by rtdosen | Jun 29, 2014 | Ryan Dosen Real Estate Articles
The Seven-Year Real Estate Itch By Ryan Dosen George Axelrod wrote a play that later became a famous Marilyn Monroe movie called “The Seven Year Itch.” The title and phrase were used to indicate the inclination to become unfaithful to one’s spouse after seven years of marriage. According to Wikipedia and Kiernan’s “Cohabitation in Western Europe” (1999), “statistics show that there is a low risk of separation during the first months of marriage. After the ‘honeymoon’ months, divorce rates start to increase. Most married couples experience a gradual decline in the quality of their marriage; in recent years around the fourth year of marriage. Around the seventh year, tensions rise to a point that couples either divorce or adapt to their partner.” If humans, in general, tire of their spouses after about seven years, how long does it to take them to tire of their residences and move elsewhere? How Often Do People Move? If you guessed that people leave their homes at about the same rate that they leave their significant others, you’d actually be correct. Right on pace with the seven-year relationship itch, the latest data from Keller Williams Real Estate tells us that people move an average of once every seven years. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the population of the United States is considered “highly mobile.” The latest Census numbers available also reveal that 12 percent of the population moved between 2011 and 2012. These numbers are some of the lowest ever reported for this country (dating back to 1948, when the data was first collected). The low number, from 2011, was...
by rtdosen | Jun 23, 2014 | Ryan Dosen Real Estate Articles
Latest Numbers Show Market Hitting Its Stride By Ryan Dosen TReND MLS just released its latest numbers for Chester County’s real estate market and we are seeing further confirmation that home buyers are making up for lost time during the rough winter months. While the year-to-date numbers are nothing to write home about (we’ve seen 1785 closed transactions in 2014 compared to 1961 for the same time period last year), a closer look at the numbers gives us reason to believe that we will make up some, if not all of that lost ground. Surging Toward the June Juggernaut In Chester County, June is traditionally the biggest month for single family home settled transactions. Over the past 9 years, only November of 2009 managed to eke out a (5 home) victory over the June juggernaut. During summer, the temperatures rise, and Chester County sells homes. June begins a 3-month period that usually dwarfs the rest of the year when it comes to people signing on the dotted line to buy a house. My father was a certified financial planner and he taught me the old adage for stocks that you should “sell in May and go away.” Though he did not make it a habit to dump all his securities every May and buy them back on Halloween, he told me that many people would sell their stocks for the summer and buy them back in the fall. He said that they did this because people would be on vacation, trading volume would be down, and historically, stocks just didn’t appreciate much during the summer. Many people look...
by rtdosen | Jun 13, 2014 | Ryan Dosen Real Estate Articles
Ryan Dosen and his father, Brian Dosen, in Naples, FL, circa 1979. The New Pennsylvania Real Estate Agreement of Sale By Ryan Dosen This April, the Pennsylvania Association of Realtors (“PAR”) unveiled a new standard Agreement of Sale for Pennsylvania residential real estate transactions. Calling the revisions more of a “refresher,” the PAR made several changes to the document you will use when purchasing or selling a home in Pennsylvania. Without going into too much detail, we will highlight some of the changes to the new Agreement of Sale. PAR Agreement of Sale Revisions Some changes to the Pennsylvania Agreement of Sale were subtle and did not really affect the Agreement. For instance, the PAR decided that it should add additional space on the Agreement for longer party names or additional buyers and sellers. Adding space doesn’t substantively change the Agreement. It just lets us write our agreements more legibly. A few changes reflect specific standard policy changes that the PAR has decided to incorporate into the new Agreement. Earlier versions of the Agreement had a default time of 365 days before the broker holding escrow funds could return deposit monies to a buyer. The revised language now cuts that default time period about in half to 180 days, unless otherwise agreed upon by the parties Other changes were made to reflect a changing of the times. For instance, before digital documents were commonplace, deposit checks almost always accompanied a contract and offer to purchase a property. Nowadays, many people submit contracts digitally, not allowing for the simultaneous submission of physical deposit checks. The new contract is...
by rtdosen | Jun 7, 2014 | Ryan Dosen Real Estate Articles
Spring Home Maintenance and Energy-Saving Tips By Ryan Dosen Spring is in full swing and summer is right around the corner. The mercury is rising and Mother Nature is pulling back on the free air conditioning. I’m from Florida and I’m used to 365-day-a-year air conditioning. It seems to me that we have more fresh air holdouts up here in Pennsylvania, probably due to the more forgiving temperatures. However, most of us have already started using our air conditioning units, and we’re going to be doing it more frequently in the near future. So, let’s take a quick look at some of the things that you should be doing to survive the heat without breaking the bank. Warm Air Rises, Cool Air Sinks Many of our homes are equipped with both ceiling and floor air returns. Those air returns are in place because warm air rises and cool air sinks, and we want to be able to choose which to kick out of our homes. In the winter months, we wanted to keep the heat in and the cold out. So, in winter, we needed to close our high air returns and open the lows. It’s now warming up, so don’t forget to switch your air returns. The last thing you want to do is pay to run your air conditioner and then immediately pump out the cool air. If you have a multiple-story home, you also want to adjust your vents so that the majority of the cool air is pumped to the upper levels. If you have a two-story home, you may want...
by rtdosen | Jun 1, 2014 | Ryan Dosen Real Estate Articles
Chester County’s Top 5 Most Expensive Home Sales of 2014 By Ryan Dosen In Chester County, as the temperatures rise, so too does the pace with which “For Sale” and “Sold” signs go up and come down. Most of those sales will happen in a fairly narrow price range. TReND MLS reports that the median price for homes sold in Chester County for April 2014 was $300,000. According to the Suburban West Realtors Association, around 50 percent of this year’s (nearly 1300) residential real estate transactions in Chester County took place in the $200,000-$400,000 range. But what about the 1 percent? What are they buying? TReND MLS reports that there have been 33 homes sold this year in Chester County in the seven-figure range. Just for fun, let’s take a look at top five most expensive homes sold in our county this year. Malvern, PA – $3,650,000 The most expensive home sold in Chester County so far this year was a newly-constructed 5,027 square foot masterpiece in Malvern, PA. This home sits on 8 acres and is designed to look like a significantly upgraded 1700s farmhouse. Despite having the appearance of an historic property, the home is brand new and features loads of special features and cutting-edge conveniences such as geothermal and radiant heat, a detached 3-car garage with lift, an outside kitchen, a saltwater pool, 3 fireplaces, 2 offices, a media room, a greenhouse, and just about all the modern luxury conveniences. Newtown Square, PA – $2,700,000 The Duckett Paper Mill was Chester County’s second most expensive residential closing so far for...
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