The Importance Of Staging • Monday Market Minute • Carrie McCormick

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Welcome to the October edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick from At Properties!

Fresh from her speaking engagement as a panelist at Inman Luxury Connect in Beverly Hills, Carrie McCormick tells our listeners some of the insights she observed. For example, the rise of the importance of staging – buyers expect homes to be move-in ready and staged. Also, how you can use video to tell a story better than pictures. I provide a marketing tip on how to personalize your holiday cards for clients!

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00
On this episode of Keeping it real is brought to you by Quicken Loans real estate professionals. When you work with Quicken Loans, you have an agent relationship manager available to you and your team. These dedicated experts are part of the agent relations team. They serve as your single point of coordination so you can count on them to keep you in the loop throughout your client’s entire home buying process, call 888-980-2891 or go to real estate dot Quicken loans.com Today, call for cost information and conditions equal housing lender licensed in all 50 states NMLS consumer access.org Number 3030. And now onto the show.

Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the largest podcast made for real estate brokers by real estate brokers. My name is DJ Parris, I’m your host and guide through the show, as always, today, we have the Monday market minute, which we do every month with the great Carrie McCormick. If you are a new listener and you haven’t yet got it listen to any of our Carrie money market minute episodes. Carrie is one of the top producing brokers in Chicago and this is a huge deal because there’s 45,000 brokers Carrie is always in the top 1% of 1%. She is literally one of the very highest producing brokers. She’s been a high producing broker for 20 years with App properties. And she just came back from Inman luxury connect where she was a featured panelist and speaker in Beverly Hills. So we are so excited to talk to you. So Carrie, welcome back to Chicago.

Carrie McCormick 1:50
Well, thank you, it was such a fun panel to be part of it was a privilege. I was seated next to Kevin Thompson, who I’ve never met in person. I’ve always seen him on panels or in, you know, different write ups. But he’s the Chief Marketing Officer of Sotheby’s International based in New York. So I got the privilege of talking to him backstage personally for a little while. And then of course, you know, seated on the panel with him. And then another gentleman that I was with is dusty Baker. He is a top producer from Southern California, also with Sotheby’s and, you know, talking to these two gentlemen that, you know, one on the East Coast, one on the West Coast selling millions and millions of dollars of real estate it was it was such a privilege, and especially to be in Beverly Hills. I don’t know, you know, how many people been out there? I’ve been out there once before, but it’s, it’s kind of lala land. It’s really it’s really interesting place to be and, you know, millions of dollars of real estate are traded in that town. It’s unbelievable.

D.J. Paris 2:57
Yeah, so tell us a little bit about what you you know what you spoke about what you learned, let’s, let’s Yeah, the listeners. And

Carrie McCormick 3:05
so the panel that I spoke on was about, you know, luxury listings and how to market them. And the reoccurring theme between the three of us is how important staging a home has become. It’s the buyers in this marketplace have changed. And again, this is not just a local thing here in Chicago, it was across the US, there were people. Like I mentioned from New York, or agents from New York, there were agents from California and Texas that deal with these oil tycoons. The same thing is, is that staging matters, when a buyer walks into a home, it has to trigger an emotional feeling and that emotion needs to be I love this house, I can live in this house, I can move right in. And, you know, it’s our job now to create an emotion of feeling from these buyers. And that’s where staging has become key. Whereas before, you know, but like I said, I’ve been doing this for 20 years, you know, it just we didn’t have to invest in that we didn’t have to worry about staging, you know, we would just use what was ever in the home. But again, staging has become key, whether it’s real staging or Virtual Staging. For the people who are listening. Virtual Staging has become a huge hit for those you know, folks that don’t want to stage their home so I would definitely look into that if you haven’t already. The other thing that I opened up the panel with was about storytelling. I use a lot of video marketing in my advertising and marketing for a home and dusty Baker who is the gentleman I sat next to he disagreed with me. He said that he does not use video because he feels that no one is watching seeing the videos. So again, everyone’s got a difference of opinion on video marketing. But I love video marketing for two reasons. One, it does tell the story about the home because you can do B roll of neighborhoods of schools of coffee shops in the area. So not only are you marketing and selling the home, your marketing and selling a lifestyle, the neighborhood, what you know, when you walk out your door, what can you enjoy. And you can’t get that through just, you know, traditional pictures. So I love the storytelling feature of the video. And also, I love it just because the SEO rankings when Zillow or any other platform sees that you have a video content in your in your listing, it thinks it’s more important, it feels it raises you up a little bit on your ranking. So I think you get to fold with these video marketing. So that was, you know, between the staging and the video marketing, that became the hot topic of our conversation on our panel, we talked a little bit about print marketing, and we all agreed that, you know, if you place an ad in a magazine, there’s you’re not going to get a buyer for that home, you know, no one’s looking for a home in a magazine. I don’t want to name any but you know that, you know, you’re not working through a magazine and saying, Oh, look, look at this home, I wasn’t even thinking about it, I think I should buy this home. But we all agree that print marketing has become a way for branding ourselves as agents. So you know, our picture, our name becomes front and center in that print, you know, if we want to list a few homes in there to obviously show off our listings or you know, hopefully there is someone that does see a home that they may like and give you a call. You know, we’ve all agree that that has become a way to leverage the print the print part of it. But really it was, it was such an interesting place to be again, I was talking with people from coast to coast. And we all seem to be struggling with the same issues as far as the buyer market right now. You know, the market times are up. Again, this is across the United States market times are up, pricing is starting to level out. If you’re looking to move a home, you’ve got to price it right. It has to be staged properly. And you have to have an aggressive marketing campaign. Hands down.

D.J. Paris 7:33
Yeah, I have a few thoughts on on all this great stuff that you just said. And I wonder if a lot of it with a staging in particular, you know, we think about and we should really mention your Instagram account because it is one of the best if not the very best I’ve seen for what a realtor should aspire to do and Instagram, which is Carrie McCormack real estate. So go on Instagram and follow Carrie number one, everything she puts up is very professional, it’s a branding opportunity for her but also it’s there’s a consistency to the look the feel, and she does it all herself that she doesn’t have an agency posting for her. So it’s really very, very remarkable. And I wonder how much of this idea of now staging, whether it’s virtual or actual staging, I wonder how much of that has to do with the rise of the popularity of social media platforms like Instagram where we take pictures of our food, and we tweak it to make it look like it’s just absolutely incredible. And we post it and I think this idea of the pictures you know if you’re virtually staging, making the every room look perfect or again, actually staging so when somebody comes through, you know, I always heard years and years ago that you were supposed to leave the room as sparse as possible so people could imagine their own stuff in the room and I just don’t think that’s the case anymore. I think you’re right. You want it to look just perfect.

Carrie McCormick 8:57
Actually the moderator of our panel also brought that up is you know, she said Let we have to blame you know, these Instagram accounts and some of these. These TV shows like HGTV has some fabulous shows. But what the public is getting used to seeing is perfect rooms right with whites and these grays and these luxury this and luxury that and the consumers that’s in your face all the time of you know this is how a kitchen should be so when they walk into a real life kitchen that doesn’t live up to that expectation, the Instagram expectation or the HGTV you know kitchens, they get upset, you know and that’s what they want. So it’s it’s a hard dynamic to, you know, to work through. Another thing we all laughed about was that these and I love all these HGTV shows is you know they do these fix and flips and it takes you know you will I’ll just show for an hour, you know, the beginning to end the house has been renovated, but you know, in the show, it takes them two weeks. So when I coach a client through renovations, or how long it’s going to take or meet with contractors, you know, I tell them this, you know, this could take a couple of months, and they’re, they’re flabbergasted. Well, they did it in two weeks on the show, you know, how could that take, you know, six months for us to do. So it’s bringing, you know, some of these TV shows, you know, you gotta bring back the reality of, you know, what’s going to happen in the renovation. So it’s, it’s challenging.

D.J. Paris 10:36
Well, and also, for everyone listening, whether you’re a realtor who are looking for tips from from Carrie, or if you’re a seller going, oh, gosh, now I have to stage every room in my house. Well, the good news is, it’s never been more affordable. Obviously, you could always virtually stage it, which is, you know, very, almost almost a free service with photography studios now, but even if you’re hiring, you know, a staging company to come in and actually replace furniture and make, it’s not that expensive, if it’s going to yield a higher return. And I know many brokers and Carrie, I know you’ve done this as well, that will tell sellers, we need to get your stuff out and move stuff in sometimes. And and it’s just a great idea, because the the data suggests that help sells homes sell home quicker. And for higher price points.

Carrie McCormick 11:23
Absolutely. I’m starting to do that quite a bit. It’s I’ve got clients living in the house and will relocate all their furniture to one area. And then we stage a few other rooms. So they’re living in a half staged house, and you know, half of their furniture. So it’s it’s a really great concept and new new idea to sell a home.

D.J. Paris 11:46
Wonderful, any other takeaways that you could share with our audience from the conference?

Carrie McCormick 11:51
Well, it’s really like I said, it’s having a robust marketing plan. And the bottom line with a lot of this right now in the market is pricing home correctly. And giving feedback, I’ve started to give a lot more feedback on my showings to people and just, again, this was across the US agents are saying, Please give each other feedback after these showings, because it helps each other in our industry. communicate to our sellers of what’s going on, because if you do a showing, and then just go see each other, you know, and don’t give any feedback. It’s it makes more difficult conversations for our for our sellers. So again, just professional courtesy to each other, as you know, giving some good feedback.

D.J. Paris 12:39
Well, and it is called a cooperative commission. Right? So brokers are supposed to cooperate. And again, oftentimes, the broker might be too close to the situation to see something that other brokers who are coming in to do this, to look at the property with their clients might not see. So you have this opportunity to provide incredible feedback. And I don’t know what percentage of brokers provide feedback, but it’s not high enough for sure. So everyone listening, if you’re a realtor, and you get that little email saying, give us some feedback, please do that, or call the other broker and let them know. So that you guys can both work together and get some homes closed. Exactly. So I have a and I want to hear I want to get your feedback on this. So I have my marketing minute of the day. And Carrie actually gave me the suggestion, really, the credit goes to her. But I wanted to also get your thoughts on this because I was like, oh, what should I talk about? And the holidays are coming up, Carrie reminded me. And it was like, Okay, what what do brokers do? Or what should they do for their clients. And so I’ll just give you my experience, because I’m not a producing broker. So I’m really the worst person to ask, but I will tell you what I get in the mail around this time of the year. And I have lots of different professionals that have various services that I employ, you know, financial advisor insurance, you know, that mortgage, that sort of thing. And I really get very little, quite honestly, around the holidays I use, I usually will get a card or some sort of mailer. But it’s I can’t think of anyone and I’m not in any way insinuating the people that I choose for my taxes or for the other services I employ. I have no qualms with them. They’re great, I love them. But I don’t know that any of them really send me anything personalized. And so I was thinking about this and like sending out something is better than nothing. And if you’re just going to throw a holiday card in the mail, hey, that’s better than sending nothing. But I would think if you have the time, and you can start now because we’re only in in the middle of October is maybe even just write one or two sentences on the card specific to that individual. And again, I know if you have hundreds and hundreds of people in your database, that’s not going to be super easy to do. But I will tell you the idea of a handwritten note, and I’m not suggesting we all write handwritten notes for every single person for the holidays, but just a sentence or two about Something about that person, you know, even if it’s just hope you and the kids have a great holiday or hope you and your husband have a great holiday. And if you’re like struggling on what to write about, really, this is where social media comes in very handy, or LinkedIn, right? Go to LinkedIn, go to Instagram, go to Facebook, look up your clients see what they’re up to. And you could write on the Holiday Card, hope you have a great holidays. Oh, I just saw you got back from Barbados. That sounds amazing, right? Or that looked amazing. Anything like that? I think personalized is just because I get I might get 10 cards in the mail, but none of them have any personalization. So that’s just my thought, again, I know it’s a little bit of work. But I would remember that card would would mean a lot more to me, if someone took a few, you know, 30 seconds to write something

Carrie McCormick 15:46
that is a great tip. And that is so true. Because I do I get cards from like, the bank or tax accountants or whoever it is. And it’s just it’s, you know, got a printed label on the front, it’s got, you know, their signatures even printed. So it’s like, I’m sure they don’t even know that that card went out to me. And again, the gesture is nice. I’m glad I made their mailing list. But if someone wrote a personal note, even if it said Happy Holidays and had a hand signature, it goes much further. I love that idea, especially getting a little more personal with a trip or a baby or wedding or whatever it is. That’s that’s huge.

D.J. Paris 16:23
Awesome. Well, I think that just about wraps us up. But before we wrap up, I want to obviously remind our listeners, if you are a buyer or a seller and investor or renter, and you’re looking for a great realtor, if it was me, I would want to choose one of the top producing ones in Chicago, because that just seems like a good idea. So Carrie McCormick is at the very, very top of that mountain. So Carrie, if there are people that want to work with you, what is the best way they should reach out?

Carrie McCormick 16:53
Absolutely. So always call me I’m always working 24/7 So 312-961-4612 Or you can shoot me a quick email to Kerry ca RR ie at@properties.com. But please do if there’s any questions just about market in general, about the panel I spoke on about marketing. I’m always loving to give back and you know, give free advice. So anyone out there if you need anything, always just call me.

D.J. Paris 17:23
Wonderful. Well, thank you to everyone who continue to listen, we’re so grateful for our audience. So grateful to our guest host Carrie who comes on tirelessly and selflessly who does not have time to do this. We were actually supposed to book do this yesterday and she’s like, Oh my god, I have a showing and I was like of course you have a showing. That makes perfect sense. That’s how busy she is. So we’re so grateful to Carrie. So thank you on behalf of the audience and on behalf of Carrie and myself to the audience. Thank you for listening, telephoned pass this around to other brokers who you think could benefit from hearing from from from from Mavericks like care like Carrie and continue to listen and carry we will see you next month. Thank you

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Monday Market Minute • Carrie McCormick • Don’t Neglect Rentals

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Welcome to the August edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick from At Properties!

This month Carrie talks about how, despite it being the busy season, sales are actually down year-over-year. She discusses best practices around working with buyers and sellers in this climate, and also discusses why many of her clients are selling their homes and renting luxury apartments. I provide a marketing tip about delivering inexpensive back-to-school care packages for your contacts with children.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello and welcome to another episode of keepin it real the old the largest podcast in the country made by brokers for brokers. My name is DJ Paris and today we have our Monday market minute with Kerry McCormick. So if those of you new to the show, who aren’t yet familiar with Carrie, she is a top 1% That top 1% of 1% Producer at in Chicago, I misses out of 44,000 Realtors, she’s consistently year over year in like the top 20 of 44,000 Realtors, she’s been in the business for 20 years, a total superstar clearly and generously donates her time to speak to you the listeners once a month about what’s going on in the Chicagoland market so that you can better educate your clients or maybe your client yourself that wants to just know what’s going on in the business. So welcome once again, my oldest co host and friend Carrie,

Carrie McCormick 1:16
you can’t say I’m the oldest Am I the oldest? Sure

D.J. Paris 1:19
that didn’t sound good. You’re You’re, you’re the you’re a seasoned co host I have. I know I should have, we should I should redo that. Because you’re certainly not old. But it’s funny. It is funny. By the way, before we get into it, I want to plug, make sure that everybody who’s listening goes and follows Carrie on Instagram for a couple of reasons. One, because it’s really good. The quality of content that she puts out there on a consistent basis is incredible. And it’s a real example of what good quality content looks like in social media. So follow her on instagram.com forward slash Carrie McCormick real estate. We’ll also post a link to that in the notes, but just look for Carrie McCormack that’s to season recording real estate, and you’ll find her so what’s going on? Carrie,

Carrie McCormick 2:12
thank you so much for that great introduction. I really appreciate it. And I appreciate everyone listening and being here. So here we are, we’re in mid year 2019. And overall, I would say it’s really been a challenged market. The volume has been down about six and a half percent this year. And we just we’ve got tight inventory right now. But even though that the volume is down, you know, real estate is selling the number one thing I’ve seen is it has to be priced. Right. I know everyone keeps hearing that. But it just I’ve tested a few different things this market and with marketing and just different strategies. It all plays together. But really, you know, you’ve got to be priced right. And in addition to that price growth is slowing. So usually in Chicago, our typical growth is about 2% a year. And now this year, it’s down to about a half a percent. And, you know, there’s a lot of contributing factors to that, but one is the tax consequences that happened about a year ago. And that’s really affecting, you know, everyone’s affordability in the real estate market. The other part is the luxury market. So, you know, homes over a million so in the first half of 2019. We saw 614 homes in the city trade hands for a million or more. Which if you look back to 2018 It’s a 15% drop, which is a huge, huge drop. However, the altra like the tippy top ultra luxury market, over 4 million is actually up a little bit, which is interesting, but we’ve got some Uber luxury buildings such as like one Bennett Park, we’ve got nine Walton that has these, you know very super, you know over $4 million properties and we’ve seen a little bit when I say a little bit it’s been like three or four property uptick but it’s it’s interesting to see that the Uber wealthy, you know are still buying here in Chicago. One thing I wanted to talk about which for me has been a change in my business is rentals. So for the first time in my 20 years, a lot of my sellers are downsizing in instead of buying you know two or three bedroom condo, they are deciding to rent right and all these great rental buildings you know, it’s it goes back to you know, taxes it goes back to just wanting to live in easier life not worrying about maintenance on a home, you know, the roof, the lawn, you know the tuckpointing etc, etc. And then again the unknown with the taxes. But because I’ve done a lot of rentals recently I’ve been and touring and visiting all these class a rental buildings, and I’ve noticed that there’s an amenity war going on. Yes. So it’s the amenities have become a big factor in clients making decisions. So like rental buildings like the old town park in the Sinclair, they have spas, they have spa services, you can do massage rooms, saunas, steam rooms and gyms. When Bennett Park which is one of my favorite buildings Nima Essex on the park, they’ve got this new service, which I love. It’s called Hello, Alfred, that allows the tenants to schedule like in home grocery deliveries, you could do maid service, you could get fresh flowers delivered daily to your home, you could actually even get turned down service. Yeah.

D.J. Paris 5:48
I was gonna say I dated a woman recently who got turned down service. And I was like, I didn’t know that was it? But yeah, they’re all doing it.

Carrie McCormick 5:55
I mean, think about that. It’s it’s like a simple life, meaning, you know, I mean, you pay for it. But it’s just this ease of not worrying about anything and having everything done for you. So rentals have become very socially acceptable they’ve become we’ve got a ton of them here in Chicago. And they’re just to me, it’s really amazing. It’s an amazing opportunity for some of our, you know, sellers to go into.

D.J. Paris 6:22
Yeah, and it’s also one of those things that it’s typically a temporary thing anyway, right. So you help somebody with a rental, you know, you and then eventually they’ll probably purchase something in the future to even if they came from selling a home and they rent and they’ll probably buy something down the road anyway. Right? Yeah, so

Carrie McCormick 6:39
it’s a good little stepping stone. Another thing I wanted to talk about is buyers. So there’s a lot of new agents that have entered the marketplace, new real estate agents that have entered into our space. And I get a lot of questions I love, you know, helping new agents and coaching and problem solving. So anyone listening who’s new and want some advice, I’m always, you know, happy to help. But one question I’ve got recently, quite a bit was about working with buyers, and how to minimize the risk of, you know, their time and effort, because you can work with a buyer for I don’t know, you know, weeks months, you know, I’ve got one that’s going on a year. And I always say that, you know, working with buyers is always risky. Because you know, you spend a lot of time your own time with them and efforts. In it, there’s no guarantee that they’re going to buy something. And you know, even if they find the right house, are they going to buy it or they’re going to put an offer in is that offer going to be accepted is the you know, is the appraisal going to appraise out. So there’s a lot of things that can go wrong, you know, even when you get someone to make an offer on a home when they find the right home. But you just need to know that and you need to manage the process very closely all the way through. And it’s just important to have open communication with your buyers. And always be honest and be a good listener. And to be solution oriented, because things will go wrong, nothing’s ever smooth. And you just need to be patient, communicate and be solution oriented.

D.J. Paris 8:24
So yeah, and also to remember to that buyers need your guidance, they need your emotional guidance, along with the financial guidance, like, obviously, you’re the one that’s going to tell them, you know, give them advice on on what to you know what to submit a bid at and when to submit a bid, but also, it is a very stressful experience, especially for a first time homebuyer to know what’s happening next, you know, and just to manage expectation and emotion and that’s, you know, the, the job of a great realtor does that.

Carrie McCormick 8:57
Yeah, and you know, things like I mentioned and you know not to be pessimistic, but things go wrong. And every agent out there has had, you know, a deal blow up or something go wrong, or you know, someone’s upset but it is you need to just take it step by step with the process. And if it does go wrong, you know, don’t let it get you down. I mean, it’s happened to all of us is you just have to learn from it. And, you know, learn from it and move on you. It just it’s part of it’s part of the job and you know, anyone that’s listening, if you ever need any advice, like I mentioned, I’ve got 20 years of experience and I’m a good listener, I’m a good problem solver. And sometimes it’s just helpful to you know, talk it through with somebody and you know, everyone’s got a managing broker and colleague so you know, use use all your resources to learn and do better

D.J. Paris 9:48
one. Speaking of working with buyers, you have a new development that you are working with. So tell our listeners about this because it’s very exciting.

Carrie McCormick 9:56
Yeah, thanks for mentioning that. So at properties and myself we just are working with L Cove in Wicker Park. It’s a new 55 unit development. There’s 55 condos and 12. New townhomes, brand new development delivering fall of 2020. It is, if you want to look it up in the MLS, it’s 1255 Polina Street, we do have a beautiful sales gallery that’s located at 1295 North Milwaukee Avenue. We’ve got a full kitchen in there. We’ve got finished samples, floor plans, we’ve got a great VR. So I would encourage everyone listening, stop by our sales center, take a look at what’s new, it’s hard of Wicker Park. It’s an amazing location, and really great floor plans and community. So feel free to visit that website. That

D.J. Paris 10:48
website, by the way is and I’m looking at the pictures it’s incredible, is alcove M. d B. So Mary David Paul alcove, Mary David paul.com. And I’ll put a link to that in the notes. It is.

Carrie McCormick 11:01
So everyone asks what what does it stands for? St. Mary David Paul, but it’s good question. It’s Milwaukee division, and Polina. So it’s this really great alcove community that we’re creating right in that intersection.

D.J. Paris 11:20
That’s very cool. And I love I love that intersection. I just think that is such a fun you have adages, right there and super cool place everyone go visit that. And so congrats on that development. That’s very, very exciting. Okay, speaking up, we do have listeners who, who are buyers, sellers, renters also investors, and if they are interested in working with you or your team, what’s the best way they should reach out to you

Carrie McCormick 11:50
always call me it’s the best and easiest way 312961461

D.J. Paris 11:56
To awesome. And real quickly, I’m gonna give a quick marketing minute it is we are now in August. And I had a quick idea. So everyone who is listening thinking, gosh, like how can I reach out to my my network, we know that your network is your net worth. Here’s a good reason to do that. I actually had two reasons. But I’m just gonna give you one today and save the next for next time. And the first is it is back to school season, right? Or we’re getting close to that. So think about all the people you know, in your network, who have children who are going back to school, whatever ages that is, and think about maybe dropping off a little care package. You know, school supplies, you know, it’s simple, it’s easy, you don’t have to worry about branding yourself on it. If you’re you know, pinched for time you just go to the Walgreens or wherever and get some notebooks, pens, paper, folders, anything like that. Kranz if the children are young enough, and just deliver you know, a little care package for you know, a few dozen of your clients that is so huge and simple and easy, and it will be appreciated and use the most important part. So anyway, that was my quick marketing minute.

Carrie McCormick 13:05
I love that. It’s so cute.

D.J. Paris 13:07
I love it. Well, anyway, that is that’s gonna wrap it up for this time. Kerry’s got a crazy busy Sunday, as per usual and she was so generous with her time. So on behalf of the listeners, we thank her as always, and on behalf of Carrie and myself to the listeners, we thank you for listening. Remember to follow us on Facebook, you can download any of our episodes right from our website, which is keeping it real pod.com In fact, you don’t have to download it. You can stream it right from your browser. Obviously any podcast app you find that you use on your phone, just search for keeping it real podcast and you’ll subscribe to us that way too. So anyway, thank you Carrie once again, we will see Carrie next month. And thanks for everyone for listening. So thank you

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Monday Market Minute • Carrie McCormick • How Tax Change Is Lowering Buying Power

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Welcome to the April edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick from At Properties!

This month Carrie reports on the adjustments to buying power that has resulted from recent tax changes. She walks through the numbers demonstrating how someone buying a 500k home last year is paying 538k today, just from tax change alone. I provide a marketing tip about sending real cards to your clients on their birthdays.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcasts made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers and actually brokers all over the country we have started to receive listener mail letting us know that it’s not just Chicago that people are tuning in. So we appreciate that. Today on the show, this is our Monday market minute. And we have Carrie McCormick who comes on every month. She is also our longest running contributor to our show. She came on since the very beginning and wanted to come on every month and talk to our listeners about what’s going on in the Chicago real estate market. She’s an app properties broker 20 years, not only in the top 1% really in the top, probably 1/10 of one but for sure. 1/10 of 1% Absolutely a powerhouse. Everyone knows Carrie, in the industry. And you should follow her on Instagram, which is Carrie McCormack real estate. So at Carey McCormick real estate for Instagram. And another neat thing is she was just featured or is featured in CES magazine and the dynamic women’s issue. So go pick one up today. Again, ces magazine, their most recent issue. So without further ado, welcome Carrie once again to the show.

Carrie McCormick 1:30
Well, thank you, thank you, I’m glad to see the sun is shining here in Chicago. We’re kind of knee deep in our spring market. But I wanted to just kind of dive in and get to some really important information that has kind of made a change in our industry. This year, our fearless leader and with our properties, our fearless leader Thad Wong had put out a video about this, which really struck a chord and it’s really great information. So it’s a little bit of math. So people who are listening just, you know, hang tight in your chairs or wherever you’re at. We’d love to if anyone has any questions about this as well, you know, just do a little bit of a follow up. But just a real

D.J. Paris 2:11
quick I was to say I am also the opinion that when fad Wong speaks, I pay attention, because he’s usually right. And he’s a few steps ahead of everybody else.

Carrie McCormick 2:21
He really is. And this is really courtesy of him as well. He really did a good job explaining this. So I just want to chat about the increased cost of homeownership because of last year’s Federal tax changes. I think a lot of our sellers and even buyers just don’t understand this, of how it’s it’s made a big impact in our industry. And really, for decades, one of the strongest reasons to own a home has been the ability to deduct your property taxes. And there is, you know, because of that change this year, people have been able to afford less than last year. Yeah, so. So we’ve always had these unlimited deductions in state taxes and property taxes. And last year, obviously, it changed to a max deductible of $10,000. And this has been just like I said, a huge change in the real estate market for what a buyer can afford. And it doesn’t have anything to do with what they want to spend. It has something to do with what they can afford each month. So with no, you know, taxes and p&i, which is principal and interest on their loan, etc. So this one change has affected the value of properties across the board. And a lot of my sellers are asking me, you know, why am I selling my home at the same prices? I bought it, you know, last year, three years ago, five years ago? Well, here’s a quick example for you. So you could bring out your calculators on this one, see if I’m right. So for example, let’s just use a property that’s priced at $500,000. So approximate taxes on a $500,000 property is $10,000. Okay. To qualify for that, that property, the buyers income has to be approximately $150,000. Right. And then your state income tax on that would be approximately $7,500. So in 2018, you had an unlimited deduction, and rough math would give you a deduction of $17,500. Well, this year, as you know, the max deduction is $10,000. So the difference in deduction from 17, five to 10,000 is of course $7,500. So let’s say again, that particular buyer, they’re they’re earning $150,000. So now they’re and I keep using the word approximately, but they’re, you know, they probably are paying about 30% in federal income tax on that money, which is a safe assumption. So you multiply that by 30 percent. So obviously they’re making 150, multiply that by 30%, that equals $2,250. So the cost of owning this particular home is $2,250 per year more. And then if you take it down monthly, it’s $187 a month. So I know it doesn’t sound like a lot, but it is. So this buyer in 2019, has to pay $187 per month more to own this home versus last year, right. But there’s more. So there’s, you know, interest rates. So, obviously, now you’re getting a loan for this property. And there’s, you know, your mortgage has interest rates. Well, the good news is that the interest rates haven’t really changed much, they did fluctuate through the year, but right now apples to apples, let’s say last year, it was four and a quarter, this year, it’s four and a quarter. Again, you’re paying $187 more a month to own this property. And then you have to multiply that by your interest rate. So overall, now over a 30 year loan, that is a total $38,250. So in all reality, this buyer in 2019, paying for a $500,000 property, that overall cost is $38,250. More. So again, in 2018, you’re paying $500,000 for the property, with all the tax implications and changes this year, you are now paying $538,000 for this property. So that person’s buying power has completely changed.

D.J. Paris 6:32
Well, that’s really interesting. And that’s just for a $500,000 property, what happens at a like one and a half million dollar property.

Carrie McCormick 6:40
So I mean, good point. So let’s, if you I’m not going to go through the math again. But if you take that scenario up to 1.5, obviously, the purchasing price consequences go up. So but doing the math on that if if it was 100, or no, if it was 1.5 million, that person has to earn approximately, let’s just say $400,000. Right, so now their tax deductions have changed. So really, again, running through all that math, that property would cost in 2019 1.678. So you’re paying 178,000, up net paying, but the consequences are $170,000 difference. So again, when someone’s buying a property, they’re looking at their overall cost, their tax deductions, and their buying power has just changed. So we’re really having this struggle in the least I’m seeing with my sellers, you know, the struggle with pricing and what buyers are offering and what they can afford. So it’s it’s a very interesting dynamic of what’s happened in our market. It really boils down to educating your sellers and educating your buyers.

D.J. Paris 7:51
Yeah, you know, it’s so that’s, that’s so such interesting information. And I was thinking that this would be I suspect, most buyers and sellers and all the just general population has no idea how these tax laws are really affecting anything. We’re just not that tied into it right now, there’s so much other news to pay attention to, this would almost be a good opportunity for listeners who are realtors to even partner with a CPA or partner with other professionals, financial advisors, that sort of thing. And even like, do little seminars about this sort of thing. Be Awesome. Absolutely.

Carrie McCormick 8:26
Yeah, absolutely. Because it’s a

D.J. Paris 8:29
lot of great information that most people are not aware of, I think,

Carrie McCormick 8:33
and if anyone has any questions, I’ve got a great little handout on it, you know, that really kind of walks you through the steps of it. Of course, I always tell people, I’m not a CPA, or an attorney, you know. So, you know, of course, consult them as well. But it’s just kind of a nice little outline. Just some good talking points with your buyers and sellers.

D.J. Paris 8:53
Awesome. Well, I’m for my marketing minute, my marketing moment minute, I have a really simple idea. And I suspect the listeners, as soon as I say it will go, I’m not interested in listening anymore. This is silly. It’s so basic. So please indulge me for about two minutes before you turn the podcast off. But I was on the way over here thinking about, you know, fundamentals and for in my own business, and I’m not a traditional realtor, I do recruiting real for realtors, but I still have similar sort of, you know, responsibilities. And I was thinking what is the one thing I do not do a good job of, and that’s personal notes. And I know I should the data is really clear that everyone should be writing their client’s personal notes as often as possible. And very few of us do it. I suspect, and I’m certainly in that category. And then I realized, Okay, well, what would be one step I could take immediately that could get me actually started doing it. And it would be a little easier to manage than writing three a day or five a day, which is tough to do, I think. And I said I have everybody’s birthday. I should be sending handwritten cards. For birthday, so my suggestion this week, it’s so simple. But please, please do it. And I was thinking back to my own birthday, which is coming up, and I was thinking back to last birthday. And Alright, when’s

Carrie McCormick 10:12
your birthday? June 10.

D.J. Paris 10:14
So it’s, I’ve got it, but a month, they thank you, I do, except you can send gifts and, and money and all of that. But, um, but what I was thinking about was birthday cards. And I realized last year, I, you know, I had a few from family, a few from friends, but not that many, maybe I’m not that popular. But I was thinking about the people who, like the financial advisor I have who I really liked, by the way, my CPA, I really like my insurance agent, I really like none of those people sent me a birthday card, I don’t need it. I wasn’t looking for it, but I’d recognized it. And I thought, that would be a really simple thing any of us can do. And so here’s my suggestion with the cart, don’t send them or if you have the option to add the ability to go out and purchase a card versus sending like your company, stationery, foldover card saying happy birthday, that’s fine. But a way better and much more effective way would be to go to Walgreens, get a two or $3 card, get maybe even a fancy one and send it off to your client. And actually just write don’t write thank you for being a client not necessary. Just write hope you’re having an amazing birthday. And you know something silly about them, you can write that just and then sign your name. And I promise you that will be the only real card that person got from somebody you know, who is one of their professionals in their life. It’s simple. It’s easy. It’s a little, you know, cost a little bit. But please do that. I promise you that person’s and mailbox is not flooded with birthday cards.

Carrie McCormick 11:45
It’s still it’s still a great reminder. I love it. Yeah,

D.J. Paris 11:49
it’s simple. And anyway, so that’s all I got this week. So on behalf oh, by the way, so if anyone is ever interested, I know. You know, in speaking with Carrie directly, we get a ton of requests for that Carrie, what’s the best way somebody should reach out to you whether it’s a buyer, a seller and investor or renter? Or somebody in who’s a real estate professional? What’s the best way to reach out?

Carrie McCormick 12:12
Always call me everyone knows they work all the time. And I’m always answering my phone. So 312-961-4612 Or if you prefer to send me an email, it’s Kerry, CA RR IE, at 80 properties.com.

D.J. Paris 12:27
Well, thank you again. And I always say this, and it’s so important for the listeners to realize is that we were very lucky to have Carrie willing to come on the show. In fact, I had been lacs and been behind in schedules, she messages me When’s our next show, because this is really important to her and to me to be able to provide this value. So one of the best ways you can support us is, you know, continue to listen and also send this off to other other people that you think could benefit. And definitely everyone should follow Karis on Instagram, she has an unbelievable Instagram account. She does it all herself by the way, which is at parrot what’s really impressive that you do it all yourself. That is not easy stuff. She’s not just taking pictures of the food she eats you know, like there’s actually like pretty impressive. You know, a posting here that I’m really jealous of but which is at Carey McCormick real estate you can find on Instagram. So on behalf of Carrie and myself, thanks again for continuing to listen. Our listenership keeps going up, pass this on to friends, and Carrie and I will see oh, by the way, if you have questions for Carrie, let us know you can find us on Facebook, our website, you know you can find us. Let us know and we’ll pass those through and Carrie can answer them next episode. So on behalf of Carrie and myself, thank you and have a great week or great month Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 13:46
Thank you. Thank you guys.

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Monday Market Minute • How To Win During Multiple Offers

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Welcome to the March edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick from At Properties!

In this episode Carrie first discusses how the city market is doing before launching into advanced strategies when working with buyers in multiple offer situations. She discusses how buyers can write personal letters to sellers and also suggests making a video to introduce themselves! Lastly she provides some buyer “don’t’s” during multiple offers. I provide a marketing tip around skill building to increase your value to customers.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:00
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Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcasts made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. My name is DJ Paris and I am your host today on the show. We have as usual Carrie McCormick for her Monday market minute or carry talks about what brokers need to know what is happening with the Chicagoland market. If you’re not familiar with Kerri McCormick she is a top producer. And just to give you an idea of what a top producer she is, by the way, she is a broker at at properties and has been very successful top producer for 20 years. However, she is not only a top 1% producer, she is a top 1/10 of 1% Producer because I did the math earlier today and there are 41,000 brokers in Chicago Carrie is always consistently in the top like 15 or 20 out of 41,000. So we are so honored to have her on the show. She just recovered from a two week illness and is still dedicated to coming and helping our listeners. So welcome. And thank you Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 1:55
Well, thank you very much for having me. And, and first off, I also want to thank everyone that listens to your show, because during the month I always get you know, phone calls, I get emails, I get messages, DM messages from the listeners, you know, asking their questions to me directly, sometimes, you know, they’ll call me. And I just want to say that’s one thing I love about our community here in Chicago is giving, giving back to the community. I’ve been doing this for decades, two decades now. And I’ve learned a ton. And I’m happy to help anyone with any questions, give advice, whatever it is, please keep the questions coming. And love to hear from everybody. Awesome.

D.J. Paris 2:40
So what are we talking about today?

Carrie McCormick 2:42
So I’m just gonna hit on a few things. One, I always like to start with some stats of where the market is, you know, we’re, we’re in our spring market and the new listings in the city of Chicago were down 7.3% For detached which is the single family homes. But they were up 4.6% For the attached which is of course the condos and the townhomes. So again, they were down for the single family homes and they were up for the condos. Now pricing is a little bit on the opposite side, the median price for the detached homes again, single families were up almost 6% But down 4% For attached properties. So just you know in this early spring market, we’re watching you know the inventory come up. We’re watching the sales, the under contract, a lot of things are moving here, we’re you know, off to a nice healthy start of the spring market. But one thing I want to talk about is working with buyers. I am very listing heavy, if you will I do a lot of listings, and I love to market properties, but I do work with some buyers. And one thing that I found in a competitive market like we’re in is how do you position your buyers for success, especially when there’s multiple offers. One thing that I do is I monitor the private listing network which is the PLN and all the other off market networks. Buyers should be prepared and it is our job to prepare them no matter what the market is but they should always present a good face for the seller in negotiations. And as much as a buyer may want to put on the boxing gloves at times. You never want the sellers or the sellers agent to get turned off or frustrated by your by your offer or the way that you position your offer because they will automatically shut down and obviously you’re not going to have a good income out income outcome with that if you if you go in you know looking for a fight so you always want to position yourself in the best light in in the eyes of the seller. I tell my buyers you always need to come across genuine and sincere and you don’t want to be just a name on a piece of paper with a price So one thing a lot of agents have been doing in Chicago is writing a letter to the seller. And this came up a couple of years ago, and everyone started doing this and presenting letters to the sellers. And it worked really nice because again, you give it a nice personal touch. Well, just a quick story is I just had sold a home with multiple offers. Every offer that came in, wrote a letter to my seller. And oddly enough, each letter was almost the same thing, obviously, with different names. So what happened is, we had six offers on this home, six letters that came through, which were almost all identical. And to my seller, they thought, Well, this was very insincere, like, what do you guys, you know, thrown around a template out there of these letters. And it kind of appeared that way. So what I thought it is now buyers need to again, be sincere, be genuine, do a little research on the seller, obviously, we’ve got Google, we’ve got Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, do some research on those sellers, see, if they have a dog, see where they went to college, see, you know, where they went on vacation recently, find something that you can speak to with the seller and put that in your letter. Because also keep in mind, that seller is also going to do research on that buyer. You know, they want to know who’s buying my home? What are they like? What do they? What are their interest. So it is important, it’s kind of like interviewing for a job, in a way, you know, you everything’s online. So you want to make sure that when you present your offer, you’re presenting it in the best light possible. One new technique that I don’t say that I came up with, but that I thought of, is to send a video to the seller. So do do a quick video or have the buyer do a quick video like, you know, hello, this is who we are, this is our dog, smokey or, you know, whoever it is, and, you know, this is what we do. This is why we fell in love with your place. Now you put some tone to to the contacts, right, so now they can see you they can understand you know where you’re coming from, it’s just kind of a nice touch, and it’ll set your, your buyers apart from everyone else.

D.J. Paris 7:21
Yeah, and just thinking about if two offers came in at the exact same price, but one of them had a personalized letter and a video, or one or the other and the other didn’t, all things being equal. I suspect the one that we had the letter or the video might be more likely to get accepted. It definitely

Carrie McCormick 7:41
gets more attention, right. At the end of the day, the seller wants price in terms. But definitely I mean, it just it gives it a different touch. It’s always worth trying, especially when you’re in a very competitive market.

D.J. Paris 7:53
Yeah, and oftentimes, maybe you know, it can be to that the seller price isn’t the most important thing it isn’t I mean, I’m sure everyone listening, the default is to think price is most important. In most cases, it probably is, but not in all cases. And sometimes people just want to sell their homes to people they like. And if you can show that I’m a real person, here’s a 32nd video about why I love your home. That and it’s genuine, I mean, that goes a long way that’s worth that’s actually worth something. I agree. intangible. So and by the way, it’s fun to do too. And it’s it’s kind of adds another level of humanity to a sort of otherwise kind of, you know, sterile transaction. And we’re going to offer this and hope that they don’t counter but I

Carrie McCormick 8:38
will tell you though, a don’t this did happen once to is I was representing the seller, we got a few different offers. This is just a few months ago, but one of the offers started liking them on Facebook, liking them on LinkedIn, that’s a little much. And then you know, kind of stalking them sending them messages. And so it really turned off my seller, right? Because it was a little creepy. So just again, you got to do it professionally. You’ve got to be careful with it. Obviously just do it with integrity and sincerity.

D.J. Paris 9:15
Yeah, it’s such a great idea. And it really separates you from everyone else. So great idea. So for for my marketing, I do a quick marketing minute at the tail end of our of our monthly episode with Carrie. And honestly, I couldn’t come up with a really cool marketing tip this week. I’ve given a lot of them in the past. Everyone can go back and listen if you’d like. But I realized maybe the most important tip is the least exciting tip that I could give but maybe it’s the most important one which has to do with your skill set. I learned early on I was in a different career and the top salesman that was there was a very likable person, but he was also the most skilled person in the whole company. And I asked him Hey, When do you ask for the sale? Because a lot of times for brokers, we might think the same thing. When do we ask for for head love to represent you and sell your house or I’d love to help you buy a home or or whatever the transaction is. He says, if you’re really good, you never ask, you don’t have to ask, because you do such a good job that everyone knows that. And then over time, people just refer you business. And I went, Well, that makes sense. And the truth was, I wasn’t very good at it because I was new and hadn’t really developed that skill set. So for everyone listening, if you’re new, and you don’t yet have 20 years experience, like Carrie does, which is worth, you know, a price above rubies, what you can start to do is build that foundation, which means every day spend 15 minutes 20 minutes perfecting or increasing your knowledge of your craft. Here’s a really simple example if you want to hyper focus in a particular geographic area. Let’s say you want to be the Linkin Park person. You know, somebody like Nico apostles a really good example of he lives in Linkin Park. He loves Linkin Park, that’s where he’s focused his energy for a lot of years. And maybe he knows it better than most brokers, but he also studied it. And if you studied whatever geographic area you want to focus in on, if you just went to the MLS and you learn every single home that’s for sale in a particular neighborhood or suburb. And you did that for two or three months, you’ll be so incredibly knowledgeable that you’ll be very valuable to anyone who wants to move to that area. And you can’t obviously know the whole city and all the suburbs, but you can know a couple of them or at least one. So if all you did was spend 15 minutes a day studying the MLS and really learning how much a single family home goes for what places are available for sale, how attached, you know, how condos are doing, if you know the inventory and know the numbers, oh my gosh, when you find a client who’s looking for that, you’ll be so insanely valuable. So spend time every day learning and perfecting your craft. It’s this, it you know, it’s like one of those things where you look at somebody who’s really fit. And you realize that every day they do push ups or setups or they do some you know, and maybe they’re not the gym for an hour a day. But if I just did 15 minutes of some exercise today, I would definitely be stronger at the end of the year. So do your 15 minutes, do your push ups every day, whatever that is, and perfecting. You know, a lot of times I was talking to Kerry offline, there’s a lot of brokers that don’t work with investors, because they don’t really understand investments. It’s a totally different world. And I suspect if you spent 15 minutes a day learning about investments and different types of lending products and all the different vocabulary for investors within a year you will know as much as just about anyone and you can really now surface a whole nother industry that you previously weren’t able to. So you know, spend some time every day perfecting your skill set and increasing it and you’re going to be so valuable to people you won’t have to spend as much time marketing so that’s my tip. All right. Awesome. Well, that does it for this month’s Monday market minute. Carrie if there are any listeners out there who may be their brokers maybe their buyer’s or seller’s and are looking for a realtor to work with what’s the best way someone could reach out to you

Carrie McCormick 13:13
sure it’s best way to reach me is just to call me 312-961-4612 Of course you can shoot me a quick email as well which is Carrie ca RR ie at@properties.com

D.J. Paris 13:29
Awesome. Well on behalf of Carrie and myself we thank you for we are coming up on our 100th episode and the numbers just keep increasing with zero marketing. I hope that means we’re we’re creating value I know we are carried hears it from from listeners I hear it as well. And on behalf of both of us. We thank you because we wouldn’t do this if people weren’t listening. And so send us your questions. Tell a friend subscribe on Facebook, subscribe on iTunes, Google Play Anywhere you find podcasts and we will see you next month. And thanks Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 14:02
Thank you

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Monday Market Minute • Buyers Are Ready!

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Welcome to the February edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie discusses how the market slowed last year, but that in 2019 we’re starting to see some increases in activity. With rates being down, Carrie is noticing her buyers are poised to purchase and provides a tip on how to prep them now with a sample contract. I also talk about contacting past clients to discuss the possibility of a refinance.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:15
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcasts made by Chicago real estate agents for Chicago real estate agents. This is our monthly series called them the Monday market minute with Carrie McCormick. If you are a new listener and haven’t listened to one of our Monday market minutes before Carrie is a top producer without properties for over 20 years has been a top producer. Last year she finished in the top 15 of all realtors in Chicago and that’s out of 40,000 Realtors. So we are so honored, she comes on once a month and tells our listeners what they need to know about what is happening in the Chicago real estate market. And also, before I bring carry on, everyone should follow Carrie on Instagram, just do a search for Carrie McCormack real estate. That’s the thing, you can also find her on Facebook as well Carrie McCormick real estate, and welcome to the show. Carrie,

Carrie McCormick 1:06
thank you, thank you Happy 2019

D.J. Paris 1:10
Happy 2019.

Carrie McCormick 1:12
So just to get started, the one thing that people have been focused on is interest rates. And with the Fed holding off on further interest rate increases, we see that this year is starting off very good. So we’ve seen a lot of activity in the market. All of us that have been in the market for a while we know that q2 was kind of flat. So last year of 2018. Really after, I’m gonna say like July, the rest of the year was just flat. And the reason going back and looking at that, you know, interest rates were increasing, taxes were increasing, there’s a lot of talk about increasing taxes. And you know, the second bill came out and people were worried about that. And actually, the wage growth wasn’t as favorable either. And it just created this affordability issue. And people I think were just hesitant about buying. People were out looking, but they weren’t actually pulling the trigger and buying. So I do still think that housing affordability is going to be an important storyline this year. But we are definitely seeing buyers starting to get out into the market. And they’re getting motivated to buy, which is great. So also, one thing to look at is last year in 2018. Because of the interest rates and taxes, a lot of people have just decided to rent. Right? So now we’re seeing an uptick in the rental rates just because of the whole supply and demand factor. So rental rates are starting to tick up this year, which now those renters are saying like, why would I rent or pay more in rent, now let’s go by, right, because interest rates are going down. So again, looking just at the economics of the market, we’re gonna see a shift this year. But we’re going to be tied to those lease months, because, you know, obviously the spring, like April and May are big lease months, so those leases will end then and we’re gonna see buyers enter the market at that point as well. So I am happy to report though, I’m starting to see multiple offers start to happen. We’re seeing high traffic counts at open houses. I do work all of my open houses. And this past weekend, I had 22 People in WoW, one of my open houses. It was energetic, it was exciting. And I woke up the next morning with three offers in hand. So you know, again, the excitement’s there, as long as you price and position the property correctly, you’re going to start getting activity in offers on those. But for now, inventory still remains low. However, in the next few weeks, I do expect that to change quickly. So my suggestion to the brokers out there is if you are working with buyers, prep them now, one thing that I started to do, which is just a little tip, is I started going through the contract already and sending them a sample contract with you know their information on it and reading through it. So just so they know what to expect. We have a new 7.0 contract that is out, right, a little different language, so I’m walking them through it. So when we do make an offer, they they’ve already read the contract, they know where I’m putting information in and they’re ready to go. And lastly, everyone knows get your pre approvals letter ready for it from your lender. So make sure you’ve got that in hand. So your offers ready to go. You’ve got your pre approval, and you can make your offer.

D.J. Paris 4:41
Now is there a preferred lender or do you have a lender that you prefer to work with?

Carrie McCormick 4:46
Of course I do. And hopefully they’re listening and they know who they are. You know, I’ve been doing this for 20 years, and I’ve learned a lot over the last couple of years and one thing that I would say is important is to surround yourself Have with pros, I always say like pros use pros, I’ve met some of the most incredible service partners and vendors. And I’ve created what I call my little white book, not black book, but little white, maybe it should be my little white black book of providers that I have for either whether it’s inspections, it’s mortgage lenders, of course, it’s handyman, it’s plumbers, it’s, you know, everything that you possibly could need. Wallpaper hangers, I’ve got, you know, people for blinds and carpet, everything, I’ve got the best of the best, I think, team around me, and that adds value to my clients. So they, I can hand that over to them. And even like I said, designer, so if I, if I know that I can refer my clients to these people I know they’re being taken care of, and it’s an extension of my service. And you know what I stand for my, in my job?

D.J. Paris 5:58
Yeah, that’s not so important. And I know also to some of these vendors, for the listeners who are brokers can also be your partners, when it comes to advertising, some of them can partner up. And they can do all sorts of different advertising, whether it’s postcards or mailers, or even other digital marketing as well. So don’t be afraid to reach out and say, Hey, I’m thinking about doing this marketing initiative. And can you help out with that, and we’ll co brand it together, it’s very common. Great idea. And so I have a quick idea of to piggyback on what Carrie mentioned, with respect to lending rates and pre approvals, and the buyer market starting to pick up. So because rates have dropped, and I don’t know how much longer that will happen, because I don’t have obviously a crystal ball, or the expertise to know but for right now, they are pretty low and they have dropped. So a couple opportunities for brokers, obviously, anyone who’s renting you can reach out to them and, you know, talk to them about making the transition to purchasing a home or, and maybe even a better idea or not, not a better but certainly as good of an idea as contact everyone you’ve already worked with, or anyone you know, that owns a home and say, Hey, I don’t know if you’ve been checking the news, but rates seem to be down. I don’t know if it makes sense for you or not to refinance, but I just thought I’d put that bug in your ear. And you should reach out to your lender or I can provide a lender if you don’t have a good one that you want to check rates with. And I can tell you as a homeowner, myself, that lender has never ever called me to say, hey, it’s a good time to refinance. So no, but the only way I ever knew to refinance is I saw like a new story on it before I got into this business. And I went, Oh, maybe I should look into that nobody ever called me. So I think it’d be a great opportunity just to keep your name in front of your clients and provide value. And, you know, it doesn’t mean they have to refinance, but it’s just you’re providing value by letting them know it might be a good opportunity. So that was my little tip.

Carrie McCormick 7:51
It is important. Yeah, I mean, always providing value to your clients is important in whatever fashion it is. So love it. Love that tip. Anytime

D.J. Paris 7:59
you can have a good reason to contact a client and not say, hey, I need more business. Can you refer your friends to me, which I think is a very hard thing to say and not something I would be comfortable saying but when you can actually say hey, I was thinking about you. And rates are down, you may want to look into refinancing seems like a great way a great reason to pick up the phone and call somebody. So all right. Well, I think that does it for this episode of the money market minute. Please send us your questions. So you can do that via Facebook. You can find us at keeping it real pod, also our website keeping it real pod.com. Send us your questions for Kerry. Any questions you would like her to ask we’ll have on a future episode in a month. And also follow us on Facebook and and follow Carrie on Instagram, Carrie McCormack real estate. And Carrie, what’s the if there are any buyers or sellers, renters investors? Anyone out there that is looking for a broker to work with? How should they reach out to you?

Carrie McCormick 8:57
Oh, thank you. Yes, absolutely. The best way to reach me is just to call me 312-961-4612. And if you prefer email, it’s Carrie at@properties.com.

D.J. Paris 9:10
Awesome. Well, thank you so much. Thank you to the listeners, if every listener could think of one person that they feel could benefit from hearing these kinds of podcasts, forward this over to them, we would appreciate it. Our numbers keep going up. Because of you guys telling every other people because we don’t spend even $1 in advertising. So we’re very grateful to everyone who’s listening and we’re grateful to people like Carrie who come on the show every month. So on behalf of Carrie and myself, we thank you for listening and we will see you next time. Thanks Carrie. Thank you

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Monday Market Minute • Optimistic For 2019

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Welcome to the January edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie looks back on 2018 and provides insight on how real estate brokers (as well as buyers and sellers) should be thinking about 2019. Listen to hear why Carrie is optimistic and learn some tips about what to tell sellers during the winter months. I provide a marketing tip on how to add more rentals to your business during slower sales cycles.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello, and welcome to the second episode of 2019. But this is our first episode of the Monday market minute, of course, you’re listening to keeping it real. We this is our monthly series with Carrie McCormick from App properties, who is nice and generous enough to come on once a month to tell our listening audience what is going on in the Chicago market. Before we get to Carrie, I want to brag for Carrie. Because as of the end, and I have not asked her for this, she probably would not have allowed me to do it. So I’m going to do it. But until before she tells tells me I can’t she This is a big deal. Carrie was ranked the 14th highest producing Realtor in Chicago for all of 2018. And that is out of 40,000 Realtors. So we are Carrie is an unbelievable producer, as I just mentioned. And we’re so grateful to have her on the show. So happy. Happy New Year. And thanks for coming. Well, thank

Carrie McCormick 1:15
you and Happy New Year to you. And thank you for all that you do. Yeah, this year is really, you know, I’m really optimistic. And I’m looking forward to 2019. But I first want to talk about, you know, everyone’s been asking me, of course, you know, just kind of recapping 2018 and talking about 2019. But I would say that the economy remains optimistic. But it’s recalibrating. So things are starting to change a little bit. I think we’re going to see moderate growth this year. And as I’ve been reading a lot of articles, as many people do, I have been reading contrasting views on home prices, whether they’re going to you know how much they’re going to increase in also, depending on mortgage mortgage rates. So two of the ones that I read, one is realtor.com. Their 2019 forecast is projecting a 2.2% growth this year. And then Freddie Mac is projecting kind of double that rate at 4.3%. So you can see how there’s conflicting information. So it’s, you know, who’s right or who’s wrong. But, again, reading into some of the articles that I’ve gone through, it looks like that all signs are pointing to higher inventory this year, both from new build activity, as well as new homeowners entering the market as sellers. So there still is a desire to own a home, especially with our young Gen Z and millennials. But it’s it’s a little bit more challenging for them as we know, interest rates have gone up. So you know, it’s a little bit more difficult and the affordability factor of them buying a home. And also the wealth by equity generation that a home brings. So in the past, for those old timers like me, you know, we would invest in a home and we could flip it and we made money and it’s just the times have changed. So that gap has definitely decreased. Going back in 2018, for me, the second half of 2018 was slow. So really the whole second quarter of 2018 was slow. I was very busy. We did a lot of showings a lot of buyers, you know, we had we worked really hard of trying to get buyers to pull the trigger. But there was really no sense of urgency in the decisions. They were kind of waiting to see what would happen with the market waiting to see what would happen with interest rates. So we did a ton of showings and a lot of hard work of getting these buyers to push forward. So again, it was busy in that sense, but it was slow just the overall production I would say of getting things sold. This first two weeks of January have been extremely busy for me whether it’s listing appointments, showings on my listings or buyers that are asking me to go out to look this weekend. I am booked from 8am to 8pm both Saturday and Sunday. I’ve got it’s just it’s insane and I’m happy I’m bent I’m ecstatic to get people out there and it’s you know, we’re still in January.

D.J. Paris 4:22
Yeah, that’s that’s an amazing start to the year and amazing end to last year even though it of course was slower. You still obviously did incredibly well. When it comes to your sellers. Do you have any tips for people looking to sell their homes you know, what can sellers do right now to get their homes ready?

Carrie McCormick 4:41
Sure. I’ve got some great tips and they’re they’re pretty basic, but it’s a good reminder for everyone. My number one tip and people just kind of look past this is painting. Really painting I’ve read numerous articles on this, the the amount of return on it as 109% on your investment, but you could eat You can benefit more from it if your colors are unusual. I always say that colors. They’re very personal in your home, whether you like blues or reds or greens or you know, whatever your style is, but the general public, you need to appeal to the masses. So you definitely need to go and neutralize your home. But even if it is neutral, a fresh coat of paint just makes it feel cleaner and better. So the colors are grayish, you know, the grays are going out and beiges are coming in. But I would go somewhere in the middle, something extremely neutral. So paint is my number one tip for people, kitchens, everyone wants a nice kitchen. So investing in your kitchen does make a lot of sense. 80% of homeowners say that the kitchens their favorite room. So when the kitchen is updated, buyers are more forgiving on other outdated areas. So I’m finding that my clients are more likely to tolerate an outdated bathroom if they have an updated kitchen. So if you’re going to spend money on something definitely go the kitchen route because you’re definitely going to see a return on that.

D.J. Paris 6:07
Yeah, probably nobody wants to look at a kitchen go oh, I now I get to remodel that right a buyer might want my probably is more willing to remodel a bathroom for versus a kitchen I’m guessing

Carrie McCormick 6:21
for sure, definitely. But with the bathrooms Don’t forget about him if you’re not going to do a remodel, but just make sure you regrout or replace the caulk and just make it look clean and fresh. And lastly, I would say your exterior and your curb appeal. I know it’s not the best time of the year but just make sure that the the old debris is picked up you know anything that has fallen in the yard. Just get it cleaned up as much as you can. And of course once this weather breaks, that you know get into the mulching and the planting but you know at this point just don’t don’t leave it arrive make sure it’s it still looks presentable, get a new doormat, because your curb appeal means a lot.

D.J. Paris 7:01
Yeah, first impressions are everything. And you know, those are the easy things to fix to

Carrie McCormick 7:06
like cars or the easy things. Yeah.

D.J. Paris 7:10
We should also I want to pause for a second because I forgot to mention this at the beginning that everybody should be following Carrie on Instagram for really the sole reason that I’ve yet to see a another Realtors Instagram who does it quite as well as Carrie, if you don’t believe me, please check her out. And it’s a great masterclass on how to have a business Instagram account. That really is impressive, which is Carrie McCormick real estate. So just go on Instagram. So yeah, it’s it’s awesome. And you do it all yourself, which is even more impressive.

Carrie McCormick 7:43
I do it all myself. And that’s a great segue into this business that I met. I actually met her through a gal that works with me and through Instagram. It’s a small Bucktown business it’s called Mitchell black. They specialize in custom wall art, wall coverings, wallpapers, decorative flooring, I went into their store which is at 1922 North Damon. Just to get a sense of you know what they do. And you know, as clients are getting their houses ready, if there’s a wall that they want to spruce up or do something different. This business has the coolest ideas, you can go online and look at them. It’s Mitchell black or on Instagram. But if you’re in the area in Bucktown, I want to give a shout out to them. It’s they have the coolest stuff. It’s at 1922 North Damon, it’s called Mitchell black stop in and see him Yeah, that’s

D.J. Paris 8:36
that’s great. And I that is a good good thing because we I get questions all the time from listeners who are asking, like who does carry use for various vendors, various services. So this is a great thing we can start doing is promoting businesses that that you’re a huge fan of, because our our lists are listeners who are either brokers or buyers and sellers could obviously use these services. So I’ll post a link to to their website in the description as well. So thanks. Oh, thanks for that. So I wanted for my market minute. And I’ll keep this short because I’ve actually, I take that back. I’ve not given this tip before but I did not come up with this tip. So in our previous episode that was just released. Ryan de April actually gave this tip. So really this this credit goes to him. But it’s such a great tip. I want to reiterate it. So one of the when I spoke with Ryan, one of the things he coaches for his brokers as he says you’re supposed to make before you start work, make 10 calls to your sphere of influence. And then I said, Okay, well that’s in theory, that’s a great idea. What do you say? And he goes, Well, he’s a very humbled nice person. And he goes, I would never ask for business because he’s not comfortable doing that. So I said, Okay, so what do you why do you call these people? What do you say, would you get him on the phone? He said, Well, this is the he goes, that’s actually the easy part. He said, All you have to do to get a reason to give these people a call to let them know that you’re Thinking of them is to go on social media, if they’re on social media, in particular, Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and see what’s going on in their lives. And then you will find some event that has happened. Maybe it’s a major life event, maybe it’s a minor event. But something that has happened, maybe they just went on vacation, and you can call them and say, Hey, I was just on Facebook. And I noticed that you, you know, weren’t so and so and so place. Just thought that was awesome. And I was just thinking about you, I hope you had a good vacation. See you later. And he said, By the way, he goes, You don’t have to call, you could send them a little Facebook instant message. He goes, it doesn’t have to be a call, but anything like that, you know, you use these social media platforms to do a little research on what’s going on with your clients or your sphere of influence. And I thought that is so smart, and wouldn’t have occurred to me. So I wanted to reiterate it for the audience.

Carrie McCormick 10:51
I love that. And it is it’s it’s great social media has so many great attributes to it. And that’s one of them is just keeping in touch with people finding out what’s going on in their life. I love it.

D.J. Paris 11:00
Cool. Well, I think that’ll do it for our first 2019 Monday market minute with Carrie McCormack. I’m sure Carrie is going to have an even more amazing year as she did last year. But we are so grateful because again, this is somebody that does not have time to do this, as you heard for her weekend coming up, but she still makes time. So we’re so grateful for her, please follow her on Instagram, which is Carrie McCormack real estate, we’ll post it, we’ll put a link to that in the description as well. And if you’re in need of a realtor, she carries the person she’s been doing it 20 years. She’s amazing, very successful, and she’ll take unbelievable care of you. Or if you can always reach out to her too if you’re a broker. So with any questions, and you can also reach us with questions. So if you would like to hear Kerry’s take on anything related to the Chicago real estate market, send us an email or visit our website at keeping it real pod.com Or visit us on Facebook keeping it real pod, send us a question and Carrie will answer it. So thank you so much, Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 12:02
Thank you look forward to that too.

D.J. Paris 12:04
All right. On behalf of Carrie we say goodbye and we’ll see you in a month.

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Monday Market Minute • Buyers And Sellers Looking To Spring

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Welcome to the December edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie talks about how the Chicago market has slowed and how both buyers and sellers are backing off at the moment. What do real estate brokers say to clients when buyers think homes are too expensive and sellers think pricing is too low? I also provide a marketing tip how working with management companies will open up twice as many rental listings than what’s on the MLS.

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute
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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:14
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made for Chicago real estate brokers by Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Paris. I am your host and welcome as well to our monthly episode of the Monday market minute with Carrie McCormick from App properties. Welcome, Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 0:33
Thank you so much excited to be here this month, it’s December, it’s the end of the year.

D.J. Paris 0:38
Well, and before we get started, it is the end of the year. And just in case you’re new to the show, who is who am i Who’s Carrie McCormack? Well, I am just the host, so enough about me. But Carrie is one of the top top top top producing realtors in the entire Chicagoland area out of just shy of 40,000 Realtors, she is in gosh, I think the top anywhere from like the top 20, usually in the top 20. So she is in the top like 1% of 1%. She’s done hundreds of transactions just this year alone, total superstar producer, we are so grateful to have her on the show. And she’s too busy to do this. And yet she still finds time time or too busy for you. Well, you’re very sweet. And we love having you on the show. So what Carrie does, by the way, she comes on once every month, and talks about what brokers need to know in the public about what’s going on with the real estate market in Chicago. So I will turn it over to you.

Carrie McCormick 1:31
Well, thank you very much. And I always like to think it’s like boots on the ground. Because, you know, obviously, this is my full time job. I’m entrenched on the streets every day in our market, and I’m talking to buyers and sellers every day. So it’s you know, it’s really just firsthand knowledge and what I experience in the market. And probably all of our listeners know that this Chicago fall market has been extremely challenging for our sellers. And what I think that that’s happening is that sellers are trying to cling on to the spring prices, you know, we had a great spring here in Chicago. And sellers still want those prices that their neighbors received. While there just are not enough buyers out in the market right now that are willing to pay those prices. So recently, I read a Fannie Mae survey, and it said the proportion of people who think it’s a good time to buy a house has decreased significantly from the spring. So it was an to net 21% from 29. So it started at 29%. And then it dropped to 21%. But also the proportion of people who think it’s a good time to sell has dropped as well. And that dropped about 10%. So if you look at the math, you would expect, you know as a zero sum transaction, right, so both abortions fell. But it seems that sellers are unhappily realizing that they’re not going to get what they thought their house was worth six months ago. And buyers think that the homes are too expensive. So this explains right now why their transaction volume in Chicago has fallen this fall substantially.

D.J. Paris 3:13
Yeah, what are you telling your Do you have some do not do you but obviously you have had selling clients who have overvalue their homes. Are those difficult conversations?

Carrie McCormick 3:23
Oh, they’re extremely it’s not that they’re overvalued. It’s that the market has changed. Right? Right. It’s interest rates have gone up, taxes have gone up. So the affordability factor for buyers has completely changed. So sellers are still expecting their price, but buyers can’t afford it anymore. So it’s something has to shift. And it’s kind of a standoff between buyers and sellers. With with the big questions kind of like the chicken in the egg is what’s going to come first our price is going to drop, and buyers are going to react and start buying or, you know, our buyers just going to change the affordability factor instead of buying let’s say a $700,000 house this year, they’re going to end up buying a $500,000 price. So we’ve got a little standoff going between buyers and sellers right now. And it is a little difficult conversation. But that’s our job as Realtors is to be an adviser to our sellers, to tell them how the market is tell them how to position themselves for success, depending on what their goals are.

D.J. Paris 4:28
I think that’s great. Do you have any predictions for the spring?

Carrie McCormick 4:32
Well, of course nobody knows how the spring markets going to go but I’ve been doing this for this January will be 20 years this will be my adulation anniversary this January. And historically Chicago has always had a great spring market. This is our time to shine. And buyers have been on the sidelines for quite a few months now. So our fall market was slow or winter market was slow. So they’ve been on the sidelines kind waiting this out. I think they’re getting a little fatigued with that. And I think they wrap their arms around, again, the interest rates, the taxes, just their affordability factor. So I think we’re going to have a spring market, a good spring market, I don’t think it’s going to be anything crazy. But I think it’s going to be there. We’re going to, you know, move some inventory. And I always tell people keep in mind, we’ve got a good economy, right. There’s nothing wrong with our economy’s doing doing well. Young adults are forming families and they need a place to live, whether it’s rental or you know, if they’re going to buy, we have currently we have low housing inventory, we have good employment, we’ve got some great companies here in Chicago that spurring employment growth. And keep in mind, Chicago is a great city, and people want to stay here. So we’ve got a lot of positives. We just need these buyers to make a move. And I think it’s going to happen in the spring.

D.J. Paris 5:53
Awesome. Well, I. So in addition to Kerry’s market, minute, I do a little marketing minute. And I wanted to piggyback a little bit on what Carrie said with the sales market being slightly less than I think brokers who are listening or even the public listening would prefer. And what we’ve seen, at least even at our firm, I’m sure at Kerry’s firm as well is there’s been a little bit more movement in rentals. So I wanted to give you a quick marketing tip. If you’re a broker and you find yourself either wanting to do rentals or needing to do rentals or just trying to stay busy while the sales markets maybe a little slower. So if you find yourself wanting to do more rentals, or even just having a client that needs a place to live, typically it’s been my experience that brokers will traditionally go to the MLS as of course they would for a sale look for whatever rentals are available. And that’s their database. And that is a database. However, it just for people listening Did you know there is a another database that is a more invisible database, but also works directly with brokers but do not does not list their properties on the MLS. These are property management companies that either own or manage or both have buildings, whether it be high rises, or three flats, really buildings and all shapes and sizes, even single family homes for rent, but owning or manage these buildings. And we’ll work with brokers and we’ll pay you a commission. And in addition to getting the commission, it’s because it’s not on the MLS there is no listing broker, there’s no cooperative broker, right? It’s just while you’re the CO operative broker, so you would get in most cases, these buildings, these management companies do pay out one month’s rent, so you’re not splitting it as you would be on the MLS. Right. So how do you get access to these listings? Well, what I would do is first get some clients that are looking for apartments, and then whatever neighborhoods they’re looking into, if it’s in the city, look for the big high rises, that would be the easiest way to go. If it’s an area of the city where there are high rises and call those management companies and ask them well, first thing I would do is ask your managing broker, if you have relationships with these management companies, likely they do if they don’t, you can call these buildings directly and say, Hey, I’m a broker, I have a client that’s interested in you know, a unit in your in your building, do you pay a commission, if I bring you the broker, or sorry, bring you the renter, and you will find out that traditionally, they usually pay one month’s rent, sometimes even in the off months, they might even pay one and a half times rent, right. So it’s a, it’s certainly not a bad way to stay busy. And also, renters become buyers, as we know. So if you aren’t familiar with this, we’ll call it a non MLS database. Again, you could just look for the big management companies that manage properties or own buildings, or both in the areas that your clients are looking at. And contact those management companies and ask and you will be shocked. The vast majority of them do work with brokers. And you can ask to be put on there. We call it hot sheets. But basically, it’s their availability lists because since it’s not on the MLS, they usually email out their availability every so often. So just call a few of these buildings. And there you have a bigger database than just the MLS. So I don’t know, Carrie, if you’ve ever used management companies for rentals, but I have

Carrie McCormick 9:01
I have done that. And my tip to the brokers that are listening is since you’re dealing with the management companies or their you know, the corporate offices, you do there’s a little more paperwork on the getting paid side and you do have to follow up with them quite extensively on that front. So it’s a it’s a great tip, just you got to keep after him a little bit. So yeah, my experience

D.J. Paris 9:28
carries, right and so that what she’s mentioning is getting paid. So once the you know, the renter signs the lease, you know, in a traditional MLS transaction, you get paid pretty quickly. Sometimes with these management companies, since it’s anonymous transaction, your your office, your managing broker will or whoever works, your office will send an invoice to these companies and it’s essentially a build for them to pay. So be prepared to wait. That’s the downside is that sometimes you get paid, you know, within a few weeks, sometimes you don’t. And that’s just unfortunately the nature of working with management companies. So that is definitely a downside. So you’re not going to get it as quickly most most of the time, but hopefully you will get it. You’ll get it. Yeah, but you will get it. Well, Carrie and I wanted to thank everyone for listening over the last year and beyond. And we’re so excited to continue the show. Happy holidays to Carrie Carrie, to you and to all the listeners.

Carrie McCormick 10:19
Yes, everyone. Happy holidays. And thank you DJ for such a wonderful year and having me on your show. You do so much for our community and I just want to thank you and of course thank everyone who listens.

D.J. Paris 10:31
Well thank you and we will see you guys in 2019 and we’re excited to bring you more tips and tricks and tell you more about the market.

Carrie McCormick 10:39
Happy selling and happy holidays.

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Monday Market Minute • These Neighborhoods Have Heated Up In A Slow Market

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Welcome to the October edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie talks about how the Chicago market has started showing pricing discounts due to home sales being down (more than any decrease in the past seven years). Where are the buyers and why have they dropped off? The good news is that there are several neighborhoods in Chicago booming right now and Carrie shares those with you. Then, I provide a marketing tip about working with renters in a down sales market and how 46% of buyers right now are first-timers (previous renters).

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute

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Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:13
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcasts made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Paris, and today is our regular monthly episode The Monday market minute with superstar producer at properties broker Carrie McCormick, welcome. Oh, thank you, as always, well, just in case this is anyone’s first time and they have not heard you on the show before. You’ve been in the business almost 20 years, or is it over 20. At this point,

Carrie McCormick 0:42
I’m going to stick with 1920 Just makes it sound like a long time. So it’s been 19 years, almost 20. Actually, January will be 20.

D.J. Paris 0:51
And not only is Carrie been a producer for quite some time, of course, she is a top producer, top 1% producer and even more than top 1% She is actually always in about the top 15 brokers in all of the Chicagoland area, year after month after month, year after year, which is a big deal because there’s about 40,000 of them. So for her to take time to be on the show, she does not have time to do the show. And yet she still does. And she comes on every month and talks about what’s going on in the market for Chicago as things brokers need to know and buyers and sellers. And we are so grateful that she does this on a Saturday when she I’m sure has a million other appointments. So thank you again.

Carrie McCormick 1:30
Well, thank you love doing it.

D.J. Paris 1:32
Alright, let’s get started. What’s going on?

Carrie McCormick 1:35
Well, we have been dodging this day of reckoning, but all Chicago people know winter is coming. And when winter comes, we start seeing price cuts here and we’ve seen them over the last couple of weeks, we start seeing price cuts, price changes, you know, just a nice shift in this market here. And for the past several months, I would say there’s been a lack of motivation on the buyer side. So this month’s home sales have declined a whopping 15% from last year, which is the biggest decline in Chicago in more than seven years. I think last month, it was about 7%. And this month now we’re hitting 15%. So it’s a big, it’s a big drop. And every day, when I’m talking with my buyers, and obviously mostly my sellers, I get the question of where are the buyers? And why is the market slow? Well, it’s just not here in Chicago. And it seems to be nationwide. So as a matter of fact, yesterday, I was speaking with a another agent from the Ohio market, and then an agent from Tennessee market. And everyone is sensing a slowdown. It’s whoever I talked to whether they’re here in Chicago, or in another state, everyone’s sensing a slowdown. And, you know, there are several factors that have dampened our demand. The Of course, the change in the federal tax code that Trank deductions for property taxes, and we’re seeing an uptick in the mortgage rates that have changed the overall affordability of owning a home. It’s not that just people are afraid of the rates, because historically they still are low. But it’s really the the affordability of of owning a home and the price point that they can buy in. And some p some people, some buyers have reached their limits of what they’re willing to pay. And this applies across the board. I’m not just seeing it was savvy, you know, buyers and investors, it’s first time homebuyers. It’s move up buyers and investors as well. Go ahead.

D.J. Paris 3:41
Yeah, no, you’re right. And I know mortgage applications are down seven to 10% On average right now as per even over like a month ago. So you know, I know rates aren’t everything, but boy, they’re really affecting people’s willingness to even move forward.

Carrie McCormick 4:00
And it’s important being in this market, you know, being a real estate agent, this market of having your, your network of people because I talk with the title companies all the time I talk to my mortgage lenders all the time, the inspectors, you know, the appraisers, everyone that’s involved in the process of, you know, buying and selling a home and just talking to them about the market and what they’re seeing and what they’re experiencing. And it’s it’s the same, you know, we’re all in the same boat. But but you know, there’s some buyers out there and the buyers that are out there, they do want to deal. They want new construction, it seems like the resale homes are getting hit a little bit harder than the new construction. And if it is a resale home, people want to deal you know, they want they want a good deal.

D.J. Paris 4:46
Yeah. Now, are there any are there any areas in the city here that are still doing well, despite, you know, the overall slowdown?

Carrie McCormick 4:54
You know, that’s that’s a really good question. So yes, most of the neighborhoods have cooled down here in Chicago. But Logan Square has really turned up the heat. And there was a recent article in cranes just about Logan Square. It was a really interesting read it was just the other day. And they did say that the single family homes in Logan Square shot up more than 19% this year. And that that data came right out of Chicago Association of Realtors, and also the number of horses that sold there. Almost 9% In the same period. So we’ve got Logan Square did really well. Another neighborhood called Avondale, which is just a little bit north of Logan Square has stayed warm, they shot up about 12%. And then also I’m starting to see some Southside neighborhoods showing some increases, there was a neighborhood, Auburn Gresham, Roseland, South Chicago, if you look at their numbers, you know, they’re they’re staying warm down there. Now their numbers are doing pretty well. But I always tell people hang in there, you know, this is Chicago, we’re a very resilient city. Everyone needs a place to live. You know, we just we have these downturns and been in this industry for 19 years, I’ve been through this before. You know, we just got to work hard price homes, right? And just stick with it.

D.J. Paris 6:16
Well said, and for everyone who’s listening, you can also submit your questions to Carrie directly, so you can send those to us. If you’re not already following us on Facebook, just facebook.com forward slash keeping it real pod. Also keeping it real pod.com Or website, you can submit questions through that as well. Let’s move over to my marketing idea, my marketing minute for the week. And I’d like to get Kerry’s thoughts on this too. So I was recently very, very grateful. I was invited by Zillow to come out to New York and see their New York operation which was super cool. And they were nice enough to have me out there. And they just recently about two weeks ago or so are released their 2018 consumer housing Trends report. It is awesome. So just so that everyone knows, obviously we know who Zillow is, but how big they are is really impressive. 186 million individuals visit zillow.com every single month. So they just aggregate Oh, it’s incredible. They they know more, they have more data on buyers and sellers than any other company. It’s super, super critical. So they aggregate all this data, they you know, just publish it for free. I’ll post a link to this report because it’s super cool. Whether you’re a consumer or broker, you should check it out. But there are two couple stats that really shout out at me that I think brokers could use in their marketing. Number one is home. We’re talking about homebuyers only here 42% Of all homebuyers are millennials and that’s interesting to me is a huge number a huge number. And then the other number is 46% of all homebuyers are first timers. Now maybe that’s not so surprising to people listening. It’s something that I always forget. So we’ll just round that up to 50%. We’ll say half of all homebuyers are first timers. And brokers of course, no, that’s the low hanging fruit. These are people who have traditionally not worked with a realtor before. Maybe they worked with one to help find an apartment but probably not. So you you have one out of every two people buying a home has probably never worked with a realtor before. So what can a broker do with this information? Seems a couple of ideas. Number one, and I know brokers typically don’t get their real estate license to do rentals, right? That’s not anyone’s probably most anyone’s dream. But it’s an opportunity to build a relationship right away. So if you’re not flushed with sales, and it’s a little slower, because the markets slow down, and you have maybe fewer buyers or sellers at the current moment, maybe reach out to some of your rental rental clients and maybe help them find an apartment or the second part is if you really don’t want to do rentals, but you still should work with rent with people who are currently renting because those are future buyers, as we know, and half of all buyers are first timers. So these are people that are renting right now. What I my idea for everyone is to reach out to companies that have a lot of employees that are younger, maybe millennials, and this this was me. Many years ago, I worked at a technology firm, there were 150 of us all in our 20s I’m guessing 95% of us were renters, but we were starting to make more money in our late 20s. And I thought boy, it wouldn’t have been smart for a realtor to come in and say you guys should be thinking about buying in the next year. And all they would have needed to do is reach out to our human resources department and say, Hey, can I come in and bring in lunch and talk about the path to ownership and then maybe bring a lender in and an attorney to help share the cost of bringing in lunch and do a 15 minute presentation and I guarantee that realtor would have walked away with a ton of clients, or at least a ton of opportunities for clients. So this is something where you can reach out to your sphere of influence. Ask them where do you work? What’s Your office like, Do you have a lot of younger people? Do you have people that may be thinking of buying? Or maybe you just want to work with renters right now and say you have people renting I’ll help them too. But you can reach out to these companies and offer your services. Right. So that’s an opportunity as well to just think about how do I get in front of more people that are currently renting, that are maybe going to be buyers? So Carrie, do you have any any thoughts on that?

Carrie McCormick 10:24
That’s actually a really great idea. And I have never done that. But I think I may use your idea.

D.J. Paris 10:32
Yeah. So I do it. Well, yeah. I mean, all it would really take is reach out to some of your existing clients and say, Where do you work? What’s what, how many people are there? If I reached, could you talk introduce me to the human resources person or whoever? I don’t know. Just something to try. And I do love renters.

Carrie McCormick 10:46
I think that’s, you know, you can’t dismiss the whole rental pool because the renters turn into buyers and you know, these people, no other people. So it’s I love rentals. I think it’s a great a great tip you have

D.J. Paris 11:02
Yeah, I interviewed an app properties broker, Susan Panozzo. A little while ago. Yeah, I know, you know, she does like 100 rentals a year and then gets like 20 sales a year out of those rentals. So anyway, all right. Well, that’s that’ll do it for this week. Oh, follow Carrie. First of all, everyone needs to follow Carrie on Instagram. It’s It’s unbelievable. She has absolutely without exception, not just because she’s on the show. But this is the Absolute Truth. The very best real estate broker Instagram account I have ever seen. And that’s Carrie McCormack real estate. Which it’s incredible. She does it all herself. She doesn’t hire an agency. It’s pretty cool.

Carrie McCormick 11:42
I do. And I get I get that question, honestly, at least once a day as Who does your social media? And I say I do that like No, seriously, who does your social? I do. I love doing it. It’s fun. And I enjoy it. So But anyways, anyone that has any real estate questions, I’m always open to a phone call, or a text message or email. I’m always here to help love to share some of my ideas with people. If there’s any questions you have, I’m always willing to give back.

D.J. Paris 12:12
And if you’re a consumer, and you’re looking for a realtor to work with, well, I would want to work with the person who’s the 15th highest producer out of 40,000. That’s who I would choose. So how could How can somebody reach you via telephone or email?

Carrie McCormick 12:25
Of course, so my cell phone is 312-961-4612. And I do try to answer my phone all the time. You can text me as well that number or you can email me at Carey ca RR ie at@properties.com.

D.J. Paris 12:44
Well, that will do it for another Monday market minute. Carrie is so generous. We’re so grateful that she does this. And again, she doesn’t have time to do this. In fact, we know we were supposed to do this at 11 o’clock and Carrie says Can we push this back 15 minutes I have an appointment. So that is how incredibly busy she is. So thank you. Thank you. And on behalf of Carrie and myself, we will see you in a month and thanks for listening. Thanks Carrie.

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Monday Market Minute • Is There A Market Slowdown?

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Welcome to the September edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie talks about whether the market is slowing down. Days on market has recently risen for EVERY major Chicago neighborhood. Carrie shares some seller tips including having exterior photos done before the winter arrives, and making sure the property is move-in-ready. Then, I provide a marketing tip about making weekly 60 second Instagram videos for your contact list to get them hooked on YOU!

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:16
Hello and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real the only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host. And today on the show, we are doing our monthly market minute with Carrie McCormick from at properties. So welcome, Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 0:35
Hello, thanks for having me. As always, you’re welcome.

D.J. Paris 0:39
Carrie comes on every single month and talks about what is going on in the market. What Realtors need to know what buyers and sellers need to know. And let’s talk about why we have Carrie on the show. Aside from being a wonderful personality for this podcast. She is also a top producer. Not only is she in the top 1% of Realtors in the entire Chicagoland area there are, by the way, 40,000 realtors, she is in the top 1/10 of 1% of production this year alone, probably almost every year. I’m sure she’s in there. But she has as of right now in the top 1/10 of 1%. I don’t know if you even knew that you know that? Well, that’s because you’re so busy that you wouldn’t know that. But I took the time to look that up just a few minutes ago. And that Anyway, she’s great. So welcome Carrie to the show.

Carrie McCormick 1:27
Thank you. Thank you. So here we are in September, we are in the beginning of September. And as everyone knows, I live and breathe real estate. And it’s been an interesting last 30 days in the market because the housing chatter has increased this summer of a market slowdown. And the data that I read appears to support those claims. And everyone is attempting to predict the next residential real estate shift. And you know, really kind of just the next financial shift in general. So here’s an interesting little story is I was on my last listing appointment the other day. And the seller and I great guy got into a discussion of just like the overall market, you know, the stock markets, the international market. And of course, we talked about the real estate market here. And on the counter of this gentleman’s home, he had shared with me the July issue of Fortune Magazine. And if you look on the cover, it’s this black and white cover, and it’s this gentleman announcing the end is near. And if you go online, you can read this article, it was written by Jeff Colvin. And it was I read it because there’s a lot of graphs and you know, history. And you know, a lot of predictions are based on data and graphs. And it’s called The end is near for the economic boom growth, and it will slow in the bull markets going to expire. Very interesting. Not that I’m thinking that the end is near whatsoever. But of course, when magazines and the media and you start seeing this on the news, you know, everyone starts talking about it. So it’s really been, you know, a hot topic for me to discuss with my sellers, with my buyers, and just, you know, general conversation. So if anyone has a subscription to it, I’d suggest reading it’s a great, it’s a great read. But right now, I think it’s too early to predict a change. And, you know, we’re starting to see some of the prices shift. I’m starting to see, you know, the some of the summer inventory that’s out there. People are doing price changes, you know, starting to cool down a little bit. But I always say that Chicago is a very resilient market and we typically don’t get hit as hard as the East and West Coasts when there is a cooldown. I think we’ll be okay for this fall. But we’re starting to see a little bit of summer inventory, making some of their price changes.

Now, I also want to just talk about the inventory because that’s also been a little bit of a topic for the last couple of months is the inventory and, and days on the market. So the median days on the market for the residential properties rose in every single neighborhood in Chicago. Or sometimes I always say that Chicago is very neighborhood specific. They’re kind of a market of their own. But I looked across every major Chicago neighborhood and everyone’s market time is up and particularly in Logan Square in Avondale. Now everyone remembers Logan Square was the hot neighborhood that you had to move into inventory wouldn’t stay on the market for a while. So right now for Logan Square the condos that went under contract last month spent 100 A No Not 100 210% more time on the market this summer versus last summer. So again, when you start look Qing and digesting all of the data in each neighborhood this year definitely or this summer, I should say this summer definitely took a little bit of a slowdown versus last summer. And everyone’s trying to predict why. Why did that happen? So it’s the question I get every day all day long. But I do want to also talk about some positive things, I looked at my my data. And actually, I’ve sold 104 homes in the last 12 months, for which it’s been very busy in the last 12 months, and my focus has always been on listing homes for sale. So I thought I would offer some seller tips for getting into this fall market. And number one, if you are going to be selling your home this fall market, you have to be realistic about your pricing. That is the number one thing, really look at the data, look what’s sold in the last couple of months, look what’s coming on the market. You know, just look at the attributes of your home and be realistic about your pricing. I’ve also noticed that when buyers come in, they want a move in ready home. Buyers do not want to do a lot of work, they don’t have time anymore, they want to walk into a home and feel like they can move right in. And buyers even have a hard time envisioning changing pink color. So you have to do that you have what I call it is setting the stage set a stage of the home, when a buyer walks in, all they have to do is fall in love and imagine themselves living there. Also think about this, when a buyer comes into your home, this is actually a second showing. The first showing happens online. So everyone sits at home, they look at your home online, they study the pictures, they look at different angles, they look at the video, the floorplan they have already mentally moved into your home. And when they come to your home in person, it needs to fit exactly what they were imagining online. So again, this is the second showing, walking into your home has to be perfect. The paint, the staging, everything about it has got to be perfect. So make sure you’re priced right for this bull market and make sure that your home is show ready for buyers to come in.

D.J. Paris 7:29
When would you say priced? Right. Are we talking about pricing to sell? Well,

Carrie McCormick 7:33
I mean, if you’re serious about price, about selling this fall? Absolutely. Because the fall markets have very short window. You know, we’ve got September, we’ve got October, we’ve got a little bit into November. But once we start hitting those holiday months, you know, really we’re taking the slowdown. And at that point, you might want to wait until spring market. Now

D.J. Paris 7:52
Yeah. What if your seller is not ready to sell this fall? But they do want to sell on the spring? What do you tell them now?

Carrie McCormick 7:59
Yeah, that’s a very important question. And there’s two important things. One, first and foremost, take your exterior photos. Now we still have leaves on the trees, the grass is green, everything looks good. Have your realtor come out and start photographing the exterior spaces of your home. So that is number one. And most importantly, because you do not want to be taking pictures in January, February, March and here in Chicago things do not look.

D.J. Paris 8:27
That’s really smart. That’s a very smart idea.

Carrie McCormick 8:29
Yeah, so definitely take your pictures now your exterior pictures now. And then start your updates on your home. So if you’re going to, you know, do some painting, or you know, I always tell people paint your front door now because the weather allows that you can’t do that in January, February. So paint your front door if you’re doing anything your outdoor decks, get them powerwash get them stained, you know, get your exterior ready. And then of course, start working on your interior projects. You know, declutter, take out some stuff from a closet, I always tell people that you’re moving anyways. So start boxing it up, you know, getting some of the stuff out of the house, do your painting projects. If there’s anything that needs to be fixed, if you’ve got outlets, if you’ve got light fixture or light your fans and aren’t working or whatever it is start getting those ready so you don’t feel the pressure in the spring so you can ease into it.

D.J. Paris 9:22
Now what about buyers for the fall? What are you telling them?

Carrie McCormick 9:26
So yes, if you’re a buyer that you’re on the sidelines, you’re waiting to see what the fall market brings? I would say that it’s going to be a competitive market. I think there’s going to be few options for you. So time will be limited to make decisions. If you see a house that you like, I would suggest moving pretty quickly on it. I would get your pre approval ready. I would like I said just move quickly because the good ones will sell fast.

D.J. Paris 9:53
Perfect. Well, thanks very much. We should also mention Carrie is aside from having all this great data and obviously being extremely successful working with buyers and sellers, she has a really impressive and absolutely worth following a couple of social media accounts in particular Instagram and Facebook, you can find her just by searching for Kerry McCormick real estate. So instagram.com forward slash Carrie McCormick real estate or you can search that way too. And same with Facebook Carrie McCormack real estate, if you want to see how to really run a successful social media campaign, I’ve never legitimately never seen anyone do it better than Carrie. So absolutely. Yeah, it’s not it’s absolute. Just the truth. Absolutely.

Carrie McCormick 10:37
I do it all myself. A lot of people asked me which company I use, and you know, who designs everything, but it’s one of my passions, I love design, and I love doing it.

D.J. Paris 10:49
Well, this and this brings me to my tip my my marketing minute tip of the week. And this has also to do with social media. So I was thinking about this. So my background is in marketing, it’s not really in real estate. So I always think from a marketing perspective, and I probably have more of a buyer seller mentality than a realtor mentality, simply because that’s really more of how I see myself. And I was thinking about this recently because we have it well, at your firm, there are 1000s of realtors, we have a lot of realtors in our firm. And I get the question a lot is like how do I do social media. And I always tell them, check out what Kerry’s doing. In addition to though I thought of something, I realized that oftentimes we forget that our contact list the people that eventually will become buyers and sellers may are not always in the market, right? They’re only in the market when they’re in the market. And maybe they’re not super, always super interested in real estate when they’re not in the market. But I thought well, what is everybody always interested in? And I thought, well, the weekend, it occurred to me that all of us share a commonality that the weekend is where we can do go do fun things. Well, not maybe Carrie, she’s always on showings, but everyone else gets to go out and do fun things. And I thought, you know, I know me, I personally because I live in the city. And I know carries the city all the time as well. We’re there’s so many things to do in the city, but not just the city, the suburbs, too. But there’s so many things to do. It’s hard to keep track. And I thought you know, what if, as a realtor, what one way that you can connect with your audience all the time, and this will always be of interest to them is to say, here’s what’s going on for the weekend. So if you focus in a particular suburb, for example, that’s even easier, because you could just look to see what’s going on. If you’re a particular neighborhoods in the city you specialize in, you can focus on that. But I thought you know, wouldn’t it be fun? Because I know, personally, I subscribe to three or four newsletters, including like Chicago magazine, and timeout and Thrillist. And these these, they send me an email every week saying here are the top things to do over the weekend. And I thought, boy, you know, wouldn’t it be cool to make a 62nd video, saying here are the three coolest things to do this weekend? So this is something any broker can do. I don’t know of anyone currently doing it. So there’s a huge opportunity, and maybe you specialize in a particular market. Give it a try. Yeah, well, I don’t know that you need to do anything more than you’re doing. But I

Carrie McCormick 13:10
got that idea. I think that’s a great idea. And if you look back in some of my social media, I didn’t do video, but I did. Like posts about the weekend. But the interesting thing, like you said about Chicago is I look to see what’s happening on a weekend. There’s hundreds of things to do. Yeah, it’s overwhelming. It’s overwhelming. We’ve got an amazing city and amazing things to do. But I love your idea.

D.J. Paris 13:31
Yep. So I will leave that with you guys is create think about content in addition to real estate content that your audience is interested in. So I always thought what’s going on on the weekend seems interesting. So think about that. And you can post that on Instagram and you could do a 62nd video, you just turn turn your phone towards yourself, make a quick video, and then call it a day. So anyway, we’re gonna sign off. So this was Thank you Carrie again, make sure everybody follow Carrie on Instagram and Facebook again. It’s Carrie McCormack real estate. McCormick has to seize. And obviously you can see how real good social media marketing is done. She does it the best. And we will see you guys on our next Monday market minute which will be in a month. It’s a lot of answering there. And other than that, thanks. Oh, by the way everyone should. If you’re not currently subscribed to our show, you can subscribe on iTunes, Google Play, anywhere podcasts are served. You can also stream every single episode we’ve done at keeping it real pod.com Find us on Facebook as well keeping it real pod. And we’ve stream all at least post all of our stuff there too. So on behalf of Carrie and myself, we thank you for listening. And Carrie, we’ll see we’ll see you next month. Sounds great.

Carrie McCormick 14:45
Have a great day.

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Monday Market Minute • Housing Bubble On The Way? • Asking For Reviews

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Welcome to the July edition of Monday Market Minute with Carrie McCormick!

In this episode Carrie talks about whether she believes we’re headed for a real estate (bursting) bubble. I ask Carrie a question about rising lending rates and how she answers clients with those concerns.  Then, I provide a marketing tip on how making sure brokers are asking their clients for reviews on Zillow, Google, Yelp, and Facebook!

Carrie can be reached at carrie@atproperties.com or by phone at 312.961.4612.

Carrie McCormick D.J. Paris Monday Market Minute

Transcript

D.J. Paris 0:16
Hello, and welcome to another episode of Keeping it real. The only podcast made by Chicago real estate brokers for Chicago real estate brokers. My name is DJ Paris, I am your host of the show. And today, as we do every month, we have our Monday market minute with superstar producer Carrie McCormick from App properties. So welcome, Carrie.

Carrie McCormick 0:34
Hello, hello, and happy July happy July 4 To you

D.J. Paris 0:39
Happy July 4 to you as well. And Carrie is not just one of the 1000s of brokers that that property, she is one of the very top brokers in the entire Chicagoland area, she is usually in the top 20 or so producing brokers in all Chicago, which is a very, very big deal. She’s been a producer for almost 20 years now. So we’re very excited to have her on the show, she has a ton of experience a lot of knowledge. And every month she comes on and talks about what brokers need to know about what’s going on in the market. So welcome, once again to the show.

Carrie McCormick 1:12
Well, thank you, thank you. So I was hoping actually I hate to say this, but I was hoping that July 4 week would be a little bit slower. So everyone can enjoy the holiday. But the market still is moving. And we’re not seeing a break. So last year, you’re just I always like looking at it from last year to this year. And we’re really in a very competitive housing market. Just again, we keep talking about the shortage of inventory. So we are still seeing it. And we you know, the prediction is that month after month, we’re going to still see a very competitive market, and there’s no signs of slowing down. So as you look at the economic news that we are seeing, it’s all positive and demand is quite strong.

D.J. Paris 2:02
Have you seen anything? Or do you have any opinions about interest rates? We know the Fed just recently raised rates? do we how do you feel that that’s going to affect the future market or the present marketing?

Carrie McCormick 2:14
Yeah, so I would say for the short term, it’s actually a positive thing, because what that’s doing is it’s creating an urgency to get a home under a contract before, you know the rates go up even higher, and they can’t afford what they want. So it’s in the short term, it’s creating a sense of urgency, again, to get something under contract, long term, you know, depends on where the rates end up going. Long term, it could slow it down a little bit. But for the short term, everything’s looking good.

D.J. Paris 2:45
So if you have buyers that are maybe on the fence, or if listeners are out there, who are brokers who have buyers who haven’t yet pulled the trigger, this is a good conversation to have, hey, the Fed just raise rates, this will affect interest rates, maybe it’s a good time to get more serious about making a decision.

Carrie McCormick 3:01
Yeah. And it’s again, it’s giving them a little sense of urgency, which is always good for the market. Another thing that, you know, I’m starting to get a lot of questions from my buyers, and my sellers is, you know, if we’re heading into a housing bubble, so because I’ve been doing this for almost 19 years, I clearly remember the housing bubble, you know, 10 years ago. So it’s always, you know, in the back of my mind, because I remember, obviously, I didn’t know that was going to happen, but I remember, you know, the conditions leading up to it. And, you know, being part of it, and understanding, you know how that affected everyone. So I’m starting to hear that question. And those terms come up again, a lot is, you know, is there a housing bubble? What do you think’s going to be happening? So one of my data sources that I look at is the National Association of Realtors, which I would highly recommend everybody take a look at their site. They’ve got some great information on there. And there’s the chief economic gentleman, Lawrence Yun, I believe that’s how you pronounce his last name. And, you know, his comment is that he does not worry that that there’s a housing bubble. And what he his comment was, quote, unquote, he says home prices are clearly rising too fast, and they’ve outpaced people’s income for the last five years. Is it a housing bubble coming in? His answer is no. And he says, because the fun fundamental supporting factors of today’s housing market versus what happened 10 years ago are drastically different. And he’s right. And what’s changed in my perspective is the underwriting guidelines, because I remember in 2000 or the early 2000s people could get mortgages, interest only loans interest, you get 0% down I mean, They barely, like checked, you know, anyone’s information, even appraisals of properties. You know, we had, hopefully, it’ll get in trouble for saying this, but there was drive by appraisals, you know, appraisers didn’t even go into the houses, which, you know, was, it was, it was, I don’t know, it was just kind of a crazy time. But now the underwriting guidelines are so strict. And you know, everyone is doing their, their due diligence. So that is a drastic change in, you know, from 2000, early 2000s. To now. You know, in plus, last, you know, when the housing bubble was here in the early 2000s, or 2008, it was we didn’t have the supply and demand issue that we’re having today. So, there was plenty of inventory back then. Right now, there’s not a lot of inventory. So, you know, I’m going off of what he’s saying. And I don’t, I don’t sense it either. Hopefully, we’re not going to have a bubble.

D.J. Paris 6:04
Well, let’s Yeah, let’s hope not. And I know that one of the key frustrations for realtors these days is a lack of in Chicago, at least it was a lack of inventory. So I imagine there’s not too much anyone can do about that other than just deal with it. But I imagine that’s Is that is that a source of frustration for your clients?

Carrie McCormick 6:23
It is it really is. And, you know, people, you know, don’t have a lot of patience, either we go out looking a couple of times, and you know, we can’t find what we’re looking for, you know, the rent is always on the back of people’s mind of, you know, maybe I’ll just rent for a little bit until the right thing comes along. So it is frustrating, but we’ll see what this fall market brings, I’m predicting that it’s going to be a strong fall market. So we’ll hopefully get some more inventory. And, and, and keep the market moving.

D.J. Paris 6:53
Awesome. Well, I, for my marketing minute want to just very quickly give everyone a very simple and obvious thing that every broker should be doing. And it’s very, very, it’s something you can implement immediately, which is asking for reviews. So of course, we know that well over 80% of all home searches start online right now, they ultimately most of them finish using a realtor, which is a good thing for everyone listening. But of course, all of your clients are always looking online, you know, you you are not the sole source of inventory for the client, since they can kind of access it all now anyway. But sorry, my dog barking in the background. But real quickly from from a review perspective, we know that not only are our buyers and sellers looking online for inventory, they’re also looking to see reviews of you, right. So very simply, if you’re not asking your clients to review you on line, you’re missing a huge opportunity, because your clients are likely going to look you up. I mean, I was just recently about to go to a doctor and I said, you know, I’m just going to check to see what the reviews were on health grades or whatever the you know. So I mean, I do it even for doctors. So all you have to do is get the links to I think a couple of sources. So immediately after a transaction, or you can really do it at anytime. But I think after a transaction, when the client is likely happiest with your service, and it’s most front of their mind, you’re going to want to send them an email saying, hey, the best way you could ever thank me, if I did a good job for you is to tell other people about me. Here’s one way to do that. And I would provide a link to this to the Zillow review site. And you can get your own specific link at Zillow, the premier agent site. Also Facebook is another place people will look and then to others, of course, Google. And then lastly, Yelp. And what I will do in the notes is provide links on how to get the specific links for your business on all of those sites. But making sure you send those in an email and saying, Hey, if you could take one minute and review me on one or more of these sites, it would really help me out tremendously. And of course, you know, we all know why. So make sure you’re asking don’t assume people are going to do that on your behalf. And we all know that there’s businesses you go to who they continually hound you to say please write us a review. And ultimately, I think it’s a great idea. And I don’t know that I do it more than once or twice asking is that’s probably enough. But definitely ask don’t assume people are going to even think to do it. I mean, we go to the grocery store, and most of the time when you check out they even circle it on the receipt they say please, you know, let us let management know how I did. Here’s the review like so. You know, that’s just my my quick advice there.

Carrie McCormick 9:34
And I think that’s great. And one other thing to add to that with the Zillow reviews is that if someone does leave a review or testimonial for you is you have the ability to reply and comment to that person. So I would highly recommend doing that as well you know, thanking them for the review and it shows up you know, on your testimonials that you know there’s engagement there and it also will will help I don’t know how it does but it helps kind of your stats because it’s showing engagement

D.J. Paris 10:03
yes and just to further that point you can on most review sites you can reply so Yelp is what is that way Google Facebook as well actually pretty much all of them so great point yes definitely always review if for no other reason then it lets the person who wrote the review know that you read it but yes, it also looks good and probably helps your stats. Okay guys, Kerry’s got to run to a showing in Wicker Park right now so she was so gracious to do this because she’s got 12 minutes to get to her appointment so thank you. Carrie, what’s if you have if there are any buyers sellers investors renters out there who want to work with you, how can they reach you?

Carrie McCormick 10:38
Yes, thank you. So my phone number is always the best way to call I pick up my phone all the time. 312-961-4612 But I’d also encourage everyone to check out my Instagram page I love doing some posting on Instagram. It is Carrie McCormick real estate and of course just the the regular old email Carrie at app properties.com

D.J. Paris 11:01
Yeah, if you want to see the best possible Instagram account that I’ve ever seen for a real estate professional Kerry’s got it. This is no exception. No exaggeration. Check it out. It’s amazing. So anyway, until next month. Thank you Carrie and good luck at your showing.

Carrie McCormick 11:15
Thank you guys. All right. Buh bye.

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