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Suit Up With Baez
Level up your real estate, mortgage, and business game with the 'Suit Up with Baez Podcast!' Tune in for bold strategies and expert insights to fuel your success!
Suit Up With Baez
Episode 32 : Yankees Joy, Red Sox Blues
A Yankees high is great, but a stable mortgage payment is even better. We ride the rivalry buzz straight into real-world wins: how New York’s new ADU pathway can turn basements and attics into compliant, income-producing spaces, and why timing your purchase before spring fever hits may be the smartest move you make this year.
We share firsthand experiences helping Latino buyers who’ve felt shut out by language barriers, confusion, and fear of asking the wrong question. Clear guidance changes everything: what actually qualifies as an ADU, which safety features matter most, and the exact professionals you need—architects, licensed contractors, and inspectors—to avoid stop-work orders, fines, and insurance headaches. When the paperwork is right, ADUs can lift your pre-approval, strengthen cash flow, and even help family members live close by without crowding your budget.
Rates are trending down, and that’s the double-edged sword everyone feels. Slightly lower rates can unlock affordability and bring millions of buyers back into the market, which means more competition and tighter inventory. Winter, though, offers a rare window: fewer shoppers, more negotiating room, and a chance to secure the right home before the spring surge. We round it out with practical cold-weather tips—protect water lines, check your roof, consider mini splits and electric water heaters—and a candid look at house hacking to reduce your monthly cost.
If you want straight answers on legal ADUs, smarter financing, and the best time to buy, you’ll find them here—plus a little Bronx swagger for good measure. Subscribe, share with a friend who’s house hunting, and leave a review to tell us your biggest question about building or buying right now.
Welcome back to Suit Up with Bias podcast. I don't know which episode this is, but yeah, we're back.
SPEAKER_01:I'm excited. Yeah. As you can see. Exactly. It was a nice week for the Red Sox. Beautiful week for the Red Sox. I'm excited.
SPEAKER_00:Yes, the Red Sox made some uh some headlines, and so did the Yankees. Gam Schleider. I I don't know how to pronounce this last name. Made a historic 12 strikeout performance a game.
SPEAKER_01:He's 23, right? 23, yeah. Amazing. That kid has a huge future. Yankees give him everything he wants. I feel like we won the World Series. And I hate Red Sox. I'm so happy the Yankees beat him. They won the first game by luck. Second and third. Yankee gave it to them. All I hear is Red Sox fans making excuses or disappearing. I don't hear anything from them. So all your Red Sox enjoy us seeing us in the playoffs. Um, we just won a big, big one. So enjoy watching us. And also the Mets fans. Juan Soto fans, enjoy watching us. Juan Soto, I know you're regretting it, man. Should have never made that move, man. I should have stayed with the Yankees. Look at the resource, man. I know it starts to be number two, but sometimes you gotta know your place.
SPEAKER_00:Are the Mets in the playoffs?
SPEAKER_01:No. But I'll tell you something. They're watching us play though. Oh my god. It's all the Red Sox and Mets fans.
SPEAKER_00:I heard that the Mets hopped the second high salary. Yeah. Payroll.
SPEAKER_01:Nah, they're definitely the owner of the Mets is extremely rich. Like, yeah. He made some crazy investment. I mean, to make uh such a big investment he did this past um summer. And I feel bad for his fans as well. All those Mets fans, you're welcome to come to Yankees and the Red Sox fans too.
SPEAKER_00:Oh my goodness.
SPEAKER_01:You're welcome here.
SPEAKER_00:I heard that the Mets price ticket prices went up like crazy on what they got once there.
SPEAKER_01:Oh yeah, yeah. That's one of the biggest contracts ever. You know, so I I'm just so happy. Boston lost. Man, I'm so happy. You know, his Alice Coral talks a lot about the Yankees, so I hope he's watching this too. Oh my goodness. Man, they had to give it to them, man.
SPEAKER_00:You know, I'm not I don't follow baseball that much, right? I I did see these two last scenes with Red Sox and stuff. I know there were I didn't know that there were arrivals.
SPEAKER_01:Oh what? The biggest. This felt I honestly felt like I was saying, hey, look, I honestly had to drop everything in nature. We watched the game at six. I had my kids and me jumping every time the Yankees made a run and you know, but man, it felt good to see see Boston Los. Honestly, man, I'm so happy, man.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. I thought it would be the Mets who were the Bible.
SPEAKER_01:People don't consider the Mets as much. Yeah. Yeah, because you know, they just they lucky than you. It's the reason they they matter. But besides that, they're not that that big on far.
SPEAKER_00:I think you told me that when the Yankees face hop what the Mets is called the Subway series.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, Subway series. Well, I mean call it Subway series, but it's not in big, not that Juan Sword or one of the people, you know, want to put some fire on the game, but in reality it's not too serious. If one is Red Sox and Yankees, it's it's real, man. That right is real, but for many years, two best teams um in M will be so uh for years. It's not they they've just been continuing their legacy. They've been two big teams, so they always numb across each other. Um, so but you know, Yankees Yableton this year.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. Another thing making headlines, you weren't in New Guess recently.
SPEAKER_01:I was lucky, guess what happened? So I was actually showing this probably when our relics, and the news 12 were passing by and you know, they we did that video of me, you know, with uh News 12, but it was good. I mean, we came out of the news, you know, just letting people know out there that we're here to assist them, right? Yeah. Uh, especially our Latinos, we have helped a lot of Latinos, you know, on the buying and selling process. So we're here to assist you guys in buying or selling. Any questions you might have, we're like an open buck, right? Uh we give you the best referrals, we give you, we, we help you and guide you through the best we can. Um, every transaction for us is personal. It's it's like us purchasing a son. So it's very personal every transaction that we do. So I was happy that New Soul was able to allow me to be on their channel. Um, it meant a lot to me. Um, you know, we're in Worcester County and we helped a lot of Latinos in Worcester County. Yeah. Population of Latina has increased tremendously in buying homes. Um, so it's big.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, no, it is. Um there's so many Latinos here and mockers, it's insane. I don't know if it's the second largest populated city in New York State, but it sets population here.
SPEAKER_01:Um I just want to let all my Latinos know. Hablamos español, we're here. We can assist you. I know a lot of um Spanish speaking have a lot of uh questions. It's not a lot of Spanish-speaking um agents, we're here for you. We can answer any questions you may have. Um, and you know, more importantly is you having communication with your realtor that speaks your language. So all my Latinos, we're here to assist you.
SPEAKER_00:Absolutely. What did you talk about in that news um article?
SPEAKER_01:Uh so we were just talking about how much, you know, how in how much um Latinos increased in purchasing home here in Worcester County Um and how I feel about it. And uh, I'm super excited, you know, as a Latino as well. Um born and raised here in New York. Um, you know, as marriage. I'm Latino and I love to see my people win. And see them building well for their family. It means a lot to me.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, especially since um not for nothing. A lot of the a lot of Hispanics that we work with, they don't even know that they qualify for homes. And so like you tell her, hey, uh, I know you're paying a lot of rent, but um, sometimes like it can be almost the equivalent of buying co-oper condo and stuff.
SPEAKER_01:I I will share, like, you know, my mother, single mother, as I would say, um rest four boys, right? She raised us four, and most of the Latinos, right, um, they don't like asking questions because of the fear, because they don't speak English, right? So for me, it's more like on a personal level. Like seeing my mother, she didn't speak English, she's always had that fear to speak to people or ask questions, right? Because she didn't speak English, right? So when I come across my Latinos, I don't speak English, it more raises me a lot to assist them because you know I remember seeing my mother like that. And because if her fear is not speaking English, uh, you know, she lost opportunities. Um, and a lot of Latinos lose opportunities because they don't want if they don't speak English, you know, they don't feel they don't they feel a little embarrassed to even try to speak it. So my Latinos, just you know, we're here. Yeah. We answer the questions, you know, and I always say if you you want to learn or more learn something, ask questions. Yeah. Have to ask questions. So, you know, so our Latinos, man, just ask questions. We hear them, because this UN, you'll be surprised how much programs is out there for for you to purchase a property. So, you know, like they say, the American dream is is actually good.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And going back to um what you said about like them being embarrassed to ask questions and stuff, a lot of the time we do see like a lot of the Hispanic um older generation using their kids to kind of send all the documents and stats.
SPEAKER_01:My mother used to do the same thing. So, you know, uh our mother, well, my mother, she used to do the same thing. So it's funny you're teaching them because we do see a lot of Latinos um when they come and purchase with us, um, they get in shock that we speak Spanish and we can help them out, but they do not know that we have the experience. But we did the same for our mother. I'm not sure for you, but I did the same for my mother. Um, she is speaking herself.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. Yeah, so no, but absolutely it's important to kind of reach out and see what are your options in that regard, because a lot of people struggle with like the rank and stuff. Like it sometimes it's just like you don't know when you're being in a rent uh a rent hike that's not stabilized, right? And it could be devastating. And I think that's what uh the news article sometimes was kind of referring to. Like, how do you how do you combat that, right? And usually you can combat that if you uh essentially just buy your own place. It might be a little bit more expensive, but down the line, it pays you dividends because you're gonna be more stabilized in your monthly payments. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01:I'm definitely more of you.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, no, absolutely. And another thing that's been circulating in the news is that Mayor Eric Adams did uh ADU expansion. So there's gonna be a new portal opened. Homeowners can now apply to build legal ADUs across New York through the ADU for you program. Offer design it offers design templates, vetted contractors, and zoning guidance. This is a slight improvement from earlier forecasts we just put um so um basically, yeah.
SPEAKER_01:You can legalize your basement and attics now.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly.
SPEAKER_01:Exactly you can rent them out. So that's gonna help a lot, right? Because most of these homes, right, they, you know, as I'm pretty sure they're gonna have codes you gotta follow, right? Um so it's pretty good because it's gonna open a lot more opportunity for homeowners to make more income out of the property. Of course, following everything the right way by codes, right? Because a lot of people do it illegally. I highly recommend you never to do it illegally because I have witnessed a lot just today, we got a call of one of our clients that we sold them a house. Yeah. One thing we tell all our clients, guys, when you sell a when we sell you guys a house, most of you guys want to do renovations. And it's great, right? It feels dead to do what you want. But when you're doing renovations to an extent that you need basically an architecture, plumber, and an electrician, don't do it without permits, guys. We got a call today from one of our clients. We told an advisor, hey, if you do that, it's gonna be at your own risk, but these are your risks. We tried to give you as much information as actually one hour like teamless clients. We explained to her, and she still went and did the work. Guess what happened? Happens all the time. The neighbor called uh Department of Building, Department of Building came, let us stop work order. Now she's calling everyone. You know, this job, honestly, when you get stop work order, you're looking at additional lease, an average, right? From 15 to 25,000 addition. Or whatever you did, and you better hope and pray that you did everything correctly. Because if you did it incorrectly, you gotta uh come and demolish it and then do it according to the plans. So it will cost you a lot more and headaches more than anything.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. That's been happening with a lot of the recent properties that we've had. They've had additions to properties that I sometimes we go and um try to put it on the market, and then somehow they uh somehow they have an addition that was never um got never went through permits and stuff, and then the city kind of gets snowed a bit and then it delays the whole sale process as well.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, so it it it's it's called peace of mind, right? It's got to have a peace of mind. It's gonna cost a little more, it's gonna be more professional, and also the good thing about this guy is they do inspection though. Department of Building does inspection to make sure everything is right and correct and safe more than anything. Um, so you're doing it the correct way is the best way. Um, you go the other route, it's gonna cost you more, a lot more. So, you know what they say, you know, are the easy route it's gonna cost you.
SPEAKER_00:No, absolutely. And it sure it costs a little bit more, but think about the whole purpose of an ADU is to provide more housing, right? Not just for people that you might want to rent, but also for family members, right? It could get them peace of mind. So it everyone wins in that scenario, especially if you're trying to rent it out as well, right? It's gonna cost you a little bit extra, but it's gonna pay you back.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah, it's a great investment to legalize your basement and your attic, right? Um, so it's gonna open more opportunity for the homeowners to make more income. But I highly recommend homeowners to hire the professionals you need, which is an architect, um, plumb, electrician, um, contractor, um, that you're gonna need on your side to make sure you legalize the basement and legalize the attic. So when you come and rent it out to the city, right, let's say, or to a tenant, everything is legal. You know, especially in basement, guys. It's serious, right? The safety hazards are very serious. You know, a lot of in the past, a lot of people will rent out the basement. I had a story of a few years ago. Uh a client was renting out the basement, and guess what? It went on fire, guys. And man, he he's going through a lawsuit right now, that client. So the reality, guys, is do it the right way. It's gonna cost you, but it's worth it. Do it the right way. And now with this opportunity, Angela, it's gonna open more opportunity in this road. And I'm happy in New York, New York C did this.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah. And Native also like um, it just adds more value to your home too, because now a person who was looking for a single family and can only use the their own income can now look at that same home that you provide, and you have an ADU, and they can use the ink the projected income of that ADU to qualify for even more, so you can get more for your property. Or just get exactly what you're looking for, simple.
SPEAKER_01:You know what's good also. You remember what happened to you, Andrew, with your client that you had a client that had a bought a single family with ADU um basement. Um, and what it did was that this client um couldn't qualify regularly, but um my wife, Heidi, the mortgage broker, she was able to qualify the client with the ADU income from the basement, and the client was able to purchase the property and now he's renting it to his family member. So that's that's big. You know, also those poll and the most clients don't know about, you know, you also could get you know a higher pre-approval with an ADU unit.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, because it it kind of counts as a pseudo multifamily.
SPEAKER_01:Correct.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and if you don't know how multifamilies work and how you get pre-approof for those, it's just like it's just a regular process, right? But they're using just the the rental income from the other units to also supplement the mortgage, like to give you higher, higher borrowing on the mortgage, yeah. So um essentially that's generally how people house hack, right? They try to get like the other units to kind of pay off a good chunk of the mortgage so you can reduce the uh the monthly payments to it. In some cases, if you put a high enough down payment and you have really good credit score, you might even not even pay anything on your mortgage. You might even break, like they might just be paying the whole mortgage for you.
SPEAKER_01:And you still make your profit as well. Yeah, the profit on top of it.
SPEAKER_00:Exactly. So if you want to like, if you have a really nice single family and you have kind of like a small basement that still qualifies an ADU, maybe you want to be living in the basement and you want to rent up the top part. You can rent it out for a good amount, and maybe that covers like probably 75% of the the costs.
SPEAKER_01:And I just want to ask, um, share something with you. How do you verify if your basement or your attic um is up to Cole to do to legalize uh ADU unit in the basement or the attic, hire an architect? He's gonna review the calls of the apartment of the building. He's lane, you know, if this if this unit or this apartment attic or basement is gonna pop up for a legalization.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, and the portal that they um introduced, they have uh vetted contractors and zoning guidance and stuff like that that can help you with that as well. Yeah. The one thing, right, that is also to be mentioned is that what counts is an ADU, an ADU can only be a maximum of 800 feet, must include a kitchen plus bathroom, has to have windows in all bedrooms, right? Uh in all rooms, because if there is a fire, like what happened over there, they have to be able to get out and stuff like that. Yeah, it's so important and has to have a separate entrance within 100 feet of the curb. If it if it has all of that, then it's pretty much an ADU. But again, you have to get um permission from the uh from the portal and all of that from uh the city and whatnot. And put it in OTEC to verify all this, exactly, and then you're good to go. It's not really that complicated. I think the only real comp, yeah. The the complicated part is just like the kitchen and back to putting them in there, but uh other than that though, and then um something that's coming up is the winter, the winter's I love the winter.
SPEAKER_01:Are we in a fall? Well, let me let me rephrase that. I love fall. Yeah, I love this weather. It's not cold or hot, feels great this weather. Um, yeah, yeah. I love this weather. And then of course, preparing ourselves for the winter, which is great because of all these holidays, you know, family time. I love I love Christmas, my favorite um holiday. So getting there is good. Um for the winter, I just want to get some tips for homes, right? Make sure you turn off your water lines that go outside the property, right? For instance, water lines for the outside of the property. Turn them off. Why? Because if they freeze, they're gonna burst the pipes. So make sure it's off, right? Most of us forget um it's gonna cost you money if you don't turn it off because your pipe can freeze. Have that in mind. Um make sure for your oil tanks, make sure you refill them before you turn them on, right? Um also for those hot water tanks. Um if you're if this is consuming oil or gas, right? Some I think the most efficient one, in my opinion, is converting the oil, the water tank to electric. So you don't have to, it won't cost you so much using the oil tank. You only use the oil tank for the winter, which is two, three months. Right? So I that's a tip I would share with people for the winter. Um and also get preparing for uh for the snow, the salt. Yeah, and make sure your roof is good. Your roof is not good, a lot of coal is gonna come in and uh, you know, you want no leaks. So just make sure your roof is safe.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, absolutely. And you're talking about efficiency. Also, you can do the mini slick you bit thing. Yes. So you didn't even have to rely on gas or oil. Yeah. You could just do that thing and you get the electric uh water heating system and you're free of gas and oil. Unless you use propane for yourself.
SPEAKER_01:You know what I say to all the clients? You want to know if you bought a good house, you want to know if it's good and good quality. Wait for the winter. Because in the winter you're gonna see if your house, honestly, because you're gonna see if it's it's insulated, right? Right. You're gonna see how it's running in the cold. And I think in the winter you will see the if you bought a good house.
SPEAKER_00:A solid house.
SPEAKER_01:You know.
SPEAKER_00:Because in the in the in the summer you can get away with it. You just get AC and stuff, but in the winter, you're gonna see insulation and all that. Yes. The harsh white stuff.
SPEAKER_01:See a pipes freeze up. Right, that's the biggest thing. A lot of pipes free. So did you ever have your pipes free? No, I never. Um, I know one of my clients, he actually uh did insulate his his his house, and he has um the main in the kitchen, the fountain, that freezes all the time. So what he does is that he grabs his daughter's um to dry up the hair. Oh, the uh hair blower or whatever. Yeah, he grabs a hair blower and puts it under the under the sink, and it's just that's the way he gets sometimes. I'm like, this is crazy. You know. Like you know how much Spanish people are. Yeah, it's so innovative. Yeah. So there, so by the winter, you're gonna see if your house is solid or not in the winter. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00:I remember we had that uh that brown stone in Manhattan that had all the all the uh pipes for.
SPEAKER_01:Oh, you know what I have? I had this house in in I think it was at Harnham, right? Yeah. Um so we had this property. I walk this house was three floors, an SRO, had over 15 barrels. And I walk in and in in there, we were like, what's that noise? You just hear, shh. So I'm like, what's going on in here? I'm like, what the? So I go in, you can't see much because there's no light, nothing on. When we reached the third floor, you start seeing all the water lines just burst. I'm throwing water. And it's been happening for months. So the cellar number one over there. Man, it was a big mess of of water everywhere.
SPEAKER_00:And not only that, that wasn't the only problem either. Not only was there so much water, but there was so much stuff.
SPEAKER_01:Everywhere. No, that was crazy. That house was the craziest all my ever. So you know how many trucks of garbage came out of the house? I'm not even joking. They counted 18.4 trucks. 18. How much did that cost? It was close to 20 knots, bro. This lady was just piling up stuff. So all my lady, especially my wife, stop buying so much stuff just to put in one corner. Maintain your house clean, because that's what brings mice, roaches, bring all maintain your house as clean as possible in sense like don't buy and just pile things up. I've noticed that most of the course females they go just shopping and just buy and you just couldn't tell them to that. Because all you're doing is bringing mice and roaches to the house.
SPEAKER_00:No, it's uh don't be a hoarder. Yeah, try not to be a hoarder. It's exactly sometimes you're just using up space that you don't you don't really need to use. Yeah, it's just making more work for yourself. That's yeah, yeah. All right, so uh another thing that we want to talk about are mortgage rates. Let's go. Thank you, Trump. The rates are dropping, the feds. Yes, it looks like Fannie Mae projects mortgage rates will end 2025 at 6.4% and drop five to five point nine percent by the end of 2026. So yeah.
SPEAKER_01:So yeah, they're saying they're gonna drop two more times, right? It's speculation. We don't know. Uh, but the way it's going, I think it it might drop. So, you know, the lower your rate is, the best, yeah, your better your your monthly payments are. So I hope they keep dropping. Uh, you know, with this, you know, the lower the rates are, the better it is for everyone. Yeah, it would the only thing about it that it is gonna create more bidding wards.
SPEAKER_00:No, absolutely. The National Association for Viltors says dipping below 6% could unlock affordability for 5.5 million households, potentially triggering 550,000 new home purchases over the next 12 and 18 months. So if you thought it was hard to find the home before, just right into the list of McBay's draw. Everyone is gonna be out there.
SPEAKER_01:Also, I want to share something, Andrew. Now that you mentioned the race in the winter, guys, the best time to buy is in the winter. Why? Because there's not a lot of buyers out there buying. Why? Because everyone is so busy with the holidays. Right? Everyone is so busy with the hot dog. Honestly, guys, the best time to buy is now, before, you know, on the fall, winter, because everyone is busy with the holidays hands. No one is thinking about buying a house. Really, people. There's still people out there thinking about it. But reality, guys, buy now because it's gonna be better, especially that rates are dropping slightly down. Um, we haven't seen this in in the past, what, two to three years that the rates have been dropping. Like I would say two years at least, uh, the rates are dropping. So this is good news, but buy now because it's less competition than otherwise.
SPEAKER_00:Yeah, I think the combination that rates are still just slightly above six percent, which means that there's not like all of these buyers in the market still, and the fact that it's about to be winter, this could be the last time that you have less competition overall. Yes. For a good amount of time. Yeah. So this could actually be like probably one of the best times to buy before rates get lower. If they do get lower, yeah, if it's you're just gonna have more competition overall. Um, and yeah.
SPEAKER_01:Yeah. Because after this, once um the next season comes in, which is next year, around February to April, it picks up tremendous tremendously. Yeah, February is only the busiest time for us, and I'm telling you, buy now because a lot of people are not buying. Not a lot of people are, that's not their main focus right now. The main focus is probably family out of this, but the holidays are the big one, yeah.
SPEAKER_00:But if you can get something right now when there's us competition, man, this is gonna be a great time for you. So, in fact, you gotta time it. You gotta go like, what is the sweet spot where I can go in? It's not that much competition, and I'm still getting like a decent house, like right now would probably be that ideal. Heading into I definitely want to say this.
SPEAKER_01:I want to end it with this. Yeah, let's go, Yankees. Thank you, Red Sox. Thank you, Mets. Let's go, Yankees. All the way we're going to the World Series this year. Again, and you know, I'm gonna be honest with you. I hope we got the repeat with the Dodgers. I really do, really do. So let's go, Yankees, and thank you, Red Sox. Hope you guys enjoy the playoffs. Take care. Have a great one, guys. Bye.
SPEAKER_00:Bye, guys.