Looking Back on 2020

It has been way too long since my last blog post. 2020 has been an incredible, strange, paradigm shift year. If I look back at 2020 with 20/20 vision, I see a year of overcoming the fear of the unknown in April and May, riding the wave of out-of-state Buyers that has not let up, and pleading for inventory to sell. Our fears were changed to optimism and relief because we were declared an “Essential Business’. My heart goes out to all the small businesses struggling to make it through. Most business have reserves to cover 3-6 months; however, this has been going on for 10+ months. The PPP money helped small businesses and there is another release of money for those that still need it. I know I have been tipping the waiter/waitress 20+ % just to try to help them out. All of this is part of the story of 2020; however, there are so many stories to be told. Teachers and educators have been dedicated to getting the learning and subject material to their students. The extra effort of our police and fire safety people has been exemplary and greatly appreciated. All these people are part of the real estate story and like 2001 when the World Trade Center came crashing down, people left the cities to improve the quality of their lives here in Maine. This has been the “Perfect Storm” for homeowners in Maine. If you have anything you can sell this is the time to put it on the market! Sale prices are up 20% year over year in general and I have only seen this once before; in 2007 where home prices grew exponentially, and incomes went down for many in Maine. How could that be? Large sums of money are coming into the state and buying up “get away” cottages, people moving because they can work from anywhere now, and people said it is time to buy that place in Maine. If you had a chance to live on a lake or the ocean instead of being cooped up in a small apartment in NYC or Boston – what would you choose?

If you have heard of the Shiller Report, you know that it is a report that goes back to 1898 and charts real estate trends over that time to present. The take-away is that trends in real estate over the 123 years lasted 10 years and then a decline started. We started recovering for the Bank/mortgage fraud issues in 2011 and if you do the math on that it has been 10 years. If Shiller is right and the trend holds, we are nearing the end of the bubble. I do not have a crystal ball- no one does; I must say “industry experts” are saying 2021 will be even a better year in real estate. It could be if there is enough inventory to sell. If you are thinking of selling, I would like to speak with you. We are a top real estate group in Maine, and we will get every penny out of your home for you. We are dedicated to you and protecting your fiduciary rights and we take our duties seriously. I am always available to talk real estate. Real estate is a passion for me and the members of our team/group. Time will tell if I am right; however, you cannot go wrong putting your house on the market now. People are buying every day! Call me for more info.

Don

Gorgeous Sebago Lake Home!

The best of Sebago Lake, ideally situated on a peaceful, private 3 acre setting, boasting 186 feet of sandy beach, dock and moorings. The home has extraordinary entertaining space inside and out. This open-concept retreat artfully blends the interior with the natural world. Beauty and functionality describes the designer’s vision of this masterpiece home with state-of-the-art systems, top-of-the-line amenities and pristine condition. An additional waterfront lot allows this to become your own private compound! MLS#: 1290725 List Price: $1,450,000

 

Our Newest Listing in Gorham, Maine!

Country living at its best! Extraordinary pastoral setting offering 10 private acres, convenient to Portland amenities and yet is “country.” Solid home built with every detail in-mind and updates to kitchen and baths that add to the value of the cosy, quaint, traditional Cape Cod style home. Snowmobiles, hiking trails, and peaceful country road add to the life-style. Sit in front of one of your wood-burning fireplaces and enjoy the best of what this home offers.  Call/Text Lori Lavoie @ 207-713-4011 or Email @ lorilavoie@kw.com. @lorilavoie @thedonlheureux MLS#: 1319937 List Price: $375,000

 

First Time Buyers and Parents

I have the honor and privilege to mentor new agents who are on our real estate team or attend classes I volunteer to teach for new agents.  One of the questions I get often is “If there is one thing you would tell a new Buyer agent about first time Buyers, what it would be?”

There are so many things to say on this topic. It could be that you are helping someone with the biggest purchase of their lives and the responsibility that goes with that.  I could be the roller-coaster of emotions that are involved in buying a house; however, when I think of a first time buyer and the role of an agent I put on my counseling hat and start with you are going to need to be a counselor.  You are their trusted advisor, counselor, and expert.  It’s easy to be an expert- it’s called experience and knowing you don’t know everything and you need to be problem solver and solution “finder”. Sometimes you need to check your ego at the door and find an expert that knows more about septic designs, easements, and installing. It’s harder to be a counselor, it takes being a good listener and truly understanding what a client is feeling.  That said, I want to share my one thing I think agents and first time buyers need to recognize.  When a Buyer puts a home under contract and starts the process of being a home owner, you are now becoming an adult in an adult world.  This is a break from a world of being a young adult to an “adult” and the roles of parents, friend, and family change.  Parents have been comfortable with a son or daughter moving out and renting, but until now their parents could protect them from making a wrong “BIG” decision.  They were comfortable with them in the pigeon hole called a “renter”.  Suddenly they are making “big boy or girl” decisions and their parents may not be involved.  Friends who don’t own a home yet may feel threatened that their friend is moving forward into the world of adulthood before they are ready.  Friends often try to put them back into the “pigeon hole or box” because they are more comfortable with their friends being like them- renters. Siblings can also feel this way, but I find parents and friends subconsciously try to sabotage the purchase more often than family.

So what does an agent say to a first time home Buyer who has parents who are trying to protect them-especially at a building inspection?  The building inspection is often the first time parents are involved and it’s where they make their stand. The first thing I ask the agent is: are the parents right? Is it a bad decision to buy this house?  We walk away from houses that are homes that need too much work or have problems that will affect the value when they try to resell it all the time; however, when the parents are clouded by their own fears it’s up to the agent to counsel the Buyer. I say, “John, your parents mean well, but they are stuck in a paradigm that they are comfortable with- buying a house is a huge symbol of your independence and that they no longer control your decisions.  That’s scary for them and they just want to put you back into that box where you are safe.”  Now don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of parents who encourage their children to a buy house or invest in property, but the purpose of this article is focus on the one thing that I find is the biggest hurdle that I see in helping first time buyers purchase a home.  Counseling skills are so important and observing behavior is as well.  Our job is to advise our clients and it is our clients who decide what they think is best for them. Pointing out the strong emotions that are involved and talking about them helps the client have a better understanding of the dynamics of parent involvement in the process.

In my next Blog I will discuss the “Mac and Cheese every night” counseling session I have with my first time Buyers.  That’s probably the first counseling session I have with my Buyers.  That said, there’s more than one thing I would tell an agent when asked what is the “One Thing”.

Dirt Road Desire

Ride with me.

Fatigue hung around my shoulders on a recent Friday night yet I collected my boots, left the company of the wood stove, and prepared for a social engagement with clients. See, Dave and Paula were loving their new house and wanted to share design and furnishing touches with Nicole and I.

Beautiful stuff, and a true reward for this career in real estate, yet I was uncertain my energy could match the occasion.

But something happened during the ride that allowed me to catch a second wind and savor the evening. The branches of hardwood trees bowed toward the center of the road, like a tunnel, or mother nature’s regal courtesy. Pavement turned to gravel, our tires felt more secure in the falling snow, and light flakes traipsed in March’s late winds.

Briefly I thought of Christmas, child-like. And isn’t a new home the biggest Christmas present of all? I held Nicole’s hand, we helped these folks and they are happy I thought to myself.

Dave and Paula met us at the door, our earlier business-hand-shakes now traded for hugs, and the couple beamed with satisfaction and pride, comfortable and at ease in their new environs.

My eyes traced their elegant home and caught subtle changes: the elegant mirror by the wet-bar, the New England art on the south facing well, the shade of the new couches near the fireplace. Inviting.

Our one hour visit turned to three as we talked about life, kids, writing, and back country ski plans for the following winter. While I know Congress Street, Ocean Avenue, Stevens Ave and Forrest Ave too, I traded those streets for deep woods, farm-country, and mountains decades ago.

If you are seeking the quiet of a Western Maine get-away, I can help. We’ll likely discuss fishing and family before we begin on real estate, but I love these hills and lakes and I feel the topography of this part of the world in my bones.

I can get you here. Glad to be on board.

Ryan (207) 462-3874

 

Our New Blog is Finally Here!

I have been wanting to start this blog for years and finally we’ve started it!  There are so many “Chic” restaurants, breathing taking views, unknown natural wonders in Maine. There are so many places I have visited as a Register Maine Guide and outdoorsman  over the past 60 + years I have lived here as a “Mainer”. I want to share my experiences and places that most people will never experience living here simply because they are kept secret or at least forgotten on purpose. I’ll share some of those places in Maine that I have discovered like the Allagash Waterway or Grand Falls on The Dead; but most of all I will share trends in Maine Real Estate because real estate is “local”.  We can predict a “shift” in real estate in Maine from the National  Sales Report numbers and indicators, the rate changes in the Ten Year Bond, but we can also see Micro and Macro trends in Maine real estate as well as from what’s happening in Cumberland/York Counties compared to the rest of the state.

That said, today’s topic is the deregulation of banks’ lending practices and the products I see lenders offering again.  I am a student of history, one of my majors in college was history and if I learned one thing it was that history will repeat itself. Now that can be a positive thing or maybe a negative thing, but it will repeat itself.  I meet with banks and mortgage brokers on a regular basis. I’m always being called and ask to meet for coffee. Two weeks ago I met with a lender who I haven’t done business with in the past and he reviewed his new products he was offering.  He had the usual products, but he pulled out this flyer and said , “this product allows cash to be used, we don’t need two years of employment status, and money can be gifted.” I said to him, “Isn’t that a no doc. loan?”  The interesting part of that was Buyers could use cash. I can not remember non- verification of funds for a loan during the past 16 years I’ve been a Real Estate Broker.  This wasn’t the first time I have had red flags on financing in the past year or so.  Back in September, a client wanted to use an online lender and one of the biggest in the industry.  When we called to get a pre-qualification letter, the mortgage agent basically said the way he “qualified the Buyer” was he ask them how much the made on W-2s and plugged in their credit score directly into the Fannie Mae website and “presto” they were qualified.  When I said, “isn’t that a “NO DOC” loan. He said, “Don, they are well qualified and we hold the note on their primary residence”.  Granted, these clients owned a Brownstone in Boston somewhere in the $1 million  range; however this is how banks and people got in trouble when Clinton (not to get political here) said in 1996 that we want “80 % on Americans to own their own homes”.  Well, the deregulation of banks and lending due to the new regulations caused the mess to happen and it was primarily due to “No Doc” loans.  What are “No Doc loans”?  Documentation of income was not required to get a loan sold on the secondary market with these high risk loans that were basically sold to hedge funds, and large banks, and investment companies, etc.  If you haven’t seen the movie “The Big Short” pull it up on Netflix.

I’m proud to say during that period from 2007-2011 I did not have a client go through foreclosure. In Maine, the problem wasn’t as bad as California, Nevada, and Florida due to the solid local banks we have here in Maine and our culture in general.  I think as we enter into this period where lending seems to be very “relaxed” it is important to ask our clients a question that I have asked my clients since the beginning; especially young first time home buyers: ” Sally and Jeff, if you buy this house, the questions is do you have enough income to go out and have fun? Will you be able to have dinner with friends?  Will you be able to put gas in your car?  Will you be able to go to the movies?  You see, I ask you this because you’re going to want to do these things and if you can’t afford it- it will stress out your relationship, make you use that credit card, and put so much pressure on you that it will be a mess.  “House Rich and Cash Poor” just doesn’t work.  So I ask you again, “Do you have enough income to support your lifestyle?” If they say said or they say they can handle it – I’ve done my job. You see, those same clients who were in their 20s are now in their 30 and 40s and I have helped them sell and buy their next “Dream House”.  Our goal should always be to look out for our clients’ best interests and create clients for life.  I what my clients to know that I want to be their “Real Estate consultant” for life.

There may be a place for the loan I mentioned with no documentation of cash or employment; I can think of a few honest people who work in a cash business that it may benefit;  it may be a legitimate product, but we seem to forget the history on banking and lending.  I think as a real estate professional, we need to educate our clients and point them in the direction of other real estate professionals like attorneys, trusted loan officers, bankers, and other real estate service professionals that will help them navigate though the process of being home owners.  I have loved this business and there’s nothing better than helping someone with the biggest purchase in their life time.  I hope this stimulates some questions and thoughts.

Photo credit: http://www.stuff.co.nz/entertainment/film/77357815/oscars-2016-the-significance-of-props-in-this-years-best-picture-nominees

 

 

Who Else Loves Real Estate?

Have you ever bought a home? Sold a home? Do you rent right now and aspire to one day be a homeowner? Are you a rookie or a house-hunting pro? Do you love Real Estate? Are you just starting your house-hunting journey? Maybe you have some housing victories or perhaps a few hiccups along the way? Well, all of us at The Don L’Heureux Real Estate Group love all-things Real Estate.  At the Housing Lounge, we want to dish about all things Housing.  Welcome! Grab your beverage of choice, a comfy seat and get ready as we share local neighborhood information, stats and tips of course, local news and events, listings, housing trivia…you get the picture, right? We want to share our passion, knowledge and experience with the world! Yes, the world…too much? I don’t think so…