We tour the houses so you don’t have to. This week we were out early and got through four of them before lunch, and they were all over the spectrum. A couple of small vacant homes right in town, and then 35 acres with solar heating and geothermal cooling, which is not something we get to walk through very often.
If geothermal is new to you, the short version is that it uses the temperature of the ground to regulate the temperature of the house. The ground a few feet down stays fairly steady all year, so the system pulls heat out of it in winter and dumps heat into it in summer. If you want to talk through what that actually costs and whether it makes sense on a property you are looking at, send us a note.
Two things to check at your own house this week
We have had a ton of rain over the last few days and it looks like there is more coming. That makes this a good week for two small jobs that save people a lot of money.
Test your sump pump. You do not need a technician for this. Take the lid off the pit, find the little float ball, and lift it up. The pump should trigger. If it does not, you have found the problem on a dry afternoon instead of at two in the morning during a storm. Some areas around here hold water more than others, so this is worth doing every heavy rain season.
Check where your downspouts point. A lot of people run them along the side of the house so the water feeds a garden bed. We understand the logic, but running water down the side of your foundation is how water ends up in your basement. Get it diverted away from the house. If you want to catch it and use it, a rain barrel is a much better answer.
Rain chains, if you want the nice looking version
We got talking about the downspout alternative you have probably been seeing around lately. Instead of the standard aluminum downspout, the whole thing comes off and a chain or a rope goes in its place. The water runs down the chain into a French drain, a basin or a rain barrel.
Some of them have small bells built into the chain, so the water rings them on the way down. They give a really nice look and a nice sound to the front of a house, and they do the same job. Worth a look if you are redoing the front of your place.
What’s going on around Belleville
There is construction everywhere right now. Bridge Street is torn up, there is more work on Wallbridge, and Bell Boulevard is getting done too. Give yourself a few extra minutes.
We drove past the new YMCA and it is big. It looks like it is going to be a great place, and we are glad the city built something it can grow into. That is not always what happens. The casino felt small the day it opened, because it was built to suit right then rather than for what was coming. The YMCA looks like the opposite of that. Costco is coming too, and we hear it will have a gas bar.
The market: more listings are coming
We are getting a lot of calls and messages from people getting their homes ready to sell. Cleaning up, fixing up, moving things around, all with the fall market in mind. Fall is our second busiest season of the year, and home evaluations have kept us busy for two straight weeks.
So expect a surge of new inventory within the next month or two.
One trend worth knowing: a lot of the homes coming up are vacant. Some are estate sales, and some are families where the parents have already moved into a different home and the kids are handling the sale. A couple of the ones we saw this morning were vacant. If you need to move quickly, that is good news for you, because a vacant house can usually accommodate whatever closing date you need.
If you are a seller already on the market, read that trend the other way. A lot more competition is about to arrive, and buyers are going to have far more to choose from. If your price needs adjusting, doing it now is better than doing it in six weeks alongside everyone else. It is a buyer’s market out there right now.
A question for you
Realtors drive a lot, and one of us is shopping for a new vehicle. So we want to hear from you. Are you still driving gas? Are you a hybrid convert? If you drive electric, do you like it, and would you do it again?
We are not sure we are ready to go fully electric, but with the kilometres we put on it does start to make sense, and a few people have told us hybrid is the sweet spot. Drop us a line and tell us what you drive and why.
Thinking about buying or selling in Belleville, Quinte West or Prince Edward County? Reach out anytime, we are always happy to talk it through.