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Feng Shui Influences How Bay Area Houses Are Priced

The Long Beach Real Estate Home Blog is pleased to welcome guest author, San Mateo California Realtor, Leonore Wilkas of The Wilkas Group. 

Living on the San Francisco Peninsula as I do, with our large Asian population, we find all kinds of Asian influences creeping into our daily lives. One of the biggest is Feng Shui, a Chinese mysticism of sorts, where it is believed that your life can improve by doing little things within your living environment through the placement of furniture, artwork, or even the front door of a house. It's a serious business around here with many experts helping Realtors and non-Asians prepare their houses for sale so that the house will sell quickly.

Having harmony in life promotes wealth, prosperity, good health, and chi - the movement of the air around you. The Chinese are superstitious people. If they believe the Feng Shui is bad at a property, they will not look at it, or seriously consider buying it unless they think the bad Feng Shui can be over come.

Numbers play a big influence in Feng Shui

Certain numbers can prevent someone from even considering a property unless they can have a Feng Shui master come and correct the chi of the house. In our area, the number 8, believed to mean wealth, is often seen within the listing price of a home. Asians believe that numbers can create harmony within the house. If the price of the home reflects certain numbers such as 1, 6, or 8, it is considered to be positive so it's very common to price homes with the number 8 somewhere in the price, for example you might see a house listed at $618,988, $888,888 or $1,886,688. The worst numbers to use are 2 and 5 and if I, as an agent, want to attract a buyer who follows Feng Shui, I will avoid them, if I can.

But, that's only part of the issue with numbers. What do you do if the house number is considered bad Feng Shui? What if the numbers are really bad like 4, 13, 24, or 104? You can't exactly change them, can you? No, not if you're trying to sell the house, so you must use little Feng Shui tricks to provide protection to the property.

Have you ever noticed houses with two large lion-type animals sitting at the front entrance to a house in your neighborhood or city? These are called Foo dogs and they're placed there to protect the house from bad chi.

If you're unlucky enough to have house numbers that are considered bad chi you place a circle around your house numbers and protect the chi.

When you see wind chimes anywhere near the entrance of a house, it is considered good luck. Is there a birdbath or water feature somewhere in the front or back yard? They may be trying to improve the chi, or energy, of the house.

The power of Feng Shui is believed in by a whole lot of people on this planet. Many other cultures have similar beliefs. The Japanese and Indians also look at numerology in their daily lives. Japanese like odd numbers like 3, 5 and 7. The Indians believe in a Destiny number that is the total number for your birthday. If you were born on March 1^st, 1968, the numbers would be written out like this: 03.01.68 = 18, 1+8 = 9, and 9 would be your Destiny number. Numerology has been around for thousands of years and is believed by millions of people.

What are the lucky numbers for Feng Shui?

8, 18, 28, 38, 48, 54, 68, 80, 84, 88, 99, 168, and 108.

The number 8 is considered lucky because of how the word sounds in Cantonese. It sounds a little like the word faat (more like you saying phat) and it means prosperity and abundance. Something we all wish for, right?

What are the unlucky numbers?

4 - is considered the worst number because when it's spoken in Cantonese it sounds like the word for death.

13 - if you add 1+3 it equals 4.

24 and 104 are also considered unlucky.

7 is considered unlucky, too!

Next month, on August 8^th, or 08.08.08, the Chinese people will be trying to either get married on that date or hope to deliver their babies on that date, because of these auspicious numbers. This might be the reason that the Olympics will start on this date.

I have had clients bring in a Feng Shui master to make simple corrections to houses with bad numbers. I have also seen people request a number change from the city and post office. Sometimes this is the easiest thing to do.

Does the number 8 help sell a house faster? Who knows? I try to put at least one 8 in every listing price I have. I do notice that we see a lot of Asian's coming through our open houses, so maybe it is helpful. Realtors are superstitious, too, so anything that we can do to help our clients sell their homes we're probably going to try. As long as it's legal, that is!

Contributed by: San Mateo Realtor, Lenore Wilkas; author of the San Mateo Real Estate News Blog

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