Names: John and Meg Veith. John is owner of North Georgia CPA. Meg works for the Cherokee County School District.
The home: A five-bedroom, four-bath home with a finished basement built in 2001.
Where: Woodstock
Why they sold: The couple built the home in Wyngate at Towne Lake when their two children were small. They liked the family-friendly location near Lake Allatoona, overlooking wooded U.S. Army Corps of Engineers property. As their children, now 15 and 19, approached college, they decided to downsize from the 3,248-square-foot home.
Time on market: 5 days
Original price: $285,000
Sale price: $285,000
What it took
Months before listing the home, the couple met with Ursula Dahle of Keller Williams Realty Partners. She suggested they repaint some rooms and replace carpet. “Whatever she told us to do, we did,” Meg said.
The kitchen and bathrooms already had been updated with granite countertops, and new carpet was installed in the basement. They removed clutter and family photos, and Dahle had professional photos taken for the listing.
“She kept saying, ‘Your house is beautiful, it will sell right away.’ We had never sold a house right away,” John said. “We were not very confident that it would sell that quickly and for full price.”
Potential stumbling block
The timing and sale of a vacation home made the situation tricky. They found a three-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath in Woodstock’s Towne Lake Hills North overlooking its golf course and put an offer on the short sale in fall 2014, right before it was scheduled to be auctioned. That home needed to close in 30 days. Then they put their existing home on the market. They also were selling a vacation property in Ellijay.
“We could have been looking at carrying three mortgages,” John said.
On their primary home in Woodstock, they received an offer within the first day and additional offers after an open house that weekend. One offer was for full price, but the buyer was using VA financing that could potentially delay the deal. Another was below asking price. They chose a full price offer with conventional financing. They closed in December 2014.
Their north Georgia home also closed around the same time, freeing them of multiple mortgages. The home they purchased in November 2014 was uninhabitable, Meg said, so they spent about four weeks making changes, such as a new roof, gutters, appliances and kitchen cabinets, as well as mold remediation, hardwood floor refinishing, and interior and exterior painting.
Seller’s hint
Use an agent who is familiar with the neighborhood. Dahle knew the prices homes were selling for and what prices were too high, John said. “If someone is experienced in your local market, that’s where the value should come in,” he said.
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