Tristan and his WHITEBOARD – LIVE!
Seller’s Personal Property…a “Please Do” Episode!
Hello everybody. Welcome to Tristan and his WHITEBOARD – LIVE! Today we’re gonna talk about personal property – a “Please Do” topic!
And we’ll talk more about that after, of course, we get to the joke of the day.:
Why didn’t the melons get married?
Simple, they cantaloupe. Can’t elope…
So let’s talk a little bit about personal property. The reason I’m bringing this up is I’ve had a few scenarios the past few deals, the past few months, where we’ve had to deal with personal property, especially as it relates to sellers removing said personal property.
First of all, what is personal property?
Personal property is anything that is not attached to the property. Normally your refrigerator, your stove, your washer and dryer, those things will be transferred via bill of sale.
But then, you also have your furniture and your clothes and your stuff inside. Of course, you’re like, “Yeah, I’m moving that stuff, don’t worry about that!”
I’m talking today more about here is the stuff outside the home. In the garage, in the shed, around the shed, behind the shed….those paver blocks that you bought way back when and didn’t quite finish the patio. That wood that you used to fix the deck and never got around to fixing the deck…(I’m talking about me here.) All these things that are outside that you need to make sure are removed.
Purchase Agreement Says…
The Purchase Agreement that will be in place will state: You must remove all personal property from the property.
I state again, ALL. That means all of the lumber, all of the bricks, everything that’s there on the property should be removed prior to closing.
Now, you’re going to say, “Well this is some good stuff here. I’ve got paint, I’ve got shingles, I’ve got this…” Here’s what I recommend to you: take a picture of it, send it to me and I’ll ask the buyers if they want it. If they want it, great! Score! If not, you can use that same picture, post it on Facebook, post it on Craigslist – say “free come and get it” or put a price on it, and it will be gone in no time. That shouldn’t be any problem as long is it’s decent stuff.
Now – We need to talk about then how to get rid of said stuff.
Tip number one, start early.
Trust me, you’ve got more stuff outside and in the garage and in the shed than you think you do. It’s going to take longer to get rid of some of that stuff than you imagine. So start the process before you list or right after you start the listing.
Definitely start before you get a purchase agreement, because it’s all going to have to go. Even if it doesn’t sell, hey – you’ve cleaned up all the junk out of your property. It’s a win-win, right?
It doesn’t matter what happens, it’s good to start early, get working through your stuff, seeing what’s there and get rid of it.
Tip number two. Resources.
I’ve got a couple of resources for you. One of them is an app. It’s called the “My Waste App”. You download this app on android or iPhone, and you can put in Rapid City, and there’s a cool little button, it’s called “Where Does This Go”. You can determine from there where you need to deposit trash or otherwise get rid of certain items.
For instance, if you put in there “refrigerator”, it’ll tell you, you can’t take this to the dump because it’s got Freon in it, but you can go to this place, this place, or this place and they’ll take care of them for you. Electronics, paints, stains, all those kinds of things, you can find out from this app where you should take the stuff that you have and get rid of it.
The other resource is Habitat For Humanity Restore. They’ll take a lot of your good construction items. They also now have a latex paint recycling center, which I didn’t realize, so you can take your latex paint there. Small electronics, scrap metal, that kind of stuff can go there.
Cornerstone Rescue Mission, the thrift center, they will take your household goods, your clothing and that kind of stuff. You can take that stuff there.
Black Hills Works also has a small electronics recycling center.
Those are three good avenues you can take stuff to and get rid of stuff as well as, of course, throw it in the truck and take it on its way.
Take Responsibility
The key here is take responsibility for what’s on your property. I don’t care if the previous seller left it or the seller before that left it or the neighbor just threw it over on your property before close. It’s your responsibility to get all that stuff off of your property for your buyers.
Of course, the reason we’re doing all of this, not only is it because it’s in the purchase agreement, but because you’d want the same thing done if you were buying the property. You’d want to walk in and not have to worry about, “Oh, now I got to get rid of this refrigerator, well crap, what am I going do about that?” Make sure it’s taken care of for your buyers.
Leave me any comments or thoughts or questions about this episode below. See you next week on Tristan and his WHITEBOARD – LIVE!
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