Colorado Springs Real Estate

Make your wish list, get prequalied, organize your household budget... People are always talking about what you should do when you're preparing to buy a house in Colorado Springs , but what about what you should do after you have signed your name on the dotted line? What are some of the first steps you should take as a proud new homeowner? The MacGuire Team is here to answer your questions. 7 Things You Should Do Immediately After Buying Your New Home 1. Inspect Your Home Thoroughly When you're buying a house in Colorado Springs , it's easy to get so swept up in the excitement of it all that you forget to notice the little details. Once the home is officially yours, give it a thorough inspection to make sure everything is as it should be. Should you need to contact the sellers, you'll want to do so sooner than later. 2. Deep Clean BEFORE Moving All Your Stuff In If at all possible, we highly recommend thoroughly cleaning your new home before moving all of y...

In addition to serving as a place to live, your home should also (hopefully) serve as a valuable financial investment. If you can eventually sell your home for more than the initial purchase price, you can use the extra money to put towards your next home, a child's education, retirement, or any number of other things. Selling your home for less than you originally paid for it, on the other hand, can be disheartening and pose financial challenges. How can you make sure that your sells for more? The MacGuire Team is here to help with these simple but effective tricks for boosting the value of your home in Colorado Springs . 1. Add A Backsplash Bring your kitchen into the twenty-first century! Installing a backsplash in your kitchen is one of the quickest and easiest ways to modernize your kitchen and raise its value. Tile backsplashes are currently very popular, and can typically be installed at an affordable price. 2. Customize Your Outdoor Living Space Beautiful outdoor...

The world of real estate is as vast as it is exciting. Buying homes in Colorado Springs  can be incredibly rewarding, but there are numerous little details that demand proper attention and consideration in order for you to be successful. The MacGuire Team is here to help you make sense of real estate with this insider info on some of the pieces that make up a real estate transaction. This week, we're delving into one of the pieces found at the very beginning of the process: earnest money. The Background On Earnest Money Earnest money is a check you provide when you submit your offer on the home you wish to purchase. This check is essentially a deposit designed to prove to the seller that you are seriously interested in purchasing the property. There is no magic number for the amount of earnest money you should provide, but it generally ranges from 1-3% of the home's total purchase price.  The earnest money you submit does not go straight to the seller. Rather, i...

What is every seller's goal? To attract tons of interested buyers so they can sell their home as quickly as possible. In a seller's dream situation, there would be two separate parties who both have their hearts set on the home. Ideally, these interested buyers will start a bidding war and significantly drive up the home's selling price. How do you make this dream a reality? If you're selling your house in Colorado Springs , the secret to success is making your home absolutely irresistible to buyers. Here's how you can make that happen. Moving to a new home? Contact us to schedule a showing of this beautiful home for sale in Colorado Springs ! Remove The Wallpaper By modern home decorating standards, wallpaper is out. Before putting your house on the market, remove any wallpaper in the home and apply a fresh coat of paint over the walls. Do not  try to cut corners by simply painting over the wallpaper - buyers will notice the difference and will likely l...

"Buyers' market" and "sellers' market"... If you've ever come within ten miles of the real estate market, you've probably heard some of these (and other) real estate buzzwords used frequently. What do they really mean, though, and what impact can they have on you as your try to buy or sell your home in Colorado Springs ? The MacGuire Team is here to help you understand the differences and how to use them to your advantage. Buyers' Market In a buyers' market, the number of homes for sale in Colorado Springs greatly outweigh the number of prospective home buyers. With so many homes available, buyers are able to be more selective about the homes they pursue. Since the homes available are in greater competition with one another to be sold, the sellers may be forced to drop the price or add other incentives if they want to sell their homes quickly. This situation is called a "buyers' market" because buyers get to enjoy th...

You've made an offer, the sellers have accepted, and everything is progressing smoothly. Before your lender can finalize your loan, however, he/she will need to procure a home appraisal. Home appraisals don't specifically indicate how big of a loan you can qualify for, but they still play an integral part of the lending process. What Is A Home Appraisal? During a home appraisal, a certified home appraiser will evaluate your home to determine its current market value. Your home will be evaluated and compared according to several different criteria, depending on which appraisal method is used. With the sales comparison method , the appraiser will evaluate your home according to the... Sale Price of Comparable Homes (also called "comparables" or "comps") Size of the Lot Amount of Finished Square Footage Amount of Unfinished Square Footage Style of the Home Age of the Home With the cost method , the appraiser will evaluate your home to deter...

Are you thinking about purchasing your first home? Congratulations - that's such an exciting step! At The MacGuire Team, we do our best to make buying your first home in Colorado Springs a fun, exciting, and stress-free experience. Most first-time home buyers have lots of questions about the process, so we've taken it upon ourselves to debunk some of the most common myths about buying your first home . MYTH #1: You Have To Have A 20% Down Payment Many people believe that you have to supply a 20% down payment in order to qualify for a mortgage loan, but in today's market, that simply isn't the case. You may have to pay Private Mortgage Insurance (PMI) until you have paid off 20% of your loan, but that does not preclude you from taking out a mortgage loan with less money down upfront. MYTH #2: You Have To Too Much Debt To Qualify For A Mortgage Loan Some people automatically assume that if they have debt yet to be paid off, they won't be able to qualify ...

You're ready to sell your Colorado Springs home . You've researched the market, you feel confident that you know how to advertise your home, and you've decided that you don't need to hire a real estate agent to help you. You can handle it, right? Wrong. It's not that you can't  handle it - you probably could. But when you're selling your home, your personal Colorado Springs real estate agent is your biggest asset. Why would you want to deny yourself the incredible advantage of having an agent on your side who knows the local market inside and out and is completely dedicated to getting you the best possible price for your home? Here are some of the key reasons why hiring a real estate agent to help you sell your home is incredibly beneficial. 1. Your Agent Has Access To Insider Info It doesn't matter how much research you've done on the Colorado Springs real estate market - there is some information that is only available to real estate ag...