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Out-of-sync mortgage laws create housing recovery hurdle | Chappaqua NY Homes
via housingwire.com
After Nearly Three Years, Negative Equity Refuses to Budge | Chappaqua NY Real Estate
As the nation’s real estate economy has evolved and slowly improved over the past two and a half years, the geography of almost every leading metric measuring the health of local housing markets has changed to reflect local economic trends and conditions except the one that many economists and policy makers consider to be critical to the national economic recovery.
Even though 1.3 million homeowners have reached positive equity since the end of last year and the national percentage of homeowners who owe more on their homes than they are worth declined from 24.1 to 23.7 percent in the second quarter (see One Homeowner Out of Eight Undervalues Their Home), the same eight states account for two out of three underwater mortgages in the nation.
California, Florida, Arizona, Nevada, Michigan, Illinois, Ohio and Georgia accounted for 67 percent of all underwater mortgages in the fourth quarter of 2009. In the second quarter of 2012, those eight states were still home to 67 percent of underwater mortgages, though the total number of underwater mortgages declined from 11,321,676 to 10,746,556, according to an analysis of CoreLogic data. The eight states accounted for 42 to 42.5 percent of the nation’s mortgages during that period.
Negative equity contributes to high rates of mortgage defaults, reduced demand for home purchases
The stubborn concentration of negative equity in a minority of states over nearly three years suggests that the impact of negative equity is felt much more at a regional or local level and that causes may be more local or regional in nature than national, even
The importance of housing debt to the national economy was the subject of a report in the Washington Post yesterday regarding a 2011 White House meeting where several leading economists urged the Administration to take additional steps to reduce housing debt. The economist argued that huge debts resulting from declining home values caused consumers to cut back dramatically on buying cars, appliances, furniture and groceries. The more they owed, the less they spent, whereas people with little debt hardly slowed spending at all. The economists said the president could have significantly accelerated the slow economic recovery if he had better addressed the overhang of mortgage debt left when housing prices collapsed..
In the second quarter of 2012, the most recent CoreLogic data available, Nevada had the highest percentage of mortgaged properties in negative equity at 59 percent, followed by Florida (43 percent), Arizona (40 percent), Georgia (36 percent) and Michigan (33 percent). These top five states combined account for 34.1 percent of the total amount of negative equity in the U.S.
In the fourth quarter of 2009, the first of CoreLogic’s quarterly negative equity reports, negative equity was also concentrated in five states: Nevada, which had the highest percentage negative equity with 70 percent of all of its mortgaged properties underwater, followed by Arizona (51 percent), Florida (48 percent), Michigan (39 percent) and California (35 percent). Among the top five states, the average negative equity share was 42 percent, compared to 15 percent for the remaining 45 states. In numerical terms, California (2.4 million) and Florida (2.2 million) had the largest number of negative equity mortgages accounting for 4.6 million, or 41 percent, of all negative equity loans.
The bulk of negative equity is also concentrated in the low end of the housing market. For example, for low-to-mid value homes (less than $200,000), the negative equity share was 32 percent in the second quarter of this year, almost twice the 17 percent for borrowers with home values greater than $200,000.
Top 10 Social Networking Sites by Market Share of Visits [October 2012] | Chappaqua Real Estate
via dreamgrow.com
Recovery Softens as More Markets End Year with Annual Price Decline | Chappaqua NY Real Estate
Over the past few months, the number of markets experiencing year-over-year price declines has steadily increased, while the number experiencing list price increases has steadily declined. Compared to one year ago, a higher number of markets are ending the year with a year-over-year price decline (44 in 2012 vs. 36 in 2011) and a lower number of markets have a year-over-year price increase (71 in 2012 vs.84 in 2011).
Realtor.com’s October Trend report shows that, on a year-over-year basis, October median list prices were up by 1 percent or more in 71 of 146 MSAs, and up by 5 percent or more in 36 MSAs. Median list prices were down by 1% or more in 44 markets, while 13 experienced a decline of more than 5 percent. The remaining 31 markets have not experienced significant changes in median list prices compared to a year ago. The nationwide median list price decreased from $191,500 in September to $189,900 in October, exactly the same level as it was a year ago, effectively erasing all of the gains that accompanied the onset of the 2012 spring home buying season.
California markets continue to dominate the list of areas experiencing the largest year-over-year increases in their median list prices. In addition, Phoenix, AZ, Atlanta GA, Seattle, WA, and Las Vegas, NV in the list of top performers. While Florida markets have been performing relatively well for more than a year, many of these other markets were registering large year-over-year price declines in October 2011. The 10 markets with the largest year-over-year list price increase are shown below.
The total US for-sale inventory of single family homes, condos, townhomes and co-ops dropped to its lowest point since 2007, with 1.76 million units for sale in October, down -17.00 percent compared to a year ago and more than 40 percent below its peak of 3.1 million units in September 2007. The median age of the inventory was down by 11.81 percent.
For sale inventories in October declined on an annual basis in all but five of the 146 MSAs monitored by Realtor.com, with for-sale inventory dropping by 20 percent or more in 44 of the 146 markets covered. Although the rate of decline has moderated somewhat in recent months, many areas continue to see dramatic declines in their for-sale inventories compared to one year ago.
The median age of inventory of for sale listings was 97 days in October, up by 2.11 percent from September, but 11.81 percent below the median age one year ago (October 2011). While the median age of the inventory is highly seasonal, the year-over-year decline is consistent with other data showing that market conditions are tightening.
Being A Pushy Used Car Salesman with Social Media! | Chappaqua NY Realtor
The reason is simply because of. Thanks to thought leaders like Mark Zuckerberg, the whole way that we perceive salespeople and marketing tactics, is changing at a rapid pace. Plus now we have a way to stay connected and engaged with our clients/prospects in a seemingly real way. It’s every salesperson’s goal to be the first person your past clients think of when they are ready to buy your product and services again.
Thanks to social media you can make that happen. You just have to be cool about it.
Social is Visual
We are becoming more visually stimulated beings. We want to look at content with infographics. We want to look at facebook posts with pictures.
On a side note: I think it is all fault. Things that really stand out and are aesthetically pleasing to our eyes are the only things that matter these days. It’s no longer a world were cold hard sales calls full of feature dumping, are the most effective way of marketing.
Matter of fact they are the least effective.
Is Email Effective?
Let’s talk about the variety of ways you can stay in touch with your past, present and future clients. First up, let’s look at email. Email is no longer considered one of the highest ways to market. The truth is, that the average email open rate is only 12%. Don’t EVEN allow me to go there on direct mail. Most of it gets thrown away, and only 7% of direct-mailers actually show a positive ROI.
Even traditional media is becoming less and less influential. (unless you’re in politics) Only 16% of all TV and Radio marketing campaigns yield a positive ROI. Now, don’t get me wrong. If you are doing these things, you are good at them and getting above average results, DON’T STOP. Always keep doing what works.
Solve Problems Rather than “Selling”
What these numbers tell us, is that our audience is getting smarter. They’re getting more hip to the same old sales pitches. The marketplace is demanding for someone to listen to them. Someone to give them transparency in marketing. Someone to show them where their pain actually is, and then cure that pain. You need to step into that space, and step out of being an old school pushy salesperson.
You are now responsible for being THE , with a much needed solution to their big a$$ problem. It’s at this point when your sphere of influence becomes a buyer from you. It’s at that point that you become a “Closer”, the sales equivalent of a “Made (Wo)Man” It’s that plain and simple.
So you might ask “That’s all fine and cool, but how do I go about doing that?”
My answer to you is simple. “Follow the steps below.”
Step 1: Listen to your audience.
How do you listen to your audience with out physically talking to them? The best way to listen to your audience, without having to pick up phone and have a conversation with them, or without having to really get to know them better is to stalk them online. Take a look at their page. Take a look at their Twitter, their LinkedIn page, find out the things that they’re saying. Actually read their posts. Look at their pictures and familiarize yourself with their online character. Chances are, what they care about on SM and in life are usually the same.
See if your prospects talk about their family life. See if they are into sports. Look and see how often they post about their business. This gives you instant ammo to start a conversation that they also WANT to have. With a little finesse, you will have them telling you what you need to hear in order to close the deal.
Step 2: Connect and engage with your audience.
We all know that it takes seven touches in order to influence an individual and for them to become familiar with you. We also know that people buy from people they know like and trust. With these things in mind the easiest, fastest, and most influential way to accomplish the seven touches you need, can be done easily via social media.
- The first touch comes from the prospect seeing your post.
- The second touch comes from when they like or comment on your post.
- The third touch comes from you @taggging them in your response comment.
- The fourth touch is a gimme, everyone likes to see their name written and hear it spoken.
- The fifth is when almost all SM sites automatically send an email when you mention them, retweet them or whatever.
- The sixth and seventh are when you keep the conversation going by keeping the comments engaging.
Remember this: Statements end in a period. To really engage your sentences should end in question marks. There’s the six and seven touches that you need accomplish to immediately gain influence and familiarity with your audience. this compels them to buy from you, without you having to jam features and verbally vomit why they should be buying from you.
Let them come to you and say “this is why I’m with you, it’s because of your expertise.”
Step 3: Question the confession
So what does question the confession actually mean? Well first off, that’s my saying. I believe you have to ask the right to make a sale. Too often times salespeople try to tell tell tell tell tell tell tell. If I’m constantly just telling you stuff/features, and even if you’re listening, you’re only trying to convince them of something you’re not closing,
A true closer is waiting for the prospect to talk about the bad. Many times we are on sales calls and listening but to only the good things. Who cares about good things? If things were good, you would not be talking. You poke around and ask the hard questions. The ones that make them uncomfortable and realize they need improvement. Then once they tell you what that pain is, you tell them you can make that pain go away. Easy, simple and a lot less words and energy.
The Sales Conversation
One more thing you must know though. There’s a big difference between just a conversation, and a SALES . A conversation is someone that you’re just talking to about your business, and has no inclination of buying your stuff, and is not even remotely interested in your services. A sales conversation is knowing you have someone on the line that has the ability to buy your product. A sales conversation is with someone who can significantly and immediately benefit from what you have. So now with that being clear…
Ask More Questions
So we are having a sales conversation, then what? Turn that conversation over completely to them. You ask short questions, they give long answers. If their answers are short, ask more/better questions. This requires a great deal of patience. In the end, they will have told you what they are good at and if you are good, they will have told you what they are bad at. It’s at that very moment you offer the solution you know will fix the problem. If they show resistance your response is simply “but you did say that you [insert what they said here]” it is at that point they usually say “you’re right, thank you, let’s do this”
Three simple steps you can use to convert social media friends into great customers that you know and like working with. Try it. it is not easy, but it is simple. If you will simply have a little patience and wait for them to tell it, you can SELL IT!
The Perfect Length of a Tweet is 71-100 Characters | Chappaqua NY Real Estate
All Tweets are the same, right? Fewer than 140 characters.
It’s not readily apparent that the length of a Tweet has an impact on the number of people who engage with it. Advertisers who use Twitter to reach their customers need all the insights they can get, especially those who are paying for promoted tweets. A recent study by Track Social, a social media analytics firm, looks at the effect of Tweet length on response levels as measured by retweets.
On Twitter, smaller is not better.
On Facebook, engagement normally decreases as post length increases. Track Social found that the opposite happens on Twitter — engagement increases as Tweet length increases.
With an upper limit of 140 characters, shorter tweets don’t stand out from the crowd and tend to be overlooked. Engagement levels are rather flat between 71 and 100 characters, and decrease as the 140 character limit approaches. 71-100 characters is the sweet spot — enough space to say something that resonates with followers plus room for retweeters to add their own references and comments.
No guarantee of success
Writing a tweet that’s in the middle of the character range doesn’t guarantee increased engagement, and short or long Tweets aren’t doomed to fail. Responses to Tweets depend on many factors, including content, frequency, and timing.
Advice
- Short, punchy statements don’t work especially well on Twitter.
- Try using images to effectively increase Tweet length.
- Avoid pushing up against the 140 character limit whenever possible.
via pamorama.net
Sandy States Get Clobbered with Foreclosures | Chappaqua Real Estate
New Jersey , New York and Connecticut got hit with a storm of new foreclosures just days before Superstorm Sandy smashed homes and a knocked out power to missions of homeowners.
RealtyTrac reported foreclosure filings on 186,455 U.S. properties in October, an increase of 3 percent from September but down 19 percent from October 2011.
“We continued to see vastly different foreclosure trends across the country in October, depending primarily on how each state’s foreclosing infrastructure was able to handle the high volume of delinquent loans during the worst of the foreclosure crisis in 2010,” said Daren Blomquist, vice president of RealtyTrac.
“Unfortunately the three states dealing with the biggest rebound in deferred foreclosure activity — New Jersey, New York and Connecticut — also had to deal with the devastation to homes inflicted by super storm Sandy. The foreclosure moratoriums being put into effect as a result of the storm will likely extend the already-lengthy time to foreclose in these states, further prolonging a fundamentally sound housing recovery.”
The three states with the biggest annual increases in foreclosure activity in October were New Jersey (140 percent), New York (123 percent) and Connecticut (41 percent). Other states with sizable increases were Maryland (27 percent), Ohio (24 percent) and Illinois (19 percent).
An analysis of foreclosure activity and inventory in the counties most impacted by super storm Sandy in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York shows foreclosure activity in October was down 8 percent from September but up 92 percent from a year ago, and an estimated $41 billion in foreclosure inventory in those counties.
Florida posted the nation’s highest foreclosure rate for the second month in a row, with one in every 312 housing units with a foreclosure filing in October, followed by Nevada, Illinois, California and Arizona.
Scheduled foreclosure auctions in October increased 9 percent from September, while default notices and bank repossessions (REO) were virtually unchanged from the previous month.
Foreclosure activity increased on a month-over-month basis in more than half of the 212 metro areas tracked in the report, and jumped significantly in some hard-hit metro areas, including Modesto, Calif. (up 68 percent), Sarasota, Fla. (up 53 percent), Las Vegas, Nev. (up 45 percent), Columbus, Ohio (up 61 percent), and Columbia, S.C. (up 58 percent).
Analysis of foreclosure activity and rates in counties
In the 34 counties impacted by Sandy in Connecticut, New Jersey and New York that are being given individual assistance by FEMA, a total of 6,380 properties had foreclosure filings in October, down 8 percent from September but an increase of 92 percent from October 2011. Despite the sharp year-over-year increase, the foreclosure rate in those counties combined was less than half the national average: one in every 1,467 housing units with a foreclosure filing.
As of the end of October, total inventory of properties in some stage of foreclosure or bank owned in these counties was 124,608, up 15 percent from the previous month and up 54 percent from October 2011. The estimated combined market value of foreclosure inventory in the impacted counties was more than $41 billion.
Fannie Mae owned the biggest percentage of REO inventory of any lender in the impacted counties in all three states, with 29 percent in New York, 25 percent in New Jersey, and 22 percent in Connecticut. Other lenders with large percentages of REO inventory in the impacted counties included Wells Fargo, US BankCorp and Deutsche Bank.
Foreclosure starts up slightly
Foreclosure starts — default notices or scheduled foreclosure auctions, depending on the state — were filed for the first time on 89,209 U.S. properties in October, a 2 percent increase from September but still down 19 percent from October 2011 — the third straight month with an annual decrease in foreclosure starts.
Foreclosure starts increased from the previous month in 26 states, including Nevada (54 percent), Tennessee (52 percent), Minnesota (28 percent), North Carolina (26 percent), New York (17 percent) and Georgia (16 percent).
Foreclosure starts increased from a year ago in 15 states, including New Jersey (286 percent), Washington (163 percent), New York (163 percent), Pennsylvania (42 percent), North Carolina (38 percent), and Nevada (20 percent).
Bank repossessions decrease annually for 24th straight month
Lenders completed the foreclosure process on 53,478 U.S. properties in October, down less than 1 percent from the previous month but down 21 percent from October 2011 — the 24th straight month with an annual decrease in REO activity.
REO activity decreased annually in 37 states and the District of Columbia. Some of the biggest decreases were in Oregon (81 percent), Virginia (72 percent), Washington (56 percent), Nevada (50 percent), Texas (41 percent), Michigan (35 percent), Arizona (33 percent), and California (20 percent).
States with some of the biggest annual increases in REO activity included Connecticut (44 percent), Maryland (38 percent), South Carolina (37 percent), New York (33 percent) and Georgia (22 percent).
Florida, Nevada, Illinois post highest state foreclosure rates
Florida registered the nation’s highest state foreclosure rate for the second month in a row. One in every 312 Florida housing units had a foreclosure filing in October — more than twice the national average. A total of 28,783 Florida properties had a foreclosure filing in October, up 2 percent from the previous month and a 12-month high, but the October 2012 total was still 13 percent below the October 2011 total.
A 41 percent monthly increase in overall foreclosure activity helped push the Nevada foreclosure rate to the second highest in the nation in October, up from the nation’s fifth highest foreclosure rate in September. One in every 352 Nevada housing units had a foreclosure filing during the month, twice the national average. Foreclosure starts (NOD) in Nevada increased 54 percent from the previous month and were up 20 percent from a year ago — the first annual increase in Nevada foreclosure starts after 32 consecutive months of annual decreases. Nevada REOs increased 69 percent from the previous month but were still down 50 percent from a year ago.
One in every 356 Illinois housing units had a foreclosure filing in October, the nation’s third highest state foreclosure rate. A total of 14,899 Illinois properties had a foreclosure filing during the month, a 6 percent increase from the previous month and a 19 percent increase from a year ago — the 10th consecutive month where Illinois documented an annual increase in foreclosure activity.
Other states with foreclosure rates among the nation’s 10 highest were California (one in every 379 housing units with a foreclosure filing), Arizona (one in 420 housing units), Georgia (one in every 439 housing units), Ohio (one in every 476 housing units), Colorado (one in 563 housing units), South Carolina (one in every 601 housing units), and Michigan (one in every 607 housing units).
Foreclosure activity increases from previous month in 53 percent of metros
October foreclosure activity increased from the previous month in 113 of the 212 metropolitan statistical areas tracked in the report (53 percent). Six of the metro areas with the 10 highest foreclosure rates documented a monthly increase in foreclosure activity, including Modesto, Calif. (68 percent), Visalia-Porterville, Calif. (58 percent), Palm Bay-Melbourne-Titusville, Fla. (71 percent).
Twenty-six of the metro areas with the 50 highest foreclosure rates documented a monthly increase in foreclosure activity, including Sarasota, Fla. (53 percent), Las Vegas, Nev. (45 percent), Columbus, Ohio (61 percent) and Columbia, S.C. (58 percent).
Proposed budget for Westchester County, NY, includes 126 layoffs, no tax hike | Chappaqua Realtor
The Westchester County executive says he’ll have to lay off 126 workers, mostly in social services, to balance next year’s budget.
County Executive Robert Astorino says the layoffs wouldn’t be necessary if workers in Westchester’s largest union had agreed to contribute to health care costs. The union says it’s still negotiating.
Astorino’s $1.72 billion proposal sticks to his no-tax-increase pledge for a third year. He said Wednesday the layoffs are necessary to offset the increased costs of salaries, health care, pensions and Medicaid.
Astorino’s budget would cut funding for three neighborhood health centers and increase the amount parents would pay for day care.
He also proposes borrowing to cover some pension costs and the costs of court-ordered tax reductions.
The county Legislature has until Dec. 27 to adopt a budget.
via therepublic.com
Quick Tip: The art of the retweet | Chappaqua Luxury Homes
One of the easiest ways to provide valuable information to your followers and add to your content strategy on Twitter, is to retweet valuable information. As part of an overall social media strategy, you should retweet a few things each day that you think are interesting, consistent with your brand message and that you think your followers may read. But, what most people don’t realize is that there is the “art of the retweet.”
There are two ways to retweet a message. The first way, is that you can simply click the “retweet button” under a tweet. If you do that, that tweet gets sent out to all of your followers exactly as is – as if it were from them (not you.) The other way to retweet (which is a much better way in my opinion), is to copy the tweet into a new tweet, add the characters: “RT” and then add a short note at the beginning or the end.
Here are a few screenshots to explain:
Option 1:
Click the “retweet” button
Option 2:
Copy text
Click ‘reply’ and then copy/paste
What is the difference? See below!
Important: When you tweet the second way, the person you retweeted gets an “@” notification that you retweeted them. When you retweet the first way, they are NOT notified unless they have their email notifications turned on.
For mobile users:
If you are on a mobile device, here is how you can do this easily.Click the ‘retweet’ button, and then click “quote tweet”
You can then add your text below
In social media, many times it is the little things that make a big difference – and this is one of them! Would love your feedback about this article, leave me a comment below!
via next.inman.com