HOMESELLING TIPS

Safety Tips When Selling

Think safety when selling your home

You have enough to think about without worrying that your home isn’t safe, or that your things may be stolen. Open houses and showings mean strangers will be in your house. A few safeguards can lessen your worry:

Remove things that matter: Store jewelry, fine art or collectibles with a friend or family member. If that’s not an option, find a place to hide valuables in your home or keep them with you in a suitcase and take it with when you leave. The same applies to personal papers with account numbers and/or social security information. Medicine cabinets are often a target.

Secure your home: Keep doors and windows locked. Prospective buyers will often open windows or doors. Some will even do that to return later to steal things. Others may even visit several times and bring an accomplice to distract the agent. So, double-check doors and windows when returning after a showing.

Consider an alarm system: It may seem impractical to install a system when you’ll be moving, but it will not only deter burglars, but may also be a strong selling point. Now there are wireless systems that do not require a home phone.

Make it look like your home: If you are not currently living in the home, think about installing motion sensors or timers to automatically turn on lights.

Reach out to your neighbors: Ask them to keep an eye on your place. Introduce them to your agent so they know things are okay when the agent is on the premises.

By taking these extra precautions, you can feel safe and secure during a home sale.

Dallas - Houston High Speed Rail?

Oct 30, 2014 12:13 pm | DFW Real Estate

Talks of a high-speed railway has been circling the Dallas-Fort Worth area for some time and local officials are now working on more specifics of the plan, slated to be up and running by 2021. A public meeting in Dallas on October 21 gave North Texas home owners a glimpse of what they can expect from the project, including the proposed routes and possible end points for the lines.
According to The Dallas Morning News, the 240-mile project is expected to get residents to-and-from Dallas and Houston in 90 minutes, helping to ease the traffic congestion that is expected to increase substantially by 2021. The public meeting unveiled developer Texas Central Railway’s three potential sites for the end points of the line, including the intersection of Interstates 20 and 45, near Interstate 45 and Loop 12 and near the southwest corner of downtown Dallas. All proposed end points are expected to make getting around the city and North Texas much easier for residents throughout the entire state.One main goal of the project is to tie in downtown’s current public transportation systems to the bullet train to make it easier for both travelers and commuters to get around. This is why one of the most argued stops is Union Station, which serves two Dallas Area Rapid Transit light-rails, an Amtrak line and the TRE passenger train, which connects Dallas and Fort Worth to one another. Some argue that Union Station is at its capacity for transportation, but there is still a lot of discussion set to take place in the next five scheduled meetings set in cities along the potential routes this month.

Concerns of the Impact of the High-Speed Train

One major point of discussion is the environmental impact as well as the effect it is going to have on all the local communities it will run through.
“We’re not just talking about the bugs and the bunnies and the air quality and the water quality,” James Maughan, an environmental science expect with the U.S. Department of Transportation, told the audience at the meeting. “We’re talking about any aspect of the human environment that might be impacted by this project.”Another main concern would be the impact that the train would have on local ranchers and farmers who have large plots of land between the two major metropolitan areas. Currently there are nine routes being considered for the high-speed railway, two of which stand out among the rest in terms of the least amount of environmental and social impact.

“We believe that high-speed rail is the biggest game changer in transportation since the federal highway system was established,” Dallas City Council member Vonciel Jones Hill said.

Sad To See The Trees Gone

Morriss Road a North-South winding road through Flower Mound, Texas no longer makes the City Beautiful.

We had it nice, but in the name of progress all of the mature trees are gone, utilities have been installed in the middle of the medium and a promise of new little trees is to come. I would not be surprised if the traffic 10 or 20 years from now is exactly the count it is today, 8-21-2010.

The new light next to Forrestwood Middle School, at Garden Rd. will be nice for school children. The right turn lane is a great idea. To bad someone made the right lane too small for an easy right turn. Maybe they will fix it before someone gets hurt or there are a few fender benders there.