Nick and Cindy Davis\’s Blog

The move, if it could be pulled off, would keep an abundance of listings off the market and make renting more affordable. Read more.

Hello!  We hope you had a great July 4^th and are enjoying the Summer thus far!    If you are currently marketing your home for sale or looking to do so in the near future, this month™s Item of Value includes great information on how to stage your Kitchen for a sale “ without the cost of remodeling.   With the Kitchen being the centerpiece of the home, making it inviting can help buyers visualize living in your house.   Even if you aren™t looking to sell, these valuable tips will help you get the most enjoyment out of your Kitchen space.  As always, if we can be of any assistance please don™t hesitate to contact us.  

Hello!  We hope you had a great July 4^th and are enjoying the Summer thus far!    If you are currently marketing your home for sale or looking to do so in the near future, this month™s Item of Value includes great information on how to stage your Kitchen for a sale “ without the cost of remodeling.   With the Kitchen being the centerpiece of the home, making it inviting can help buyers visualize living in your house.   Even if you aren™t looking to sell, these valuable tips will help you get the most enjoyment out of your Kitchen space.  As always, if we can be of any assistance please don™t hesitate to contact us.  

Cash continues to be king. NAR reports that 30% of May home sales went to cash buyers, up from 25% in May 2010. Read more.

Hello!

Owners receive a letter saying their mortgage has been sold; but payments end up in scammers’ pockets. Read more.

Higher homestead exemptions and falling values have removed thousands of houses from local property tax rolls.

Read more.

SAN FRANCISCO “ May 20, 2011 “ Trulia and RealtyTrac released the latest results of an ongoing survey that has tracked American attitudes toward foreclosed homes since 2008.

Key findings

¢ More than half (54 percent) of U.S. adults believe recovery in the housing market will not happen until 2014 or later. In a previous survey conducted six months ago, 42 percent said they thought the market would turn around by 2012 or had already turned around. Now, only 23 percent continue to think this will happen.

¢ 45 percent of American adults say the government is not doing enough to prevent foreclosures. Only 17 percent say too much is being done, while 16 percent say government is doing the right amount, and 22 percent say they aren™t sure.

¢ Almost one-third (30 percent) of homeowners say that they or an acquaintance has applied for a loan modification, stopped paying their mortgage, been foreclosed, walked away or short sold their home.

¢   More than half of U.S. renters (56 percent) and 47 percent of current homeowners are at least somewhat likely to purchase a foreclosed home. Along with having some concerns about hidden costs, a risky buying process and loss in home value, many potential buyers expect to save money if they buy a foreclosure versus a similar non-foreclosed home. In fact, American adults expect to pay 38 percent less for a foreclosed home than a similar home that was not in foreclosure “ not too far above the average discount of 36 percent on sales of bank-owned homes (REO) compared to sales of homes not in foreclosure reported in the RealtyTrac 2010 Foreclosure Sales Report.

This April 2011 survey was conducted online within the United States by Harris Interactive on behalf of Trulia between April 15-19, 2011, among 2,018 U.S. adults aged 18 years and older. The sample included 1,257 homeowners, 906 of whom currently have a mortgage, and 704 renters. Figures for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, region and household income were weighted where necessary to bring them into line with their actual proportions in the population. Propensity score weighting was used to adjust for respondents™ propensity to be online.

© 2011 Florida Realtors ®

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. “ May 17, 2011 “ If you have clients who served in Iraq or Afghanistan during 2010, they™ll want to know about new legislation providing a tax break for homestead owners.

HB 1141 implements a constitutional amendment approved by voters in 2010 and provides a new homestead exemption for military personnel on active duty overseas. The exemption is based on the amount of time the individual served overseas.

How to calculate the tax break
Taxable value of the property multiplied by the percentage of time spent overseas in 2010. (Calculate percentage of time spent overseas by taking the number of days overseas and dividing it by 365).

So, if someone spent six months overseas in 2010, he or she would get a 50 percent discount. If someone spent the entire year overseas (12 months), he or she would get a 100 percent discount.

The property tax discount applies to 2011 taxes, but applicants must apply to their county property appraiser by June 1. If applicants miss the June 1 deadline, they have a second chance, but must apply with 25 days of receiving their assessment notice (TRIM Notice) and demonstrate extenuating circumstances.

œSince many counties do not even have an application form yet, you might recommend (that applicants) send a letter to their county appraiser before June 1, says
Vicki Weber, an attorney with Hopping Green & Sams in Tallahassee, Fla. œIn the letter, they should say, ˜I know about HB 1141, and I was deployed overseas last year. I qualify, and I will submit an application as soon as you send me one. But in the meantime, consider this my application.™

After 2011, the application deadline is March 1.

Questions? Call Florida Realtors Legal Hotline, an included member benefit for Realtors in Florida at (407) 438-1409.

© 2011 Florida Realtors ®

WASHINGTON “ May 16, 2011 “ Home sales are on track to outperform last year, even though the market doesn™t have the benefit of the homebuyer tax credit, NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun told a packed room on Thursday during the Residential Economic Update at the 2011 Realtors ® Midyear Legislative Meetings.

Yun credits sustained economic growth, the slowly recovering jobs picture and historically high affordability conditions. Although unemployment remains high at about 9 percent, the country is seeing steady job growth. More than 100,000 jobs are being created a month, and the U.S. could see 1.5 million net new jobs this year, Yun said.

Frank Nothaft, chief economist for secondary mortgage market company Freddie Mac, said he expects a bit more robust job growth that Yun “ closer to 2 million “ but both economists said the unemployment rate will remain high despite the new jobs because of the size of the hole that needs to be filled. More than 8 million jobs were lost during the 2008-09 recession, and new entrants to the labor force, such as recent college graduates, add another 2 million to the hole.

Both Yun and Nothaft predict home sales a little higher than 5 million, which would improve upon last year even though 2010 had the artificial stimulus of the tax credit.

Historically high affordability is one of the key drivers of the improved sales performance. NAR™s affordability index is at its highest level ever, at nearly 170, which means households earning the national median income have 170 percent of the income needed to buy a home at the national median price.

Behind the affordable conditions are low interest rates, which today are below 5 percent, and home prices that are rising in some areas (like booming North Dakota), will remain quite a bit below their peak during the housing boom. The high number of distressed homes (those in which the value is below the amount of equity the owners have in them) is one of the main reasons values are struggling to get off the bottom.

Yun said that overly strict lending standards are holding back more robust sales: 2010 mortgage originations have a lower serious delinquency rate than those originated in 2002, when serious delinquencies were barely above 1 percent. And 2011 is shaping up to be another stellar year in delinquency rates because lenders still require extraordinarily high credit scores and other hurdles to obtaining financing.

œIf lenders would just go back to the normal standards that were in place prior to the boom years, sales might be 20 percent higher, Yun said.

Although he™s seeing no signs of lenders opening up on lending yet, Yun said conditions are in place for lenders to start easing up. They™re sitting on plenty of money, and they could be reaching the point at which they can earn more revenues at reasonable risk levels by making home loans than by doing other things with their money. œI™m not seeing that yet, but that is a potential upside, he said.

In some ways, the heroes of housing today are the all-cash buyers. They™re 40 percent of the market now, so they™re helping to drive sales despite the tight availability of financing. Yun thinks all-cash buyers are investors who either can™t get financing or think they can get a better return on their cash by putting it into real estate than they can in savings instruments or stocks, particularly given the rock-bottom process of so many houses. He also thinks some empty-nest baby boomers might be acting as the lender for their children, buying a home for them on an all-cash basis and taking back a note. œI™m seeing this anecdotally. I don™t know if it™s a trend, he said.

Yun™s forecast: The U.S. economy will grow about 2.5 percent this year, with between 1.5 and 2 million new jobs added to the economy. Home sales will reach about 5.1 million, up 7-10 percent from last year, with home values staying virtually unchanged.

Nothaft had a largely similar forecast.

Source: Robert Freedman, Realtor ® Magazine

© 2011 Florida Realtors ®