News | Stapleton Realty

New Home, New Year

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2021-01-19T15:37:02-05:00January 19th, 2021|Buying a Home, General, News, Selling a Home|

It is the new year we had all been looking forward to! New year, new start for so many hopes, dreams, and ideas. After being in your home so much more than usual over the past “Covid Months”, you are thinking you need a different scene, it would be hard to blame you. Interest rates are staying low as we head into the spring market which makes it a good time to buy. It also means that prices are up, so your home may be worth more than even a few months ago. Worth Exploring? Let us look closer. Selling your home today = more buyers because interest rates are low. More [...]

Thankful

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-11-17T13:49:24-05:00November 17th, 2020|General, Maureen's Musings, News|

This year has seen an unprecedented change and disruption in the world and economy that none of us could have predicted. One thing that didn't change however is how incredibly thankful we at Stapleton Realty are to our buyers, sellers, and all the individuals that help us to be successful in our endeavors to do the best we can be in representing all of our Buyers and Sellers. We learned what it meant to be “Essential Workers” with video calls, virtual showings, safe practices, adjusting events, and pure resourcefulness to serve our clients. In Lake Country, we saw residents and businesses supporting morale-encouraging new ways to adapt to unusual circumstances, and a general desire to [...]

Life Transition Points and the Effect on the Housing Market

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-11-17T13:42:02-05:00November 17th, 2020|Buying a Home, First-Time Home Buyers, General, News, Selling a Home|

This year, 2020, has offered us so many different challenges, but the housing market has stayed hot. How could that be? Record layoffs, unprecedented unemployment, stock market volatility and so on. The housing market has been hot: a low inventory of for sale homes, many people in the market to buy motivated by low interest rates and ability to move where they want to live while working remotely. If you could live anywhere and work from home, you might choose to live in an area with outdoor attractions, closer to your family, or perhaps where you grew up. A lot of what was for years, attractive about living in big cities, has [...]

Lake Are Free Clinic

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-09-11T13:24:13-05:00September 11th, 2020|General, Maureen's Musings, News|

Lake Area Free Clinic Photo credit: Lake Area Free Clinic and Ocreative https://www.lakeareafreeclinic.org/gala-event/ All bidding for the Gala will be done through Text2Bid. Preview our Silent Auction items on this site beginning September 1. Silent Auction using Text2Bid begins on Saturday, September 5 at NOON Silent Auction ends Saturday, September 12 at 6:00 PM Live Auction begins September 12. Join us on this website for the Live Event and have your mobile device ready for Text2Bid during the event. Note: You will receive notification after 7:00 PM on Saturday, September 12, 2020 when "My Bill" is ready. DONATE NOW Cash Donations are always needed and appreciated. Fund a Need Your contribution to "fund [...]

Why Inspect?

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-11-17T13:35:33-05:00September 11th, 2020|Buying a Home, First-Time Home Buyers, News|

The process of buying a home is nerve racking for many reasons. It is a large investment; it is the beginning of a lot of work to move from your old home and it is change. Worrying about what shape the home we are buying is in, is important, but most of us do not know enough about home conditions to evaluate our new purchase. Most realtors would suggest you hire a home inspector. Their job is to go through the home you are buying and to look for things that may be an added expense for you or may be dangerous. They are not there to evaluate the cosmetics of the [...]

Spring Bank – Oconomowoc Lake

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-08-17T15:28:36-05:00August 14th, 2020|Lake Homes, Maureen's Musings, News|

Photo Credit: http://www.oconlake.com/ A masquerade ball given by Fred Pecks at the Townsend House Hotel (now the site of the roundabout in Okauchee near the prior Coach house that still remains there) brought Captain Tom Parker and his wife Clara to Oconomowoc in 1874. Captain Parker bought 235 acres of land for $50.00 per acre, a handsome amount at the time. Sea Captain Parker spent his early life aboard ships, and after his father died, Tom left England to invest his inheritance in his first American sailing vessel. He kept buying cargo ships until he became the largest Crimean War profiteer in the nation. In 1863 he came to Chicago where he [...]

Surviving in a Seller’s Market

Bonnie Lewis-Tschannen2020-08-14T14:40:16-05:00August 14th, 2020|Buying a Home, News, Selling a Home|

What is the difference between a buyer’s and a seller’s market? As its name suggests, a buyer’s market is beneficial to the buyer and a seller’s market is beneficial to a seller. A buyer’s market is a market in which the supply is higher than the demand. A seller’s market exists when the demand for homes exceeds the supply, or there are more buyers looking to purchase a home than there are homes available. The outcome is multiple offers on a single property which leads to a bidding war. If you are lucky enough to be experiencing a seller's market in your area, it is indeed a fabulous time to sell. Not [...]

Why use Stapleton versus another realtor, discount company or flat fee company?

Andrea2020-07-13T11:04:08-05:00April 10th, 2020|News, Selling a Home|

All financial decisions go exactly the way your parents told you when you were younger,” you get what you pay for!” If a company significantly reduces the fees for selling your home, they will need to make up for the loss of revenue with volume. With more listings, agents have less time to help you with the sale of your home. With less time, they will know each home less than they need to and will not be able to answer questions about your home. With many more homes listed, how much effort can a discount agent give to each sale and how committed will they be to you getting the [...]