Real Estate Rocks - Real Estate News and Updates

• Survey of Tax Credit

  Most recipients of the  $8,000 housing tax credit plan to pay off debt with it, or pay down their mortgage loans a little bit. The advantage of this from an economic standpoint is that not only does it encourage more people to buy homes, but it also helps the people to build more wealth, and hopefully then have more disposible income which will then help more with the economic recovery.

  tags: tax, credit, extra, cash

  • According to the survey by the NAR, most consumers would spend their tax credit:

     

    • To pay off debts (34 percent). Paying off debts leaves more money to spend or save and invest for returns that again generate spending money.

       

    • To make home improvements and potentially increase the value of their home and home equity (29 percent). Home equity, can be a way to consolidate other, more expensive debt or spend further on capital improvements that generate more returns on the money.

       

    • To put into savings and investments (28 percent). Saving and investing for returns is a much better personal financial approach than using credit for purchases.

      The survey also found, after learning about the tax credit expansion, 20 percent of those surveyed said they were more likely to consider purchasing a home than they were six months ago.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

It seems like about half of the buyers closings I’ve had, the Title Companies would get docs just before or after my clients and I arrived for closing. They hadn’t seen the settlement statement, and neither had I. It was always fun when the lender wasn’t there, and we find out at closing that the buyer is supposed to bring in a lot more cash than they anticipated. The interest rate and their, monthly payments were also much higher than they thought it would be, and what was quoted to them in their good faith estimate.

Now, HUD is cracking down on errors like these. They’re working to make the real estate industry more transparent.  They have issued some new rules that are going to require mortgage lenders to reveal much closer to the true cost, and give borrowers time to actually review the documents before they are locked in. Here are the details for all closings starting after January 1st:

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) requires that lender and mortgage brokers provide borrowers with a new Good Faith Estimate (GFE) that clearly discloses loan terms and closing costs. Closing agents will also be required to provide borrowers a new HUD-1 Settlement Statement that compares borrower’s final and estimated costs.

1. NEW GOOD FAITH ESTIMATE (GFE)

• The New GFE (3 pages) must be issued to the borrower within 3 days of receiving a borrower application.
• All lender and mortgage broker fees must be combined and shown as a single amount - now called “Our Origination Charges.” This charge will include lender fee, mortgage broker fee, and mortgage broker compensation.
• The mortgage broker and lender are bound by initial GFE, unless there are “changed circumstances” as defined under RESPA Reform.
• The GFE can only be re-issued if there is a valid “changed circumstance.”

I guess we’ll wait and see how accurate the lenders can really be. All in all it should be a good thing for Utah Real Estate.

• Utah outlook on housing is improving - Deseret News

  Here is some information from a great article in the Deseret News about the housing market future of Northern Utah. According to Jim Wood the director of the University of Utah’s Economic and Business research. Home prices in Salt Lake will likely decline this year, but the market has bottomed. Home prices will start going up in 2010 as there will be increased demand for Utah Real Estate.

  tags: salt, lake, market, predictions, home, sales, trends

  • In Salt Lake County, we’ve probably touched bottom in 2009 and we’re going to see a slight improvement in 2010," Jim Wood, director of the University of Utah’s Bureau of Economic and Business Research
  • In 2009, only 900 new single-family homes were built in Salt Lake County — the lowest level since the war years of the 1940s
  • Salt Lake County home sales this year will show some slight improvement over last year, he said
  • median housing prices in the Salt Lake metropolitan area peaked during the third quarter of 2007 at $246,600, dropping just over 11 percent over a two-year period to $218,900.
  • Wood predicted that home values along the Wasatch Front would continue to decline this year, falling another 3 percent to 5 percent.
  • This will bring the decline in median sales price of homes in Salt Lake County to 15 percent through 2010," he said in the report. "By then, the price declines should be over, replaced by stable to slightly improving prices in 2011.

  • Demand in the Utah housing market is on the upswing, as is the state’s overall population.

    "Between 2010 and 2011, we’re going to have to build 100,000 new housing units in Utah to meet the needs of pent-up demand and growth by the end of 2011," Nelson said.

  • The bottom has passed and we are going to be inching up, and 2011 and 2012 are going to be extraordinary years for homebuilding.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

• Fraud with the Federal Housing Tax Credits - eRealEstate

  Last year, the only things that were required on Form 5405 to receive the home buyer tax credit were: Social Security Number, Address, and Contract Price….Now, with only those requirements, can anybody see any problems that might arise?

• Well, thousands did.

• 580 people filed tax returns claiming the credit for children under 18. One of these kids was just 4 years old. Yeah, I bet he really bought a house, most 4 year olds I know can qualify for mortgage financing…
• More than 19,000 people filed tax returns claiming the credit for homes that they DID NOT purchase.
• And 74,000 people claimed the tax credit when they were not actually first time home buyers.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

• 2009 US Real Estate Profile

  Profile of the Typical Buyers in the US

  tags: 2009, home buyers, US

  • The NAR recently published a profile of US home buyers in 2009. There was some interesting info, and their is quite a difference on buyer behavior depending on the region.

    Overall, the largest demographic of home buyer are Married People. 60% of 2009 home buyers are married. Single women bought more than twice as many homes 21%, than single men 10%. Unmarried couples purchased 8% of the homes and “other” purchased the remaining 1 %. I have no idea what that means.

    The median age of US home buyers was 39 years old. 35% of buyers were between 25-34 years old and 22% were between 35-44 years old. Just 8% of US home buyers were retired people over the age of 65.

    In the Northeast the average home was substantially older, built in 1969, than any other region in the US. The average age of homes purchased in the Midwest were built in 1983, 1995 for the West, and 1998 for the South.

    Nationwide, the median home price was $185,000. Homes were most expensive in the West, Median price of $240,000, followed by the Northeast, $210,000, and then the South where the median home price was $175,000. US Homes were least expensive in the Midwest with a median price of $158,000. Home buyers in the west spent more of their household income on housing than those in the East. The average household income of buyers in the west where homes are most expensive, was $74,000, whereas the average income in the Northeast was $79,500.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

• Cap and Tax Bill, Bad for Real Estate

  There’s nothing wrong with making our homes more energy efficient, however there is something wrong with government forcing homes to be more energy efficient.Here are some experts of a great article I just read on Broker Agent Social.

  tags: energy efficient, waxman-markey bill

  • This bill is downright scary, and unfortunately, very few people fully understand it, this chubby Realtor included. The bill aims to reduce greenhouse gasses, and as Obama has promised (while he was running for office no less) the bill will cause utility prices to "skyrocket"
  • The bill will give Obama and friends the right, no the mandate, to enter your home and inspect it before you’re "allowed" to sell.  This is America.
  • If we make single family home efficiency issues a federal problem, we’re going to raise the cost of selling a home. We’re going to raise the cost of building a home. Did you know that the bill specifically calls for the inclusion of an outlet in every garage that would be capable of charging your electric car? Oh, you drive an SUV because you can’t fit 4 kids in the back of a Prius? Or you actually noticed that the #1 and #2 best selling cars in the US last summer weren’t cars at all, but GMC and Ford trucks? Better call the electrician anyway.
  • Say no to Waxman-Markey, say yes to a free market, and a more affordable real estate transaction.

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

This last month I have heard primarily positive real estate news. News that claims the economy and housing market are recovering. That home prices are going to remain stable and home sales will go substantaially up.

This morning when I checked my RSS news feeds and emails, almost all the real estate news was negative. The big slam on the real estate market was that foreclosures continue to rise. As long as foreclosures are rising and foreclosure inventory remains high, traditional home sellers will have a really tough time trying to compete.

So which is it? Is the real estate market really going to improve in 2010, or is it going to remain stagnant.

The answer is that it all depends on the area. Real Estate is local. In my local market, Logan Utah Real Estate is doing pretty well. Our percentage of Cache Valley Short Sale homes is just 6%, and there is currently just six months of active inventory.

Watching the real estate market conditions and the amount of homes for sale in your local market is really the best way to know if the real estate market is going to recover or remain stagnant.

• One in 7 U.S. mortgages foreclosing or delinquent | Reuters

  Nationwide Foreclosures are at their highest rate EVER, and this isn’t expected to peak until the middle of next year. The bulk of new homes in default is of conservative conventional loans, and is primarily a result of the high rates of unemployment.

  tags: foreclosures, mortgage, delinquincies

  • A record one in seven U.S. mortgages were in foreclosure or at least one payment past due in the third quarter
  • U.S. mortgage delinquency rates and the percentage of loans that entered the foreclosure process also jumped to records from July to September, the Mortgage Bankers Association said on Thursday.
  • Rising job losses were behind the increasingly bleak portrait of the housing market in a trend that will continue into next year, the group said in data that adds to recent evidence of a still-struggling housing market.
  • record foreclosures will add to the growing supply of unsold homes, sapping the housing market as it attempts to recover from the worst slump since the Great Depression.
  • The MBA said the percentage of loans in foreclosure rose to 1.42 percent
  • "Foreclosures remain the biggest hurdle to the housing recovery," said Michelle Meyer, economist at Barclays Capital in New York.
  • "Foreclosures will be worse in the first part of 2010 and we do not see a peak in foreclosures until the middle of next year."
  • conservative, prime fixed-rate loans often sold to homebuyers with the highest credit ratings continued to represent the largest share of foreclosures started and were the biggest driver of the increase in foreclosures
  • In fact, 33 percent of foreclosures started in the third quarter were on prime fixed-rate loans and those loans were 44 percent of the quarterly increase in foreclosures, Brinkmann said.

Gloomy outlook, just when the housing market and recession appeared to have peaked for the worst…

• Fannie: ‘Recovery is here’ | Real Estate and Technology News Inman News

  Good news for those in the Real Estate. Fannie Mae predicts that the housing recession is over and we will see National improvement next year.

  tags: fannie, recovery, real, estate

  • The deepest and longest recession since the Great Depression appears to be over, Fannie Mae economists say, projecting sales of new and existing homes will jump 11 percent next year and that national home prices will stabilize, remaining essentially flat.

  • "It appears that the economic recovery is here," Fannie Mae economists Doug Duncan and Orawin Velz said in a report summarizing their economic and mortgage forecasts, although they expect it will be weak compared to previous recoveries from deep recessions.

    Real gross domestic product (GDP) grew at a 3.5 percent annualized pace in the third quarter, following five declines in the prior six quarters, they noted, but growth is likely to moderate in the final three months of the year before strengthening in late 2010.

  • Their housing forecast projects that housing starts will surge by 35 percent next year, from a recent historic low of 462,000 projected starts in 2009 to 624,000 next year.

    Fannie Mae expects national home prices will stabilize next year, with the median resale home price remaining essentially unchanged at $170,800. That’s a 0.2 percent decline from 2009 and a 22 percent decline from 2007

Posted from Diigo. The rest of my favorite links are here.

• NAR OKs indexing of listings | Real Estate and Technology News for Agents, Brokers and Investors | Inman News

  tags: MLS, IDX

  • NAR’s board of directors approved several changes to the association’s Internet Data Exchange (IDX) policy as it wrapped up the group’s annual meeting in San Diego.

    The changes included the deletion of language that previously obligated real estate brokers participating in a multiple listing service (MLS) to employ "reasonable efforts" to protect listings from "scraping," or unauthorized duplication by third-party Web sites

  • New language prohibits MLS participants from using listing data for any purpose other than display on their Web sites, but clarifies that they don’t have to protect listings from legitimate search engines like Google, which collect information from Web sites and store it in internal databases to make searches faster and more relevant.

My question is what else are real estate agents going to use listing data for? What are they going to do print up listings and make books for people?

It’s time MLS realize that information is readily available for everyone. It’s the age we live in. They made a move in the right direction on this one. If they prohibited google from showing home listings, Google would have just become their own international MLS and would have eventually driven MLS’s out of business…