Posts in category 'Client Stories'

Many homeowners believe that once they sign their closing documents, choose an insurance company and begin making payments, their monthly mortgage payment is settled. That may be true for the principal and interest portion of a fixed-rate mortgage, but it is not necessarily true for the total amount withdrawn from the homeowner's bank account each month.

Property taxes, homeowners insurance and escrow shortages can all change the total monthly payment. A homeowner who overlooks a letter from the county, insurance company or mortgage servicer may discover the problem only after the payment has increased.

South Carolina's 4% Legal Residence Assessment

South Carolina provides a 4% property-tax assessment ratio for an owner's qualifying legal residence. Other residential real estate generally receives a 6% assessment ratio. A home is not officially lab...

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Yesterday afternoon I spent a couple of hours with a family preparing their home for professional listing photographs. Most people probably imagine that a photo shoot is all about cameras, lighting, and making sure the house looks perfect. There is certainly some truth to that. Before the photographer ever takes the first picture, I walk through the house turning on lights, opening blinds, clearing countertops, hiding trash cans, putting toilet seat lids down, and making sure anything that doesn't belong in a photograph quietly disappears. In this home, that even included gathering up every dog toy before the photographer arrived.

Once everything is ready, the photographer begins working room by room. As she moves through the house, my job is simply to keep the homeowners one step ahead of the camera. If she is photographing the living room, we wait in the kitchen. When she moves into the kitchen, we step into a...

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Terry came home the other day with a story that immediately made me think about homeowners and the parts of their homes they rarely see.

Someone had recently scheduled routine maintenance for their air conditioner. The HVAC technician completed the service, gathered his paperwork, and was getting ready to leave when he mentioned something unusual.

"Before I go, you may want to have a pest company take a look at your attic. I thought I heard rats running around up there."

Now, if someone tells me there might be rats in my attic, I'm probably heading for a ladder and a flashlight pretty quickly. That's exactly what this homeowner did.

What he found wasn't rats.

It was bats.

A lot of bats.

A missing inspector, a crawlspace adventure, and an unexpected plumbing leak became a reminder that some of the most important parts of a home are the parts homeowners rarely see.

A few weeks ago, I was sitting in a living room with some sellers while their pre-listing inspection was taking place. The inspector had gone into the crawlspace, and after quite a while we realized we hadn't seen him come back out. At first, we laughed about it, but after calling for him several times and getting no response, we started to wonder if we should check on him.

We walked around to the crawlspace entrance and called again. Nothing. I called his phone twice and still didn't get an answer. We looked around the house for another access point but couldn't find one. Finally, I did something that probably wasn't in any real estate training manual. I crawled under the house.

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The closing table may end a transaction, but it is only the beginning of living with the decision.

One of the things I wish more people understood about real estate is that success is not measured by whether a transaction closes.

Success is measured by how the decision fits someone's life years later.

Over the years, I worked with one family through multiple purchases, sales, new construction projects, and relocations. Looking back, their story reminds me that every housing decision creates a ripple effect that continues long after the moving boxes are unpacked.

When buyers are searching for a home, they naturally focus on what they can see. The floor plan. The neighborhood. The garage. The backyard. The location.

Those things matter.

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