Best Time to Buy AND Best Time to Sell?
If you know a great real estate professional, you might be questioning them right now. They may tell a friend of yours
in the afternoon that this is a great time to buy a home and in the evening tell another friend that they have to lower their price in order to sell their home. Wait a minute. How can it be a great time to buy if prices are falling? Is the real estate agent just saying this to make a sale? Actually, the agent is 100% correct. Perhaps for the first time in American real estate history, you must buy now and you must sell now. How can this be? Because what is important to the buyer is different than what is important to the seller. Let us explain.
The most important thing to the seller: PRICE
Every seller is most concerned with trying to get the best price possible for their home. In order to do that, they must sell now. Banks repossessed the highest number of foreclosed homes in history last month. These houses will come to market at dramatically discounted prices. This is the main reason analysts are calling for another dip in prices over the next eighteen months. The best advice a seller can receive is to sell their home now before these foreclosures come to market.
The most important thing to the buyer: COST
Price plays a part in the buyer’s decision. However, the most important thing to most buyers is the cost – the mortgage payment they must pay every month. That payment is determined by the price of the home AND THE INTEREST RATE ON THE MORTGAGE. Rates are artificially low because of government intervention. That will not last forever.
The National Association of Realtors (NAR) has projected that rates will rise over the next seven quarters. What will that do to the cost? Here are NAR’s projections and what impact it will have on a $100,000 mortgage:
As we can see, the interest rate has a major impact on the COST of the home. Even if prices continue to fall, the cost may not go down if interest rates increase.
Bottom Line
Your real estate agent is trying to give the best advice they can to every family they work with – even if that advice seems to be counter intuitive.
Will Your House Be Worth More in the Spring?
This is a question anyone thinking about selling must ask. Should they sell now or should they wait for the spring?
Most years that would be an interesting question. There is a belief that many buyers come out in the spring and, with that increase in demand for housing, prices may appreciate. This year is unlike any year in recent memory. Most experts believe there will be continuing depreciation of home values throughout the next 18 months.
As we posted on recently, there may be a window of opportunity throughout the rest of 2010 as the banks try to straighten out the paperwork on thousands of foreclosures. Once that paperwork is corrected, the flow of distressed properties coming to the market at discounted prices will begin again.
This was mentioned in the latest Home Price Expectation Survey. Robert Shiller, MacroMarkets co-founder and chief economist said this:
“Over the past month, the average projection for 2010 nationwide home price performance improved slightly among our experts, but for each year thereafter it deteriorated. One plausible explanation for this month’s more negative overall sentiment is recent news concerning foreclosure processing questions and the related possibility of extending the supply pipeline.”
Other experts are also reporting that prices will soften next year
In October’s RPX Monthly Housing Market Report, CEO Michael Feder commented:
“We are at a flex point in housing valuation. With record supply, already paltry demand and systemic threats to a possible correction, we remain terribly concerned about forward home prices.”
The very next day, in a special release, Clear Capital reported a “sudden and dramatic” drop in U.S. home prices:
Most recent data shows a two-month 5.9% price decline representing a magnitude and speed of decline not seen since March 2009; similar declines for September and October expected to appear in other industry indices in coming months.
Bottom Line
If you plan to sell within the next year, you shouldn’t wait for the spring market. Price your home at a compelling price to make sure it sells in the next sixty days.
5 Reasons to Use a Real Estate Professional
Should you spend the money on a real estate commission or save that money by selling your home by yourself? That is a question many home sellers ask themselves. Today, we want to discuss why it is crucial to have a true professional guiding you through the minefield of challenges that exist in the current real estate market.
The housing market today is more challenging than it has ever been and seems to be becoming more difficult each day. What impact will foreclosures have on prices? Which loan products that were available just last month are no longer available? How do you convince perspective purchasers to pull the trigger on an offer when everyone is telling them that they should see another 100 houses before they make a decision? These are tough questions for a trained, experienced professional. The lay person would find it almost impossible to keep abreast of this rapidly evolving industry.
1. Pricing Is Difficult
Just a few years ago, you didn’t have to worry about overpricing your home. If it was too high, all you needed to do was wait as historic appreciation was taking place. The situation is quite different today. With experts calling for another drop in home values, overpricing your property will cost you time. In this market, time costs you money. A professional real estate agent will discuss how increasing inventory could dramatically impact the value of your property in the months to come. They will help you set the right price in today’s market.
2. Negotiating Ability Is Crucial
Buyers today have an almost unlimited supply of homes from which to choose. They realize that puts them in a great negotiating position. Most buyers are now being represented by an agent. Sellers need to also be represented by a professional expert trained to negotiate real estate contracts.
3. Mortgaging Is Key to the Deal
The biggest impact of the housing market collapse is that lending standards are much stricter today than they were a few short years ago. Rules are constantly changing. Even FHA has gone through a guidelines overhaul in the last several months. You need a real estate expert who has teamed up with a knowledgeable mortgage professional to make sure that the buyer in the deal is in fact capable of obtaining a mortgage. Losing time with an unqualified buyer costs you money in a market where prices are falling.
4. Your Family’s Safety
We have always found it puzzling that the same person that will lock every door and window and set the alarm today will then allow total strangers into their house tomorrow. The real estate industry trains its practitioners to take steps to protect themselves and their clients. Take advantage of putting a person between you and the person calling on an ad or yard sign.
5. You Probably Have More Important Things to Do
Selling a home could turn into a full time job. Learning the necessary disclosures, coordinating the dates of your closings, dealing with a challenge regarding your appraisal and re-negotiating the offer after an engineer’s report are just a few of the concerns you may face. You would probably be better off spending that time with the items important to you and your family and leaving the challenges to your agent.
Bottom Line
To make sure the sale of your home is handled professionally – hire a trained professional. In the long run, you will wind-up with more money in your pocket and have fewer challenges with the move.
The Giving Spirit
Did you know giving back to the community not only benefits others, but can also improve your health? It’s what is known as a “helper’s high”: volunteers report greater life satisfaction and better physical and mental health than non-volunteers.
The holiday season always inspires generosity, and in today’s challenging economic climate, there are many non-monetary ways to give back to your community. Check out the ideas below for inspiration, then add a few new ones of your own!
• Donate “gently worn” clothing and coats to a local shelter.
• Read to at-risk kids or help them with their homework.
• Collect and deliver toys to a charity or firehouse in your area.
• Hold a canned food drive to benefit your local food bank.
• Serve a meal at a senior center or soup kitchen.
• Organize a group to sing carols at a nursing home.
• Visit hospitals or nursing homes to cheer up patients
or residents who seldom get visitors.
For more volunteer ideas in your area, check out
Volunteer-Match (www.volunteermatch.org) or
Craigslist’s volunteer section (www.craigslist.org).
Foreclosure Mess Update!
Banks have lifted their freeze on foreclosures. It seems a doomsday scenario will be averted. There is no way to absolutely predict what the fallout will be from the banks’ negligence in their foreclosure filings. There will be lawsuits and some will cry out for the banks to make forms of restitution to injured parties. However, it seems the problem will not be of the magnitude originally expected.
The title companies who were threatening not to issue insurance to some foreclosed properties are softening their position as well. The Wall Street Journal reported:
Title insurers have decided not to require lenders to provide a blanket shield from claims caused by flawed foreclosures after discussions around crafting an industry-wide agreement fell apart.
… First American Financial Corp. said Thursday that the Santa Ana, Calif., company had concluded that requiring banks to indemnify the title insurer from foreclosure errors resulting in questions about who owns clear title to a property was unnecessary “given the actions taken by lenders to remediate deficiencies and to improve their processes going forward,” said Dennis Gilmore, First American’s chief executive.
… Stewart Title Guaranty Co. said in a statement Thursday that the unit of Stewart Information Services Corp., of Houston, “stands ready to issue its title insurance to purchasers of foreclosed properties from institutional lenders representing that they have followed all applicable legal processes.”
Terrie Fink And Associates 
