Senior Housing Options | Raleigh NC | Your Next Move

Assisting families with the transition to Senior housing in Raleigh NC

919-601-8203

julie.kopetsky@yournextmovenc.com

Top 10 Tricks of the Trade When it Comes to Selling Your House – Part I

By

Consider these strategies from HGTV when putting your elderly parent’s home on the market to get the best sell price.

Tips to Selling Your House for the Most Money

1. Price it Right to Begin With.

getting home ready for saleHow many houses have you driven by with a “Reduced” sign slapped over the For Sale Sign. The best approach is to start out with the right price – a price 5% to 10% less than what your house is valued, which attracts hordes of buyers. A bidding war will ensues, driving the price over what it’s worth, which means more money in your parent’s pocket. It’s a risk all too many sellers aren’t willing to take, but right now, it’s your best strategy.

2. Create the Illusion of Storage Space.

We all want more space because no matter how many times we declutter and throw things away, we end up with more ‘stuff’. Buyers look for big closets, expansive attics and more cabinet space. To create the appearance of more space, pack away half the items in closes, shelves and cabinets, and then tidy the remaining contents.

3. Stage to Impress.

Rearrange furniture to make the rooms look larger, pack away personal affects, add fresh flowers and candles, repaint walls in a neutral color, etc. And it’s important to have the staging complete just before you list online, where 90% of buyers look first, according to Realtor.com.

4. Let there Be Light.

Buyers want lots of light – natural or otherwise. It makes a room seem more open and airy. Make sure all the light bulbs throughout your house are working, dust lamp shades – replace them if they’re dense and dark. Remove curtains, wash windows and keep window blinds open. If you have trees or shrubs obstructing windows, trim them back.

5. Find the Right Agent.

You want someone experienced, especially experienced in your particular neighborhood. Select an agent that uses all the social media and technical tools of the trade to help get the most exposure for your parent’s house. Your Next Move specializes in senior relocation and transition and matches you with two Realtors in your area who will provide you with a price opinion on your help, then review the price options with you to help you select the agent who best suits your needs.

Top 10 Tricks of the Trade When it Comes to Selling Your House – Part II

Your Next Move can help you locate the perfect senior housing for your aging loved one. Our team of relocation specialists are also with you through every step of the transition process including home sale, downsizing, estate sales and moving household goods.

If you are interested in further information you may contact us below. LIKE us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to get the most current communication on the subject of senior relocation. Please join our mailing list.

Your Next Move, Easing Your Senior Transition
Julie Kopetsky, President
www.yournextmovenc.com
919-601-8203
Julie.kopetsky@yournextmovenc.com

Downsize or Relocate with a New FHA Reverse Mortgage Program

By

mortgageJust this year, a new Federal Housing Administration reverse mortgage program can help retired homeowners relocate or downsize to a new home without paying closing costs twice or giving up all their savings, even while they’re still in their existing property.

For the past several years, reverse mortgages have become an invaluable tool for seniors with limited income to be able to stay in their homes by turning their equity into cash to cover basic monthly living expenses or even healthcare. But now homeowners can get reverse mortgages to downsize or buy a new home, allowing them to bypass the need to ever have a forward mortgage, according to NewRetirement.com.

Home Equity Conversion Mortgage

This type of reverse mortgage, called Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM), is new legislation enacted by the US Federal Housing Administration to allow seniors to get reverse mortgages on properties they haven’t purchased yet. The FHA created the HEMC program because seniors were selling their homes, downsizing to smaller ones, then taking reverse mortgages on the new homes, paying closing costs twice – on the new real estate purchase and then when they switched to a reverse mortgage.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development explains that the program is designed to allow seniors to purchase a new principal residence and obtain a reverse mortgage within a single transaction, and is also designed to enable senior homeowners to relocate to other geographical areas to be closer to family members or downsize to homes that meet their physical needs.

How it works:
If you have a sufficient down payment, you can buy your new home without monthly payments. With the HECM for Purchase program, instead of getting the reverse mortgage on your existing home, you inform your reverse mortgage lender that you want to purchase a new home using the reverse mortgage. Your lender will calculate the amount of loan you qualify for as if you already owned the property.

Not everyone qualifies for a Home Equity Conversion Mortgage (HECM) for Purchase transaction, so work with a reverse mortgage counselor or financial advisor to see if the HECM will work for you.

To Downsize, or Not to Downsize…5 Questions to Ask Yourself to Help Make an Informed Decision

By

Should you downsize your homeDetermining whether or not to sale your family home and move into something smaller in retirement is difficult. And with so many mixed messages out there when it comes to downsizing, it’s enough to make even the most well-prepared logical person question their choice. The easy answer is, not everybody should downsize. Location, priorities, health, and financial obligations are important factors to consider. So, should you downsize or stay put? Ask yourself these questions to help you make an informed decision.

5 Questions to Ask Yourself to Help Make an Informed Decision

  1. Is the location of your family home ‘healthy’?

    Consider your future physical and medical needs as you age and whether or not you’ll be able to navigate the house for daily activities. Do you have stairs to climb? A large lawn to mow? On-going house maintenance? How about your proximity to medical care? Are you close enough to family and friends so you won’t feel isolated? Even though you may be fit and healthy now, your future health is definitely something to keep in mind when thinking about downsizing.

  2. Do you need to stretch your nest egg?

    Reducing housing costs – mortgage, taxes, utilities and maintenance – by selling your home is one the easiest ways to increase your funds. If you’re falling short on your projected retirement budget, then downsizing may be a great option.

  3. Should you downsize for emotions?

    Life changing events like divorce, the death of a significant other, or new grandkids can prompt an abrupt desire to sell your family home and move. These events aren’t necessarily a reason to throw caution to the wind and move. After all, downsizing is an important decision, and it deserves some soul searching. Most real estate agents suggest waiting at least a year and then revisit the decision. What if you downsized and moved to a new city or state to be close to your new grandchild, and after a few months of relocating, your son gets promoted and moves his family away. So take a step back and leave the emotions out of the decision to downsize.

  4. What’s does the housing market look like in your area?

    The real estate market is improving across much of the country, new construction is rising, and inventory is decreasing. Zillow, an online real estate database, named Raleigh-Cary metro one of the top 10 hottest American housing markets for 2014. Location still very much matters in real estate and before you make the decision to sale your home and downsize to a smaller house, condo, or apartment, do your homework, especially if you still owe on your mortgage. You want to make sure you have money left over after paying off your mortgage, commission, fees, and covering your moving costs. Always work with a professional real estate agent who specializes in your area. She can help you determine the right time to sell and the right price for your family home should you chose to downsize.

  5. Have you factored in lifestyle costs?

    You’ve picked the perfect city to retire to. You got a good price on your family home. You packed up your belongings and move away…Only to discover you’ve moved away from your family, friends, and well, your social existence. Now you’re spending a lot of time and money traveling back to the old homestead to socialize. The money you thought you were going to save by downsizing goes to travel expenses. When choosing to downsize and move – whether across the city or across the state border, keep in mind the importance of lifestyle costs. What you get from downsizing may not be saving you anything.

10 Tips For Staging Your Home for Sale and Getting More Offers

By

Staging a home for saleDespite a mixed performance in 2013, the Triangle Real Estate market is making strides in the right direction in 2014, as inventory levels diminish and new housing permits are on the rise. So for those of you thinking about downsizing, now may be the time to finally put your house on the market. But the upswing in the market also means more homes going up for sale, so you need to stay ahead of the competition. Make the best impression possible for a wide range of potential buyers by staging your home.

Staging is the ‘art’ of preparing a home for resale.

By doing away with clutter, rearranging or removing furniture and improving your home’s curb-appeal, you make your home more appealing to the highest number of potential buyers, hopefully decreasing the time on the market and selling for the maximum price. By staging a home for sale, prospective buyers can more easily picture themselves living in your house, with their furnishings and belongings, instead of yours. You can hire a home staging professional, or go it alone with these 10 room-by-room tips from professional stagers.

10 Tips For Staging Your Home for Sale and Getting More Offers

  1. The first step is clear away the clutter. If you’ve lived in your home for decades, you’ve no doubt amassed some clutter – books, photographs, toys, magazines, anything that’s taking up space and collecting dust. Pack up overstuffed closets and unused furniture and store off-premises.
  2. Clean your house from baseboards to ceilings. It should be immaculate, like a new canvas ready for paint.
  3. Too much furniture can make a room look smaller. Take any large pieces that aren’t a necessity to a storage facility and rearrange or move to other rooms in order to create flow throughout the house and give the illusion of larger rooms. The overall vibe for your house should be to make it look larger, lighter, refreshing, comfortable, and inviting.
  4. Walls should be neutral paint colors, hanging artwork should be minimal but contemporary and tasteful. Remove family photos and your first grader’s prized macaroni collage. The goal is to showcase the rooms features and functionality, not belongings.
  5. Rethink loud or drab color schemes throughout. If your bedding and drapes are outdated, change them up. White bedding is the perfect option for bedrooms. It’s clean and generic, and easy for potential buyers to visualize a tranquil retreat.
  6. Lighting is essential. You want to bring in the most light in each room. Pull sofas away from windows, remove old blinds and heavy drapery, clean light fixtures and replace burnt bulbs.
  7. Dining rooms aren’t necessarily used that often as a dining room. If other rooms in the house are small or missing additional family room, consider converting your dining room into an office or separate TV room or even a child’s playroom.
  8. Pack away unused toys, stuffed animals, books, etc. when possible.
  9. In bathrooms, move personal items like razors, toothbrushes, toiletries and makeup out of sight. Decorate with fresh-smelling soaps and nice clean towels and washcloths.
  10. Don’t neglect the exterior. Curb appeal should be one of your most important staging priorities. Make sure shrubs and trees is neatly trimmed and the lawn is maintained. Add some color with tasteful container gardens of plants and flowers.

6 Triangle Area Towns Named Best Places to Own a Home in NC

By

Wow, the triangle-area is making news on the real estate front!

Nerdwallet.com, a personal finance company that builds data-driven tools and crunches numbers to help consumers make good money decisions, recently named 6 triangle-area towns as best places to own a home in North Carolina. So if you’ve been looking to downsize and you own a home in Holly Springs, Fuquay-Varina, Wake Forest, Clayton, Apex and Morrisville, now may be a good time.

What makes the Triangle Area a Great Place To Live?

Triangle Area NC mapHome prices and home size, along with new construction permits, decreasing inventory levels, and a plunging unemployment rate, are making the Triangle-area a superb place to live. Nerdwallet looked at the 59 cities in North Carolina with populations greater than 15,000 to find out which offer the best value for potential buyers. Their analysis answered three main questions: Are homes available? Can people afford to live there? Is the area growing? The answers, yes, yes and yes, put 6 of our towns in the spotlight, with Holly Springs receiving the top-rated #1 honor. .

Cost of living, crime rate, education opportunities, median household income, home value, and amenities abound in the Triangle-area also make North Carolina a top city to live in. With this welcomed housing market news, for retirees thinking about selling that overly-spacious home for a smaller dwelling, now could be the time to list and start padding that nest egg.

You can check out Nerdwallet’s entire methodology and findings here.

Caregiving Under Pressure: How Do Your Coping Skills Measure Up in a Crisis?

By

old woman taking tempuratureThe best approach to a crisis is being prepared before one ever happens. As a caregiver for your elderly loved one, it’s essential to have a plan of action, especially if you don’t deal well under pressure.

To thrive in a crisis means you have to react based on what’s happening at the moment, rationally, without emotion. Take a few minutes to fill in this Caregiver Crisis Preparedness Worksheet created by Viki Kind, author of The Caregiver’s Path to Compassionate Decision Making: Making Choices For Those Who Can’t, and see if your coping skills are up for the next challenge.

1. Think of a time when you handled a difficult situation really well. What did you do that made it easier? Better? More manageable?

2. Now, think of a time when you panicked, mishandled a situation, or when you didn’t make the right decision. What got in the way of thinking clearly enough to cope with what was happing?

3. What can I do to calm myself down so I can think more clearly?

How to Prepare for the next crisis
Get ahead of the game by gathering everything you need before a crisis happens.

1. Paperwork and Medical Information. Work with your parent or loved one to get copies of their personal information, including:
• Power of attorney, living will, trusts, access to safe deposit boxes, birth and marriage certificates, military records, drivers license, social security number, cemetery plot information and address book.
• Medical history, doctors’ addresses and phone numbers, prescription information, advanced health directives, Medicare and Medicaid information.
• Life insurance policy, automobile titles and insurance policies, long term care insurance policy, mortgage information and home owner’s insurance.
• Monthly bills, bank account information and other records of financial accounts.

2. Pack a Kit. Before you have to run out the door on a second’s notice, know what you need to take with you – better yet — have a kit already packed and ready to go that you keep in the trunk of your car. Here are some things you should include:
• A change of clothes, including night clothes.
• Phone/computer chargers.
• Books, magazines.
• Bottled water, snacks
• Your own medications
3. Contacts and Calls. Should a crisis occur, have a list of contacts and stand-bys to help you out.
• If you have children, have a designated person set up who can watch them at a moment’s notice.
• Call your spouse and siblings. Alert your loved one’s friends and neighbors if necessary to look after their house, pets, etc.

So, when the next crisis happens.
1. Calm down
2. Make phone calls
3. Grab your kit
4. Bring the paperwork
5. Did we mention, calm down

Your Next Move can help you locate the perfect senior housing for your aging loved one. Our team of relocation specialists are also with you through every step of the transition process including downsizing, estate sales, moving household goods, and home sale.
This blog post is brought to you by the team at Your Next Move. If you are interested in further information you may contact us below. LIKE us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter to get the most current communication on the subject of senior relocation. Please join our mailing list.
Your Next Move, Easing Your Senior Transition
Julie Kopetsky, President
www.yournextmovenc.com
919-601-8203
Julie.kopetsky@yournextmovenc.com