Sometimes we need to say goodbye

Posted on by Jack Boardman

BY Jack Boardman – Guest Author

Farewell old friend

I knew the day would come; I didn't know when. He'd been my constant traveling-companion for nearly fourteen years. Oh, the places we went and the sights we saw…

Countless trips to the North Shore of Lake Superior; Duluth, Two Harbors, Castle Danger, Knife River, Little Marais, Grand Marais and the back-roads and back-waters thereabout.

Park Rapids, Brainerd, Mora, Rochester, Winona; scouring the highways and back-roads of Dodge and Wabasha Counties looking for cemeteries and ancestral homesteads.

To the Ozarks of central Missouri; running the mountain-ridges like a moonshiner and exploring Route 66.

To LaCrosse, Wisconsin, and on to Historic Galena, Illinois, Saint Louis, Missouri, Chicago…

But we mostly explored our beloved Saint Paul—Seventh Street from the remaining bits and pieces at Fort Snelling on the bluff and the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers to the opposite end on the East Side.

Summit Avenue from its current eastern terminus past the majestic Cathedral of Saint Paul and curving past the former Weyerhauser and Forpaugh mansions; stopping at Ramsey Street and the continuing on until stopped finally at East River Road and the Mississippi.

We explored broad University Avenue its entire length from the northern suburbs past the University of Minnesota, Midway industrial areas, the small businesses and shops and past Regions Hospital to to its end at Lafayette Road…ahh the roads we have traveled.

But alas, all relationships must end, and I've found another traveling-companion; she's younger and better-appointed than you are, old friend. I've known her for a few years and we have occasionally gone out together—nothing serious—until now.

Now, my friend, Lumpy, we have come to that fork-in-the-road where my path and yours are not the same. Farewell, old friend; it's been a great ride.

Lumpy
 

Forget about the leaves

Posted on by Teresa Boardman

Fall_leaf

I saw this lying on the side walk. :(  It seems like fall is the shortest season and it is also the most beautiful.  If you are looking to take a short road trip this weekend it might be a good time to go to one of our  local orchards and get some of those wonderful Minnesota grown honey crisp apples. I went out to Aamodt's last weekend. They have more than apples there, and I may have eaten a bag of kettle corn on the way home.   They also have honey crisp apples at the downtown Farmers market.  I write this because I love the apples and because I like to buy locally grown food when ever possible. It helps the local economy and from what I have read the food is better for you than the stuff that is hauled in from far away places.

Apples

It is also nice to buy fruit that doesn't have a bar code label stuck to each piece. I wish they didn't do that. 

The leaves are just starting to turn in this part of the state.  To find out where the best fall colors are see the Explore Minnesota web site.  They are predicting beautiful colors this year because of the warmer weather and the rain.  I will predict that I will be out taking photos. 🙂

 

My car has ESP

Posted on by Teresa Boardman

Volkswagen-jetta-fahrenheit-gli-2007-3 It is Friday and Fridays are for fun.  I am kind of challenged when it comes to cars.  I really don't get them at all.  My other half . . and I have not decided if he is my better half . . dragged me kicking and screaming to the car dealership. Maybe that is a slight exaggeration. I didn't show it on the outside but on the inside I was kicking and screaming.

Apparently cars don't last forever and one of our cars has more than 170K miles on it and is over 15 years old.  Personally I don't see why we can't just slap collectors plates on it and continue to drive it but the mister had other ideas. 

There is a rule some place that Realtors have to have nice cars preferably something large, very expensive and if it gets more than 12 miles to the gallon, and doesn't have four wheel drive it isn't the right car.  So I went ahead and bought a Volkwagen that doesn't meet any of the criteria, except it is nice.

The car is very confusing and while I was driving it home I attempted to adjust the side view mirror and ended up opening the trunk as I was driving on the freeway. No I am not making this up.  It could have been worse but I have not found the button or lever for the hood yet.

On most cars warning lights are red.  I couldn't understand why the number of miles on the car, the time and the temperature all showed up in red right in the center of the dashboard so I got off the freeway and closed the trunk.  It seemed logical to me at the time but when I got back into the car the red lights were still on. 

It took me a couple of days but I figured out the mirror thing and found the round dial on the dashboard that controls the head lights and at the same time makes the yellow DRL light go off. The ESP button is next to the radio so I don't think it is very important and when I have the chance I will Google ESP and find out what the letters stand for. 

It might not sound like it but I love my new car.  I just need to stop myself from over thinking it and get over my preconceived notions about warning lights and just ignore the red glow. 

For sale or rent

Posted on by Teresa Boardman

For-rent-sign Recently some changes were made to our local MLS and as for this week properties that are for rent can be added.  There are already 8 listed in St. Paul.  There will be more but I am not sure what percentage of property that is for rent will show up. The owner of the property would have to be working with a Realtor as a leasing agent.  Very soon, like next week the properties that can be leased will show up on the public MLS so that anyone can search it for rentals. 

Right now our MLS is the best source for homes that are for sale because most of them are on the MLS.  I am not sure that the same will ever be true for rentals but I could be wrong and will be checking each week to see how many show up.  If enough rentals are added I should be able to pull up some numbers on average rents but only if there is enough data, we shall see.

As a Realtor I can act as a leasing agent for a property owner. Right now I am not in that business and I don't think I will go into it.  People call me all the time looking for rentals and some call looking for renters.  In  some states it is common to work with a Realtor when leasing an apartment.  Here in Minnesota it is almost unheard of but times have changed and so has the housing market.

Tall Buildings

Posted on by Greg Sax

Skyline-from-sculpture-sm 

by G. Sax, @gsax

The photo is from behind the Walker Art Center, looking upon the heart of downtown Minneapolis. I hadn't seen this particular angle of Minneapolis until yesterday. The oddball windows of the Walker make it interesting to me. The familiar flash of blue of the IDS Tower makes it Minneapolis.

The IDS once dominated the Minneapolis skyline. It, along with onetime tallest boy in Minnesota, the Foshay Tower, were a source of intrigue for me as a little boy. I could often see them from hilltops in my Saint Paul neighborhood, and I often wondered what was in that distant Oz.

As a teen and young adult, I was attracted to the bright lights, big city of Minneapolis. The Foshay and IDS remained most relevant in my mind due to their unique shapes…and prominent positioning on the logo of favorite club, First Avenue.

The IDS Tower is now crowded with two buildings of about the same height, Wells Fargo Center and the Capella Tower. They were ostensibly leveled off at their current heights out of respect for the IDS. I prefer a jagged skyline myself and hope to see a new downtown building cast shadows on all of them one day.

Tall buildings still capture my imagination. Some of my earliest memories are from backseat views down John Ireland Boulevard of two domes on either side, the Saint Paul Capitol and Saint Paul Cathedral. 

The "1st" of the First National Bank Building will always be my 1st skyscraper, and I was at an impressionable age when Galtier Plaza and then-named World Trade Center (now Wells Fargo Place) went up in downtown Saint Paul.

Today, all the good stuff seems to go elsewhere and not to Saint Paul. Our last "wins" are now ten years past—structures like the Lawson Software headquarters and home of the Minnesota Wild NHL hockey club, the Xcel Energy Center. I once heard Saint Paul Mayor Chris Coleman discussing some project for my fair city that would "change the postcard." I liked that phrase. He hasn't delivered on that statement in the two years since I heard him utter it.

To be fair, the economy has hindered the development of tall buildings in Saint Paul for several years. To be unfair, I don't care. Tall buildings are magical and memorable, and I would like to see more of them go up in Saint Paul.

Saint Paul's status as a twin could use some more girth.

Legal contracts matter

Posted on by Teresa Boardman

Crayons When you buy a home chances are you do so with a Minnesota purchase agreement.  These contracts and real estate in general are very heavily regulated by the Minnesota department of commerce.  Each year our state legislature makes new laws . . I guess that is what they are supposed to do.  The contracts get bigger and they change a little every August when the new laws go into effect.  Every September the Minnesota Association of Realtors has a class for Realtors on the contracts and the changes.

It seems that there is a right way and a wrong way to fill out legal contracts including Minnesota purchase agreements. I like to fill them out correctly but when I do it creates a hell of a mess.  There are sections of our contracts that require dollar amounts where most agents put in a word.  There are some standard ways agents were taught by someone at some time to fill out a contract and they just keep doing it that way even though it is wrong.They like to have initials put on pages that don't have signature blocks but not on all the pages and they like to have their clients sign in signature blocks that are not applicable. It happens all the time.

In most cases when an agent fills out these forms incorrectly it really doesn't hurt anyone.  It is hard to explain but it is true.  There are a couple of blanks in the forms that most agents fill out incorrectly but it is rare that they result in any harm to any party in the agreement but the potential for harm is always there.

Brokers are responsible for all contracts that their agents write but most of the brokers fill out the contracts the same way the agents do.  I am convinced that in some of the real estate companies no one is checking the contracts, they couldn't be and I get to be the bad guy and kick them back to the agent.  I take the Minnesota contracts class every year because I take contracts seriously especially contracts to purchase something that is as expensive as a house.  Yet I always come away from the class frustrated because if I fill out the contracts correctly there is going to be trouble over it.

In general the contracts are fill in the blanks and in my humble opinion they are not a place for creativity or creative writing.  Buyers, sellers and even lenders have some kind of strange ideas about how contracts should be filled out but at least with the buyers and sellers I can walk them through it and explain every line.  The lenders are another matter and it doesn't matter what the rules are for the rest of us they seem to have their own.

I know I am just venting but it would be nice if there was a Minnesota law that required all agents and brokers to take the yearly Minnesota forms class and pass a test.  We are required to take continuing education each year but a contracts class is not required.  We have a ton of laws how much would one more hurt?