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Monthly Archives: March 2014
5 Reasons to Say ‘No’ to a Listing | Katonah Real Estate
For all the hoops real estate agents have to jump through in order to secure a highly-coveted listing, it may seem crazy to say, but the truth is: Sometimes a listing just isn’t worth it. Before you take on a property you’re not sure about, ask yourself if it falls under one of the categories below. If it does, it’s probably not worth your time or trouble, so it’s a smart move to back away before it’s too late.
Instead, focus on the listings that you know will be a great partnership between you and the seller and lead to a successful sale. And remember, a listing that isn’t the right fit for you is the perfect chance to make a referral to one of another trusted agent in your network. You’ll avoid a situation that will cost you more time and money than it’s worth, and you’ll build goodwill within your own network.
Here are five red flags to look for that will let you know when it’s okay to say, “No way!” to a listing.
1. Sellers Want to List a Property Before Its Ready
A seller might want to list a property right away—before all of its challenges are solved. And when a property is listed before issues are resolved, it will stay on the market longer, negatively affecting the selling price and wasting your time and marketing budget.
2. You’re Not Qualified to Handle a Property’s Challenges
When there are known issues like repairs, zoning restrictions, or environmental hazards that pose obstacles to a smooth closing, you need to ask yourself if you have the qualifications and time to deal with them. If you’re not, tell the property owner they need to bring in the appropriate experts first.
3. The Seller Isn’t Authorized to Sell the Property
In certain cases, the person who presents himself or herself at the seller might not actually be authorized to sell the property, so it’s up to you to clear up any murky issues before taking on a listing. In instances of divorce, find out who the legal decision maker is and whether both parties must sign.
What The Home-Price Slowdown Really Looks Like | Bedford Hills Real Estate
The current slowdown of home prices has been sharpest in markets that crashed during the bust and bounced back last year. And although asking-price gains have been slowing since last spring, price increases remain high by historical standards.
The Trulia Price Monitor and the Trulia Rent Monitor are the earliest leading indicators of how asking prices and rents are trending nationally and locally. They adjust for the changing mix of listed homes and therefore show what’s really happening to asking prices and rents. Because asking prices lead sales prices by approximately two or more months, the Monitors reveal trends before other price indexes do. With that, here’s the scoop on where prices and rents are headed.
Asking-Price Gains Have Been Slowing Down Since April 2013 Nationally, asking home prices rose 10.4% year-over-year in February 2014, down slightly after peaking in November 2013. But the year-over-year change is an average of the past twelve months and therefore obscures the most recent trends in prices. Looking at quarter-over-quarter changes instead, it’s clear that price gains have been slowing for most of the last year: asking home prices rose just 1.9% in February – a rate similar to those recorded in January and December – compared with increases near 2.5% from July 2013 to November 2013 and over 3% from April 2013 to June 2013. The quarter-over-quarter change in asking prices topped out at 3.5% in April 2013 and now, at 1.9%, the increase is just over half of that peak.
But even with this slowdown in gains, prices are still rising much faster than the historical norm. The quarter-over-quarter increase in February of 1.9% implies an annualized rate of almost 8% – which is well above the long-term average.
It’s Time to Spring Clean Your Yard | Pound Ridge Real Estate
Sure, you typically focus your spring cleaning on the inside of the house, but getting your yard ready for the new season should also be on your list. Here are several tips to streamline your outdoor spring cleaning.
1. Survey the damage, post-melt. Once the last of the snow is gone, survey your lawn for any bare areas or dead spots of grass. Heavy traffic and pet messes can keep the grass from growing back. You can help by sprinkling some soil over the area and adding grass and fertilizer. Be sure to keep the dirt moist until the seeds sprout into grass.
2. Tidy up any debris. As you scan your yard, remove any fallen branches and twigs. If your lawn is covered with leaves, there’s no way around pulling out the rake. Before collecting the leaves, be sure the ground is completely dry — raking over wet grass can tear it from the roots, leaving you with even more bare patches. Don’t send the leaves, branches, and twigs to the garbage, though. Use them to create a compost pile.
http://shine.yahoo.com/at-home/time-spring-clean-yard-165800417.html
How one homeowner got a home with a $4,000 down payment | Bedford Corners Homes
Ashley Schwartau was tired of living with her parents. She lived in their Nashville, Tennessee home for three years to save money for her own place.
“I didn’t really want to go rent a place,” says Schwartau. “I could get a house with a mortgage cheaper than renting an apartment,” she says. “Houses in this area that I wanted to move into are priced really, really low – in the low $100,000s.”
Living with her parents paid off, as the 29-year-old graphic designer bought her first home in February 2012. The best part? She was able to do so with a low 3.5 percent down payment. Read on to see the details of how she got a home with very little down.
Finding the Perfect Home
Schwartau started looking at homes to buy in October 2011. Most of the homes she viewed were foreclosures that required remodeling, but a little yellow house stood out as quaint and perfect for her. It was in an older neighborhood that was about 15 minutes from downtown Nashville.
Built in 1952, the 1,500 square feet house is comprised of three bedrooms and 1.5 baths – perfect for her and her fiancé.
She wanted a three-bedroom home so both she and her fiancé could have home offices. She works from home and runs the graphic design department for her father’s video/e-learning business.
http://homes.yahoo.com/news/how-to-get-a-home-with-3-5-percent-down-221617126.html
Which Home Remodeling Projects Are Worth Your Money? | Chappaqua Real Estate
Even if you’re not planning to sell your home anytime soon, it’s an inevitable question when you consider remodeling: How much will this improvement add to the value of my home?
Surprisingly, much of the time the answer is not as much value as it costs to actually make the improvement.
But some home renovations bring you more bang for your buck than others.
The top-ranking home improvement? A new front door, which on average adds 96.6 percent of the amount you spent to the value to your home, according to Remodeling magazine’s annual Cost vs. Value Report for 2014.
But “it has to be the right front door,” says Steven Aaron, owner of the Steve Aaron Realtor Group at Keller Williams Beverly Hills and one of the protagonists of the HGTV series “Selling LA.” Keep in mind that sometimes painting the existing front door provides the same payoff.
All 35 projects included in the Cost vs. Value report added more value this year than last year, and this is the second consecutive year of increases after several years of decline.
http://news.yahoo.com/home-remodeling-projects-worth-money-155500763.html
Bedford Schools Make More Cuts To Keep Budget Under Tax Cap | Bedford Real Estate
Bedford residents would see a 2.99 percent drop in their property tax bill under the 2014-2015 Bedford Central School District preliminary budget, while residents from Pound Ridge, New Castle and North Castle will see an increase.
The tax rate would drop in Bedford to $134.29 per $1,000 of assessed value. It would increase in:
- Mount Kisco by 5.75 percent to $73.45 per $1,000 of assessed value
- Pound Ridge by 4.31 percent to $83.89 per $1,000 of assessed value
- New Castle by 8.86 percent to $73.03 per $1,000 of assessed value
- North Castle by 7.84 percent to $650.47 per $1,000 of assessed value
While no major programs were cut in the $123.5 million budget, School Superintendent Jere Hochman said this will be the last year he will be able to say that.
“In spite of negotiations with all unions which resulted in a significantly reduced trajectory of salary and benefit increases (reduced to 3 percent), the board’s use of reserves ($3 million), and previous year’s cuts and efficiencies, this budget includes over $2 million in cuts and some changes in service expectations,” he said.
http://mtkisco.dailyvoice.com/news/bedford-schools-make-more-cuts-keep-budget-under-tax-cap
Freddie Mac Weekly Rate Report Lagging Reality | Bedford Corners Real Estate
The venerable Freddie Mac Primary Mortgage Market Survey (PMMS™) is a cornerstone of mortgage rate data. It is both longstanding and highly accurate in capturing week-over-week movement. The only problem is that it is unavoidably backward-looking due to its methodology. There’s no scandal here and Freddie does a good job of convey that methodology, saying
“The survey is collected from Monday through Wednesday and the results are released on Thursdays at 10 a.m. ET. Survey reminder emails are sent out on Mondays and lenders are asked to respond by close of business Wednesday. If we have received no response on Tuesday, we follow-up with a reminder email on Wednesday morning.”
There’s no harm in this if one of two conditions are met. Either rates need to be flat enough so that there’s a minimal discrepancy between Thursday morning’s rates and Freddie’s (which will be most similar to Monday or Tuesday’s rates) or mortgage rate watchers must be familiar enough with the methodology that they know it’s backward-looking. The latter isn’t going to happen on a broad scale and the former is hit and miss.
This week is a miss.
The very best rates of the week (close to the best in more than 3 months!) were seen on Monday. There would be no issues with today’s PMMS had it not been for the abrupt increase in rates over the past 2 days. As it happens, the 0.09% drop reported is more like a 0.14% increase. This is based on the average of actual lender rate sheets (not quotes that lenders subjectively report to Freddie) from last Thursday morning to this morning.
Mortgage News Daily’s “daily mortgage rate” is updated every day and adjusted for changes in closing costs that aren’t necessarily large enough to prompt a change in the actual “note rate.” These typically move in .125% increments and rates typically don’t move that much in a day–many times even in a week!
This week they did. Last Thursday morning, we calculated an adjusted “Best-Execution” rate of 4.35%, meaning that most borrowers would be quoted 4.375% with minimal closing costs and that some would be seeing 4.25%. Apart from this Monday, that’s the closest we’ve been to 4.25% since February 10th.
Today’s calculated rate is all the way up to 4.49%! It’s still early in the day for a final calculation as lenders may undergo price changes in the middle of the day, but as of right now, the true difference in cost–expressed in terms of interest rate–is indeed 0.14%. That means that most borrowers will be at least .125% higher in actual note rate (i.e. a quote of 4.375% last Thursday is likely going to be 4.5% with minimal differences in closing costs. 4.25% would be 4.375%).
U.S. 30-Year Mortgage Rates Decline for First Time in Four Weeks | Pound Ridge Real Estate
U.S. mortgage rates for 30-year loans fell for the first time in four weeks, decreasing borrowing costs for homebuyers as the recovery in prices stretched into 2014.
The average rate for a 30-year fixed mortgage was 4.28 percent this week, down from 4.37 percent, Freddie Mac said today. The average 15-year rate slipped to 3.32 percent from 3.39 percent, the McLean, Virginia-based mortgage-finance company said.
U.S. home values continue to rise as buyers compete for a limited supply of properties for sale. Prices climbed 12 percent in January from a year earlier, the 23rd consecutive gain, Irvine, California-based CoreLogic Inc. said this week.
“Prices are still growing at very high rates because the markets are still tight,” Patrick Newport, an economist with IHS Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts, said in an interview yesterday. “We haven’t been building enough homes at high enough rates for five or six years.”
Rising prices and tougher credit standards have shut out some first-time buyers, slowing the pace of the housing recovery. First-timers accounted for 26 percent of purchases in January, down from 30 percent a year earlier and the smallest share in more than five years of data-keeping, according to the National Association of Realtors.
How Many Homeowners Are Still Underwater? | Bedford Hills NY Homes
With the help of low inventory levels and unprecedented actions by the Federal Reserve, higher home prices have been a life preserver to the real estate market. Millions of Americans are no longer underwater on their mortgages, but millions of homeowners are still struggling in the wake of the housing bubble.
In the fourth quarter of 2013, the national negative equity rate declined to 19.4 percent of all homeowners with a mortgage, according to Zillow’s latest Negative Equity Report. The reduction comes after the previous quarter witnessed the fastest decline on record. In comparison, 27.5 percent of homeowners with a mortgage were underwater one year earlier. The peak was made in the first quarter of 2012, at 31.4 percent.
The national negative equity rate has now declined for six consecutive years. In fact, this is the first time in years that the rate dipped below 20 percent. Almost 3.9 million homeowners were freed from negative equity during the final three months of 2013. While this is a significant improvement, many people are still underwater, especially in certain states. Nevada leads the nation with 34 percent of borrowers owing more than their homes are worth, followed by Georgia at 32 percent.
http://wallstcheatsheet.com/politics/economy/how-many-homeowners-are-still-underwater.html/?ref=YF