This week’s a free-for-all. Catch up with our hosts, Saad and Mike, as they riff on everything they’ve seen in real estate over the last few weeks. @theaikengroup, Southie realtor, joins us as a surprise guest. 🎙️
Mike: What’s up, dude?
Saad: Need to shave.
Mike: Dude, the beard delta has been out of control. You shocked me like when my dad shaved his mustache to now. It’s great.
Saad: Two weeks I let it go, and it just looks like, I don’t know, I just haven’t been around people. I promise you, have. just, you know, just been kind of laissez-faire lately.
Mike: Yeah, yeah, no, I like that. I like that. I can’t, at least yours is like respectable. I used to be able to do that. Now, this in particular needs very tight control.
Saad: Oh yeah, well, I mean, I mean, like, look, my hair looks fine…even this.
Mike: It looks great.
Saad: If I’m going out I’m like, you know, I can’t do a full-on shave right now, but I’ll still do kind of a little bit of a lineup. like, you know, like I’m putting a little bit of effort…butit’s just real estate life. Sometimes you have those weeks.
Mike: Yeah. Yeah, I feel you.
Saad: So Mike, what are we talking about today? Ben, what’s up, man? Thanks for rejoining Storii Time.
Mike: Yeah, Ben, hop in. What’s up? Dave Lopez, Nehemiah.
Sad: David, how you doing? Thanks for joining.
Mike: Oh, wait, I do have a request. Oh, from Ben. Oh, it’s a free for all today. Let’s just do it.
Ben: How are you doing?
Mike: Good.
Saad: A two-timer on Storii Time. Look at that.
Ben: I know. It’s a very fitting time. I just got lined up, but I kept the beard growing.
Mike: Oh, everybody’s…It’s the hair episode.
Saad: Ben showed me up.
Ben: It’s funny you’re talking about like real estate life. I just got this listing at the Ritz, which I’m walking from. Got it yesterday, talked to guy in my office, was like, telling him about it. He called me two hours ago. He’s like, “hey, can I show it?” And I’m like, dude. I’m in jeans, a polo, and sneakers. Like, sure, let’s go.
Mike: Yeah. You mean you’re dressed up?
Ben: No. Usually I’m a little bit more put together than this. It’s definitely going well. So I’m very excited about that.
Mike: Right on. Give us the deets.
Ben: Three bed, three bath, 2242 square feet an A unit on the 33rd floor…it’s got just phenomenal views of Straight down Boylston Street all the way over to like Charlestown. You know the kitchen and dining room has the state house as kind of the center of the windows. It’s spectacular view…
Mike: is it the Departed condo?
Ben: No, but like it should be. There’s no balcony for the rat to run on but yeah, the place is sick. What’s interesting is we were running the comps like you know the high end market is a little depressed right now. It’s just not gaining the appreciation that people were expecting, so they’re renting it for 15k.
Saad: Wait, so this is a rental listing right now?
Ben: Yeah, we were talking about selling it. But when we were looking at what’s going on in the building, it was pretty much the same number that he bought it for and he bought it in 2014. So he’s like, if I can rent it, great. If we can’t get the rental number he wants, so put it on the market and sell it. Because he just bought a place in Maine and the North Shore.
Saad: If you put it on somewhere on the market, what would it go for?
Ben: I think we’d put it on 375, 36, something like that. realistically, he’s probably looking at 325. Yeah. And after, net-net, he’s clearing what he bought.
Saad: Yeah, wow. That’s pretty wild. That’s not common around here to hear that.
Ben: I know. I was surprised when I was at expired, right? Trying to figure out why they expired and more than half were listed and expired for less than they bought them for.
Mike: Wow.
Saad: mostly what you were looking at were mostly the luxury, the luxury tier?
Ben: Yeah, it was like one, five and up in the South Valley. And I don’t know that’s super indicative of the entire market, but….
Mike: I mean, I would put that at there has been a lot more buildings in that with those types of units that have popped up over the last 10 years than ever before or in Boston.
Ben: Yeah.
Saad: That’s probably true, but also like…how much higher can you go? Right. Like, I mean…I know I’m sure people 15 years ago were saying the same thing. There’s been some serious appreciation from 15 years ago all around Boston, but we’re at the point now, especially in a high interest rate environment like the one we have today, where prices are high as well.How much higher can you go? Right? That’s why I think more people are doing off-market, in terms of like selling off-market, and I think people who are less who are like…
Mike: Ben, we’re getting a lot of traffic…
Ben: How do I mute?
Saad: you know how to mute.
Saad: anyways, I think the luxury tier is super interesting. Those prices are already so high, how much higher can you g,o especially with high condo fees.
Ben: The condo fee there is like 5 grand
Saad: That’s insane. I have a thousand dollar a month condo fee and it hurts me so much to pay it every month. But 5 thousand a month?
Ben: It includes an electric bill?
Saad: I don’t care…. I mean it better, right?
Ben: Mike, they got a machine in the lobby that makes cortados.
Mike: Oh, you know we love cortados.
Ben: You know we love a cortado.
Saad: Yikes. It’s crazy.
Mike: Because of the noise, I mean, they’re going to say mute or…
Ben: I don’t even know how to mute.
Mike: Alright, then there’s a big red button you can hit that too.
Ben: Where is it? This is embarrassing. Anyways, they opened the fountain at Winter of Circle, or Winter of Square.
Mike: Oh! Nice. Lap of luxury right now. Beautiful.
Saad: Love it. Love it, love it. Is he muted now?
Mike: Yeah, it looks like you’re muted.
Saad: There you go. I mean, speaking of listings, Mike, obviously, we were just talking about this, you and me.
Mike: Yeah.
Saad: What are some of the trends you’re seeing? Are you seeing similar things in various markets? You have a multifamily? You’ve got a condo? We’ve got a bunch of other stuff coming on in the coming months too, which is both exciting. and also a little nerve-wracking because the market’s different. You can’t just throw something on the market and it’s gone. So yeah, what are you seeing and what are you thinking?
Mike: I just think that the condo market is softer. I’m going to tell you about it. So, I’ve got a Roslindale three-bedroom that’s priced well. It’s at $700. That’s where it should be.
Saad: And it’s really nice.
Mike: I think that the first rule is that if there’s something that needs to be done, then you got to price it much lower. But if it’s in great condition, even at that point, what you think it will go for, which is what we price.. We didn’t price it at like a lofty number. We didn’t underprice it because we want to sell it quickly. So if we got the number that we listed it for, then gone. But it didn’t go that first weekend and then the end of August is dead.
Mike: Now, we got a lot more activity going on, but I’ve noticed I think some of the other similar listings, comparables that looked at ours took notice and listed another, probably, 5% below what we did just to get it gone in that first week. So that’s my recommendation moving forward until I see otherwise, is like what you think it’ll go at. probably put it 5% below that.
Saad: You know, it’s funny you say that too, because we have one of our agents, he does rentals, and he does rentals in and around the city. He has a rental in Medford, a client who I sold this uni tot, I sold this unit to him a couple years ago. Really nice unit, not super new or anything like that, but it could probably command like, I don’t know, 3,200 a month if he wants to rent it out, which he does. He might be moving out to the West Coast and he doesn’t want to sell it. So they put it on for 32, maybe 31 or something like that just to get it moving quickly. uh Somebody else saw it, saw that it was rented for that. Somebody else in the building who also had a listing at 2900. They dropped their rental and again, this is an anomaly. This is not common. But they dropped their asking rent down to 1400.
Saad: Wild, absolutely wild. Obviously you do not see that very often and they probably just have the, it’s probably paid off or something like that. Something along those lines…but I mean, it has to be. It makes zero sense if it isn’t right. But like, but, but that’s kind of, I mean, there’s some things that we’re seeing in the market today that we haven’t, that at least as long as I’ve been doing this since 2021, I certainly haven’t seen.
Saad: COVID times are crazy for different reasons. I think right now, you’re seeing a different type of craziness.
Ben: I think there’s like a I think there’s a bit of price sensitivity just around the entire market condos for sure Mike I agree with your point there…but the rental market I can’t quite sort it out I’ve got a listing, can’t move it, in East Boston another listing in East Boston that the landlord was like you want to know what focused on my sales. I was selling two of his condos and he had another place to live. And I had it on for 31. He rented it for $2,400. I was like, okay, cool.
Ben: And they just needed to get rid of the vacancy. And a lot of the other agents, especially in my office, kind of like, can’t quite pin pricing. It’s just…
Mike: It is elusive right now.
Ben: To both your points, it is elusive. It’s almost like you can’t go low enough. It has to be very attractive.
Saad: you think that’s because interest rates? You think it’s because of the economy? Mike and I have talked about both of those things, but you think there’s something else?
Ben: Honestly, I’ve been trying to figure it out for a couple of weeks. Talking to agents, the general consensus is interest rates, right? People aren’t buying. I think that the new law surrounding brokerage fees is playing a role in people re-upping their leases and not getting back into the rental market. The move, I don’t see a big reason why that would play a big factor in someone’s decision-making, but you know, not everybody sees the market like we do.
Ben: I was talking to my barber the other day, and even his numbers are down, right? he typically is booked, and I walked right in, and I go, why aren’t you booked? What’s going on? He’s like, we’re having a terrible year. I’ve heard some restaurants are down significantly. So I think it’s just general economic pressure and people making smarter financial decisions or being less frivolous with their with their money…there’s something going on that i can’t pin.
Saad: The job market has been…there’s been some positive news lately, but the job market’s definitely played a factor you know tech jobs pharma jobs, things like that. There are layoffs happening across the board…my wife works for a big tech firm and there were recently opportunities to be voluntarily laid off. Right?
Saad: Likeyou’ll get a package, leave the company. That’s a real thing happening right now. And if it’s happening at these big companies, imagine what’s happening at the smaller companies. I also think that, to Ben’s point about people just spending less money, the tariffs are real. They’re starting to take their effect on the general market… groceries…there’s three grocery stores I go to. I hate going to Star Market. The prices at Star Market these days are absolutely insane. So, I mean, I’ll go drive a little further to go to Trader Joe’s for sure, because they their own name on everything. You know, they have their own name on everything. So the cost is significantly lower for the same bag of goods. It’s tough times. The housing market especially in a place like Greater Boston, is going to see it.
Mike: Benny, we’ll ask you to mute one more time. Again. Yeah.Thank you. I mean the city ambiance is all right, but not in this light.
Saad: I love that he just joined spontaneously though. It reminds me of uh when Ilya did the same thing.
Mike: yeah, Ilya was our last spontaneous joiner on this. Anybody else wants to join in? Carmella, I see you out there. You to tell us what’s going on in New York?
Mike: I love a free for all. It just gets me going. Man, structure stinks.
Saad: Mike, little does everybody know, because of this, Mike’s got a different level of energy now for the rest of the week.
Mike: I’m jacked. If you can make every event into a Royal Rumble style where you don’t know who’s coming in a couple minutes.
Saad: It’s a countdown? Oh, man. That’s a little too chaotic for me, but hey, I can work with it.
Mike: I see Carmella on here. She’s an agent in New York. I’m just gonna… I’m just going to invite her for the hell of it, see if she bites. So yeah, in an unfortunate circumstance for everybody that was waiting on our interior design/staging episode yesterday, Instagram has now instituted a rule where you have to be a public account with more than1,000 followers to join in on a live.
Saad: Which is whack. It’s whack, Instagram. Whack, as the kids say. Yeah. But, we were really, excited to have TheSheDesigns team on to talk about staging. I mean, we were just talking about listings.
Saad: Like, what a great time to start talking about staging and how you can set up your property in a market like we have today. But, you know, eventually we’ll have them kind of like share their thoughts in a different medium, maybe in a guest blog post or…Speaking of which, you guys should check out our blog.
Saad: That actually might be a good avenue for them to share some of their thoughts because they did a great job with Mike’s listing in Roslindale.
Mike: If you have a place that’s just a big empty box, forget about it. Nobody’s got the imagination to see what’s what, so that’s going to sit even longer.
Saad: I’ve got a listing coming up in Somerville. The tenant is going to be moving out by the middle of the month and I’ve already had the conversation with them about staging. I’m like, listen, we’re going to have to stage this thing. In fact, it is better that the tenant is moving out. But if we don’t stage the property, be prepared to let it sit. Regardless of price, it’s too tough out there right now. And even if you didn’t need to, there’s gonna be ROI on you doing that. So, I think, it’s a no-brainer. And that’s why it would have been great to have those ladies share their thoughts and how they go through it. Not just them, but we work with another group as well, Friendly Staging. There’s a whole process that’s involved with properly staging at home. I think both of them have their PhDs, for example, in design or something related to design. So they go through the house and kind of figure out the whole feng shui, so to speak, to make sure that everything works harmoniously.
Saad: So people get the right feeling that you’re trying to invoke during open houses, showings, all that kind of stuff. So I think staging is really important, especially now.
Ben: I think this really speaks to our pricing conversation earlier. Yeah. If you’re going to command a higher price, you really have to put forth a better product that the consumer can actually see themself living in. Right. I think staging is worth every dime. And Mike’s right. If you’ve got a big blank box….I sold a loft in downtown and we staged it across the owner 18 grand a stage. But it was exactly that, just like a big empty..and you saw it Mike, right? Yeah. And like we had a stage, looked great. And we still didn’t even get the asking price. But we were the first to sell…there are six on the market in the building…and we were the first to sell. And the reason the buyer said they bought it is it felt the most homey and they could see themselves living there. And I was like, boom, we can be sitting on the market or you could spend 18 grand to get it sold. What do want to do? That’s what I came down to at the end of the day. I think staging is very well worth it.
Saad: I’ve never had a client regret staging. Initially, they’re like, yeah, you know what, there’s a cost here, all that kind of stuff. But when you explain it properly to them, they’re ready. They’re like, yeah, look, we’re trying to sell this asset that’s the most valuable in our entire portfolio.
Let’s make sure we do it right. I think Ben said it right. You’ve got to put the right product out. Yeah. Staging is part of that.
Mike: Yeah. It is a feeling. I mean, that’s why they sell that baked cookie air spray and all that shit. But you know, like, have candles and all that you like it’s got to feel, smell, taste, great.
Saad: If you’re into that?
Mike: That’s something I’ve never been, how’d that condo taste?
Ben: I got to jump, but thanks for letting me on.
Saad: For sure.
Mike: Thanks for hopping on. This is awesome. We were just flying with no direction is great.
Ben: You know, birdman flies in any weather in any direction. Birdman flies.
Saad: All right. right. Any parting thoughts, Mike. Yeah.
Mike: You can be discerning as a buyer in most markets. Some of them are still, this is a single family and everyone’s budget. This is going to go. So you can be a bit discerning, but once you find something that you like, and I’m going through this with a couple other clients right now, make a bid, make an offer, even if it’s not at the ask, and you’re like, “oh, do you think that they’ll take X amount of dollars?” You don’t know. When you talk about the rentals, if they miss a month of rental income, think of that sprinkled across a 12-month lease, right? And then bid down that much. Other people, if stuff’s sitting vacant or if somebody needs to sell to buy, know that they’re in a more urgent situation to sell. This is a time to, if you are a buyer and you find something that you like, act on it in a way or a dollar amount that’s comfortable to you. The worst they can say is no, but throw stuff in there if you are looking. That’s my…
Saad: Yeah, I think that’s 100% true. This was the case back during COVID times. It’s the case now to the most successful buyers are those that are active. So by active doesn’t mean you’re putting in an offer on every house that you’re seeing, it means you’re just out there checking the listings, going out to see a few places. I know Macy’s watching right now. She’s my client she and her husband Stanley. So the exact thing happened last week, they were interested in a property. We asked about it. They were like, actually, we already accepted an offer on it. It was an offer we can’t refuse. But we have these other homes that we’re building. Do you want to go check them out? The house they went to check out, they’re not putting an offer in at the moment. The location’s not ideal for them, but it opened their eyes into some other opportunities for them, not just something that some random person is selling, but new construction.
Saad: Now they have a connection with somebody who’s actually building as well to help answer some of their questions. I think over the last few days, it’s like just asking that one question about that one listing that they weren’t gonna get anyway, right, has opened some doors along the way that you would not have imagined.
Saad: Again, that’s all because of activity. If you’re not active, if you’re just kind of passively looking, you’re gonna miss out on the opportunities that really help move the needle and ensure that you get as close as possible to that 10 out of 10. Yep. Because supply is still low, especially if you’re looking outside of condos. So if you’re not active, you’re missing the boat.
Saad: This is our Thursday riff session.
Mike: Preach, brother, Saad. Preach.
Saad: And we still got some, we still threw some shout-outs out there for She Designs. We wish they could be on with us, but you know, one day, I guess.
Mike: Yeah. If you’re watching, go like She Designs Home handle. They need about 200 more followers to do a live with us.
Saad: There you go. Go, Wack. I hate it. hate it.
Mike: It’s Zuckerberg! OK, go.
Saad: Cool. Well, another Storii Time.
Mike: All right. Another good one for He’s Mike, I’m Saad. This has been Storii Time.
Saad: See you next week.
Mike: Yeah. All right.
Saad: All right. Later, bud.
This Instagram live is transcribed for your easy reading. If you want to catch Storii Time live, every week, follow @saadmun1r and @photolowski on Instagram.