Thursday, December 18, 2008
Recent actions by the Federal Reserve have resulted in mortgage rates dropping to their lowest levels since 2003.
Homebuyers: Did you know that a % change in interest rates is equal to a 5% change in the sales price of a home? That means the recent dramatic drop in interest rates is equal to at least a 10% reduction in home sales prices. To take advantage of this opportunity, start your home search NOW on JohnLScott.com or Find out more about the mortgage options available to you!
Homeowners: Significantly reduce your monthly mortgage payment by refinancing to a lower rate loan. Request Information about reducing your payment.
Qualifying: Contrary to what you may have heard, you dont need to have perfect credit, a large down payment, or a large amount of equity in your home in order to qualify for a low interest loan. Loans still exist for the majority of people looking to purchase or refinance.
| Posted by Michael Shumway at 12:21 PM |
|
|
Thursday, December 04, 2008
The residential real estate market is just right for consumers looking for a single family home, condominium, or co-op. Pro or con?
Pro: Get Out Your Wallet
by Thomas FitzGibbon, DePaul University
At this time in the economic cycle, one might think that venturing into the choppy waters of home buying is the last thing you should think about. But there are good reasons you should consider it.
Home prices have declined to a level that's more in line with household incomes than at any time in the past several years. Residential real estate prices were artificially inflated because of wider access to easy-to-qualify loans that had features making affordability of payments, even if only for a year or two, seem attractive. So home buyers only looked at the payment, not the loan features or the price of the property. The idea was that home prices would continue to rise, and the borrowers would at some time refinance the loan or sell the house to recoup the equity and buy a diffe...
| Posted by Michael Shumway at 10:46 AM |
|
|
Thursday, July 31, 2008
Culminating months of intensive advocacy efforts by the entire NAHB federation, the Senate has approved a major housing stimulus package that will go to the President's desk to be signed into law shortly.
"This landmark bill contains several provisions to help home buyers, stop the slide in home prices, provide a lifeline to borrowers facing foreclosure, improve mortgage liquidity and bolster confidence in Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac," said NAHB President Sandy Dunn. "We commend Congress for working in a bipartisan fashion to provide much-needed relief to the American people."
For the past year, NAHB has been in the forefront in pushing for legislation to address the turmoil in the financial and housing markets and to bolster the nation's faltering economy.
Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), a chief architect of the bill, calls it "the most important piece of housing legislation in a generation."
Echoing those comments, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) sa...
| Posted by Michael Shumway at 6:19 AM |
|
|
Wednesday, June 25, 2008
There is a new player coming in the wireless Internet arena. Is your home office ready?
| Posted by Michael Shumway at 8:18 PM |
|
|
Tuesday, March 25, 2008
Please don't let me spoil a good cathartic experience for you. If you are certain the sky will fall, then by all means wear a helmet and turn elsewhere for confirmation. I enjoy amateur economics, you know, basic stuff like supply and demand. In my job, we study the real estate market in the Treasure Valleyand have been closely monitoring residential inventory since 2006 after the unfathomable sales year of 2005. At this point, you probably know there is an extreme excess supply of residential lots and, in my opinion, a much more reasonable supply of finished home inventory. I would argue that the market has been correcting itself for some time and we have made considerable progress toward equilibrium.
One way to evaluate the trend of finished residential inventory supply is to study the change in inventory by month from one year to another. Because we live in Idaho, winter both impedes the construction process and the buying process. During the holiday period, people are other...
| Posted by Nora Kormylo at 3:00 PM |
|
|
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
Gradual Recovery Through Spring
Boise, ID: Home sales statistics for February show that 360 Single Family Homes sold in Ada County according to figures released by the Intermountain MLS and reported by the Ada County Association of REALTORS®.
According to the National Association of REALTORS® Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist said many buyers have been waiting for higher mortgage loan limits. "The higher loan limits for both FHA and conventional loans will increase consumer choice and provide greater access to lower interest rate mortgages in high-cost regions," he said. "Therefore, a notable rise in home sales can be anticipated in the second half of the year."????????
"Buyer activity is continuing to grow," said ACAR President Dan Hernandez. "February sales are up 16% compared to last month. Sellers are coming back gauging the temperature of the market and getting ready for the spring."
Median home prices for existing homes ...
| Posted by Nora Kormylo at 12:48 PM |
|
|
Monday, March 10, 2008
This is a very confusing time in our economy, and especially in the real estate market. We hear from the national media that values will continue to drop on homes and that we should wait to buy a home.
Interest rates are down and I want to buy, but I'm afraid and not sure what to do! That is what we are hearing from a number of people. It is a very important decision and there is a lot to consider.
First of all not all states and city's are created equally. Every city or community has their own economy. The problem with these statements from the national media is that they do not tell us what is really happening in our own community. Even the local papers are quoting some expert in Washington D.C., New York or wherever! We need to know our local market. In the Treasure Valley we are very lucky as we have very low unemployment, a healthy commercial building climate, job creation and growth, low crime rates and mild weather, which all create an atmosphere where people want to liv...
| Posted by Mike Pennington at 2:35 PM |
|
|
Tuesday, February 26, 2008
Best States for Jobs
Anthony Balderrama, CareerBuilder.com writer
Location is everything, according to the real estate adage. Many people learn the wisdom of these words after they move into their first apartment on a tight budget and have a view of a landfill and the smells that come from it.
The same holds true for job hunting. Your chances of finding the right job - or any job, really - depend on where you live. The unemployment rate is the ratio of job seekers to the working population. Therefore, a low percentage means few people are having any difficulty finding work.If you're looking for a job, you want to be in a state that has an unemployment rate lower than the national average, which is 5 percent according to the most recent data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Here are the 15 best states to find work ranked by their unemployment rates.
1. South Dakota
Unemployment rat...
| Posted by Nora Kormylo at 2:04 PM |
|
|
Monday, February 25, 2008
Here's an article from Time Magazine, February 25, 2008 titled "Ignore the Headlines"...
Famed Money Manager is perhaps best known for his timeless wisdom that you can beat the pros by focusing on stocks of companies where you either work or shop or have some other edge. But a more relevant Lynchism today is this gem: Ignore the headlines.
That's no easy thing. How do you tune out all the chatter and ink on recession, housing, subprime woes, the credit crunch, rogue traders, insolvent bond insurers, $100 oil and nukes in Iran? It's enough to make you sit on your thumbs and wait before making any big moves. But what, exactly, are you waiting for?
There has rarely been a moment in history when you couldn't scare yourself into doing nothing. And yet, as Lynch observed nearly 20 years ago, "in spite of all the great and minor calamities that have occurred ... all the thousands of reasons that the world might be coming to an end--owning stocks has continued to be twice as ...
| Posted by Nora Kormylo at 2:05 PM |
|
|
Tuesday, February 05, 2008
Issues with enough bandwidth are just around the corner, but service providers are getting ahead of the trend.
| Posted by Michael Shumway at 1:11 PM |
|
|