[Music]
Hello everyone and Welcome to another
episode of Selling Greenville the
podcast I Stan McCune realtor here in
Greenville South Carolina have created
here in 2020 as I have spent more time
at home as we have just not been out
as much I have cut out as much traveling
and as much really just getting out
of my house as much as possible due to
co there's not really a whole lot to
do as it is outside of walking around a
park which I don't mind doing every now
and then but regardless this has
given me the opportunity to do this
podcast and we have a lot of episodes
already well over 20 episodes if if you
just started listening I would encourage
you to go back and listen to some of our
older ones our audio quality suffered
a few times during the early days but
I have upgraded our microphone and
hopefully it sounds better and I would
appreciate if you guys could rate or
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or if you just want to chat with me all
of my contact information as always is
in the show notes and I'm always happy
to to talk to you guys I usually get
some kind of text message or email or
something about my show after I release
it and I really like that I enjoy
going back and forth with you guys so
yeah let me know if you have any
questions or concerns or you just need a
realtor today we are are going to be
talking about the 8020 principle and how
that applies to your home now if
you've never heard of the 820 principle
there's like a a gazillion different
ways to explain I'm not going to get
into all of that but the kind of like a
nerdy definition is that 20% of your
inputs result in 80% of your outputs
a a business example might be that 80%
of your Revenue comes from 20% of your
clients that's a general rule and some
businesses it might be more of like a
1090 principal or a 30 70 but but
8020 in general we find that often times
20% of something has 80% of the results
just generally speaking and so that
has really helped me in my life to
really cut the fat on a lot of things
that I don't need because you when you
you learn that
20% of what's going on or 20% of the
things in your life cause for instance
80% of your happiness well then you can
can start to weed out the other 80% that
that's in your life that's not
causing happiness that that you don't
need well when it comes to being a
homeowner or an investor whatever the
case may be there is an 8020 there
there are several 8020 principles that I
think apply that can help you to think
more clearly as you're buying houses as
you're selling houses as you're trying
to invest in real estate as you're
trying to think as a landlord for your
tenants whatever the case may be
there are a lot of ways that we can use
the 8020 approach to kind of make our
thinking a lot more clear about
approaching real estate and and what
real estate what impact real estate has
what impact different things in the home
have and and how we can best use our
time and our resources and how we can
best approach it when we're when we're
looking at at homes and making major
decisions for where we're going to live
where we're going to invest how we're
going to update our home so I want to
start with this and again this is all my
obviously my opinion this whole podcast
is my opinion all of my podcasts are are
my opinion so you you can for sure
disagree with me but this is just what
I've seen in my professional experience
80% we'll start with this I've got five
of these 80% of your home value is
determined by 20% of your home features
so 80% of your home value is determined
by 20% of your features when people walk
into your home and in their mind they're
assessing the value of the
home they're looking at 20% of your home
there's an a whole 80% of your home that
is really important to you or that may
be important to you that when the
average person walks in they're not even
paying
attention here's the way I look at it I
I think about home features and home
updates in three different buckets there
are
negatives there are neutrals and there
are positives this is really
groundbreaking right never heard of
these categories before right but I
want to put a different spin on what I
mean by this and how this impacts the
way you approach your home and what you
do to it this is really important right
when people walk into your home they're
going to see negatives neutrals and
positives they might walk in and be like
oh man I love the layout of this
house you know that would be a
positive right they love the layout I
love the layout you know the master
bedroom is kind of small but I can
live with that I can live with the fact
that it's small I can live with the fact
that it doesn't have a walk-in closet
cuz it's got you know two other you
know normal
closets that will be adequate that's
a neutral right we can live with
this but oh man I just hate that yard
that yard it's sloped it's small it's
not fenced in it's high maintenance
that's a negative all right so these are
that's just an example of the three
different buckets now when you are
updating your house obviously we update
our houses for a lot of different
reasons they it may not have any
direct relation to our home value
sometimes we just update our homes in
order to improve something that's
important to us that might not be
important to other to other people
but if you're up updating your home from
the standpoint and and focused on home
values then there are certain things
that need to be considered when it
comes to these three buckets all right
and 80% of your home value is determined
by only 20% of your features so you need
to focus on the 20% what are the 20% the
20% are the negatives that need to be
turned into neutrals or positives and
the neutrals that need to be turned to
positives okay what that means is if
your home is already great in one area
in one thing you don't need to keep
doubling down and focusing on that one
thing the best thing that you can do is
to take a negative and flip that into a
positive and this is what when I walk
through homes and give people
suggestions for what they can do in
order to improve home value that's what
I'm looking for what's the negative I
walk into the kitchen and I see that
it's a pretty nice kitchen but the floor
is really dated has a lot of wear and
tear people are going to walk into that
kitchen they're going to be like oh man
what this floor is is really really
dated really worn and in their mind
they're going to start adding up all of
these dollar figures that may not even
be accurate and that's the worst part of
it right the worst part of it is when
people are left to their own
imaginations and their imaginations are
not properly calibrated for the reality
of the situation you can flip that
negative into a positive by replacing
that floor fixing that floor whatever
the case may be you can make that floor
that currently when people walk into it
they're going to hate it or they're not
going to be happy about it upgrade it
into something really nice so that when
people walk into it it's it's like oh
man I love this kitchen floor you've
you've now flipped it from something
that is a distraction and a detraction
from your house to a feature that is
what you want to do as much as possible
you've got a really ugly paint color
throughout the house and a lot of
imperfections to the walls you know
whatever the case may be you can
paint that house fix those things get
all of that taken care of and make it
look
like a new house in a lot of ways and
that can flip that item from a negative
into a
positive a lot of people they they they
will get down in the weeds of like you
know well I know that we've got you know
I my garage is unfinished you know it's
it we never painted the garage and you
know we've got you know old faucets in
the bathrooms and whatnot and and it
again it every Situation's
different but you need to be thinking
from the standpoint of of what are the
20% items here what are the 20% of the
items that people are going to be
focused on if you have a really
luxurious
bathroom and in that bathroom the
faucets are
awful you need to replace the faucets
right but if you got a bathroom that's
not already a feature of the house and
it's got old faucets aets most people
aren't going to be looking at the
faucets they're going to be looking at
the bathroom as a whole and so in that
case the faucets wouldn't be a part of
the 20% that's adding to your home value
and so that is the way you need to be
thinking thinking through what are when
people walk into this house what are the
negatives they're going to immediately
see and how can I flip those at least
into a neutral but even better flip them
into a positive and then what are the
neutral items that I can maybe easily
flip into a positive for instance an
example would be like your yard maybe
your yard it doesn't look bad but it
doesn't look great maybe you can just
add some mulch add some plants in
there and do a few basic things and now
your yard now is something that when
people come to your house they're like
wow that what a great yard I really
am just amazed by the curb appeal I love
it I love the way it looks it really
makes the house stand out in the
neighborhood I would love to you know
just be able to to go out here and for U
my kids and my pets to enjoy it this is
awesome maybe it wasn't a problem
before maybe the yard wasn't a problem
but you turned it into something really
positive now you have to be careful when
you're turning a neutral to a positive
you don't want to spend as much money
because it's something that wasn't
already broken it's just something
that you're improving so you don't want
to go overboard you know for another
example would be like kitchen
countertops if you have a really nice
kitchen but the countertops are just
kind of like kind of low-end
nothing very fancy nothing very nothing
great about them then you can
probably flip that neutral quote unquote
neutral
countertop into a positive by replacing
it by putting something that would be a
showpiece type of granite or type of
quartz or whatever the case may be when
people walk in there they're like wow
look at that piece of granite like you
can tell that you know this is a unique
feature a unique piece in the house I
love it and and it flips the
conversation whereas before people come
in the kitchen they're like okay well
the kitchen's nice but I wish that you
know these wouldn't be the countertops I
would choose but that it's okay it's
just countertops after all now they're
coming in there saying wow look at this
kitchen look at these countertops this
is awesome that's flipping it from a
neutral to a positive and those 20%
items do account for 80% of your home
value now in a similar vein 20% of your
homes features account for 80% of your
enjoyment so this is more of you're
updating the house for your own
enjoyment not necessarily just for
the home value but 20% of the features
account for 80% of your
enjoyment so for instance like a deck
U my old house we didn't have a place
for a deck in our backyard it was a tri
Lev house and we had a front entrance
and we had a back entrance the back
entrance was down in what you might
consider the basement part of the house
even though at from a basement
standpoint only one elevation was
under the dirt the rest of the house was
not underneath you know the ground at
all but that was where our our back
door came off and that's where our deck
would have been well there wasn't any
way to put a deck there because it went
right out into our back driveway so then
that meant that we didn't have a space
to really put a grill so then that
meant we didn't really ever Grill at all
and there wasn't a place to do any
outdoor dining if we were going to grill
we had to grill we had to to bring
everything back inside go through our
quote unquote basement up the stairs
there was our kitchen there's our dining
room and practically it just meant that
we never spent time out there we never
grilled we never did any of that now at
the house that we're at currently we
have a deck we use it a good bit we
we grill really frequently and that
is a a major item that that is just one
feature but it impacts a lot of
different things another one is your
kitchen appliances you don't want to
skimp on your kitchen appliances don't
get the cheapest appliances get good
ones particularly if you're cooking a
lot if you're spending a lot of time
in your kitchen you want good appliances
in there some people are stickers for
gas appliances if you're a stickler for
a gas Appliance don't sell yourself
short you want to enjoy your kitchen
appliances they very much impact your
appreciation of the house way more than
cosmetic things and this is something I
wanted to make sure I mentioned is that
we tend to go into a house and we look
at all these cosmetic oh I love you know
the the interior doors are are updated
doors and I and I love all the stainless
steel and the crown molding and whatnot
I love the the flooring and the foyer
well you know guess what you don't spend
a lot of time in the foyer you're you're
not living the crown molding of your
house you need there needs to be some
logic in terms of what in your mind you
prioritize and obviously I'm not
downplaying Cosmetics Cosmetics do
boost your pride in home ownership they
do boost your your enjoyment of the
house in in kind of a way that can't
necessarily be measured but there are a
lot of other things that can be measured
that directly impact your enjoyment of a
house and and sometimes it's the homes
that don't have all of those fancy
cosmetic features that are some of the
that have that sorry that bring some of
the most enjoyment to people because
they have all these other features
another good example would be multiple
HVAC units we're we're now seeing in
South Carolina we've seen this for a
while a lot of what we call one and a
half story houses these are houses that
they're basically a ranch but then
they have a bonus room so they don't
have a full Second Story to them but
they do have an upstairs bonus room and
often times that bonus room doesn't have
an AC unit to it well that can directly
impact your use of that room and and I
talked about smart home Gadgets in a
recent episode there are some things
that we can do now to
offset the lack of a second AC unit but
let me tell you it can be difficult and
in the tri level home I used to live in
we had each level would be a different
temperature and it it just it wasn't
pleasant we had one AC unit trying to
cool three different small spaces you
know it wasn't a big house it was like
an 18 1900 squ foot house but one AC
unit cooling off three different
levels is a lot different than one AC
unit cooling off a ranch and it and it
presented some challenges our bedrooms
were always high hot at night because
our bedrooms were on the second floor
and the heat rises up there and so
that's a small thing that and it's
something that's easy to overlook but
that really impact us I mean not having
a cool room at night meant that impacted
my sleep schedule well that's a that's a
major thing your sleep schedule that
impacts everything if if you're not able
to sleep a small one that I mentioned
I want to give another shout out I
mentioned this in the smart home gadgets
episode but doorbell camera I was
just talking to someone the other day
who went from a house that didn't have
one to a house that does and he was
saying just how much of a difference it
makes it really does I can't say
enough good things about doorbell
cameras you you really have to use it to
fully understand it but just to be able
to see what's going on in front of
your house or in the back of your house
to be able to respond to people people
when they ring the doorbell whether
you're there or not or in a different
part of the house or whatever the case
may be it it's it's really nice it's
really Pleasant it disproportionately
it's one of those
20% of the features that increases your
enjoyment of the house by
80% that is one of those items those
are the things as you're updating your
house be be focused on those things
because that is what will improve your
quality of life all right another one
80% of your yard work is in 20% of your
yard
and this is something that a lot of us
realize instinctively but you know for
instance your grass may not need to be
mowed as much as you're having to mow it
because 20% of your lawn is made up of
weeds that are growing super duper fast
so maybe you just need to hire a company
to come in and and help control your
weed situation that might
decrease your yard work by maybe not 80%
but it might decrease your yard work
tremendously maybe there's a tree that
is clogging up your gutters and that is
causing all kinds of yard work raking
and whatnot in the fall and acorns going
everywhere maybe that tree just needs
to come down maybe the 20% that you can
improve that will dramatically impact
your your yard work and make it so much
less is just removing a tree or two
there are some basic things think about
your yard think about yards of of homes
that you're going to and and consider
how high maintenance or how low
maintenance they are those are important
things that it's easy to overlook and at
the end of the day 20% of your yard work
is is sorry 80% of your yard work is
in 20% of your yard most of the time the
majority of the yard is not that labor
intensive but there are some Hedges or
some things here or there that just take
up tons and tons of time and if you can
can find a way to minimize that work
that's what you need to be focused on
with updating your house similarly
80% of your headache in your house comes
from 20% of your house so most houses
unless it's it's a house that's just
falling apart there's only a handful of
things that cause a majority of the
headache I already talked about in that
one house trying to my tri level house
trying to keep the house at a
comfortable temperature oh man that was
definitely one of of the 80% of my
headache that came from 20% of the house
I mean I was constantly worried about
that we had all kinds of things we
had to do in our crawl space which is
really frustrating it's why you know
slab homes have a lot of appeal because
when you have to do a bunch of work in
your crawl space you never get to enjoy
your crawl space and for a lot of people
80% of their headache is down there is
down there in their crawl space that's a
space that they will never that you
never want to go in the crawl space
right nobody wants to go in their crawl
space but it's a very if you have a
crawl space in your home that's a very
important area you have to make sure
that you don't have termites that you
don't have moisture that you don't have
things rotting down there and and
something that a lot of people don't
even consider in this when it comes to
80% of your headache coming from 20% of
your house well logically if you get a
bigger house that 20% Then is bigger 20%
of 2,000 square ft is a lot more than
20% of 1,000 square ft and this is why
you see one of the reasons why you see a
lot of people these days downsizing is
because they realize you know what I
don't need all of this house I don't
need all of this headache I can
eliminate half the headache by just
getting half the house and so for some
people downsizing can really increase
their head space because they're getting
rid of so many
headaches I'll mention as well that a
lot of the biggest headaches that we
have in houses are not from things that
we can see but from things that we can't
see electrical issues Plumbing issues I
just had at at my house I use that
I'm experimenting with as an
Airbnb as a short-term
rental I just had a plumbing thing over
there that was it was a real headache I
mean it was like trying to get in there
in between guests and I I wasn't
exactly sure what the issue was and once
I figured it out I didn't have enough
time in order to fix it it was a big
headache but a very small thing you
don't think about your plumbing and how
important that is but your plumbing
issues your electrical issues those are
things that you don't want you you want
to make sure that that you're going to
have as few headaches from those things
as possible and this is why when I go to
people that are selling their home if I
find that there are two-prong outlets in
their house I'll tell them listen update
those to three-prong because a person
that sees two-prong Outlets their mind
immediately goes to this is going to be
a headache house this house already has
electrical issues it's not up to code
I'm going to be constantly worried about
and constantly focused on fixing things
in this house that's where people's
minds go and and you need to realize
that as well it's why an inspection is
really important when you're buying a
home I think multiple inspections are
really important and there there are
several different types of inspections
that we can get down here in South
Carolina those help to reveal obviously
it's not perfect but they help to reveal
some of those items that you wouldn't
necessarily see but that will
potentially end up being part of that
80% that you're 80% of your
headaches it's often times the things
that when you look around you don't
immediately notice and so you want to
just eliminate those things so you know
what if you're having a bunch of
electrical issues just have pay the
money for an electrician to come out and
or at least have an electrician come out
look at it and give you a quote often
times these things cost less than you
would think in order to get fixed and
what price tag can you put on having
fewer headaches on on having more time
spent not trying to fix your house you
you can't necessarily put a a price tag
on something like that those things are
important and we need to make sure that
we're eliminating as many of those
headaches as possible and thankfully
it's only a small percentage of your
house that contributes to most of those
headaches so focus on those things focus
on those things where you can get rid of
that 20% as much as possible and now
your headaches in the house have gone
down
dramatically last but not least 80%
of your time is spent in 20% of your
house we all know this instinctively
I kind of made a reference to this
earlier when I talked about you know
having a really nice foyer we we don't
spend a whole lot of time in our foyer
typically but a lot of people will
invest a lot of money in decorating and
making their foyer look really nice
because they want when people walk in
you know to be wowed by their foyer well
for you as the homeowner obviously
that's nice when people walk in and
they're Wild by your foyer but you as
the homeowner are not going to benefit
from that a whole a whole lot some of
the most sellable parts of your house as
well are not necessarily the places
where you spend a whole lot of time so
really we tend to think of the most
sellable parts of the home as the
kitchen and the bathrooms right those
are the spaces that are unique and that
really stand out when people walk into a
home but some people don't spend a
whole lot of time in their kitchen and
hopefully hopefully you're not spending
a whole lot of time in your bathroom
and so you need to think at when you're
looking at homes or when you're updating
your home for your own personal
enjoyment for your own personal benefit
what are the spaces in here where I'm
going to be spending the most amount of
time that is the space that you need to
be updating it might be a bonus room it
might be a it might be the kitchen
for a lot of people the kitchen is
where they spend a lot of times it might
be a
workshop it could be your office it
could be your entertaining spaces often
times the spaces that we tend to
prioritize are not the ones that are as
important your master bedroom for
instance are you going to be spending a
ton of time in your master bedroom a lot
of people don't I don't spend a lot of
time in my in my
bedroom that's to me my master
bedroom it takes up a whole lot more
space in my house than it really needs
to and there are a lot of spaces that
are like that that people in their minds
because you know we've been programmed
to focus on like I said to focus on the
bathrooms and to focus on on the master
suites and and all these other things
that you can neglect that is like you
know what in my house I'm actually going
to be spending a whole lot more time in
my office than I will be in the master
bedroom so let's make sure that the
office you know that it's heated and
cooled well let's make sure that it's in
a good spot that it's in a quiet spot
away from the kids that it has you know
maybe a nice nice Viewpoint out to
wherever you want to to be looking
whatever the case may be that is the
20% of your house that you're going to
spend 80% of your time in that's where
you need to be thinking when you're
updating your house or when you're
looking at new homes those are the
spaces you need to be more worried about
than okay you know is this guest
bathroom a show a
showroom it's nice if the guest bathroom
is a showroom but you are never going to
hardly ever use the guest bathroom so
why does it matter for you
personally spend that money focus on
yourself first and then prioritize your
guests and some of these other things
that are going to be lesser used
deprioritize those things to come
secondary to to the spaces that you are
spending 80% of your time in you'll find
that it's really a small number of rooms
that you spend the vast majority of your
time in and those are the rooms that
ultimately you need to prioritize so
that's the 8020 rule applied to real
estate applied to home selling home
updating home buying if you have any
others that come to your mind that
you've thought about please feel free to
let me know I'd love to hear your
ideas all my contact information is in
the show notes and I hope you guys stay
safe until next time
[Music]