Impeccable Photography and Stunning Multi-Platform Web Design are just two of the reasons that Historic and Central Phoenix homeowners choose Don Mertes with the Historic Phoenix Group, Homesmart to sell their properties.

Not just any marketing. REAL Marketing.

“In the past 6 months, Don listed and sold two houses for my wife and I. Both were under contract at full asking price within 48 hours. You better believe he gets five stars from us!

His passion is for marketing, and it shows. His social media footprint huge. Within days of listing each home, we had random friends and colleagues from all over reaching out, excited to tell us that they had stumbled upon our listing. On multiple occasions when discussing our move with strangers or acquaintances, we quickly discovered that they were already familiar with our listing and had visited the website.

That brings me to Don’s second specialty, presentation. The content he produced with his photographer and historian was worthy of a magazine spread. He knows what it is that makes a home look its best and has the tools to put it on display. Not only did his work sell our homes in no time, but it will be kept as a family treasure. We’ll be able to look back and remember these two lovingly restored homes where our family grew.

Throughout the process, Don was an absolute pleasure to work with. He was never pushy, but always generous with excellent professional advice. We always knew where he stood, but felt comfortable that each decision was ours to make.

Don is a professional through and through. He has our highest recommendation.”
— Brian and Andrea Pursley
 

Our Marketing is designed to engage our audience. Check out our Facebook Page and see for yourself!

Our Marketing is designed to engage our audience.

“Don did a phenomenal job selling our home. We received multiple offers before it even went on the market! His photographer did an amazing job making our home look its absolute best and his marketing skills are incredible. We had friends calling and texting us asking where we were moving because they had seen Don’s Facebook posts...again, all before the house even went on the market. We received the full asking price and the selling process went very smoothly.

Don also helped us with the purchase of a new house, and found the perfect house for us. He took us to see multiple homes, many within hours notice when we would frantically call him as soon as we saw a new cute historic house pop up on the market. The house we ended up buying was not a house I would have picked out on my own, and to be honest, when I initially saw the listing, I was only mildly interested. But Don went to preview it in person and saw how special it was, that it fit “us” and convinced me to come take a look. Wow, I am so glad he did that!! I absolutely love our new house and neighborhood. My husband and I have never been big on home decorating, house projects, etc. - in fact, it is one of the reasons we sold our other house...it just needed too much work that we weren’t willing to do. We just said “we’ll fix that later” about everything. But we love our new house so much, we are constantly doing things to fix it up, buying new furniture, decorating, planting flowers, etc., and making it our own. We even stay home more often now because we just enjoy spending time there. It is such a special house that I would have never even looked at but for Don. He really has a knack for matching people up with the right house!

Oh, did I forget to mention, Don is so much fun and a terrific person, too?! I loved going to look at houses with him and he made the process a blast! Thank you so much, Don for everything!!!”
— Christina and Brian Palmer

Here are some of our most recent listing videos.

How Can I Help?

If you think about it, listing your home for sale is a lot like starting a new business.  Before the sign even goes up, there are steps we must take to ensure that your new venture starts off with the best possible chance for success.

The following pages will help you to understand some of the processes that we'll go through together, to make sure that when your home is listed for sale on the MLS, it's ready, it's looking great and everyone knows about it!

So, scroll down and whenever you're ready, call or text me at (602) 919-8471 and we can talk! 

“Don has been nothing but the best real estate agent I have ever worked with. He took one of my very difficult, million dollar projects I did at the east edge of Coronado, and got it sold! This was in the worst down market we have had since the depression. He is brilliant, honest and lovable!”
— Georgia Bates

Staging Your Property

Not staging a home in today's housing market is like leaving money on the table. Some listings may require more work getting them “photo ready” than others, but the effort put forth can help drive prospective buyers to your listing, resulting in a successful sale – and that makes all of us happy!

Home Appeal
If you've been living in your home for awhile, chances are you've customized the furniture arrangement, the colors, even how you utilize the storage, and staging the home means that we revisit those choices with fresh eyes, so that when a potential buyer enters your home, they see the best that your home has to offer, instead of the little things that might cost you a sale. 

Staging will probably involve leaving your shades up and the drapes opened to let the light shine in (homes show so much better with light). It may mean moving a lamp into a dark corner and replacing low wattage bulbs with brighter alternatives. And that Star Trek memorabilia that you've carefully displayed between the sofa and piano? Let's just pack that up and save it for the next house!

Cleaning - and lots of it – is another big part. Clean until everything sparkles.  I visited a home not long ago that had the cleanest windows I had ever seen. EVER. I asked the owner how she managed to keep them that way and she replied "we pay a company to come and clean them once a year, and they were just here last week. I always look forward to their visit!" Now, I recommend that company to all of my new clients and everyone raves about how fantastic the windows look when they leave.

After a deep clean, general decluttering followed by fresh linens, fluffy bed pillows and clean crisp blankets is a great start to any bedroom, while new towels, floor mat and nice soaps can brighten any bath.  A dining room table void of laptops, homework or bills is a must.

Outdoor Spaces
Stagers are devoting more attention to outdoor spaces, with some of the most in-demand outdoor features including seating/dining areas, fire features, grills, and decorative water elements. Carve out three spaces when staging a patio and lawn: a dining area with tables and chairs; a cozy seating area, such as a group of chairs around a fire pit; and a spot for the dog(s) to take their break.

Mood Lighting
Lamps are a hot home accessory warming up interior spaces this season, adding artistic and mood-boosting touches. Lamps create ambiance and the feeling of space, and also can be used to add pops of color. A rustic lamp or glass ceramic lamp can add texture and warmth to a space. Plain wrought iron lamps with ivory shades for table tops or floors can offer a modern edge to a room. So can table lamps with more flair, such as metallic or glass lamps that have colorful, patterned lampshades. Lighting is always part of our checklist when staging a home because it can make a big difference to a space.

Professional Photography

All photography provided by Don Mertes, Homesmart Elite and historicphoenix.com

photographed by agent with an iPhone

photographed by agent with an iPhone

photographed by D.J. Cordero, a professional photographer

photographed by D.J. Cordero, a professional photographer

When over 90% of traffic is going to come from buyers who have seen your home online, why are there still agents using their phones to take grainy photos in a dark room?

On every property that I represent for sale, my photographers take professional photographs throughout the home and property. They use different lenses and lighting depending on the look and personality of the home that I want to feature for the marketing materials.

Photos are taken on a tripod with professional Canon cameras and we use a combination of natural light, studio strobes and speedlights, to fill the shots with the definition and ambiance that sells property.

Then, each photo is processed through Lightroom and Photoshop.  Any spots on the floor, or curtains that may not hang correctly are edited along with the exposure and color. Photos are cropped and resized for optimization and only then - added to your home's marketing package.

Some photos are actually a combination of up to 15 different images, each highlighting a specific area of the shot. Then, these images are combined in Photoshop for one stunning image.

Not only does this extra effort make your home look amazing online, but great photos are more likely to be shared on social media sites, so you might see photos of your own home in places you'd never imagine!

In a recent article, homes listed between $200,000 and $1 million, Redfin found that homes with listing photos taken with professional cameras sell for $3,400 to $11,200 more relative to their list prices.  That's HUGE!

AND... Researchers tracking the eye movements of subjects who looked at online home listings found that more than 95% of users viewed the first photo—the one that shows the exterior of the home—for a total of 20 seconds.

The dusk and twilight hours are my favorite time of day for outdoor photographs. Twilight offers a unique perspective on any home, when sunlight gradually fades into the artificial light being emitted by street lights, creating an almost magical effect that is virtually impossible to recreate. These photos have an 'un-real' feel to them as the shortage of light diminishes the eye's perception of distance, yet many buyers have remarked that it was these twilight photos that made them want to see the property.

Take a look at the other homes that are for sale online and judge for yourself. We're all drawn to beautiful photos and we tend to skim quickly past those that we don't identify with as being well done. For most of us, our homes are our largest investment.  So, don't trust the sale of yours to anyone that doesn't insist on quality from the very beginning. 

“The listing stood out and looked great. And when an offer was accepted, the entire transaction went smoothly.”
— Michael Madigan

The Pre-Listing Release

Even before agents see your new listing in Arizona Regional Multiple Listing Service, your neighbors (along with buyers who are actively looking in your neighborhood) will already know that your home is about to go on the market. 

This is done several different ways, but one of our favorites is through our Facebook Page.  Just look at the results that we've had with a series of well-placed "Coming Soon" ads.

and speaking of Facebook... 

Social Media

Facebook has over one billion users today and that number is growing every minute of every day. 

There are probably many agents that would profess their use of social media to perspective clients, but in our case, it's true!

Our Facebook Page currently has more than 15,000 likes, which is great - but, what good is Facebook if we can't ENGAGE our followers? Well, we do that too!

In any given week, we post several interesting links to the happenings of our downtown and historic areas. Articles that we think our followers would be interested in reading and sharing with their friends.

Over time, we've captured the attention of thousands of Facebook users and when we share our listings, they get noticed, shared and commented on like crazy! Just look at the screencaptures on this page.

Under most circumstances, we allow our linked articles to gain momentum organically, but when we post your home's website - or invitation to your open house, we pay Facebook to "Boost" these posts.  That ensures your property is seen by as many targeted Facebook users as possible.  These impressive numbers shouldn't mean much to you without some equally impressive results and we have those, too.  To date, our posts have resulted in numerous fast sales at wonderful prices, and our clients couldn't be happier!

So, if you're talking to other agents who tell you that social media is a big part of their marketing efforts to sell your home, ask to see their Facebook pages and compare them to ours. 

Syndication:

We syndicate all of our listings, unless directed not to by our sellers. So, what is a "syndicated listing"? About.com defines "listing syndication" as the process of getting a listing's information displayed on other sites around the Internet.

Where else will your listing appear?  These are just a few sites that feature our properties!

Some of the sites where our syndicated listings can go are: Google Base, Yahoo! Real Estate, Cyberhomes, Trulia and Zillow, to name just a few. These sites are incredibly popular with the home-buying public today, and are often the first place consumers go to find their next home. 141 million average monthly unique users visited Zillow and Trulia during the second quarter of 2015.(1)

By syndicating your listings, you will get the most widespread on-line exposure possible!

No matter how popular, stylish, easy-to-use and full of information historicphoenix.com is, we don't have 141 million visitors a month. Those millions of website visits mean that your home's listing will get exposure to those consumers. It's practically the most widespread on-line exposure possible!

ATTENTION Central Phoenix homeowners

 

If you've learned enough about me on these pages, let's meet and talk about how I can help you.
There's no obligation at all, and I'm available most any time..