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Bedford Hills NY Real Estate

In a hot real-estate market, buyers make their pitches personal | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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With painfully few homes on the market and the “sweet” Medford Colonial the perfect place to raise the baby they are expecting, Elizabeth Deutsch and Brian Rosen were determined to vanquish the competing bidders. Not only did they offer $11,000 above the asking price, but they wrote the couple who owned the home a personal note. “Dear Caleb and Autumn,” it began.

 

Small problem: Lisa, not Autumn, is the name of Caleb’s wife. Autumn is their dog, a boxer-terrier mix : beloved, but not a decision-maker in real estate matters.

 

“They got the place anyway,” said their broker, Ed Greable of Keller Williams Realty. “The owners got a laugh out of it.”

 

You would be cheerful, too, if you were a seller in spring 2013. And if you were a buyer, you might also be writing nice notes to sellers.

 

 

With inventory down and prices rising, buyers are exhibiting the kind of frenzied behavior not seen since 2005. It is not enough that they are mobbing open houses, bidding thousands of dollars over asking price, and making all-cash offers. They are going so far as to Google owners and craft pitches in which they pretend to enjoy the same things the sellers do. Family photos are not uncommon.

 

“The garage would be a great place to store my kayak,” one aspiring buyer, a nonkayaker, wrote to a kayaking owner. Some would-be buyers linger at open houses to eavesdrop on the competition. Greable said one client regularly called him from packed open houses. “The vultures are here,” she would whisper.

 

In a hot real-estate market, buyers make their pitches personal – Lifestyle – The Boston Globe.

What to know about open houses | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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A full 94% of sellers do some “staging,” such as repainting or bringing in new furniture, says Coldwell Banker. “You can be so wowed by staging that you overlook important things,” says San Jose Realtor Carl San Miguel.

To focus on what matters, lift rugs to look at floors, ask the agent to turn off music so you can listen for nearby noise, and beware of any smells masked by candles. Also request a disclosure sheet, which lists known structural issues.

See what else CNNMoney advises regarding open homes here.

 

What to know about open houses | HousingWire.

Impact Of Mortgage Refinance On Housing | Bedford Hills Homes

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Mortgage refinance applications have been taking a hit recently.

This morning’s MBA purchase applications showed that refinance index was down 15% for the May 31st week.

The refinancing index is down four straight weeks, and was down 12% the previous week.

Refinance applications tends to be more sensitive to a rise in mortgage rates.

The MBA 30-year fixed mortgage rate climbed from 3.59% in the first week of May to 4.07% in the first week of June. The decline in refinance activity reflects the rise in mortgage rates, Ed Stansfield, chief housing economist at Capital Economics explained in an email interview.

There are three key reasons to watch this data.

First, despite the recent sharp rise, mortgage rates are still at low levels. So the impact on refinance activity shows that both the housing market and overall economic confidence are still “fragile” and the the recovery is dependent on the loose monetary policy.

Second, is the impact on consumer spending, which Stansfield doesn’t think will be “large.”

Third, for those with adjustable rate mortgages (ARM) the rising interest rates have been a bigger blow. “This could offset some of the benefits of falling unemployment on delinquency rates, though again I would not really expect this effect to be large based on the rise in mortgage rates seen so far.”

 

Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Impact Of Mortgage Refinance On Housing | Bedford Hills Homes.

Robust growth seen to prop up real estate | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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FORECAST ROBUST growth within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) is expected to prop up the real estate sector on the back of strong domestic demand, according to a report from consulting firm Jones Lang LaSalle released yesterday.

In particular, growth will be experienced in the office, industrial and logistics and retail spaces.

“This growth translates to robust domestic investment into commercial property, driving demand for office and logistics space.

“Increased consumer spending will boost demand for expanded retail formats, which in turn will support the developments of retail malls and the subsequent accompanying infrastructure in emerging markets,” said Chris Fossick, managing director of Jones Lang LaSalle Singapore and Southeast Asia.

Add to the upbeat outlook is the “increased transparency in the real estate market” in ASEAN economies, or proper disclosure of costs and transactions involved in property ownership.

The consulting firm said in its recent transparency report that six ASEAN countries saw improved scores last year, namely, Singapore, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Vietnam.

Meanwhile, Jones Lang LaSalle sees a growing labor market, more sophisticated needs and new markets as key opportunities for the property sector.

“While economic growth drives corporate activity across Southeast Asia, businesses are making changes to accommodate growing workforce and modernized office spaces in new, emerging markets,” the report said.

In particular, Jakarta, the Philippines and Thailand were cited to rising demand in office space.

It said the Philippines “often overlooked by investors, witnessed record levels in demand for office space, sparking new developments in previously unexplored sub markets and a 3% rise in rents from the same period 2012.”

Indonesia was noted to have more than doubled its office space demand in four years, while Thailand saw a recovery in its real estate market.

Jones Lang LaSalle said “demand for offices will spike and vacancy levels are forecasted to reach historic lows by 2014.”

The industrial and logistics market will also see growth “thanks to improvements in Southeast Asian economies and international trade, ASEAN industrial and logistics markets have reached historic highs and show no signs of slowing, as trade volumes are predicted to increase by 130%.”

“Real estate will have a critical role in driving trade and industrial growth,” the firm said. It added many markets have already experienced an increase in rates as most developers “will seek new markets.”

Further, the consulting firm noted that stronger consumer confidence is expected to drive the retail market.

Jones Lang LaSalle said Indonesia leads the region in retail market growth followed by Thailand.

“… (T)he retail industry is in a unique position to influence and be involved in many key aspects of development in the Southeast Asia region, both economic and social. There is a role for the industry in areas such as infrastructure, housing, education, health care, tourism and industry and trade which are all inextricably linked,” said Mr. Fossick.

 

Robust growth seen to prop up real estate | BusinessWorld Online.

Another subprime bomb on the way? | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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The Telegraph says demand for subprime bonds surged in the first part of 2013, leading global investors to fear a repeat of the financial crisis.

The demand for subprime bonds is higher with yields on Treasury bonds still low, The Telegraph added.

The paper quotes Peter Schiff, head of investment firm Euro Pacific Capital, as saying it seems the financial markets are willing to travel down the same road again.

 

Another subprime bomb on the way? | HousingWire.

San Francisco Median Home Price Tops $1 Million | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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Earlier this month, San Francisco reached a potentially dubious milestone–themedian price of a home in the city topped $1 million.

To give a sense of just how quickly this has happened, its important to note that the current median price is a 32 percent jump from where its sat last year.

The phenomenon isn’t solely confined to San Francisco proper. Other Bay Area cities are experiencing similar surges in housing prices, leading the whole region to see a 22 percent increase in prices over the past twelve months.

This is great news for current homeowners thinking about cashing out and moving to the Bahamas. But for everyone else it raises two questions: 1. Where can I get one of those internet millionaire jobs I keep hearing so much about, and 2. Are we in the midst of the housing bubble?

According to a recent study by real estate brokerage house Redfin, San Francisco is one of the cities in the United States most likely to be experiencing a real estate bubblebased on a host of factors ranging from the ratio of home prices to median household income, the speed at which prices are growing and the speed at which houses are sold after being listed on the market.

“The normal laws of economics don’t apply to the Bay Area,” Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman told HuffPost in April. “You could have huge unemployment numbers here and home prices would still go up because [the supply is so constrained and] there are enough people with limitless amounts of money who want to live there.”

Unlike the real estate bubble that triggered the Great Recession, the Bay Area’s newfound growth in home prices isn’t fueled by sketchy financing (“Do you have a heartbeat and signature? Here are the keys to this 12 bedroom estate!”). Instead, what’s going on is directly tied to the strength of the Bay Area’s largely tech-fueled job market, which is drawing an influx of wealthy people into areas where there isn’t enough supply to go around.

The reason for the Bay Area’s lack of supply is largely due to the aftershocks of the last bubble, which devastated the construction industry and led to far fewer houses being built to accommodate the region’s swelling population.

Some of that is starting to change–especially in San Francisco, where a construction boom is simultaneously creating new housing units after years of virtually nothing coming onto the market–but the new construction isn’t happening fast enough to stabilize demand.

While the Fed is helping to keep interest rates low, which makes buying a house considerably cheaper, the money coming into some pockets of the Bay Area is so great that it’s common for properties to stay on the market for less than a week and the majority of buyers are paying entirely with cash.

However, it’s not only internet millionaires acquiring scores of Bay Area real estate with mountains of cold, hard cash. The practice of house flipping–where an investor buys a property (often with cash), fixes it up and then sells it almost immediately to make a profit both on the renovation and the rising tide of the housing market–is back with a vengeance.

 

San Francisco Median Home Price Tops $1 Million.

Why House Flippers Might Get Hosed | Bedford Hills Homes

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They’re baa-aaack.

Reuters

House flippers helped generate the real-estate frenzy from 2003 to 2006, buying and selling homes within six months or less to turn a quick profit as home values rapidly rose. Some flippers made a killing, but in general they added to the froth that eventually pushed the housing market over the edge. As prices began to plummet, some flippers became reluctant “underwater” homeowners suddenly stuck with a white elephant.

With home prices now rising by double-digits once again, flippers are making a comeback. Research firm Realty Trac recently published a report claiming that “flipping homes will likely become more favorable for investors in 2013 as home prices are expected to continue climbing.” The top five markets for flipping, according to RealtyTrac, are Orlando, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Tampa and Memphis.

[Click here to check home loan rates in your area.]

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that the number of homes flipped in California has hit the highest level since 2005, leading a national trend. Some flippers are professional investors, but others are individuals who just happen to have the funds for an all-cash purchase. House-flipping seminars have returned in some areas, along with warnings by consumer advocates to be wary of them.

House flipping, like many forms of speculation, has a legitimate place in a capitalist economy, as long as flippers risk their own money and pose no unusual risks to the broader system. Speculators often put up capital others don’t have, which can help keep markets fluid.

Risk of getting swamped

But some real-estate experts think flippers could quickly get swamped in a market that is still prone to shocks. “They’re a real concern to me,” says Stan Humphries, chief economist at real-estate research firm Zillow (Z). “They create volatility and make prices go up more than they should. And it’s usually the less sophisticated participants who get hurt the most.”

The majority of economists think the recent rise in home prices — which soared by a nationwide average of 10.2% per year in the latest Case-Shiller report — is good news for the economy because it repairs some of the damage from a housing bust that slashed home values by 30% or more. But some feel new bubbles are forming. And a full housing recovery is still years away, with price gains likely to be jagged and unpredictable.

 

Why House Flippers Might Get Hosed | The Exchange – Yahoo! Finance.

Census Bureau: New home sales ascend | Bedford Hills Real Estate

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New home sales ascended in April, rising to 454,000 homes sold. New single-family home sales inched up 2.3% in April, above the revised March rate of 444,000.

April sales are up a dramatic 20% from the year-ago estimate of 352,000, according to data from the Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

Analysts at Econoday noted that sales are rising in the new home market despite limited supply, a mix that’s driving prices sharply higher.

“Price readings are skyrocketing, up 8.3% in April alone for the median price to $271,600. The average price, at $330,800, is up 15.4% in the month,” the analysts said.

They added, “These readings, which are not based on repeat transactions, can be volatile but the year-on-year gain, at 14.9% for both the median and the average, is very convincing and mirrors gains in yesterday’s existing home sales report.”

The median sales price of new homes sold in April picked up from $247,000 to $271,600 in the most recent month. April’s average sale price was $330,800.

At the end of April, the number of new homes for sale rose to 156,000 units, compared to 153,000 units in March. This represents a 4.1-month supply of homes at today’s sales pace, down from March.

“Home price appreciation was billed as perhaps this year’s big economic story, a story that appears to be playing out and that points to rising confidence and spending among homeowners,” according to Econoday.

 

Census Bureau: New home sales ascend | HousingWire.

Social Media Behavior Akin to Cicada Swarm | Bedford Hills Realtor

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Some parts of the east coast are already experiencing the highly anticipated emergence of cicadas.  There reception to these buggers has been decidedly mixed.  Some see the mass numbers of cicadas as gross and their presence is little more than a noisy pestilence.  Others view the coming of the cicadas as a rare sight of beauty, appreciating the significance in their appearance.  Whether or not one favors the hordes, it may behoove every observer to stay their judgment until they take a more personal look at their cicadabrethren.

Use of social media brings the casual observer much closer to cicadas than they might realize.  If one breaks down the purpose of varying social media platforms into its most basic forms and apply a bit of abstract thinking, there are five ways in which social media bridges the gap between humans and cicadas.

We tweet, they buzz:

Most savvy social media users know that Twitter is a micro blog designed to allow people to send out short messages.  Cicadas send out brief bursts of buzzing.  In essence our tweets and their buzzes function in very similar fashion, they are meant to get attention.  Furthermore, in order to be effective, tweets and buzzes happen with high frequency.  Finding one individuals tweet in a lengthy string of tweets is difficult, especially if they don’t tweet often.  Likewise, for one cicada to find another specific buzzer, the buzz needs to be reoccurring.

Summer Lovin’:

Online dating sites are essentially a form of specialized social media.  They serve to bring people together for the specific purpose of making a connection with that special someone.  While common interests and hobbies are all well and good, the end goal is to find a mate.  At the end of the 17 year life cycle for the cicadas, their buzz is a search for another cicada to help continue the species.  Humans simply have the added benefit of not expiring after reproduction.

Finding Opportunity:

LinkedIn is perhaps the most notable way for people to make those professional connections.  The idea is to present one’s credentials in order to network with like professionals or even seek new opportunities.  When all is in order, success is likely the end result.  However, others have difficulty and fall short of their goals.  Humans and cicadas both run the risk of running out of time before finding what they are looking for and miss out on an opportunity of a lifetime.

Countless Friends:

Few social media platforms allow you to claim as many friends as Facebook.  Some profiles claim numbers of friends large enough to populate a small country.  In reality the quality of those friends vary significantly but they are still apart of an individual’s social circle.  When cicadas come out in force they number in the billions.  In both cases, a sharing of significant events, like weddings or the last few days of your insect life, can be experienced with those around you.

 

Social Media Behavior Akin to Cicada Swarm | Social Media Today.

Tornado damage not easy to quantify | Bedford Hillls Real Estate

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Early estimates suggest the tragic tornado outbreak in Oklahoma this week resulted in $2 to $5 billion in insured property losses, according to weather risk-monitoring firmEQECAT. 

But calculating accurate property damage estimates in the wake of a tornado remains a challenge for analysts, insurers and the mortgage industry.

CoreLogic Spatial Solutions is currently working on a new modeling system that aims to expedite and more accurately assess tornado property damage in the days following a storm.

But tornadoes remain a challenge for scientists on the property damage front.

When compared to hurricanes and earthquakes, tornadoes are less predictable — and the damage is not equitable, making it hard to simply declare losses in an entire neighborhood without sending out ground troops to separate total losses from homes that were only partially damaged.

There is no rhyme or reason to how a tornado hits; it hits one house and leaves another, creating an inconsistent trail of destruction that is difficult to study by simply analyzing property values within a given parameter, says Tom Jeffery, senior hazard scientist at CoreLogic Spatial Solutions.

EQECAT made its initial estimate after the National Weather Service confirmed 16 tornado touchdowns on May 18, another 29 on May 19 and 31 tornadoes on May 20.

“Advance tornado forecasts and warnings were not sufficient to reduce the loss of life from these events,” EQECAT said in its report.

Jeffery says his group “was originally created to provide mortgage and insurance industries with an idea of where the risk is and where the potential for the highest amount of damage is going to be.”

The company has a large database of parcel boundaries and can use that information to easily estimate the number of properties damaged within an impacted area by combining that data with property valuation research.

But the inconsistent nature of tornadoes makes it much more difficult to get the best property damage estimate early on, Jeffery told HousingWire.

In a tornado, there will always be total losses sitting next to homes that are not damaged or only 10% damaged, he said.
“This is where the feet on the ground is valuable,” Jeffery explained.

While hurricanes and floods generally have definitive boundaries where every property is mostly impacted in some way, tornadoes create an inconsistent path for researchers.

“When those events occur, we can usually put out an estimate fairly quickly,” Jeffery said. “They leave a definitive boundary. Unfortunately, tornado activity does not provide us with a nice clear boundary. There are going to be homes that are less damaged next door to those that were completely destroyed, so we are trying to work our way through an algorithm that will allow us to do that.”

Jeffery said the goal is to be as accurate as the firm can be in the wake of a tornado incident.

 

Tornado damage not easy to quantify | HousingWire.