Who Sold Your Property?

If you’ve kept up with my prior columns you will see a focus on the dynamic of Quebec sales that lead to Ontario purchases.  What Quebec loses, Ontario gains.  A good marketing effort captures the natural gift of low hanging fruit of where people are looking.  If your property is not marketed properly to this natural, turn key and large volume of buyers, then you need to tune your agent’s marketing engine.

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Seeing Over the Horizon

A cornerstone of our lives, whether we realize it or not… is our home.  Yet selling or buying one is a big financial decision that usually takes place without a clear view of future.  Believing what you are doing is the right thing is comforting.  But knowing is always better.

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Micro Climates

The difference between micro and macro when it comes to economists, sociologists and other scientists is simply scale.  Micro climates are regional systems that have external influences, but also have their own system interactions that create their own weather, dynamism and activity.  The microclimate of Eastern Ontario has been a very quiet and undervalued place for a long time.   Continue reading

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To List Your Home: Pounce or Pause?

When animals make decisions they don’t have the benefit of all of the human encumbrances of second guessing, doubt, emotion and comparison.  A predator (or prey) makes its decision purely based on the signals it’s getting from its environment and how to time the key leap for lunch or safety from its camouflaged lair. Continue reading

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Lead the Herd: How to Time Your Listing

One of the biggest problems the industry and its participants face as we head into the spring is the ambivalence and lack of planning around specific dates. When you have made the commitment that listing your property for sale is something that you want to do, be sure not to drag your feet in the early months of the year.   Continue reading

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Sales vs. Consulting

More than a few famous entrepreneurs have said that, “90% of sales is education –  Educate the client and you’ve got a loyal customer.”  That being said, this is not how real estate professionals are viewed.  Despite our best efforts, we appear to the public as individuals who want to sell something no matter what it takes.  Salespeople, by definition, are tasked with moving inventory.  Get it sold, or lose your job.

But therein lies the biggest opportunity for all sales people: Continue reading

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The Housebank Problem

One of the benefits of a rising real estate economy is that your house turns out to be one of the better investments you made in the past ten years.  This is especially true when you look at the rate of return on the property vs. other places money could have been parked.  The stark reality with many Canadians is this: Whether your house is worth $75,000 or $250,000, odds are, it is the largest asset you own.

But therein lies the problem

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Representation

When buying property, consider this:  What are you buying? What are you signing?  But most importantly, who is in your corner?

The last question is key.  Your buyer representative (if you have one) is your best source of information. It is their job to make sure you know what you’re buying, why you should buy it, how much you should pay for it – and where you should look.  They are regional experts – they have to be.

Realtors don’t always highlight the importance of explaining these details, however.   Continue reading

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Ontario: Yours to Discover

Eastern Ontario real estate may not realize it, but the great thing about license plates is that they plug for your State or Province. Like a bumper sticker, but sealed deeper into your brain – they are everywhere. When Ontario launched the “Yours to Discover” campaign, they had one group in mind, and it wasn’t Manitoba. While the intent wasn’t just the greater Montreal area, you can’t argue that Vankleek Hill, Chute-a-Blondeau, Alexandria, l’Orignal and others are hard to discover when you are so close. Continue reading

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Crossing the Border

Many of us who grow up in Quebec, Ontario, or even New England have different images of this statement.  For Quebecers, it mostly meant giving up, heading down the 401 and starting a new life in Toronto.  Today, there’s a new trend afoot – and it isn’t quite as far as Toronto.  Prescott-Russell County is less than an hour from Montreal.  And for many Montrealers, the trend is to buy across the border. Continue reading

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