Author: SIR Admin

Everyone at Joan Herlong & Associates Sotheby’s International Realty thinks Greenville and the Upstate is a great place to live, but just don’t take our word for it. Here are some recent stories that shine some more light on why this region is so amazing.

The New York Times named Greenville, SC one of the 52 Places to go in 2023
With the amount of tourism we saw this year, we’ll bet lots of folks took this list to heart. The Times
article says that while visitors may initially show up for access to our outdoor adventures, they’ll most
likely leave Greenville having tasted flavors from around the world. If that doesn’t make you want to
head downtown for dining, we don’t know what will.

Greenville named a “Must See City” and named a 2024 Best Family Travel Award Winner by Good
Housekeeping
Good Housekeeping labels Greenville as a “southern gem,” a place that welcomes everyone warmly and
appeals to people of all ages and interests. They highlight our 32-acre Falls Park, the BMW Centrum
Museum, Roper Mountain Science Center, plus our 200 locally-owned restaurants and shops.
Greenville’s vibe is described as energetic with a happy feeling in the air.

Greenville ranked #4 by Condé Nast Traveler’s 2023 Readers’ Choice Awards for the Best Small Cities
in the US
The Condé Nast piece brags on Greenville as a “food lover’s town” filled with farm-to-table restaurants,
specifically calling out Jianna and Vault and Vator as recommendations. They also shout out the
exploding craft beer scene, dynamic urban spaces, Falls Park, and Swamp Rabbit Trail. This is also the
7th consecutive year that Greenille has been named one of the best small cities by Condé Nast.

Travel + Leisure named Greenville amongst 10 Most Beautiful and Affordable Places to Live
Greenville ranks #3 on this list, which boasts about Greenville’s lively downtown and exciting restaurants
(noticing a theme here?) and affordability, with our median home price still falling under the national
median.

Greenville listed on U.S. News & World Report’s list of Best Places to Live and Best Places to Retire
Ranked as #31 for Best Places to Live and #76 for Best Places to Retire, it’s no wonder so many people
are moving here. A now “bustling metropolis,” the list highlight’s our city’s manufacturing jobs,
reinvigorated downtown, big city amenities without big city pains, and a low cost of living.

Want to know more about living here? Contact one of our Associates today to get the process started
right.

Originally Posted by Joan Herlong on Forbes.com on November 13, 2023 (Original Article)

Cliché. Fairytale. Fantasy.

That is what rushes through my brain whenever I see a real estate professional claim they are putting people in their dream homes. Or condos. Or houses. Or dream locations. Basically, if you are a real estate professional using any reference about finding a dream home or perfect home, you’re doing your clients a great disservice.

If you are buying a home, and your real estate agent hypes you on finding “your dream home,” then you might want to keep looking . . . for a different buyer agent.

It’s. Just. A. House.

You’ll make it a home.

Houses Are Just Collections of Objects

Houses have walls, roofs, floors, doors, windows, toilets, showers, sinks, etc. They don’t have any magical ability to change your life no matter what Disney movies tell you. At the end of the day, it’s just a house.

Case in point, consider the following anecdote that has been attributed to many, but I’m going with baseball legend Branch Rickey. Rickey would tell his managers and coaches the tale of a man who stepped off a train in a new town. He asked someone what the place was like, and the answer was it was a cutthroat, no-good place where everyone was only for themselves.

The man found that description of the town to be true. The next day another person got off the train, and asked the same question, but he was told that it was a great place where people willingly helped one another. The man found that description of the town to be true.

The Lesson for Real Estate

You are going to make your house a great place. You are going to enjoy life in a house once you make it feel like home. A buyer agent’s primary role is to help their buyers remain fixed in reality. If a buyer falls in love in a “dream house” — but doesn’t get it, then every other house will seem inferior. That mindset helps no one.

If they do get the house, thinking it’s a “10 out of 10,” reality will eventually sink in. Even if it’s an 8, it will feel like a disappointment compared to “the 10” their agent let them believe it was. Classic recipe for homemade buyer’s remorse.

How can agents and buyers avoid falling for “the dream house” bête noire?

• Be an advocate. The real estate agent best serves their buyers and sellers by acting as their advocate and guide through a process that is foreign to them. They need to help clients navigate the complexities of a real estate transaction to make the very best decisions. The best decisions are fully informed decisions.
• Focus on realities. An adept buyer agent will let you rave about the purple exterior, but they will also caution you that – on resale – purple homes in that area often take longer to sell. You’ve hired a professional to do a job, and that’s not the same as echoing everything you say.
• Look at every house. A lot of potential buyers will not look at more houses once they have their heart set on their dream house. I say no, remain open. If you have five houses to look at in one day, you need to look at five houses. How else can you make an informed decision? Plus, it’s common courtesy. Those five sellers made their homes available to you so you need to respect that effort.

Remember, while buyers might tour dozens of properties before making an offer on one, and sellers will agonize over putting their home on the market, they spend precious little time looking for the right real estate professional to help. They assume they are all the same.

They are not. One way to tell the better ones? Ask them about finding you your dream home.

– Joan Herlong

Click here to order my book, “As Is: An Insider’s Guide to Real Estate”. Follow me on LinkedIn. Check out my website.

If you haven’t noticed, Joan Herlong, the CEO and Founder of this amazing real estate company, has been in the news a lot in the past few weeks. Here are some of the highlights.

Joan was interviewed in the Post & Courier Greenville about her thoughts on why the housing market is booming in Travelers Rest, a city just north of our main office in Greenville.  This area has really picked up as growth spot in the past few years and Joan offers some keen insights as to why.

Speaking of insights, you may have seen Joan’s piece in Forbes about why local knowledge is important when choosing a Realtor.

Finally, Joan’s book,  “As Is: An Insider’s Guide to Real Estate”, is available online and in stores. She was interviewed by Fox Carolina about the book and journey that has led to such a fascinating career in real estate.

Want to have Joan share her business insights with your group or company? She is a marvelous public speaker.  Or maybe you want her to come and sign some books. Contact her at info@joanherlong.com for details.

Originally Posted by Joan Herlong on September 29, 2023 (Original Article)

To paraphrase the late, some would say great, Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill, “all real estate is local.”

I don’t mean that real estate is a savage series of verbal sparring matches where diametrically opposed forces battle for power for the sake of the average person. That’s taking the political metaphor too far.

I mean that every time you see a story, graph, meme, or video talking about “the national housing market,” those things are about as helpful to your local endeavor as the average politician. Caveat emptor.

The only thing more local than politics is real estate. Nothing, and I mean nothing, is more local. I have learned and taught this in my 30+ years in real estate. Just because something plays well in Peoria doesn’t mean diddly to the fine and wonderful folks living in East Peoria. It’s THAT local.

Why? Here’s why:

Real Market Analysis

Perhaps the most significant responsibility of a seller agent is determining the right price for a home that hits that sweet spot that gets the seller the best price within a reasonable amount of time.

In any market, data-based pricing is paramount. While data can be collected about a market by just about any algorithm, it takes a seasoned Realtor to analyze the data. Your savvy local agent will know about a planned road widening, rezoning, the strength of the local school’s PTA, or other seemingly random things that could affect home values in the future.

Personally, I never price anything before I walk through a home first. A Zillow search or VR scan won’t do that for you, and therefore has zero nuance or interpretive value to add.

Local Means Local

This is my company’s own little exclamation point. We use Zip Code Pricing.

For example, my downtown Greenville, SC office zip code is 29601. Homes we list in that immediate area have prices ending in – 601. Other popular zip codes we sell are in 29681, 29615, 29607, and so on.

Since location is buyers’ first and most important criterion, our Zip Code pricing inherently emphasizes location. Even our pricing works harder for our clients.

Finding the Right Fit

The unspoken real estate rule that should be spoken is that the Buyer Agents’ role is to help their clients find two or three houses that will meet their needs – not just “that one home of their dreams.”

If a client falls in love with a house—but then they don’t get it—the remaining contenders somehow feel like runners-up. An adept agent helps their clients see the big picture. We’re guides, not matchmakers.

We don’t find our clients ONE dream house to love. The dream fades when the roof leaks. That discernment only comes from relying on a strong local Realtor who helps you separate emotion from a major financial decision.

Spotting the Differences

“As Is” can be a scary phrase to homebuyers, even some investors. It can often be seen as code for “fixer-upper,” which in turn can be seen as anything from a house with a rotted roof to a dated dwelling that only a mother could love. But a smart local Realtor will tell you that “As Is” could also mean that the proactive seller has professionally inspected the property before anyone darkens the door.

Why would a seller have their own house inspected first? Without a professional inspection, no seller knows the exact condition of every aspect of their home. If something troublesome turns up, the seller gets to address it in their time frame. If a seller foregoes the cost of an inspection and lets the buyer’s inspector undercover something scary, the seller loses any timing advantage. They then have to make decisions about repairs and costs under the threat that the buyer is about to back out.

Choose Wisely

Despite the surfeit of available agents, most sellers only confer with one Realtor about listing their house. Their chosen agent might be their next-door neighbor or their wife’s cousin who “needs a leg up in the business.”

Regardless of price point, selling your home is a very big deal – yet too many sellers tend to hand that deal to someone they’ve just met who hasn’t even competed for the business.

While buyers might tour dozens of properties before making an offer, sellers often do precious little “shopping” for the right listing agent. They assume selling their home will be easy, so it doesn’t matter who the listing agent is.

But if the agent and/or company did not matter, then all agents would sell the same amount of real estate. All companies would be the same. They’re not.

If you do your homework, you’ll get a better grade of Realtor when selling your home. And a better Realtor usually means a better outcome for the client.

In case you missed the article in the Greenville Journal (read that article here) this week, Joan Herlong has written a book entitled, “As-Is:  An Insider’s Guide to Real Estate”. While the book won’t be on store shelves until September 26, you can pre-order it now at www.joanherlong.com.

So, why should you pre-order this book or even buy this book? She’s basically encapsulated everything she’s learned in her 30 years in real estate, but this is not some memoir. Nor is it a bunch of boring platitudes on success. This is a book aimed at making the real estate industry better across the board. Whether you’re a buyer, a seller, an agent, or an aspiring agent, you’ll find insights and strategies that will help you become better informed, to get the most out of your  real estate experience. 

What can you expect from this book?

• Reasons why most real estate professionals fail and how to avoid those traps.
• The correct things that buyers and sellers need to know about the real estate process.
• How to manage the unexpected parts of the real estate world.
• Tips to be a better business leader.
• Laugh. Expect to laugh. Some of the stories you will read include showing a house that had a picture of the owner wearing a bikini in every room;  Joan’s experiences with “reality” home buying shows; the adventures of showing a house with only a drum kit in it; and why she plays Van Morrison to help sell a house and many more.

This book is her effort to raise the bar, hopefully inspiring more dedicated, full-time real estate professionals, who will treat this high-stakes business with the seriousness that buyers and sellers deserve.