Speaker 1: Welcome to Ready, Set, Sold with your host Bryan Vogt. Are you wanting, or even thinking about, selling your house but don’t know where to start? Good thing you found Ready, Set, Sold. And now, real estate broker Bryan Vogt.
Bryan Vogt: Welcome everyone to Ready, Set, Sold. I am your host, Bryan Vogt. Thanks so much for joining us this Saturday. My goodness, it’s Autumn. It’s been Autumn now for, I guess, for a couple of weeks. Or I guess it’s Fall. I’m not quite sure. Autumn? Fall? Is that the same thing? I don’t know. Joey, you’re my producer. Is that the same thing? I really don’t know. I think they are, right? The same word?
Joey: It’s St. Louis weather, that’s all you have to know.
Bryan Vogt: St. Louis weather, I like that.
Joey: Metro East, St. Louis weather.
Bryan Vogt: Metro East, St. Louis weather. Thanks so much for that help. That’s true. So anyway, thanks so much for joining us. Enjoying the cooler weather, shall we say. For the most part. Want to talk about what we’re going to be talking about today and that brings us on to the subject we are going to be talking about, is how to be profitable in the Fall market. And maybe it would better be said as how to be the most profitable while putting your house on the market and getting the most amount of money. We’re going to be digging into that, not only in this segment but in the other segments down the road.
One of the things I do want to talk about, that I’m really excited about, is we have a special guest today. Mayor Jim Vernier of Shiloh. I’ve known him for some time now. He was actually the first person on this show. On our debut in, I think, the last weekend of May. So that was kind of cool. I asked to bring him back because we’re trying to put a series together of just talking about maybe those hidden things that people don’t know about a certain town or a city that might inspire them to, as a buyer or if you’re listening to this show, want to move to that particular area.
The Metro East as a whole is fantastic. The St. Louis Metro East area is fantastic with all the things that we have to offer. Sometimes, last week, it’s kind of funny, Mayor Mark Eckert of Belleville was talking about the hidden jewels. That this area itself has so many hidden jewels.
That’s another reason we wanted to have the mayors on, talking about their cities. Not only about for potential buyers but, again, if you’re moving from that area maybe find out that there’s another area of the same city. Shiloh, Belleville. There could be different school districts, you might move because of that. There’s various reason you why you can move but still stay in the same town, city. For work or play.
So we’re going to be talking more about that with the mayor but we’re also going to be talking about the Fall and why it’s such a great time to put your house on the market. Briefly, before I forget. I get this question at least once or twice, sometimes three times a week. And that is, “Oh, you have a radio program? How did that start?” And so to try to tell everyone again, and those loyal listeners that have been listening now from the very start.
One of those people is my Aunt Ag who lives near Keyesport/Carlyle, Illinois. She listens every week. I greatly appreciate that. But she is probably one of the most honest, nicest people I’ve ever met. Man or woman. And she told me, I found out through the grapevine, that she didn’t listen a couple a weeks ago. I was kind of like, wow. What’s going on Aunt Ag? And she kind of made up some excuse. Now, I’m not sure it was not true, but she’s going to be 99 this year.
She still has her sons with her, Tom and Jack. And there’s other family members, she has another son also. But, you know what? You miss once, you might miss a lot of things. But that’s okay. That’s okay. And, of course, I’m kidding. I’m always just flattered that she listens every week and I do greatly appreciate that.
But that brings up another topic that if you do miss a show, you miss a program, that we’re on iTunes. We’re on Google Play and we have podcasts. So, if you miss a section, if you miss a whole show, that you can go back and easily listen to whatever you needed to pick up the information that you did.
As I mentioned about being on the radio program. I get asked that often. It was a book I wrote at the end of last year, beginning of this year. Became a best seller called Ready, Set, Sold. i.e. that’s why the radio program is called Ready, Set, Sold. 12 proven steps to sell your house fast for top dollar in the St. Louis Metro East market. And the key word there is proven.
These are things that we have been, over close to two decades of being in the business, business that I absolutely love. Very passionate about. That have had great success for sellers by using these simple principles. These 12 steps to have some great success. And in the radio program we’re offering it absolutely free. All you have to do is go to readysetsold.org not dot com. readysetsold.org, not dot com, and get that book absolutely free.
Market. Market conditions are fantastic. We have not had market conditions this long, this period of time into the year, for years. And I do mean years. So if you’re even thinking about selling your house contact your agent. Maybe an agent you’ve worked with in the past. Someone that you know, like and trust. Touch base with him. See where it’s at. This is just a fantastic time to put your house on the market, not only because it’s Autumn or it’s Fall, but also because, very simply, we’ve just been having some great success. We never know when that success is going to change though. If you’ve heard or if you’ve been listening to the program at all, you’ll know that they can change in three months.
In fact, they will change one way or the other in three months. In 60 days it’s 50/50. In 30 days it’s rare, but it can change within 30 days. So if you’re making that decision, this is the time to start looking at it. If we’re talking about … I wrote the book. The radio station then heard about the book and they contacted me and they said, “Hey, do a one hour program.” And that’s, in a nutshell, how this all got going.
So, with that said, let’s delve in a little bit more what we’re going to talk about today. And that is selling in the Autumn, in the fall, whichever you want to call it. As Joey said, it’s just the St. Louis weather. That’s so true. That’s so true. I remember years ago I was playing golf in December. And I know it was December, and I know it was the middle of December because it was a Saturday and that night we were going to a Christmas party.
So, like you said … even said that, it usually doesn’t mean that you have to have 95 or 100 degree weather. That wasn’t the case there. So at least it’s much more comfortable. Maybe, at best, a sweater. And you’re not to the point now wow we get those wind chills sometimes in January and February, where we have the Eskimo hoods on. I don’t know if they’re Eskimo coats? I don’t know if they still make those or not but they have the fake fur and you put them on and you tie them down. So we’re not there either. So it’s a really great time for buyers and it’s also a great time for sellers.
What I want to do is share some tips with you on what you can do to get the most money out of the sale of your house during the Autumn. Let’s start with the outside, and I think the outside becomes really important, and that’s the leaves. You have to rake up those leaves. If you need to rake them up once, twice, three times, stay on top of that. Understanding is that that doesn’t not make the house look better, it makes the yard look better. But there’s also … buyers have a perception when they’re looking at houses, whether it’s in their conscious or subconscious, how much maintenance? How much work am I going to have to do with this house?
And the mature trees are fantastic, but if you’ve got piles of leaves, and even if they turn the colors and that’s fantastic, they’re going to be thinking about work. They’re going to be thinking about, oh my gosh. And now, since burning laws have changed so much, they also might be thinking of cost. If I’m going to have to bag the leaves and now there’s a cost factor to that. And even though it might not be much, perception is reality when it comes to real estate. And so you want to make sure those leaves, either in the front yard or in the back yard, are picked up.
The second thing that you want to talk about is this is where many … if you have trees, I’ll call acorn trees, possibly. Other trees that will drop their fruits, their acorns. I had a mulberry tree in my first house and an acorn tree and let me tell you, depending on the size of them those can be dropping down. And again, it’s that work factor. Low maintenance. You want to make sure that those things are picked up also.
So maybe the leaves are gone, but you want to make sure those spiny little mulberry things are not going to be out there, or those acorns. And I appreciate sometimes, depending on how big the acorn tree is … we had a very, very big one. That can be a little bit of a struggle but, let me tell you, it will pay off in the end when you’re showing it, when the buyers are seeing it.
So that’s from the outside there too. I think also is, if you decorate for Halloween or Thanksgiving or just for Fall, keep doing that. There’s nothing wrong with having some yellow mums. I mean, yellow mums for whatever, seems to work really well. Or, putting out some pumpkins. Or putting out some corn stalks. Or maybe a little scarecrow or whatever. Those are nice touches. I think people … Halloween in particular is the second rated day of people decorating their houses for a period of time. So don’t be afraid to do that. Those are great things that you want to do. It’s Fall. Celebrate it. And people love that. Buyers love that. They love seeing those type of things.
Those are just a few things on the outside. We’re going to have Mayor Jim Vernier this week. He’s going to be in the next two segments talking about the great city of Shiloh. And we’re going to be talking more about the inside. What you can do as far as getting top dollar for your house when you put your house on the market for the Fall.
Hey, you’re learning to Ready, Set, Sold with your host Bryan Vogt. Hey, get the book readysetsold.org not dot com. It’s free. Go get it right now.
Ready Set Sold with Bryan Vogt #21-01: Jim Vernier Mayor of Shiloh Il: Making the most profit during the Fall selling season
October 14, 2017