The Golfi Real Estate Show

Staycations Mean A Run For Cottage Country & Receiving Handwritten Letters From "Buyers" | The Golfi Real Estate Show - Niagara Edition (March 20)

March 23, 2021 Rob Golfi Season 3 Episode 33
The Golfi Real Estate Show
Staycations Mean A Run For Cottage Country & Receiving Handwritten Letters From "Buyers" | The Golfi Real Estate Show - Niagara Edition (March 20)
Show Notes Transcript

On this week's Niagara edition of The Golfi Real Estate Show, Rob Golfi and iHeart radio host Tim Dennis talk about how the rise of staycations is fuelling a huge demand for cottage real estate, receiving handwritten letters from potential buyers, everything you should know about property taxes, and the top five most common anxieties for first-time homebuyers.


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Hello, Niagara. This is Rob Golfi with the Golfi team. Welcome to the Golfi real estate show Niagara edition with host Tim Dennis. We're at it for another week. As the real estate business continues to be a hot topic. It continues to be a hot item. And Rob, of course is here to answer your questions every week.

You can always contact him during the week or contact me with questions and we can ask Rob those questions when they come up. We're going to start off though, talking about a little as we did last time, week about your appointment center. And, uh, it's again for people who might not have heard last week, what the appointment center is and how you get the numbers from that.

Just give us a quick sketch about what the appointment center is. The appointment center. What they do is like every time an appointment is made through our office. So now we've got about 11 offices with dough, Remax, a skirmish and Remax Niagara offices. And what we do is we take all the data information for every appointment that's made.

And we also take the appointments and figure out, uh, how many appointments on average took to sell each house. So, and it tells us. You know, when are the highs and lows of every day when appointments are made? And for instance, um, in, um, it looked, it looked like this, like the March 7th to the 13th was an, it was an incredible year, I mean, week, just because of the fact, usually Fridays are the biggest, biggest days for people booking appointments, but, but from March 7th to the 13th, It started picking up a lot of steam on Wednesday and Thursday, and then Thursday really like record number for Thursday and Friday again, uh, record numbers.

So, so what this indicates, what I look at this information, and I'll tell you something, a lot of realtors do not look at this. And I look at this every single week, I look at the numbers and I want to know this is a good indicator, is when to put your house on the market. And it tells you, like, if you put your house on the market on a Monday, you're not going to start getting activity till like maybe Thursday, Friday, or Saturday.

So you may end up getting, putting your house on Monday for sale. And then what happens is you may get an offer on Tuesday or Wednesday and really. The bulk of the people are booking for the weekend and you might've sold that house too early and maybe too little. So you gotta be very careful when you put a house up for sale.

Uh, and, and because I use this information and I use this information for the benefit of my sellers and they'll benefit from it. But for instance, um, so, uh, March, March, March, March already has surpassed. March, 2020. It can't even, you can't even see it in the rear view mirror with less than 18 days left this month, we have already booked more appointments than, than all of March of 2020.

We have achieved a new record on, uh, on Thursday of 1,320. For appointments, a record single day ever. And then on Friday, another 1,582, a record a Saturday 1,124, and a record overall week of 6,802 appointments. This means we didn't just outperform last year. We. Are reaching all new records. So the sold appointment index is slowly itching, upwards as buyers reenter the market and inventory levels increase.

So, um, this is a good indicator, um, for people like for right now, it's showing that the average, the average, uh, house, uh, that sells it's, they had 21.5 appointments. So, I mean, some houses were getting, um, uh, you know, 50 to a hundred appointments in some, you know, when you average it out on the higher ends, you're getting maybe 20 of them.

So overall average per sale, you're getting 21.5 appointments. So it's, it's, it's, it's a great indicator. I like using it. And, and it's a good way to use that information, uh, when you're putting a house up for sale and, and it's just, well, like baseball, when you start talking about, you know, metrics and the numbers you get into it.

And, and a lot of the really successful managers in baseball, dive down into these numbers to get you better results. And that's what you're doing here is you're diving down into the numbers. Who knew that there was a better day of the week than another one to put your house up for sale? I mean, I would never have known there was a difference.

So is what is Friday the best day in the end. I like to put it on Thursday, sold, sold a house that, um, I put up for sale. We listed at 1 million, $150,000 and I showed him strategically how this is going to work. We listed it on a Thursday around noon. Because I wanted Thursday around noon because I don't want some guy jumping too fast making an offer.

So we had, uh, we had already like eight appointments booked, even for that day on Thursday. They like people saw the listing coming up now, uh, and a lot of lists and a lot of people booking on on Friday. So this house will sell this weekend by Sunday. It would S it will sell. And there's a high probability.

We'll probably have at least three to five offers now. W we will, uh, we'll have a lot of, uh, second showings that are happening. So I'm expected offers on Sunday on this place and it's gonna, and it's gonna do very, very well. So it's all strategic. That's where experience comes in when you're putting a house up for sale.

It's not just a, you know, like I know there's a lot of realtors out there. They're all good people, but they just, some of them don't have the information like, like we do. And what we do is we use that information to benefit our clients. And again, same thing with the information on here. I type I brought in, uh, uh, in Niagara.

So the home, how many days on, uh, on market does it take a host to sell, you know, sell data? So right now we have 17 days. Of, uh, of, uh, uh, inventory left and, uh, and it says months of no, sorry. Months of inventory, uh, is 1.9. So we have one month and nine days of inventory, the average days. Now this month, so far is 17 days to sell.

Um, so the average listing on the market selling within 17 days, incredible. Do you panic if it takes longer than 17 days? You know what? Yeah. Like I, you know, like, I'll hear your name. This is a true story. This just happened. So I listed this property in Jordan, uh, in, um, in the, in the Lincoln area. So, uh, we listed, uh, the, uh, uh, it was a bungalow townhouse, upper end townhouse.

There's 950,000. My suggested price was eight 99, nine. And, uh, so, but I went with the client's price and we, and we did it. So then what happened there was, it was on the market. Like we were in the market for a month. And nothing's happening. We weren't getting as many showings as we should, but I know sometimes they, it takes a little time.

So I was talking to my seller and I said, w you know, what do you guys want to do? Do you guys want to, you know, like, I'm, you know, I'm not a high pressure. I don't want to push him. And he says, you don't want let's. I w I was trying to convince him to put a sign on it on there. He didn't want to sign. So, but anyway, um, Um, so what we did was, uh, we were just ready to take it off the market and I, and, uh, B because, um, I was out of town for a day and a half.

I didn't send him the paperwork right away. We had a bowl two or three showings. All of a sudden we did get an offer and we got a full price offer. And see how, see how, see how time. And there was no other offer. There was no other offer. Like it was just full price. This is our, our number. And they paid for it.

It was, uh, somebody from the, uh, Oakville that purchased that beautiful bungalow. And, but see how that one, there was a 30 days on the market, uh, Tim and, uh, you know, they do that the higher, the, when it gets higher end, they take a little longer, the lower end. Is, uh, they, they, it, they sell so fast. They sell less than five days on the market, depending on how long you're holding offers.

And it's just, just incredible. Then they on bolt. And then, then you've got this down below. Um, it, it shows, uh, um, sales numbers versus number of new listings. Now you can see that inventory is starting to climb right now. So inventory is starting to climb. And I got here in Niagara. This is all of a Niagara.

Um, so, uh, so far in March 653, uh, sales have happened. And, uh, and now new listings as of, as of today, 1,097. So now things are starting to inventory, starting to climb. We noticed our inventory is starting to climb. So that means this thing is, you know what? The market's still hot. The market's still good. Um, but it, things are going to start changing little by little as each month goes on, is going to start going up across all price ranges.

I mean, if people are coming down here from the GTA or people are coming from St. Catherine's to Fort Erie and looking for homes, are they are the inventory numbers going up in all price ranges? Th they, they are. So what's happening right now is everybody saw all the people that benefited from this hot market.

And what they're doing is now they're going to jump in, they're jumping in, in this market. And, uh, so they're going to, they want to take advantage of it. W whatever's what's left of it. And, but it's still hot. The market's still hot inventory is climbing because it's still a bigger demand of buyers than there is sellers.

There's more buyers than sellers out there. So that, so, so as more inventory comes in. Some, some of the buyers that probably jumped out out of it are coming back in. So it's slowly, slowly coming back the inventory. Now I did a check in, in Niagara falls and this is, I can't believe it. So I D I eliminated, uh, condos, like apartment condos and trailer homes.

I went from zero to 400,000 Tim. There was only nine homes for sale in Niagara falls. And then I saw one and every single one of these homes, except for, but one, they were holding offers. So every, every, all these homes, this inventory that you see right now that I, that you have in front of them, Most of them, I'd say 99% of them haven't holding office doors.

One that wasn't holding offers. And, uh, and I think it was listed at three as, uh, it was on Emery street, or I shouldn't say that, but everybody's going to jump at this, that, so th this is listed, this is listed. Um, with purple bricks now I'm not, I'm not discrediting purple bricks. What I'm doing here is I'm saying is that they're not getting the, uh, of the experience that they deserve now that there is something I, it caught my eye because they're not holding offers.

It's, it's an, a price point that I think that there's money to be made there and you probably can negotiate a good deal there. So there is money to be made on that, on that property right there. If somebody goes in, puts an offer in may, they might be able to get for three 50. Who knows. I don't know. And see what happens.

Um, and they could probably flip that property for probably about 50 to a hundred thousand dollars more. If they did a cleanup on that property, you know, you know, just put basic stuff, new flooring, you'll just get a home Depot, kitchen cabinets and nice paint job. You'll have a beautiful place. Now you look at, so you look in St.

Catherine's, there's only 16 homes, bigger city. Obviously they have more, but, but I thought maybe St Catherine's would have less homes. Uh, under a 400,000. So it looks like it looks like Niagara falls. It seems like that's not that's the hotspot Niagara. And then I went to Welland under 400, again, there was only 12.

So, um, it's, it's crazy. Like there's not much out there under 400,000 and those properties. Uh, and if, if I look at days on market that they're listed there, they're not, they haven't been on the market very long. Here's the big question though? What are you getting for under 400,000 in the Niagara region?

You are getting a, probably a one, a bungalow or one and a half story or two story that's that is probably, um, I'd say. 75 years, 65 years old, somewhere around there. And S and some of them are the two, the two and a half stories are two stories. They're probably close to a hundred years old. So they do need some work.

They got knob and tube wiring. A lot of them, some may be windows. Some, some have been updated some habit. They need some update on the kitchens, but, um, but those, those are, those are the properties you can make money on, but the problem is they're all holding offers. So, so there are these properties that are under 400, they're gonna end up selling.

Probably 50 to a hundred thousand dollars more than what they're asking for. And that's the sad part for the buyers. It's, it's, it's sad, but, but there's not much available. In that, uh, in, in that price point. So, um, so for the buyers, it's tough, but it, but inventory is starting to climb it, but again, it like CMHC predicts that this market is going to be going like this for the whole year in it'll cool.

Down in 2022. So guys get in the market right away. Just get in there. You can sniff out a really good deals out there and, uh, Uh, and like that one there on Emory. I think it's a good deal. I was that that caught my eye and I'm actually possibly thinking about looking at that and I think I can, uh, make some money on that.

So, so there's, there are good deals out there for anybody that, that is okay. I want to bring up something you brought up a couple of minutes ago when you were talking about one of the stories and you said the, the, the gentleman you were talking to didn't want to put a sign up. How often does that happen and how important is that sign on the lawn, Rob?

That sign is so important that that's like 50, that could be that 15% difference of you selling it or not. Now I think if I had that sign up prior, I probably would have had an offer earlier on that. Uh, just, you know, cause if people like, sometimes people drive by a certain area all the time. They're not looking to buy a house, but if something came up on the, on the route of their travels, they say, you know what.

I always said in my mind that if something came up for sale in here, I would look at it and buy and probably buy it. So that kind of hurt him a little bit of that exposure, but they say the exposure of a sign is equally well, 15%, uh, with all the marketing and everything that, uh, that you're doing with, um, when you're putting a house up for sale.

We must pause. Uh, we've got a lot more coming up on the Golfi real estate show with Rob Dolphy I'm Tim Dennis, stay right there. Lots of information coming your way right after this, the Golfi real estate show is, um, well of course, Rob Golfi and me, Tim, Dennis, we're here every week to talk about. How you can buy how you can sell some tips, some things that questions that come up all the time in, in this business.

And I wanna, I wanna start off this segment by talking about something that. Uh, people have asked me about plus it's it's happened to me. I've come home and I've opened up my, my mail box. And in, it will be what looks like a handwritten note to me saying, Hey. I really want to buy your house. Uh, I, and we can, we can do this without real estate people involved.

We'll G I'll give you a great deal. And it looks legit. I had a friend of mine who lives in Eastern Ontario who just moved, moved into the house. And about three weeks later, they got this thing in their mailbox saying we can get up. Big bucks your for your, for your home right now, and you don't have to go through a real estate broker or anything of that sort.

And they actually called them up. How is this a deal or is this a scam? What's what's going on here? Because they, they seem legit. They look like handwritten notes. What's going on. There sharks be careful. Um, I, this is great. Um, not in this market, I would not sell a house to any of these guys in this market.

Um, they're just, you know, they're investors and, uh, or they have a pocket of investors that, uh, they'll buy the property and this is what happens. And the P there's a lot of people out there, um, that don't know the market. So for instance, This letter comes there. You get, you get, uh, uh, uh, somebody that says, you know what?

I don't want to deal with the real estate and have people coming through my house and I don't want to sign on my front lawn. I just don't want nobody to know that I'm selling my house. And so I understand that they don't want that. And what happens is they get this, they say, Hey, you know, I'm going to call this guy and see what he says.

So. Built that personal say, how much do you want for your house? Now, this guy, the homeowner does not really know what his house is worth, but in his mind he's going, you know, if I can get 300, cause he's thinking I bought this house maybe for 50,000, 30 years ago, um, or you know, or 80,000, he goes 300,000 to him is like, wow, this is great.

And he's thinking he's giving a high number, uh, the seller and the, and the other guy in the other line gone 300,000. Okay. Well, let me take a look at it. And, uh, if I, if I feel the value, is there. I'll uh, I'll buy it up yet. And then all of a sudden he's walking through there and that guy that's walking through the house that wants to buy this house.

Like it's a business. These, these are businesses. That's why there's a lot of letters going out what's happening is they'll say to the, to the person that owns the house, say, yeah, we'll give you 300,000 and they'll have the offer typed up. Ready? He signs. They give a deposit. Boom, boom done. He's locked in no matter what.

Now that house, that house could be worth 400,000. It could be worth more. And that homeowner did not know the value of that house. And do you know what happens is when he brings that paperwork to his lawyer and his lawyer has gone, are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? You gave this house away and that's what happens.

That's what these guys do. And in a way, and that's why there's more and more letters coming out because they're there they're sharks. They know that there's a percentage of the population out there, um, that are, uh, that are letting go their houses for cheap and they don't even know it. And so what I'm saying to you as a homeowner is, you know, be careful with those letters, you know, uh, because if they're not buying your house, it's because you know, the market.

If they're not buying it, these guys aren't buying houses at market value, they're buying below market value. So be very careful. So if you call this guy in and, and, and you gave him a price and he's not going to buy it, he's B he's just going to wait till the next guy calls and try to find somebody that does not know the market and take advantage of that situation.

Are these the same? Is he are these the same as when you're driving down and you're stopped at the stoplight and there's, there's a sign that's nailed up on the, uh, you know, on the telephone pole that says we buy homes. Now, same thing, th they just been putting, I saw that the signs were put up saying, uh, we buy houses and a phone number on there.

Uh, they're putting these little, little flag things down on the ground. And, uh, it's just it's, you know, like, like you do see letters. Of realtors putting out, saying, I have a client now they have to do their due diligence and give you a what the market value of the property, because they, if they mess, if they, because otherwise they can get sued and they can get in a lot of trouble and they could lose their license, if they don't give a good, honest opinion of the, of the property.

But when a private citizen, that's not a realtor and a private citizen that, uh, that is a seller. They do an exchange. That's just the luck of the dry while you were, you know, you can't do nothing about that. But if a realtor is involved, they have to do their, they have to do their, uh, fiduciary duty of giving the, the, uh, the homeowner of what the value is.

And this is what's and this is what they're catching. They're catching that. So you think about it, there's, you know, uh, a goal through the whole Niagara area. If somebody's dumping these things out there, they're going to get maybe five to six phone calls. And those five or six phone calls. Those people have no clue of what their house is worth.

And they think maybe 300, three 50 is a great deal. And they, when they sign on a dotted line and then after when they, I go to the lawyer's office with the paperwork, well, that's when the lawyer says, are you kidding me? What did you do? And then the kids get involved and the kids will say, you know, mom, dad, why didn't you call me?

You know, like you, nothing you can do. They signed a contract. And you're, you're obligated to fulfill that contract and it's happening, happening everywhere. So people be very, very careful, uh, when you see that, um, and, um, you, you, you will, you were short change yourself. I'd say, I'd say 50 to maybe even a hundred thousand dollars somewhere in that range.

Let's talk about this summer. Um, the. You know, the predictions for what we are, and aren't going to be able to do in the summer are wide. The lot of people say that we'll be able to do a little more travel. Others are saying no, but regardless, uh, last year taught us one thing. There are areas that you can get away to.

A lot of people saying I'm going to stay in Ontario or staying stay in Canada. And that's meant. All kinds of, um, all kinds of rentals up North in cottage country, which is obviously affecting the retail, uh, real estate business as well. Um, are you seeing a lot of people coming to you saying, find me something that I can rent up, you know, up North for a couple of weeks.

Definitely. You're good. You're not, you're going to have a hard time renting any cottage this summer. Uh, people already booked those and there and there, and it's done, they're locked, sealed. And that's it. What I found was that, uh, people, people now there's this, this is a second summer. We're entering this COVID.

This is like, like, think about this. It's it's bad enough. We live in Canada and we have a short summers. Like we don't have the log, but now nobody, everybody wants to do something this summer. And even me as a consumer, I did. So, so what people are doing is they're booking cottages. And if they, if they haven't already, uh, I don't know if you might be able to find something, but I would book right away right now for the summer.

Um, RVs and trailers and, and motorhome, like all those kinds of things there selling like crazy they're selling like crazy. I had a friend of mine. He has, uh, one of these trailers that you hook on the back and it's like a, um, uh, I'm not, you don't call it motor and you of a, whatever, a trailer, motor, motor homes, motor homes.

And he had, I had one, but he also has a place at Sherkston. So somebody offered him ridiculous amount of money for his just. Yeah, because people want to do stuff this summer. So me personally, as a, uh, as a consumer, one thing I did in the, in, uh, in the last month, I went and bought myself. I want to do some mountain biking.

Okay. Because you know, what am I going to do this summer? I, you know, um, so I went looking for a mountain bike and I'm not sure if I told this story before on here. Um, uh, I, uh, I wanted a full suspension mountain bike, you know, 29 inch, uh, wheel Rams. And medium-sized by. So I was looking for that. That was a specific bike to fit my size.

Do you know how I had to call everywhere Niagara? And, uh, and, uh, in, in Hamilton and Burlington area to look for a bike like that. And I found one in St. Catherine's at a Whelan, uh, and, um, and they got me one, it was great. They set me up and everything. They were fantastic. So, so that's one thing I changed my life for this summer.

You're not going to believe this. You know, another thing is I was able to rent and get an RV for the summer. I'm actually like starting, starting in may, I'll have, I'll be able to have a rental RV for five months. And now w w what made me do that? Like, I don't want to do, I just want, I want to be able to do something.

The reason why I rented it, and I actually worked out a pretty good deal with somebody I knew and what it is is I have it at my disposal anytime. So I can, instead of calling and renting and everything like that, I've got one, I secured it for the, for the summer and, uh, and I can go to any, uh, camp, camp, ground, and now, so here's the other thing.

Yes. Yes. You better book now. So you're better off booking now then canceling, you might lose a little bit of a trip, pause it, but those are getting booked up. You know, you go to the Algonquins and the pine pinery and every, anywhere up North, they're starting to get booked up. So the same thing is happening with cottages.

So like, I personally think if you are things like, like I said, if you're thinking of selling your cottage, Sell it, but people want that last summer with it. You know that if somebody comes to you and says, I've got a cottage, we've been thinking of maybe getting rid of it, or, you know, the, the family's getting older now, maybe it's not such a big deal.

Do you tell them to sell it or do you say, well, you know, you can get some pretty good money on rentals for the next couple of years. I'd hang onto it for a bit, make some money. Yeah. You know what absolutely. You know, I'll tell you, as long as you own real estate, you always going to not only make money with it, you're going to increase your net worth with it.

You like, so if you have a cottage, but it depends on every person is different. Maybe people don't want that headache. And I mean, you can hire a management company that. Takes care of that, but maybe people need the money who knows what it is, but if you're selling a cottage, you're going to do extremely well with it.

You could have bought a cottage a year ago, a year and a half ago, and you'll probably make quite a bit of money. You probably could have made $200,000 on your cottage. But, but right now, um, yeah, I would rent it out. I would rent it out to cottage. And you would do very, very well on the rental. Like, um, like I was talking to somebody that went to blue mountain on, uh, in, uh, in Collingwood jammed.

Yep. It was, it was sold out. Me too. I talked to somebody who did exactly the same thing. Yep. So people, people are, people are dying to get out. And, and I know there's talk of a third wave and they talk about, you know, closing down things. Again, people aren't going to go cuckoo in this world. If we have to do that again, like it's just, it's just not it's, we're not, I know we're not, you know, a lot of people aren't listening and they're not listening to what Doug Ford has to say and do this and do that.

People are dying to get out. And, and there, and then we're seeing the news at Florida. Everybody's, you know, they're going to concerts, they've got conferences and everything's like, well, I've come. These guys can do it. And they don't seem to have a problem with, uh, with the COVID, but we, we do here in Canada, but I understand it.

I understand it. W when people talk about going to the cottage nine times out of 10, they mean, you know, Muskoka coworker has, you know, someplace like that. Are you seeing a bigger. Interest in cottages, a little closer to us in say the Niagara region along Lake Erie, are you seeing a lot of people taking advantage of that kind of cottage vacation, which is kind of underrated?

Crystal beach is booming. I'm telling you. I know, I know, I know three or four people that I was shocked that they actually bought a place in crystal beach. And, uh, so they are, uh, um, there, they bought a place there. They're renovating it now. Now that's their second home and it, and the great thing about crystal beaches.

If you're, if you live in Niagara, Um, you, you're not too far. You almost can you almost connect. I have a cottage there and live there for the summer. And if you have to do anything back, you know, like if you live in Niagara falls, St Catherine's or welling you're, you're not, you're probably like half an hour, 20 minutes away, half an hour away.

And it's not a, it's not a bad, not a bad way to, to, to own a cottage and same thing. Even if you're going down the queen either, you know, towards the Hamilton and Burlington area, it's still not bad. I know, I know the traffic on Saturdays is brutal. Uh, going towards Niagara on Saturday. Uh, if you're not, if you're not, if you haven't left your house by eight, eight o'clock in the morning or nine o'clock in the morning, you are going to be stuck in traffic from Burlington all the way, right through to Niagara, uh, especially the corridor there in the Lincoln area.

And you've also got that section up. You know, Dunnville Cayuga Nanticoke way along the Lake Erie shoreline, where there are a lot of gorgeous cottages. And I know people who rent up that way or have looked at buying up that way saying, heck, it's just as good. Oh, it is. Yeah. Yeah. It's becoming more and more popular out that way.

And, uh, like I said, there's a whole shift happening in, uh, in Ontario. You're getting people crossing over, you're getting people and instead of going North, they're going the other way. They're going towards crystal, the Niagara peninsula for, uh, vacationing. Um, people are moving that way. People are vacationing there.

Everybody's doing everything. If you've got some questions about all of that, you can always call rob@theofficeatnineohfivesixfouronezerothreezeroeightorgoonlineatrobGolfi.com. That's G O L F i.com. We'll pause for a moment, lot more of the Golfi real estate show coming up right after this, you're listening to the Golfi real estate show.

And if you'd like to listen to any of the. Others in this series swell and just go to your platform, whatever your favorite platform is, it's Spotify, iTunes, Apple, Google podcast, whatever. And just look for the Golfi real estate show and follow the buttons. So you can hear every episode and all the advice coming from Rob Golfi of the Golfi team.

All right, let's get into some nuts and bolts about real estate again. Um, when people buy homes. These days, Rob, how, how much should they pay attention about the property taxes? Because I find a lot of friends who have purchased homes, don't look at that and then they get a little bit of a shock the first year the taxes come in and they think, I didn't realize I had all of that to pay part of your job is letting them know you got to keep an eye on that too.

Right? Absolutely. And you better make sure that the real I would double-check the taxes, uh, to make sure that, uh, um, it is what it is on, on the, uh, listing information when people are looking at, but the biggest problem, the biggest biggest problem is when people buy new houses, you don't know what the taxes are going to be.

And no matter what you say about in your mind. Okay. Well, it can't be any more than this. It is. It ends up being more than that. And, and, and the problem with the property taxes, when you buy a brand new house, They don't, they're not, they're not really taking any money yet, so because they haven't assessed the property.

So you can end up being your second year, this LK, we assessed your property. And we're going to say it's a 70, $7,500 a year. So you'll have $7,500 from last year and you got to start paying for this year too. So now you're. Now you're in the hole now you got, you're playing catch up now. And that's the hard thing about buying a new home.

So you almost have to make a deal and just go to, um, go to the, you know, the city or the town and say, listen, I want it. Just, just take this out of my account. So, and it goes towards the tax account and, you know, once you guys figure out what it is, then. Then you grab that or, or the, or the banks will take it on the mortgage, but sometimes the banks don't know what it is.

They don't know what to assess. They don't know what to, to deduct, uh, with your mortgage. But you gotta be very, very careful people don't look at that too much. And, uh, and the tax bill is, is the thing that, uh, hurts. It can, it can vary. So wildly. Yeah. Is it, is it all based on where the house is or how big the house went?

How do they come up with the number? It, it, it, a lot of it has to do it's based on how big it is. Like you could have a, I've seen houses that, um, are completely dated, but it's the biggest house in the neighborhood. And they pay more than everybody else. I've seen houses where the average, the average in that neighborhood would have been probably five to 6,000, but this one house is paying 10,000.

Now, if I saw a house that you're paying $10,000 and you got to spend money to update this house, to make it look new, I don't know if I would buy that house, like it, like, it's the best, you know, want the houses that have the best taxes are the older homes. Um, and, uh, and neighborhoods that are, are like, so you can have the biggest house sometimes in an average neighborhood.

And for some reason, if they haven't changed hands too often, Your taxes will be lower because of the average, but, but if you start applying for permits and what you have to, you know, put in the pool and put an addition on putting, you know, finishing your basement and doing all that, the tax, you know, the, the city and town will build they'll, they'll grab it and they'll start adding, adding, adding, and then you're going to pay, pay, pay you almost, you have to fight.

Uh, impact all the time and then they'll make deals. You have to fight them and just, you know, send a letter, say I'm not happy with my taxes. I think I'm paying more than everybody else. I have a house, there's a house down the street, you know, they sold for this much or there, you know, and they're paying that many taxes because you can check what people, what their taxes are.

You can check your neighbors what their, what their tax assessment. And this includes anything from an inherited property to, even if you buy a vacant lot, you still have to pay property tax. You got to pay property taxes, no matter what property you buy. And, um, and it's just, that's just the way it is. And, and, and a lot of people get in trouble when they say they'll pay the taxes themselves, and then they don't and all of a sudden, and you know, like you should pay it with your mortgage or just do a monthly payment plan or have automatic withdrawal out of your account, easy to pay it with your mortgage.

Isn't it. I mean, as you tell your mortgage on, I want to throw the taxes into this. They'll just calculate that in. They they do. And which is the best way, because then you know what, then you don't have to worry about quarterly payments and all that kind of stuff. Um, it, it is the best way and it, and it, and it's less stressful for the, uh, the home, the homeowner, uh, in dealing with it because believe me.

Uh, those quarterly installments come real fast. I mean, you, you six months or a year later you go, Whoa, I haven't paid my taxes. I'm going to be in trouble now. Now, now, now you're, you're paying the first quarter of the second year, which you haven't paid any quarter of the last year. It can add up, but you find a lot of young, young people get in trouble with that.

They get in trouble. So it's, it's just, you know, you just gotta be disciplined. In this day and age with all the, the low interest rates, I'm sure you're running into an awful lot of people who are buying homes for the very, very first time. And. I remember when I bought a home for the very first time, I was completely naive about things and I was stressing.

I didn't know about, I didn't know about taxes. I didn't know about what I was going to be paying. What, uh, what the process was when you talk to people, Rob, as a, as a seasoned veteran in the real estate business, and they're telling you, they're buying for the first time, what, what kind of things are bothering them?

What are the, what are their top reasons for being worried? Well in this market, um, overpaying, that is a huge stress on a lot of buyers right now of overpaying, especially the, the, the millennials, because they're getting into their first home and they want a house so bad, but then. The biggest stress is now that they're sitting there and there's 12 offers on this place and they're looking at putting an offer and it's like, what do I go in at?

And, and they submit it. And then, then the stress goes, okay. I hope I'm not overpaying Ang for this thing. I hope I'm not overpaying, but that is one of the biggest stress for a lot of these people. And, uh, I, I, I feel for them, I feel for them and it's tough. Um, but once they, once they buy it, A month, by the time they close the deal or, or two months after they moved in, they'll start noticing other houses have sold a lot higher than what they paid for.

Th th that anxiety goes down quite a bit, and then they start calculating, Oh, I bought my house for 600, but that house across the street sold for 700. I must have my house is way better than that. And, uh, so, so I made a hundred thousand dollars in three months, you know, so you get a lot of that, but, uh, but definitely.

A lot of stress and anxiety of overpaying. And, uh, yeah, it's a tough one because her career, a lot of, a lot of pain, a lot of anxiety for a young person, the people coming in and saying, okay, this is what I want in a house. This, this is my dream home. This is what I've always wanted and I'm not going to buy until I find that, which is probably unrealistic in the big scheme of things.

The hardest thing for somebody young, that's looking at buying their first house is that they have this image of a house in their head. And, uh, and what, what they're seeing is they're, you know, the, you know, the picket fence and all that kind of stuff, and it doesn't turn out to be that and, and their stress because they're going through these houses and, and, and the ones, the one that they had, that image that was close to it.

Sold for a lot higher than they were able to afford to put an offer in. And now they're looking at houses, uh, less, less price point. And it's nowhere near what the image in their head that they had. And it is stressful for them. And, and sometimes they eventually. Eventually they come down, you know, mentally and they realize, you know what, this is just this, uh, stepping point.

This is just a, it's a start. You know, maybe I can get my dream home, uh, you know, the next house after, but definitely a lot of stress on, on, on people that don't get what they envisioned that they wanted to buy. There's a lot of, a lot of stress on that. What about, uh, what about some of the other things that they are concerned about?

They worry about what they are getting, they worried about overpaying. Do first time buyers tend not to look at some of the issues with fixing up a house. Might they overlook some of that and then be surprised later. Yes, I I've I've I had, um, a couple, they were just like, they walked through the house.

They were just happy that they were had the opportunity to bios. They didn't even care. They, Oh, look. Well, you know, I mean, I go look, guys, this is not the right house for you guys. I go, I know it. I go, this is what it's going to cost you. And they didn't care. And I said, guys, you don't understand, like, I, I know.

And they're just excited just to own a house and they, there, there could be problems there and they don't see the price problems. A lot of the times that I see. And, uh, so we try to point that out and, and we, you know, and sometimes we'll send an email to them and say, Hey guys, listen, I know you're putting an offer on this house, but I just want to let you guys understand.

I hope you understand that, you know, this house has this issue, that issue, and, and if you're still wanting to go forward with it, Let me know. And sometimes I tell them, you know, bring somebody else like, like right now it's hard to get home inspections because houses are selling so fast. And, um, and so you're kind of, you kind of, depending on what the realtor's telling you and you're kind of, you know, so it's always good.

I like, I've got a portable ladder in my truck, in the back of my SUV. Like, Hey, if I need to get into the attic, I, and I got a flashlight, I can see anything. I'm like, I'm like, Uh, so if you like, everybody should be having a portable, portable ladder just in case they need to see what they need to see, uh, on this property.

And, and having a flashlight is important because when you're in the basements and going into utility rooms and everything, you want to be able to bring that light around, but there's definitely, definitely, uh, uh, you gotta be a new first-time buyers. Definitely gotta be careful when they're buying. Make sure they've got an experienced realtor that knows about houses and everything that can.

Educate them on things that they may need to fix up. Yeah. And finally, before we run out of time this week, I wanted to talk about something else in the real estate business, which you and I, I don't think I've ever really discussed, which is buyer's remorse. Um, we talk about the success stories, et cetera, et cetera.

What issues should you be looking at so that you don't. You know, buy a home or sell a home. And then, then you second, guess yourself and wonder whether you've done the right thing. How is the, is there a lot of buyer's remorse? Do you find there is buyer's remorse sometimes and that's when a realtor pushes their client too much.

So you gotta be careful about that. And the buyer's remorse happens. The buyer's remorse happens when you. Uh, wake up the next morning when you buy a house. So the, and you go, uh, um, like you put an offer in, on a house it's seven o'clock, eight o'clock at night. And, uh, you, um, um, you're happy you got the deal.

There's 12 offers on it. And, uh, and then, uh, you won the deal. Your agent pushed you to go a hundred thousand over ASCA and you didn't want to go any higher than. You know, 50,000 or 70,000, and then you got the deal, you got it. And uh, and then now you're waiting for the deposit check. So the next morning, your eight, the agent Haskin their buyer.

Hey, listen, you know, you got the house. That's great. Fantastic. You, you won the bid. We need that deposit check. And then all of a sudden. The, uh, the buyer starts ghosting the agent. It's like the, the agent can't get a hold of this buyer is like, what's going on? We just bought a house last night now. Um, he's not, uh, I'm having a hard time trying to find, uh, find this buyer.

And it's just because he's had buyer's remorse when you can't get ahold of that person that bought that house. And he's and, and, you know, he's got buyer's remorse, so you've gotta be able to deal with that. I haven't had the buyer's remorse. Um, especially if you bought cash, if you bought with no conditions without that check, it's not really a deal because part of that, part of that agreement of purchase and sale.

You need a deposit checks. So that's, that's almost like a wet and pretty well a way out because that's part of the deal and getting that deposit checks. So that's why I like doing deals, uh, when I'm representing my sellers, uh, during the day. And I want to get that deposit check, uh, the same day, because I don't want them sleeping overnight, but people do have buyer's remorse the next morning.

People for some reason in their dreams, I don't know what happens. Sleep makes people. Well, I mean, it's a lot of money. These in cases, this is the biggest deal you will ever make in your life financially. So obviously you need to make sure you're making the right decisions, uh, and talking to the right people.

And that's why, you know, you're there to answer questions before any of this happens. And if people have questions, let's run down again, the best way that they can ask you and your team, those questions, Rob. Yes. Uh, they can, uh, uh, they can call us at (905) 641-0308, or they can go to, uh, questions@Golfiteam.com questions@Golfiteam.com or they can, uh, you know, follow us on, uh, you know, uh, you know, online on Spotify, iTunes, Google podcasts, Stitcher, and many more, uh, just search, uh, the Golfi real estate show.

Um, in, uh, in favorite podcast platforms and you'll hit follow, hit, follow the button, I guess. Yeah. And you never missed an episode, but yeah, we've got all the episodes. Um, but again, like I said, there's, uh, you know, you can find anything about us and, uh, and, and update yourself on education. Right. And if you've got a question, just ask the question online and who knows next week, we could be answering your question right here on the Golfi real estate show.

Thanks Rob. Thank you, Tim.