Oh Mercy! The amount of near non-stop work that I expected for today certainly came to pass, and then some. At least I managed to get everything I wanted done without any un-expected surprises. I certainly put enough miles on my car from having to drive to Clear Lake and back, then down to Thornton and back, and later over to Nora Springs. I actually managed to get back into the City and get to my last appointment on time.
When looking at the fields as I was hop-scotching across North Iowa, I’d say it had better stop raining or the farmers are going to start sweating over the time crunch there’ll be in getting their corn planted. We sure got a downpour after lunch today.
One dis-appointment I had today was with a client who’s decided the hold firm and fast on the price of a home I’ve had for sale for far too long. I’ll never understand how it is some in the general public believe they know exactly what their homes are worth–especially when their jobs have absolutely nothing to do with real estate sales. It’s almost like doctors thinking they know how to practice law, or landscape architects believing they know pharmacy. I do as much as I can to get people to understand, but there are those few who insist on knowing all the better.
One of my clients and I happened to get on the subject several days ago about what’s likely going to be happening in our area in the near future, and it’s not something pleasant to think about. We both came to the conclusion why more homeowners, especially the younger ones, are not doing the normal maintaining and improving on their homes as did those generations that came before them. Our assessment of the situation is a double-edged blade that’s slowing slicing away at the values of their homes. First of all, there are far too many people that have created excessive revolving debt to where it’ll likely take them years if never to get paid off. There’s absolutely no residual income left after all their monthly bills are paid. So if there’s no money left, how can one have worn down shingles replaced?
Secondly, were already finding the cost of home repairs and improvements sky-rocketing to the point where if a homeowner is faced with a new shingle job on his/her house, he or she will not only pay a much higher price for the materials, but also a spiked price for the labor. It’s terribly sad when knowing many are facing downward spirals and they don’t even realize it, but they will when it’s too late.
Have you ever wondered why so many contractors drive such expensive trucks and have near-new machinery and tools, as well as living in expensive homes? Without enough real competition in their lines of work, offers opportunities to inflate prices, and nearly everyone pays what they ask. That’s all we can do is keep working at learning how to do as much as we can around our homes without considering ourselves all thumbs, and also to start cutting debt and saving even the smallest amount each month just for those rainy days that are sure to happen either sooner or later.
