Westside LA Real Estate Advice: Lots of people, especially those trying to battle high utility bills, believe in energy-efficient homebuilding.

But there’s something holding green technology back: It simply costs more to include it than it adds to resale value

Appraisals for newly built green homes do not fully reflect the cost of green technology, and the lower appraisal values mean buyers often cannot get the full financing they need from banks.

That discourages developers from using green technology, in turn diminishing the market for more green products.

“We can’t get lenders to appreciate the value, and if we can’t get the values recognized, manufacturers can’t justify moving these products forward,” said Bill Nolan, a Florida home building consultant.

How that works is illustrated in the case of clients of Michael Chandler, a North Carolina-based green building adviser, who wanted to build a $400,000 home incorporating many green features.

The house was designed to include passive solar heat, solar hot water, radiant floor, high-performance windows and insulation. But the bank’s appraiser told them that the appraisal would come in for less than the cost to construct.

In that case, the buyers would need to come up with a bigger down payment.

“Our best guess is that it will appraise at $380,000,” said Chandler. At 90% financing, the bank would put up $342,000, leaving the would-be buyers with a down payment of $58,000, instead of the $40,000 needed if the house was assessed at the full price.

“With 10% down, the clients would have to come up with (an extra) $18,000,” Chandler said. “They can’t do that.”

Appraisers feel their hands are tied.

“It doesn’t do a lot of good to simply add value based on cost,” said David Snook, a California-based appraiser who serves on the real property committee on education for the American Society of Appraisers. “The question is ‘How much will the market pay on resale?’”

The appraiser’s job is to accurately assess the value of the home. If a feature costs $50,000 to install but only adds $25,000 to the price when the home is resold, the appraisal cannot reflect the full $50,000 spent.

“Appraisers don’t make the market, they reflect it,” said Jim Amorin, spokesman for the Appraisal Institute. “Cost does not necessarily equal value. It depends on how the market reacts to the feature.”

Not under the influence

Also complicating appraisals these days are new rules to prevent loan originators from influencing appraisals. Builders cannot demand specific appraisers, ones more experienced at evaluating green building.

With Chandler’s client, the house is in a rural zip code, one where few energy efficient homes have been constructed. The appraiser had little idea of how much building green adds to value.

“The appraiser has no experience with green building,” he said.

Another problem is that appraisers also rely frequently on foreclosed homes for comparison, especially in places hit hard by defaults. These homes sell at big discounts to the regular market and even bigger discounts to green homes.

Low cost alternatives

Because of the appraisal issues, developers often opt for installing only the lowest-cost green features.

“Some can be incorporated without much additional cost,” said Curt Jones, a Connecticut-based civil engineer and green building consultant. As he describes the process for green certification, points are given for a wide variety of factors, some costing a lot, others costing nothing.

Angling the home a little differently, for example, to catch more rays and help heat the house passively, may not cost the builder a dime. But installing solar panels on the roof definitely will add a lot to the final price.

Ironically, turning green probably does add considerable value — or will, once green gets more established in individual locales and buyers get more familiar with it.

In Seattle, a hotbed of green-building activity, new homes with green certification sell for 8.5% more per square foot than comparable non-green ones, according to a report from GreenWorks Realty. They also sell 22% quicker.

“As more American homeowners green their homes, there will be more and more of a premium paid for green homes,” said Ben Kaufman, GreenWork’s founder. “I can imagine a miles-per-gallon type sticker on homes for sale and the marketplace will absolutely favor fuel-efficient homes.” 

Source: CNNMoney.com

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: Lower-than-average unemployment and strong economic prospects help.

Last month business in Washington, D.C. ground to a halt as record snowfalls pummeled the area and a sparring match over national health care reform hijacked the political conversation. But the nation’s capital is getting something right: It is emerging from the recession better than any other major city in the country, according to research by Forbes.

Jobs in Washington are growing quickly, and in 2008 the city produced more in goods and services than almost anywhere in the country.

D.C. and nine other cities (among them: Boston, Los Angeles and a host of metros in Texas) are best surviving the downturn in part because they specialize in industries that are relatively insulated from economic volatility. Federal and state jobs all but guarantee the health of a local economy, and nowhere is there more government-related work than in Washington. The city has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the country, at 6.2 percent, and its output amounts to $362.3 billion, more than three times the average for the country’s largest cities.

It also saw a more modest slide in home sale prices than many other metros in late 2009. Cities where the recession’s effects are lessening either never felt the full brunt of the housing crisis, or have proven resilient enough that demand is returning sooner than elsewhere in the country. These strong housing markets further enrich the local economy by feeding a host of secondary industries, like construction, lending and household services.

Government spending hasn’t hurt Austin, Texas, either. It’s the seat of state government and tied for No. 1 on our list of 10 cities best surviving the recession. Jobs have been lost nearly everywhere in the last three years, but between December 2007 and December 2009 the number of jobs in Austin rose by 0.98 percent; more than any of the other major cities we looked at. And by three years from now, jobs are expected to grow by 8.09 percent, the second-best job outlook on our list. Third on the list is Dallas, home to a thriving technology and energy sector, where jobs are projected to jump 7.19 percent in three years.

To find the cities where the recession was easing, Forbes looked for a relatively low unemployment rate, using December 2009 figures, the most recent available, and the rate of job growth between December 2007 and December 2009, both from the Bureau of Labor statistics. We sought cities where economists expected that jobs would keep growing, based on the three-year job-growth forecast from Moody’s Economy.com; we also looked for metros with the highest positive change in median sale price for single-family homes between the third and fourth quarter of 2009, according to the National Association of Realtors. Finally, we factored in Metropolitan Gross Domestic Product — the dollar amount of goods and services produced within a metro area — provided for 2008, the most recent available, by Moody’s.

Forbes ranked the 40 largest Metropolitan Statistical Areas for which it had comprehensive data (that excludes Nashville, Tennn. and Detroit, Mich.) on all these measures, then averaged the rankings for a final score.

If one state is a poster child for economic recovery, it’s Texas, home to four of the 10 cities on our list. There’s more to why Austin, Dallas, San Antonio and Houston are faring well than just the state’s energy industry. The tech, government and education industries supplement the oil state’s riches. As for housing, cities in Texas didn’t see the same run-up in home prices and rampant speculation that led to the spectacular bubble burst elsewhere in the country.

“The housing market got lucky, if you want to look at it that way,” says James P. Gaines, research economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. “We didn’t have excessive overbuilding, so we don’t have a big overhang of unsold new homes, and because Texas has among most affordable housing in the country, the demand sustained.”

Like Austin and Dallas, Houston, tied for No. 4 on the list, is expected to experience a three-year 7.03 percent rise in jobs. But nowhere are jobs projected to grow more than in San Antonio, where four military bases should help drive its expected 8.32 percent increase.

California was perhaps hit hardest by the housing crisis. In spite of that, Los Angeles rises above the rest of the state, and other big cities in the country, to No. 9 on our list. Although the Golden State’s real estate woes began earlier and were more pronounced than in large parts of the country, they began easing sooner.

Los Angeles has strong banking and finance industries and a housing market that, while it suffered from a major pricing bubble and bust, has seen a resurgence of demand. After falling to a median $311,100 in the second quarter of 2009, home sale prices there jumped 11 percent in the third quarter and another 2 percent between the third and fourth quarter of 2009 to a median $342,700, according to the National Association of Realtors, making number four in sales price improvement out of our 40 cities.

Although it’s across the country, Boston, No. 8 on the list, has some of the same characteristics that make Los Angeles recession-resistant. Like the City of Angels, it is a cosmopolitan city and an educational center, chock full of amenities and jobs. Unemployment is below the 9.7 percent national average, at 8.2 percent, and the city pumped out a healthy $284.3 billion GDP in 2008.

Many former manufacturing centers in the Midwest suffer from pronounced economic troubles that began before — and will likely extend beyond — the country’s recession. But that’s not the case in two Midwest cities, Minneapolis and Kansas City, Nos. 4 and 10 on our list, respectively. Incidentally, Kansas City has extra cause to celebrate its appearance on this list: it’s also No. 13 on Forbes’ list of the 20 most miserable cities. High taxes, crime rates and poorly performing sports teams landed it on that list, which ranked cities on nine metrics, most of them non-economic (for example, pollution, government corruption and commute times). A promising economic outlook should give Kansas City residents reason to feel less miserable.

In Minneapolis unemployment is a relatively low 7.2 percent. The Twin Cities have moved away from their manufacturing roots and are headquarters to major companies including Cargill and General Mills. Although Kansas City, Missouri’s largest city, has lost jobs in the last three years, it has done so at a slower rate than most other cities, only dropping 2.7 percent, thanks in part to a strong education sector and a diversity of industry.

The cities quickest to emerge from the recession benefit from evergreen industries like government, defense, education and technology — sectors that will always provide work, even in a national slump. In addition, these 10 cities are diverse; their fortunes aren’t invested solely in one industry, giving them good prospects for the future.

Source: Forbes.com

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: I described last week as a roller coaster ride for mortgage rates. A busy schedule of economic data provided much of the motivation for movement in the rates marketplace with the release of the Employment Situation Report on Friday capping off the volatile action.  The jobs report indicated fewer jobs were lost than economists had forecast. This better than expected read on the health of the labor market pushed benchmark Treasury yields higher and mortgage-backed security prices lower. While most lenders repriced for the worse after the data was released, several ended up repricing for the better before the week came to a close as of MBS prices rebounded late in the day. This brought mortgage rates right back to the lows of 2010, basically unchanged on the week.  To remind readers, as the price of MBS move higher, lenders can offer lower mortgage rates. 

If you missed my recap of the Employment Situation Report and the accompanying chart of reprices for the worse and reprices for the better: HERE IT IS

There are no major economic data releases scheduled for release today.   As for the week ahead, there isn’t much to discuss either.   The highest impacting events and releases will be Treasury supply coming to auction block and Retail Sales on Friday.

Tuesday

• $40 billion 3 year Treasury notes will be auctioned (medium impact)

Wednesday

• Mortgage Bankers Association’s Weekly Applications Index (low impact)
• $21 billion 10 year Treasury notes will be auctioned.   Since the average life of a mortgage loan is much closer to 10 years than 3 years, this auction will be of higher importance for mortgage rate watchers.
• January Wholesale Business Inventories (medium impact with poential to be high impact because of slow economic calendar)

Thursday

• January International Trade (medium impact)  The Trade Balance report measures the monthly difference between what our nation imports and what our nation exports. 
• Weekly Jobless Claims (more than medium impact less than high impact)
• $13 billion 30 year Treasury bonds will be auctioned.   Treasuries with terms of less than 2 years are known as bills, terms of 2 years to 10 years are known as notes, and terms of more than 10 years are referred to as bonds. The last auction of the week usually carries the greatest potential to disturb the interest rate market.

Friday

• February Retail Sales (high impact). Did the snow storms impact shopping?
• Consumer Sentiment (medium impact)

For more on the week ahead, READ THIS POST.

Reports from fellow mortgage professionals indicate lender rate sheets to be marginally worse when compared to Friday afternoon pricing.  However the best par 30 year fixed conventional mortgage rate does remain in the 4.75% to 5.00% range for well qualified consumers. Mortgage rates are more or less holding steady near the lowest levels of 2010 even as benchmark Treasury yields have risen. READ MORE.  To secure a par interest rate you must have a FICO credit score of 740 or higher, a loan to value at 80% or less and pay all closing costs including an estimated one point loan origination/discount/broker fee.    Rates for 15 year fixed rate mortgages’ remain in the 4.25% to 4.50% range with similar costs. 

If you have been sitting on the sidelines waiting to refinance, now is the time.  The Fed is about to end its MBS purchase program at the end of the month, while we do not expect mortgage rates to skyrocket, we do anticipate they will move steadily higher.  I have been saying all year that the only way mortgage rates will move back to the best levels of 2009 is a fundamental shift in economic outlooks or a surprise announcement from the Fed regarding the extension of the MBS purchase program. At the moment, both events seem highly unlikely.  Still locking.

Source: Mortgage News Daily

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: A smaller percentage of mortgages were delinquent and the rate of those entering the foreclosure process slowed in the fourth quarter of 2009, possible signs that the foreclosure crisis that has gripped many of the nation’s housing markets is finally starting to ease, a trade group has reported.

“We are likely seeing the beginning of the end of the unprecedented wave of mortgage delinquencies and foreclosures that started with the subprime defaults in early 2007,” said Jay Brinkmann, chief economist of the Mortgage Bankers Association, in a written statement.

The delinquency rate for mortgages on one- to four-unit residential properties was a seasonally adjusted 9.47% of all mortgages outstanding in the fourth quarter, down from 9.64% in the third quarter and up from 7.88% in the fourth quarter of 2008, according to the MBA’s quarterly delinquency survey.

Delinquencies include mortgages that are at least one payment or more past due but not yet in foreclosure.

Meanwhile, 1.2% of outstanding mortgages entered the foreclosure process in the fourth quarter, down from 1.42% in the third quarter and up from 1.08% in the fourth quarter of 2008. The percentage of mortgages at some point in the foreclosure process at the end of the fourth quarter was 4.58%, up from 4.47% in the third quarter and 3.3% in the fourth quarter of 2008.

The MBA survey covers about 44.4 million loans on one- to four-unit residential properties, or about 85% of all first-lien residential mortgage loans that are outstanding in the country. No doubt, the foreclosure nightmare isn’t over yet.

The percentages of loans 90 days or more past due and loans in foreclosure process set record highs in the fourth quarter, according to the report. Many of those loans more than 90 days past due are in loan modification programs, and some of them have been seriously delinquent for months waiting for modifications to get finalized.

But the good news is there are fewer problem loans actually entering delinquency—likely a result of fewer layoffs, Brinkmann said. “We normally see a large spike in short-term mortgage delinquencies at the end of the year due to heating bills, Christmas expenditures and other seasonal factors. Not only did we not see that spike but the 30-day delinquencies actually fell by 16 basis points from 3.79% to 3.63%,” he said. He added that the non-seasonally adjusted 30-day delinquency rate has only dropped three times in the past between the third and fourth quarter—”and never by this magnitude.”

Depending on the fate of seriously delinquent mortgages—whether they are cured with modifications or ultimately enter foreclosure—the percentage of mortgages somewhere in the foreclosure process could start to see a gradual decline in the second half of the year, he said during a conference call with reporters.

If normal seasonal patterns hold, there could be a bigger drop in the 30-day delinquency rate in the first quarter of 2010, Brinkmann said. That would be a positive sign for the months and years ahead. “The continued and sizable drop in the 30-day delinquency rate is a concrete sign that the end may be in sight,” he said. “With fewer new loans going bad, the pool of seriously delinquent loans and foreclosures will eventually begin to shrink once the rate at which these problems are resolved exceeds the rate at which new problems come in. “It also gives us growing confidence that the size of the problem now is about as bad as it will get,” he said.

According to the MBA data, Florida was the most problematic state, in terms of delinquencies. Twenty-six percent of Florida mortgages were one payment or more past due at the end of the year, and 20.4% of mortgages in the state were 90 days or more past due or already in the foreclosure process.

Source: MarketWatch.com

Westside LA Real Estate Advice:  The Treasury Department was forced Friday to reiterate its financial support for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac after a key lawmaker rattled investors by pointing out that their debt does not enjoy the explicit guarantee of the federal government.

Speaking to reporters at a housing conference, Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., noted that debt issued by the two mortgage finance companies is different from bonds issued by the Treasury Department. He also raised the risk that investors in the companies’ debt may not be paid back.

“I’ve always said to people, even when I was not too worried about Fannie and Freddie, please do not think this is federally guaranteed,” Frank said. “I don’t think it is, I don’t think it should be.”

To calm worried investors, Frank later issued a statement adding that this status does “not prevent the Treasury from treating the debt of Fannie and Freddie in the manner that it believes best supports the important goal of stabilizing the financial system.”

The impact of Frank’s comments on mortgage rates should be negligible, said Greg McBride, senior financial analyst with Bankrate.com. “This is noise compared with more significant economic data,” he said

The two mortgage finance companies were seized by federal regulators in September 2008. They are vital players in the mortgage industry, purchasing home loans from lenders and selling them to investors. They own or guarantee about half of all residential mortgages. Had they gone broke, millions of people would have been unable to get home loans.

While debt from Fannie and Freddie does not carry an explicit government guarantee, the Treasury has taken numerous steps to reassure investors that the government will keep the companies running. Late last year, the Obama administration pledged to cover unlimited losses through 2012 for Freddie and Fannie. So far, the companies have needed $126 billion in taxpayer aid.

“As we said in December, there should be no uncertainty about Treasury’s commitment to support Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac as they continue to play a vital role in the housing market,” Treasury spokeswoman Meg Reilly said in a statement.

Frank’s statement unsettled investors because it injected a measure of uncertainty into the market. “The status quo has some chinks in it,” said Jim Vogel, a debt analyst with FTN Financial.

Frank has scheduled a hearing for later this month on the two companies’ future. The Obama administration, however, wants to wait until 2011 to propose an overhaul of the mortgage giants.

The administration’s Republican critics have argued that President Barack Obama should have proposed sweeping changes to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac last year, when he demanded an overhaul of financial regulations.

Source: Associated Press

Westside LA Real Estate Advice for Home Buyers:  Brief synopsis on $8,000 First Time Home Buyer’s Tax Credit. Narrated by veteran Los Angeles Realtor- Clinton Wade.

Brief synopsis on the appraisal process & the problem we’re facing. Narrated by veteran Los Angeles Realtor- Clinton Wade.

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: Like politics, all real estate is local. This is drummed into us time and time again. You hardly ever see a report about state or national real estate trends without the cautionary caveat that “local markets are all different.” So how, then, does it make any sense for real estate appraisals to be conducted by out-of-the-area appraisers who lack (and don’t have time to get) specific local-market knowledge?

Well, it doesn’t, of course; but the practice has become commonplace thanks to the recent adoption of the Home Valuation Code of Conduct (HVCC). The HVCC is not a result of legislation. Rather, it is the result of an agreement, a settlement, entered into by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and the office of the New York State Attorney General. The agreement went into effect May 1, 2009. Its aim was to put an end to corrupt practices in the business of appraising residential properties. Perhaps, to some degree, it has achieved its aim; but what we know for sure is that it has caused a lot of problems so far.

The major emphasis of the HVCC has to do with the selection of appraisers. Believing that much of the abuse of appraisal practices resulted from quid-pro-quo selection practices, and good-old-boy networks, the Code seeks to insure that the selection of an appraiser will be an arms-length transaction. Hence, for example, under the HVCC neither a mortgage broker nor a real estate agent may be the person who selects the appraiser. A lender may select the appraiser, but the person who does the selecting can have nothing to do with the “loan production” staff.

The institutional response to this, following the path of least resistance, has been to employ a third-party Appraisal Management Company (AMC) to select the appraiser. An AMC is a middleman. It receives an appraisal request from a lender and then it assigns an appraiser from its list of approved appraisers who have agreed to take assignments.

The use of AMCs has a great appeal in theory. But, on the basis of outcries from around the country, in practice it is not working out very well.

The primary complaint about AMC appraiser selection processes is that too often appraisers are given assignments that take them out of their geographical area of familiarity and expertise. Let’s face it: an appraiser, just like a real estate agent, can at best be very knowledgeable about only an extremely limited number of neighborhoods or areas. Each may be licensed by their state agencies to work anywhere in the state; but none are likely to have the ability to do so with expertise.

The following scenario has become commonplace since AMCs have become the selectors of appraisers: the appraiser does not live in the area of the subject property; he or she may have never had an assignment in the particular neighborhood or even the city; the appraiser is not a member of the local or regional MLS and does not have access to relevant comparable information (which, of course, is not simply geographically determined). You just have to hope they have a GPS system so that they can find the property.

Moreover, unlike earlier days, it is turning out to be much more difficult for an agent (the one who is likely to know the neighborhood and relevant comparables) to provide helpful information to the appraiser. Actually, the HVCC does not prohibit real estate agents and appraisers from talking to each other; but everyone is so uptight about the new regulations they have been interpreted to mean that no one can have a substantive discussion with the appraiser. The over-zealous attempts to avoid even the appearance of trying to exert undue influence have resulted in a diminished quality of the reports.

National Association of Realtors® (NAR) President, Charles McMillan, recently met with both the New York State Attorney General and with the head of the Federal Housing Finance Agency – the overseer of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – to convey industry concerns. Representatives Travis Childers (D-MS) and Gary Miller (R-CA) have co-sponsored HR 3044 that would impose an 18-month moratorium on the use of the HVCC. It would seem a good time to pause and reassess.

Source: RealtyTimes

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: Bernie Madoff’s daughter-in-law, Stephanie Madoff, is changing her name. She says the Madoff name is tainted with scandal and she wants a name with less negative connotation. She will now be known as Stephanie bin Laden.
 
But an underwriter is an underwriter, regardless of name. Lately I have been hearing from producers, some of whom are upset about the current lending environment, some not. But for a slightly different view of things, here is what one very experienced and knowledgeable underwriter wrote to me: “It used to be that we could ‘underwrite’ a loan and use common sense to navigate individual circumstances and actually make a decision that a loan was a good credit risk.  Then DU and LP came along and gave us the laundry list that had to be followed.  We were still able to manually underwrite loans for those transactions that did not fit the box.  Then the bottom fell out of the business and everyone got scared and new rules came out. Investors and Wall Street were to blame for allowing individuals who were not telling the truth to buy homes. Today investors are pre-underwriting loans prior to purchase and we have to ‘march to their tune’ including getting pieces of paper that seem ridiculous, but since we need the investor to purchase the loan so we obtain them anyway.  Only the most qualified borrowers with all their ducks in a row get loans these days.  Manually underwritten loans are subject to scrutiny such as we have never seen before and frankly, we do not have the courage to paint outside of the lines because we cannot afford to have a loan purchase refused. Today, it takes two to three times as long to underwrite a loan and we have checklist upon checklist that help us make sure all of the i’s are dotted and the t’s are crossed.  I have been doing this for over 30 years and frankly we are back to the rules of the early 80’s or worse when it comes to documentation.”
 
Speaking of analyzing credit, are you ready to have an underwriter at the closing table? In Fannie’s latest letter to lenders, the company states, “Borrower Credit – Undisclosed Liabilities: Lenders are responsible for determining that all debts incurred or closed by the borrower, up to and concurrent with settlement on the subject mortgage loan, are disclosed on the final loan application that is signed by the borrower at closing. These debts must be evaluated and included in the qualification for the subject mortgage loan. Lenders must have adequate internal controls and processes to support this requirement.”

Source: Mortgage New Daily

Westside LA Real Estate Advice: Home buyers and home sellers have the same goal: an exchange of property. Buyers want to pay as little as possible for the nicest house they can afford; sellers want to earn as much as possible on their property. They may seem like conflicting interests, but they aren’t. Buyers and sellers goals, at bottom, are both about making a fair trade.

For sellers, there are some intangible factors they simply can’t control, like fluctuations in the market in their city or neighborhood, interest rates on mortgages, and the price at which nearby homes are selling for. Sellers can, however, control how their home is presented when their Realtor shows their property to prospective buyers. One of the best ways for home sellers to ensure the sale of their property is to make it attractive to buyers.

Having a pleasant interior design can put buyers at ease and reassure them that your home is well cared for. Buyers don’t easily get excited about purchasing a home that is sloppy, dirty and poorly decorated.

Interior design professional Emily Spreng, who holds degrees in interior design and historic preservation, says working with just two elements of your interior design can reap huge benefits in the overall feel of your home.

Lighting

“Lighting is one of the most important elements in interior design,” Spreng says. “By changing lighting you can instantly change the mood of a room.”

Whether you’re showing your home day or night, pay close attention to the mood being created by your lighting. In the bedroom, Spreng recommends creating a relaxing, ambient feel by turning off your overhead light and adding lamps with opaque shades to your bedside tables.

For cramped or dim spaces, Spreng says mirrors can make a room feel larger and warmer. “Put a mirror on the opposite wall of yours window to bounce the light around,” she says. By reflecting the sunlight, mirrors create the illusion of a second window.

You should also pay attention to your choice of window dressing to use the daylight you have, Spreng adds. “Use blinds that open and close and go up all the way, so you can let in a little bit of light or a lot—it’s just another way to control your lighting.”

Accessories

“Your accessories are the cheapest thing to change if you’re working on a budget,” Spreng says.

Accessories are the stuff you put in the room to make it more interesting, things like vases, candlesticks, pottery, flowers and wall hangings. For Spreng, the thing to remember about accessories is: less is more.

“I think the most important thing to remember when accessorizing your home is that one very interesting accessory is better than six or seven knickknacks,” she says. “If you want to emphasize the design of your home, it’s important to remove as much clutter as you can.”

Spreng advises home sellers to focus especially on area rugs, paintings or photos and throw pillows to spruce up a room. “An area rug is probably the best way to warm up a room,” she says, adding that it will bring a room together and make it feel cozy. Paintings and photos are a good way to add color and character to your room, and you can liven up drab furniture with cheap, colorful throw pillows.

An extra tip: if you have a big room with an empty corner, folding screens are a great way to round out the space and bring the focus back into center of the room.

Source: RealtyTimes