Archive for the 'Local Issues' Category
4 Terms You Must Know As A Buyer
February 28th, 2008 categories: Local Issues, Short Sales & Foreclosures
I attended an investor meeting around a year ago in the area. People were going around the room and talking about transactions that they were working on at the time. A guy spoke up to mention that he was working on a “short sale” transaction. The leader of the meeting interrupted him to take a count of people who understood what a “short sale” was.
At that time there were only around 3 people out of 200 in the room who had ever heard of a “short sale!”
Who would have thought that a year later, we would not only know more about them, but hundreds of the listings on the market would be “short sales?”
I wonder now how many people still don’t know what some of the terms we use mean? Here is a short list to help you understand 4 major types of sales transactions you may see when looking at homes online: (these definitions were taken from a friend over at the San Diego Housing Blog).
- Traditional Sale: Owner needs to or wants to sell and has equity. At closing, seller will receive proceeds from the sale.
- Distress sale: Owner needs to sell due to personal circumstances. Time is of the essence, they are highly motivated (not selling is not an option).
- Short sale: At closing, proceeds from the sale will be Read the rest of this entry »
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Vote For The Dulles Rail
February 26th, 2008 categories: Local Events, Local Issues
Like many of you, I am a strong advocate of the Metro coming to the Dulles area. As the growth in the area continues as predicted we must be able to address the traffic issues.Here is your chance to speak up!
You can sign a petition here for your voice to be heard along with many others to let our leaders know how important it is that this project continue.
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4 Statistics Waiting Buyers Should Know
February 20th, 2008 categories: Local Issues, Market Statistics
There is a lot that economist look at when forecasting the growth or decline of a real estate market. Here are four stats that reveal the PENT UP activity taking place in our current market taken from the past couple of years. These stats are taken from an article written by Lawrence Yun, Cheif Economist with the National Association Of Realtors. You can read the whole article here.
1. Net job gains have increased by 4.3 million according to both company payroll data and household survey data.
2. U.S. aggregate personal income has risen by $1.4 trillion over the past two years.
3. These job gains should have translated into 2 million additional homeowners, however there were only 600,000. During the same time period, housing affordability has improved, income has risen, and conforming mortgage rates are near a historic low.
4. With normal population and job increases, household formation typically expands by 1.2 million to 1.5 million a year.
These stats obviously reveal that many buyers are holding out for the right time to buy. The question is, what will be their sign? When will they know it is time to buy?
My assumption is that we will not see a huge increase in purchasers until they see that prices are stabilizing.
Lawrence Yun, Cheif Economist says, “Though pent-up demand clearly exists, it is still tricky to anticipate when a meaningful recovery will take place. I do not foresee any major existing-home sales declines from this point onwards, but sales could remain at their current soft pace for a while. Will it be spring or summer or fall when we will see a notable pick-up in home sales? Difficult to say, but it will happen in 2008.”
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Someone At The Bank Is Losing It…
February 14th, 2008 categories: Local Issues, Real Estate News, Short Sales & Foreclosures
I don’t claim to understand all of the process that a bank goes through when foreclosing on a home.
Here is what I do understand…
A lot of them gave out loans that they shouldn’t have, to a bunch of people that shouldn’t have been able to get them. Fine. We all make mistakes and some buyers have dug their own ditch. So, both parties are responsible and we have to get passed pointing fingers and start coming up with solutions.
We don’t just have people who couldn’t afford their payments. We have people who can’t afford their payment once their ARM (adjustable rate mortgage) expires. You say… Why don’t they just refinance? Good question. The answer is that they can’t refinance because the home will not appraise for what they owe on it so a lender will not give them another loan. That sucks.
So, what happens?People stop making payment and end up in some level of foreclosure. When this happens to A LOT OF PEOPLE we end up where we are right now. In a recession because so much is tied to housing.
It seems to make a lot of sense that instead of banks loosing thousands and thousands of dollars on these foreclosures that they would just contact the owner of the home and re-negotiate the loan or extend the lock on the ARM. I know this can’t work for everyone but it would help. Its better to loose a little than a lot.
There are a lot of first time buyers that like the prices on these homes but are having a difficult time getting them financed because the bank won’t give a loan on a home that is in such poor condition (most are). It also takes SOOOOOOO long to get answers and responses from banks when putting in an offer on the homes.
So, the circle continues. Too much inventory, buyers can’t get loans as easily, homes won’t appraise for re-financing so people loose more homes.
I think a really good start would be for banks to have enough people on hand to handle these issues.
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Tomorrow Matters For Virginia: Poll Locations
February 11th, 2008 categories: Local Events, Local Issues
Usually after Super Tuesday it doesn’t really matter what state primaries are left. In fact, I can’t even remember primaries being that big of a deal in the past but now they are. I will resist promoting my political opinion but I do encourage you to take advantage of the freedom that we have to vote by heading to the polls today.
If you are looking for the correct location to go:
Loudoun County click here
Fairfax County click here
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One Good Thing About Declining Home Values
February 9th, 2008 categories: Buyers, Local Issues, Loudoun County, Real Estate News, Sellers
When you live in a town home, yelling up the stairs becomes an accepted form of communication. I found our new county tax assessment in the mail this morning so I yelled upstairs to see if there was any other surprises that came with it. Not a chance. I was encouraged to see that the value was dropped in the eyes of the county.
Fine by me… However, more important than the value dropping is the county dropping me a check in the mail refunding the extra that I paid this year. I won’t hold my breath on that one.
You should be receiving yours also if you live in Loudoun County if you haven’t already.
After looking it over, you will probably notice one thing…
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Don’t Derail This Train!
February 7th, 2008 categories: Local Issues, Loudoun County
Living in Northern Virginia is great. We are close to the city, not too far from the mountains, all the shopping a woman could want (my wife says this), and we have the Redskins, (at least their practice field).
Nevertheless, if you were to ask people the number one complaint about living here it is the TRAFFIC. Everything that has been built or planned off of the Route 7 Corridor of Fairfax and Loudoun County in the last few years has had in mind the extension of the metro from the Orange Line in Falls Church to Ashburn. We thought redemption was close. Even builders included the extension of the metro as part of their sales pitch of why “This” was a great location for appreciation.
Not Too Fast…
It appears that this train is close to being derailed because of the FTA trying to pull funding because of increased costs. Think of that… The government is playing the frugal card.
I like the frugal card. I am a tight myself. However, in my opinion, this is a project that must continue. The toll road has no room for more lanes, route 7 is a quicker on a bike, and there seems to be no end to people moving to this area (which is a good thing).
The metro will not fix all of the traffic issues but it sure will help. It is said that it would cut back on as many of 4 new lanes of roadway. It will also cut down on gasoline expense, which I like. The good news is that Gov. Kaine is working to resolve the issue and there are a lot of stubborn people in Northern VA that will fight or complain until we get this train moving.
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