Helping Seniors Move in St Louis and St Charles Area
Dan: You had mentioned to me earlier that one of your focuses has become around the senior sector. Can you tell me a little bit about your work with the senior sector?
Phillip: Sure. Last year I joined two senior resource groups. What our senior resource group is, they are group of business owners that focus on the senior sector. You have people that do reverse mortgages. You have people that put ramps on houses when people have mobility issues. You have people like Visiting Angels, which is a company that does companionship and food and different needs that the seniors might have that’s not medical, so they’re considered non-medical. You also have medical care from hospice, to live-in help, to the various retirement centers. We even had a lady that does ambulance service.
Anyone that’s a resource for seniors is who’s part of this group. So I joined them to try to help reach more seniors.
Dan: How do you help the seniors to sell their homes?
Phillip: Most of the time seniors when they call us up they want to sell the house quick and easy. The traditional route of getting the house perfect and then calling a real estate agent and putting the sign in the yard; that would work if the house is in perfect shape. A lot of the times the houses we find, they’ve owned the house since the ‘60s or ‘50s or ‘70s, and they’re almost like a time capsule. They still have the old shag carpeting, the old appliances.
Some of the maintenance has been as we call it deferred. The family, or the people that live in the house don’t want to do the work to try to get top dollar for the house, so that’s when they call it an “as is, cash buyer” like Fasterhouse.
Dan: How do you come up with your cash offer price for the houses that you’re looking at?
Phillip: For me I have to back into the number. I like to use the analogy if I think the house is going to sell for $100,000, and that’s after it’s been fixed up and brought to the market. Then I have to buy it at a bit of a discount and also subtract off what I think the rehab cost is. Part of my job as a buyer at Fasterhouse is to determine what items need to be fixed and rehabbed to get it ready for the market. Once I determine that I subtract that off the price and make them a cash offer on the difference.
One thing I think people like is when talk with them I’m transparent with those numbers. I tell them hey if you guys want to do these items you could probably sell your house for that $100,000, if you guys want to do it. Even if I don’t buy the houses from them I feel like at least I’m still helping them if they want to do the work themselves get the biggest bang for their buck.
If you know or are a senior who needs to sell a house please give us a call at 314-926-0660 or fill out this form
