Doug Francis Real Estate Blog in Vienna and McLean Homes for Sale, Fairfax and Arlington with a little humor too. Easy Home Search
This “Step One” concept actually came to me after trying to buy a mini-van at a car dealership. With good intentions, my wife and I brought our toddler into a Ford dealership to buy a (dreaded) mini-van for our growing family. But after 2 1/2 hours of car dealership bull sh t crap, we walked… Continue Reading →
Having a home seller miss the deadline to respond to your offer is extremely frustrating. In fact, most real estate agents discourage their buyer clients for putting in a deadline for a simple reason. But you want to know, “why didn’t the seller respond to my offer?” It is best to start from the beginning… Continue Reading →
With all the media regurgitating the stale news that “real estate inventory is low”, it’s time everyone understands what it is like being a home buyer these days. It can suck! For example, yesterday a new listing popped up in Vienna Woods that seemed too good to be true. So, after they finished work, I… Continue Reading →
The real estate market in Northern Virginia has been very competitive recently. And if you are a home buyer here, then you know it’s actually Über-Competitive. It is easy to understand that anyone selling their home wants the highest price, but I thought I should share some strategic buyer tips that will help your offer… Continue Reading →
Anyone deciding to buy a lot to build a new home on really needs to consider some important factors which may seem daughting to a novice. If at the end of this article you decide this is the case, you may want to consider looking at some of the builder “spec” inventory that I see… Continue Reading →
If you have a child in Fairfax County Public Schools then you might have a different perspective than what people believe when reading Zillow school profiles. For example, the student population has surged in Fairfax County exceeding the projections given to the School Board just last year, and those temporary classroom trailers seem to have… Continue Reading →
If you are like most hopeful real estate buyers in Northern Virginia, you are probably noticing that there aren’t many nice homes out there to buy right now. Not to bore you with more real estate stats, but from Vienna to Ashburn, it’s slim pickins out there! You are not alone. I just read an… Continue Reading →
If you are living in Vienna Virginia, then you may have noticed the non-stop custom home construction boom that has been going on over the past few years. And, honestly, if you haven’t noticed then you really need to get offline right now! 2012 proved to be another record setting year up 21% for new… Continue Reading →
Have you ever wondered why some online listings have fewer real estate photos? This seems like a problem circa 2004, but even yesterday I ran into this totally ridiculous problem on three properties with two different buyer clients. The first listing was new on the market. Total photos: 0, as in zero. Since my client… Continue Reading →
Your wake up call may have come if you read a recent article in The Washington Post about a house in D.C. that had 168 offers on it. Okay, it was listed at a very nice price (it was a foreclosure, rare in D.C.) and had a textbook bidding-war that bumped up the price… Continue Reading →
A few years ago I noticed that real estate sites seem to show the same MLS listings, so I decided to create a distinct real estate blog to share my local insight - if you already live here or are relocating. There are topics based on recent client experiences, buying custom homes, and more learned over the past twenty years. Take a few minutes and read a blog post or two to see if my approach matches your goals. I am a real estate agent with RE/MAX, have lived in Oakton and McLean, and live in Vienna Virginia. My goal is to provide you with intel into today's market, candor, practical advice, ideas to get you moving, some humor, geeky stats, the best coffee shop, some video, and a cool way to search for homes. Helping you understanding the process of making an offer, the sales contract and more will come when we meet. Yes, I live here. It is easy to reach me: doug@dougfrancis.com or call me to discuss the real estate biz. 703-304-6827 ~ Cheers!
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The Vienna VA real estate market gets broken down by the three zip codes that cover the Vienna mailing address. As you can easily see from these three charts of the three Vienna Zip Codes, 22180, 22181, and 22182 that there has been a decline in the number of active homes over the period while… Continue Reading →
When I started this blog post of Things You Should Know Before Moving to Northern Virginia, I had to force myself to stop at thirteen “things”. Over the years I have heard myself saying these things over and over to clients relocating here, so I thought that I should put down my observations for the… Continue Reading →
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Thanks for reading... and feel free to contact me at 703-304-6827 or send me an email at doug@dougfrancis.com anytime!