Where Oh Where Have All the Distressed Sales Gone? The signing of the Attorneys General agreement five months ago was supposed to speed up foreclosure processing and move more properties through the pipeline faster than we’ve seen since Robogate. Over the past year, new initiatives by the GSEs and the biggest banks, and improved transaction management technology were supposed to get record numbers of short sales to closing faster and easier than ever.So what the heck happened?If you’re … [Read more...]
Is Buying a Foreclosure a Good Idea?
September 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Is buying a foreclosure a good idea? Maybe. Are you looking to buy a home to live in or are you an investor? If you're goal is to occupy the property as your primary residence, buying a foreclosure may be right for you. You can get more bang for your buck by purchasing a home that needs a little TLC. But if you are a real estate investor, buying a foreclosure may not be a good idea at all. Here are four important steps to follow when buying a foreclosure to live in as your home: Hire a … [Read more...]
How Does The Recent QE3 FED Announcement Affect Mortgage Rates?
September 15, 2012 By Leave a Comment
How Does The Recent QE3 FED Announcement Affect Mortgage Rates? The Federal Reserve made an announcement on September 13, 2012 about their plans to support a stronger economic recovery. This was a much anticipated announcement, because of what the actions will do to mortgage rates and the overall economy in the future.The two major actions the FED plans on doing as part of this QE3 are:Purchase additional mortgage-backed securities at a pace of $40 billion per month.Extend the target range … [Read more...]
Legislating Disaster in Nevada and Maryland: Good Intentions Gone Wrong
August 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Legislating Disaster in Nevada and Maryland: Good Intentions Gone Wrong It stands to reason that if you pass a law delaying something bad for your local housing economy, like foreclosures, in hopes of buying time to help a few defaulting borrowers, you’ll be delaying the inevitable and all other homeowners in the market will eventually pay the price in the form of delayed depressed values and extended pain.That’s pretty much what’s happening right now in several states with new laws … [Read more...]
The Convoluted World Of Real Estate Handouts
July 26, 2012 By Leave a Comment
The Convoluted World Of Real Estate HandoutsTwo weeks ago, we found our company in a position that, somehow, we had not dealt with in our years of buying real estate in Memphis and Dallas. After having completed close to 800 transactions in the last 3 years, last week was the first time we had run into a closing where the seller used a government program to assist in the sale of the home. Not only was a government program used, but the bank involved in the loan got into the act as well and … [Read more...]
Why Aren’t Sellers Selling?
July 25, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Why Aren’t Sellers Selling?Several factors are driving the inventory drought which is dramatically changing housing markets, especially for properties under $200,000 in Western markets. HousingWire reported yesterday, for example, that Phoenix short sale prices rose 23 percent in June from last year, while foreclosures were up 36 percent and non-distress sales up 11 percent.Nationwide the drought helped push the average home sales-to-listing price ratio to 95.6 percent in June, according to … [Read more...]
Financing Your First Real Estate Deal: How to Pitch Your New Business to Banks
May 27, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Financing Your First Real Estate Deal: How to Pitch Your New Business to BanksWould you lend to two recent college graduates who formed a partnership to invest in real estate, with little starting capital, and no business or real estate background? Just a few short years ago I was one of those college grads, eager to get my real estate investing company off the ground, and as you can imagine, securing financing to purchase our first investment property was a major hurdle. The housing collapse … [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...]
Marketshare Decline With Foreclosures And Short Sales
April 20, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Marketshare Decline With Foreclosures And Short SalesAccording to latest Realtor Confidence Index survey by the National Association of Realtors, a sign that lenders have not yet released large volumes of backlogged foreclosure inventory by the end of March, when the survey was conducted. Fewer numbers of foreclosures and short sales also accounted for a decline in the distressed sale market share in March. March foreclosures fell to 18 percent from 20 percent of all sales in January and … [Read more...]
How a Commercial Short Sale Can Save the Day
April 19, 2012 By Leave a Comment
How a Commercial Short Sale Can Save the DayAs an investor, you’re looking for opportunities to help people. That should be your ultimate goal.Often, in bad economic times (like the past few years), companies need to reduce their asset load due to decreases in property values. In essence, the properties that were once assets are now burdens and foreclosure is a very real possibility. However, for an investor with a focus on what will happen down the road – not how the next mortgage payment … [Read more...]
Report on the Foreclosure Storm
April 18, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Report on the Foreclosure Storm On March 12, the multi-state Attorneys General agreement was filed, ending the Robogate scandal and opening the way for expedited foreclosure processing. Foreclosure activity hit a five-year low in the first quarter according to RealtyTrac and Lender Processing Services reports first-time foreclosures remained stable in February as repeat foreclosures saw an 8 percent month-over-month decrease. Even delinquencies were down 12.2 percent from last March, … [Read more...]
Real Estate News: Week of April 7 – April 13
April 14, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Real Estate News: Week of April 7 – April 13A quick rundown of the important real estate news from the week of April 7 – April 13, by the numbers:10% – Increase in foreclosure filings in the first quarter, in states where the foreclosure process must undergo judicial scrutiny. The increase in fillings come on the heels of the $26 billion mortgage settlement between the government and the nation’s largest mortgage lender.2.4% – Decrease in mortgage applications (seasonally adjusted) … [Read more...]
A Home Run with Hard Money?
April 13, 2012 By Leave a Comment
A Home Run with Hard Money?I had made up my mind. No more debt.No more credit cards. No more car payments. No more hard money loans. Sure, paying 18% was steep. But that wasn’t the real reason I decided to give up leveraging my fix and flip deals. Borrowing money had bankrupted me in 2007. The funny thing about creditors is they don’t give a damn if your real estate investment portfolio drops in value by 65% – they still want their monthly payment.Then the summer of 2009 rolled … [Read more...]
Real Estate News Week of March 31 – April 6
April 7, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Real Estate News Week of March 31 – April 6A quick rundown of the important real estate news from the week of March 31 – April 6, by the numbers:120,000 – New jobs added to the U.S. economy in March. The number was disappointing, as it was half the jobs added the previous month.8.2% – Unemployment rate in March, down from 8.3% in February. However, the drop was largely due to a shrinking labor force, as many stopped looking for jobs.$15.2 Million – Purchase price of singer Julio … [Read more...]
Distressed Borrower Programs The Current Scoup
April 3, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Distressed Borrower Programs The Current Scoup Bank of America Offers Principal Reductions Up to $100,000 According to the Los Angeles Times, these principal reductions will be made on loans that were originated by Countrywide Financial and packaged into securities. Bank of America acquired Countrywide in 2008, along with their good and bad assets. According to Reuters, qualified borrowers are expected to receive principal reductions averaging over $100,000. Those receiving the reductions … [Read more...]
Real Estate News Week of March 10 – March 16
March 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment
A quick rundown of the important real estate news from the week of March 10 – March 16, by the numbers:35% – Amount who think the economy is heading in the right direction according to a Fannie Mae survey. The reading is 19% higher than results of a November survey.3.9% – Increase in seller’s ask price, year-over-year, as of March 5. Seller’s ask price increased year-over-year for the first time in 6 years this past December.21 – States that had an increase in foreclosure filings in … [Read more...]
What Happened To All the Foreclosures?
March 5, 2012 By Leave a Comment
What Happened To All the Foreclosures?There’s something missing from the nation’s foreclosure capital. It seems that while no one was looking all of the Nevada foreclosures have disappeared. Has the market finally absorbed all of the delinquent homes so that markets can return to some semblance of normality? Hardly. You can thank a new state law – with a wave of a magician’s ward, and a quick abracadabra, the overabundance of foreclosures have gone poof.In the last legislative session … [Read more...]
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Why Investors Were the Real Heroes of 2011
Why Investors Were the Real Heroes of 2011 A single survey, even if conducted to meet the highest professional standards of opinion research, can only include a limited number of questions, and thus, it can address a finite number of issues.That was the case with the Joint BiggerPockets.com/Memphis Invest survey released last week. I had the pleasure to participate in its design and execution, and we focused to three vital issue investors face: their purchasing plans for the near future … [Read more...]