Well I think we're going to see more and more RTO's. Here's why when a home owner facing a reset is smart enough to modify the loan to a lower rate.. the owner now gets a choice....mmmm do I sell now or later,,ok....this is a benefit for the would be renters that want to buy a home and need time to get there deposit and financials together..I also believe that those tax credits will probably be extended...first dibs on this prediction...and the loan mods will continue too...
Owners want to delay the price on these properties till the end of the contract...there waiting for the market to change maybe in there favor, going up?, eventully..in the meanwhile..cash flow , keep the property..and wait for the tsunami of well qualify buyers with fistfulls of cash...tick tick tick...3 years later house prices....still flat...I'm not holding my breath..is it a good time to buy?
really depends on the local market...ok
Saturday, May 30, 2009
Tuesday, May 26, 2009
procrastination....sometimes bad, sometimes good.
There are many levels of procrastination that either help or hinder a transaction...this is what we do..we help facilitate the transaction involved with a transfer of ownership of a real estate/property. Whew, that's a big sentence, but essentially if you wait to decide, you must know what the circumstances are that can help you...
I believe the time it takes to make a decision is based on not having enough information to know how to make a decision to accept the terms of the contract and recieve the aquisition. So that's a good reason to wait or procrastinate...
Now there is the opposite reason to stall a decision when you are not ready. And not being ready has a multitude of reason to not make a decision to sign and accept what you want. I don't need to explain excuses but it is related to the reason why it is good to wait but like a bullet in a chamber once fired you can't put it back.
My suggestion and the reason I blog this issue is because to empower your self with a confident decision is a wonderful life changing experience...even on the most minute, infantile level.
To satisfy yourself and not delay your joy...take the time to do your research, once you get all the facts,,,maybe make a checklist..verify you completed the list and then decide confidently.
At that point, procrastination is not an issue to quote "To think too long about doing a thing often becomes its undoing." ~Eva Young
I believe the time it takes to make a decision is based on not having enough information to know how to make a decision to accept the terms of the contract and recieve the aquisition. So that's a good reason to wait or procrastinate...
Now there is the opposite reason to stall a decision when you are not ready. And not being ready has a multitude of reason to not make a decision to sign and accept what you want. I don't need to explain excuses but it is related to the reason why it is good to wait but like a bullet in a chamber once fired you can't put it back.
My suggestion and the reason I blog this issue is because to empower your self with a confident decision is a wonderful life changing experience...even on the most minute, infantile level.
To satisfy yourself and not delay your joy...take the time to do your research, once you get all the facts,,,maybe make a checklist..verify you completed the list and then decide confidently.
At that point, procrastination is not an issue to quote "To think too long about doing a thing often becomes its undoing." ~Eva Young
Sunday, May 24, 2009
I didn't write this but it's relevance is paramount...
http://www.latimes.com/classified/realestate/news/la-fi-cover3-2009may03,0,7623052.story
House hunting? It's not a buyer's market everywhere
Potential buyers visit a home in Eagle Rock. In desirable areas, bidding wars are common. “The biggest problem,” says real estate agent Phyllis Harb, “is that people are overreacting to housing statistics, thinking they can come in and make an offer 20% below price.”
The median price in Southern California may have plummeted, but in more desirable neighborhoods, home buyers are still engaging in bidding wars.
By Chip Jacobs 6:15 PM PDT, May 2, 2009
The confident smile Sam Rivero wore as he hunted for his first house had a lot to do with the buzz thumping in his ears. Ever since home values began sinking, pundits have touted the juicy opportunities for aspiring buyers priced out of the market before, and the young business-development executive heard that cue like a sonic boom.Out he ventured into Mount Washington, Glassell Park, Eagle Rock, Montecito Heights and other desirable middle-class communities northeast of downtown Los Angeles, searching for a bargain in the $400,000 range. Candidates came and went, and Rivero, who is getting married, was upbeat. Considering the pulverized housing values, with the median price of a Southland home today -- $250,000 -- at half of its 2007 level, the properties should come gift-wrapped, right?
As the Glendale resident and his fiancee, a makeup artist for the television show "Entourage," discovered, the supposedly wondrous buyers' market seems more consumer myth than easy pickings.They bid $50,000 over asking price for a "great" four-bedroom contemporary in Valley Village, only to lose out to one of the 16 other offers tendered, Rivero, 33, said. A North Hollywood house he had been eager to see attracted so many people walking around with sales fliers that he couldn't find parking and drove off from the "vultures" who got there first."Every open house I've been to has been a zoo," said Rivero, who has examined 35 properties during the last three months. "If you follow what the [general] media say, you'd think sellers are desperate to sell a house, but when you get there it's totally the opposite."So what's going on?Real estate brokers and investors say would-be buyers misunderstand how the drop in housing prices has affected desirable neighborhoods. Just because an abandoned house in a troubled part of San Bernardino County might be going for $200,000, it doesn't mean you can get a nice place in Sherman Oaks for that amount -- or even twice that amount.House hunters are trying to pounce on deals from sellers they expected to be frantic -- if not curled in the fetal position. What they're finding instead are bidding wars as low interest rates and pent-up demand in traditionally stable or chic areas have kept prices up -- not as high as the market's peak, but not nearly as low as they had hoped."The biggest problem," said agent Phyllis Harb, "is that people are overreacting to housing statistics, thinking they can come in and make an offer 20% below price."As sales figures and home buyers' anecdotes are underscoring, when the residential real estate bubble burst, it set off several distinct sprays that created false hopes and confusion.Though nearly 20,000 homes in Southern California sold in March, a 52% jump from a year earlier, a sizable number of those transactions occurred in Riverside and San Bernardino counties, where foreclosures exploded. In the region overall, foreclosure sales accounted for 55% of March's deals.Bank-owned or not, the cheaper properties are dominating the sellers' block in the notoriously expensive L.A. County real estate market. In March, 2,871 homes under $300,000 were sold compared with only 734 a year earlier, according to real estate information firm MDA DataQuick.At the higher end, just 202 homes priced above $1.2 million changed hands last month, compared with 354 in March 2008.Houses priced from $400,000 to $800,000 represented less than a quarter of the market in March, down from about 45%, meaning fewer offerings for would-be buyers in that mid-market or pickier sellers, according to DataQuick.Mark down Nicky and Bunny DeMarinis as frustrated. They offered about $1 million for a 3,300-square-foot traditional in the Los Feliz area. Though it boasted a magnificent view, the house was an ode to passe, with cheesy frescoes, gold trimming and 1970s-era kitchen appliances, they said. For all the updating it required, the owner came down only a fraction from his $1.7-million asking price and passed on the DeMarinises.The couple, who own Nicky D's Wood-Fired Pizza in Silver Lake, have seen about 50 houses so far. They don't know where to vent their anger: lenders demanding higher down payments and less-favorable terms, talking heads distorting the market with oversimplifications or listing agents itching for bidding wars."You get out there and think you can grab something at a fantastic price, but that's not the case," Bunny DeMarinis said. "Each time we look at a house and see these inflated prices and our offer is rejected, we feel rejected too. We had an unrealistic portrait of what was really happening. It's disillusioning."It's becoming a populist theme among potential local buyers and a contentious topic on websites devoted to the post-bubble market.Real estate investor Burt Slusher said home shoppers should disregard the broad trends and focus instead on nuances and inventory in finely drawn areas.Take the 40% jump in L.A. County home sales in March compared with a year earlier. In studying the data, Slusher said, he found that a large batch of those deals transpired in Palmdale, Compton, Inglewood and other communities that suffered as a result of "treacherous subprime mortgages."People interested in properties in coveted niche markets such as Pasadena, Culver City and Santa Monica have read or heard too much about frenzied activity in the bottom of the market, he said, without comprehending that it held little relevance for them.Slusher's advice is to muster patience, because he believes there's still an over-inventory of mid- and upper-priced properties that will drive overall prices down into 2011."Buyers hear about foreclosures and bank sales and a bad economy and think they can offer a beer price for a wine home," Slusher said. "But the market is not a homogenous place, where everything is the same."In classic economics, buyers should have a decided advantage in neighborhoods in which supply dwarfs demand. Where there's typically a six-month inventory of houses for sale in coveted Beverly Hills, Pacific Palisades and West Hollywood, for instance, there's a year to two years' worth today, agent Christopher Hain said.Hain has a theory about why all that supply hasn't translated into blocks full of delirious new homeowners. He calls it the "sucker syndrome," in which buyers are nervous about overbidding when nobody truly knows whether Southland home values have reached their bottom.Said Slusher, "Nobody wants to be the sucker who paid too much, so they combat that fear by offering unrealistically low amounts. But if you're trying to time the bottom, you're going to end up with junk. It's always the best houses and cheapest houses that sell first."More should be known about the market for more-expensive properties when "jumbo" loans -- ones exceeding $417,000 -- become available this summer, according to DataQuick. In a sign of how locked-up conditions are, jumbo loans represented 40% of all Southern California purchases in 2007. In March they accounted for 10% of the activity.On a recent Sunday, an open house for a vintage 3,159-square-foot Craftsman near Occidental College in Eagle Rock drew 105 people in the first hour despite sweltering temperatures, a Lakers playoff game and a list price of $699,000. Never mind the hilly curb appeal or the aroma of freshly baked cookies that listing agent Tracy King baked. There was plenty of head-shaking among would-be buyers about the absence of bargains.Jose Mares, 38, a Huntington Park police officer, said he'd been searching for eight years for a house. To him, the dark-shingled house needed too much renovation to justify the tab. He thinks he knows why it's priced where it is: There's not a glut of quality competition close by, and the owner and listing agent know their edge."Some want to charge $550,000 for a starter house," Mares said.King, the agent, said she'd heard earfuls about that, and noted that this was not your father's housing crash. Today, everyone is savvier, able to analyze properties with a few keystrokes or see a street view using Google.Instant information, though, also means fiercer competition and fewer hidden gems. As an example, King cited a 1,625-square-foot, midcentury-style fixer-upper in La Crescenta priced at $299,000. Forty people were standing on the front lawn within an hour of its listing, she said. Ultimately, there were 80 bids, 15 of them exceeding $400,000. The winning bid was $480,000."What I'm seeing is that perceived bargains are going in multiple offers for more than the asking, and buyers are very disappointed," King said. "Real estate is hyperlocal, so a [regional] $250,000 median price is meaningless here."Predicting where values are headed is hardly a science either, no matter what the cable-TV experts or the galaxy of websites with every imaginable statistic say. For one thing, people selling costlier homes tend to have deep pockets buffering them from needing a fire sale to stay afloat. If they don't like the bids, they can pull their property off the market.Banks are an even bigger X factor, and not just because of their stricter lending requirements and bailout havoc. USC real estate professor Tracey Seslen said she'd heard that lenders were carefully timing the release of homes they'd repossessed to avoid further flooding the market and driving prices down more. Those institutions also know that a fresh avalanche of foreclosures from people with resetting loans may be looming."So the banks are playing this game too," Seslen said. "They're keeping prices artificially high."Rivero, the soon-to-be-married business-development exec, wishes that weren't so, and hopes his tenacity pays off."We've learned not to get our hopes up because it sets us up for heartbreak," he said. "What's driving me is that I actually want a house."
MY 2Cents
this is not the bottom line...the fact is "you can't beat the house...I mean bank"
House hunting? It's not a buyer's market everywhere
Potential buyers visit a home in Eagle Rock. In desirable areas, bidding wars are common. “The biggest problem,” says real estate agent Phyllis Harb, “is that people are overreacting to housing statistics, thinking they can come in and make an offer 20% below price.”
The median price in Southern California may have plummeted, but in more desirable neighborhoods, home buyers are still engaging in bidding wars.
By Chip Jacobs 6:15 PM PDT, May 2, 2009
The confident smile Sam Rivero wore as he hunted for his first house had a lot to do with the buzz thumping in his ears. Ever since home values began sinking, pundits have touted the juicy opportunities for aspiring buyers priced out of the market before, and the young business-development executive heard that cue like a sonic boom.Out he ventured into Mount Washington, Glassell Park, Eagle Rock, Montecito Heights and other desirable middle-class communities northeast of downtown Los Angeles, searching for a bargain in the $400,000 range. Candidates came and went, and Rivero, who is getting married, was upbeat. Considering the pulverized housing values, with the median price of a Southland home today -- $250,000 -- at half of its 2007 level, the properties should come gift-wrapped, right?
As the Glendale resident and his fiancee, a makeup artist for the television show "Entourage," discovered, the supposedly wondrous buyers' market seems more consumer myth than easy pickings.They bid $50,000 over asking price for a "great" four-bedroom contemporary in Valley Village, only to lose out to one of the 16 other offers tendered, Rivero, 33, said. A North Hollywood house he had been eager to see attracted so many people walking around with sales fliers that he couldn't find parking and drove off from the "vultures" who got there first."Every open house I've been to has been a zoo," said Rivero, who has examined 35 properties during the last three months. "If you follow what the [general] media say, you'd think sellers are desperate to sell a house, but when you get there it's totally the opposite."So what's going on?Real estate brokers and investors say would-be buyers misunderstand how the drop in housing prices has affected desirable neighborhoods. Just because an abandoned house in a troubled part of San Bernardino County might be going for $200,000, it doesn't mean you can get a nice place in Sherman Oaks for that amount -- or even twice that amount.House hunters are trying to pounce on deals from sellers they expected to be frantic -- if not curled in the fetal position. What they're finding instead are bidding wars as low interest rates and pent-up demand in traditionally stable or chic areas have kept prices up -- not as high as the market's peak, but not nearly as low as they had hoped."The biggest problem," said agent Phyllis Harb, "is that people are overreacting to housing statistics, thinking they can come in and make an offer 20% below price."As sales figures and home buyers' anecdotes are underscoring, when the residential real estate bubble burst, it set off several distinct sprays that created false hopes and confusion.Though nearly 20,000 homes in Southern California sold in March, a 52% jump from a year earlier, a sizable number of those transactions occurred in Riverside and San Bernardino counties, where foreclosures exploded. In the region overall, foreclosure sales accounted for 55% of March's deals.Bank-owned or not, the cheaper properties are dominating the sellers' block in the notoriously expensive L.A. County real estate market. In March, 2,871 homes under $300,000 were sold compared with only 734 a year earlier, according to real estate information firm MDA DataQuick.At the higher end, just 202 homes priced above $1.2 million changed hands last month, compared with 354 in March 2008.Houses priced from $400,000 to $800,000 represented less than a quarter of the market in March, down from about 45%, meaning fewer offerings for would-be buyers in that mid-market or pickier sellers, according to DataQuick.Mark down Nicky and Bunny DeMarinis as frustrated. They offered about $1 million for a 3,300-square-foot traditional in the Los Feliz area. Though it boasted a magnificent view, the house was an ode to passe, with cheesy frescoes, gold trimming and 1970s-era kitchen appliances, they said. For all the updating it required, the owner came down only a fraction from his $1.7-million asking price and passed on the DeMarinises.The couple, who own Nicky D's Wood-Fired Pizza in Silver Lake, have seen about 50 houses so far. They don't know where to vent their anger: lenders demanding higher down payments and less-favorable terms, talking heads distorting the market with oversimplifications or listing agents itching for bidding wars."You get out there and think you can grab something at a fantastic price, but that's not the case," Bunny DeMarinis said. "Each time we look at a house and see these inflated prices and our offer is rejected, we feel rejected too. We had an unrealistic portrait of what was really happening. It's disillusioning."It's becoming a populist theme among potential local buyers and a contentious topic on websites devoted to the post-bubble market.Real estate investor Burt Slusher said home shoppers should disregard the broad trends and focus instead on nuances and inventory in finely drawn areas.Take the 40% jump in L.A. County home sales in March compared with a year earlier. In studying the data, Slusher said, he found that a large batch of those deals transpired in Palmdale, Compton, Inglewood and other communities that suffered as a result of "treacherous subprime mortgages."People interested in properties in coveted niche markets such as Pasadena, Culver City and Santa Monica have read or heard too much about frenzied activity in the bottom of the market, he said, without comprehending that it held little relevance for them.Slusher's advice is to muster patience, because he believes there's still an over-inventory of mid- and upper-priced properties that will drive overall prices down into 2011."Buyers hear about foreclosures and bank sales and a bad economy and think they can offer a beer price for a wine home," Slusher said. "But the market is not a homogenous place, where everything is the same."In classic economics, buyers should have a decided advantage in neighborhoods in which supply dwarfs demand. Where there's typically a six-month inventory of houses for sale in coveted Beverly Hills, Pacific Palisades and West Hollywood, for instance, there's a year to two years' worth today, agent Christopher Hain said.Hain has a theory about why all that supply hasn't translated into blocks full of delirious new homeowners. He calls it the "sucker syndrome," in which buyers are nervous about overbidding when nobody truly knows whether Southland home values have reached their bottom.Said Slusher, "Nobody wants to be the sucker who paid too much, so they combat that fear by offering unrealistically low amounts. But if you're trying to time the bottom, you're going to end up with junk. It's always the best houses and cheapest houses that sell first."More should be known about the market for more-expensive properties when "jumbo" loans -- ones exceeding $417,000 -- become available this summer, according to DataQuick. In a sign of how locked-up conditions are, jumbo loans represented 40% of all Southern California purchases in 2007. In March they accounted for 10% of the activity.On a recent Sunday, an open house for a vintage 3,159-square-foot Craftsman near Occidental College in Eagle Rock drew 105 people in the first hour despite sweltering temperatures, a Lakers playoff game and a list price of $699,000. Never mind the hilly curb appeal or the aroma of freshly baked cookies that listing agent Tracy King baked. There was plenty of head-shaking among would-be buyers about the absence of bargains.Jose Mares, 38, a Huntington Park police officer, said he'd been searching for eight years for a house. To him, the dark-shingled house needed too much renovation to justify the tab. He thinks he knows why it's priced where it is: There's not a glut of quality competition close by, and the owner and listing agent know their edge."Some want to charge $550,000 for a starter house," Mares said.King, the agent, said she'd heard earfuls about that, and noted that this was not your father's housing crash. Today, everyone is savvier, able to analyze properties with a few keystrokes or see a street view using Google.Instant information, though, also means fiercer competition and fewer hidden gems. As an example, King cited a 1,625-square-foot, midcentury-style fixer-upper in La Crescenta priced at $299,000. Forty people were standing on the front lawn within an hour of its listing, she said. Ultimately, there were 80 bids, 15 of them exceeding $400,000. The winning bid was $480,000."What I'm seeing is that perceived bargains are going in multiple offers for more than the asking, and buyers are very disappointed," King said. "Real estate is hyperlocal, so a [regional] $250,000 median price is meaningless here."Predicting where values are headed is hardly a science either, no matter what the cable-TV experts or the galaxy of websites with every imaginable statistic say. For one thing, people selling costlier homes tend to have deep pockets buffering them from needing a fire sale to stay afloat. If they don't like the bids, they can pull their property off the market.Banks are an even bigger X factor, and not just because of their stricter lending requirements and bailout havoc. USC real estate professor Tracey Seslen said she'd heard that lenders were carefully timing the release of homes they'd repossessed to avoid further flooding the market and driving prices down more. Those institutions also know that a fresh avalanche of foreclosures from people with resetting loans may be looming."So the banks are playing this game too," Seslen said. "They're keeping prices artificially high."Rivero, the soon-to-be-married business-development exec, wishes that weren't so, and hopes his tenacity pays off."We've learned not to get our hopes up because it sets us up for heartbreak," he said. "What's driving me is that I actually want a house."
MY 2Cents
this is not the bottom line...the fact is "you can't beat the house...I mean bank"
Friday, May 22, 2009
multiple offer bonaza for short sales...!!!!
I can't believe this buyer's market has come down to a seller's market.Oh you haven't noticed that the banks are driving us agents crazy...I go to the MLS and pick 15 properties..7 of them have offers already but the bank has us all hostage...will it be the highest bidder?..or the one whose more credit worthy...? or the one with the biggest down payment?..heck if I know? What kind of criteria are we dealing with?...I rant and work my brain trying to figure what's best for my client...perhaps it is a "bankers" market.....
Monday, May 18, 2009
thank you....
To Keri, Angelica and Juan...
for helping out with my first home buyer's meet and greet It was a success
And the 3 of you know..working hard to achieve a goal is the hardest thing to do..Follow through to the end is the wining prize...The clients I got are out there waiting for us to host another to show there support.incidently..I got a call today from a neighborhood volunteer who saw my flyer..he called me to scold me about putting my flyer on the Chandler bike path,,,I called him back after thinking that getting involved with the community is a very good way to network...I offered to help out, he went on and on about community projects, it seems like I made a new friend and a vital future source of networking..yaay!!!
I must mention the salsa will be back for the next one too..
for helping out with my first home buyer's meet and greet It was a success
And the 3 of you know..working hard to achieve a goal is the hardest thing to do..Follow through to the end is the wining prize...The clients I got are out there waiting for us to host another to show there support.incidently..I got a call today from a neighborhood volunteer who saw my flyer..he called me to scold me about putting my flyer on the Chandler bike path,,,I called him back after thinking that getting involved with the community is a very good way to network...I offered to help out, he went on and on about community projects, it seems like I made a new friend and a vital future source of networking..yaay!!!
I must mention the salsa will be back for the next one too..
Sunday, May 17, 2009
Today is the Seminar....at Satsuma Gallery
I have been promoting my mission for almost 2 years and if you didn't know it is to help people my friends and clients undrstand real estate as a home, an investment an as security..The seminar is a way for me and my fellow professionals Angelica Lassiter and Juan Argeutua to avail our expertise to you....
please come with questions about your neighborhood's real estate. And come to hear where the values are going, what the current tax advantages are.
hey atleast came for my salsa... and if you didn't know it's at a real cool art gallery...
thanks
please come with questions about your neighborhood's real estate. And come to hear where the values are going, what the current tax advantages are.
hey atleast came for my salsa... and if you didn't know it's at a real cool art gallery...
thanks
Thursday, May 14, 2009
aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah..... I see now..
This is how it's done....multiple callbacks follow ups and waiting for others to respond to your due diligence.....That's cool.....it's a buisness and I love the pace....stay at home real estate agent for now, haha...next year my assistant will be helping out because I will need one. Must be able to handle kids, negotiate house work and be at my beck and call...10.00 per hour part time....she or he must be smart and interested in this buisness....interested parties, send me your resumes....that's my craiglist ad...."my hands go up and down emulating Mike Myers of Wayne's World"...I suddenly wake up by my phone ringing...
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Short sell bidding..Multiple offers???? OMG!!!
Hey I respect the fact that the owner decided to opt out...ok now the bank is left with the crap....so whacha do with lemons????....Make lemonade!!!!
So now they have these homes and they are selling the good candy to the highest bidder...."sounds like good buisness to me..." I give props to the banks..but people you should realized a house is a home..this not a good investment for the short run..it should have never been that way in the first place...Buy a home, and please live in it...
Oh one more thing..it will go down in value...for the first years..but historically..by 2014 (5 years) I can see and feel the population factor will push the prices back up. Yaaay!!!
So now they have these homes and they are selling the good candy to the highest bidder...."sounds like good buisness to me..." I give props to the banks..but people you should realized a house is a home..this not a good investment for the short run..it should have never been that way in the first place...Buy a home, and please live in it...
Oh one more thing..it will go down in value...for the first years..but historically..by 2014 (5 years) I can see and feel the population factor will push the prices back up. Yaaay!!!
Mother's day caravan to Norwalk and Carson
Well well well.....I need to show properties and at first i was in a state of shock to jump in the calling the listing agent water but out of all the 9 properties I wanted to see..I talk to only 1 agency, who had multiple offers and was putting the status of the home in pending mode...Hmmm I thought...must have been a nice property..So now I'm amp to call the others and no answer and answering machines dire my hopes of connecting with anyone...IT'S Mother's day right??...gotta remember and honor our mom's..and family, which is the best reason for finding a home for my client...remember!!! everybody has to live somewhere...How about a new home?
Thursday, May 7, 2009
I can't rant when I'm busy..
I've been busy these last 2 days..You know you have to respect stay at home mothers and fathers..I happen to be the latter..anyway..I have my 2 young son's to take care of and everyday I cannot stop my own production...2 contracts to follow...people to see I also had to run to my VW dealer..Mad props to Michael at the service department at Van Nuys Volkswagen..had my car back to me within 1 hour..my 6 month old was not fed and though he ws not cranky he needed my attention..my almost 2 year old ws very busy..but they have a lego table in th ewaiting room...brillant!..
So the car was ready lickly splity and I was back at home....now I have my callbacks, Tammy J, about Studio City, a few condos and town homes...I still need to get to west LA and queens rd...just busy...and it's a beautiful day in southern cali..
ENJOY..!!!!
So the car was ready lickly splity and I was back at home....now I have my callbacks, Tammy J, about Studio City, a few condos and town homes...I still need to get to west LA and queens rd...just busy...and it's a beautiful day in southern cali..
ENJOY..!!!!
Tuesday, May 5, 2009
Home Sale recovery??
"The latest encouraging data came May 4, when the National Assn. of Realtors said its index of pending home sales rose 3.2% from February to March.
First of all, remember what pending means. These are homes that have gone under contract -- but have not actually sold. The Realtors' association says that based on historical data, the pending sales numbers do closely track future sales. But the correlation is much stronger in the year-over-year data than it is in the month-over-month numbers. The increase over March 2008 was much more modest, just 1.1%."
This is not a recovery....
Cheaper Homes Selling Well
More than 40% of all sales nationally -- is being driven by banks unloading foreclosed homes at distressed prices. Higher-end homes are not selling anywhere near as well as cheaper homes. That's not an indicator of a truly healthy housing market.
At the Milken Institute's Global Conference last week in Los Angeles, leveraged-buyout king Thomas Lee pointed to a slide showing the large number of "Alt-a" adjustable-rate loans due to reset in coming months. These loans -- made to buyers with decent credit but who were required to show less documentation of their income -- could default in larger numbers, to the extent that they reset at higher rates.
Ok here comes the truth...
Another 10% to Go?
Donald Brownstein, chief investment officer for money manager Structured Portfolio Management, told Milken conference attendees that his internal calculations show home prices have to fall about 40% off their peak before hitting bottom. The latest Standard & Poors/Case-Shiller home price index numbers showed a 30% decline from the peak in the summer of 2006, meaning we still may have a ways to go.
This edit of an article posted on my website is the subject of my concerns...and like I said before...
the trump is right.
First of all, remember what pending means. These are homes that have gone under contract -- but have not actually sold. The Realtors' association says that based on historical data, the pending sales numbers do closely track future sales. But the correlation is much stronger in the year-over-year data than it is in the month-over-month numbers. The increase over March 2008 was much more modest, just 1.1%."
This is not a recovery....
Cheaper Homes Selling Well
More than 40% of all sales nationally -- is being driven by banks unloading foreclosed homes at distressed prices. Higher-end homes are not selling anywhere near as well as cheaper homes. That's not an indicator of a truly healthy housing market.
At the Milken Institute's Global Conference last week in Los Angeles, leveraged-buyout king Thomas Lee pointed to a slide showing the large number of "Alt-a" adjustable-rate loans due to reset in coming months. These loans -- made to buyers with decent credit but who were required to show less documentation of their income -- could default in larger numbers, to the extent that they reset at higher rates.
Ok here comes the truth...
Another 10% to Go?
Donald Brownstein, chief investment officer for money manager Structured Portfolio Management, told Milken conference attendees that his internal calculations show home prices have to fall about 40% off their peak before hitting bottom. The latest Standard & Poors/Case-Shiller home price index numbers showed a 30% decline from the peak in the summer of 2006, meaning we still may have a ways to go.
This edit of an article posted on my website is the subject of my concerns...and like I said before...
the trump is right.
Monday, May 4, 2009
the new black,,,,
got this tidbit from downtown loft la..
The day of the pre-qualification is over. It's now PRE-APPROVAL or nothing.
30 days worth of paystubs
2 yrs W-2s
2 yrs full tax returns and corporate returns for self-employed borrowers (all schedules and all pages if applicable)
2 months bank stmts for all accounts holding money for down payment, closing costs, and reserves (all pages for every statement)
this is so true....
The day of the pre-qualification is over. It's now PRE-APPROVAL or nothing.
30 days worth of paystubs
2 yrs W-2s
2 yrs full tax returns and corporate returns for self-employed borrowers (all schedules and all pages if applicable)
2 months bank stmts for all accounts holding money for down payment, closing costs, and reserves (all pages for every statement)
this is so true....
Home prices not low enough....
This is ridiculus..yes stupid and greed riden. Let's rant...yes let's grab the pitchforks anf flame throwers..err ok molotov cocktails and show the banks why they are wrong about this market....OK..Ok..I see home sales in general trying to inch upwards the NAR(National Associations Of Realtors) says like 3 %..that's proproganda to hype peoples expectations...This is what's really going on..Banks don't want to lend in the Los Angeles area more than 250K... that's where my approved clients are qualifying at.
In Los Angeles..250K buys you in 8 out of 10 of the properties I see, homes listed in areas which were highly inflated before the crash...so the banks are still getting 100% mark up from pre 2000 year level values...(year 2000..125K, year 2005..500K.. now 250K) Ok and if you look at these properties you'll need a contractor to fix something..Get a home inspector and you see..this is one big scam....the best thing to do is to move out of LA...or buy some dirt and really get your money's worth. I could go on but the gist of the story is...you cannot beat the bank no matter what. they will always come out on top.
In Los Angeles..250K buys you in 8 out of 10 of the properties I see, homes listed in areas which were highly inflated before the crash...so the banks are still getting 100% mark up from pre 2000 year level values...(year 2000..125K, year 2005..500K.. now 250K) Ok and if you look at these properties you'll need a contractor to fix something..Get a home inspector and you see..this is one big scam....the best thing to do is to move out of LA...or buy some dirt and really get your money's worth. I could go on but the gist of the story is...you cannot beat the bank no matter what. they will always come out on top.
Sunday, May 3, 2009
How Socialism Works
How Socialism Works
Some friends e-mailed me this terrific example of how socialism works:
An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.
All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.
The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.
It could not be any simpler than that...
How about a show of hands for everyone who thinks that socialism will work any better than this for such trifling subjects as the economy and health care...?
Yeah, that's what I thought. Better get ready for a fight - that's the end goal of President Obama and the Democrats.
Some friends e-mailed me this terrific example of how socialism works:
An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said ok, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.
All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.
The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.
It could not be any simpler than that...
How about a show of hands for everyone who thinks that socialism will work any better than this for such trifling subjects as the economy and health care...?
Yeah, that's what I thought. Better get ready for a fight - that's the end goal of President Obama and the Democrats.
turn the page...express yourself.
So After 2 hours..i'm convinced i was made to be famous.errrrrrrrgggggh record scratch....I'm not there, my lifestyle is at this corner about to... to turn ....my past I'm putting on the shelf, naw I wont exactly throw it out..but in reality, life moves forward not backwards...try driving a car backwards..you end up in the same place, if you u-turn and go back to where you start.. so you might as well dont look back...there's a world out there that needs me...and you...to my son's make a difference..don't be timid..to my friends..dont be afraid to express yourself.
Saturday, May 2, 2009
saturday....I'm free today.
Going to the market and I'm going to find a client..."goin to the chapel" melody hums in my head...I tweat...I meet..are you ready to have me smile in your face and say.
Hi my name is...I'm happy and you.......that's what I'm doing....meeting people....I have a few homes to visit and verify they're decent...short sale homes can be trashy and it's up to me to decide what I want to show clients...
First Norwalk and then Koreatown.
Hi my name is...I'm happy and you.......that's what I'm doing....meeting people....I have a few homes to visit and verify they're decent...short sale homes can be trashy and it's up to me to decide what I want to show clients...
First Norwalk and then Koreatown.
Friday, May 1, 2009
Is it friday?
I=UGGGGGGGGGGGGhhhhhh aaaaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh..."..ha, ha i'm loser baby..so why dont they kill me" that's what I was feeling when I look at my day....but it really was productive...of course I let it out and try to make sense of it all..case in point..I have only 2 clients so far that i'm activily looking properties...errrh maybe one now since I couldn't show Mynda..some norwalk homes..per her request yesterday...anyway I will follow up with her because we started a communication and I want to have it distill down to a result.
I took both of my younger son's to the DMV/Glendale with me today....Ok not for a driver's license...
for my registration for the Passat...That's a productive thing to accomplish..
I came back home and the house is blown up by Chase...and I'm blogging because I need to feel like I accomplished more than being the best dad in the world......
God am I asking to much from Friday.
is he really listening?
I took both of my younger son's to the DMV/Glendale with me today....Ok not for a driver's license...
for my registration for the Passat...That's a productive thing to accomplish..
I came back home and the house is blown up by Chase...and I'm blogging because I need to feel like I accomplished more than being the best dad in the world......
God am I asking to much from Friday.
is he really listening?
ok I did it....
I put up a huge article about money being freed up for nice homes needing to be bought and sold...this is important if you wanna buy a bangin' house in the hills..mmmm that's my dream and perhaps maybe yours..but in reality...the middle class peeps..only can get an sub 300k approval...which it seems the banks are still afraid of taking any risk,,,I think they knwo something that the whole real estate industry is not admitting...and here we go again...that f'n trump was right...once the price goes down to circa 2000..then the hmes will be priced right..besides until our economy is built back to stablilization we will all be waiting for that ching in our buisnesses and paychecks....tbc,,,,thanks...I also wanted the peeps to know..my profile is phat. check and you decide...pontificate...cheers
Fwd: SFGate: Rates on bigger mortgages finally should come down
Ioftheneedle
djsubcode
scionXa
Begin forwarded message:
From: "me" <djsubcode@yahoo.com>
Date: April 30, 2009 8:46:11 PM PDT
To: "Mike" <realtormikejett@yahoo.com>
Subject: SFGate: Rates on bigger mortgages finally should come down
----------------------------------------------------------------------
This article was sent to you by someone who found it on SFGate.
The original article can be found on SFGate.com here:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2009/04/23/BUEL1777HH.DTL
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Thursday, April 23, 2009 (SF Chronicle)
Rates on bigger mortgages finally should come down
Kathleen Pender
Home loans from $625,500 to $729,750 in high-cost regions, including most
of the Bay Area, should get cheaper in the next few weeks.
To make bigger mortgages cheaper, the economic stimulus act passed in
February increased the conforming loan limit in high-cost regions to a
maximum of $729,750 from $625,500 for single-family homes through the end
of this year. The conforming-loan limit is the biggest mortgage that can
be purchased by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Anything over the limit is
called a jumbo loan, and they cost considerably more than conforming loans
because Fannie and Freddie can't buy or guarantee them.
Raising the limit should bring down the price of loans between $625,500
and $729,750. But more than two months after the stimulus bill was signed,
loans in that zone are still being priced like jumbo loans.
Why?
Lenders say they couldn't lower their rates until Fannie and Freddie
issued underwriting criteria. Fannie issued its criteria March 30 and
Freddie on April 16. Both will start buying loans of up to $729,750 from
lenders on May 4.
That opens the door for lenders to begin making them.
Wells Fargo says it will start making conforming loans of up to $729,750
on Monday.
Bank of America will begin making them "by mid-May," says Vijay Lala, a
product executive with the bank.
As they and other lenders start making these loans, the price should come
down. By how much remains to be seen.
Before last year, the conforming loan limit was the same across the
continental United States.
Last year, Congress pegged the limit to median home prices in each region,
with a minimum of $417,000 and a maximum of $729,750 for single-family
homes. Later in the year, Congress changed its formula for calculating the
regional limit, which dropped the maximum to $625,500 after the end of
2008. (Different limits apply to homes with two to four units.)
This has created two tiers of conforming loans. Those below $417,000 are
true conforming; those above are often called super-conforming.
Super-conforming loans have always cost a bit more than true conforming
loans, partly because an industry group has decided that certain
securities backed by conforming loans can't have more than 10 percent
super-conforming.
The interest rate on a super-conforming loan is typically one-fourth to
one-third of a percentage point higher than the rate on true conforming
loans, says Keith Gumbinger, a vice president with HSH Associates.
But Dick LePre, senior loan officer with RPM Mortgage, says
super-conforming rates are "gigantically volatile from day to day."
It's not clear whether banks will price loans between $625,500 and
$729,750 the same as loans between $417,000 and $625,000 or create a third
tier of conforming loans.
Brad Blackwell, national sales manager for Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, says
his firm will price them the same.
On Wednesday, Wells was charging about 4.75 percent on a true conforming
loan below $417,000, 5 percent on a super-conforming loan up to $625,500
and 6.25 percent on a jumbo loan above $625,500. If the new conforming
loan up to $729,750 had come out the same day, it also would have been at
5 percent, Blackwell says. (All rates are for 30-year fixed-rate
mortgages.)
Bank of America's rates for a 30-year fixed-rate loan were 4.875 percent
for true conforming, 5.25 percent for super-conforming up to $625,500 and
6 percent for jumbos over $625,500. Lala also says BofA will price loans
between $417,000 and $729,750 the same.
Even if they are priced the same, it could be harder to get a conforming
loan up to $729,750 than one up to $625,500.
Fannie and Freddie will, in some cases, buy true conforming loans for up
to 95 percent of the home's value, but on loans up to $625,500, the
loan-to-value ratio can't exceed 90 percent.
On loans up to $729,750, Fannie will go up to 90 percent loan-to-value but
Freddie will only go as high as 80 percent.
Fannie and Freddie will require a "field review" by a second appraiser on
loans that are greater than $625,500 and more than 80 percent of value.
John Abraham of Redwood City is eagerly awaiting the new loans. The rate
on his $690,000 loan has been fixed for almost six years, but it will
start adjusting in a year or so and he's very worried.
He would like to refinance into a fixed-rate loan. All he can get now is a
jumbo at close to 6 percent, which would make his payments soar.
If he got a conforming loan around 5 percent, he could afford the payments
and relieve a major source of stress.
"Our main objective is to create long-term stability for our family," he
says. Limit by county
The 2009 stimulus act increased the conforming loan limit in high-cost
areas through the end of this year. Lenders are just starting to offer
conforming loans up to these new limits. Here are limits for Bay Area
counties through Dec. 31.
CountyCurrentAlameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Francisco, San Mateo
and Santa Clara $729,750 Sonoma$662,500 Solano$557,500 Source: Fannie Mae,
Freddie Mac
Net Worth runs Tuesdays, Thursdays and Sundays. E-mail Kathleen Pender at
kpender@sfchronicle.com. ----------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright 2009 SF Chronicle
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