Great House, Great Location – 43 Balsam in Baie d’Urfe, QC

Here’s a rare one: fully renovated, updated, high-end but affordable Canadiana home for sale in beautiful Baie d’Urfé, Quebec, on a child safe-crescent.

Located within walking distance of German, French and English schools, this home features four bedrooms upstairs plus one in the basement, and a main-floor office or den just off the front entrance.

The best thing about this house?  It’s been fully renovated and updated without losing any of its charm.  It’s a Canadiana but still has lots of natural light.  And it’s been designed for how most of us truly live, so you aren’t paying for real estate that never gets used.

Gourmet Kitchen in Home for Sale in Baie-d'Urfe QCThey say the kitchen is the heart of the home.  Well, this one runs across the entire back of the house.  Gourmet kitchen with high-end appliances (think Sub-Zero, Miele and Thermador), thick granite countertops, wood cabinets with beautiful detailing.  Huge adjoining dining area with built-in hutch and cabinetry, big windows onto the backyard, and French doors to the deck.

Dining Area in Baie d'Urfe Quebec Home for Sale

 

Can I paint a few scenes for you?

How about serving up a delicious cup of cappuccino from your built-in Miele cappuccino maker and enjoying it on the deck in your private backyard.  Too sunny out there?  No problem – just press a button for instant shade with your remote-controlled awning.

Living Room of Baie D'Urfe Quebec Home for SaleFeel like cozying up?  Enjoy your extra-large wood-burning fireplace in the living room, with plenty of room for guests or the kids.

Movie night?  Let’s head to the basement with its exposed staircase and wood beams, plenty of natural light, and extra bedroom for guests.

Master Bedroom Suite of Home for Sale Baie d'Urfe QuebecTime for R&R?  Welcome to your huge master suite where we find beautiful hardwood floors, gas fireplace and seating area, large walk-in closet, ensuite bath with whirlpool tub and separate glass-enclosed shower, and an exposed brick wall.

Well that all sounds nice, but what about the guts of the building?  Furnace, oil tank, and hot water tank – 2000; Roof and insulation – 1999; Central air conditioner – 2001; Canexel siding and insulation – 2000-2001; Plumbing and electrical – 2000-2001; Windows and doors – 2001-2001. 

Priced at $795,000.  Municipal evaluation: $734,600.  MLS 8586047

Open house this Sunday, September 25, 2011, from 2-4 pm.  Or call me for a private showing: Tanya Nouwens – 514-919-8468; tanya@readysetsold.ca

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Tanya Nouwens, September 22nd 2011 | Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Listings, Real Estate

3 Things I Thought I Knew About Selling Real Estate Before I Actually Started Selling Real Estate

I’m feeling confessional…again.  So here are 3 things I thought I knew about selling real estate, before I actually started selling real estate.

#1 – Before

“There’s no excuse for a house not looking great in MLS pictures.  And seriously?  You couldn’t get the cat out of the bedroom long enough to take a picture?”

 After

Sometimes real life gets in the way of a home looking smashing in pictures.  And while it is certainly the real estate agent’s job to make sure the quality of the pictures is stellar, and the photo of the bathroom features more than the toilet (with the lid up), sometimes the way a home actually looks simply reflects the reality of the people living there.  And that’s life.

Furthermore, despite our best intentions, somehow, somewhere, the cat’s tail, if not the entire cat, will end up in at least one shot of the home. It’s Murphy’s Garfield’s Law.

#2 – Before

“Real estate agents should preview all homes before they show them to their buyer clients.”

 After

Sometimes, previewing makes very good sense.  Other times, you get a very hands-on client who wants to see and touch and feel and smell what is on the market (within certain parameters of course) before they can hone in on what moves them to move.  And if we’re smart, we’ll know how to adjust our modus operandi to suit our clients’ preferences.

#3 – Before

“Showing homes – that’s basically what a real estate agent does.”

 After

Showing homes is just the showy part of our work.  The less glamorous stuff – continuing education, marketing, networking with colleagues, training, staging, previewing new listings, maintaining hands-on knowledge of the market, on-line background research, contract management, project management – is what allows us to do the showy stuff.

How about you?  What did you think you knew about real estate before you actually started selling real estate, or before you actually bought or sold a home?

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Tanya Nouwens, June 29th 2011 | Tags: , , , ,
Posted in Real Estate

Got clutter? Might be time to move.

Have you got clutter?  A linen closet that takes a full-on tackle to close?  A cabinet under the kitchen sink that looks like a product testing lab for household cleaning products?  Bin upon bin in the basement that may or may not contain your grade 7 report card?

Well then, it might be time to move!

I’m only partially kidding here.  A friend of mine is getting ready to put her Baie d’Urfé home for sale (with me as her listing agent – hooray!).  I was at her house on the weekend and she showed me the work she and her daughter were doing to purge, organize and give away the clutter that accummulates after 10 years of living in the same house.

It got me to thinking about all the stuff taking any and all available space (and more) in my own house.  It used to be that I moved A LOT.  When I was in university, I moved every year.  When I started my career, I moved every two years.  When I started my family, it was every four years.  Well, now that I’m living in the most wonderful neighbourhood in Kirkland, Quebec, it’s been seven years and counting…and I’ve got the clutter to prove it!  I don’t plan to move, but I do plan to behave like I’m getting ready to put my home on the market.  So I’m strapping on my body armour and heading to the linen closet this afternoon. 

How about you?  Have you got clutter?  Then maybe it’s time to move!  If you’d like to know what your home might be worth, I know just the person to call.  She lives and works in Montreal’s West Island, selling great homes and helping people find a place to call home. And though she may be lost under an avalanche of pillows at the moment, she’ll be out soon enough.

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Tanya Nouwens, June 27th 2011 | Tags: , , , , , , , ,
Posted in Real Estate

Did you consider location before your flip flopped?

Did you consider location before your flip flopped?  I didn’t think so.

When you first saw the house on MLS, it was probably too good to be true.  Or rather, it was so bad it was good.  But here’s the thing: Even when you flip houses, the 3 most important things in real estate are still location, location, location.

So it doesn’t matter how well you did the wood floors.  It doesn’t matter that you put in new bathrooms.  And it doesn’t matter that the paint is fresh and lovely.

What matters is that you invested all of that time and energy – and your MONEY - into a house that sits on a busy street and faces the highway.  And that’s why it’s been on the market for months and hasn’t yet sold.

Home buyers will pay a premium for homes that are move-in ready.

Home buyers will deduct a premium – or worse, not even come to see your project at all – if the location sucks.

Next time, ask a Montreal real estate agent to guide you through the process and to help keep the big picture in mind.  It’s what we do.

1 Comment

Tanya Nouwens, April 8th 2011 | Tags: , , , , , ,
Posted in Real Estate

We are all artists.

I’ve been reading a lot of Seth Godin lately, in particular his blog.  Lately, Seth has been pushing us to push ourselves – not to work harder or faster, but rather to work on the things that matter, the things that can make a difference to the way we, and the world at large, think, feel and do.  He encourages us to take the risks that must be taken to create “art.”

I’ve also been watching American Idol with my 9-year-old.  Again, artistry has been the theme, and in this case too, the judges have been pushing the contestants to create art, to take risks, to find their true voice or their “lane”.

Artists put themselves out there. Painters, singers, musicians, writers, poets, sculptors – they all dig deep, expose the fleshy parts of themselves, not knowing how their audience will react, who their critics will be, and whose lives they may change.

In fact, we are all artists. Our works of art are ourselves.   Every experience we have, every emotion we feel, everything we learn, moulds us, creates or softens our edges, adds contours to our being, paints us with brilliant colour in some places and with shades of pale in others, making us absolutely unique and uniquely beautiful.

Never stop creating your art. Be who you are meant to be.  Be brave enough to stay true to your inner voice, to show the colour that wants to shine through, to flow into the shape you want your life to take.

You are a work of art, and as with any piece of art, not everybody will like you.  But critics be damned.  Greatness never comes from playing it safe … nor does it come from pressing the inner mute button.

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Tanya Nouwens, April 7th 2011 | Tags: , , ,
Posted in Musings

The Shine on Your Ceiling is Like the Shine on My Forehead

A funny cute charming annoying thing has happened as I age [ahem] “gracefully”: I have developed a mid-day shine on my forehead.  Call it the development of combination skin commonly associated with women of a certain age, if you must.  Better yet, just hand me a napkin and tell me to wipe it off. 

Which is exactly what I’d like to tell homeowners who paint their ceilings in a high-gloss paint.  

I can imagine how it happens.  You scrape the Christmas tree across the ceiling one year, leaving a nice stripe, and then you suddenly notice scuff marks where the outdoors-only street-hockey ball hit the ceiling, and where you tried to wipe off what you thought was dust but was really an incubating insect.  Then you realize you might as well paint the whole ceiling and – Hey! You just happen to have a can of leftover white paint from the trim you painted last year!  How handy!

STOP!  Put down that can, mister!

That paint you have in your hand has a gloss to it, because this is typically what we put on trim.

But high-gloss paint on a ceiling does the exact same thing as oil on my forehead: it accentuates every single nook and cranny, every ridge, every less-than-perfect surface.  And ceilings are full of them.  As is my forehead – at least in the magnifying mirror (which, in my opinion, is the cruelest gadget ever made…but I digress).

Ceilings should have matte paint.  Only.  That’s it.  What you save by not purchasing a can of matte paint you lose when a potential buyer walks in, looks up, and thinks, “Our ceiling doesn’t have all those waves and stuff.  Maybe they have a leak somewhere?” 

Every ceiling has some imperfections, as does every complexion.  No need to accentuate them, dahling.

3 Comments

Tanya Nouwens, March 9th 2011 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Home Staging, Real Estate

I refuse to expect the worst in people.

Warning: This is a bit of a rant.

My son lost his iPod Touch on the bus yesterday.  Today, the bus driver returned it to him.  I was not surprised — I was happy, but not surprised.  Others were surprised.

I absolutely refuse to expect the worst in people.

“Ha! Poor girl. Is she ever gonna get used!!” Anyone thinking that?

And sure, I have been used from time to time.  But I’d much rather get bamboozled, stepped on, disillusioned, or used once in a blue moon than to go through my life with every encounter tinged with cynicism just so that I can avoid that rare time when someone may pull a fast one on me.

This is not to say that I don’t try to “read” people and ensure I act accordingly.  (My background in criminology helps me here.)  It’s absolutely critical to read people, both in real estate and in life in general.

But what I won’t do is expect the worst from people as my starting off point.  I cannot imagine how having that starting point must limit possibilities and relationships and horizons…and how it clouds our ability to see the sun that is in all of us.

I refuse to limit myself in that way…and to limit others’ potential too by pre-determining a cynical motive and just waiting to be shown that I’m wrong.

I believe the world is full of mostly-good people just trying to find their way.  I’m one of them.

And yes, my glasses are rose-coloured.  I wouldn’t have it any other way.

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Tanya Nouwens, February 11th 2011 | Tags: , , ,
Posted in Musings

Quoted in an on-line article on home staging

Last week, a writer from PropertyWire.ca interviewed me for an article on home staging and its impact on the home selling process.  PropertyWire is a new Canadian on-line community of real estate and mortgage professionals.

The PropertyWire article on home staging, “Staging as Added Value to Your Business,” is geared more toward real estate agents, but anyone buying or selling a home may be interested to see home staging discussed from the viewpoint of industry insiders.

For the record, though, I’m not big on the whole cinnamon / baking cookies thing before a buyer comes to visit.  It can seem so contrived.

And I don’t think all family pictures need to be removed either.  This is one of three common home staging myths that are referred to, but not linked to, at the end of the article. 

I’d love to hear what you think of the PropertyWire article.  Thoughts, anyone?

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Tanya Nouwens, February 7th 2011 | Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Home Staging, Real Estate

My Ya-Yas: Thankful Thursday for January 2011

I have a love/hate relationship with January.  I love the feeling of renewal and fresh beginnings that comes with the first month of the year.  But by the last week of this torturous, outrageously long, cold, dark, icy month, I’VE HAD IT!

And so it was that last night I dragged my sorry, grumpy self out of the house for dinner with some of my girlfriends at a local restaurant, Steak et Frites, here in Kirkland, Quebec.  This is a group of women I lovingly call my Ya-Yas, so named after the book Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood by Rebecca Wells.  (If you haven’t read it and you’re a woman, you must run and get it immediately.)

My Ya-Yas are an amazing group of women who care, listen, laugh, share, complain on occasion, and fight the good fight. 

And we do it all together every 6 weeks or so thanks to one Ya-Ya in particular, my friend Nancy Elliott.  She is the social convener of the group, one of the best moms I know, and a person who always seems to have her priorities in order.

I left the restaurant feeling like my very soul had been hugged, and I awoke this morning fully re-energized — which is quite remarkable considering the fact that I woke up at 4:15 a.m. 

I am so, so thankful for my Ya-Yas, and for Nancy – who pulls us all together, knowing it will be good for us whether we know it or not.

2 Comments

Tanya Nouwens, January 27th 2011 | Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Musings

All the home staging in the world won’t sell an over-priced home.

“All the home staging in the world won’t sell an over-priced home.”  That’s what Nairn Friemann, a great New York home stager, told us during my first day of home staging training back in 2007. 

I was reminded of those words today as I went out to preview homes for sale here in Montreal’s West Island and saw a beautiful house that’s just come on the market. 

The home is gorgeous: not too country and not too modern, well-renovated kitchen, nice lot, no loud colours to turn off buyers, no disproportionately large furniture eating up entire rooms, stylish accessories, lovely art and lots of light.

But it’s over-priced…by quite a bit.  And the agent knows it.

The owners of this home have undoubtedly heard from all of their friends that their house is absolutely stunning.  And it is.

But friends don’t tell you that the windows need replacing, that the garage floor is a wreck, that the roof is at the end of its life, that the low ceiling in the basement will be a problem for many buyers, that the bathroom hasn’t been updated.  (In the case of the bathroom, they’re impressed that you’ve actually managed to do so much with so little!) 

But these are things that a real estate agent will consider and point out, especially a buyer’s agent.

Now, I’m both a Montreal home stager and a Montreal West Island real estate broker so rest assured that I loudly sing the praises of home staging and what it can do to help homeowners sell their home more quickly and for top dollar.  But what staging won’t do is sell an over-priced listing.

So sellers, when pricing your home, listen to your agent, not your friends — because all the staging in the world won’t sell an over-priced home.

This blog is now featured on PropertyWire.ca, an on-line network of real estate and mortgage professionals in Canada.

3 Comments

Tanya Nouwens, January 25th 2011 | Tags: , , , , ,
Posted in Home Staging, Real Estate
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Tanya Nouwens is authorized to pursue the activity
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