WHERE IS THE BEST PLACE TO GET A MORTGAGE?

Getting a mortgage can be a daunting task to the uninitiated, but it pays to understand the process upfront and pick the right mortgage company to work with to ensure a successful and quick closing.

When getting a mortgage, there are three key individuals in the process: the loan officer, the loan processor and an underwriter. Your interface to the lender is a loan officer, sometimes called an account manager or mortgage banker. Their job is to collect a complete and accurate loan application package from the borrower, and provide quotes and estimates of your loan terms. Loan officers usually have a processor that helps them to gather, submit and track application status along the way. The other key person in the mortgage process is the underwriter. The underwriter reviews loan files to see if they fall within the lender’s lending guidelines and are the ones who will ultimately approve or deny a loan application.

Choosing the Right Mortgage Professional

You have countless choices of loan officers, but many buyers make a critical mistake and simply walk into their local bank or credit union branch to apply for a home loan. In-branch loan officers often wear many hats taking loan applications, opening checking accounts and processing deposits. Anything not mortgage-related is a distraction, and you are best served by loan officers who do mortgages for a living. Moreover, many of the loan officers at bank branches are on salary or salary plus commission so are not as dependent at trying to complete each loan timely.
Mortgage brokers do not originate loans, but simply act to broker your loan application to an appropriate mortgage lender. Mortgage brokers have an advantage over banks or credit unions because they can place the loan with any of the lenders in their portfolio. Having the ability to shop the loan and not be bound by the underwriting criteria of one particular bank or credit union is a clear advantage these days. Furthermore all mortgage brokers have to be individually licensed by the state while loan officers working at a bank do not have to (they work under the bank's license). In other words you find more experienced and more seasoned loan officers at a mortgage company which results in not only knowing upfront that the loan can be funded but also how it should be processed so that it is underwritten and eventually funded at closing.

Ask the Right Questions Before Applying for Your Mortgage

Nothing is more painful than loan delays when closing the purchase of your home. One way to avoid them is to ask the right questions, which almost no one does.

1. Where is my loan going to be processed and underwritten?
2. What is your current turnaround time for loan underwriting?
3. Do you have a mechanism for escalating files that are in jeopardy of being delayed?
4. Can you provide statistics on what percentage of loans you close on time?
5. Will you provide any guarantees or fee reductions if my loan is late?

By asking the right questions upfront, you can avoid painful loan delays at the back end of the home buying process.
We have had great success with Netcentral Mortgage as they have helped in making numerous loans in the past 14 years that other banks and credit unions could not. They're extremely competitive and they can be reached at 414-258-7833.

6 MYTHS BUSTED

Don't fall for untruths some agents spread about Homeowners Concept. They have a much higher commission and administrative fees to protect.

1. “You have to pay money upfront “
    ABSOLUTELY NOT - There are no listing fees

2. “You don’t get the experience of a 6% agent”
    ACTUALLY, THE OPPOSITE IS TRUE - Instead of having armies of agents doing just        a few sales a year, we have fewer Realtors that sell a much higher volume than average (3 to 4 times higher). Also, Homeowners Concept’s Realtors have 19+ years in business vs only 6 for a typical agent.

3. “You won’t get as much exposure”
    NOT TRUE - Not only do we have our own magazine, our homes appear on the top two real estate websites: Zillow and Trulia (unlike some companies that hold back their listings from these sites).

4. “Other agents do not show their homes”
    WRONG - This a pure scare tactic. Nowadays, the buyers find the homes they like to look at, on the internet. They then either contact us directly or tell the agent they’re working with to set up appointments. Agents have very little control on which homes the buyers like to view. 

5. “You have to be available to show your home”
    NO - We have had a full service program where our agents show your house for over 10 years and because of the volume of sales we can charge much less than 6%.

6. “You won’t get good service if you don’t pay 6%"
    AGAIN, NOT TRUE - Not only have we been in business for 30 years now, we have maintained an A+ rating with the BBB for all those years (unparalled in the industry)!

1984-2014: 30 YEARS OF PROVIDING PREMIER SERVICE WHILE SAVING COMMISSIONS IN METRO MILWAUKEE!

Yes, we are extremely proud of our record, having sold tens of thousands of properties and saving close to $95 MM in commissions. Thanks to all of our current and past clients for making this exceptional record a reality.

Our Concept of bringing to the table a high level or real estate expertise in highly skilled, full time, long term agents who are truly dedicated to real estate while saving thousands of dollars in commission for the average priced home, made sense in 1984 as it does now.

Instead of constantly bringing in rookie agents or having agents that do very few sales a year (exactly what most real estate companies offer), we decided from day one to develop and maintain real estate professionals with a high sales volume. Selling 3 to 4 times as many homes than the average agent per year and doing so for many years (on average our agents have been in business for 19+ years) assures a very high level of expertise for our clients. Our Realtors don't have to market themselves and we make every effort to hire just enough dedicated experienced agents so that they make a decent living. Our marketing is almost exclusively geared to promoting the properties for sale which is good for our clients and our long term survival as evidenced by our 30 yrs in business. Our Realtors are truly focused on buying and selling homes, not promoting themselves. The savings in commissions then, becomes a bonus. And that is a great bonus walking away from a closing, having saved thousands of dollars and knowing you received the highest possible price for your home!
  

IF YOU'RE PAYING MORE THAN 3.9% TO SELL YOUR HOME, YOU'RE PAYING TOO MUCH!

Real estate brokers collected $42 Billion last year in commissions. But it could've been much less if all sellers used a program similar to Homeowners Concept. It's a statement we can make with certainty having sold upwards of 23,000 properties since 1984.

Our program has been proven unequivocally, to be extremely successful and actually work better than paying a 6% commission. There have been hundreds of instances over the years that the lower commission made the difference in the sale of the home. The thousands in savings and with no administrative fees at closing have helped considerably. Couple the savings with all the expertise we bring to the table (only full time, seasoned, incredibly knowledgeable Realtors that sell 3 to 4 times more homes per year than the average agent) and one can see that paying more than our top of the line 3.9% program is a pure waste of someone's hard earned equity.

SHOULD ONE REMODEL BEFORE SELLING?

One of the biggest questions sellers ask agents when selling their home is: should I remodel my home before I sell?

You may have heard a number of stories about people who were able to command top dollar for their properties because they remodeled them. Although remodeling can, in fact, yield a higher asking price for your home, you must be careful when spending money on remodeling projects, as you may not always see sufficient return on your investment.
Generally a remodel will pay off but don’t assume that you will recoup all of your expenses, or even that you will see any of your investment returned to you. An experienced agent will be able to guide you on this (stick with experienced agents such as the ones employed by Homeowners Concept).
Below are some common mistakes to avoid when remodeling your home for sale:

• Remodeling to suit your tastes – When remodeling, think like a buyer. In other words, you are remodeling to suit them, not yourself. Don’t remodel with taste-specific components; instead, keep it simple and neutral, thereby attracting the largest audience of buyers.
• Overpricing yourself out of the area – You must pay very close attention to the high end of prices for your neighborhood. You will not be able to get any more money for your house, regardless of what improvements you have made if you go over the price ceiling. Before remodeling, look closely at recently sold properties and the updates they had. This will provide you with a good gauge when deciding which remodeling projects to undertake and how much to spend.
• Emphasize kitchen or bathroom(s) remodel – Bottom line: the most important rooms of a home in today’s market are the bathrooms and the kitchen. These rooms have been shown to have the biggest influence on the price of a home; so, if you're on a budget, consider spending your remodeling dollars to update these rooms. They will yield higher returns on investment, provided you don’t go overboard in your remodeling efforts.

EXCEEDING EXPECTATIONS, the savings was our bonus. Testimonial

When we decided to sell our house in this somewhat challenging housing market we knew we were taking a risk, however, after our first meeting with Mary Skanavis from Homeowners Concept we knew we were going to have a knowledgeable and experienced professional by our side.

From the beginning Mary gave us straight-forward facts about our home sale. Unlike some of her competitors, she wasn’t telling us what we wanted to hear; she gave us a clear understanding of what our house was worth and how best to get the maximum price for the home. Together we came up with a “game plan” for how we were going to tackle our home sale. We also felt very comfortable after finding out that she is in the top 2% of agents as most of her coworkers are.

Like a good coach, Mary had almost daily correspondence with us informing us how showings went, how other houses in the market were doing and advice on how we could improve the success of selling our own home. Through that dedication we were able to sell our house remarkably fast and we sacrificed very little in the process. I cannot stress enough how thorough and involved Mary was, especially with answering all of our questions.

When it came time to buying our new house the decision to use Mary as our buying agent was an easy one.We ended up buying the house of our dreams and she negotiated the price saving us a substantial amount of money.

Working with Mary goes way beyond her expertise in the real estate industry. You can easily tell she enjoys her job and the challenges that come with it. She is very encouraging and charismatic and I would encourage anyone to work with her for buying or selling a home and the savings in commissions was a bonus.

Lisa and Mike G.

Sold in Wauwatosa/Bought in Pewaukee Using Homeowners Concept

THE ADVANTAGE OF AN EXPERIENCED AGENT!

About 15 months ago, our agent Kathy Spencer had done a market analysis on this home at 1133 Burr Oak in Waukesha. The market analysis had shown that this home would sell between $175 and $185k. Seller was not happy with the very extensive and realistic market analysis that our experienced agent Kathy did and had other Realtors out. In what usually happens in these cases, another agent either suggests a higher price to get the listing or is not competent enough to perform a proper market analysis (usually the case, as most agents sell less than 5 homes a year!).

Needless to say, the seller put the home on the market with Ogden at $209,900 with this listing:
 

$209,900
1133 Burr Oak Blvd
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Expired / 1230775  

Property did not sell and subsequently listed the home with RE/MAX and even relisted with another RE/MAX agent and with different MLS numbers. Here are the additional listings:

$199,950
1133 BURR OAK BLVD
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Expired / 1266057 

 

$197,900
1133 Burr Oak Blvd
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Expired / 1274490  

$188,900
1133 BURR OAK Blvd
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Expired / 1276916  

$187,950
1133 BURR OAK Blvd
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Expired / 1292071 

Frustrated but wise, the seller called back and listed with Kathy just a couple of months ago. Kathy priced the home at$180k, staged the home properly and the home sold within a week on the market!

$179,900
1133 Burr Oak Blvd
Waukesha, WI 53189-7201
Sold / 1302546 

Furthermore, the seller saved close to $4,000 in commissions and had no administrative fees paid at the closing. The expertise of Homeowners Concept agents is invaluable. Our agents sell considerably more homes per year (3 to 4 times more) and have been in real estate for many more years that the average agent (17 years versus 6).

29 YEARS OF SAVING GREATER MILWAUKEE SELLERS THOU$AND$ IN COMMISSIONS

A client recently commented of how impressed she was at the fact that we have been offering a reasonable alternative to the high 6% commission for such a length of time. Indeed, Homeowners Concept is celebrating its 29th year of operation in Metro-Milwaukee. Obviously, we are proud of our record, having sold tens of thousands of properties and saved well over $94 MM in commissions. That is $94 million dollars that Greater Milwaukee sellers are richer for not having to pay an average of 6% commission!

We have done this by providing more in marketing properties (covering ALL real estate websites, our own website with the most photos per home and our magazine, among others) and having highly skilled, full time, long term agents who are truly dedicated to real estate.

This is so different than the way traditional high commission real estate works. You see, the traditional 5, 6 or 7% commission office is like a revolving door. Agents enter and leave the business constantly (ever wonder why the larger offices have to continually hire and train new agents, even in down markets?). They count on each agent to at least attract a relative/friend or spend enough money of their own to attract a client outside their sphere of influence. It takes a lot of time and money for traditional agents to convince the consumer to pay the exorbitant commissions and to differentiate themselves from the competition. Sellers for the most part end up working with a mediocre agent and paying a hefty commission.

On the flip side, our agents are all full time, high volume with many years of experience before they even start at Homeowners Concept. We have become the company that not only saves the sellers thousands of dollars in commissions but provides exceptional real estate expertise. Our long term success speaks volumes.

UNLIKE SOME COMPANIES, OUR LISTINGS APPEAR ON EVERY WEBSITE!

Most sellers do not know that the largest real estate company in Southeastern WI excludes their listed properties from the top two real estate websites: Zillow and Trulia.

According to aggregate Web visit metrics compiled by Experian Marketing Services (formerly Experian Hitwise) as of 2/13, Zillow and Trulia continue to be the top destinations for real estate.

Inman News®

Rank	Website	Total visits	Visits share
1	Zillow	44.19 million	9.17%
2	Trulia	33.70 million	7.00%
3	Realtor.com	29.32 million	6.09%
4	Yahoo Homes	26.48 million	5.50%
5	FrontDoor Real Estate	26.14 million	5.43%
6	Homes.com	17.98 million	3.73%
7	MSN Real Estate	7.17 million	1.49%
8	Rent.com	7.12 million	1.48%
9	AOL Real Estate	6.56 million	1.36%
10	Apartment Guide	5.89 million	1.22%

The reason this local company and a few others nationwide have decided to not display their listings on the top websites is that they lose buyers to other agents who advertise alongside each property. By doing so though, they compromise their sellers' ability to get maximum exposure for their home and ultimately sell in a timely fashion and for the highest price. BOTTOM LINE, greed trumps ethics.

Home sellers think they're better off signing up with the largest local firm (as their TV commercials promote) but what they don't realize is that company size is irrelevant to the buyers. Latest data shows that almost 95% of the buyers find their eventual home on their own, primarily using any of the real estate sites above. So not having your home show up in the top 2 websites is definitely a disadvantage.

This is another example that Homeowners Concept's Full Service program at 3.9% provides more marketing than having to pay 6%.