It is pretty common knowledge that kitchens and master bathrooms make or break the appeal for a home on the market.  Get those two areas right can land a buyer that might otherwise pick another home.

But doing those rooms right isn’t cheap.  Back around Christmas I wrote a post about how the front door was the most bang for the buck in the improvement arena.  In the same post, I mentioned that a “Minor Kitchen Remodel” averaged over $20k in cost (while only delivering about $15k in value).  That isn’t cheap…

So, what are some improvements that can make a big impact on the appeal of the home, without making that big of an impact on your bank balance?

• Add appropriate crown mouldings. If you are handy, this can be a great improvement.  Depending on the profile you select, you might be able to do a room for $100-$300… or possibly less.  If you have a home priced over $150k, buyers like to see crown mouldings.
• Paint is the ULTIMATE low-cost upgrade. Face it, for a couple hundred dollars you can paint the inside of your whole home.  You can knock it out in a weekend.  Select neutral colors that are currently popular and enhance the space and you can “Wow!” buyers touring your home.
• Scrape the ceiling… This one isn’t easy.  I’d find someone to hire to do it…  But, smooth ceilings are WAY more popular than popcorn painted ceilings.  Scraping the ceiling and repainting will make your home more desirable than other comparable homes with popcorn ceilings.

Of course, hiring a stager to talk with about how to make your home show better is a great idea.  The stager can help with color selection and ideas to easily improve the “showability” of your home.  Many times those ideas are inexpensive.. and even free.

And if you aren’t looking to sell, focus on improvements that make you happy.  Add wainscotting to the garage (I like the polished aluminum diamond plate…) or more light in the garage.  Upgrade flooring.

When we moved into our home we changed to Decora style rocker switches for all of the lights.  It cost us less than $50 for the whole house and updated the look.  We got rid of the old ivory switches and plates and went with much cleaner pure white.

Have fun…

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A friend of mine recently forwarded the link for this slide show to me.  It is REALLY cool.  I understand the work that went into this, although I can honestly say I have never been able to create anything on this level.

I have been a car guy since I started crawling… maybe longer… and when I was a kid I built models.  I LOVED detailing them.  I would sometimes make them look weathered and worn.  I also built some dioramas, but nothing to this level…

These are incredible.

This week, let’s tak about accidents.

They are all pretty short…

I’m here for you.  I have been getting these emails for years from builders promoting their inventory of homes.  In some cases, they are offering incentives to agents to bring buyers to their communities.  In other cases they are offing incentives to buyers.  Sometimes, there are both…

I finally figured out how to help people find those deals, or know why their agent might be “hot” on a particular community.

I have sold some new construction in the area, and know how to help a buyer get the best deals, so I thought this might be a good outgrowth of that.

Let me also state…  The cost of the buyer’s agent is built into the cost of the home.  It is very rare that builders cut a better price for unrepresented buyers.  There are a variety of reasons.  One of the biggest is that builders are reluctant to cut the price of their homes.  If they do, those lower prices show up in the comps that will be pulled for an appraisal.  That lowers the value of the community…

So, if you are interested in a new home in or around Gwinnett County, GA, give me a call. Also, feel free to subscribe to Builders.LaneBailey.com.  That is my new site to track builder deals.  These are basically the unfiltered flyers that the builders and their agents send out.

The agents on site are very nice people.  I have worked with a lot of them.  But remember, they are contractually obligated to represent the best interest of THEIR client.  And their client is the builder.  They aren’t going to tell you that the community is in trouble, or what dangers that might bring.  They aren’t going to tell you if there is another community with a better deal.  They aren’t going to tell you if there are factors in the community that might affect resale value.  You need an agent on YOUR side.

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Last year I wrote about Senate Bill 55 in the Georgia Senate.  Basically, the bill required the Counties to include foreclosures in assessments.  Previously, assessments for taxes excluded foreclosures, so they (falsly?) increased values and tax revenue to the counties.

While that makes it tough for the counties, it is a needed break for home owners.  The counties complained that they would lose revenues… well, the people are losing revenue, too.  They have to suck it up.

In the last year, the bill quietly passed and was signed into law by Governor Sonny Perdue.

Here is the link to the original post.

I’m just wondering…

I have been reading a lot of posts and articles about the general state of the economy, and while there are some signs of stirring in the corporate world, some analysts think that the rise in the stock market has more to do with the fall of the dollar than the health of the stocks.

If that is the case, could we be looking at the beginnings of another stock bubble?

Two years ago I wrote about whether it was time to sell here in Gwinnett County…  Wow have things changed in the last two years.

The basic logic is the same now, but looking in the rearview mirror, it sure is tough to justify back then.  Of course, back then I didn’t know what the last two years would look like.  My crystal ball was a little dirty.

To start with, where I was talking about $2000/mo rent for a $200,000 home, now the home is likely worth $170,000 and the rent would be unlikely to exceed $1500.  Of course there are neighborhoods that command higher rents… they also have stronger sales and support for higher prices.

Anyway, here is the read.

Over on one of my other blogs, I re-blogged a post from Jeff Corbett.  He is VERY involved in the mortgage and housing industry and loves diving into the ugly underbelly of the industry. 

In this post, he lays out the reasons he sees why there will be increased volitility in the mortgage and housing sectors.  Basically, since the Fed is currently slated to stop buying mortgages next month…

It is worth a read…

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Eddie Alterman at Car & Driver Magazine is the one that inspired the title…  In one of his columns he refered to the new Lexus LF-A as the WTF.  And I think there is good reason.

This car has been in development with Toyota for 10 years.  The problem is that in the 10 years it has been in development, the targets have all moved.  A LOT.  Let’s look at some specs…

• Nürburgring Nordschleife Lap in 7:24 (Toyota claimed)
• Top Speed is 202mph
• Curb Weight is 3263 pounds and power to weight is 5.9lb/hp
• 0-60 is 3.6 seconds
• Sticker Price will be between $350,000 and $375,000

Those seem to be impressive numbers, except for one thing… that price is out of line with the rest of the performance. There is also the matter of the styling, which has been compared to the Nissan GT-R… or a Supra that spent too much time in the plastic wing aisle at Pep Boys.  It isn’t that it is terribly ugly, but it just isn’t unique.

Since we brought up the Nissan GT-R (I have trouble not refering to it as the skyline):

• Nissan claims a Nürburgring Nordschleife Lap of 7:26.7 (video confirmed)
• Top Speed is 193 (Nissan, but Motor Trend said 195)
• Curb Weight is about 3800lbs and power to weight is 7.9lb/hp
• 0-60 is 3.5 seconds (after March 2009)
• Sticker Price is between $80,000 and $90,000

Wow.  A slight performance increase and a MASSIVE price increase.

Now, let’s toss a third into the mix…  Let’s try a car more tuned for performance and a little less towards touring.  The Corvette ZR-1:

• GM did a video confirmed Nürburgring Nordschleife Lap of 7:26.4
• Top Speed is 210mph
• Curb Weight is about 3352lbs and power to weight is 5.3lb/hp
• 0-60 is 3.3 seconds
• Sticker price is under $114,000

Now we have race…

But the big question for me is why did it take 10 years to develop this car?  It would be one thing if is was amazing, but the only amazing thing about the car is the price.  The lap time at The ‘Ring is respectable, certainly.  But it is barely beating cars that cost a fraction as much.

Some industry insiders say that part of the reason is that Toyota hasn’t ever really tried to break ground.  They take the ideas of others and tweak them…  Even with the LF-A, the car that is to be their image car, it looks like another makers design.

I don’t have a beef with Toyota.  they are the number 1 carmaker in the world, they obviously can do some things right (current acceleration issues notwithstanding).  But without a personality and a soul, why would someone spend $350,000 for a car that underperforms its peers while costing SEVERAL times as much.

from GwinnettGarageGuy.com

Last Friday we were at EPCOT in Disney World.  One of the coolest things there was “Turtle Talk with Crush”.  This is an animated AND interactive feature.  Crush interacts with the kids (and some parents) in the audience.  Here is a video…  Just one this week.  I didn’t tape it, but this has higher quality than the one I tried to make.