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A Chef, A Greenskeeper and a Realtor Walk into a Bar …

September 14, 2015 By Rick Jarvis

‘Why do we need a Realtor?’

In my early years, I used to get offended by that question. Probably the main reason was that I didn’t really have a good answer. Uhhh … contract … MLS …. Lockbox … you need us!

 

But as I have aged in this industry, I actually have come to enjoy being asked the question. Why? Because it gives me a chance to educate the clients as to our role and the value we add.

I can cook, but I am no chef…

Sometime in the late 1990’s, as a thank you gift from a client, a personal chef came to our house and cooked a meal for us. It was the first time I met Ellie Basch.

The fig an Prosciutto salad rocks. And her seared tuna is always worth the price of admission.
Ellie’s fig and Prosciutto salad rocks. And her seared tuna is always worth the price of admission.

Now, for those who have ever been on the receiving end of a Jarvis-prepared feast, we are pretty good cooks. I am not saying we are ready to compete on any cooking shows, but you will not feel cheated if you get to eat at Chez Jarvis. My wife’s tenderloin is restaurant quality and I am pretty adept anything grill related. So, as competitive as I am, I could not wait to see if the personal chef (Ellie) was that much better than we were.

Long story short, she was.

Ellie not only made us an absolutely awesome meal (and it was so awesome that we still use her for the One South holiday party some 10+ years later,) it was how she went about making it that was equally impressive. She made it in a stranger’s kitchen, wasted no food, created about 1/10 of the mess we would have and brought it all together at not only the exact same instant, but at the perfect temperature. Lastly, she did what would have taken us several hours and did it 30 minutes, tops.

In all honesty, it was not only fun to watch, it was a great life lesson about being an amateur and being a pro.

You can putt on my lawn, but it won’t be any fun…

I have another good friend who is the superintendent at an upscale golf course. Now, as he will readily admit, growing grass is perhaps the simplest form of agriculture imaginable. Everyone, at some level, can grow grass – seed + water + dirt + waiting – it is not that hard.

Golf, anyone?
Golf, anyone?

But just know this – golf courses, when at their best, are being pushed to their limits of health in order to create conditions most desirable to the golfing community. In key parts of the season, particularly the summer months, it his job to take the grass to the edge without killing it.

So imagine managing 200 acres to its limits each and every day, with multiple types of grasses growing in varied soils, varied shade conditions, highly varied air circulation conditions and varied moisture conditions all while trying to anticipate Virginia’s schizophrenic climate. If the National Weather Service gets it wrong by 5 degrees, especially during the peak summertime, you can kill an entire golf course.

Talk about pressure …

The short version is that my friend is equal parts scientist and artist.  He takes what are an infinite number of variables (nature) and makes sense of them all. He not only has to answer to himself, he answers to those who only see the results but rarely understand the constraints. His work is so good it is considered elite not just here locally, but at a national level.

And you know what else? He makes it look easy.

But real estate is easy …

For anyone who has even been through a real estate transaction, it can appear easy, especially if the agent you are working with is an accomplished pro.  Realize that the biggest part of the reason the transaction is easy is the advice they are providing and the work they are doing that you never see.

Doctors, mechanics, accountants, stylists, PR people, architects, graphic artists … and yes, chefs, golf superintendents and Realtors … we all do things that the public rarely sees and consequently doesn’t fully appreciate.  Yet thanks to HGTV, Zillow, Trulia, Houzz and Pinterest, the myth that real estate is a D-I-Y endeavor is perpetuated.

It is unfortunate because it is just not that easy.

So you can be your own Realtor, but should you?

It didn’t take Ellie 30 minutes to make my meal, it took her 10 years and 30 minutes to make my meal.

It didn’t take my golf buddy a few hours to lay out the protocol for maintaining green speeds on 97 degree days, it took him 15 years and few hours to lay out that protocol.

And guess what else, despite how it sometimes seems, it didn’t take me (or any other Realtor) a few hours to sell your home or find you the perfect home – it took us far longer.

The information and knowledge that we convey to our clients each and every day may seem like we just went to MLS and pushed the ‘meaningful statistic’ button … we didn’t.  Odds are the analysis we did was pulled from the latest market data and created exclusively for you.

While getting a real estate license is relatively easy, becoming a true pro is not. A good pro agent has a feel for values, trends, appraisals, incentives, geography, contract structure, marketing, data, analysis, competition, human nature, staging, design, construction, schools, zoning, finance, rental rates, law and negotiations (and yes, this is an abbreviated list.) We also have to keep up with changes in technology, continuing education, both local and national development and what goes on in Washington, DC.  It is not easy.

When a good agent makes a recommendation, it is based on far more than you can find on one of the thousands of websites dedicate to D-I-Y real estate.

Hire a pro. You will be happy.

Don’t Bring Your Macro to a Micro Fight

September 13, 2015 By Rick Jarvis

microMicro or macro?
Factual or anecdotal?
Data point to trend?
Forest or trees?
Big picture or small picture?

There is an old adage that goes something like this – ‘Don’t bring a knife to a gun fight.’ Personally, I have always tried to avoid fights (especially ones where weapons are involved) so I find that statement particularly easy to abide by. But as it relates to real estate, I often see buyers and sellers using large statistical based arguments to guide individual decisions … or I see them using anecdotal points to try override what large sets of numbers are trying to tell them.

It is unfortunate.

Data Points or Trends?

As agents, we constantly hear – “Well the house down the street sold for $450,000 … ”

I’m sure it did … but how long did it take? Did several sell at that price or just that one? Did they drop the price multiple times or did they get multiple offers? What were the terms? Was there personal property included? Or did the seller include closing costs What was the condition? What season? How many houses were on the market when it did? Who was the builder?

We also hear – “Well the average dollar per square foot in the neighborhood is $165 …”

I’m sure it is … but what houses were included in the analysis? Was the age range set tightly or loosely? How many had a finished 3rd floor … or basement? Or an oversized lot? Or were recently renovated? Same builder? Is the data from the fall or spring? What were the highs and lows?

As you can see, many questions need to be answered in both cases to validate either statistic. Despite the need to fully understand the statistic, many times buyers or sellers (or agents!) grab the one data point out of a sea of analysis that supports their version of the narrative and subsequently base their entire strategy upon it. It rarely works out well.

Micro and Macro Are Different

In its simplest form, MICROeconomics is the study of an individual’s (or entity’s) behavior when resources are limited. This is contrasted with MACROeconomics, where an entire economy is being studied (yes, Econ majors, I know that is a gross oversimplification of Macro and Micro theory, sorry.)

When an individual elects to buy or sell because they feel that the economy is doing well and prices are likely to rise, they are making their decision based on more of a MACRO-economic analysis. If a couple changes their behavior because 3 homes in their neighborhood just sold at record prices, then they are making more of a MICRO-economic decision.

In either case, both micro and macro based decision making is fine, when used to make micro or macro decisions, respectively. However, using macro stats for micro decisions (or vice versa) is not as sound of a practice.

One of the most common mistakes we see is clients taking overall market statistics (MACRO) and trying to apply them to a specific neighborhood (MICRO). Take a look at the chart below – the following graph shows the inventory levels in different segments of the market:

  • Overall Richmond Metro inventory levels (blue line)
  • Southern Chesterfield inventory (purple line)
  • Museum District/Windsor Farms (red line)

As you can tell, the inventory levels in Southern Chesterfield are far higher than both the overall Richmond market and the close-in areas surrounding Carytown.  The MACRO inventory (Richmond Metro) tells a far different story about the market than the MICRO inventory counts in 23838 and 23221.  A client moving from 23832 to 23221 but using a strategy based on 23832 data will not find success.  Similarly, pricing or negotiation strategies based on the entire Richmond region would have drastically different results in either 23838 or 23221. Make sense?

Be wary of bringing your macro analysis to a micro analysis decision (and vice versa …)

Summary

We are all constantly searching for data points to fit our preferred narrative. Sometimes we look down the street at a single comparative sale (out of seven) or sometimes we look to MSNBC, CNNMoney or the Case-Shiller Index for aggregate demand data … both can be equally right (or wrong) depending on the type of decision you are tying to make.

In order to really make the best decisions, know your data. Apply data correctly and you will find your outcomes far better.

Interest Rates 101

August 31, 2015 By Rick Jarvis

When I got my license in 1993, interest rates were 7.5%.
By the end of 1994, interest rates were approaching 9.5%.
When the market really got rolling in the early 2000’s, interest rates were still hovering around 8%.

In 2008 (the year the market crash began in earnest,) mortgage interest rates crept up near 7% during the summer before falling quickly.
In 2009, rates fell below 5%.
In 2011, rates fell below 4%.

The market has stayed + 4% range for most of the last several years and despite numerous predictions that rates will begin to rise, they really haven’t.

mortggae_rate_chart_-_Google_Search

Sounds insane, doesn’t it?

When every market crashed in 2008, the Federal Reserve took the unprecedented action of flooding the market with cheap money.  They reasoned (and they were largely correct) that the banks would stop loaning their own money in a market where assets were losing value rapidly and they needed to make cheap money available to prop everyone (and everything) up for while.  The Fed did everything they could to flood the market with liquidity by dropping their rate to 0% and FORCING money into the system via the Quantitative Easing programs.

As market watchers, we get a lot of questions about interest rates.  Will rates go up?  Down?  Flat?  Should I lock in?  Should I get a fixed rate?  Adjustable?  Hybrid?  What to do??

And now, with the following disclaimer – this post is filled with many oversimplifications – here begins the post about interest rate fundamentals.

What is an Interest Rate?

An interest rate is nothing more than a rate of return extracted from the lender when they loan money to a borrower.  In theory, the lender should receive compensation (interest) that is consistent with the amount of risk the loan carries.

Lending money to a doctor to buy a home is (in theory) far less risky than loaning it to your unemployed cousin who wants to start a llama farm … and thus the interest rate you charge should reflect the difference.

In its simplest form, an interest rate is made up of three primary pricing components:

  • The ‘Pure Rate’
  • Repayment Risk
  • Inflation Risk

Each is discussed below.

The Pure Rate

What if, as a lender, you knew that there was absolutely no chance than you would not get paid back and that when you did, the money you get back would be worth the same … what rate would you charge?  That is the definition of the ‘Pure Rate’ of interest.

I have seen studies discussing this concept and generally speaking, they isolate the Pure Rate at somewhere between 2 and 3%.  In a very simplistic way, you can imagine the Pure Rate of 2% as the floor for all interest rates.  Any interest rate above 2% is due to risk factors over and above the Pure Rate.

Repayment Risk

Cute little dudes, eh?
Cute little dudes, eh?

So, using the cousin and the llamas example from above, assume you loaned him $50k to buy some land and some llamas.  What do you think the likelihood is of getting your loan back from him?  My guess is ‘less than 100%’  So in order to compensate you for the substantial risk, you should charge your cousin a high rate of interest for the loan to buy the land and/or llamas.

Generally speaking, banks like to loan against owner-occupied single family housing.  Why?  Because it is a relatively low risk to do so.

Banks (more or less) figure that when push comes to shove, you will make the house payment before you make your rental property payment or your boat payment.  Additionally, if you don’t make the payment on your home, they can take it from you, sell it, and get their money back.  Traditionally, lending against housing is a pretty safe bet for banks (2008 – 2011 aside.)

(Now, for this post, we are ignoring the impact of many underwriting factors on the repayment risk.  Suffice it to say, down payment, loan limits, asset types, the GSE’s (Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Ginnie Mae) all can impact rates as they all influence risk to some extent.  But generally speaking, the difference between a Maximum FHA loan with Mortgage Insurance and a Conventional Fannie Mae 80% is less than 1% in APR.)

So just know that the bank making you a loan secured by the home you are buying is historically a pretty safe bet for them, despite what recent memory tells us to be true.

Inflation Risk

We have all head the stories from our parents and grandparents … ‘I remember when gas was a quarter and a soda was a nickel.’

To illustrate, if you took out a mortgage in 1985 (30 years ago) and made your last payment today, you would have paid the bank back with money that used to be worth far more:

  • gas was $1.09/gallon in 1985
  • the average new home cost $89k in 1985
  • the average new car was $9k in 1985

Pretty amazing, huh?

So it is safe to say that the value of money has changed over time – and the difference between what money is worth over time is called ‘inflation’ (or deflation, if prices go down.)  Imagine loaning someone money for 30 years and then getting it back … what would it buy?  Far less, that is for sure, so you better charge for it.

So when a bank commits to lending you money for 30 years, they need to make sure that when they are paid back, the money they receive back has the same value as it did when they lent it to you.  Know that the rate they they charge you is reflective of what they feel their money will be worth when they get it back.

Pricing Mortgage Interest Rates

So how are mortgage rates priced?  Think of it as adding the three components together:

  • The Pure Rate + Repayment Risk + Inflation Risk = Interest Rate

Well if the ‘Pure Rate’ is largely fixed and the Repayment Risk is pretty small, then the difference must be inflation, right?

Yep.

When you see loans in the 3 – 4% range, what is really being said is that the expectation for prices for the core goods and services in our economy to rise substantially in the immediate future is relatively small.  And given the recent upheaval in the Chinese stock market, the likelihood of the world economy getting overheated again (at least for the foreseeable future) is pretty small and thus, rates should remain relatively low for quite some time.

The Fed vs. ‘The Market’

One of the most commonly misunderstood parts of interest rate pricing surrounds who is actually doing the pricing of the rates.  Many people incorrectly assume that the Federal Reserve sets the rates – which is not true – mortgage interest rates are set by a mysterious force we call ‘the market.’

So what is ‘the market’ you ask?  Currency exchanges, the bond market, Wall Street, The Federal Reserve, both large and small banks, puts, calls, options, derivatives … all are in some part an input to the overall market and have an impact on the price of money.  These entities constantly look into the future and either buy or sell the right to money at specific prices based on their version of where they think the value of money is headed.

When money is in demand and supply is fixed, interest rates will tend to rise.  Conversely, when the demand is low and the supply is higher, then the prices will tend to drop (think 2012.)  The Federal Reserve has the ability to increase or decrease the supply of money to INFLUENCE the rates, but they do not set them.  When you see the 6 o’clock news talk about the Federal Reserve announcing QE II or the leaving the Federal Funds Rate alone, they are simply using the tools they have available to hopefully increase (or decrease) the supply of money (and its price) in hopes of properly supplying the needs of the capital markets.  It is an amazing dance to watch.

But to emphasize – the Federal Reserve cannot dictate the price of money, only influence it.  Imagine trying to drive a car at a constant speed without using the brakes and you will know what it like to be The Fed.  You can speed up by giving the car more gas and you TRY to slow down by downshifting or taking your foot off of the gas, but ultimately, things like gravity and wind and road conditions (or crashing into a tree) are what will make your car come to rest.  But thinking the Federal Reserve sets your rates is technically incorrect despite many’s belief.

Long Term vs Short Term Rates

Continuing the theme from above – no interest rate discussion would be complete without pointing out how long term and shorter term rates are priced.

Basically, as a borrower, you have two mortgage product options – fixed rate products or adjustable rate products.  As one one would expect, a fixed rate mortgage has a rate that stays constant over the life of the loan while an adjustable rate loan contains language that allows the rate to adjust at specific intervals based on a specific index.  What is really happening is the risk of inflation is being redistributed depending on who has the right to the rate and for how long.

In an adjustable rate mortgage, the borrower carries the inflation risk by agreeing to allow their rate to periodically adjust to market conditions. In a fixed rate mortgage, the lender carries the inflation risk as they CANNOT change the rate, even if inflation increases.  It is why you typically see adjustable rates trade lower than fixed ones.

An interesting note is that in recent history, the difference between the adjustable rates and fixed rates (sometimes referred to as the ‘spread’) has been extremely small.  Why?  If you guessed ‘low expectation for inflation’ then you are beginning to get the hang of this!

Summary

If and when we being to see rates rise, it will be for one of the following reasons:

  • ‘The Market’ is seeing the global economy is heating up
  • The Federal Reserve decides to decrease the money supply
  • The Federal Reserve decides to increase the rate at which they charge banks to borrow money

And specifically, if you see the long term rates rise, it is because the market is beginning to expect inflation and if you see short term rates rise, it is due to the Fed trying to influence the market.

The interest rate markets and pricing models are extremely complex and those who successfully buy, sell and loan money for a living are very astute.  That said, even if you are not a professional, having the ability to understand the correct way to finance properties can save hundreds of thousands of dollars over your lifetime.  Spend some time understanding interest rates … you will be handsomely rewarded for it.

Making Sense of the Numbers

August 17, 2015 By Rick Jarvis

We got one of these a week for my first several years in the business. As thick as a phone book .... amazing.
We got one of these a week for my first several years in the business. As thick as a phone book …. amazing.

It used to be simple(er).

When I first became licensed (1993), things were far different than they are today.  Back then, if you wanted to know what homes were available for sale, you used to have to wait for the Richmond Association of Realtors to deliver the ‘MLS Book.’ Each Friday, our local Multiple Listing Service would deliver us a stack of MLS books, approximately the size of phone books (I am not making this up) every Friday afternoon to each and every office in the Metro. As an agent, you would thumb through the pages and make copies and fax them to people or (GASP!) hop on the landline phone and call clients to tell them about the latest and greatest property for sale.

No text. No e mail. No cloud. No Authentisign. No DropBox. Just a phone book in black and white with a picture of the front of the house. That is all you got to go on. Good luck.

You know what?  We got it done.

Access.  Access.  Access.

Fast forward to today and I now have access to MLS via desktop, laptop, smartphone or tablet. I also have online access to the City and County tax records for assessments, past sales or other searches. From MLS, I can download bunches of records and export them to a spreadsheet to help with analysis, or I can also use one of the numerous functions inside of MLS to see trends and find neighborhood highs and lows.  If I am too lazy to analyze my own info, I can have it spoon fed to me by a myriad of statistical services that can slice, dice, merge and layer sales and demographic data into neat little charts and graphs.

Outside of MLS, I can look at Zillow’s estimates of value (as well as about 20 other automated value estimates) and gobs of research from Case Shiller or the NAR. And all of this info is available to me BEFORE I ever type anything into the Google bar and see what I can find out there floating in the web, on blogs or in research papers.

On one hand, it makes wonder how we ever did our job before all of this information was available. And on the other hand, it makes me wonder what is coming next … but that is another post for another day.

Easy as 1, 2, 3 … 4, 5, 6, 9, 37, 142, 359 … Wait, this is Hard!

The relative ease at which we can all access information is, in my opinion, the signature development in the last decade.  So it would stand to reason that with all of this access, being an agent, buyer or seller should be easier than ever … but is it?

I don’t think so.

Simply put, with access to an almost unlimited amount of information, it is getting incredibly difficult to tell what data is meaningful, what data matters and most importantly, what it all means.

Look at the chart above … does it really tell you anything?

As a buyer, should I care that the 2nd Quarter’s sales of 1,800 – 2,000 SF homes in 23832 is 11.1% above the same quarter last year? Or down 35.2% from the previous quarter? What do I do with these facts?  Should it change my strategy?  Does it make my offer lower??  Should I rent???  Should I pay cash???? Should I move to Canada?????  Or should I just paint my house mauve and fuchsia and stay put …

What Do I Do Differently?

As an agent, it now takes me about 3 times as long to explain my role than it did in 1993 … that’s all that has really changed. I still do the same basic things, it just takes me far longer to explain it than it used to and thus I have about 20 new speeches to help people make sense of the process.

Here are a sample of my new speeches –

  • ‘Why isn’t this house for sale in MLS when I see it on Trulia?’  (Answer –  Trulia is not MLS)
  • ‘Why is the house for sale on Trulia but not in MLS?’ (Answer, Again, Trulia is not MLS)
  • ‘Why is some other agent’s picture next to my home on Yahoo Real Estate when it is your listing?’ (Answer – because Yahoo isn’t MLS, either)
  • ‘Why can I get a 3.9% mortgage from USAA when the lender you recommended is at 4.25%?’ (Answer – because closing dates don’t mean anything to them)
  • ‘Why does Zillow say my house is worth $375,000 when I just paid $400,000 last year?’ speech (Answer – Because it is a computer generated estimate)
  • ‘What do you mean we aren’t closing Friday?!?’ (Answer – Because Dodd-Frank/TRID just mandated a 3 day wait period for changes to closing statements)

And many more.

My Job is Still the Same

The bottom line is that all of the changes in the past decade haven’t really changed what I do, it has only changed how many things I have to cover with my clients before they understand the process.

And guess what – the public is more confused than ever before.

A recent study showed that the number of people using agents has actually increased in the past 5 years. So despite the relative ubiquity of information with blogs and message boards explaining the home buying (or selling) process in great detail, the public is entrusting their real estate transactions to Realtors at increasing levels.  I find this trend both fascinating and refreshing.

At the end of the day, having information and knowing what it means are two different things.  A good agent knows the difference and can help you make sense of an increasingly complex and complicated process.

Its our job to make sense of it all. Use us.

 

Our Algorithm

August 16, 2015 By Rick Jarvis

If you ask 10 Realtors what their job is, you will get at least 11 different answers.

You would get answers like:

  • ‘We make dreams come true’
  • ‘We take the mystery out of buying or selling a home’
  • ‘We facilitate transactions’
  • ‘We market properties’

While all of those answers are true to some degree, we think they miss the most important and fundamental service Realtors can provide to our clients – accurately valuing property.

At the end of the day, helping clients understand where they stand in the market means impacting their financial health in the greatest of ways.  How you market your listings matters … the same way understanding deeds, inspections, RESPA, Fair Housing, construction materials and zoning matters. But if you don’t understand the underlying value of what you are buying and selling, then the rest of it matters far less (and if you read any of our blog posts with any regularity, you know we spend a lot of time talking about values and valuation methods.)

Why do we feel this way?

Because if we can help you understand the reasons why properties are valued the way they are, then you will make a decision that benefits you both now AND in the future.  In this new market of volatile market swings and conflicting information, helping our clients make sense of a hugely important financial decision is a responsibility we take extremely seriously.

The Rise of the Data

In case you missed it, the internet is having an impact.  How we communicate, how we date, how we shop, how we research our decisions (ok, research each other), how we promote ourselves and how we get our news have all been impacted.  And as the web continues to evolve, search engines, aggregators and analytics companies are becoming increasingly sophisticated in their ability to not only make sense of the mind-boggling amount of data available, but to present it to the user in better and better ways.

Algorithms are Everywhere

How are these companies making sense of the data?  Algorithms, that’s how.

This is Zillow's algorithm to make short term adjustments to its short term pricing predictive model.  Seems simple enough to me...
This is Zillow’s algorithm to make adjustments to their short-term pricing predictive model. Seems simple enough to me…

Algorithms for categorization, algorithms for valuations and algorithms for recommendation are becoming not only more prevalent, but more accurate.  Google is said to take into account over 200 different factors in how it ranks pages.  Zillow says it recalculates its Zestimates on over 1M homes per day.  The city (and counties) collect taxes based on valuing properties they have never been in and have to be able to defend if challenged.  And IBM advertisements claim that they can predict who is going to drop out of college based on how far they live from campus (or something like that.)

But are they getting it right?  If they get the underlying data right, then yes …

Does Zillow capture floor level in their model?  Doubtful ...
Does Zillow capture floor level in their model? Doubtful …

Agent Algorithms

Analyzing ‘housing’ (as an overall market) is one thing, but analyzing an individual house, and the surrounding neighborhood, and the floor plan, decor, color palate and neighbor’s car on blocks in the front yard, is quite another.  And this is where the agent adds value.

Good agents have algorithms, too, and they are very accurate.  Good agents have the ability to look at the data that matters and use it to help their clients make great decisions. And while they may not have the same number of µ’s and Σ’s in them that Zillow’s model does, our models contain one thing that the national predictive models never will – the correct and applicable underlying data set.

  • Do you think Zillow knows the difference in value between Grace Streets north and south sides?  Good agents do.
  • Does Realtor.com know that Woodland Heights recently received its historic designation … and what the impact will be?  Your agent should.
  • Can Google accurately reflect the subtle but important differences between the Ryan Homes and Eagle Construction warranty departments?  Good agents can.
  • Can any computer model tell you where the shrink/swell soils are in Richmond?  An experienced agent can.
  • Can Trulia tell you how another agent negotiates?  Once again, a good agent can.

Our Algorithm

You want to know about our algorithm?  And what makes it better than Zillow’s?

Here’s ours:

  • YOUR Best Decision = YOUR NEEDS + As Much Math as Required + Current Market Conditions + YOUR NEEDS + Schools + What is Available + YOUR NEEDS + Time of Year + Decor + Architect + Parking + Other Agent + Richmond + YOUR NEEDS + Timing + Development + Inspections + Lender + YOUR NEEDS + Builder + Trends + Whatever Else Needs to Go Into the Analysis + YOUR NEEDS

And do you know why our algorithm is better for your situation?  Because we wrote it for you.
And do you know what else?  If your needs change, we will change the algorithm accordingly …

Our algorithm was written for one person – you.  YOUR best decision is about what YOU need and not what we think or what Zillow, Google, your buddy, your boss, your mother, a colleague, or a friend of a friend at a barbecue thinks.

Summary

At the end of the day, good agents are far better at impacting their clients decision about individual houses than any über-computer run by any team of Stanford grads will ever be.  Our algorithms incorporate things that the computer models cannot even fathom and we change them each and every day based on the need of the clients we are working with.

All accomplished agents have advanced algorithms.  We can’t always explain them, but they work extremely well.

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How Do I Schedule a Showing or Find Out More?

I am Kendall C. Kendall, Client Care Coordinator for the team. I am a licensed Realtor and it is my job to answer questions and schedule showings for the properties shown on our sites. Here's our call policy.

kendall@richmondrelocation.net

Working With Buyers

I am Sarah Jarvis, Broker at One South and I work with our buyers. I bring 20+ years of experience to our Buyers Advocacy program and take great pride in helping our clients understand the RVA marketplace.

sarah@richmondrelocation.net

From the Blog

Dollar Per Foot, a Critique

‘How much a foot?’ ‘What is the per foot on that home?’ 'Feels like a lot per foot!' 'Dollar per Foot' is probably the most used of the comparative statistics in the valuation of housing today. Every buyer references it at some point during the home buying process -- as do most sellers. And so …

[Read More...] about Dollar Per Foot, a Critique

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804.201.9683


How Do I Schedule a Showing?

I am Kendall C. Kendall, Client Care Coordinator for the team. I am a licensed Realtor and it is my job to answer questions and schedule showings for the properties shown on our sites. Here's our call policy.
kendall@richmondrelocation.net

804.305.2344


How Do I Determine What I Can Afford?

We offer competitive mortgage solutions with a commitment to exceed your expectations. We’re local industry experts who are also your friends and neighbors. Whether you want to communicate online or in person, we’re just a call or click away.
www.cfmortgagecorp.com
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Equal Housing

The Sarah Jarvis Team agrees to provide equal professional service without regard to the race, color, religion, sex, handicap, familial status, national origin or sexual orientation of any prospective client, customer, or of the residents of any community. Any request from a home seller, landlord, or buyer to act in a discriminatory manner will not be fulfilled.

IDX Disclaimer

All of the information displayed here is deemed to be gathered from reliable sources but no warranties, either express of implied, are made part of this site. Additionally, the IDX Feed for listing information may contain descriptions of properties not represented by One South Realty, its agents or staff and any violations or misrepresentations are the sole responsibility of the listing brokerage of the subject property in violation.

Contact The Sarah Jarvis Team

804.201.9683

One South Square Logo

2314 West Main Street Richmond, VA 23220

sarah@richmondrelocation.net

Our Call Policy

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Lending

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Chris Lester
Senior Loan Administrator
NMLS# 353830
804-307-7033
Email Southern Trust Mortgage

Our Network of Sites: RichmondVaNewHomes.net, RichmondVaCondos.net, RichmondLuxuryNeighborhoods.com,
RichmondFanRealEstate.net, RichmondVaMLSSearch.net
Housekeeping: Sitemap, Listings Sitemap

 

Members of the Sarah Jarvis team are licensed in the Commonwealth of Virginia.

 

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