John Badalamenti, CRS's (jbadale) Blog

For homeowners preparing a house for sale, it’s often the single most difficult decision: what about the kitchen? When the kitchen is undeniably past its prime, it can be a true dilemma. We all know that kitchens can sell a home, but when the budget for a full-blown remodel doesn’t make financial...

Remember the days when you didn’t have to rummage furiously through the house to find a ringing phone, because it  stayed where it was supposed to be—plugged into the wall? You remember: it used to take less than 10 minutes to check out the TV listings because there weren’t hundreds of channels. ...

…an energy audit, that is! That’s a lot more than a piece of tax-time humor – it’s a growing trend that rising energy costs have made ever more practical. A survey by Fannie Mae found that the cost of heating, cooling, and hot water is now the highest single cost of homeownership, second only to ...

“Curb appeal” is an instantly understandable byword: one every home seller hears. You can see for yourself how property listings that feature sparkling exterior shots with superior ‘curb appeal’ instantly draw your attention — and often, higher offers.Hearing the phrase makes you picture potentia...

 Last week home sellers saw more than the usual number of reasons to look forward to this spring’s home sales selling season. It looked like the opposite of the lengthy real estate “Perfect Storm” that caused free-fall across the national landscape. Signs pointed to the possibility that we may be...

Your yard is your home's calling card. A dated or overgrown yard can be a huge turnoff to potential buyers – just as an appealing one can trump other objections.  Landscape designer Cynthia Bee knows this well. "Landscaping often makes the difference,” she says, “between a prospective buyer getti...

We all know the feeling – the one where guests are due and you haven’t had time to clean the house.  You shove all the…well… stuff into the back bedroom and shut the door (you’d lock it if you could). Now imagine that feeling times 10.  If you are trying to sell your home this spring, and you hav...

The importance of kitchens to prospective homebuyers is something that never seems to change. If you are preparing to bring your home onto the market anytime soon, you’ve probably been thinking about how to make your MLS listing as attractive as possible. Odds are good that updating your kitchen ...

“Mansion” is the Wall Street Journal’s entry into the high-end real estate magazine world. Well, not quite a magazine -- it’s an extra section they run on Fridays. It’s a nice diversion for those who want to read about really rich people selling their properties. More than that, it could actually...

Sometimes, even after your mortgage application has been approved, you have to scratch your head at apparent non-sequiturs that attach to the process (for instance, when a loan is made contingent upon your repaying an ultra-low-interest credit account). Even more so if your perfectly dandy financ...