January 2021 | Jeff Howard's Las Vegas Area Real Estate blog

Ready to Refinish Your Cabinets? You Have Options!

You have been staring at your kitchen cabinets for a year now and realized you do not like them and haven’t for years.. It is time to do something about them. 2021 is a year about promise and change, so, why don’t you start the process in your own home? There are many ways to give your cabinets a new look and there is an option for every budget. Most of the time you won’t even need to replace your cabinets or counters, unless you just really want to. Your approach just depends on just how much time and money you are willing to put into the project.

You will have the most flexibility if you’re working with wooden cabinets, even if they have been painted previously. Laminated cabinets (also sometimes called MDF) are a bit of a different beast, and are very difficult to change once they’ve been installed. Here are a few things you should consider, depending on your cabinets:

Swapping Hardware. Sometimes, the hardware is the thing that is making your cabinets feel old and dated. It might sound like a small thing, but heavy cabinet hardware from the 1970s has a whole different feel than more streamlined contemporary hardware. If you’re on a small budget, or you can’t have your kitchen torn apart for an extended period, simply investing in new hardware would give you a whole new look
.Repainting. This is generally only a trick to try on cabinets that are made of wood, but if you use specially designed paints and primers, you can often make paint stick to laminated or metal cabinets. Choose a paint that’s self-leveling and dries hard, like a latex-based enamel cabinet paint, along with a bonding primer, for the very best results.

You’ll need to take the doors down, sand the existing finish just enough to rough it up, and allow for plenty of dry time, but because these paints are tintable, you can let your imagination run wild. It goes on just like other high-grade paint, so mix and match colors, paint two-tone designs on your existing cabinetry, or freehand it with fancy designs for a look you really love.

3.Restaining. This will only work with wood cabinets, but you can really change the look of a room simply by restaining your existing cabinets. It’s possible to strip old paint off of painted cabinets, but be warned: it will be a lot of work and mess, so do it outside as much as you can.

Once you have all the old stain or paint sanded off, apply your new stain per package directions. Today’s stains come in a lot more than traditional “wood” colors; many can create simulated whitewash or aged wood, or add a thin tint of color that will still allow the wood grain to show through.

If redoing your cabinet doors seems like it may be more mess than you’re prepared to deal with, or you want to change the actual design of your cabinet doors, another viable option would be to order just new cabinet doors. You may still need to paint or stain the cabinet bases to match, but a whole new design is a lot easier to achieve with new doors, and replacing those doors is a lot simpler than replacing all your cabinets.

You can also swap the old hinges for “soft-close” … something I did at my home. It doesn’t change the look, but it’s a nice change in terms of everyday use!

If you decide to have a professional company do the work, call me and I’d be happy to give you a couple of referrals to interview.

Do you have a need for commercial / industrial / retail buildings or land? Are you ready to buy or sell a home? We can help you with that, safely… just call us at 702 SELL NOW or click on this link to my website http://www.702SellNow.com

Choose to have an amazing day…. Jeff

How Much Does It Really Cost to Buy A Home?

First, let me start by saying you do not need a 20% down payment to buy your first home! Many of you reading this might be saying “I know that”, but I meet many people who don’t own a home because they still believe that to be true. There are loan programs for as little as zero down payment. Not everyone will qualify for those, but with no special qualifying and mediocre credit, you can usually get by with a down payment of only 3.5% of the price of the home.

Of course, shopping for a home can leave you feeling like you have been on a roller-coaster ride. Even though you’ll eventually find the right one, you may also find yourself cutting it close on cash if you didn’t properly prepare financially. So, it’s time for your pre-purchase checklist of places you may be spending money.

What It Costs to Close

Home sellers find closing is a fairly simple process, and most of the time they walk away with a check in hand. However, for buyers, closing can involve a myriad of expenses. I find that it’s much easier to deal with if you’re totally ready for everything that’s going to go into that transaction. And there’s a lot more to paying for your new home than just coming up with the down payment. If you’re like most borrowers, to cover additional expenses on the big day, you can expect to add an additional three to six percent on top of the down payment.

These costs include, but aren’t limited to:

Loan-related fees. The lender you are using should have already disclosed the fees they collect in order to actually create your home loan. If you haven’t talked to a lender yet, you may be surprised at some of the fees that are charged to take your loan from a little dream to a big investment in your future. An application fee is sometimes required to begin the process, as it covers the costs of things like your credit report and the initial loan processing. Other fees include, loan origination fees, discount points, mortgage broker fees and appraisal fees. All of this can really add up!
Real estate-related expenses. There are other fees related to your loan that may or may not have been covered. These include home inspections, as well as any repairs you’ve chosen to pay for at closing (in a sellers’ market, the seller is not always willing to pay for repairs).
Prepaid expenses. Because items like your taxes and homeowner’s insurance are generally paid out of an escrow (or impound) account, you’ll have to put some money into it at the get-go to kick things off. The actual initial deposits will depend on where you live, but count on at least two months, if not a full year, of each being collected to establish that account. If you have mortgage insurance, the same would also apply. You’ll also typically pay the 1^st 2 months of any homeowner’s association dues. And you’ll prepay interest from closing day until the day your first payment is due. There is some good news here though, you will not have your first mortgage payment due for more than a month after you close… so if you closed on May 15^th, the 1^st payment is due on July 1^st, not June 1^st, which does help a little.
Title-related fees. Although it would be wonderful to live in a world where you could trust that a seller was absolutely, without question, capable of guaranteeing you could buy and own their home without complications, that world doesn’t really exist. But that’s what title searches and title insurance do. Title and escrow fees are paid to ensure that you will be able to buy a house without anyone else having a legal claim to it later. Imagine if someone claiming to be the owners brother showed up after 5 years and wanted to try to prove that the house was rightfully his! That would complicate your ownership considerably. Fortunately, before a bank will loan you money, they want to know that a home has a clear title. Title searches track all the people who have owned the property before, and title insurance protects against any problems that might have accumulated on the title over time.

Today is a great day to get connected with an experienced mortgage lender who can explain the fees involved in closing a loan for your specific situation. If you need a lender just ask me, I have worked with some amazing lenders over the years and have developed deep relationships.

Choose to have an amazing day…. Jeff

Live Theatre (not streamed) – Love Letters by A. R. Gurney

The Las Vegas Little Theatre is reopening making theatre goers very happy. The first performance of this season is Love Letters by A.R. Gurney. Love Letters was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The first performance was in 1988 at the New York Public Library.

The play centers on two characters, Melissa Gardner and Andrew Makepeace Ladd II who exchange letters, but not marriage vows, in a warm and complicated friendship lasting 50 years. Because they choose others as mates, and live to regret it.

Love Letters has a wistful tone: beneath the sparkle there is sadness and remorse. “This is a play about missed opportunity,” said John Tillinger, who staged it. “They keep missing each other but they’re bound to each other. He doesn’t really realize how much she means to him until she dies.” “She was at the heart of my life,” he laments to her mother.

This play is a unique and imaginative theatre piece which, in the words of the author, “needs no theatre, no lengthy rehearsal, no special set, no memorization of lines, and no commitment from its two actors beyond the night of performance.” The piece is comprised of letters exchanged over a lifetime between two people who grew up together, went their separate ways, but continued to share confidences. As the actors read the letters aloud, what is created is an evocative, touching, frequently funny but always telling pair of character studies in which what is implied is as revealing and meaningful as what is actually written down.

This show will feature a different pair of actors performing each weekend of the run!

Limited seating live performances :

Fridays, Jan 15, 22, 29 @ 8pm

Saturdays, Jan 16, 23, 30 @ 8pm and
Sundays, Jan 17, 24, 31 @ 2pm

Starring (First Weekend) – April Sauline & Michael Kaczurak

Starring (Second Weekend) – Monica Johns & Glenn Heath

Starting (Third Weekend) – Teresa Fullerton & Blake Boles

Directed by Walter Niejadlik

Tickets are $30.

The Las Vegas Little Theatre is following strict safety guidelines including reduced capacity, 6-foot distance with seating and mandatory masks. The theatre is located at 3920 Schiff Drive. For more information, please click here for LVLT’s reopening plan.

Choose to have an amazing day…. Jeff

Using Paint to Change the Game

The way your home is decorated says a lot about you and your family. Choosing the right mix of colors can set the mood and having the right color on the wall can make it spectacular. Putting a contrasting color in the right spot can also dramatically change the features of a room.

Paint is a wonderful way to change the look of your home and the best part of it is easy to change if you do not like it. Plus it is not expensive to change a color. Many paint manufacturers make what I would call “a sampler size container” for you to purchase so you can get 3 different shades of a color and see which works best. Or you can get 3 or 4 different colors if you don’t have a color in mind. It’s important to see the color in the sunlight and in the lighting of your room.

The following are just a few ideas to enhance the details of the house you already have:

Pay close attention your front door. It is one of the best spots for setting the mood for your whole home. It says something that your windows never could, so paint it like it’s the most important part of your home. Matching the house trim is very passe’. Today’s front doors feature bold or fun colors that complement the rest of your outdoor color scheme. Some houses can also see a bump in interest when homeowners try the same trick on their garage doors.
Choose bold trim colors. Your trim color doesn’t always have to be white, though it shouldn’t be the same color as the wall. Instead, you can make a huge statement by highlighting some of the more decorative elements of your home with paint colors that have something to say for themselves. Pair light gray walls with black trim, or choose several different colors to accent ornate trim work in older homes. When picking your paint colors keep your furniture and their colors in mind – you might want to choose a trim color that ties in with your furniture.
Rethink built-in cabinets and shelving. Plenty of homes have built-in shelving or cabinets, but most homeowners opt to paint these the same color as the trim in their homes, effectively hiding a potentially eye-popping element. Instead of blending your built-ins into the background, choose colors to highlight them. Selecting a bold or bright color for the back wall of an open shelving unit can really make a statement. This can also work for the risers on wooden staircases, that really looks great and makes the stairs pop in a designer kind of way.
Why not white? A lot of people shy away from white walls because they feel like the color lends an institutional feel to a room, but white doesn’t have to be hospital-grade. There are a range of “barely there” colors within the white spectrum, and you can enhance them with color pops in the room itself. It’s your house; if you want a white, don’t let anyone tell you you’re wrong. Choosing a trim color that complements your white is also vital to success with all-white walls.
Color on the ceiling? Sure! There’s been a long tradition of ceilings being painted a flat white, but that wasn’t always the case. In the past, ceilings have been havens of color in rooms of various sizes and shapes. Depending on the effect you’re looking to create, you can use lighter or darker colors to visually raise or lower the ceiling, or accent decorative ceilings with color for added dimension. If you can paint a picture you can paint some clouds on the ceiling.
Try textured paint. Wall texture comes and goes as a trend, but it’s a great way to deal with older homes that may have irregular or downright rough walls. Today’s texture paint goes well beyond Venetian plasters, giving you a huge range of options in texture and more ways to get an end result you’ll absolutely adore. Use a heavy texture as an accent, or go a little lighter for interest throughout your living space.

Choose to have an amazing day…. Jeff

Fireplaces Add Some Snap, Crackle, and Pop!!!

As the song goes “when the weather outside is frightful, a fire can be so delightful”. A major portion of homeowners tend to agree with the sentiment, so surely they can’t all be wrong. Adding a fireplace to your home can seem like a big undertaking, but there are several options for homeowners looking to add a little snap, crackle, and pop to their living spaces.

Fireplaces: Beyond the Chimney – A very long time ago, there was only one way to have a fire indoors: you had to have a brick chimney or metal stove to contain the flames and keep everybody safe. However today there are lots of options for adding fireplaces to your home without having to also add a new chimney or repair an old one that’s no longer in use. This is wonderful news, especially if you really want a fireplace for ambiance, rather than to be used as a primary heating or cooking source.

While wood burning masonry fireplaces have a sort of rustic, nostalgic appeal, today’s modern ventless options are much easier to install require a lot less maintenance, and are environmentally friendly. They are often extremely fuel efficient should you choose to use them to help fight back winter’s chill.

Chimney-Free Fireplace Options – If you have an existing chimney that’s in great shape, you have lots of options for units that can be installed into that space. For many homeowners it’s not that simple since either their home never had an open chimney, or the one they do have is in poor shape. This is where chimney-free fireplace options come in to play. They can be placed pretty much anywhere you want to put them since there’s no flue required.

When you go shopping, consider options like:

Ventless gas fireplaces have been in use for awhile now. Unlike some gas units, the ventless gas units don’t require any kind of vent, so they can be installed on an inside wall, between rooms, or in other tricky spots. Although they don’t need a vent, it is recommended that you put them in larger rooms. You can often use a ventless gas fireplace when the power is out, making them a great emergency backup in a house that’s otherwise heated with electricity.

Electric fireplaces – If you really like the look of a fireplace, but don’t want to deal with cleaning or maintaining anything, an electric fireplace is a great option. Most units have beautiful LED-based simulated fire and blowers that can put out a lot of heat. When in heating mode, they work a lot like large space heaters. But like an electric space heater, they need almost no care to keep running year after year. Many units can also have the LED turned on independently of the heating element for cool-to-the-touch flames all year round. The other great thing about this option is that it is easy to move them around if you decide to rearrange your furniture! I have one of these myself!

Ethanol. Looking for real fire without having to hook up gas lines? Ethanol may be the solution for you. Instead of piping in gas or tying into the electrical, an ethanol fireplace will produce a real flame with bottled alcohol-based fuel that you simply pour into the burner and light. They come in a huge range of sizes and designs, suitable for many indoor applications. You’ll get some heat from these, but not anything substantial. They’re similar to gel fireplaces, which have been losing popularity to ethanol fireplaces for years, but unlike gel fireplaces they use a liquid fuel instead of a gel-based one.

Water Vapor. If you only want the look of fire, but no actual fire to deal with, a water vapor fireplace can give you one of the most realistic experiences without limitations. These fireplaces can be incredibly large and long, limited largely by your imagination. They don’t produce any heat, since water vapor is used to reflect special lights that create the illusion of a flame. All you need is electricity and tap water to set the mood.

Choose to have an amazing day…. Jeff