Without a doubt, the St. Paul Dayton's Bluff neighborhood registered vacant building home tour was a success. More than 100 people toured the homes on Saturday and the count was not final for Sunday's tour at the time that I left. From the home owner's perspective, the tour may not have been a success, because I didn't see any purchase agreements being written, but that doesn't mean they won't be!
There were a couple reasons I chose to do the tour even though as a licensed real estate agent in St. Paul, I could easily have set up "previews" to go through the homes myself. First, it was important to support this neighborhood attempt at moving homes off of the registered vacant building list. When the people who toured the homes tell others how nice some of the buildings were, it will encourage buyers to check out the vacant homes as well. Secondly, I was curious as to how St. Paul REALTORS were involved in the tour.
There was no disappointment on my part. Whereas some of the nicer condemned homes were chosen for the tour, the goal of showing what was available for a reasonable price was reached. Not a lot of disclosure was made regarding the ramifications of being on the registered vacant building list. Only one house talked about the cost of fixing the property so it would no longer be condemned. For those with savvy, buying a house for less than $70,000 and adding $30,000 for fix-up isn't a bad deal.
My second goal of "spying" on my colleagues marketing ploy was met as well. There was NO hard sell from any of the agents. Not all of the houses had an agent in them. Some houses were only "guarded" by active neighbors. The most marketing I saw was a stack of cards on a card table. I was impressed.
The crowd was composed of some amateur rehabbers and others that were just curious. The crowd included my husband who left a house asking me if I thought it would be worth our while to buy that house for a rental! This coming from the man who tried desperately to prevent us from buying our first rental property many years ago! His auditor mind was doing numbers as we walked. "How much do you think . . . ?" Aaack! I have created a monster!!!!
Funny, Jack. I had to reread my comment to "get" yours!
Posted by: Bonnie Erickson | May 09, 2008 at 04:20 PM
Don't registered vacant properties often NEED windows?
Posted by: Boomer Jack Boardman | May 09, 2008 at 04:14 PM
Luck is right, Jack. I thought we were window shopping!
Posted by: Bonnie Erickson | May 09, 2008 at 03:13 AM
Bonnie, I have been neglecting my feed reader lately--my weak defense for not visiting. The problem is corrected, I placed "Snippets" on my blog roll--that I go through daily!
Registered vacant buildings are an increasing problem here in Saint Paul, and I believe it is important to get them back as viable housing.
Ummm--about the auditor...good luck with him! ;-)
Posted by: Boomer Jack Boardman | May 07, 2008 at 03:42 PM