Last winter, on a typical arctic-chill day in Minneapolis, Nate Karnitz hopped on his early-’90s steel-frame Schwinn World bicycle, stripped down and rebuilt to suit his year-round commuting needs, and cut through snow and ice to meet his Realtor®, Harry Greenberg, who was also on two wheels. No, this was not an extreme sports outing. They were going to shop for homes.
Karnitz was participating in the small-but-growing bike-and-buy trend. Instead of driving to open houses, folks like Karnitz are huffing and puffing alongside real estate agents like Greenberg, who are equally fanatic about getting around town on two wheels and making bicycle-friendly showings a part of their business.
Biking, if you haven’t heard, is big time. Twenty-eight U.S. cities now have bike-share programs, and, according to the League of American Bicyclists, the number of people across the country who commute by bike increased 105% from 2000 to 2013. Thus, bike-and-buy is happening in markets ranging from Washington, DC, to Portland, OR.
Pedals to Properties, a real estate firm that lets buyers view homes from the seat of a cruiser bike, opened in Boulder in 2006, after founder Matt Kolb spent a frustrating day driving a California client across the city and back to check out listings. None inspired an offer. Yet later that day, the client rented a bicycle and scoped out Boulder himself, stumbling upon a for-sale sign in a front yard and making an offer on his own. After Kolb lost the client, he promptly went out and bought a fleet of 10 cruisers to use for future showings. Pedals to Properties was born (though the firm won’t say how many properties it has sold this way).
In bike-mad markets such as Boulder, CO, and Minneapolis, showing homes this way is just plain good business. “There’s a humongous cycling community” in Boulder, says Tim Shea, a broker who bought Pedals to Properties from Kolb in 2013. “It’s really all ridable.” With 300 days of sunshine and the University of Colorado, bicycling has always been strong in Boulder.
And while Minneapolis, of course, has far fewer days of sunshine, “it’s an unbelievable bike town,” says Greenberg. In 2015, Minnesota is ranked No. 2 among bike-friendly states by the League of American Bicyclists. That same year, Bicycling Magazine dubbed Minneapolis the most bicycle-friendly city in America. Just under 5% of its residents—some 20,000 people—commute on two wheels.
The idea came to Greenberg in part because when he was shopping for his own Twin Cities pad in 2008, he’d often bike to the showing, beating the agent who was stuck in traffic. But it crystalized when he started showing homes near the University of Minnesota, where the major drawback for potential residents was automobile parking. Avid bicyclists, though, were still buying in that part of town, and they were an untapped, underappreciated market.
For the biking buyer, having an agent along for the ride makes a huge difference in getting to know the area as well as the home.
“As you’re cruising along looking at houses on the back roads, you can start to get the Realtor’s deep insight into the neighborhoods,” says Karnitz, a 34-year-old financial consultant for Pharmaceutical Strategies Group. Karnitz sold his car in 2007 and has been commuting by bike ever since.
Indeed, as they pedaled through different Minneapolis neighborhoods, Greenberg dished on the best places to hang out. “If you want to see a neighborhood, you can’t really see it from car windows,” says Greenberg, who either meets clients at the showing or pedals with them from his office. He’ll often suggest having coffee at a local café after seeing a home, to further reinforce the idea that a neighborhood is an extension of the listing.
Camaraderie, too, builds more easily when pedaling alongside someone. “It’s a way of bonding with clients,” says Greenberg.
Buyers “let their hair down a little bit and relax. They tend to be lifelong clients,” says Shea. Here’s another boon: “It’s just fun.”
For agents, biking alongside clients gives them a chance to better understand their clients’ needs and proclivities. For someone who bikes to get to work, see friends, and run errands, a bicycle-friendly neighborhood is as high on the wish list as a sizable yard and gourmet kitchen.
Greenberg’s sweet spots, for example, are in South Minneapolis and Northeast Minneapolis, because they are dense, urban pockets with bike-friendly lanes and paths. Greenberg’s insight to a bicyclist’s needs is part of what drew the Karnitzes to him.
“He’s not going to be pushing houses out in the suburbs where we don’t want to be,” says Karnitz. In his case, it meant looking for houses in the neighborhood where his own business, Lawless Distilling, operates.
Many biking buyers tend to be on the younger side, millennials and Gen Xers, rejecters of the car-centric culture, prone to healthier lifestyles, and craving a community-oriented neighborhood that’s close to bars, restaurants, and shopping.
Many of the places Greenberg shows are starter homes such as a two-bedroom for between $175,ooo and $200,000. “I’m not showing million-dollar listings,” Greenberg says.
Boulder, of course, is a different market, so some of Pedals to Properties’ recent listings include a $1.25 million energy-efficient modern home and a $450,000 split-level ranch.
Please, Mr. Postman
Send me news, tips, and promos from realtor.com® and Move.
The Karnitzes ended up buying the property they saw that day: a two-bedroom, two-bathroom split-level ranch built in the 1970s. The couple cycled with Greenberg to the closing, and after signing papers the trio pedaled to lunch. They’ll move into their new home next month. As soon as the essentials are unpacked, Karnitz can’t wait to turn half of the attached two-car garage into his bicycle-repair shop.
Don’t worry if you’re not in one of the biking capitals of America. You, too, can get in on the bike-and-buy craze. The easiest way, of course, is to show up at open houses on two wheels, and to communicate to your agent that you’re looking for bikability—a home within biking distance, near bike paths or parks, in a neighborhood that’s not totally car-dependent.
But what if you want your agent to join you? There isn’t a directory—yet—of bike-and-buy agents, so you’ll have to rely on word of mouth and some old-fashioned Googling to find an agent. Try local bicycling organizations to see if they know of someone who offers this service. And, perhaps most important if you want the trend to keep blossoming, tell your agent that’s what you want!
In the meantime, Greenberg will continue to serve the youthful home-seeking population of Minneapolis. They tend to be the ones who get his two-wheeled mission. “People who are younger are generally more open,” says Greenberg. “Young people don’t judge me and say, ‘You’re a moron. Get a car.’”
The post Buying by Bicycle: Agents Show Houses on 2 Wheels appeared first on Real Estate News and Advice - realtor.com.