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You Are Invited: BBRN Home for the Holiday’s Boutique Tour

Dmitry and I will be at our new listing at 1011 Stratford in the City of Bloomfield Hills. It is a beautifully updated ranch with a finished lower level, that we know you will enjoy seeing. The complex is right off of Woodward across from the main gate to Cranbrook. Please stop by!

Tags: Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate

Oakland County Homes Sales, 3rd Quarter 2008

The Metropolitan Consolidated Association of Realtors released third quarter 2008 home sales statistics for Oakland County today, compiled from information they received from Realcomp, our mls.

We’ve highlighted the report for markets that we serve, like Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Royal Oak and Troy.

In the county as a whole, sales were up by 21.12% year to year, with the number of listings down by 12.82% and sales volume down by 5.5%. The falling number of listings, if broader economic conditions were more positive, would typically bode well for stabilization of prices. Obviously with today’s economic uncertainty, it is challenging to predict future prices, and it seems likely that downward pressure on prices will continue until Metro Detroit begins to create jobs. There, I said it out loud.

A few key stats from some local municipalities:

In Beverly Hills sales, in units, were UP by 20%, while median price fell by 25% to $226,300.

In Birmingham sales, in units, were down by 5.71%, while median price fell 26% to $265,750

In Bloomfield Township sales, in units, were UP by 27%, while median price fell by 13% to $258,421

In Royal Oak sales, in units, were UP by 2%, while median price fell by 17% to $142,000

In Troy sales, in units, were down by 7%, while median price fell by 13% to $213,917

All is not dismal in these numbers. I think far more homes are being sold than people tend to believe. Dmitry and I continue to have our record best year, representing buyers and sellers in Oakland County. If you aren’t seriouslycommitted to selling your home, it should not be on the market. If you are a buyer, Oakland County is your oyster, with some exceptional deals to be had.

Tags: beverly hills mi, birmingham mi, Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate, oakland county, Royal Oak MI Real Estate, Troy MI Real Estate

Bloomfield Hills Most Expensive Home

This week I will be running a series of articles about the most expensive homes on the market in Oakland County. These are some of Metro Detroit’s super luxury homes, with price tags above $5 million dollars. In spite of Southeast Michigan’s struggling economony, in the last year the luxury home market saw a lot of activity and a number of homes sold within a few short weeks of listing.

In October 2006, I wrote about the most expensive home available in Bloomfield Hills at the time. It was a a 12 million dollar spec home that had been reduced by $3,000,000 since it was first listed.

Well, another $2,000,000 has been knocked off the price at 730 Vaughan, with a current listing price of $9,900,000. We’ve been through the house and it is amazing. Hall & Hunter, the listing brokerage, has given the home a lot of exposure. We’ve received some beautiful listing materials from them notifying us of frequent open houses.

The basics:

Square Footage	13,000
Bedrooms	6
Bathrooms	9 full, 4 half
Basement Square Footage	8,777
Current Taxes	$124,955
Garage	5 Car Heated

Yes, the annual taxes cost more than many starter homes in Metro Detroit, but if you are in this price range then the taxes are to be expected.

The builder, Sally Russell, has a lovely virtual tour on her site. Take a look at the wine tasting room, the butler’s pantry and the rest of the home if you want to find out what could be yours.

If you are a qualified buyer, I would be happy to show you this fine home. If this one isn’t exactly what you are looking for, stick with me, and I will be putting up more luxury homes this week.

Tags: Bloomfield Hills expensive home, bloomfield Hills luxury home, Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate, hall & hunter, sally russell

Fresh Eyes on The Birmingham Bloomfield Luxury Home Market

I’ve just finished up a whirlwind two days with clients in from Miami who were looking at luxury homes in Birmingham and Bloomfield. Their comments gave me a fresh perspective about our area and about our housing market. It was good to hear how we look from the eyes of those seeing the area for the first time.

Michigan Living

• Snow is a photo opportunity if you are live in Florida. They were excited to see flakes falling from the skiy in the evening as they returned to their hotel. Just as we Michiganders are feeling really frustrated with the white stuff. I am betting that they rarely take pictures of palm trees at home, like Dmitry did the first time he went to Florida.
• Men playing golf in the snow at Forest Lake Country club are amusing. Well, I found them amusing too, out there in their shirt-sleeves enjoying a sunny afternoon.
• They delighted in seeing 4 deer along the side of Woodward Avenue as we passed through the City of Bloomfield Hills.
• They noticed nobody speaks Spanish on the streets in Birmingham or Bloomfield. That is a change from Miami for sure.
• Where are our good South American restaurants? I confess I was stumped by that question. They really liked the Middle Eastern food restaurant where we had lunch though. Metro Detroit does Middle Eastern food like nobody’s business!

Our Houses

• Michiganders like their basements. Floridians don’t have them, but after they see ours they think that basements are a very good thing. Especially finished basements.
• Our luxury spec homes are almost all have white kitchen cabinets. Not so common in Florida where cherry is a popular choice.
• Florida offers more gated communities. Could our demand be more limited? Right now a buyer who wants a gated community is going to be in Turtle Lake, Hills of Lone Pine and potentially Barrington Park, where a gate is under discussion with the City of Bloomfield Hills.
• Seems like even individual houses in South Florida might have more gates and privacy fences than we have here.

Another reminder for Birmingham Bloomfield Luxury Home Realtors

• These buyers, like most I work with, were making their choices about what to see and what not to see, in part, based on the pictures and the virtual tours I sent them from the MLS. They tend to skip over the houses with only one photo and no tour because they only had no time to waste.

Tags: birmingham bloomfield expensive homes, birmingham bloomfield luxury homes, birmingham bloomfield real estate, birmingham mi, Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate

Bloomfield Hills: Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous

Get a load of this 1983 segment on Bloomfield Hills, which was America’s richest zip code at the time. That happens to be the year I graduated from high school along with the children of some of the “Auto Barons” mentioned in the clip. I especially loved Ronna Romney’s (Mitt’s ex-sister-in-law) outfit! I only wish Robin Leach had been there to offer “Champagne Wishes and Caviar Dreams.”

Tags: Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate

Birmingham Realtors — Thanks for the Great Support!

On Tuesday this week, our group of 9 top producing Realtors in the Birmingham Bloomfield Realtor Network held another of our broker tours. Dmitry and I held open our brand new listing in the Estates Section of Bloomfield Village that we had just put on the market the day before for $1,650,000. I can’t tell you how thrilled we were to have more than 70 agents through along with 5 non-Realtors!

70 agents is a huge number, and our sellers were equally elated when I called them with the good news. When I got back to the office I spoke with an agent from Max Broock who held open a home at the same time (but not on our BBRN tour) and she was happy to have had 7 agents through her house. Frankly I was happy for her that she had 7, as I have had broker opens with 1 or 2 people over the course of 3 hours…

Results? Yep. Today we have 2 showings on our new listing. The feedback was great and people really liked the house. Others said they had clients to bring back!

Congrats to the agents from Weir Manuel in Birmingham. The BBRN will be providing the whole office with a catered lunch as thanks for their wonderful turnout Tuesday morning.

We’ve cut down our BBRN tours to 6 in 2008. I can honestly say that it is one of the strongest tools we have for getting agents to preview a home. What seller in today’s market would not want 70 agents passing over their doorway in one morning? I am happy to have this as a part of our marketing plan.

Last week the BBRN agents gathered together to tour our own listings. 9 of us carpooled and walked through a couple of each of our newer listings and the feedback we gave each other was great. It was really like having a team of consultants with us as we all shared our thoughts with the listing agent about experiences we were having in the same neighborhood, same price segment, etc. It also gave each of us some wonderful homes to consider for our buyer clients.

This week I had a comment on my blog from Gerry Burke, the newest owner of Hannett, Wilson, Whitehouse. Gerry complimented me for thinking outside of the box in a challenging market. The BBRN is just one of the tool we have to push the envelope for our clients. In today’s market that is just so important.

[tags]birmingham mi real estate, bloomfield hills real estate, bloomfield village[/tags]

Photo by Victoria Peckham

Tags: BBRN, Birmingham Mi Real Estate, Bloomfield Hills MI Real Estate, Bloomfield Village