Curious about how the end of the school year affects real estate trends? Join us as Mark Chaknos steps in for Pete Heim and shares insights on what he's seeing as the Broker of our company. We kick things off with some fun banter and then dive into the nitty-gritty of how the end of the school year shakes up the housing market. Homes priced at $350,000 and below are flying off the shelves, while higher price points have slowed a bit. We also look at the role of interest rates, the possibility of future rate cuts, and how these factors impact affordability and market dynamics.
Ever wondered why more home buyers are skipping inspections, or how deposit releases can turn into legal headaches? This episode covers those hot-button issues and more. We explore the surge in rental prices, the boom in multifamily apartment constructions, and why real estate is becoming a favorite long-term investment. Mark also provides valuable tips for agents on navigating the tricky waters of deposit releases in real estate transactions. Don’t miss out on this informative and entertaining discussion, and remember to catch our show every Thursday at 7 pm on various platforms!
"Definitely great to hear a broker's point of view on the market and common conflicts between buyer's and seller's in today's market. Many buyers have been waiving inspections during this Super Seller Market. I asked Mark if he's seeing an uptick in disgruntled buyers months after settlement... Tune in for his answer!" - Brad Weisman
--- Welcome to The Brad Weisman Show (formerly known as Real Estate and YOU), where we dive into the world of real estate, real life, and everything in between with your host, Brad Weisman! 🎙️ Join us for candid conversations, laughter, and a fresh take on the real world. Get ready to explore the ups and downs of life with a side of humor. From property to personality, we've got it all covered. Tune in, laugh along, and let's get real! 🏡🌟 #TheBradWeismanShow #RealEstateRealLife #realestateandyou Credits - The music for my podcast was written and performed by Jeff Miller.
Curious about how the end of the school year affects real estate trends? Join us as Mark Chaknos steps in for Pete Heim and shares insights on what he's seeing as the Broker of our company. We kick things off with some fun banter and then dive into the nitty-gritty of how the end of the school year shakes up the housing market. Homes priced at $350,000 and below are flying off the shelves, while higher price points have slowed a bit. We also look at the role of interest rates, the possibility of future rate cuts, and how these factors impact affordability and market dynamics.
Ever wondered why more home buyers are skipping inspections, or how deposit releases can turn into legal headaches? This episode covers those hot-button issues and more. We explore the surge in rental prices, the boom in multifamily apartment constructions, and why real estate is becoming a favorite long-term investment. Mark also provides valuable tips for agents on navigating the tricky waters of deposit releases in real estate transactions. Don’t miss out on this informative and entertaining discussion, and remember to catch our show every Thursday at 7 pm on various platforms!
"Definitely great to hear a broker's point of view on the market and common conflicts between buyer's and seller's in today's market. Many buyers have been waiving inspections during this Super Seller Market. I asked Mark if he's seeing an uptick in disgruntled buyers months after settlement... Tune in for his answer!" - Brad Weisman
--- Welcome to The Brad Weisman Show (formerly known as Real Estate and YOU), where we dive into the world of real estate, real life, and everything in between with your host, Brad Weisman! 🎙️ Join us for candid conversations, laughter, and a fresh take on the real world. Get ready to explore the ups and downs of life with a side of humor. From property to personality, we've got it all covered. Tune in, laugh along, and let's get real! 🏡🌟 #TheBradWeismanShow #RealEstateRealLife #realestateandyou Credits - The music for my podcast was written and performed by Jeff Miller.
Speaker 1:
from real estate to real life and everything in between the brad weisman show and now your host brad weisman.
Speaker 2:
All right, we're back for another show super excited, you know, every month we have this amazing person that comes on the show. Uh, his name is pete heim and he is here today with us again to go over real estate stuff in depth. So, pete, how are you doing?
Speaker 1:
I'm doing great. Thanks, brad, for having me on Hugo is something different with Pete.
Speaker 3:
He looks fit, he looks very fit, Very fit.
Speaker 2:
Oh my God, it's Mark. So we have some good news and some bad news. The bad news is Pete's not here.
Speaker 3:
Yeah.
Speaker 2:
The good bad news is pete's not here. Yeah, the good news is, mark chakras is here and we didn't kill him this, actually and we did not kill him. That is not his head. We did not kill him, it's. It's definitely a cut out. Yeah, it's, it's. It looked really real, though. I'll tell you, yeah, it looked really real. So welcome to the show, mark.
Speaker 1:
Thanks it's been a little bit how's your coffee?
Speaker 2:
the coffee's great. That's good. That's good. It's weird he's drinking coffee in the evening. That's really strange, right it's funny.
Speaker 1:
I feel like I'm on a talk show, because on the talk shows they always say you know they get a coffee or something like that, do you? Think that's what they're drinking, or is it just water?
Speaker 2:
I think sometimes it's just water. Yeah, I think it's all fake. You know, they said that Dean Martin actually did not drink. Did you ever?
Speaker 1:
hear about that.
Speaker 2:
No, that when you thought he was drinking, it was actually not whiskey, it was something else Sweet tea, sweet tea. Yeah, exactly, it was actually just a prop, and you know because otherwise they said he would have been loaded the whole time he was on stage because the guy drank it like crazy. So a lot of that stuff was fake or whatever, but that doesn't really matter. We're not here to talk about Dean Martin, nope, we are here to talk about real estate.
Speaker 1:
I think he's in Canada actually, you were just in Canada. Yeah, I just got back from Canada. We went on a fishing trip over Memorial Day weekend and I think Pete and his son are doing the same. I think they went up to Newborough Lake, which I've been to one time. Really cool up there.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, yeah, no-transcript, and I want to talk a little bit about getting that. That school is out. Okay, so school's out, and do you think that that makes? Do you think people are like all right, either A they're going to go on vacation, so our business slows up, or whatever, or do you think that people are like all right, we need to find a house in order to get to the next school in September. What do you think?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, I think it depends where you're at in your life, obviously, and especially with kids like you brought up. I think the market has slowed down a little bit at the higher price points. Since we've kind of reached the end of the school year, people Since we've kind of reached the end of the school year, people are going on vacation a little bit more. Their kids just ended up either graduating or they just got done with school. But the lower price points, my goodness and when I say lower price points I really think anything $350 and below is still getting like, isn't?
Speaker 2:
that funny that that's a lower price point. Yeah, Like years ago, lower price point would be $200 and under Sure. Sure it's crazy.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, you're right In terms of, like that, general market regardless of school district. 350 and below, you're still getting well over 20 showings on a lot of these houses. You're getting 510 offers on some of them. Once you start creeping above the 350 mark.
Speaker 2:
I think that's where you're starting to see a lot of the activity slow down and it could be relative to the school year ending, yeah, and I've seen a lot of the, a lot of the ones in the four 50 to 500 range, with price reductions, sure, and we haven't seen that for a while, yeah, and I think that is definitely a sign of the interest rates. I mean, as much as we don't want to, you know you don't want to doom and gloom at the rates, the rates are actually. They're coming down a little bit. They're actually affect affordability. I mean it really does.
Speaker 1:
It affects your monthly payment no, yeah, no doubt about it. I mean, I think the rates have, uh, have stalled to the point where they haven't done a whole lot gone up, gone down or whatever and so people are kind of like now in this limbo, like, hey, what's going to happen with them? We, we assumed at this point we would add one, maybe two, maybe three rate cuts.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, for the fed we haven't had that so I think maybe the end of the year we're going to see that first cut and that's when things are going to really pick back up, and that could be a little scary, because imagine, pete and I talk about this all the time this pete right here, the one on the table, yeah, yeah, uh, pete and I talk about this all the time where you know what is going to happen. Imagine if, right now, the rates were four and a half percent. Oh yeah, like yeah, we wouldn't have 333 homes in the market. No, you probably have 150 homes in the market, yeah, and the prices would be jacking up even more, yeah, you know. So it's almost a blessing, in a way, that the rates did come up a little bit to kind of calm, which is exactly what they want, kind of calm things down a little bit. I thought we would be at a much higher inventory, though, than 333, with the rates being higher.
Speaker 1:
I'm surprised that we have we're not in the 500 to 600 range you know yeah, I think that's the misconception is, but now people are starting to finally understand it. The rates didn't curb demand, they curbed supply. Right, you know they're they're the people that are sitting on the 3% interest rates don't want to move quite yet because they feel like they're in such a position of power. And then, unless you're forced to move, you know that's one thing, but that's not going to create enough supply.
Speaker 1:
You know, we always talk about the death, the divorce, the downsizing, but you know, again, I think people are just reluctant to put their house out there because they're like, wow, what a great interest rate I have. Why would I make this move?
Speaker 2:
So that's a good point you make there, in that there's two things to look at there. We got buyers on the sideline waiting for the rates to come down and we have sellers on the sideline waiting for the rates to come down because they don't want to make that move. And you said downsizing you could be downsizing your house but upsizing your payment. Yeah, absolutely Right, yeah. So there's a lot going on there with that and it'll be interesting to see what happens if we do get a rate drop I'm talking mortgage rate, not Fed. If we get a mortgage rate drop of like a point, if it gets down in the six percent range, it'll be interesting to see what happens then with that I agree.
Speaker 1:
I think the one thing two people forget about when they're like I got such a great interest rate, it's like, yeah, listen, I understand you've got a great rate, but your equity could have went from a hundred thousand to 300,000 in the last four years and it did for some.
Speaker 1:
Yeah. So and I've always said this and my dad kind of instilled this in me it's like nobody got rich sitting on real estate in Berks County, at least the majority of people here. So if you've got all this money just sitting in this house, think about what you could do with that, whether it goes on the next purchase or to pay down debt that you already have. Pay debt, that's costing you more.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, that's exactly right.
Speaker 1:
The difference between your three and your 7%. Yeah, yeah, amazing.
Speaker 2:
And also invest in more real estate, yeah, or buy flips. You know, buy multi-units, buy something, take some of that equity out of the house and buy something of an investment. You have a graph there that you were going to talk about. Which I thought was interesting was the monthly mortgage payments. I thought for sure, when the rates went up, we were going to see the average monthly mortgage payment go sky high.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, that's not the case. No, it's not. It's kind of reached like a level field here where it's not all that inconsistent from what we've seen in the past, Like historically. You know, the mortgage payment is kind of relative to what, what is typical, let's just say.
Speaker 2:
So what is it? What's the typical in there? What is it showing as an average through the years? It's like 2000.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, just the last. Right now it's saying 2000,. 2100 is the most recent number that's on here, but like it doesn't differ all that much Even in the last year, you go back well over a year. Actually it's within a couple hundred bucks.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, it's not that much. Now I wonder if the reason as we're talking about it, the reason that that payment didn't change much Remember we just talked about how the $500,000 price range is coming down. So if you take the average of payments, that's going to affect the averages by that pricing coming down. So if the house was 500,000 and now the rates went up and the mortgage and their mortgage is now much higher, it's going to affect that or it's going to be affecting that also. So there's a lot of things that go on there. But I was surprised. I thought we were going to see this like going from 2000 a month average to $2,500 a month average because of the rates and it just didn't happen.
Speaker 1:
No, no doubt about it, and I think the thing that has the bigger volatility in it right now is the rental prices. You know, and you're seeing such a steep increase in rental prices over the past four or five years and that's starting to level off a little bit, but that's really been the main indicator of why there's still a lot of demand out. There is because these rental prices aren't cheap. So these people in the lower price points are like well, I could rent for this or I can still buy for this. So I think that's why you see demand in lower price points and the buyers that can afford the more expensive houses are more conscious of the interest rate. Yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 2:
And what I find is we're definitely even in our county. Here I'm seeing more apartment buildings going up than I am. New homes, oh, no doubt about it.
Speaker 1:
Multifamily is huge right now. It's big.
Speaker 2:
I mean we're talking big complexes of 300, 400, you know, apartments or units in one spot. And as much as we say things about rental, that will help though the market overall, because it's still a place to live Absolutely.
Speaker 1:
Right.
Speaker 2:
And some of the older clients are actually starting to go into those situations because they're sitting there going you know what? I don't want to mow grass anymore. I don't want to deal with this. I'm going to go to a 1,000-square-foot apartment and all my budgeting is fixed. It's all done.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, exactly, so it's kind of cool.
Speaker 2:
Even your taxes, it is cool. So this is an interesting one. America's opinion of best long-term investment. This was interesting. Real estate is still the number one. Oh yeah, yeah, isn't it amazing. Number two is stocks and mutual funds. You know what? Number three is Gold. Okay yeah, gold is still the standard. It's still up there with everything else, not Bitcoin. You know what's funny? Savings account is number four, which is really weird.
Speaker 3:
Bonds is number five and cryptocurrency is the last one.
Speaker 2:
Yes, I just thought that was really interesting that we still look at real estate as being a wealth builder and the best investment that you can make.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I mean, it makes the most millionaires in the country. That's what they always say and I think that's true Um over. You know, long-term real estate has shown outstanding returns, you know.
Speaker 2:
I had a broker question for you Not not a tough one, I, just because you know you're the broker of our company and and I thought there was different things I could ask and we can bring up and discuss. One of them was you know, we've been going without inspections for quite some time. Yep, are you seeing any kind of an uptick in conflict? I don't want to say lawsuits right away, but conflicts or phone calls of ah son of a gun. I should have gotten inspection because now I'm realizing there's mold or the roof is leaking and the seller didn't tell me. Are you seeing an uptick of that or is that? Is it still pretty good?
Speaker 1:
Yeah, no for sure, there's no doubt about it and you know, sometimes it takes a little bit of time until you see those things kind of roll in, but there is a statute of limitations. So two years you got to file something against a property, especially if you think the seller misrepresented, like on the seller's disclosure. But we're definitely start to seeing it, start to seeing it more. The one thing that I take notice of actually is you know, we do a pretty good job here with compliance. I'm proud of that. But our insurance rates go up quite a bit and I talked to the insurance guys and they're like we'll just be honest with you.
Speaker 2:
People are getting sued left and right and that's because you think of no inspections. Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, so it's not like it's our firm individually, like we've done a pretty good job with that, but I think other companies out there are getting hammered and then, consequently, everybody's insurance rates go up because of it.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and one of the things that we're very we are very good with, I think, telling our agents you are and we all do as leadership is that you know, we never tell a buyer not to get an inspection. Yeah, okay, we give you the tools and the ideas of how to win a home. Yep, and we're not saying inspections are bad. Inspections are great, yeah, but it's this, but this market has forced people to do things that they don't normally do, because when you have 20 offers coming in, you've got to be competitive, and what has happened is inspections have become something that people use.
Speaker 1:
Yeah, you have a better chance of getting a home inspection agreed upon on a higher-priced home than you do on a lower-priced home.
Speaker 3:
Exactly right.
Speaker 1:
And that can be tricky for a first-time homebuyer. Let's just say who's scared? This is their first property. They want to go into it with, you know, a clear conscience that they're not getting into a money pit, yep, you know, opposed to the guy that might have a little bit more money, or gal, and they're buying an expensive home but they can afford to get an agreement signed with a home inspection contingency. So yeah, it's a different thing. It comes down to competition right, like you said, if there's five to ten offers.
Speaker 1:
You have to guide your client to do whatever they're willing to do to put them in the best position in the house. A lot of times that's waiving inspections.
Speaker 2:
Unfortunately, but that's what's happening and it's been happening for like two, three years. I mean, there's people that are getting in the business now that never even really dealt with inspection.
Speaker 1:
It's funny, I sat down with two agents uh, just yesterday, um, you know, to go over a home inspection report and you know the relatively newer agents and, and they were, you know, scared off by it, as as rightfully they should be. These, these reports can come back pretty ugly sometimes, but you know it's funny, I haven't, like you know, uh, dive deep, dove deep into like a home inspection report in quite a while. I mean I think I've done like less than five in the past three years.
Speaker 2:
Crazy which is wild, it is, I don't think. Over the past two years, the offers that I've written maybe one yeah, maybe one yeah and, like I said, we give them the choice. We always give them the choice. They look, this is what an inspection is about, this is what an inspection is about, this is how, what it does. And then you decide from there Hugo, did you do an inspection?
Speaker 1:
No, I don't think I did yeah, yeah, and he had a really good realtor. I mean, I just bought a home seven months ago, interest rate in the sevens, no inspections. I bought it no inspections because I had to do what I had to do to get the house you know it's about winning.
Speaker 2:
It's about winning the house. It's a little different than it used to be. Do you have any questions? You go at all. No, because sometimes you do about houses and stuff like that. You're pretty good on that. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3:
Well, I was going to. I have a question about titling. You know, if my wife and I bought this house and her name is on the deed along with my name, but only my name is in the mortgage, If I was to die, you know, will that present any challenges for her?
Speaker 2:
And I think how we answered that was ask Lorena, but no, no, but the other no. The answer to that is it depends on how you, when you bought the property, how you took ownership of the property. It will be on the deed whether it's tenants in common. Uh, tenants the right of survivorship? Uh, it depends on that. Typically, because you're married and you're both in a deed would be tenants in common, correct? Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2:
Which means if you one of you goes, the other person gets the passes on. There's hardly ever a time where, if you two people are on the deed, hardly ever where um the one, if one passes the, the estate actually owns the other half which is really gets complicated yeah, Very complicated. So you're going to talk to Lorena. Get back to us with any answer on that then next month?
Speaker 3:
How's that?
Speaker 2:
All right, is there any? The other thing I want to say what are the things that you get the most calls on for with, with agents and or with complaints, or? And not saying that we, every broker, deals with issues, no matter what. When you're doing how many units we do a year, you're going to have stuff, yeah.
Speaker 1:
A lot of it's contractual negotiations whether you know they want to write something in like in the additional term sections of our agreement. You know some sort of clause or some sort of other arrangement between the buyer and seller. I like to have the input on that because you got to be careful what you write in these contracts that aren't already kind of pre-printed in them. The other thing is dispute over deposits, terminations of agreements. You know whether the buyer actually has a right to terminate or a seller has a right to terminate. You know can be interpreted and misconstrued oftentimes by agents. So you want to make sure that you're putting your client in a position where it doesn't jeopardize their earnest money deposit. Yeah, cause that's really what it comes down to.
Speaker 1:
And sometimes you have these deals where there's 20, $30,000 earnest money deposit. Person wants to get out of the deal, right or wrong. You better make sure you're right because otherwise it can be disputed, it can drag out, there's the potential loss of that deposit. Most times and I always love to go with this theory in life in general, cooler heads will prevail. Most people don't like to sue and go to that length over an earnest money deposit, especially in a market where the house will probably sell to somebody else. But yeah, those are probably the top two things that I hear and deal with the most.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, and also I think a lot of people forget that and is that both people have to sign something to release that escrow. Yeah, the buyer and the seller must agree where that's going, whether it's all going to one person or it's going split half, 50-50.
Speaker 1:
That has to be agreed upon. Yeah, the termination aspect of the agreement is a unilateral decision. One party or the other can do it. But as far as the actual release of the deposit, both parties have to sign off and agree upon that and if they don't, there is a timeline in our agreements, depending on how it's written and structured, that a decent amount of time can actually go by without that money being released. So we advise our agents to do things a certain way. That'll speed up that process and everybody kind of gets on the same page in terms of like okay, this isn't working out, it's either put up or shut up time you know or just get me, get me my money back.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, cause the reality is this you start getting into legalities and stuff with that, nobody wins. No, nobody wins and that deposit becomes nothing because you're all you're doing is is just spending money on on legal fees. It's hard for a seller to retain the deposit yeah truthfully it I agree with you.
Speaker 1:
If they push hard and long enough and they're right, yep, they probably will win. But a lot of people don't want to do that no, no, it's not fun.
Speaker 2:
It's not fun at all. Is there anything else you want to uh talk about before we end the show?
Speaker 1:
no, I mean honestly thanks for having me back on, absolutely Absolutely.
Speaker 2:
Don't tell Susan you were on, okay, she'll get very jealous and upset about it.
Speaker 1:
Pete and Susan are both on vacation right now. Look at us. Yeah, I'll tell you what she's cruising the Mediterranean.
Speaker 2:
Here we are in the basement in the studio, busting our asses, trying to make a living. What else is new? What else is new? It's amazing. All right, Thanks so much for coming on man, I really appreciate it. Yep, thanks for filling in All right. There you have it. Well, it wasn't Pete, it was Mark Chaknas, our broker here at Keller Williams Platinum Realty, and we are so thankful he stepped in for him. Come see us every Thursday 7 pm on YouTube, facebook, instagram and anywhere else that you can find a podcast.
