Real Estate Information

The Rutherford Theatre Co. is presenting Bye Bye Birdie at the First Presbyterian Church Parish House, 32 Ridge Rd, Rutherford, NJ on Friday May 18 at 8 PM, Saturday May 19 at 8 PM and Sunday may 20 at 2 PM. Reserve your seats by calling 201-575-6416 or sending an email to boxoffice@rtconj.com
to reserve your tickets. For more Info visit http://www.rtconj.com

The Rutherford Health Department is sponsoring a free skin cancer screening for Rutherford residents on Monday, June 25th at 1 PM in their offices at 184 Park Avenue. Dr. Shari Sperling will conduct the screening. Appointments are required. Call 201-460-3020 between 1 & 4 PM Monday - Friday. there are more than 700,000 cases of skin cancer diagnosed each year and 9,000 deaths annually are caused by skin cancer. Get checked!!

In other parts of the county, Zillow's Zestimates  might be accurately but in the North Jersey area, the public data that they use is so bad that there estimates have to be wrong and they are. Some are much too high but most are very low. I was looking at a house that is listed for $349,000 and in my opinion it is worth about $320,000. Zillow gives it a rediculous range of  $228,975 - $610,600 and from the range they give it a Zestimate of $305,300. When you click on the info tab you get the following disclaimer

If you are looking for a house, you should use Google Maps (www.google.com/maps) as part of your search. When you find a property that you might want to see, find it on Google Maps. If it is on a street that Google has photographed, you will be able to see a photo of the house and the neighborhood. This is a great way to find out if there is something undesirable (such as a factory) or something desirable (like a park) in the neighborhood before you look at the house.

Google has photographed entire towns in some cases and only main streets in other cases. For example, almost every street in Carlstadt, Wood-Ridge, and Lyndhurst, New Jersey has been done, but only main streets in Rutherford and East Rutherford. For example this link brings up my listing on 227 Sylvan St, Rutherford 

http://www.google.com/maps?q=227+Sylvan+Street,+Rutherford,+NJ

but you can only see it from a side angle, because Sylvan St has not been done, only E. Pierrepont Ave.

To bring up an interactive photo, click on the photo that is in the left margin of the map (if there is no photo, the area has not been done yet). To see what areas have been done on a map, click on the little man on the top left of the map and drag it into the map. Area that are done are highlighted in blue.

If you have an IPhone or an IPad, you can open the built-in Maps app, find the address and click on the little orange man on the black strip that shows the address (if there is no orange man or if it is grayed the area has not been done yet.

I found some very informative videos on IPad Maps at the following links http://ipadvideolessons.com/mapsapp/ and http://ipadvideolessons.com/mapsapp02/

Most of the items taught in these videos also work on the IPhone.

If you are interested in the listing that I show in the above map link, it can be found at www.227Sylvan.info.

There is a nice article in today's South Bergenite about me and 12 other ERA Justin Realty being trained in selling short sale and foreclosure houses. A short sale is when a home owner sells a house for less than what is owed to the mortgage holder. To do this, the mortgage holder must agree to the sale. It takes a trained professional to accomplish this successfully. Here is the link to the article

http://www.northjersey.com/realestate/broker_agent_news/138990959_Trained_Realtors_help_deal_with_foreclosures_.html?scpromo=1

There has been a tremendous improvement in the number of 1 - 4 family homes, condos and coops that have gone "Under Contract" (UC) so far this year in the South Bergen County area compared to the same period last year. Looking at South Bergen statistics, this year (according to the NJMLS) 63 properties are UC compared to 32 last year. The average days on market (DOM) is 148 compared to 132 and the average list price (ALP) is $327k compared to $338k. In Rutherford the numbers are UC 19 compared to 5, DOM 153 compared to 161, and ALP $344k compared to $370k. All of the ALPs in this data gave been rounded to the nearest thousand.

What this shows is that the real estate market is improving. Some of this improvement might be weather related because we had a lot of snow last January, but I believe most of it has to do with historically low interest rated coupled with sellers finally getting realistic with their expectations. We have had a number of listings this month that have gone under contract in less than a week and some of these have had multiple offers, because the sellers were realistic in their asking price from the beginning.

I think this is a very good sign and it it keeps up we might eventually see some price increases, but I think this is still a ways off. If you are thinking of selling but have decided to "wait for spring", you really should reconsider and take advantage of this improved market before the Spring Rush of sellers increases the competition. Remember it's supply and demand and right now supply is low compared to what we will have in a few months.

Feel free to call me with any questions on my cell 201-390-6734.

There was in article in the NY Times today about how critical Twitter is in the Presidential campaigns, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/29/us/politics/twitter-is-a-critical-tool-in-republican-campaigns.html and I was wondering if  Twitter will ever become important in selling real estate or maybe it already is and I don't know it yet lol. I can see it as a great way to get listing information out and am thinking about using it more often. Let me know your thoughts on this.

The December edition of my Rutherford NJ Real Estate podcast is now available. This month's edition covers Rutherford, NJ real estate market activity and then we'll discuss how recent market activity and low interest rates are bringing stability to one of the best real estate markets in recent history!

Features special guest Terri Murphy of US Learning.


Program length: approximately 6 minutes.

To listen click on the microphone below or click HERE

On a mobile device, use this link http://www.talkrealty.com/glennelliot/audio/ge201112.mp3

Enjoy!!

Unfortunately, this will be my final podcast because the company that produced them for me has stopped doing podcasts.

I hope you all had a nice holiday season. Happy New Year!!

The November edition of my Rutherford NJ Real Estate podcast is now available. This month's edition covers Rutherford, NJ real estate market activity and then we'll share tips to prepare your home for winter and protect against factors that cause mold.

Features special guest Terri Murphy of US Learning.


Program length: approximately 81/2 minutes.

To listen click on the microphone below or click HERE

On a mobile device, use this link http://www.talkrealty.com/glennelliot/audio/ge201111.mp3

Enjoy!!

Enjoy!!