can we make our offers better?
• 11:31
  SPEAKER_00: And a hiker Stevenson Ranch in Valencia, California, as a real estate buyer, more than likely, if you do make an offer on a property that looks good to you, it's probably looking good to other people as well, especially when you have such a tight market.
• 11:44
  SPEAKER_00: And Stevenson Ranch is a great indication of this with only five active listings currently on the market.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: As a home buyer, a lot of people, when they get a response saying that we have multiple offers on a property and you'll see this, then you really don't know where those other offers are.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_00: Now, of course, a good agent's gonna call and try to pull that information out of the seller's agent.
• 12:05
  SPEAKER_00: But in a lot of cases, if the seller's agent doesn't have the seller's permission, and if the seller's agent is doing it the right way, they won't give up the ghost on any of that.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: They will keep their mouth shut and say very simply, instead of being offensive, I'm not gonna tell you, they'll say, you know what, I have not had the discussion with my seller whether or not I can speak about what he will take or potentially take or the reasons for him selling.
• 12:32
  SPEAKER_00: But if in fact I've had that conversation with the seller and they've given me authority to speak on their behalf to any real estate buyers, maybe even about offers they received, then potentially I can offer up the information.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: But at the end of the day, it's gonna really be seller-dependent and of course agent-dependent as well.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_00: So those questions are great to ask, but a lot of times you're gonna get nothing back in return as far as where the other offers are in price.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_00: And in actuality, you might even know where they're you might know where they are at price during the original offer, but the counter-offering period might be very short.
• 13:08
  SPEAKER_00: So you might want to get in quickly and you're not gonna have time to even find out what those other offers coming back had changed.
• 13:16
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they changed the pricing, maybe they said they'll offer more, maybe they changed the deposit amount, making their offer look stronger.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they went in with some kind of financing that wasn't as solid as another type of financing, thereby them having the wherewithal to have the better financing.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe that's what they changed to.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: The thing that you want as a real estate buyer is whatever type of offer you're going to submit, make sure your agent does it by the numbers.
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: Because they might only get one shot at sending in that offer, it has to be complete.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: So it should be a complete package.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: It should have the letters, the lender's pre-qualification, and hopefully not just any pre-qualification, but an actual processor-approved qualification, something that's been run through the system with the underwriter, so you have an underwriter approval.
• 14:08
  SPEAKER_00: Now, you know, these approval letters come on pieces of paper.
• 14:11
  SPEAKER_00: And right now, the deepfakes and AI, there's some pieces of paper being generated that aren't worth the paper they're printed on.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_00: That's why it's up to your age.
• 14:20
  SPEAKER_00: And as a good agent, well, just like I do, is I make sure I reach out to that lender on that pre-approval letter as I'm going through the offers prior to presenting to my seller, just so I have the intel on who they are.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: And if I call up that lender and say, hey, Brenda, Connor McIver with Realty One in Santa Clarita, I have an approval letter for Mr.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: and Mrs.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_00: Joseph and John Smith.
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: How's that going to work?
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_00: How are they?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And if Brenda says, Well, hold on a second, let me uh let me see what's going on, that's an indication, especially if I get feedback from the agent that they've been in touch with a lender and this pre-approval has a date that's incredibly recent, but they don't recall.
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_00: There could be an issue here with actually what's on that letter.
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_00: So the thing is, if they say, oh my gosh, you know, the Smiths, they're great, they're a great couple, they're wonderful people, love that, they have great credit scores, they have firm employment, they have great funds, this is a down payment.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: This all makes me feel very good.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: So I can take that back to my seller and I can offer them that and say, this is what I found out from the actual lender on this offer, this offer, this offer.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_00: But this offer, when I called the lender, they had no idea who I was talking about.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_00: And in fact, when I talked to them about the pre-approval letter, it took them for them to do their research and call me back before they had information, but their information was limited.
• 15:41
  SPEAKER_00: They didn't tell me about employment, in fact, they didn't really know, and they didn't tell me other things that were critical.
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: That's important if you are a real estate buyer.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_00: Make sure you go in fully loaded, loaded for bear, as dad used to say, and make sure that you have your agent follow in suit accordingly.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: So they're turning in a smart offer and not overtaxing the system by doing something that's outside of the purview of the way the market is sitting currently.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_00: Right now in Santa Clarita, Valencia Stevenson Ranch, definitely a seller's heavy market, meaning there are very few listings and a higher buyer drive.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_00: So as far as your update, that's where we are in Stevenson Ranch and Valencia, California.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_00: Super tight inventory, rest of Santa Clarita Valley.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: Doesn't have many more listings either.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: You look at the cities of Castac, Canyon Country, Newhall, and Saugus.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_00: Again, those listings aren't very many.
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_00: If you want to search online, do yourselves a favor, just be wary.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_00: Don't give up any personal and private information.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: You will be contacted ad nauseum by so many real estate agents, lenders, grocery store clerks, insurance people, wherever your information is going to be sold, that's who's going to hit you up.
• 16:51
  SPEAKER_00: The best place to get those searches for real estate are through that local agent.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_00: I appreciate everybody watching.
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: We will be back on Friday with an open house broadcast.
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_00: And I try to do these shows every day to educate people in the real estate realm.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: And some of it's repetitive, but it's all good info.
• 17:08
  SPEAKER_00: If you have an idea for a show, you want something explained to you about how things work in real estate or what to expect, I am Connor with Honor, and I would love to get that question.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_00: Just send me an email, Connor McIver at gmail.com, and you'll find that a form that you can fill out at Connor with Honor.com.
• 17:26
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for watching.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_00: It is my pleasure.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: Bless you on Hash Wednesday, and uh may you go with God and go in peace.