Shirley Kistler's Real Estate Blog: Serving your Real Estate Needs in Sacramento, Placer and El Dorado Counties » Business and Economy

Home Buyers Changing:

Shirley Kistler — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 09:00:07 +0000

With married couples comprising less than 50% of all US households, home buyers are changing. A growing number of non-family households, according to a report from John Burns Real Estate Consulting are on the increase. Non-family households where no one is related to the house holder have increased nearly five times in the last 50 years from 7.9 to 39.2 million.

A lot of non-family households are looking at SMALL HOMES: preferring a home under 2500 sf with three or fewer bedrooms. LOCATION: the proximity to work and entertainment over home size and they are less interested in media rooms and pools.

Six Mistakes Investors Make

Shirley Kistler — Thu, 19 Jan 2012 09:00:57 +0000

Investing in real estate right now can be surprisingly profitable as rents are on the increase in many areas due to the number of people losing their homes to foreclosures or doing a Short Sale of their homes.

Remember that owning rental property is time consuming, expensive, challenging, and many investors lose money.

Mistake 1: Confusing a cheap deal for a good deal – You can buy homes at a low price but that doesn’t mean you can rent them out. They usually aren’t any more appealing to rents than they are to buyers. Also less-desirable school districts may hamper renting your property.

Mistake 2: Overlooking key costs – Knowing potential rent is not enough. You should also factor in closing costs 3-6%, costs to fix up the place and maintain it, and your holding costs.

Mistake 3: Forgetting that time is money – You lose money when your home is empty, whether you are trying to rent it, in between tenants or painting. You may be better off accepting a lower rent than waiting for a higher-paying tenant.

Mistake 4: Assuming you will sit back and watch the rent roll in – You are a rent collector and sometimes tenants lose their jobs and stop paying rent. Evicting them can take several weeks without rental income coming in.

Mistake 5: Underestimating repair costs – Carpet in rentals typically must be replaced every five years and you may have to repaint after every tenant. The National Association of Residential Property Managers suggests setting aside six months of expenses so that you will have funds if a major repair is needed.

Mistake 6: Assuming that owning a rental is the same as owning a home – You might put up with flaws in a home that a renter won’t tolerate. A property manager can handle most headaches, but you should expect to pay up to a month of rent for finding and screening tenants and up to 10% of the monthly rent for management fees.

6 Mistakes Investors Make (nashvilleareahomes.wordpress.com)

New wave of foreclosures hit Sacramento again

Shirley Kistler — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 08:00:15 +0000

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The Sacramento Beepublished an article September 26, 2011 with the following statistics compiled by RealtyTrac and Foreclosure-Response.org. They placed our region’s shadow inventory at 53,256 homes in the four surrounding areas of Sacramento, Yolo, Placerand El Dorado counties.

They included in this number three categories of distressed properties:

12,285 houses already owned by banks but not sold
19,367 units whose owners have received an initial foreclosure notice, or notice of default, but have not been foreclosed on
21,604 homeowners who are 90 days or more delinquent on their payments but have not received a notice of default

Lenderare starting to pick up the pace on repossessions once again. The figures provided by RealtyTrac show foreclosures in the area soared 76% from July to August, the highest number in 11 months.

Based on this “shadow inventory” it would take a year and a half to sell these distressed homes.

To read the complete article by Rick Daysog of the Sacramento Bee click here

Home Buyers Changing

Shirley Kistler — Mon, 26 Sep 2011 08:00:05 +0000

Image by Bohman via Flickr

Emerging Demographic Means Changes For Real Estate Market (robertsinohue.wordpress.com)

Gov Brown signs AB 771 Preventing Gouging for Condo/Townhome Buyers

Shirley Kistler — Sat, 24 Sep 2011 08:00:19 +0000

Governor Brown signed Assembly Bill 771, on September 1, 2011. This bill prevents home buyers in a common interest development, such as a condominium or townhome, from being charged excess document fees.

Current law requires this information come from the Homeowner’s Association “HOA” and prohibits it from charging fees in excess of what is “reasonable,” not to exceed the actual cost of processing and producing these documents. HOA generally have provided the document for approximately $75 to $250. In the past HOAs have been delegating document preparation to third party vendors or contractors who, under a 2007 court decision, are exempt from this fee limitation. This delegation of responsibility by HOAs sometimes resulted in home purchasers being forced to pay additional fees, as much as $1000, for other documents which were “bundled” with the required documents.

AB 771 addresses this by specifying that only fees for the required documents may be charged when such documents are provided, effectively prohibiting any “bundling” of fees for other documents with these fees. The bill also creates a new form detailing which documents are required, and requires the provider to disclose the fees that will be charged for the documents before they are provided. The seller of the home must complete this form and transmit it to the prospective purchaser along with the required documents. This will eliminate any uncertainty for the prospective purchase as to exactly which documents are being provided and the precise fees being charged in those documents.

Homes Sellers Fare Better in Getting Their Home Sold Using a REALTOR®

Shirley Kistler — Mon, 11 Apr 2011 08:00:43 +0000

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Are you trying to decide whether to sell your home on your own or hire a Realtor? Check out this survey to help you make a decision:

Homegain.com conducted a survey on selling your home: For Sale by Owner “FSBO” vs. REALTOR_®. Homeowners were asked whether they used a REALTOR_®to sell their home or whether they attempted to sell it themselves.

83% said they used a REALTOR_®and 17% tried on their own.

59% of homeowners that used a REALTOR_®to sell their house were successful vs. 39% of the FSBO’s reflecting a 50% higher closing rate for those using a REALTOR_®

81% of the homeowners that used a REALTOR_® to try and sell their homes said they would use a REALTOR_®again for their Real Estate needs.

88% of the homeowners that used a REALTOR_® to try and sell their homes said they would use a REALTOR_®again.

71% of FSBO’s who managed to sell their home on their own said they would try and sell their home on their own again.

The survey also pointed out that 24% of FSBO’s eventually enlisted the aid of a REALTOR_®

HomeGain Survey Finds Home Sellers Fare 50% Better in Getting Their Homes Sold Using a REALTOR Than Selling On Their Own (chrisjohnsonre.wordpress.com)

Payoff your Debt before Saving for Retirement

Shirley Kistler — Thu, 21 Oct 2010 08:00:14 +0000

Image by quaziefoto via Flickr

A lot of people are trying to save money for their Retirement years and have questions concerning how to go about saving and paying off their debts to prepare for retirement.

The following information was given by Steven Zeller, a Gold River, CA, based investment adviser regarding credit card debt and publised by RISMEDIA:

If you are heavily in debit, he would not encourage anyone to go into bankruptcy proceedings if he or she can help it. It creates a lot of stress and is not the best for your self-esteem.

If you have multiple credit cards to payoff, I would begin paying off the credit cards, starting with the smallest one first, until they are all gone for good.

It may be painful at first, buy you will increase your cash flow over time by eliminating the monthly payments.

He also stated, ”At the end of the day, if you pay into an IRA and Roth IRA instead of paying down your credit card debt, you will still have debt. ”

5 Reasons To Stop Saving for Retirement(money.usnews.com)

Fannie Mae Announces New Incentives for Bank Owned Properties

Shirley Kistler — Sat, 25 Sep 2010 08:00:42 +0000

Fannie Mae “FNMA” took back 130,767 foreclosed properties in the 1^st and 2^nd quarters of 2010 and they were holding 129,310 single-family Real Estate Owned “REO” properties.

Fannie Mae with such a large inventory announced incentives to buyers and sellers of its REO properties.

On 9/22/10, the program announced a seller assistance incentive for properties listed on their REO website, HomePath.com. They are also expanding the initiative to offer additional incentives to real estate agents and brokers. Qualified owner-occupied homeowners can received up to 3.5% of the sales price which may be used towards the buyer’s closing costs including a home warranty. Buyer’s agents may also qualify to receive a $1500 bonus.

Eligible offers must be submitted on or after September 23, 2010 and must close by December 21, 2010. The maximum amount of days to close escrow is 60 days from acceptance of their offer.

SHORT SALES & BACK UP OFFERS

Shirley Kistler — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 08:00:04 +0000

With the Sacramento Real Estate market full of Short Sale Properties for Sale it is taking longer to close on the purchase of your new home. Due to the vast number of short sale properties available, the banks are starting to back up again on the approval of short sale properties.

If you are unwilling to wait a minimum of 60-90 days for an approval of your offer then a short sale is NOT for you. With the decrease of inventory available for sale in the Sacramento area, we are seeing an increase of multiple offers on our listings for sale. We are also seeing quite a few buyers who are unwilling to wait for short sale approval. This is the main reason we take BACKUP offers on our listings and ask that our buyers be held in backup position. We have seen countless buyers who are in 1^st, 2^nd and even 3^rd backup position get their home. Patience is the name of the game in the short sale process.

If you are making an offer on a Short Sale Property, be prepared for a lengthy process. Updates are sometimes hard to come by, but working with a diligent agent who is well versed in Short Sales will help make the process quite a bit smoother and sometimes quite a bit faster.

Taking advantage of today’s low Sacramento interest rates

Shirley Kistler — Thu, 22 Jul 2010 22:50:07 +0000

: Image via Wikipedia

In the past 32 years working in the real estate industry, I have not experienced a 4-1/2 % interest rate on a 30-year fixed rate loan. It is time to give a lot of thought to purchasing a home in this market.

Are you concerned that home values may decline?

Sure, it is possible but will you ever see 4-1/2% again? That equates to $450 for every $100,000 in the purchase price of your home. Can you rent for that monthly payment? I doubt it. Lets also not forget the tax benefits of owning your own home and the freedom of making your house a home for you and family.

Advantages to Buying a House with your Hard-Earned Money (homeloans.org)