Due to popular demand from the real estate community, HomeGain.com regularly conducts its nationwide home improvement and home staging Home Sale Maximizer™ survey. Past findings from the survey have been a guide for thousands of home sellers in preparing their home for sale.

HomeGain recently conducted a new survey of top 12 low cost*, do-it-yourself (DIY) home improvements for people getting their home ready to sell.  Nearly 1,000 REALTORS® responded to the survey.

The top five nationwide home improvements that Realtors recommend to home sellers, based on average cost and return on investment (ROI) to sellers, are:

1. Cleaning and de-cluttering ($200 cost / $1,700 price increase / 872% ROI / 98% recommended)
2. Home staging ($300 cost / $1,780 price increase / 586% ROI / 82% recommended)
3. Lightening and brightening ($230 cost / $1,300 price increase / 572% ROI / 95% recommended)
4. Landscaping ($320 cost / $1,500 price increase / 473% ROI / 94% recommended)
5. Repair Plumbing ($385 cost / $1,250 price increase / 327% ROI / 88% recommended)

Costs are averages and rounded up. For ranges of values, see chart 1 below. For actual price increase, see chart 2 below.

Cleaning and de-cluttering continues to  rank as the top suggested home improvement (since the survey was originally conducted in 2000). This low cost home improvement is recommended by 98% of Realtors and costs less than $200 but has a returning value of nearly $1,700 to the home’s sale price, or an 872% return (ROI).

“Inexpensive cosmetic home improvements and basic improvements greatly enhance the value of the home,” stated Carol Wilson of Carpenter Real Estate in Indianapolis, IN (AgentEvaluator member since 1999). Continue reading this post

The economy’s decline leveled off significantly from April through June, confirming  that the worst is behind us.

GDP declined at an annualized rate of 1 percent in the second quarter, after shrinking an amazing 6.4 percent earlier this year. But consumer spending, 70 percent of economic activity,  continues to fall as Americans continue to save and  reduce debt. Economists express concern that our basic spending habits have been permanently altered by this great recession. This is also having an effect on rentals as renters downsize or insist on rent reductions.

With this as a backdrop we looked at rental rates which a are a prime factor in evaluating a property. We clearly have a long way to go. The Dept of Commerce chart indicates we are at a fragile beginning of a recovery. The key to successful property ownership now will be to keep it occupied and ride this out. Continue reading this post

As a REALTOR®, communicating on a regular basis with the seller is a crucial component of the listing’s success. And, as I have so often found from experience, sellers who have mentally made the transition from “homeowner to home seller” have a much easier time accepting advice and feedback from their real estate agent realizing it as a means to an end: the sale of their home.

Such was the case for one of my listings (before and after pictures, below), a truly beautiful single family home that I sold back in early February, recently featured in the May, 2009 edition of REALTOR.org “Best Room Makeovers”.

Painted in a South-West Adobe orange color motif, many buyers just found the family room too loud for their tastes.

The seller originally gave me resistance about changing the color, but after reading the feedback I was sending him from buyers, he finally realized the family room needed to be re-painted. Continue reading this post

In this edition of HomeGain’s Winning Agent Calls, Janelle and Eric Boyenga of Intero Real Estate in Silicon Valley, California, reveal the do’s and don’ts of building a successful real estate team.

The Boyenga Team’s accomplishments include: over 12 years experience in real estate; recipients of the Intero President’s Circle, being ranked in the top 2% of Realtors in their agency since 2004; sold over $100 million dollars in home sales; named in the top 5% of Realtors in their county by San Jose Magazine; certified home staging professionals; have closed double digits in home sales with HomeGain.

Listen to this month’s featured Winning Agent Call, hosted by Peter McCullough:

Highlights:

Continue reading this post

HomeGain recently rolled out its March/April issue of the Agent Success Newsletter.

The newsletter included:

• Feature Story, which announced results from HomeGain’s recent home values survey.
• Question of the Month — “I recently met with a seller I found through your AgentEvaluator program who told me they received 12 proposals from agents in my area but decided to go with mine. I’ve just listed their home, but am a bit concerned about my effectiveness going forward. Should I be worried?”
• News about HomeGain’s Instant Home Values and Home Sale Maximizer™ widgets that are now available for FREE download.
• An Awards section, where we congratulated the newest AgentEvaluator Platinum Club, Gold Club and Silver Club members. 
• Agent Quote of the Month from Ron Petzel — “I have been in close contact with Nick Di Tomasso and Ryan Monsanto. Your company is one of the BEST. I have offered to talk to anyone you put in front of me or by phone to tell them what HomeGain has done for me and my Team.”
• Announcement of February’s Customer Advocate of the Month, Da’Mali Ross in the Product Team. “Da’Mali is the sole point of contact for all AIMS agents, and for each of them she takes care of all operations, setup, customer service, billing and tracking issues. She sets an example for what it means to put the customer first,” commented Salvatore Giammaressi, VP of Product at HomeGain.
  

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Read past real estate newsletters

HomeGain, the first website to offer free instant home valuations, just released instant home values and home sale maximizer widgets for free download.

There are three different versions of each of the Instant Home Valuation and Home Sale Maximizer widgets. (pictured below)

These widgets work best for HomeGain AgentView members. If you have a HomeGain AgentView membership and place one of these widgets on your site, when your visitors request a home valuation or to use the Home Sale Maximizer tool in the zip codes where you are featured, they will be sent to your AgentView module where they can review their home valuation or access the Home Sale Maximizer tool.

These widgets are a great way to attract visitors and to get them to come back. Used in conjunction with AgentView it allows AgentView members to keep their visitors engaged on their sites and on their AgentView sites.

The widgets are also a great addition to any website in need of quality home valuation or home improvement content.

If you are interested in getting these consumer-pleasing widgets for your website, click here.

Try HomeGain’s free instant Home Valuation Tool here