Topic: As Valley home market cools, emotions heat up (Read 194 times)
Cindy Guest
As Valley home market cools, emotions heat up « Thread Started on Jul 30, 2006, 8:52pm »
How's it going? I read an interesting article in the Arizona Republic today... "As Valley home market cools, emotions heat up" Anyone read it? The market's got some sellers on the verge of loosing it. It was quiet interesting... Here it is:
The Arizona Republic Jul. 30, 2006 12:00 AM
Real estate agent Neil Brooks was getting the feeling that his client was about to completely lose it. He'd seen it before.
He had just broken some bad news about her house deal, and she wasn't taking it well. She was pacing, yelling and swearing at him, tossing a cellphone from hand to hand.
"I was thinking, 'OK, here we go,' " said Brooks, who's with Century 21 Arizona Foothills. "Something's going to happen. Something's going to blow." advertisement
He was right. The client whirled suddenly and whipped the phone at him. But he was ready. He ducked, and the phone shattered against the wall behind him. The client stormed out of the house.
Brooks wasn't mad, and he wasn't offended. The business of buying and selling houses provokes extreme emotional outbursts. The stress, the financial worries, the personal feelings people have about their homes - sometimes it's too much to take. People yell, they lose sleep, they cry, they're stricken with buyer's and seller's remorse.
That's especially true these days in metropolitan Phoenix's post-boom housing market, where nearly everything has reversed since last year's frenzy. The number of homes for sale on the Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service increased nearly four times from June 2005 to last month, when it hit a level nearly double what experts consider healthy. Last year, homes sold in about three weeks. Now, it's about triple that.
Some of the post-boom market figures are closer to historic Valley norms, but many homeowners had their assumptions of what a house is worth and how quickly it should sell recalibrated by the buying craze.
The rising angst of buyers and sellers cracks back on agents, who are paid to stay cool and steer their clients away from bad decisions. It's not always easy. Real estate schools in many cases don't teach people how to counsel distraught customers but, increasingly, agents have to do that. Some deals take on the mood of an afternoon TV talk show.
"I feel like the Dr. Phil of real estate," said Brett Barry of Realty Executives in the northeast Valley. "I give my clients hugs. This is much more emotional now than any time of the 15 years that I've been in the business."
Pressure is wearing Holly and Aaron Mueller have gotten a taste of both sides of the market, along with some extreme swings of emotion. They went from the elation of a big windfall profit and financial security to the non-stop stress of a house in another state that won't sell, two mortgages and forced changes in their lifestyle and employment.
The couple paid $218,000 for their northeast Valley home in 2002 and sold it for $399,000 - $10,000 over asking price - last year. That was a profit of $181,000.
They moved to a $373,000 house on an acre in the north Valley. The Minnesota natives spent $60,000 for things like a block wall surrounding the property, shutters and landscaping, mistakenly figuring the rising housing market would more than reward them when they sold. "We thought we were doing pretty well," said Aaron, a Honeywell electrical engineer. "We wanted to move back to Minnesota. My wife was pregnant. We wanted to be near family."
His job transfer came this spring. With the help of a credit line on the Phoenix house, they bought a $495,000 house in a Minneapolis suburb. They put the Phoenix house on the market for $760,000 in March. Three price reductions later, it still hasn't sold at $650,000, which is $60,000 below its appraised value. The couple pays about $5,000 a month for their four mortgages - a first and second on each house. Holly, a nutritionist, wanted to stay home after having the baby but is looking for a job. Money is tight, and stress is high.
Asked what he was going to do, Aaron said, "Pray."
The financial pressure is wearing. The new house needs landscaping but that would be an extravagance. So the dog tracks in mud. And the Phoenix house needs maintenance, and it's racking up utility bills.
"It's on your mind every day," Aaron said. "Every time the phone rings, you hope it's the Realtor saying, 'Your house sold.' As far as doing things like vacations, we can't spend the money. We'll be fine. We talk a lot. We have a good relationship. It's just stressful."
Re: As Valley home market cools, emotions heat up « Reply #1 on Aug 1, 2006, 12:29pm »
I'll say their loosing it, that was quite an interesting article... I wouldn't want to be a Real Estate Agent right now. I don't think I would of taken it so lightly if somebody through their sell phone at me...
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