Archive for September, 2009
My home patch is Stoke, the major suburb of Nelson situated halfway between Nelson and Richmond, where I grew up in since 1973.
PHOTO – Stoke Panorama (if you’ve got the bandwidth & time a 4351 x 919 version is here)
In over 365 posts here I don’t think I’ve ever really drawn a focus to it, so now is good.
That is, except for recently on a few occasions pointing out that a few months back Stoke did make a name for itself in being the suburb in NZ that was best at surviving the recent downturn in the strongest possible way.
Geographically, Stoke is midway (6.5km to Richmond – 7.5km to Nelson) between Richmond and Nelson, and is made up of……I guess you’d call them micro or satellite suburbs.
In our case that means the following suburbs make up Stoke;
Maitlands
Monaco
Nayland
Stoke Central
Ngawhatu
Saxton
…..and bordering on the outskirts there are some areas of these suburbs that are referred to as either….
Enner Glynn
Annesbrook
Wakatu
Tahunanui
You can find out more directly on each by clicking on the name in my left hand column here under suburbs.
The mix of housing is typical 3 bedroom, but with a higher percentage of 2 bedroom properties than one would commonly expect in a normal suburb.
That’s more than likely due to the fact that our general area is very much a destination for retired folk. As a case in point here, Ryman Healthcare opened the new Ernest Rutherford retirement village at the beginning of last year, and have since sold near on 120 x 2 bedroom standalone villas. This is in addition to the numbers that have brought 1 & 2 bedroom apartments in the main building complex.
Although another company at the same time opened their development, Gracefields, in the last few weeks have sold their sales office and a nearby adjoining property, so I wouldn’t count that as a positive vote. Then again their prices were stratospheric for the area…..from memory $500k+ for 3 bedroom premium property in a retirement village type setting.
Compare that to approx $300-315k for a 2 bedroom standalone & serviced villa @ Rymans, and you can make your own mind up.
For those statistically inclined over the period July 09 to Sept 09 (data so far sent to REINZ for Sept 09 that is) the median price is bang on $350,000, the median Days to Sell are 38, and the amount achieved has been consistent at 98.1% of the published asking price.
September 29 2009 | Nelson | No Comments »
In today’s Dominion Post an article has been published about “doctoring” (their words) of photographs by a real estate photographer.
It’s not really an issue for us in Nelson because we usually don’t have much of a problem with Grey Days. 
I note that the reporter is in Wellington.
In telling the paper that they had some “blue-sky” templates that were sometimes used because of tight time-frames / advertising deadlines, the owner of the local Open2View photographic franchise was just informing the reporter what most people were already aware of.
Some days are fine, some overcast and some rainy – so what’s the fuss about – surely a persons property deserves to be shown in its “best light.”
If the photographer went back a couple of days later on a sunny day then everything would be the same except for a sunnier disposition of home and surroundings, including sky.
That’s as long as the photos do not depict sunlight falling somewhere that it never does, another reason why I mentioned that exact topic previously regarding taking photos on or around the shortest day.
What is obviously not acceptable are photographs doctored in an attempt to hide something.
Into that category fall things like;
cell ph towers,
TV station / other communication type masts,
objects such as electricity/high tension power poles/lines,
trees,
or as the Dom Post puts it, ugly chimneys.
If you’re curious to find out how you can spot if a photo has been taken on a “grey day”, and then later in post processing had its sky tuned up. Sunny day light is harsh and any photos taken will usually have quite a selection of highlight & shadow spots. However on a “grey day” the light is much more balanced, much more even as it were. Give aways to look for are;
reflections in glass windows or doors (the reflection is often in a different direction to where it looks like the sun would be shining)
amount / direction of any shadows under the eaves
any shadows falling across the property from a nearby power pole, tall tree, hedge, even the clothesline.
Just too even of a light showing over the house, this is particularly noticeable if you can see a house corner on, and both walls that run away from that corner have the same contrast/brightness.
None of this would crop up if the photo was a twilight shot, taken in the Golden Hour.
I was amused at two of their “apparently” TRICKS OF THE TRADE Real Estate Photographers use
* Mounting a camera on a pole so a wider photograph of a room can be taken. (I’m thinking she means a wider photograph of the outside?)
* Holding open homes when the sun is at its peak. (Where does this come from?…..although I must admit I have been guilty of taking photos of a home with coastal views when the tide was high)
September 26 2009 | Nelson and photography | No Comments »
Get your message out there in such a small country like New Zealand?
More importantly how do you do it cost effectively?
Are there any examples of other Real Estate companies doing something similar and succeeding in getting their message out there?
Actually…….its funny you should ask that question……because the answer is, Yes!
Ok….show me how?
Well actually I’d rather show you a couple of examples and then you can make up your own mind, and follow through from there…………….I think 3 is a good number to keep it concise.
As a company its not hard to imagine that a NZ company that has since exported itself internationally would be up with the times. And indeed they are, and as you may note here…..its not limited to the head office………as in fact….local offices can surely participate………..
So what can you say if you wanted to do something like this……here’s the latest example
25 September 2009: The North Shore property market is booming, with considerable demand from a wide range of buyer types and a marked increase in sales occurring, according to local Harcourts business owner Martin Cooper.
The Principal of Harcourts franchise Cooper & Co, which operates seven offices on the North Shore, says the latest Real Estate Institute of New Zealand statistics showed there was a huge increase in sales last month when compared with…….
You’ll note it has a Press Release feel about it. Hmmm….. did the local agency boss on the North Shore sit down and write this himself?
Some might ask does that matter?
As you can see though, there’s nothing stopping you from doing your own is there?
Now for number 2
If you look at this…………..
You’d just have to consider that this company has found its own little niche,
and is certainly continuing on with what they have started here………..
At the end of the day, it just goes to show that even here in New Zealand there are opportunities to get your name/ company / official message out there…..I just hope you are doing all you can.
Anyway I feel number 3 coming up………
As the above screen shows you don’t have to be a major downtown Auckland, Wellington or Christchurch player, you just have to be pro-active.
And one more, number 4…..
TopNews NZ is another one that gets your message out, nut you’ll have to do your own investigative stuff to find out the cost effectiveness of them too.
From a quick search on volume of “submitted by’s” either this person is a PR staffer or a staffer at said company because the person submits too much stuff related to that company to just be an “interested person” – well to my way of thinking anyway.
To be sure PR Newswire and the others will guarantee some serious Google mention, but there is also a likewise serious investment required if you want to go down this path.
What I was attempting to showcase here was that you can mix it with the “bigboys” for a reasonable expense, in some cases for free, if you just have the time to invest.
September 25 2009 | General and New Zealand and Technology | No Comments »
Natural Mountain Backdrops. Nature is there for free – use it.
I’ll be upfront here and acknowledge that for all locations, what I illustrate and talk about here tonight might not be able to happen for you, or logically might not be possible given your geological constraints.
So, ok what can you take away from this post then?
Well one crucial thing, that pause………..that makes you take 5-10 seconds to look around to see the background, not this sort of background either.
Epic is all I can say when it comes to this backdrop. Yes the overall shoot price for this property was probably “up there” but one shot like this can make a portfolio of listing photos.
Or if you’ll really blessed with a location, (yes I know regular readers have seen this before – but you must agree its not a bad shot) you can get this sort of image that, well, just paints hundreds of words.
Shots like 1 & 2 benefit when you in fact do have a mountain range to the east of your location, so that goes for most of the West Coast of both Islands here in Middle Earth, but then I believe also for places like Wanaka, Taupo, Akaroa or Queenstown they benefit from being in an almost “valley” location.
To be pedantic, in fact this would happen in reverse if you lived on the eastern seaboard and had a mountain range behind you, except for one thing. The timing wouldn’t be evening, it would be dawn, and that one thing is that either you would need to be out at sea, or up in the air in a chopper. Places I am talking about here would be like Katikati, various Bay of Plenty locations like Whakatane, the Hawkes Bay vicinty, some areas around Blenheim and the Marlborough Sounds, and of course many Canterbury locations. I haven’t been much further south than Oamaru, so can’t comment on areas south of there.
In most situations along the West Coast of NZ at dusk, then the home itself would also probably be lit from the setting sun, whereas the fact that places like Queenstown are in that “valley” predicament, well that helps for this type of photography.
How?
Well you can see that courtesy of the “valley” I talk about, the home itself has been shielded from the setting sun by the mountain ranges in front of it (re perspective to the above photos I mean – ie: behind the photographer) so the highlights feature as they do in this photo.
In some places, for example Taupo, even if the sun doesn’t set behind your location – to the east, if you have a view over Lake Taupo to the mountains, then an oblique angle with sunlight on the peak could still be very emotive.
And if you can achieve that, then the goal of making your property stand out from the pack has been achieved, has it not?
Want to go a bit further and do your own experiments in your region.
Well fire up Google Earth and click on the button I’ve highlighted above.
Then discover more about exactly what it does and why its there.
Its really a must have for a Real Estate Agent or Realtor.
You can then screen shot or send a link (.kml if you really know what you are doing) to anyone living overseas and they too can experience exactly what you see every day, albeit from an aerial “top down” perspective in your desired location.
September 25 2009 | Buyers and General and New Zealand and Sellers and Technology and photography | No Comments »
Times are a ‘changing.
Soon it will be even more difficult for non-professionals to maintain a career in the Real Estate industry, helping buyers and sellers of property.
The new Real Agents Act 2008 has been introduced by the NZ Government, and becomes law in November this year.
It will introduce longer training/qualifying periods before an individual can earn a Real Estate Salesperson’s Certificate and can actively help clients.
It will also herald other changes like a 24hr cooling off period and a maximum agent listing authority period of 90 days.
However in related news Bloglines alerted me yesterday via the Official Google Blog that they, Google have quietly gone about launching a new toolbar with an interesting side feature. An Australian Site I follow has already this morning deciphered how good this could be for the industry. Sort of continuing the “hyper-local” nature of search that seems to be all the buzz lately.
Its not exactly new news by itself, because many other sites, like RealEstateRatingz for example have been down this path already. For a good primer this Realtor article appeared in the US earlier this year.
Giving customers a chance to rate the agent based on the service provided.
Now it will always be said that the level of “expectation of service” can be very different between individuals.
Again that “level” needs to be ascertained in advance from the client by the Agent. This then sets the minimum benchmark level, and for the relevant individual its the expectation spot from where they view following events as either in a good or bad light.
They have been doing this in the States for some time now………………
www.incredibleagents.com
We see those in the UK are doing it…….
Like this site allagents.co.uk.
Who make it very easy on the front landing page to see a list of the Best Rated and right alongside that, the Worst Rated Estate Agents.
There are others, but many seem to suffer from that great big bin on the Internet, that is they are hot one moment, then have no activity for years. Others seem to suffer from a decidedly noticable lack of volume in their ratings………take the top realtor above – with just 3 reviews?
Although some like Homethinking.com ….
seem to have regular updates and offer at least a hint as to the sort of properties generally handled by a particular agent – although a range of $219k to $2.5m isn’t really specific enough to really indicate if the agent has any specialities relevant to properties priced in your neighbourhood.
And with typical US competitiveness Homethinking also offer this…………..
Even our friends across the ditch have tried it, albeit with an emphasis on the agency / location rather than a specific salesperson.
And here in NZ there is nocowboys.co.nz offering a rating service. Their used to be topagents.co.nz but nobody seems home there now.
So now to the party, entering from stage left, comes the 300lb Gorillia.
Yes Google is here to help again.
Sidewiki will enable people to leave relevant comments, and share entries via Blogger, Facebook, Twitter and Google profiles. More than ever before agents will have to get online and be more transparent than they even thought they would need to be. Check out Business2’s post here for more info.
It looks like another stride in Googles “power to the people” march forward.
And you can try it out yourself for free by going here.
September 25 2009 | Buyers and General and Sellers and Technology and The Market | No Comments »
Sunshine, after all who loves a house because its dark and cold?
This tip is more about a mindset than actually technology so hopefully that means those “non-geeks” out there can take away some stuff they can use today or tomorrow.
So the next time you are considering those photos of a new listing, or “refresh” ones of a listing that has not sold, just think about what time of day the sun streams through the windows of that particular property. In fact if the home hasn’t sold in months, then you owe it to your vendor to re-shoot the property, the different seasons most definitely appeal to different audiences.
If I was to be critical of my own shot here, it was that I didn’t get enough blue sky, but my excuse is that I was trying to balance the inside, including that sun across the bed, with as much greenry as possible filling the windows.
It was an older elevated almost character home, note floors, fireplace, window frames, and in the past I have found folks that are interested in this type of home are also the same type that are interested in “cottagey” type gardens.
You might also notice that even though it didn’t need to be, the fact that the main central hanging light for this room is on. This had nothing to do at all with lighting, but when you spot a lightshade like that, it can add a sort of “creditibility” / reinforcement of any theme that alludes to the fact that it is a character / older home. After all it would be pretty impractical to be lying there on the bed at that time of day with it on, wouldn’t it?
This was a late afternoon shot in case you hadn’t already guessed that.
This one was taken more around early afternoon, sometimes you need to check the width of the eaves to ensure that you will get a good coverage of sunlight into the room. Shooting the photo from a lower perspective in the room helped here. Its not hard to imagine that an afternoon nap (for the right buyer) here would be warm.
Yes I could have pulled the blind on the right back, but it would have exposed the net curtains, and with many buyers they are a love or hate affair, so there was really no need to go that far.
Actually I was a bit pushed for time that day from memory, given a bit more time I would have unhooked the nets completely. Yes it might have taken 4-6 minutes but it would of let more sunshine into the room to stream across the bed.
The chair on the right, should I have removed it……hmmmmmm…….actually no…….my target buyer for this property was a retiree/retired couple…….and subtle clues when such buyers view photos help them build confidence in a property just from the photos.
What do I mean?
Well the chair there more likely than not, indicates (but not always) that a retired person was already living & enjoying the location here, perhaps they may have had difficulty placing their socks/shoes on and needed some elevation?
The fact that many retired folk move to Nelson for the sun / warmer climate to alleviate the problems their bodies feel when its colder is something not lost in this photo.
Although you could argue that my above photo does a disservice to the room because of the lack of overall brightness, as there are quite a few shadow areas, the whole purpose of this shot was to illustrate / accompany words that said “sunny lounge.”
You read that phrase in practically every other real estate advert for a home, but can “they see it?”
This was different again, and like one of the above photos my target buyer was a retired couple or individual.
It meant being at the home before breakfast time, but I feel the shot I got, for my two cents worth, was the type of emotive feel exactly how I planned.
The target buyers I were after here, I knew would just love the thought of waking up in the morning, and imagining themselves having cornflakes or toast here along with a cuppa to start their day……..in fact part of the reason I decided to leave the tablecloth there actually……..it stands out completely against the other colours of the room, hightlighting the table……..and that encourages the brain to think of the reasons its there………breakfast for example?
This short of shot would have even extra buyer interest if the home they were originally downsizing from, the older homestead on the farm, the metropolitan city location with neighbours/fences close by, etc didn’t have its kitchen/dining on the morning sunny side.
The above shot, orange bed was taken by the local Open2view photographer, but again that emotive morning feel means that a potential buyer can picture themselves here having a coffee in bed on a weekend morning, and waking up to that fabulous Nelson sunshine!
September 25 2009 | Buyers and General and Nelson and Sellers and photography | No Comments »
As a youngster I grew up in Marsden Rd, Stoke where we lived next-door to a past Mayor of Nelson, Doug Strawbridge. It was a great place to be as a teenager and bits of nature from parks, creeks, estuary, coast, beaches, you name it, weren’t that far away by foot or pushbike.
Dougs property bordered on Isel Park and on occasions he would let us get there via the rear of his section and by crossing the Creek, …… more of a babbling brook I’d call it. The creek started up in the foothills of the Marsden Valley.
The Valley was where you traversed through when you were climbing up Barnicoat to test out your handheld CB radio back in the early 70’s. A lot has changed since then, including my hairline.
The Nelson City Council (NCC) is proposing changes to the original rezoning of 124 ha of Marsden Valley land to allow for a higher density residential mix than originally submitted.
It’s known by the exciting title of “Proposed Plan Change 13 – Marsden Valley Rezoning and Structure Plan Project.”
Plan Change 13 Section A mentions that……
This proposal will result in the creation of a new community. Currently Marsden Valley contains approximately 10 houses, it is anticipated that the proposed zoning could accommodate around 600 households, or 1500 residents. There will also be additional households located in neighbouring land, such as Marsden Plateau, that will have ready access to Marsden Valley.
Meanwhile if you need visual cues like this below…..
then Plan Change 13 Section B has some graphics contained within the last 3 pages that give a visual overview for locals.
Here are the results from a search on the changes at the NCC website.
Should you wish to lodge a submission, by the 30th October 2009, there is a downloadable form here, or for the online version go here.
Long term the NCC plan is to have new subdivisions/residential housing zones in not just the Marsden Valley, but also Enner Glynn, Ngawhatu Valley and the upper Brook Valley. As the council puts it
A roading connection can be achieved between Marsden Valley and Enner Glynn, and also from this saddle to Panorama Drive. This achieves permeability in the community by avoiding the valley being a dead end, and provides options for travel in different directions. Vehicle and cycle traffic in particular will benefit when travelling from Marsden Valley to Nelson City by being able to take a more direct route along Enner Glynn Valley, while also providing options for residents of that valley (and Panorama Drive) to access amenities and services in Marsden Valley.
The long term plan is to have a road starting from Waimea Rd (near the current Waimea Rd / Ridgeway intersection) skirting the foothills via Enner Glynn – Marsden Valley – Ngawhatu – Upper Saxton and finishing in the Upper Champion Rd, Richmond area.
Given time and the roll-out of the new national cycleway (of which a section is planned to pass through the Upper Marsden Valley area) we may find we are included on this map (currently seems to only be around Wellington but then again it seems to be sponsored by the Wellington City Council) or a localized Nelson version of it.
Related post about Marsden Valley here.
September 24 2009 | General and Nelson | No Comments »
Would like to have called this Tip # 2 but really its an extenuation, however short, of Tip #1.
As you will recall in Tip 1, I spoke about the importance of exposure in Real estate photography.
I made the effort of taking a couple of photos with my trusty Ricoh at one of last weekends Open Homes, in an attempt to show just how easy it is to do the right thing. Not just the right thing photography wise………but the right thing vendor wise too.
Frankly, to all intents and purposes, this above, is the result of a shot with a simple point and shoot. The camera has done all that it was asked to do, average the light/shadow areas and expose accordingly.
However………
given the benefits of a modern digital camera, point & shoot I’m still talking about here (not a DSLR) sometimes depending upon your preset metering method/exposure the camera may go a bit overboard with the flash, either that or you thought you would tell the camera to force the flash……..in other words “flash on.” But as you can see amply demonstrated above, neither image is the most desirable. For me its the fact that the blue sky isn’t there, but everyone has their own personal preferences.
So….what next..well the trusty old 3 year old Ricoh has a mode called “flash synchro” (or something like that) and what exactly does that accomplish I here you ask?
Again….not exactly perfect..but not bad if you are trying to reflect the emotive feeling from which you took the photo originally.
The other way to get this shot would be to ensure your camera is set to “Spot” metering mode, and meter the outside while “flash on” or synchro or flash fill or natural flash is active at the same time.
The advantage with spot metering is that you don’t need to walk over to the window to ensure that, like as in center weighed metering, at least 70% of the whole frame is filled with outside light before composing your shot. With Spot metering activated you can stay in the one place inside where you want to take the photo from, while aiming the spot metering indicator in your viewfinder at the outside scene.
September 23 2009 | Sellers and Technology and photography | No Comments »
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