The Muljat Group Blog

When your home starts feeling too small or outmoded, you may think that the solution is to remodel. Although it is a workable solution for many homeowners, others who do extensive remodeling end up selling their homes within a few years of completing the work. The decisions you make about your renovation could have a significant impact on whether you can recover your investment when you sell your home.

Real estate agents see a lot of homes and listen to a lot of buyers. Together with architects and professional kitchen planners, they can offer valuable advice on how to improve a kitchen or bath, or add a room that will increase your family’s enjoyment and attract future buyers.

Before you decide to take the remodeling plunge, you should consider whether expensive improvements will over-improve your home in relation to the neighborhood. If you are inclined to make an investment in your home that far exceeds the selling price of other homes in the area, it may be better to sell your present home and buy one that corresponds to your needs.

By Fawn from Johnson Real Estate Team

We all know that appliances don’t last forever, but there are lots of things you can do to help them last longer. The average life span of your oven/stove is 17 years for gas, and 15 years for electric. Below are a few tips courtesy of Jefferson Livingston at Pillar to Post Construction to help your oven/stove last longer.

Protect the control panel. Most stoves made in the last 15 years break down too soon due to the control panel. Why? Because the panel is behind the back burners which causes it to overheat. To nix this problem heat large pots on the front burners only. Extend stove life: 3 years

Prevent cracks. If your stove has radiant or halogen burners, always place a pot on the burner before you turn it on. A cold pot coming in contact with a hot burner can crack the stove top, requiring a costly repair.

Wipe up spills fast. Leaving splattered food or grease inside an oven significantly boosts the heat level, adding extra stress to the unit’s mechanical and electronic components, which shortens its life span. Extend stove life: 3 -5 years.

By Fawn from Johnson Team Real Estate

Living with an undersize, outdated kitchen? If so, a sledgehammer may feel like the only solution. But these days you’re probably not up for spending the $50,000 or more — maybe much more — it would cost to demolish the space and build a new state-of-the-art room from scratch.

Fortunately you can make your existing kitchen work better with products that aim to solve nagging problems like dim lighting, cramped space, and overflowing cabinets. Even better, most of these clever solutions cost no more than a few hundred dollars.

Not enough workspace

If your kitchen is skimpy on counter-tops, create extra space for chopping, kneading, mixing, and assembling your family meals with a sturdy counter-height worktable (about $200 to $1,500 atjohnboos.com, roomandboard.com, or ikea.com). Just leave yourself room to maneuver — at least 36 inches of floor space on each side of the table, 42 inches where there’s an appliance, says Mark Karas, manager of Adams Kitchens in Stoneham, Mass. Not enough square footage? Get a table with locking wheels (such as the $1,400 Quovis at dwr.com) and roll it against a wall when it’s not in use.

Another trick: Free up existing counter space by mounting small appliances under the cabinets. Black & Decker’s stainless-steel Space-maker appliances hang easily ($30 to $90 each at bdspacemaker.com). If you’re a java gourmand, check out Brewmatic’s upscale coffeemakers ($500 to $600 at poshportage.com), which hang from the cabinet with a large thermos-style carafe resting on the countertop below. Since microwaves are giant space hogs, consider installing a built-in microwave-and-vent combo over the stove ($200 to $1,200 at bestbuy.com, plus installation). And while you’re at it, trade that countertop spice rack for an adjustable wood one that mounts to the inside of an upper-cabinet door ($90 at rev-a-shelf.com).

No place to eat

Long for a modern breakfast bar? The most space-efficient way to add an eating area to a small kitchen is with a prefab breakfast bar island ($400 to $2,000 at allkitchencarts.com, surlatable.com, and ekitchenislands.com). It can seat from two to four family members and often includes storage compartments or stool-stowing space underneath. Keep in mind you’ll need 48 inches of clearance — 54 inches if there’s an adjacent appliance — on any side with seating.

For an even cheaper option, create a simple breakfast bar by hanging an 18-inch-deep shelf along a wall 40 inches above the floor, using drop-leaf support hardware ($20 at rockler.com) so that you can fold the top down when it’s not in use. For any breakfast bar, order stools with seats about 10 inches lower than the eating surface. And opt for seats without backs if you want to slide them completely under the bar when no one is sitting on them.

Jam-packed cabinets

Start by removing everything, tossing what you don’t use, and re-thinking where you locate what you do. Like items should be grouped together, and the more often you use something, the more centrally located it should be.

“Your baking stuff should go in one spot, your cooking stuff in another, your coffee stuff in another,” says Jeri Dansky, a professional organizer in Half Moon Bay, Calif. Then, add in storage devices to maximize accessibility.

Among Dansky’s favorite products: chrome roll-out drawers that fit into deep base cabinets ($60 to $80 at stacksandstacks.com) and adjustable under-sink shelves that fit around the pipes ($15 at organizeit.com).

If you have a severe cabinet shortage, consider the $130 plate rack atplowhearth.com, which will let you mount your plates on the wall, or a hanging pot rack like the ones at kitchensource.com ($50 to $800).

Dim lighting

A single ceiling fixture provides no direct task lighting for food prep, pot washing, bill paying, algebra homework, late-night snacking, or any of the other activities we do in the kitchen. The easiest way to brighten the countertops is to hang wireless Rite-Lite LED light bars ($20 each atamazon.com) into the recessed bottoms of the upper cabinets — but they’ll churn through AAA batteries so fast you’ll be buying coppertops by the gross. A better solution is Priori’s xenon system ($200 to $500 atbudgetlighting.com or lighting-universe.com), which also hides under the cabinets; it strings together like Christmas-tree lights and simply plugs into a backsplash outlet. Adding electrical circuits will have to wait for the sledgehammer job.

By: John Garskof from Money Magazine

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You know the saying “there is no place like home”. And yes, there is really no other, especially when you talk about a peaceful home. Home is where you tend to feel the most comfortable thus steps to make your home more peaceful can be benificial for all that live there. Below are some tips courtesy of Pillar to Post Home Inspections Services to help make your home a more peaceful environment.

Up the fluff to create comfort.
Fluff up your pillows or pile them together; soft, overstuffed pillows project warmth, comfort and security, so we feel more relaxed just by looking at them. No wonder photographers and Realtors use this trick to make homes look more inviting!

Make your tub more tranquil.
Steep two chamomile tea bags right in the tub. Its relaxing properties will be absorbed through your pores and into your blood stream. Plus, chamomile will relieve tired, achy muscles, and its pleasant aroma will bring a smile to your face.

Grow soothing lavender indoors.
The scent of this sweet flower increases relaxing alpha waves in the brain. It’ll thrive in your home if you place it in a sunny location and let it dry out between waterings.

Create a “my” space.
In a clutter-free corner, place a small chair and lamp to read by. This will give you a spot to go to when you need to relax and shield yourself from the stress of the day.

Paint a wall a restful green.
Soft green produces a soothing effect on the eyes because of how easily it is absorbed by the retina, reveals a recent study commissioned by The Corporate Design Foundation.

By: Fawn from the Johnson Real Estate Blog

Ever wish you had a list of all the tricks your Grandma used to keep her kitchen spotless and running smoothly? Below are some great tips to keeping your kitchen clean with quick cleaning tricks using things you have around the house already! 

•  To add extra sparkle and clean to your dishes add a few tablespoons of vinegar along with the dishwashing detergent.
• Remove hard water stains and lime build up from your teapot or kettle but adding two cups vinegar to the kettle and bringing it to boil for 10 minutes. Rinse and the stains will be gone.
•  To whiten an old kitchen sink poor half a cup of salt into the sink and scrub it with lemon. Let sit for 5 minutes and then rinse.
•  Remove kitchen and food odors from your home by soaking a cotton ball in pure vanilla and placing in a saucer on the counter or refridgerator.
• Rub shoes skid marks from the vinyl floor by first applying toothpaste to the mark before cleaning the floor.

By: Fawn from the Johnson Real Estate Blog

Owning your home is part of the American Dream, but if you’re not prepared, buying it can be a nightmare. Here are some fundamentals for buyers and sellers.

1. Don’t buy if you can’t stay put.
If you can’t commit to remaining in one place for at least a few years, then owning is probably not for you, at least not yet. With the transaction costs of buying and selling a home, you may end up losing money if you sell any sooner – even in a rising market. When prices are falling, it’s an even worse proposition.

2. Start by shoring up your credit.
Since you most likely will need to get a mortgage to buy a house, you must make sure your credit history is as clean as possible. A few months before you start house hunting, get copies of your credit report. Make sure the facts are correct, and fix any problems you discover.

3. Aim for a home you can really afford.
The rule of thumb is that you can buy housing that runs about two-and-one-half times your annual salary. But you’ll do better to use one of many calculators available online to get a better handle on how your income, debts, and expenses affect what you can afford.

4. If you can’t put down the usual 20 percent, you may still qualify for a loan.
There are a variety of public and private lenders who, if you qualify, offer low-interest mortgages that require a down payment as small as 3 percent of the purchase price.

5. Buy in a district with good schools.
In most areas, this advice applies even if you don’t have school-age children. Reason: When it comes time to sell, you’ll learn that strong school districts are a top priority for many home buyers, thus helping to boost property values.

6. Get professional help.
Even though the Internet gives buyers unprecedented access to home listings, most new buyers (and many more experienced ones) are better off using a professional agent. Look for an exclusive buyer agent, if possible, who will have your interests at heart and can help you with strategies during the bidding process.

7. Choose carefully between points and rate.
When picking a mortgage, you usually have the option of paying additional points — a portion of the interest that you pay at closing — in exchange for a lower interest rate. If you stay in the house for a long time — say three to five years or more — it’s usually a better deal to take the points. The lower interest rate will save you more in the long run.

8. Before house hunting, get pre-approved.
Getting pre-approved will you save yourself the grief of looking at houses you can’t afford and put you in a better position to make a serious offer when you do find the right house. Not to be confused with pre-qualification, which is based on a cursory review of your finances, pre-approval from a lender is based on your actual income, debt and credit history.

9. Do your homework before bidding.
Your opening bid should be based on the sales trend of similar homes in the neighborhood. So before making it, consider sales of similar homes in the last three months. If homes have recently sold at 5 percent less than the asking price, you should make a bid that’s about eight to 10 percent lower than what the seller is asking.

10. Hire a home inspector.
Sure, your lender will require a home appraisal anyway. But that’s just the bank’s way of determining whether the house is worth the price you’ve agreed to pay. Separately, you should hire your own home inspector, preferably an engineer with experience in doing home surveys in the area where you are buying. His or her job will be to point out potential problems that could require costly repairs down the road.

Click here to take a quiz to see if you know the basics about buying a house

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Recent FHA Changes Make Financing Tougher for Bellingham Real Estate

Prior to and since the crazy days of real estate financing, FHA loans have been the primary loan of choice for those borrowers with downpayments of less than 20%.  The 20% rule gives a lender more cushion against falling prices and the inevitable rising foreclosure rate they bring.   With FHA’s typical downpayment requirement of 3.5%, there isn’t much of a cushion.

Before we talk about the changes, let’s make clear how an FHA loan works:

The FHA doesn’t make loans – they guarantee loans written to their standards and made by FHA authorized lenders.  Think of the agency as an insurance company who insures the lender so they will make a riskier loan.  The borrower buys the insurance policy for the bank in lieu of making a larger downpayment.  There is an upfront premium that is financed as part of the loan and monthly premiums that are added to the monthly payment amount.  The premiums collected by FHA are supposed to cover losses the agency may incur.

Unfortunately, the financial problems our economy is experiencing have hit the FHA particularly hard.  A few numbers tell the tale:

• Congress requires FHA reserves of 2% based on their insurance guarantees.  Last fall they had reserves of 3%.  As of November, they had reserves of .53%
• The amount of single-family mortgages insured by FHA in fiscal 2009 were more than 4 times the amount insured in fiscal 2007.
• Almost half of first time homebuyers get an FHA loan to purchase.
• In the 3rd quarter of 2009, 14.4% of FHA loans were deliniquent, compared to 9.6% of all loans.

As a consequence, FHA is doing what any insurance company must do to control losses:  they are tighening the qualifying requirements for coverage.  Changes and impacts include the following:

• The upfront premium amount is increased from 1.75% to 2.25%, and it is proposed to increase the monthly premium from .5% to .55%.  Since the initial premium is financed as part of the loan, the payment increases.  As already noted, the monthly premium also increases the monthly payment.  Since borrowers are limited to monthly payment amounts based on their income, they will be able to afford less expensive houses.
• In the past, the seller of a house to an FHA borrower could pay up to 6% of the purchase price toward the borrower’s cost of getting the loan.  The new rules cap this at 3% of the purchase price, which is comparable to the amount of seller contribution for a conventional loan.  This means a buyer will need more cash to buy a home, even though the downpayment amount stays at 3.5% (for now).
• In addition, the agency will be monitoring lenders who offer FHA loans more closely and is asking Congress to increase the liability of those lenders.  This may reduce the number of lenders approved for or willing to make FHA loans.

Over the past 20 years (and before), there has been a great deal of pressure to increase homeownership in the United States.  There have been strong sociological as well as political reasons for this pressure.  The pressure has lowered the standards required to get a home loan at the same time that lenders were getting very creative with buyer qualification.   The current economic downturn has destroyed paper equity and caused loss by foreclosure for homeowners at all economic levels, but those who stretched the hardest to buy or who had the least “skin in the game” have been more likely to lose their homes.

There will be criticism of this move on the part of the FHA, but a question that should be asked is, “Which is the more negative impact on a family:  living in rented housing or fighting to buy a home and then losing it because they really weren’t strong enough financially to handle it”?  There has to be a balance somewhere – hopefully these changes bring it close.

By Lylene of the Johnson Real Estate Team Blog