Stay Home Directive & Real Estate

What does the Governor's stay-at-home directive mean for real estate agents and how does that affect us and you during this time?

I wanted go over what real estate agents can and cannot do during this Stay Home Directive since we were deemed on the non-essential list for businesses. We can still operate in some capacity, but there are a couple of restrictions.

As far as what we can do, we can do anything that involves us still remaining at home. So thankfully, a lot of our documents can be signed electronically and we have the capacity to do that with technology and our computers. So anything done digitally, we can take care of for you. We can conduct buyer's consultations over FaceTime or Zoom. So, anything that involves us not having to leave our house is on the list of what we can do right now.

As far as what we cannot do... essentially, anything that involves us having to leave our house. A lot of these things include showing properties, a property tour, or a property video, opening the house for an inspector, even going to take listing photos we currently cannot do. All of that stuff is currently being put on hold during the Stay Home Directive.

We understand that people are still wanting to buy and sell, but during this time, there are things that we currently cannot do. The biggest one a lot for buyers is showing properties. The second one is if you wanted to list your home during this we actually cannot do that unless we had pictures taken beforehand.

What about pending? Anything that we currently have pending right now because, as you know, real estate takes around 30 to 45 days to close, we will be able to see those through to their closing date, as long as everything goes smoothly. We still have the banks working right now, which is a big part of funding that. Title and escrow companies are restricted as far as what they're allowing, but they are still working on getting things closed, and appraisers are still working since they are bank ordered. So, everything that we need as far as a pending status is going to be okay.

Some of our buyers and sellers have been asking us, "Well, what can we do during this time period then, if we can't go see homes since we're actively looking?" If you are in the initial buying phases, some things that we're recommending to people is, it's a great time to work on your taxes or look at your financials a little bit closer, getting in touch with a lender, doing pre-approvals over the phone, things like that are all really great things to do. We are suggesting doing Zoom buyer consultations. As far as listing, what we are recommending is just get working on your house. This is a great time to get all those projects done that you wanted to do, especially if you're home all day. It's a good way to start chiseling away since all we can really do right now is be outside. Thankfully, it's beautiful out and hopefully it will continue to be beautiful out, but these are just the things that we're recommending. So, I hope that helped. I hope that gives you a little bit of an idea of what we can do and what we cannot do during this time, and maybe some things if you are in a buyer or seller situation that you can do as well.

Stay home, stay safe, wash your hands, we love you all.