Tips Around the house

Useful Tips Around The House

1. To avoid wet sleeves and arms while washing windows. Take a large sponge and make a split through the middle, slip it over your wrist. When the sponge becomes soaked simply wring the water out and put it back on your wrist.

2. Men who travel on business will really enjoy this little tidbit. Keep your ties from wrinkling by laying the tie on one page of a magazine; bring the second end of the tie back down a few pages later. Then fold a few more pages over and bring the tie back up. Your ties will never again be wrinkled!

3. Remove scratches and spots on lacquered furniture. Break a walnut or pecan in half, remove the edible part and use the broken side to rub on the spot to zap marks.

4. Load your dishwasher cutlery basket with ease, fill it and place it in the sink un-rinsed. Spray the entire basket with water to rinse (do this instead of rinsing a few pieces at a time). Return to the dishwasher and wash as usual.
5. Cut a pie into five equal portions. Begin by cutting a "Y" in the pie, next cut the two large pieces in half. You will have five perfect slices. Bon appetite!

6. When your ironing board ends up with a tear don't despair. Simply purchase an adhesive pant patch and iron it over the hole.

7. Did you know that baby oil is a great product for removing grease from hands without resorting to abrasives? Rub a little on your hands before and after each job.

8. Wrap your veggies in a slightly dampened terry facecloth before placing them into the crisper. These are far more absorbent then paper towels, they are also less expensive because they can be used repeatedly and better for the environment. Or put newspaper on the bottom of the crisper with a few layers of paper towel on top to absorb moisture.

9. For those people who love to collect driftwood as garden ornaments, you may want to give it a bleached, clean look. Fill the tub with warm water and household bleach, place the wood into the tub and leave overnight. The more often you repeat this process, the whiter the wood becomes. Put the wood in the sun and leave for two weeks to dry. If you want colored pieces, place the dried pieces back into the bathtub with food coloring and warm water.

10. Speaking of food coloring, are you tired of drinking white milk? Why not add some oomph to your day by dropping in a bit of red, blue or green food coloring. After all variety is the spice of life.

11. Make your own inexpensive ice cream treats this summer. Choose any ice cream flavor and sandwich it between two graham crackers. Wrap the sandwiches in parchment paper or store in a freezable plastic container. You'll save a bundle!

12. Keep recipe books looking new. Tuck a folded clear plastic bag inside of each recipe book cover. When the time comes, open the book and lay it inside of the plastic bag so that you can see the recipe. 13. Yikes, lice in the hair! Rub your scalp with lots of mayonnaise. Leave for 4-6 hours (there's an attractive image). Wash out with Dawn dish soap or baby shampoo.

14. For grease stains on fabric, apply talcum powder to both sides of the spot. Rub and let stand overnight, wash as usual.

15. To replace full vacuum bags, spray the open hole of the bag with water. Place the vacuum bag inside a grocery bag. The water sprayed will reduce the flying dust mess.

REALTORS like to say it's all about location, location, location when it comes to selling a home. But the findings of a new study suggest they might want to consider changing that to it's all about descriptive words, words, words.

Paul Anglin, a professor of real-estate trends and economics at Guelph University, published an academic paper showing that some words are more helpful than others when it comes to selling a house. What works and what doesn't might surprise you.

Anglin studied more than 20,000 real-estate listings, all the homes posted on the Windsor and Essex County Real Estate Board's MLS system between 1997 and 2000. He looked at three things: sale price, time until sale and the descriptions found in the listings.

Crunching the data, Anglin found that properties with the descriptors "beautiful," "handyman's special" and "landscaping" sold faster and for a higher price than those using a term like "motivated."

We aren't talking about small differences, either. According to Anglin's research, using a word like beautiful or gorgeous in the listing cut the time the house remained on the market by 15 per cent or more. They also boosted the sale price by five per cent. A house described as a handyman's special sold 50 per cent quicker than the average.

Perversely, if the listing mentioned that the vendor was "moving" or "motivated," the property tended to take up to 30 per cent longer than average to sell and fetched one per cent and eight per cent less, respectively. Using a come-on like "must see" had no discernible effect on buyers, according to Anglin.

The results surprised even the professor. It turns out that home buyers are suckers for words that play up a home's curb appeal and generally pay less attention to those that emphasize price or potential.

Are people really that gullible?

"It seems they are," Anglin said in a recent phone interview from Guelph. "But there's a danger. If you say a home is beautiful -- whatever that means -- it had better be beautiful. Otherwise, the buyer will immediately have a negative reaction and wonder what else you've misrepresented."

In some instances, listings language can actually damn with faint praise. Rather than piquing buyers' interest, the promise that a house is "freshly painted" might actually make them wonder if that's the only thing the place has going for it. What aren't they saying?

I'm guessing that this opening line, which, I kid you not, was recently posted in an online MLS listing, is not what the good professor has in mind: "This cottage on 3 levels don't look that good in exterior but his interieur (sic) can be fabulous with a little work."

According to Anglin's theory, that property would draw attention if the unenticing description was matched with an enticingly low sale price. It wasn't.

Real-estate agent Barry Schreiber listened with interest as I described the broad outlines of Anglin's research. What he heard made sense to him. A former advertising man and English professor, Schreiber has been an agent with his Montreal-area office for three years. He puts a lot of time into crafting his listings and prides himself for writing ads that jump out at the reader.

"It's definitely a skill," said Schreiber, who once wrote and ran an ad in a local paper comparing one of his Westmount listings with Windsor Castle -- both might be viewed as old, in need of costly repairs and not close to downtown. He got lots of calls. "I'm not sure the client appreciates the effort that goes into a good listing," Schreiber said. "But if you do it right, your listing stands out among all the others."

Winnipeg Realtor Jeff Stern of Maximum Realty said many words are overused in listings and "really don't carry very much."

"Gleaming hardwood floors" and "close to schools and bus" really don't help Winnipeg advertisements.

"Where the magic comes in is when you look at the property in the best light," Stern said. Part of that, he said, is understanding who is the most-likely buyer for the property. Stern agreed that "vendor motivated" is a term that Realtors should use only between themselves, as in the public's eye, creates a perception that something is being concealed.

Creating a compelling listing "is not just slapping in words to get the space filled."

Stern said on the Multiple Listing Service, which is also used to create the printed Winnipeg Real Estate News advertisements, Realtors have two areas to include comments about the home: One area is strictly between agents; the other is for public consumption. Stern said some Realtors simply copy the same information in both areas -- a mistake.

Anglin's observation that pretty words sell seems to have an exception, namely, the use of the term "handyman's special." To some, that might prompt images of a dated kitchen, or doors and windows begging to be replaced. Not to others.

"It's Marketing 101," explained Anglin. "You're trying to attract that one buyer in a hundred who is looking for a fixer-upper. The corollary is that the house has to be priced accordingly."

That is the real bottom line of his research. Anglin set out to understand what influences the sale. Unsurprisingly, it boiled down to two things: getting the description right and getting the price right. Finding the sweet spot -- correct price and correct description -- results in a quicker sale at a better price.

--CanWest News Service

NOTE: The comments contained on this web site are for information purposes only and do not constitute legal advice.