When buying a house, getting your offer right is both very important and very difficult.

What do you need to consider? How do you make your offer stand out? How do you get your offer accepted? And how do you ensure that you are getting the best deal? These are some of the questions that you might already be struggling with, so to help you out, we have put together some of the key things to consider.

What to consider before making the offer

Ask yourself...

• What are my long term plans?
• Will I live here for more than a few years?
• Can I commit to paying my mortgage on time every month?
• Will I like the neighbourhood?
• Am I ready for the expenses of a home?

Use our calculators page for help with affordability

Other things to

Listing your home for sale: Should you update, or should you sell as-is?

When listing your home for sale, should you spend the money to make some home improvements, or should you sell it as-is?  Of course, as in most questions of this sort, it depends on the particular improvements that your home needs, and it depends on the local market trends. It depends on your goals as a seller. It also depends on the condition of the homes that are your closest competition.

 The Mind of A Seller VS. the Mind of A Buyer

In my experience, there is a different calculation that goes on in the mind of the seller, compared to that which is in the mind of a buyer.  For instance, if the carpet in your bedrooms is original carpet in your 18-year-old home, there

The spring home-buying season is in full swing.

But there is just one problem: Low housing inventory in most price points of the market.

And no matter how much the demand is there and how much lenders are willing lend, it means little if there are no houses to buy.

As a result, the few houses left end up being fought over in multiple offers, leaving many borrowers without a house.

Here are a few tips that may help you win a multiple offer situation:

1. Offer Full Price or More. Money is a major factor in a seller’s decision, but not the only one.
2. Good sized deposit. Show the seller you are committed with a good sized deposit to stand by your “word” (purchase agreement) to buy the home.
3. Cash is King. Go in with cash if possible to

The two most important elements of selling a home have always been 1.) Price and 2.) Condition but maybe today there is a third factor.

MARKETING can be equally -and sometimes more- important when selling a home as price and condition. Professional marketing is the secret sauce that sells homes! There are more options to market a home than ever before. The way a home is marketed online determines how much attention it gets as in cases where homes that were priced too high end up in multiple offer situations due to impressive marketing presentations online. On the opposite side there are homes that sell for less than they are worth due to poor marketing efforts.  When people start to sell their home most of the time they haven't thought much about the

So you want to get started investing. Now is the best time to set yourself up for a comfortable financial future, but there are a few tasks you should tackle before putting your money to work for you. These tips apply to any investment, whether it’s in real estate, tax liens, or the stock market.

5 Financial Steps to Take Before You Invest in Real Estate

1. Fill Your Emergency Fund

Your emergency fund is a pool of savings you set aside to pay for emergencies. It’s self insurance for things you can’t insure.

Whether it’s a major car repair, unexpected medical bill, or the loss of a job, having an emergency fund can help bridge the the financial gap. Instead of turning to high interest credit cards for funding, you can turn to your emergency

Getting your home purchase or the sale of your Kamloops Property right there are a few simple steps to making it as stress free as possible.

BUYING A HOME IN KAMLOOPS

A step at a time: Before seriously house hunting, have your mortgage financing in place, says Kent Browne, broker of record with Royal LePage Team Realty in Ottawa. Make sure you also have roughly two per cent of the anticipated purchase price set aside in cash for legal fees, land transfer tax and other expenses.

Preparation: Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp.'s free, downloadable 72-page guide Buying a Home walks you through the entire house-hunting and -buying process. There's also a condominium guide: http://cmhc-schl.gc.ca/en/co/buho/index.cfm.

Browne suggests scouting

Whether lighting a single family home or the common areas of an investment property, the difference in electricity cost between LED, fluorescent and incandescent light bulbs is astounding.

It costs possibly six times as much to operate an incandescent bulb as it does the equivalent illumination (lumens) of an LED bulb. In this writer’s geographic area, a 60W incandescent lamp costs 15 cents to operate 24 hours while the equivalent LED bulb costs 2.5 cents.

You can download a detailed analysis of 30 lights left on 24 hours a day for 20 years. While that is likely not the case for a home, the cost ratio between the two lighting technologies should remain similar.

The spreadsheet with all calculations can be downloaded here. Plug in your

This controversial real estate move is leaving some homeowners feeling scammed

Imagine your realtor sold your home for $500,000 more than the price you agreed to — but you didn't see a penny of that extra cash. That's the situation for some Vancouverites, as exposed in a Globe and Mail feature Saturday February 6th 2016.

A controversial sales technique called "shadow flipping" allows unscrupulous Realtors to score two or even three times their standard commission on a single house by reassigning the sale to different owners at ever higher prices. But it's a practice that has left the original sellers feeling scammed and justifiably so.

How does it work?

An increasing number of real estate transactions in the Vancouver region feature what's

If you’re selling a home in Kamloops, you’ll want the best possible representation.

Buying a home is a big step, but then again, so is selling a property. The most important thing when listing a home is finding the right real estate agent to get you the most money possible and ensure a smooth, stress-free process.

Before You Start to sell your Kamloops Home

First off all sellers should take a look at the Working with a REALTOR® brochure, available on the BC Real Estate Association website (bcrea.bc.ca). This is a great introduction to what a certified REALTOR® does, what their legal and fiduciary duties are, and how you can best work with one.

Interviewing Kamloops Real Estate Agents

To ensure your agent is the right fit for you, sellers

Province focuses affordability towards Canadian buyers of new homes, paid for by hiked luxury home tax;also promises collection of data on overseas buyers

It doesn’t matter if you’re a first-time buyer or not – the province is focusing the much-needed affordability measures in its 2016 BC Budget towards buyers of newly built entry-level homes, Finance Minister Mike de Jong announced February 16.

In an unexpected move, which had been widely predicted to be a cut in Property Transfer Tax (PTT) specifically for first-time buyers, de Jong announced that buyers of new homes up to $750,000 in value will no longer have to pay PTT (although GST still applies), effective February 17. This exemption is available to Canadian citizens and permanent residents