Kick Appeal to the Curb

Posted on May 15, 2009 by Minda Reves

Short Sale Properties

Typically those seeking to do a short sale are short on cash and time. However, as Kiplinger.com points out, “with existing homes selling at the slowest rate in a decade, if your house will be on the market, you can’t afford not to spend some money.” So, what are some cost effective ways to boost your homes appeal?

Landscape

Do all of the obvious chores like keeping the lawn mowed, pruning existing plant life and watering regularly. This is especially important in Orange County where even just a
small patch of green can look like a dream yard. Kiplinger suggests adding a few large potted plants to spruce up the entrance to your home because “A plant in a pot looks much bigger than when you put it in the ground.” More for your buck, Chuck.

Inside

When prospective buyers walk into your home you want them to feel as if they’ve lucked into a real bargain not stepped into a “fixer-upper” situation. Take a little pride in your home and clear out any rubbish or clutter, wash the walls to brighten the paint, do the
windows (inside and out), give the floors a good scrubbing and the carpets a good cleaning and patch any holes in the walls. You’d be surprised how these simple steps can really add a shine to your place.

Garage

Tackle the garage. You heard me.
You’re moving anyway, so now is as good a time as ever to get rid of all that junk that has piled up over the years. Have a yard sale to help you recoup the small out of pocket costs from sprucing up your home and haul the rest to your local Good Will, Orange County has tons of them. The larger your garage looks, the better. Potential homeowners will be envisioning it filled with their own boxes, bikes and books or if they’re dreamers, they’ll want to actually use that two car garage for, you know, two cars. With these tasks completed, your short sale may not be the quickest escrow closing on the block, but it will go a long way toward impressing any potential buyers.

Minda Reves is a SHORTsense.com freelance writer

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Down and Out in Beverly Hills… and Other Nice Areas Too

Posted on May 14, 2009 by Jim Malmberg

Down Out Beverly Hills
Think you can’t afford to buy in Beverly Hills, you may want to think again. There are some bargains in the MLS. And if you’re OK with a Beverly Hills PO within the City of Los Angeles, there are even more bargains available to you.

The lowest priced single family home currently listed with a Beverly Hills P.O. is going for $425,000. It is bank owned and, to be fair, it is a real fixer… maybe even a tear down. But the property is high in the hills and surrounded by homes in the seven figure range.

If you want to be within the Beverly Hills city limits, there is another bank owned property listed for $699,000. That one already has offers on it, and will likely go for more, but it gives you an idea about what is available and how affordable certain areas are becoming.

But what if you are a beach person? Well, right now there are three short sales available in Malibu for under $600,000 and one of them is a single family residence with canyon and ocean views!

It’s been more than ten years since we’ve seen house prices this low. People who got into the nicer areas around Los Angeles in the last downturn and who didn’t use their homes as a piggy bank are still way ahead in terms of equity. The nice thing for buyers to consider is that the current housing market is presenting bargains at all levels.

For instance, one of the homes our team is working on is a $1.8 million bank owned property that isn’t in the MLS because the bank doesn’t know what to do about the tenant that still resides there. While $1.8 million may not sound like much of a bargain, and it is probably larger than you last grocery bill, just consider that the last sale price on this place was north of $2.5 million and the house has views that run from downtown Los Angeles to Catalina Island! For the right buyer, it may present the opportunity of a lifetime.

As a buyer, there are things that you have to keep in mind while shopping for your new home.

First, when you view a home, don’t focus on the cosmetic issues that are easily changed. When viewing a short sale or bank owned property, you need to know going in that these homes often need some TLC.  In many cases, the cosmetic issues can be fixed with a bucket of paint and a scrub brush; neither of which should keep you from buying. Many of these homes are still occupied and the current residents will rarely – meaning “never” – clean them up to show.

Second, location is the most important thing when considering a long term investment return. This market won’t remain down forever. When it does come back, the most desirable areas will come back first.  They will be followed by outlying areas.  Some areas that are the most remote from major metropolitan areas in Los Angeles and Orange County Real Estate will be very slow to recover and may never return to the values they were at before the housing market collapsed. With that in mind, this means that you may be able to find a very nice home in these areas for less than it would cost you to build one.
 

Third, if you are seriously thinking about buying in this market, get pre-approved for your loan now. This will tell you how much you can afford to spend, keep you focused on homes within your reach, and allow you place a bid immediately when you see your dream home. Without a pre-approval letter, you will have to go through the approval process before you can submit an offer and that dream home may actually be sold to another person in the mean time.

by Jim Malmberg

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About the Author:  Jim Malmberg is an agent and real estate professional with SHORTsense.

 

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Is The Market Really Looking Up in Orange County?

Posted on May 14, 2009 by Debbie L. Sklar

Orange County Real Estate Market Looking Up

Are things looking up?  Is the Orange County Real Estate market truly back on track?

Well, according to an article called “Foreclosure starts dip, home seizures rise,” posted by Reporter Mathew Padilla of the Orange County Register who writes a column called Mortgage Insider they might be.

He cites a ForeclosureRadar.com report for Orange County in April:

  • Notices of default totaled 2,002, down 21 percent from a year ago, and 23 percent from March.
  • Banks foreclosed on 573 houses and condos, down 49 percent from a year ago but up 52 percent from March.

Well, if these numbers are accurate, things might be turning the corner, I said might.     

However, being somewhat of a pessimist, I must say that I am still noticing a large number of homes for sale that have been sitting empty. I’m also seeing short sales and foreclosure signs blaring from many homes. In my own tract, there are six for sale and they have been on the market since December. On the other hand, just yesterday, I noticed a “sold” sign a few doors down from me that had only be on the market for a few weeks.

Several real estate friends that I speak to regularly are insistent that things are indeed turning around. I’m not sure if that is wishful thinking or just the ego of a typical real estate person who doesn’t want to really admit that the market is still tough.

I have another acquaintance that used to work for a real estate company in South County and who was sent packing because of the economy. He says he is reluctantly now working for a solar energy company and isn’t making nearly the amount of money he did when he was a Realtor.

So, who do we believe the stats or the real estate people?   What do you think?

Debbie L. Sklar, SHORTsense.com

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Is Victoria Gotti Up for a Short Sale?

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Nicola Nakase
Victoria Gotti Short Sale

Victoria Gotti Short Sale Home

This is a Gotti awful mess.  The mafia princess, Victoria Gotti will need to downsize from her palatial 6-acre spread in Long Island.  According to the NY Post, the Brooklyn Appellate Court has ruled against Gotti to begin foreclosure protocol on her $4.2 million mansion that she won in her divorce from ex-husband Carmine Agnello.

She reportedly owes $650,000 to JP Morgan Chase from ceasing to make payments since 2006.  If Gotti had a real legal job and then got laid-off, maybe she could qualify for a short sale.  But her loss of cash flow due to government crack down may not have the lenders feeling so sorry for her.  Maybe Gotti can live out of her Escalade, Mercedes, and BMW until the market picks up again.

Nicola Nakase, SHORTsense.com

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Real Estate Market Poised For Bounce Back ?

Posted on May 13, 2009 by Minda Reves


Real Estate Market Poised For Come Back Fortune Magazine isn’t the first to say it, but they may be the most reliable. In an article posted in the “Fortune Investor Daily” section of their website Friday, May 8, Fortune reported that now is the time to start reinvesting in homebuilder stocks, “The two main bellwethers for housing’s future – the
supply/demand equation and affordability – are both pointing towards a recovery.”

What’s good for homebuilders is even better for homeowners. According to Fortune, homes in some of the nation’s most
desirable areas have dropped by 40% and consumers are driven to buy by the “New Affordability.”  This is the best time to position a short sale as an unbeatable bargain. Prices are still down so a short sale is a viable option, but at the same time a rising labor force and incoming immigrant population have created a market for affordable housing.

Fortune is urging readers to invest in companies that specialize in starter homes for first time homebuyers.” Why let the homebuilders reap all of the rewards? A short sale is already built, is on
the market for the same alluring price of a starter home, but is in a more desirable, already established neighborhood than what one might receive with a recently built track home in an underdeveloped part of town.

If you’re interested in pursuing or buying a short sale, now is the time to get in touch with a short sale real estate agent that specializes in the process, so they can give you additional insider info in the real estate market in your area.

Minda Reves is a freelance
blogger for SHORTsense.com

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Short Sales – Know Before You Go

Posted on May 12, 2009 by Jim Malmberg

Knowledge Is powerEverybody loves a bargain. That’s why a lot of home shoppers in Los Angeles and Orange Counties are looking at short sales as a way to get into neighborhoods that they could only dream about a year ago. But there are a number of things that can go wrong in the short sale process. Knowing what some of these are can be the difference between successfully completing the purchase of your dream home or pulling your hair out in frustration.

If you have never heard the term “short sale” here is a quick definition. When a seller puts their house on the market for less than they owe on it, that’s a short sale. By default, this means that when these homes are sold the original lender is going to take a loss. All short sales need to be approved by the lender or lenders who will be taking that loss. By this, I don’t simply mean that your offer needs to be approved. The actual seller of the property needs to be approved too. If the bank thinks that the seller is hiding assets, or pricing the house too low, that can stop any sale dead in its tracks.

The first thing to keep in mind when looking at short sale properties is that not all neighborhoods are created equally. In some areas, there are many more sellers than there are buyers. In others, just the opposite is true.

In the areas with higher demand, you can’t make a ridiculously low offer and expect to get anywhere. Below market pricing of homes in desirable areas is actually a strategy used by realtors, sellers and banks to get bidding wars going. Even in this market, bidding wars for competitively priced properties are fairly common. In fact, if you are looking at homes on the West Side of L.A. or in the southern hills of the San Fernando Valley, there is a lot of competition.

This means that when you are bidding on a short sale property, you need to know a little about the neighborhood. What is the demand in the area? What are other homes selling for? Are there any problems with the neighborhood or the subject property itself? Are there any issues with the seller that may prevent an approval? Only then can you actually put in a bid with a reasonable expectation of success.

To make an offer on a short sale property, you need to be pre-approved for your loan. You will also need to provide a good faith deposit and proof that you have the funds for the down payment. Without these items, the lender approving the sale will never even review your offer.

Once your offer is made, it can take up to 90 days to find out if it has been accepted. You can withdraw your offer at any time prior to receiving written notification that the offer has been accepted. Once you withdraw an offer, your good faith deposit will be refunded. This means that even after you make your offer, it may be wise to continue to look at other property. Who knows, you may find an even better deal in a location that is even more desirable.

There are short sale bargains in this market but not everyone will be able to take advantage of them. The key to being successful in your bargain hunt is in knowing the market inside and out or partnering with a real estate professional who does.

by Jim Malmberg

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About the Author:

Jim Malmberg is an agent and real estate professional with SHORTsense.

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Holding Back the Short Sale Tide

Posted on May 11, 2009 by ShortSense
Holding Back The Short Sale Tide 

VisionVictory/YouTube.com


You’d think, with the way so many people blow their horns over layoff’s here and bailout’s there, that this came as a big surprise. Well, when have the car companies in Detroit NOT needed a bailout from their crappy retro designs and (just as old school) manufacturing
processes? Why would companies NOT close an unprofitable area of operations unless is was government subsidized?  Why are banks tearing down newly built homes?   What?

Yup, that’s right – As you may have heard Guaranty Bank of Austin, TX started ripping down newly built homes in Victorville that, they said, would be too expensive to finish and it was cheaper for them to knock them down than keep on the books and try to sell. Talk about a strange turn around! Another one to look at closely is that as of Friday, in Santa Clara County alone, and with the main buying season here, “only” about 5100 homes were for sale, down from over 5900 just last month. What is this saying about the housing market in the area?  Well, its too early to say, but the lower number may be due to the moratorium on foreclosures, which recently ended.  Let’s see if the number is higher in the coming months.

Some say short sales are down too, at least at the higher end of the market, with owners
holding properties off the market – that may be true, but it in my view, there will be growing market for short sale luxury homes in LA and Orange County, as more and more high-end home owners just want to get as their option ARMs reset to a much higher principal and interest payment.

Shortsense.com – Lean how to short sale.  Find short sales for sale.

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