Just Horsin' Around - Thoughts on Central Texas Real Estate and More

I first saw Skidboot on Texas Country Reporter.  Having had a heeler before (Jake, Best Dog Ever), and hoping to have one again (which we now do - J.D., Just Dog, trying hard to follow in Jake's footsteps in his own unique fashion), I was fascinated, of course. 

Over the years I followed Skidboot - he was an amazing dog, true to his breed. 

On March 25, 2007, at 14 years of age, Skidboot was laid to rest.  He'll be missed. 

The above is a quote of a weatherman here in Central Texas last year, and it's an accurate one.  (You other Texas agents will understand.)

A couple of weeks ago, due to the drought we've been experiencing, we were under a burn ban.  The creek that runs in front of our house through our pasture is not visible from the house during most times even when we're not in a drought, being at the bottom of a draw. 

This is the creek as of this afternoon (it wasn't visible this morning): 

The hundred year flood plain, by the way, comes right to the fenceline.  We determined that when we bought the property - our agent, and the title company, and our insurance agent, made a point of it.  (It's been up to it three times in one year since we bought the place ten years ago - can you say new impervious cover upstream?)

This is another photo of the creek as it curves around the side of our property:

 It's about 40-50 feet across at its widest.  Believe it or not, this has us out dancing in the rain - we seriously need it.  And the lakes are expected to rise three feet by mid-week - good news for boaters who've been running aground and for those of us who like a nice bath or drink of water of a summer day. 

Going to be interesting to see if I can get off the farm and into the sales meeting tomorrow morning.

In Central Texas, we do love to party.  Some times of year (this is one of them), you can hardly throw a rock without hitting a festival of some sort or another.  For example, this week/weekend: 

From March 28-April 1, the Texas Wine and Food Festival has its 22nd annual event - over 100 restaurants and 60 wineries participate.  This one, I AM going to - I've been invited to join the Cedar Park Wineaux in attending the final event of the week, on Sunday, a big food and wine "do" in San Gabriel Park here in Georgetown, complete with (what else?) BBQ and other beef treats, culinary stages, wine seminars, and more. 

On Saturday is another one of my favorite events, the Swamp Romp.  Yep, I said Swamp  Romp.  Well, it's official name is the Louisiana Swamp Thing and Crawfish Festival, but I've always known it as the Swamp Romp every since attendingn the original, which was held on 6th Street in downtown Austin (the original of a lot of things are held on 6th Street, it seems).  Food, music, entertainment, face painting, a great family-friendly event with all the enthusiasm you'd expect of something called a Swamp Romp.  Just look at the food list! 

Then, there's the 50th Annual Zilker Garden Festival held at Zilker Gardens.  Plants, vendors, the Taniguchi Oriental Garden and Tea House (built by 70-year-old Isamu Taniguchi), and, surprise, surprise, food (oh, wow, Evita's Botanitas is going to be there!) and music. 

Also this week, there's the 6th Annual Lone Star Rod and Kustom Round Up with hot rods and, yeah, food and music. 

There's lots more going on; as you can see, we have something for just about everyone, as long as they like food and music!  Come on down and have some fun!

Welcome home to 301 Harbor Drive, Georgetown.  This ranch home situated on an acre in secluded North Lake just minutes from Lake Georgetown, Wolf Ranch, the upscale HEB, and other Georgetown amenities, and with access to an easy commute into Austin or to Round Rock, Cedar Park,  Leander, or Liberty Hill, is waiting just for you. 

Welcome your guests into the living room; seat them in front of the fireplace.  Invite them into the sunroom (perfect also for an office, sitting room, or play room), or out onto the deck for a dip in the pool.  Conversation sparkles under the chandelier in the formal dining room.

At the end of the day, relax in the giant tub in the master retreat, and curl up with a glass of wine and a good book to wind down.  You've reached safe harbor!

This beautiful 3000+ square foot two-story home is an entertainer's dream tucked away in Stoney Brook, a quiet Round Rock neighborhood just minutes away from shopping (IKEA!  Round Rock Outlet Mall! Wolf Ranch! La Frontera!), movies, golf courses, schools, Scott & White Hospital, restaurants, IH35, State Highways 130 and 47, and more. 

The spacious, open floorplan boasts not one, but two, living areas, the downstairs living room with fireplace and the upstairs gameroom for more casual entertaining or a children's (or adults') play area.  If the party should be even larger, it can spill out onto the covered patio in the back yard - also a perfect place for sitting quietly at the end of a long day. 

The cook who doesn't want to be left out of the action will delight in the kitchen that opens onto the living area, perfect for keeping an eye on dinner while visiting with guests, while also being conveniently located to the formal dining room just through a passageway.  Guests can even help out with dinner around the kitchen island - cooking parties are all the rage! 

When the party's over, retreat to the peaceful, spacious downstairs master retreat with its separate shower and garden tub.  Pull a robe out of the large walk-in closet and settle down with a good book.  The three second-floor bedrooms just off the gameroom provide plenty of privacy for all. 

At just $195,000, you can't beat this deal.  In order for the beauty of this 2004 well-maintained home must be seen.  Let's make an appointment, shall we? 

Now that you're looking at your house, not your home, and you're on the search for a good real estate agent, take a good, long look at the piece of property you are hoping someone will buy. 

Get out a piece of paper - no, get out several pieces of paper, one for each room, and one for each side of the house outside - and a pencil.  Label the pieces of paper according to which room - or side - they represent. 

Take the piece of paper labeled "living room" and go into that room.  Start looking the room over for those problems that you have grown so accustomed to living with ("I'll get around to fixing that soon" - well, soon just got here).  Start at the ceiling. Are there cracks, old water leak stains, etc.?  Do the light fixtures need a thorough cleaning or perhaps replacing for an updated look?  Gradually work your way down the walls, ending up at the floor.  Look at every part of the room.  Make a note of everything you find that isn't perfect.  You may not be fixing all of them, but you want to know what you've got to work with cosmetically - that is, problems that can be seen with the naked eye, and that WILL be seen by a buyer who is looking for reasons to eliminate your house from their list that they are weeding down to the one they will purchase. 

Repeat this process with every room.

Now, take your sheets of paper and go outside.  Go out to the street and look at your house for curb appeal.  Again, look for problems - limbs that need trimming, grass that needs some help, empty places that could benefit from some plantings.  Look at the gutters and make sure they are secure - do they need painting?  Look at the roof from ground level - anything obvious there?  Does the house need painting in order to look its best?  Anything loose on the outside?  Look, again, for those problems that will help a buyer quickly eliminate your house. 

Once you've completed this process, put these sheets into protective sleeves and put them into a 3-ring binder.  This binder will be your "planning book" in which you keep the information you come up with on your own and the information provided by the various professionals you are engaging to help you with the process. 

Now that you have a list of what you can see that a buyer can see, you need to engage an inspector to do a "pre-listing inspection".  This will tell you what things may be wrong that you can't see with the naked eye - the hidden problems that can jump up and bite you in the middle of a contract, costing you money in negotiated repairs or souring the deal entirely. 

Hiring an inspector before putting your house on the market gives you the opportunity to decide in advance what repairs you are willing to make, to get estimates for those that you have decided not to make so that you are in a stronger negotiating position, and prevents some  unpleasant surprises during the contract period.  Providing a new inspection as part of the Seller's Disclosure form used in your state also gives potential buyers confidence that you're not hiding anything, and if you can provide evidence (receipts, warranties, etc.) in notebook form of all repairs that you HAVE made in preparation for putting your house on the market, that, too, goes a long way towards increasing buyer confidence in your home.  Top that with a Home Owner's Warranty, and you could potentially see offers thousands of dollars more just because of that buyer confidence. 

You can find licensed inspectors in the phone book, check with your state licensing board for references, or, best, you can get a few names from your real estate agent who has no doubt worked personally with many different inspectors and should have a list for you.  Your agent will also be able to advise you on disclosure laws in your state once you have all the information provided by the inspector, and can give you a list of repairmen, landscapers, etc. 

This is my variation of the traditional oatmeal cookie recipe from the Quaker Oats box lid.  I took their recipe and played with it a bit.  This cookies are not only awesome, they have a tendency to disappear.  Great (and memorable!) for open houses or just to take to the office.  It's important to use golden raisins; regular dark raisins are good but have a different effect and don't appear to have the same awesome effect.  (I don't recommend leaving them at home because, like I said, they have a tendency to disappear and all rumors to the contrary, cookies that you eat standing up DO contain calories!) 

• 1 cup butter, softened until partially melted

• 2 cups firmly packed brown sugar

• 1/2 cup granulated sugar

• 2 eggs

• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• 1 teaspoon cinnamon

• 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt

• 3 cups Quaker Oats

• 1 cup golden raisins

Now that you've had your attitude adjustment and realize that this building of stick and stone is just that, a building, you're better equipped to get it ready to sell for top dollar.  So, what's Step 2? 

Find a good real estate agent. 

Why?  Simple.

A good real estate agent is an invaluable resource when engaged in one of the larger financial transactions that will occur in your lifetime.  While it is possible to sell your house yourself, you'll find that you'll make more money, suffer far less angst, and be less likely to trip over one of the many boulders that will spring up, seemingly from nowhere, in your path to a successful sale and closing. 

A good real estate agent will provide information on the market and homes similar to yours in order to help you come to a good price that will help your home sell quickly and you walk away with the most you can. 

A good real estate agent will help you find an inspector so that you will know what your house needs in order to be at its best and so that you will avoid any nasty surprises during the option period of the contract.  A good real estate agent can also provide a list of repairmen in your area who can take care of any problems that turn up.  

A good real estate agent will be able to look at your house with an even more objective eye than you can in your new "it's a house, not a home" mode and make suggestions for staging.  They can provide information on storage facilities or pods if you should need to put some items away in order to make the house a more inviting place for someone else's life.

A good real estate agent will know what disclosures you are required to make by law and, in this and other ways, keep you from violating any laws just because you don't know about them. 

A good real estate agent will plan, implement, and guide the marketing of your house so that it is visible to the greatest number of people that are likely to be in the market for a house just like yours.

A good real estate agent, once you have an offer in hand, will help you determine how good the offer really is, what about it is good and not so good, what counter offer you might want to make, and what you are obligating yourself to in the contract if you should accept the offer. 

A good real estate agent will, with, if such is involved, their counterpart, the Buyer's agent, choreograph the dance between all the people involved in bringing a contract to closing - the title company, the lender, the inspector, and all the many people who must have their parts of the process coordinated. 

That's why Step 2 is finding a good real estate agent. 

So, you want (or need) to move, and you have a home to sell first.  But it's a big process, and you've never done it before (or did it long ago), and you're not sure what all is involved.  Well, never fear!  Here's something to get you started. 

Step 1:  It's No Longer Your Home, It's Your House

Yes, you still live in it, but now is the time to start thinking of it as a piece of property that you want to sell, rather than as your beloved home and sanctuary.  This is necessary for several reasons.  You are going to want to ask a price that buyers will be willing to pay, and buyers are not buying your memories, they are buying a house that they will fill with their own memories.  Your memories are, indeed, precious, but they do not have a dollar value, and that is as it should be - some things have a value that cannot be measured in gold. 

What does this mean?  This means that when your real estate agent gives you what's called a comparative market analysis, it is showing what buyers are willing to pay in your area for homes that are similar to yours in those ways that CAN be measured in gold - the size, the location, the age, the condition, all of those kinds of things.  These are the things that buyers will be considering when they are looking at your house, along with all the other similar ones, and making a decision to buy or not to buy.  If you are looking at this house that you have to sell AS a house, it will be easier for you to make an informed, intelligent decision on how to price it realistically so that you will get the most for it that you can reasonably expect in the quickest amount of time. 

It will be also easier for you to listen objectively to the information and advice that the professional you hire to sell your home for you has to give you about how to price it for a seller's or a buyer's market (which kind of market is your part of Texas in?), how to prepare it for market, what things you should do to make it competitive in your market in the way of repairs, painting, and so on - in other words, it will help you to work with  your agent to accomplish your goal of getting your house sold.  There are many things that need to be done to get a house ready to go on the market, and they are easier if you remember - from this point forward, it's your house, not your home, that's being sold.  Your Home - well, that will go with you wherever you go. 

That's Step 1 - adjusting your attitude towards the building you want to sell.  What's Step 2?  That's for the next blog. 

Back in 1963, University of Austin Professor Lloyd Birdwell's English class needed a break due to spring fever.  So, they had a party for a fictional character - Eeyore, the perpetually depressed donkey from A.A. Milne's "Pooh" series.  It was a small affair, held in Eastwoods Park on the east side of the University campus.  Some refreshments, a donkey, a May Pole - your typical 60's kid's birthday party. 

Fast forward to today, some 44 years later.  People noticed the party.  People thought it was a good idea.  People thought costumes would be an even better idea.  The party outgrew Eastwoods Park after several years.  It moved to much larger Pease Park along Lamar Blvd.

Eeyore's Birthday Party is held the last Saturday in April each year (with a rain date of the following weekend).  Thousands of Austinite's and past Austinite's and future Austinite's and people just passing through attend, many in costume.  There are live bands, drummers, a costume contest, refreshment stands run by local nonprofits as fundraisers - it is a BIG party.  And, yes, Eeyore is still in attendance - it is, after all, HIS birthday!

If you want to get the flavor of Austin, you should attend Eeyore's just once.  This year's will be April 28 - will I see you there?