Posts Tagged “declutter”
As you age, you may want to see you children enjoy the wealth you anticipate leaving them upon your death. Especially at a time when many young families are barred from entering the housing market due to low housing inventories and high prices in many Canadian cities, parents may want to offer a helping hand to home ownership. Transferring property to children or buying property for them can eradicate resources you might need in your retirement while having costly tax consequences for you or them if you do not proceed carefully and in line with the tax codes. Current economic times call for creative housing solutions.
Perils Of Real Estate Transfer To Children
With the best of intentions, parents who own real estate decide to transfer 50% or more of the ownership to their house to their kids in hopes of avoiding inheritance taxes or probate fees. When the property is the principal residence for the parent, they may escape tax liability, but the children may be taxed on the appreciation for their percentage. Canadian taxing authorities consider the transfer as a partial sale.
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In some cases, a tax advisor might recommend this transfer so as to let the kids receive the full benefit of increasing values, but when the children pay the tax, they are in effect pre-paying tax that may be greater than had the house not transferred until the parents’ death.
Co-Ownership Options
An increasing popular way to effectively share property use is through co-ownership, where multiple generations own it or even occupy it. This can take several forms.
The most traditional is buying the home together. When the parent co-invest simple to help their children obtain a mortgage, the owners may have to pay capital gains when the place is sold. If the parents want to gift their contribution, they can have their tax advisor set up a trust for their interest that will ultimately go to the child.
For some families, sharing the same space is a workable approach to co-ownership. In a single-family home, there is mixed of personal areas and shared space that works well for many families. Increasingly, this is taking the form of sharing separate spaces on the same property.
The property may have an income suite on the upper or lower level, or the home may be constructed as a duplex. There may be a secondary suite on the property that this a small, self-contained homes that might be called granny flats or granny pods, coach houses, laneway houses, garden suites, or guest houses.
Advantages Of Secondary Units
This arrangement has several advantages:
– Building the home can be much less expensive than building separate houses on two lots.
– The small dwelling can be a first residence for a small, young family or a down-sized home for the parents. As the needs of each segment of the family changes, the families can swap residences.
– The arrangement keeps grandparents nearby to assist with their grandchildren, while allowing grown children a convenient way to keep track of aging parents.
– When the family no longer needs or wants to share the property, the unit can be rented out as income property.
If you are looking to buy or sell a house with a space that can be an income unit or separate space for parents or children, call me today. If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Position Your Halifax Home Competitively For Resale. Planning on selling your home because you are downsizing or retiring and moving to a senior community? You may want to upgrade your home a bit so that you can position your Halifax home competitively for resale. The question is, what types of renovations should you make to position your home competitively in the Real Estate Market.
Don’t Improve Your Home Beyond Values In Your Neighborhood
If your home looks shabby because you fell behind on normal maintenance, you may need to make repairs to sell it and make it appealing to buyers. Beyond that, your goal in fixing up your home is to make it comparable or slightly better than other Halifax homes in your neighborhood.
Do not make it too high for the neighborhood values. If you live in a neighborhood of $150,000 homes, prospective buyers will be unwilling to pay $250,000 because of upgrades you did. Your home will be competing with other homes in your neighborhood so don’t overprice your home.
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Improvements That May Not Increase Value
Realtors warn against investing in specific improvements if you hope to recoup your investment. These include:
Extensive landscaping
Having a manicured lawn and beautiful plantings will make your home a magnet for buyers while not increasing the selling price. If your outside needs work before you sell, pay to have your property made neat and appealing. Don’t overdo your landscaping so much that potential buyers feel they might need a gardener to maintain it.
New carpeting
Ripping up worn carpeting and replacing it may give your home a quick facelift, but buyers don’t want carpeting. Hardwood floors are in vogue, as many consumers regard carpeting as unsanitary and full of chemicals. Carpeting your home with inexpensive carpeting will not suit many buyers and the Halifax Buyers may not like the color or style.
Hidden improvements
If you replace your plumbing or electrical lines, you benefit buyers with upgraded mechanical systems. Buyers expect the basics to be in good working order, you cannot expect to recoup your investment for maintenance upon sale.
Upscale improvements
Stone counters, spa bathrooms, and stainless appliances are appealing buyers may not want to pay extra to have them. These are improvements for you to make to increase your own enjoyment while you are living in the house. They might not bring you a return on your investment at a sale. In upscale neighborhoods, many of these features are standard. Upgrading to match other homes in the neighborhood will not put you in a position to command more than market value.
Consult A Real Estate Professional Before Making Improvements
If you are thinking of selling your home, the best way to determine which improvements will benefit resale value is to give me a call. While you can do research on your own about the area, I can shortcut the process for you, based on my knowledge of area and neighborhood comparables.
If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Planning Your Best Real Estate Move
Throughout Canada, particularly in Toronto, house prices are out of sight, which makes it favorable for sellers and challenging for buyers. In Nova Scotia, prices have been falling, while sales have been rising. As a Halifax resident ready sell your home as part of a retirement strategy, what should you do?
The Housing Situation In Nova Scotia
Due to a low inventory of available homes, prices in Toronto for single-family detached homes have skyrocketed by 27% in November, 2015 as compared to last year. This puts first time buyers and even those trying to downsize in a difficult situation. In Halifax, housing prices have dropped by 4.67% in the past year, while home sales have increased by 19%.
The area remains fairly affordable although affordability varies by neighborhood. Pricing in Dartmouth,. for example, is vastly different than in Halifax South, which makes it harder to find a home in a more affordable area than in a more exclusive one.
Planning Your Best Real Estate Move
What should you do might vary depending on whether you are a Baby Boomer planning ahead for retirement or a retired person ready to sell your home to downsize to a smaller home or become a renter in an apartment complex or assisted living?
Given the peculiarities of the Halifax market, you should call me, a seasoned Realtor®, early in the game. I can show you the comparable sales figures for different areas of the city and help you assess your chances of selling and devise a pricing strategy for you.
You may also want to bring your financial advisor in on the discussions fairly early in your thought process. There are no certainties in the real estate market. If you are ready to make a move now, you may be able to add a lower price than you might have hoped. Your advisor might suggest that you wait out the cycle in hopes that prices will rise if you are a baby Boomer in your fifties or a retiree in good health with no urgency to move.
What Are Your Post-Retirement Plans?
What you do depends on what your plans are. If you are ready to buy another home in the Halifax region, you may get a deal as a buyer that offsets the compromises you might have to make as a seller. If your plans involve buying in another province, you may be caught up in the higher price cycle seen throughout Canada, your advisors might tell you to hold off
If you do want to move now, having a correct pricing strategy in place is important to ensure that you receive the maximum price for your house. I can help you price your home so that even after negotiation, you get the most you can. I can even advise you as to improvements you might make to get the best value.
Whether you are buying or selling or both – I am happy to help you fulfill your housing plans in 2017.
If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
For many seniors, the recent holidays have meant opening up your big family home to family and friends who flocked in to enjoy your Christmas or Hanukkah treats, exchange gifts, watch sports ,and enjoy each other. If you are thinking of downsizing, you may be nostalgic about this possibly being your last holiday season in your home. Even if you are staying put, you may not be up to hosting the holidays as you age. Great things are ahead for you, but now is time to talk with your family about how to make future holidays just as festive.
Meaningfully Trim Down Your Decorations
Whether you are looking toward assisted living, buying a new home, or renting an apartment you are likely to have less space for holiday decorations. In moving from one place to another it is also possible that even if you moved somewhere with the same square footage, all the decoration you used would not fit the same in your new space.
Make this the year you part with some of your favorite decorations and let your children and grandchildren include them in their own celebrations. You will have the triple benefit of making them happy, being able to see something familiar when you visit their homes, and have less to move.
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“Preparing to Downsize” Report
Share Hosting Duties
If you have not already shifted the hosting duties for holiday dinner to others in the family now is the time to plan for it. Even if you have a crew of helpers who come in to help you get things ready, it is still stressful to always play host. When you talk about this with your family, you may find that your children or other relatives will step up to take turns with dinners. You might plan some future holiday gathering at a restaurant or in the club or party room of your new apartment.
Part of your holiday hospitality may have included putting up relatives at your home. This might not work out If you have a small new place. Even paying part of a guest’s hotel bill is less costly than staying in a home that is too big for you.
Discuss The Future
The holidays may be the first time that you speak honestly with your children – or they with you – about your decision to move, or even your need to do so. This discussion is a good time to determine what you need to do to get the house ready to sell. Even without talking to me, as your Realtor®, about upgrades that will make your home command a better price, you can consider the obvious decluttering, cleaning, repair, and freshening up that needs to happen. With plenty of advance notice, you can determine what family members can do and what needs to be hired out.
After your preliminary discussions with your family, the next move after the holidays is to call me. As an agent who loves to work with Baby Boomers and seniors, I can help you sell your current Halifax-area home and even buy a new one.
Looking to sell your home? Give me a call today.
Find out what homes in your neighborhood are selling for. Free monthly report by email showing current listings, recent sales & market stats. Go to www.HalifaxHomebeat.com
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Ready to retire and sell your home? Pricing it correctly is important to getting the most money from it, but determining the value can be a challenge. If you have lived in your home for a long time, kept it in good shape, and even upgraded it, you may not have a realistic view of its value.
Avoiding The Taj Mahal Syndrome
Many homeowners are afflicted with the Taj Mahal Syndrome, the misguided belief that their home is much better than similar homes. Often, they make this assessment based on factors that do not equate to increased value. For example, owners may look back over their years in the home and remember the years they raise their children there. They let emotional factors inflate the value to others, which leads to overpricing.
In preparing to sell their home, many people clean and paint it and undertake renovations to make the place more inviting to potential buyers. Sometimes what they spend money on repairs and maintenance items that they should have done periodically over the years. Repairing peeling paint and cracked bathroom tile and faucets are necessary to bring the house up to basic standards and local codes, but these things are not renovation costs that can be passed on to new buyers.
Improving a home with upgraded windows, remodeled kitchens, and new flooring does not usually result in a dollar for dollar increase equal to what you expend. While real estate shows on TV often show that putting money for renovations results in increased value, studies conducted on the resale value of improvements shows a varying rate of return that is always far less than 100%.
Using Professional Home Valuation Tools
Real estate agents and appraisers traditionally use “comps,” comparable values of other homes in the neighborhood, to help determine the value and subsequent best price for your property. By going into information found on the local MLS, the professional can see how much other homes of similar size, condition, and location sold for.
The assumption is that the value of a home is what others are willing to pay for it. Comps do not take in mind any unique attributes that your house might offer. An extra bedroom, a larger footprint, a remodeled kitchen, a big garage, and other amenities impact might what buyers are willing to pay. In addition, a home located in a popular neighborhood with a great school system at a time when no other properties are available might bring in increased price.
Online Tools Lack A Realtor’s® Touch
With the rise of the Internet, individual sellers have access to many online tools just by plugging in information about their home. In addition, some real estate sites provide estimates of value, while offering information about other homes sold in the neighborhood.
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“Preparing to Downsize” Report
While any of these tools can offer you a ballpark idea of your home’s value, you need the expertise of a professional to provide the insights – and the honesty – that will lead to the most accurate pricing. I am always happy to look at your home, evaluate its condition, and measure it to other homes for sale or that have recently sold in your neighborhood.
I will devise a proper pricing strategy and when necessary, encourage you to be realistic about the likely price your home will command. While it will be your decision as to how much to list it for, pricing your home too high may delay its sale. When you are selling so you can run to the next chapter of your life, I will help you price pricing it accurately in hopes you will yield a fast, fair sale.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
Realtor’s® Tips To Increase The Show ability Of Your Home
Thinking about selling your home? You may have decided, after years of home ownership that you want to start fresh as you enjoy your retirement. Before your home hits the market, it is important to do some decluttering to make it attractive to potential buyers.
Over the years, your home has been your castle. One advantage of owning a castle is that you can decorate it however you like. When it is time to sell your home, you need to divest it of anything that might turn buyers off from thinking that it could be their home.
Realtor’s® Tips To Increase The Show ability Of Your Home
Here are some suggestions that most real estate agents offer to their clients:
- Remove extra or oversized furniture to make your home look more spacious. Moving is a good time to consolidate your possessions, donate what you don’t need, and replace some worn out items. For items that will go to your new house, consider renting a storage unit for a couple months. If you have oversized furniture that you think will work in your new home, send that to the storage unit and rent some pieces on a smaller scale, as you will see on The Property Brothers and other TV home phones.
- Eradicate clutter from your home to again maximize space. Make sure that there is a place for everything, while throwing out or donating what you don’t need. Consider using your storage unit to store items you need that do not require for daily life.
- Depersonalize your home. This means removing family pictures that can distract potential buyers. While a photo or two might make your place seem homey, photo walls can tell a story to buyers that makes them interested in your family and prevents them from seeing your home as one that potentially might theirs.
- Store your collectibles. Your train set might be distracting, while your extensive collection of teapots might make your home seem too cluttered. Since you will be dismantling these things when you move, get an early start by packing them up and taking the boxes to your storage unit, if necessary.
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- Take down your sports memorabilia. That wall in your den that shows your loyalty to the Toronto Blue Jays or local team such as the Halifax Rainmen could offend a potential buyer with loyalty to a different team. Sports rivalries run deep and you don’t want to infuriate potential buyers.
- Minimize the presence of pets. While you should have pets contained, preferably off the property during home showings, you do not want buyers to be knocked over with pet smells, see an abundance of pet dishes or toys, or see evidence of pet damage. You may need to replace a stained, smelly rug or carpet or curtains full of snags from rambunctious kittens and sand and refinish doors and window sills that show signs of bites and scratches.
- Remove anything controversial. This might include mounted animal heads, art, photographs that contain nudity, or flags or posters that might be interpreted as racist or offensive to others.
Enlist An Impartial Third Party To Evaluate Your Home
While you might feel that you are hiding who you are by depersonalizing your home, it is important to remember that it is your house, not your lifestyle or personal preferences, that are up for grabs. Since it can be hard to objectively view your home, chat with your Realtor® Roy Thomas or with a stager who can help you get your home ready to show effectively.
If you are ready to sell your home for maximum value, the best place to start is by clicking here and scheduling an appointment.
Roy Thomas SRES® (Senior’s Real Estate Specialist) is a REALTOR® with Sutton Group Professional Realty. Since 1991, Roy specializes in helping retirees with their later in life real estate transactions. Call Roy at 902-497-3031 or contact Roy here
