by Neil Kearney | Jan 1, 2013 | Boulder Real Estate |
Happy New Year!
This past Friday Kearney Realty was featured in a cover article in the Daily Camera’s At Home section. The full article can be read by going to this website.
Here are a few excerpts from the article:
Kearney Realty, a trusted name in Boulder real estate for over 20 years, has just announced the opening of their new downtown Boulder offices in the Iron Flats Building at 2400 Spruce Street.
At the same time, the agency is re-organizing into an independent, boutique agency designed to provide a high level of personalized service to real estate buyers and sellers.
“We are taking the knowledge, skills and principles from our decades of experience in Front Range real estate and transforming our team into an independent agency,” says Neil Kearney, owner. “Real estate is a personal experience, and we know that we can serve our clients best by providing personalized service. We like to describe it as a ‘high touch, high tech, five-star customer experience.”
“We bring a real mindset of service to work everyday,” Neil Kearney explains. “We’re not focused on making that one big sale, but rather on developing long-term relationships with our clients. When we provide great service, we know the rest will take care of itself. People today have access to plenty of information on properties for sale, for instance. Our job is to provide the expertise that helps our clients make good decisions based on that information. Each of our full time associates is empowered and engaged to give top quality service based on impeccable ethics, consistent systems, professional development and cutting edge tools.”
“We’re a small agency with a big handle on technology, using all of the most current methods and tools that larger companies employ and bringing great efficiencies to every transaction. As a seller, you want to ensure that your property is marketed in the most effective ways possible. And as a buyer, you want a complete picture of values, neighborhoods, and anything that might impact the desirability of a property. In the end, it’s still about our personal understanding of your needs and how to solve them.”
I am really excited to be starting the year with a new focus on our local personalized brand and an excitement to implement new ideas on how to better serve our clients. I’m also really excited to be working in our new location at 24th and Spruce in the Iron Flats building. As we get settled more I will share more about our new location.
Kearney Realty article 12-28-2012
by Neil Kearney | Oct 24, 2012 | Featured, For Buyers, For Sellers, Real Estate 101 |
Even though we are in a slower time of year, houses are still selling. All year I have been seeing a shortage of good listings in the market. Right now there are 15% fewer available homes on the market than last year at this same time. This means that if a serious buyer is out looking for a nice home the cupboards are fairly empty. Right now there are many leftover homes on the market. I define leftover homes as those listings that haven’t sold for a specific reason whether it be price, location or condition. This shortage leads to heavy activity on those homes that come on the market ready to sell. Those homes are well priced, in good condition and in a location that doesn’t raise a red flag. This leads to multiple buyers being interested in the same house at the same time. Here is some advice for handling multiple offers from the buyer and seller perspective.
From The Buyers Perspective:
- Check to see if you have competition. Your agent will call the listing agent to announce your intention to write an offer. Make sure you know if you are competing with another buyer. At the same time have the agent ask for the sellers preferred closing date and for any items that will be excluded from the offer. All of the information below assumes that there is another offer.
- Make your decisions quickly. Getting your offer in a day ahead may make a big difference. Ask for a quick acceptance deadline.
- Do your homework: Check comparable sales and decide the maximum price you will be willing to pay. Also, think about how you would feel if you would lose this house over a couple of thousand of dollars.
- Do a thorough walk-through: When you see a house you are interested in, take your time. Check on the condition of the house, what would you need to do to make it yours. Are the systems (furnace, roof, windows) in good condition?
- Prepare a clean offer: Don’t ask for Sellers to pay for appraisal, cleaning, HOA transfer fees etc. When the seller is considering two similar offers, $50 can make a big difference and send a signal that the buyers asking for all of the small stuff will be tougher to work with down the road on inspections etc.
- Have your financing in place and make sure to include a letter from a lender along with the offer. I prefer to see a local lender who can jump in and make the closing work in a difficult situation rather than somebody who is working a toll free line.
- A nice touch is to write a personal letter to the seller explaining who you are and why you love their house. The seller has an emotional attachment to the house and wants to sell to someone who will take care of their house.
Consider an escalation clause. When the house is a good value and you know there is competition one effective method is to write in an escalation clause. This clause in the contract automatically raises the bid price if another offer beats theirs financially. For instance it could read “the offer price shall be automatically raised to a price $1,000 above any other bonefide offer, the purchase price shall not exceed $xxx,xxx”. This is where the buyer has to know how much they are willing to pay; is it full price or $5,000 over?
From The Sellers Perspective:
- If you are attracting more than one offer it shows that you have taken care of your home and priced it correctly.
- You want to make sure that all interested parties have a chance to submit an offer. Have your agent communicate to each agent who has shown the property recently to gauge interest.
- When reviewing offers look at these main points: net price to you after all closing costs, dates and terms and buyers ability to pay and close. (more…)
by Neil Kearney | Oct 15, 2012 | Boulder Real Estate, Featured |
Interested in learning about the different neighborhoods in Boulder? In this report I have split Boulder into eleven different areas and present the lifestyle highlights, schools, shopping districts, local recreation and real estate statistics for each area. If you’re interested in learning about where to live in the City of Boulder this is your guide. Click Here to view and download the guide.
by Neil Kearney | Sep 25, 2012 | Colorado Lifestyle, Photos |
This past weekend I loaded up the bike and took a high country fall foliage tour on two wheels. I lucked out and caught the fall colors
East Side of McClure Pass toward Marble
at their absolute peak. I will deviate from the normal theme of real estate and give you a sense of why I love living, working and playing in Colorado.
Here are the details of my Colorado bike tour. My route started in Redstone Colorado on Friday night and headed immediately west over McClure Pass. I camped near the top of the pass and the next morning descended to Paonia through alpine aspens fields, to rolling ranch land, coal mining operations and finally into the orchards near Paonia.
Between Paonia and Crawford
After a stop in Paonia for a smoothie I rode the back way from Paonia to Crawford. This 20 mile road wound through rolling pastureland, orchards and as I headed south it became drier and more desolate. After lunch in Crawford I rode south toward the Black Canyon of the Gunnison River. It was a hot day and the road seemed to head up much more than it headed down. With a fully loaded bike, it is hard to carry much speed. I characterize the slope of a hill by how fast I can go. Steep hills are 5 mile an hour hills and not so steep hills are 7 mile per hour hills. The road from Crawford to the Blue Mesa Reservoir had many 5 mph hills.
The road didn’t have a big shoulder but the road surface was smooth, the
Between Crawford and Gunnison
drivers were very considerate and the traffic was very light. I would estimate that 50% of the vehicles that I saw on that stretch of road were motorcycles. As I headed toward Gunnison I caught some views (although hazy) of the eastern edge of the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. After a 90 mile day I was very thankful to find a campground at the dam of the Blue Mesa Reservoir. The views over the last 20 miles were characterized by rock buttes skirted in aspen groves, very beautiful!
The next morning I rode along the 19 mile long Blue Mesa Reservoir before heading through a small canyon and coming out in a wide valley that holds the town of Gunnison. On this stretch of the road I met another cyclist loaded up for touring just like I was. This is a rare occurance so we both slowed and I crossed over to chat. Tom was on his 46th day out of New Jersey on a cross country tour that will take him next through Utah, Nevada into San Francisco and then down the coast to LA. We had a lot to talk about because in 1993 I rode my bike (the same one) from Seattle to Boston.
Curecanti Ranch Area near Blue Mesa Reservoir
After a big breakfast I headed up the valley from Gunnison to the ski town of Crested Butte. The valley is very scenic with many river crossings, large ranches and a cute fly fishing village called Almont which was filled with anglers with a wet line. But as I headed north the wind headed south. Headwinds added at least a half an hour to the 25 mile ride up the valley.
Crested Butte is a cool little ski town. From what I could tell the town is filled with young, healthy, outdoor types and their young families. There were bike racks everywhere, even in front of houses. My guess is that bikes outnumbered residents. After some great ice cream at the Third Bowl Ice Cream shop (salted caramel and cowboy coffee in a waffle cone) I resupplied and headed up the dirt road to Kebler Pass. I was really glad that the pass was a 7 mph climb of about 7 miles. The views on the west side of the pass were just incredible! If you want to get a slice of back country Colorado, this is a great way to do it in a car. As I descended I had to stop often to take photos. I’d never seen so much yellow in one place and at the prime spots were filled with serious photographers with all of the gear.
Near Kebler Pass
There are many good primitive camping spots on the west side of the pass and I found a spot a beautiful aspen grove. I woke to a wet tent and after packing up I descended 19 miles of dirt road. The road in general is in good condition but after a rain it’s pretty sloppy. There are some absolutely beautiful high country cattle ranches on this road.
The last stretch was again back up the west side of McClure Pass. Most of the way is fairly rolling with only a five mile ascent to the summit. I reached 38 miles per hour on the decent from the pass and rolled easily back into Redstone and a hot shower at a past clients home.
Overall it was a great weekend and I have to say that my legs are feeling the next day. In all it was 214 miles of beauty that is best enjoyed at a slow pace.
Fall colors near Kebler Pass
by Neil Kearney | Sep 21, 2012 | Real Estate 101 |
A few days ago as I was showing properties, I stumbled upon a vintage mid-century modern home sitting among large two story homes built in the 1990’s. From the Wikipedia entry it states that “Mid-Century architecture was frequently employed in residential structures with the goal of bringing modernism into America’s post-war suburbs. This style emphasized creating structures with ample windows and open floor-plans with the intention of opening up interior spaces and bringing the outdoors in. Many Mid-century houses utilized then-groundbreaking post and beam architectural design that eliminated bulky support walls in favor of walls seemingly made of glass.”
The home in Lafayette, Colorado still has many of the original design features from 1955 when it was built. The entry was a wall of windows melding the patio to the entry/dining room. The ceilings were high and beamed following the contour of the low-pitched roof line. The kitchen had wonderful turquoise countertops and tear drop shaped light fixtures. The good news was that the house was in vintage shape, like stepping back in time. The bad news was that the house hadn’t been maintained and was showing it’s age. Here are some photos.
