Multi-Family Investments: Still Great for Investors + New Local Market AnalysisWhoever said multifamily dwellings are a dying investment clearly hasn’t looked at the recent numbers. Even though the housing market has been lackluster the past few years, the multifamily rental market appears to be growing. This is due to several factors including:Young adults moving out of their parents’ homes. Families and individuals who had to let their homes go back to the bank in a foreclosure. … [Read more...]
Housing Update: Distressed Sales Hang Tough
May 23, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Housing Update: Distressed Sales Hang ToughAnnouncements that a recovery is underway are not paying attention to the huge piece of the home sales pie belonging to foreclosures and short sales. Distressed market share is not diminishing in the middle of the spring sales season and it is the first time in two years when prices are rising in a majority of markets.Improving prices are supposed to inspire sellers to act, but if they are, then there is a rush of distressed properties pouting into … [Read more...]
Top Turnaround Towns: Tomorrow’s Hot Real Estate Markets
May 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Top Turnaround Towns: Tomorrow’s Hot Real Estate MarketsWant to know where home prices will be rising in the coming months? No longer do you need to toss darts at a dart board or guess. Someone has actually created an index using the very, very freshest listing data combined with economic metrics to scientifically select tomorrow’s hot markets.Every quarter Move, Inc. operator of Realtor.com, publishes the Top Turnaround Towns (There used to be ten’ we just expanded to 25). As a member of … [Read more...]
Embracing the Two-tiered Real Estate Marketplace
April 11, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Embracing the Two-tiered Real Estate MarketplaceIf you want to buy a Ford, you don’t expect to pay a Mercedes price, do you? Fords and Mercedes are two different automotive submarkets; about all they have in common are four wheels and a horn.So if you want to buy an REO, you should expect to pay a significant discount from the price of all non-REO properties in the neighborhood because they also are two different tiers of the housing market. That reality has existed since the first wave of … [Read more...]
The Real Estate Market Reports are False!
April 2, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Have you read headlines recently that read something along the lines of, "housing market is showing improvement."? Ha! The truth is, the real estate markets in most parts of the country are far worse than are being reported. The fact remains that shadow inventory is huge...in fact, it's bigger than analysts are able to calculate due to their limited access to the whole picture. While some estimate the shadow inventory size at 1.6M, others estimate 10M-20M. That's a big range! The … [Read more...]
Investor: More Activity in Short Sales
March 29, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Investor: More Activity in Short SalesThe total share of distressed properties in the housing market in February, as represented by the HousingPulse Distressed Property Index (DPI), continued to climb, reaching a near-record of 48.7%, using a three-month moving average. This was the second highest level ever recorded by HousingPulse and the 25th month in a row that the DPI has been above 40%. All of the growth in the distressed property share of the housing market over the past six months has … [Read more...]
Seller Financing: How Investors Can Get Involved
February 15, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Seller Financing: How Investors Can Get InvolvedThe housing market is flooded with inventory, which reduces demand for any given house. And mortgage approval rates are down, making it tough for buyers to get financing.Sounds like a rotten situation for sellers and buyers. But not necessarily. Despite these difficulties, it’s possible to get creative with financing – seller financing, that is.Seller financing is simply the seller offering to finance the buyer’s loan. It’s kind of like a … [Read more...]
Real Estate News by the Numbers: Week of February 4 – February 10
February 12, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Real Estate News by the Numbers: Week of February 4 – February 10A quick rundown of the important real estate news from the week of February 4 – February 10, by the numbers:Less than 50% – Number of lenders offering mortgages to applicants with FICO scores less than 620 and a 10 % down payment. Borrowers are being rejected, even though the applicants fit within the government sponsored enterprises’ purchasing guidelines.3.33% – Drop in consumer sentiment in January from the previous … [Read more...]
How Do Parks And Recreational Spaces Effect Your Investments?
February 9, 2012 By Leave a Comment
How Do Parks And Recreational Spaces Effect Your Investments?Sometimes there is more to a pleasant park than meets the eye. In fact, on some occasions you may actually lose value in a property if the recreational area is poorly policed or badly maintained.Particularly in today’s housing market, which sports many vacant houses and localities in which property taxes simply [...]Read the full post here... … [Read more...]
Appreciation or Cash Flow — Which is Better?
January 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Appreciation or Cash Flow — Which is Better?Yes I know, I am treading into a debate which in all likelihood would cause a real brawl if discussed over a few beers, but that is not my intention.My intention is really simple. Is today’s market a better market to be investing for appreciation or for cashflow? In some markets the answer might be BOTH, but I doubt it!I am constantly discussing goals and objectives with new and experienced real estate investors and invariably the discussion … [Read more...]
Is New Gov’t Foreclosure Plan a Good Deal?
January 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, cited a plan to pilot a program early this year which would convert government-owned foreclosure properties into rentals. Foreclosures now owned by Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and HUD would be sold to investors in bulk. Is this new government foreclosure plan a good deal?After recently acquiring $450 million in vacant foreclosed homes with a plan to rent them out, John Brady, Oaktree Capital Management's head of global real estate, said, "We believe that this … [Read more...]
What Do the REITs Know That You Don’t?
January 11, 2012 By Leave a Comment
What Do the REITs Know That You Don't?Morgan Stanley’s report Housing Market Insights – A Rentership Society was released recently and has a fantastic prediction for real estate investors and those that are operating in the bulk REO arena scouting packages. One of the study’s authors, Oliver Chang, was interviewed recently on CNBC and has some encouraging news for investors.What do you think about what Oliver has to say in the video?.Read the full post here... … [Read more...]
What Do the REITs Know That You Don’t?
January 11, 2012 By Leave a Comment
What Do the REITs Know That You Don't?Morgan Stanley’s report Housing Market Insights – A Rentership Society was released recently and has a fantastic prediction for real estate investors and those that are operating in the bulk REO arena scouting packages. One of the study’s authors, Oliver Chang, was interviewed recently on CNBC and has some encouraging news for investors.What do you think about what Oliver has to say in the video?.Read the full post here... … [Read more...]
Equity Investors and the Economy?
November 8, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Equity Investors and the Economy? On September 7, Kerry Curry wrote an interesting article on Housing Wire entitled “New Normal Means a Lot More Pain to Come.” I read the article, which addresses our existing housing market. In it, an economist for the Federal Reserve Bank in St. Louis discusses how our “new normal” in housing is marked by 2% to 3% growth rates, more frequent recessions, and decreased consumer spending. The article also states that equity investors who can purchase … [Read more...]
Future Predictions? Watch out Dips?
October 27, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Future Predictions? Watch out Dips?You know how irritating it is to hear Christmas songs way earlier than you should? Like if you're shopping in October and they're already playing Jingle Bells? Well, that's the way I feel about housing predictions for Spring in the Fall. It's just to soon to tell.Read the full post here... … [Read more...]
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A Sawtooth Recovery: Validation of What You can Expect in Our Housing Market!
A Sawtooth Recovery: Validation of What You can Expect in Our Housing Market! Back in May of 2010 I wrote an article for BiggerPockets with the title of, “A Saw Tooth Recovery.” By the title you can guess that the housing recovery was expected to see ups and downs in both prices and inventory until a full recovery could be expected. Two years later it seems that indeed we are in the middle of a Saw Tooth Recovery. As predicted, we are just now experiencing a bottom in inventory and … [Read more...]