[rotwein]

Wife and I will be in Marquette early next month for several days. We would like to sit down with a knowledgeable real estate person who handles both residential sales and rentals.. We are not going to purchase at this time but are moving to Marquette in the spring. Looking for a recommendation.

[jeeg]

I can recommend that you do NOT go to Look Realty.

I've heard good things about Chris Cosco out of Remax. Just type the guy's name dot com and you'll go to his website. Have no personal experience with him tho. Just now looked at his website and he's got some pretty good info on there for people new to the area.

[rotwein]

Thanks Jeeg

[SpaceGhost79]

I would avoid Century 21. I actually used them when I purchased my house, mainly because I did it through USAA (insurance) so I could get a nice rebate from them. I had no issues with them when buying, but know some people who used to work there and left because things on the inside got pretty bad. They all went and started up a Coldwell Bankers Real Estate affiliate, I think (so I'd recommend looking into them).

I also think Century 21 overprices a lot of what they sell. For instance, there's a 2 bed, 1 bath house w/ one car garage but no basement (just a crawl space) that is still listed from 2 1/2 YEARS ago. When I was first looking at houses back then I actually bid on this property. Original asking price was $92,900, I offered $85, then bumped up to $87,500. The lowest they were will to go was $89K, so I held out. A few months later, they finally gave in and accepted my offer if I still wanted it (I didn't).

Then like last year this house was still on the market, so they put new vinyl siding on it. That's it, just vinyl siding. And they jacked up the price to $116,000 The housing market has been going down, down, down, they put on a few thousand bucks worth of siding, and jack up the price $25,000?! Needless to say, that house is still available.

They also just built four new houses in my neighborhood and sold them for like $170K each. Or that was the asking price. Overpriced again, in my opinion, but they did sell them all. But when you start looking at the materials they used, well, I wouldn't have paid that much! For instance the windows are made by Jeld-Wen, which is some cheap-o brand you can buy out at Menard's.

I also suggest going on realtor.com and searching the online listings so you can get a feel for what's out there. Pretty much all the real estate companies put their houses on that website, too, so it's a good starting point.

[jeeg]

Sometimes it's the owner rather then the realtor, who sets the price so high. There's a house on M35 where the owners demanded a listing price of over $200,000. It's a very old doublewide worth MAYBE $85,000. Been listed since we moved here. The realtor knows it will never sell but the owner lives on another planet and refuses to come down.
Anyhow I recommend upmls.com (throw the www in front of it) for searching for houses in the area. Just click the school district you want and away you go (I'm guessing the OP wants Marquette schools but they may look in Negaunee or Ispheming schools?). I recommend searching by school districts because then you'll get the houses outside of the city limits too.

[SpaceGhost79]

Well, in this case I happen to know the realtor (who was my realtor) lives right across the street from this house and if I remember correctly might even be related to their family. I agree, though, it ultimately is the seller who makes the deal.

[Bluefly]

^^
Like those WaterMarq Lofts in the old Levine Plumbing building - asking almost $800,000!

If a local realtor set that price, they should find a new career. It's as if the owner drove up from Chicago without having any clue about the culture or market here. Now, we citizens have to sit with a big empty building because no one's dumb enough to pay that much to have strangers watch them take a bath.

I looked at buying that building and it was listed for less than $300,000 raw. They didn't do enough to justify that kind of price jacking. I could see those going for $300-$400.

Sorry - not your topic. I don't have any recommendations for you.

[SpaceGhost79]

Not totally on topic, Bluefly, but I totally agree with you. And I consider it helpful information to anyone looking not just for a realtor but housing in general in the area.

Last time I checked there were lofts down there asking for $500K and the townhouse condos across from lower harbor were also asking $500. I think there are three of them for sale right now and they've been on the market for a while. I thought they originally sold in the $250-300K range a handful of years ago (or whenever they were built). In today's economy and real estate market, that isn't going to fly. Especially up here where I don't know of that many jobs that pay that well to allow people to afford such a place. Just looks like some folks are holding out hope that some sucker will bite on it.

Plus now they're going to build more condos with the parcel of Founder's Landing they just sold, and that lodge just up US-41 that was sold is being converted to condos, too. Marquette's starting to become the latest overpriced condo city. Ugh.

Back on topic, I seem to recall someone I know saying good things about Gina Feltner Bouws of RE/MAX. And a friend of mine used to rent a place owned by Terry Huffman (RE/MAX) and had nothing but bad things to say about him. Not to mention Terry used to air some of the worst locally produced commercials I've ever seen (and that's saying something!).

[jeeg]

Originally Posted by SpaceGhost79

Plus now they're going to build more condos with the parcel of Founder's Landing they just sold, and that lodge just up US-41 that was sold is being converted to condos, too. Marquette's starting to become the latest overpriced condo city. Ugh.

If you head down Grove st. towards 41, on the south side of the hill there is another billboard proposing yet another condo complex to go in there.

Not sure where these developers are going to find the customers to buy all of these condos considering there are so many on the market already.

Especially with the way the credit market is going.

[johnfinn]

Thanks also for the info jeeg, bluefly and spaceghost.
My family is moving to Mqt. (have job) as soon as we
sell. What are your opinions on Neguanee?