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4 Easy Steps to Buying Your First or Fifth House

After months of searching online and getting nowhere, here you are. Now you know the 4 Easy steps to buying a home.

First, as 90% of buyers today, start with a home search online. As long as you’re here why not search here? We have all active listings shown on North Alabama’s MLS index. In addition to our MLS I also offer several “For Sale By Owner listings”. That is an extra step in giving you every option to find the perfect house.

Second, You found it! Congratulations! I knew if you started here you could more than likely finish here. Wasn’t that easier than driving around town for countless hours hoping to see “the house” around the next corner.

Third, this is the fun part. All you have to do is sit back and let years of negotiating and getting the best deals for our clients, work for you.

Fourth, Sure there were several points in the process that were high pressure or potential deal breakers, but you didn’t need to stress over any of them. We always keep a positive outlook and keep the process moving forward. Now we celebrate the big moving day.

Yes, it is that easy. Give it a try.

 

infographic-online-home-search

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7 Local Backyard Oases You Want to See

I’ve seen many housees in the past years that I would not schedule a return without protection in some form or fasion. Iv’e also seen houses that made me want to stay for a few hours and just relax. The latter being the exception. I thought it might be neat to put together a short and sweet ppost showing some of the great local backyard oases in and around my area. The following are several pools and outdoor kitchens you may want to look into a bit closer. Feel free to comment and or share.

 

custom-concrete pool

Pool with a fountain
Pool with a fountain
Custom Stone raised pool
Custom Stone raised pool

 

Custom Outdoor Kitchen with tongue groove ceiling
Custom Outdoor Kitchen with tongue groove ceiling

 

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Custom concrete with fountain

 

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Outdoor Kitchen overlooking pool

 

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Custom Heated Pool with Mountain views

 

If any of these homes interest you and you would like to take a closer look, feel free to contact me for a showing appointment.

 

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Fannie Mae Shows Signs of a Recovering Market

2013 was an extraordinary year for a lot of Real Estate Pros. Many conversations about the housing market are ending in a much different matter than they had in years past. Lately the story is, “Wow”, We are really seeing an increase in home prices and a decrease in inventory”. Years ago this comment would have been accompanied with a graphic of a donkey with mouth wide open laughing hysterically.

The Real Estate market is definitely showing signs of growth and movement. Today home prices are beginning to slightly increase and whispers of a “Sellers Market” are rolling off agents tongues. This truly makes people a little more comfortable with the country still trying to pull out of the recent crash. All of this still would simply be mostly “lip Service” if not for the the giants of the mortgage market producing such impressive numbers. Let’s take a look at Fannie Mae and data released in a recent article by Timothy J. Mayopoulos President and Chief Executive Officer, Fannie Mae 

In the statement Fannie Mae reveals their financial performance, over the past few years, has improved significantly, and in 2013 reported “84.0 billion in net income and $38.6 billion in pre-tax income, the highest annual income and annual pre-tax income in our company’s history”. In addition to this improvement Fannie Mae also has strengthened the underwriting and eligibility standards as so to promote a more sustainable housing market as related to homeownership.

In addition to developing stronger requirements for home buying eligibility, Fannie Mae has also worked to help owners avoid foreclosure by “completing more than 1.5 million workout solutions since 2009. In 2013, we completed 234,000 foreclosure prevention solutions. Less than 1 percent of the single-family loans in our book went into foreclosure in 2013, and we strive to help every at-risk family find an alternative to foreclosure.”

Below is a graphic giving a few numbers to grow on. Take a look and decide for yourself if you still should be standing on the sidelines or if it is time to Move forward?

fannie mae numbers at a glance

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Bad, Bad Real Estate!

As the Real Estate market turns the corner and begins the ascent back to sustainable numbers, we are starting to see increased inventory. With this increase we are also getting new photography ideas. While spending hours per day viewing hundreds of listings and images for clients, there seems to be a great number of Agents who should have their picture taking license revolked.

Understandingly, it is extremely difficult to get a perfect picture to successfully market a home online. To be honest, some  are not even trying. A simple smartphone takes better pictures than a large part of what can be found online.

For the ones who do use a camera that does need to be wound after each click or dropped off at a discount store for processing, a simple scan of your surroundings first could go a long way. Take a look at a few images recently compiled from a local MLS. These homes are currently being marketed online with these photos.

If any of these images are of your house or you took the photo or know who did please keep the identity hidden. This is in no way a solicitation of business nor an insinuation to hire a different Realtor. It is simply a lighthearted light shedding exercise to help increase the quality images used for Real Estate marketing online.

Comments and suggestions are welcome.

cluttered-real-estate-photo
A little decluttering maybe?
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People in the picture?
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Dirty sinks, clutter, blurry, time stamp on the picture?

 

 

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YIKES!
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What is this even of?
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This could be a scary ghost sighting? When you see it.
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A Blair Witch project?
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Showing the great small space perfectly?
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Looks like a picture was taken of a picture?
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Ready for spaghetti and syrup?
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Guess what this is and WIN?
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Must be a flip phone?
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Reports Indicate Another Housing Slowdown | Via Inman News

New reports point to housing slowdown | Inman News.

 

Economic reports released today show that activity in two sectors of the housing market dropped to its lowest levels in more than a year, providing some of the latest evidence that elevated mortgage rates and home prices may have slowed the pace of the real estate recovery.

Housing slowdown before real growth

“Housing is not about to collapse into another bust, but it is due for a pause after a strong rebound since the first half of 2012,” wrote David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, explaining the thrust of the reports.

For the week ending Feb. 14, a seasonally adjusted purchase index from the Mortgage Bankers Association hit its lowest level since September 2011, the trade group said today. On an unadjusted basis, demand for purchase loans for the week dropped 17 percent from the same week a year before.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Census Bureau and U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development reported today that housing starts in January hit a 17-month low, falling 7 percent year over year to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 573,000, a figure that dovetails with the National Association of Home Builders’ finding yesterday that builder confidence plunged in February.

Other indicators also point to a slowdown. Pending home sales and existing-home sales have trended down in recent months, though one of the few brights spots in recent housing data are new-home sales, which grew at a fast clip in January.

Some trade groups and analysts have said that the unusually cold weather has contributed to weakening activity in the housing market.

“While we don’t want to dismiss out of hand the downbeat message of these measures of residential construction activity, we think that they largely reflect a correction from the sharp gain in starts in November and the recent unseasonably severe weather,” Capital Economics, an economic research firm, said in response to the report on housing starts.

The biggest impetus for the recent slump, however, may be substantial increases in both home prices and mortgage rates. The combination of both has pushed up the cost of financed homeownership by roughly a quarter from last year in more than 300 counties nationwide, according to a report data aggregator RealtyTrac is set to release tomorrow.

“Last year was a nice bounce-back year for the housing market, particularly home prices, but we cannot expect to see the patterns of 2013 repeat in 2014,” said RealtyTrac Vice President Daren Blomquist. “This year will be more of a reality check type of year as home prices and sales slow down to allow incomes and confidence to catch up.”

More from Teke Wiggin

– See more at: http://www.inman.com/2014/02/19/new-reports-point-to-housing-slowdown/#sthash.hGvhs6HV.dpuf

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What buyers want?

Times of needing to have a formal dinning area may have come and gone, but having a space to dine and entertain hasn’t.

Years ago folks wanted to have a formal dinning room so they could have a nice gathering over a meal and entertain guests. Well, that hasn’t changed except where it is located. Today buyers are wanting a warm comfortable open kitchen design where they can entertain guests and still be where the action is- “The Kitchen”. Even with the influx of restaurants in local places folks still want to have guests over for entertaining.
Today’s buyers want an updated kitchen area, generally overlooking a dinning area or den area.
So there is something to think about when you are updating your house for a market analysis. Should you take down that wall or simply update the kitchen. My recommendation is, if you’re going to update the kitchen then probably go ahead and take out that wall and open things up. Otherwise, leave the kitchen to attract a different buyer wanting a fixer upper.
Call me if you would like a Pre-market analysis and or “on the market ready” analysis.