When a Picture is Worth 1,000 Words. 'Yikes!' Being One of Them.

What it looks like when Satan gets into cocooning.

 Here at MontReal Estate central we like to goof around, particularly when we come across really dubious photos attached to real estate listings. You can check out some favorites by searching the key word "What?" in the topics to the right of this post.

Now that many real estate brokers are using smartphones equipped with quite good cameras it is easier than ever to get half decent photos. The new iPhone camera is basically idiot proof, with a high-definition setting that lets you sharpen the focus of any photo, not to mention correct the colour or add effects after the fact. I'm pretty sure that's what went wrong with the photo to the left. The room can't possibly be that red, unless Satan doth dwell there, right?

You have permission to pee in the bath tub.

As these photos plucked from recent MLS listings illustrate, if a good picture can help sell a house, a bad one can really keep people away.

It is a serious enough problem that the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board sends out a steady stream of press releases, tip sheets and video features offering brokers ideas on how to improve the quality of their photos, because bad photos are a disservice to clients.

Recently the board mandated a private company to examine the photos on the MLS for quality-control purposes. (My dues at work!)  The result, 20 per cent of photos on the MLS are blurry, poorly framed or most likely, too dark. They didn't get into the fact that sometimes the pictures are INSANE, (see above) but I digress.

Crisp lines and even light. A total absence of  clutter doesn't hurt.

 I recently had a buyer client who kept sending me links to listings to give me an idea of what he liked. After a while it dawned on me that what he really liked was listings with high-definition photos with their bright, even colours and crisp lines. See how sharp this one is?  Doesn't it make the condo pop? Exactly.

Sometimes when I'm in a hurry I grab my pictures for listing purposes. Mostly, however, I rely on a professional photographer to do the job right. Sharon Wilson takes great pictures. That's her work just beneath. Notice how she frames the shot to show the flow of one room into another.  She gets the right angles, the right lighting and the right framing. Plus, she's reliable, good-humored and delivers her pix on time. For me, it is among the smartest money I spend to promote a property.

A Sharon Wilson photo. Nice!

I dunno if Sharon has every knowingly taken a picture of a portable toilet in a bath tub. I know that she always puts the seat and lid down if she's photographing a real toilet. Now that's attention to detail.

Montreal Resales Surge in September

Eager buyers paced a surge in single-family home and condominium sales on the island of Montreal in September,with sales in each category rising by 15 per cent and 10 per cent respectively compared to September, 2010, according the latest stats from the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board.
That worked out to 324 houses and 510 condos sold.
The jump in those two categories offset a 5 per cent drop in plex sales last month. The number of two- to five-unit building sold totaled 213, compared to 225 a year earlier. Sales volume, or the amont of money buyers spent, rose by 6 per cent to $854.4 million in September alone.

The strong September results were the fourth consecutive month of gains for the Greater Montreal area, with the island leading the way.

Spectacular Verdun Victorian

The parlor with its tile-fronted fireplace and the stairs leading to the bedrooms.

Take a look at this spectacular four-bedroom Victorian just listed by Amy Barratt and me. The asking price is $359,000.

UPDATE: The price has been reduced to $349,000.

The vendor has deeds, many of them handwritten in spidery cursive, going back to the late 1880s. This is a rock-solid house with brick walls and a stone foundation. The four real bedrooms on the second floor feature high ceilings and generous proportions.

The reception rooms on the main floor include a large formal parlor with a tile-fronted fireplace, a family room which was probably once the formal dining room, a dinette and kitchen. The main floor also has a water closet (toilet) near the front door, as well as a full laundry room and an open office area near the back door. There's plenty of natural light and it is surprisingly quiet, thanks no doubt to the thick stone walls and the triple-glazed windows.

The house has original woodwork throughout, hot-water radiators, lovely stained glass windows added by the owner, as well as thoughtfully chosen light fixtures that accent the property's vintage character.

Family room and dinette. The laundry room is beyond the stained-glass doors.

The owner is a gifted interior designer and something of a bulldog when it comes to home maintenance and repairs. Over the course of her decade-long tenancy, she has undertaken at least one major improvement a year - furnace, roof, windows and doors, painting, etc. Her most recent investment was an interior french drain and waterproofing of the basement. The basement is more than 6 feet, high and dry. It could be finished, if someone was so inclined.

The property has a small fenced yard which could be also be used for parking, though street parking is not a problem in this part of Verdun. May Ave. is the last street off of Wellington St. before you cross under the viaduct into Point St. Charles. The Maxi grocery store is one short block away. LaSalle metro is about two blocks away. It is a quick 15-20 minutes door to door to get downtown via public transit.

If you look around Verdun, $359,000 is a typical asking price for a two- or three-bedroom post-war cottage. They are cute and cozy but nowhere near as spacious or as grand as this Victorian beauty. This property is priced at a market discount because traffic approaching the Champlain Bridge pass overhead not too far from the building's front. It isn't particularly noisy, but the location isn't going to be for everyone.

Exterior from the corner of May Ave. and Rushbrooke St.

If you are in the market for a lovingly restored Victorian that has both acres of elbow room and impeccable bones, this could be the house for you. Give me a call at (514) 978-6522 to book a visit. You won't regret it.

Agreement with the Competition Bureau Ratified by CREA

Members of the Canadian Real Estate Association have aceepted the agreement negotiated by CREA and the federal Competition Bureau with regards to access to the Multiple Listing Service.
I haven't seen the whole agreement yet but the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board has just issued a press release highlighting what it considers the main points.

As the GMREB has already indicated, this agreement will not have a significant impact on the way that real estate brokerage is practiced in Québec, for the following reasons: 

·         It does not give the public direct access to the MLS ^® system or to the centris.ca ^™ and realtor.ca websites; the MLS ^® system remains a service that is reserved for members of a real estate board;

·         It does not require real estate brokerage agencies to change their business models;

·         It  does not change the fact that the listing broker is responsible for the accuracy of the information contained in a real estate listing and in the MLS ^® system ; your obligation to comply with the Québec Real Estate Brokerage Act remains unchanged;

·         It does not preclude the Boards or CREA from having rules for the efficient operation of an MLS ^® system, provided that these rules are not contrary to the agreement;

·         It does not impact compensation.

The fundamental point is that CREA and real estate boards/associations cannot prevent or discriminate against "mere postings" or against real estate broker members who offer mere postings. 

The GMREB has never restricted this type of business model and has never discriminated against others in this regard. We can assure you, however, that the GMREB will continue to make every effort to ensure the accuracy of information published in the MLS ^® system so that consumers are well served and the professional image of real estate brokers is enhanced. The quality of the information found in the MLS ^® system is what sets us apart from "for sale by owner" websites. 

Finally, the agreement stipulates that seller contact information is limited to the member-to-member portion of an MLS ^® system and recognizes seller contact information will not be published on centris.ca ^™ and realtor.ca. 

As a real estate broker, you are still responsible for providing advice to your clients, and you still have the obligation to share compensation with the selling broker as well as inform sellers that they need to pay compensation to selling brokers. 

This agreement reached with the Competition Bureau concludes the litigation between CREA and the Competition Bureau, and ensures that the Bureau waives further legal action against CREA for "anti-competitive practices". The agreement will be in force for 10 years.

Here's what jumps out at me. The GMREB is making a point about the role and responsibility of agents in the real estate transaction. It looks like vendors will be able to post their properties on MLS, but they will still have to go through an agent to do it.
Some agents may choose to offer this service at a discounted rate but A) they still won't be paid until after the deal is concluded. No cash up front. B) Agents will still be responsible for the accuracy of the information on the MLS listing. Agents will still have to provide accurate tax and evaluation information, cadastral numbers and other pertinent listing details.
 In conclusion, the board reminds its agents that they/we are bound by the terms of the Brokerage Act, Quebec legislation ratified by the National Assembly. The act says that agents have an obligation to honestly and faithfully represent the interests of their clients. That obligation means that I can't just list your property and then leave the rest to you, the client. I can't waive my responsibility to you, even if all I've agreed to do is let you list your house under my name.

UPDATE

I'm not feeling the love. Here's a pithy comment from some disgruntled - is there any other kind? - Internet commentator on the Globe and Mail's site.

Realturds have replaced lawyers as the least respected vocation, for very good reasons. The sooner this group of clowns go the way of the dodo bird, the better.

Fair's Fair, Except When It Ain't

The Financial Post had a recent story speculating on what kind of deal the Competition Bureau and the Canadian Real Estate Association have worked out regarding access to the Multiple Listing Service (MLS).
Not much, according the lawyer type guy who led the charge to force CREA to open access to the MLS to consumers.
Again, I have no idea. CREA's membership, in the form of the big brokerage firms, will vote on October 24, during a regularly scheduled meeting in St. John's, Nfld.. I'll wait until the dust settles before commenting further on that.
Here's what caught my eye in the Financial Post story. Look who's making a fuss about the danger of opening the MLS up to civilians.

The other major ramification of the agreement could be a gradually squeezing of for-sale-by-owner (FSBO) sites, which could find themselves competing more and more as discount models on the MLS. That was one of the fears of National FSBO Network, whose vice-president of operations, Stephen Skelly, had argued in a letter to the Competition Tribunal that if agents list property on the MLS for a one-time fee and provide no additional service, his members would not be able to compete.

So, the guys who offer bare-bones, some might say nonexistent support to homeowners who want to sell their properties themselves,  are now worried that opening the MLS to homeowners could put them out of business. My heart bleeds. 

Bursting the Myth of the Real Estate Bubble

If I had a nickel for every time someone has said they were waiting for Montreal's real estate "bubble" to burst, I'd have enough money to buy one of those fancy lattés instead of a Timmy's double-double.
The myth of the bubble is the single biggest misconception I battle as an agent. I can talk until I'm blue in the face about fundamentals like interest rates, job creation and demographic shifts and the impact they have on the local housing market but I guess I have all the credibility of a used-car sales person. "Trust me! I'm a real estate agent."
OK, so don't believe me. But take a peek at this column by Gazette business scribe Jay Bryan. He puts his boots (more like LL Bean mocs, actually) to the myth of the housing bubble

Here's an interesting point to note about the Montreal real estate scene. The number of properties for sale in May, the last month for which there are statistics, fell by 16 per cent compared to a year earlier. That might have to do with nervousness. It's also true that if people don't list, other people don't list and next thing you know, there's a shortage of listings. A classic Catch 22.
That shortage of listings translated into an 8-per-cent drop in sales. Still, despite the inventory squeeze, the volume or total dollar value of sales rose by 1 per cent compared to May, 2009. Prices for houses, condos and plexes were up 8 per cent, 7 per cent and 11 per cent respectively, according to the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board
Not too shabby

Montreal Real Estate, A Return to Form in October

Housing resales in greater Montreal were up by 23 per cent last month compared to October, 2008.
A total of 3,543 homes traded hands - a notable improvement over the year earlier period, also known technically as "the beginning of the giant freakout."
In fact, real estate sales in the metropolitan area plummeted by 17 per cent a year ago, as buyers and sellers digested the carnage being visited on the U.S economy and wondered what the heck it meant for Montreal.
Not so much, as it turned out.
Still, let's not belittle last month's terrific sales numbers. It is more useful to measure them against October, 2007, the best October of record, according the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board. How did last month stack up? Three per cent more sales than the best previous October.
Condo sales were up 28 per cent compared to a year earlier and up 12 per cent compared to 2007.
Single-family home and plex sales were up 23 per cent and 16 per cent respectively compared to last year but were stable compared to 2007.
Prices across all property types were up six per cent compared to this time last year.
The median price of a single-family home reached $240,000, while that of a condo reached $195,000 and a plex (two to five dwellings) reached $350,000.

Montreal Housing Resales Climb in September

Housing resales across the greater Montreal area rose by five per cent in September, compared to the same month a year earlier, according to the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board.
Last fall was a slower than average period for real estate, what with everyone gripped by the collapse of the U.S. housing and banking sectors. But this September's numbers don't just look good compared to a crummy '08. According the GMREB, it was the best September on record. (We pause to toot our party horns and raise a midday glass of champagne!)
I know I'm doing my best to keep the numbers up. I closed two sales last month. That compared to one sale in September, 2008. A welcome 50-per-cent increase!(Update: Alert reader Amy Barratt points out that is actually a 100-per-cent increase. This is why I let her handle the calculator.)
What else does the board say? Prices are on the rise, with the median price of a single-family home or condominium unit up 7 per cent. Plexes are up by 5 per cent.
The number of active listings decreased by 7 per cent to 20,912. The number of new listings to hit the MLS system in September totaled 6,110, a 11-per-cent drop compared to a year earlier.
There were more sales between January and September, 2008 but lower volume through the first nine months of 2009 translated into prices that were bwtween 3 and 4 per cent higher than a year ago.

No Dog Days of August for Montreal Real Estate

Resale housing in the Greater Montreal region rose by robust 9 per cent in August, according to the latest figures from the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board.
The prices increases were seen in all property types and across a wide geographic area.
The number of single-family home sales rose by 5 per cent compared to August of last year, totaling 1,674 properties. On the condo front, sales rose by 15 per cent to 855, while plex sales rose by 17 per cent to 337 units.
All three property types saw price increases, too. Single homes rose by an average of 6 per cent, plexes ( 2 to 5 units) rose 5 per cent and condos by 3 per cent.
The board pointed to the usual factors -- low borrowing rates, an improving job market and stronger consumer confidence -- as the key to the August market.
It must also be noted that August, 2008 was about the time all hell began to break loose in the U.S. economy, with failures setting off a chain reaction of business failings and job losses.
Montreal managed to dodge the bullet, at least compared to many other large North American cities. Still, the beginning of the year was a little too quiet for most agents' liking.
First-time buyers kept us busy during the bleakest part of winter. New rules allowing first-timers to withdraw up to $25,000 from their RRSPs helped quite a bit. Eventually, vendors and buyers regained their nerve, making for a busy May through August.
The cheery portrait was confirmed in a new report by RBC Economic Research, the thinking end of the big chartered bank. RBC tracks housing affordability across Canada - ie the portion of pretax household revenue needed to service mortgage, utilities and taxes. Affordability got a boost in the second quarter, thanks to lower mortgage rates and a softer real estate market.
In Montreal, that meant carrying costs for the typical bungalow ate up 37.3 per cent of household income, down from 38.1 per cent during the previous three-month period.
For the average condo owner, 30.1 per cent of household income were dedicated to paying the mortgage et al, compared to 30.9 per cent three months earlier.
The average Vancouver bungalow owner spends 63.4 per cent of household income paying the mortgage. In Tawrawna, it's 45.6 per cent.
"Greater affordability has opened the door more fully to buyers, who have sprung into action," noted Robert Hogue, senior economist at RBC. "Sales of existing homes in Quebec have rebounded strongly, rising by more than 40 per cent from the cyclical low reached mid-winter, with improved market sentiment helping prices rise."
Taking the current market conditions into account, the Royal says affordability is unlikely to show much more improvement locally in the near term.

Pauline Marois' Chateau on Île-Bizard Up for Grabs

The Parti Québecois' grande dame has put her spacious waterfront retreat on the block, much to the delight of local media hacks.
The 12,000-square-foot La Closerie is listed with Sotheby's International Realty for a cool $8 million. That price buys you the usual bells and whistles of genteel West Island living, including 1.7-million square feet of fenced, landscaped and manicured land overlooking Rivière des Prairies. The 15-room home has eight bedrooms and a total of 10 bath and powder rooms.
You can check out the full listing on the Sotheby's site.
You might recall that Château Marois made headlines in 2007 when The Gazette ran an investigative piece by William Marsden alleging that Marois and her husband, the financier Claude Blanchet, improperly annexed government-owned agricultural land to create the 41.3-acre estate. You can read a version of Marsden's original story here.
None of the allegations have been proven in court. It is worth noting that Marois and Blanchet are now suing The Gazette and Marsden for libel, to the tune of $2 million.
Back to the house. News of the listing has created a buzz for columnists and bloggers during the usually drowsy summer news season.
La Presse's Patrick Lagacé blogged about the château, noting that he was surprised by how tasteful the place is. "We've all seen rich people with way less taste when it comes to matters of interior decorating."
Still, Lagacé thinks the house sends the wrong message. Too big, too in-yer-face for voters to easily accept.
Readers are engaging in a brisk back and forth. Some chide the leader of the soi-dissant social democratic PQ, for being showy. Others are equally vocal in their defense, saying Quebecers need to get over their deeply ingrained suspicion and jealousy of those who make scads of money. "Does she have to rent a 3 1/2 in Montreal North to satisfy you people?" goes one comment.
Anyway, if any of you are interested in seeing Château Marois, references required, please give me a call. I would love to collect the commission.
But I'm not holding my breath.

UPDATE

As luck would have it, I ran into Marois' agent Cyrille Girard of Sotheby's last week. He opened the door for my client and me at one his listings on Parc La Fontaine. I knew Cyrille slightly from my old job as Gazette real estate reporter. I complimented him on the coup of landing La Closerie. He showed me some clippings from the papers.
Here's the interesting part. Girard told me with a big conspiratorial smile that he has an even more interesting listing on Île-Bizard. It has nearly 35,000 square feet of living space. He told me who it belongs to. I'm not going to tell, but I will give two broad hints. She used to be the first lady of a country in southeast Asia. The 35,000 square feet presumably includes plenty of room for her shoes.
That's all I'm going to say.

The Best News I've Heard in Maybe Seven Months

The number-crunchers at the Greater Montreal Real Estate Board report that May marked the first time in seven months that home sales outpaced the same month a year earlier.
Yup, after a sl-oooooo-w fall and early winter, buyers started to pop up like so many brave little crocuses in late March and April. In May, they were in full flower.
Sales through the board's MLS system increased by 8 per cent to 4,839 transactions. Single-family homes led the way, with 2,959 sales, a 13-per-cent increase compared to the same month in 2008. Condo sales rose by 2 per cent and plex sales up by 3 per cent.
The market spread the love around, with sales on the South Shore up by 13 per cent, year over year, on the North Shore sales rose 8 per cent. In Montreal, the off-island western suburbs and Laval, saw sales increase by 7, 5 and 4 per cent respectively.
What happened to get the market moving? The real estate board pegged it to increased consumer confidence, which is at its highest level since July, 2008. According to the board, 55 per cent of consumers surveyed said this was a good time to buy a home, compared to only 38 per cent in April. Historically low interest rates may have had something to do with that increased confidence.

April Resales - Fewer Transactions, Prices Hold Steady

The Greater Montreal Real Estate Board confirmed what agents on the ground have been sensing, that April was a quiet month for Montreal resale market.
The board reports that residential resales declined by 6 per cent to 4,829 sales last month compared to the same month a year ago. April, 2008 was one of the busiest months on record, according to the GMREB.
As for prices, single-family values held steady last month, neither rising nor falling, while the average condo price crept up by 5 per cent. If you break out condo sales on the island of Montreal alone, prices rose by an average of 7 per cent. The average plex (two- to five nuts) edge up by 1 per cent.
Buyers are taking a little longer to make their choice, with the typical property staying on the market 80 days, compared to 67 days a year ago.
The number of active listings has increased by 10 per cent, year over year, to 28,322.

New Hampstead Listing!

Just listed, a lovely 3+2 bedroom semi-detached brick cottage in Hampstead. For those who don't speak fluent real-estatese, that means three bedrooms upstairs and two more in the finished basement. There's a main floor family room with its own entrance - ideal for a home-based business. There are oversized patio doors in the dining room, leading to an enormous walk-out terrace in contoured concrete. The back yard is huuuge with an apple tree and the biggest pear tree I've ever seen in captivity. The vendor tells me that come August, he gives pears to all the households on the street. Clearly this is a house with a soul and very easy on the eyes. Asking prices is $457,000. You can call me for more information, or view the complete listing here.