The David Marshall Team

09/15/2026

09/15/2026

A buyer walks away. Maine sellers assume the deposit is theirs.

It rarely works that way, and the reason comes down to a single date written into the contract long before anyone backed out.

Full breakdown coming, including the Maine dollar threshold that decides how expensive a fight over a deposit gets.

Watch for the full video posting on my page.
As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/13/2026

The belief that a low appraisal means your house is overpriced is the single most expensive misunderstanding in a Maine transaction.

What an appraisal actually is: one licensed opinion of value, ordered by the lender, written to protect the bank's collateral position. When it comes in under contract price, the lender is declining to fund the top slice of the loan. The buyer still owes the contract price under the purchase and sale agreement.

That means the first move is documentary, not emotional. Read the contract, and check first whether it contains an appraisal clause at all, because the standard Maine purchase and sale form does not. Without one the protection sits inside the financing paragraph, and that runs to the closing date rather than to a short notice window.

Here is the part that surprises people. Whether the buyer gets the earnest money back turns on whether they could have closed anyway. A buyer with the cash to cover the gap, walking away from a seller who will not reduce, is in default and forfeits the deposit. A buyer without that cash is denied by the lender, and the financing contingency returns it. Most transactions never reach either outcome, because the two sides split the difference.

From there a seller has real options: a reconsideration of value through the buyer's lender, which only works when it supplies facts the appraiser did not have. A negotiated split. A change in loan program. Or a return to market, keeping in mind an FHA appraisal attaches to the property for a set period while a conventional one does not.

Maine adds its own wrinkles. Greek Revival, Queen Anne and triple decker housing sits beside far newer construction on the same street, so three genuinely comparable sales can be hard to find, and condition items like knob-and-tube wiring or an aging oil tank surface in the narrative too.

Prevention beats repair: price off real comps, document improvements with permits and invoices, and hand the appraiser a package on arrival.

Would you split the difference or hold your price? As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/12/2026

The appraisal comes in under contract price and the first instinct is always the same: drop the price.

That is the move to make last, not first. There are three that come before it, and one of them starts with a document you already signed.

Watch for the full video posting on my page.
As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/11/2026

Most Portland sellers believe a nearby public project is a pricing argument. It is not.

Portland is built out from a peninsula, with a dense downtown core, older residential streets around it and newer development pushing toward the edges. When municipal work happens in a place laid out like that, it is visible, and the instinct to link it to value is understandable. It is just imprecise.

Here is the honest mechanic. An appraiser considers a project only to the extent it already appears in closed comparable sales. Appraisers work from documented sales and supportable adjustments, and a lender does not lend against a forecast. If the effect is real, it is already in the comps. If it is not in the comps, it is not yet a pricing input.

Cash buyers behave the same way. They calculate from after repair value, subtract repair cost, subtract holding and transaction cost, subtract their intended margin, and the remainder is the offer. A project still in design or under construction does not touch that arithmetic.

What holds up is description instead of prediction. The street was repaved. A sidewalk runs continuously to a nearby park. It is a short walk to Congress Street. A buyer can stand there and confirm every one of those, and confirmation is what builds trust in a negotiation. Then point to the city's own capital planning documents, council agendas and project pages, because scopes change, phases get deferred and funding gets reallocated.

Then put the effort where it actually moves the number: condition, presentation, pricing against closed sales, and clean paperwork on well, septic, oil tank, lead paint and title items that Portland's older housing stock routinely surfaces.

Do you think public improvements increase home values?

As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/11/2026

Sellers in Portland love to mention the nearby project: the repaved street, the riverfront work, the new sidewalks.

There is one version of that sentence that sounds completely harmless and still creates a problem when the appraisal comes back. And it is the fastest way to lose a buyer's trust.

I break down exactly where the line is.

Watch for the full video posting on my page.

As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/11/2026

Most people hear about a proposed apartment building near their street and assume it is a done deal. It is not.

What is actually on file at 41 Ashmont Street:

A 0.45-acre paved parking lot, 19,619 square feet, in the B-1 Neighborhood Business zone. Two apartment buildings proposed. Building one, four stories, 30 units. Building two, five stories, 33 units. That is 63 units, with 10 parking spaces listed on the agenda where 45 leased spaces sit today.

Those 45 spaces are not public parking. Many are leased to tenants of a building the applicant also owns on Forest Avenue. Whether their removal changes on-street conditions is exactly what site plan review exists to examine.

Where it stands:

A pre-application meeting in December 2025. An engineering cover letter in June 2026. A Planning Board workshop on August 11, 2026. A workshop is a working session, not a vote. Nothing has been approved, and unit counts, heights and parking figures have all been known to change between a workshop and a final plan. A possible subdivision of the lot is also flagged in the filing.

What it means for nearby owners:

The record establishes dimensions, zoning citations and drainage details. It establishes nothing about future home values, and any agent who tells you otherwise is going beyond the documents. Maine disclosure obligations attach to the condition of the property being sold, not a neighbor's pending permit. Still, buyers research municipal filings before they write offers, so knowing the file first turns a surprise into a straight answer.

If you own near Ashmont Street, what would you want answered before the next agenda? As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/10/2026

A 0.45-acre parking lot on Ashmont Street. An application for 63 apartments across two buildings.

Most neighbors on those streets have the status of this one wrong, and the difference changes how you should read it.

I am going through what is actually in the public record, and the one thing the file does not contain.

Watch for the full video posting on my page.

As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/10/2026

Buyers choose new houses because they want new construction. What they actually want is predictability, and an older Maine home can deliver it.

WHAT IS ACTUALLY BEING COMPARED
Not charm and not square footage. Most buyers weigh three things: when will I write the next big check, what does this location cost me every week, and how many obstacles stand between here and closing.

LOCATION IS USUALLY THE OLDER HOME'S ADVANTAGE
Older homes tend to sit in walkable neighborhoods. Newer subdivisions on the fringe trade that access for commute time, and that cost shows up every week rather than once at closing.

THE REPAIR COLUMN IS FIXABLE
This is where sellers of older homes lose ground, and it costs nothing but organization. A property disclosure carrying the roof date, heating system service records, the electrical panel upgrade, sewer line or septic records and radon results turns unknowns into knowns.

FINANCING IS PART OF THE COMPARISON
Older homes can be harder to finance through FHA and VA. Homes built before 1978 with flaking or peeling paint are a common obstacle, and so are missing handrails and balusters on stairs, or missing smoke and carbon monoxide detectors.

TITLE CAN RUN LONG
An old right of way or an undischarged lien takes time to clear, and both are findable before you list rather than after an offer.

Contact me. My info is in the bio.
Have you thought about building a folder with important information about your home so you're ready when you want to make your next move?
As always, ask anything and follow for facts.

09/09/2026

One built last year. One built a century ago.

Most people think the choice comes down to charm or new construction. It does not.

Most buyers weigh three things when they compare them, and one of those three has nothing to do with the house itself.

Contact me. My info is in the bio.
Watch for the full video posting on my page.
As always, ask anything and follow for facts.