Licensed since 1984, San Diego real estate broker Gary Kent is a recognized authority on real estate. In addition to selling over 5,500 homes for clients, he has been an expert court witness, trainer of other agents, and he does seminars on home buying, home selling, and investing. Gary has sold homes for The Salvation Army, dozens of major banks, and Fannie Mae, amongst others. You can find Gary on Facebook, Instagram and YouTube.

Responding To An Offer

“Once I receive an offer on my home, how long do I have to respond?” ***ANSWER: Great question. Believe it or not, there is no specific time frame that I’m aware of. Unless you have another offer coming in, my advice is typically to respond in 24 hours or less. Buying a home is very
Read more
No Comments

Watching the Market

“Hi Gary. My friend put his condo on the market and got three offers within a week. And I know of another house that got several offers. I’m looking to buy a home and want to know if the market has picked up.” ***ANSWER: It’s hard to distinguish between a temporary blip versus the beginning
Read more
No Comments

Check Your Credit Report!

“We should get a free copy of our credit report.” ***ANSWER: This one was from my wife. And it wasn’t a question. So you can bet I got right on it. I googled “free credit report” and clicked to one site that looked free, but after I filled out most of the form, suddenly they
Read more
No Comments

Solid Financing

“When we sold our condo in UC a couple of years ago, we had two offers. Our agent suggested we take the lower offer because the buyer had more solid financing. We took our agents advice and everything worked out. But we always wondered how much difference does the financing really make?” ***ANSWER: I don’t
Read more
No Comments

Real Estate Transaction Fee?

“Hi Gary. I made an offer on a condo last week. The agent wrote in that I had to pay their company a $395 transaction fee? I didn’t get what that was for. Do you know?” ***ANSWER: Some real estate agents and/or firms charge clients an extra fee they call by various names, such as
Read more
No Comments

San Diego Home Inspections

“I’ve just had an offer accepted on a home. If my inspector finds things like a leaky roof or the heater doesn’t work, does the seller have to fix the items?” ***ANSWER: Nope. The seller is only LEGALLY required to have: 1. Operative smoke detectors in the “sleeping areas”. 2. Earthquake straps on the water
Read more
No Comments

Soft and Hard Prepay

“I’ve heard the terms ‘soft prepay’ and ‘hard prepay’. What do they mean?” ***ANSWER: As you may know, “prepay” refers to a prepayment penalty that is charged when a home loan is paid off early. Most home loans don’t have prepayment penalties, but some do. For those that do, the penalties are usually for the
Read more
No Comments

Disclosing Home Problems

“I bought a condo with a cracked slab 5 years ago. We filled it at that time and have not had a problem with anything that we can see since then. I had put in wood floors and new carpet back then and have not looked under either since. Do we have disclose this to
Read more
No Comments

San Diego Condos

“We rent right now and can barely afford a house, so my wife and I were thinking condo. But I don’t want to pay those monthly association fees. They’re a waste of money. Are there any condos without fees?” ***ANSWER: Sorry. With rare exception, buying a condo means you’ll be paying those pesky “HOA fees.”
Read more
No Comments

Home Buying and Credit Scores

“I recently had a realtor tell me that running my credit multiple times for the purposes of obtaining a home loan/mortgage would not take points off my credit score. Is this true? Is this different than having my credit run several times for, say, an auto loan?” ***ANSWER: That Realtor was correct. To get you
Read more
No Comments