Diane G Real Estate

Touching just a little bit on the outdoor lighting options out there is not enough, it needed another post.  One thing that you need to remember whenever you are dealing with outdoor lighting is the fact that gold is out.  Gold is a color that used to be extremely popular but now, it is actually out and blacks and silvers are in.

If your home is a neutral color like white or even beige, you definitely will want to stick with blacks and silvers, as they will really work well with your homes color, but if your home is an unusual color, you may want to investigate a little bit.

Another option for outdoor lighting that is becoming very popular is tree lighting, as this creates some great night-time focal points around your yard!

Improving your curb appeal of your home is something that many people do not even think about when they are looking to sell their home, however it is important.  Curb appeal is what will actually attract the consumers to your home and honestly, it is something that will get their foot in the door so that you can sell them on everything that your home has to offer.

Outdoor lighting is by far one of the best ways to improve the curb appeal of your home and in the next few blogs; we are going to talk about some of the trends in outdoor lighting that seems to be popping up.

Solar lights are certainly something that are popping up everywhere but by far, the color lights and orbs are something that are very popular in the way of outdoor lighting right now.  More in the next blog people!

The reason that this is such risky business is that because you – as the home owner have insurance and your renter does not, you are now responsible for them.  The reason is because they are under your home and under your roof.  A lot of landlords nowadays are not even allowing their tenants to rent without renter’s insurance.

This should certainly be your policy as well, as they can definitely sue you for the damages that they reap if they do injure themselves.  For my fall … I am fine, I am not going to sue but from now on – I am going to ensure that I get renters insurance so things like this are covered.

Stats have shown that over 58% of renter’s do not have insurance … that needs to change and it all starts with you!

In this blog, we have talked a lot about real estate and the market itself and we have also given you tips and tricks as a real estate agent as well as a buyer or renter.  With that being said, we are now going to talk about something very, very important … home insurance.

If you are a landlord and you are renting out to someone either a room or even an entire apartment, you might want to ensure that they do have renter’s insurance.  This can actually really harm you if they do not have renter’s insurance.

Recently … as of Sunday actually, I fell down the stairs of my rental home.  Now – I personally do not have renter’s insurance.  If I wanted to, because I am not covered and the landlords are – I can actually sue them because I fell down the stairs.  Now … I am not going to do that because I am fine, but what would happen if you weren’t fine?  More on this in the next blog!

Now that we have talked a little bit about what you should be doing with your tenants and how you should be meeting them face-to-face whenever possible, let’s move onto the rental application.  This is a piece of paper similar to a resume for the prospective renter and I can promise that if you evaluate it right, you are going to find the ideal tenant.

One of the first things that you need to do once you get the application is call of the past landlords that the tenant has had.  That way, you can make sure that the tenant has a good rental history, as that is what is going to be key whenever you are trying to get someone to rent something that belongs to you.

You always want to make sure that they are going to take care of it and you want to ensure that they are going to respect it.  Next, check their credit – do they pay their bills on time?  These are key things here.

If you are a brand new landlord, I can promise that you are going to have not only a lot of questions but you truly lack the experience that a lot of other landlords might have, therefore you might not know what a good tenant looks like versus a bad one.  Well, that is what we are here for and I can promise that there are a lot of different tenants out there for you to choose from.

Firstly, you always want to make sure that you meet the tenants in person.  You never want to rent to someone that you have not met or at the very least talked to do an extended period of time on the phone.  It is hard to find people to just come in and look at your space, but truly, you want to try to get as many people in as possible to see the place that you are trying to rent.

In the next blog, we will talk about how you can evaluate your rental applications and what the process is to truly find the right tenants for you!

One of the very first things that you want to make sure that you do when you are trying to overcome your fear of cold calling is taking stock of yourself and your skills.  You want to list all of the things that you can do for the person that you are calling, list all of the qualities that make up you, as a person and make you the person the prospect should work with.

Next, you want to make sure that you list all of the benefits of working with you.  You always want to make sure that you keep these lists right by the phone so that way you can tell any prospects them without hesitating at all.

Finally, you want to make sure that you take the first step and pick up the phone – it is the hardest step but once you pick up the phone, you will feel better.

With the way that the economy is right now, in the real estate business, we are all going to face some sort of fear when it comes to cold calling.  When you are real estate agents, you are in the sales business and while not all sales businesses are about dealing with making call daily, this particular business is.

In the game of real estate, you need to make sure that you are generating brand new business and you are gaining more and more prospects in order to meet your quarterly quota.  Well, you do that by calling on prospects and that can be difficult.

In the next couple blogs, we are going to talk about how you can overcome the fear of cold calling and how you can generate more and more business for yourself.

Still, where do you start finding successful real estate agents? Actually, one of the best sources you will be able to find is your friends, your family members, your colleagues, your acquaintances: the people you already know, in other words.

Find people who have worked with real estate agents in the area. They will be able to give you a solid recommendation, whether good or bad. Remember, you want an agent who is highly professional, who knows who to be aggressive, who has the killer instincts.

Checking out real estate agencies with good funding can be helpful as well, because they tend to have high standards for the agents who work there.

An agency with published standards is even better, because then you can find out what you are getting into well ahead of time.

When you are in the market (ha ha, forgive the slight pun) for a real estate agent, your best bet is to look for a successful one. Check around the neighborhoods you are interested in, and see which real estate agents seem to have had the most success with selling homes in that area. Typically, there were will two or three agents who are doing a lot of the selling — and closing — in the area.

Another sure sign of a successful real estate agent is the number of houses he or she has listed; the more listings, the better. For that matter, real estate agents who have full page ads also tend to be more successful.

Naturally, you want the most successful real estate agent you can find. For that reason, sorry to say, you may want to stay away from agents who only do the job on a part time basis.