Is it really the right time to buy your next home?On the face of it, home prices haven’t been this low in a long time. In some markets, home prices are expected to fall further in 2011.The Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) released its latest housing scorecard and found that home affordability is quite high. Prices have fallen and mortgage interest rates remain near historic lows. If you’re going to buy another property, you’ll pay less than you might have eight or even 10 years ago.

But deciding whether it’s really the right time to buy your next home means taking a deeper look at where you are in your life and where you want to be over the next seven to 10 years.A big mistake homebuyers made over the last decade was to think about homeownership as a liquid financial investment. But buying a home isn’t the same thing as day trading stocks, even though it felt like that for a while.Real estate is, by its very nature, illiquid. It’s been historically difficult to unload a home quickly without taking a huge financial loss.Two years after my husband and I bought our first home (a vintage co-op along Chicago’s lakefront), I wanted to sell. I decided I wanted to plant a garden, something not necessarily compatible with living seven stories in the air.But by the time we had made that decision, our sort of home had fallen out of favor. No one wanted to live in a vintage co-op. Everyone wanted to live in a single family house with a garden. So we watched our home grow stale on the market for about six or nine months, before pulling it off.Two years later, we put the home back on the market and sold it six months later, feeling lucky to get an offer. Back then, in 1994, six months was a long time to be on the market, and while we hadn’t found a place to buy, we decided just to sell and rent so we’d be in better shape when we finally found the right property.The early 1990s seems like a long time ago, but it was at the beginning of the upswing that culminated in the frenzied irrational exuberance of the housing bubble. And as every school kid knows, the bigger the bubble, the more bubble gum you get all over your face.

Our housing market is still gummed up, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t amazing, once-in-a-generation opportunities to buy property. I was in Atlanta last week and someone asked me if I was planning on buying a condo or two in Midtown. There are condos selling for $30,000 to $50,000 that originally (three to five years ago) sold for $150,000 to $200,000. With granite countertops, great views, indoor parking, the works.I supposed I could buy something. I have the cash and available credit. Heck, at these prices, some of my colleagues are charging their real estate purchases on credit cards.The question I have to answer is what are my long-term intentions with this property? What’s the business strategy? If the purchase is an investment property, what is the expected rental income and what’s my exit strategy? And how much time and energy do I have to put into this investment? You really have to think through any real estate purchase you make these days, and not let yourself fall in love with a property. Good judgment can’t be overruled by emotion.

And, don’t forget to pull out your crystal ball, because you should plan on a seven- to 10-year timeline, just in case. And in some cities, even that might not be long enough to see the housing market get all the gum off its face.

So you’ve decided to buy a house, but you’re not sure if your finances are quite up to speed. Even if you hope to buy six months from now, there are numerous improvements and adjustments to be made in the interim, prior to taking on a mortgage.

First-time home buying is well documented as an arduous process, and much of that can be attributed to the sheer number of new and unexpected issues. Therefore, the more you know, the better you’re likely to fare. Here, briefly, are some aspects buyers should consider when shoring up finances to buy a house.

Knowing is half the battle. To start, learn as much as possible about the process that will soon temporarily take over your existence. When Corinne Weiner and her fiancé recently bought a home in upstate  New York, she says it was one of the most stressful experiences of her life, “but that was mostly because we had a completely incompetent ‘team’ between the brokers and the bank. So advice number one: get references on those people.” She also recommends a book by CNBC’s own  Suze Orman,  The Money Book for the Young, Fabulous, and Broke  which breaks down the house-buying process in simple terms, and has exercises to make sure buyers can handle the responsibility.

While you’ve got the researching cap on, Cathi Brese Doebler, author of  Ditch the Joneses, Discover Your Family  recommends shopping around to see which banks give the best rates. “Also, ask people you trust who have mortgages which banks they use and what they think of their experience having a mortgage through that bank.”

What can you realistically afford? To determine your price range, use the online calculators, then see if the bank agrees by trying to get pre-approved. “this will bring you back down to Earth so that you can begin shopping in the appropriate price range,” says Gail Cunningham, Vice President of Public Relations for the National Foundation for Credit Counseling.

Doebler offers this clever and helpful challenge: “Months before you buy a home, begin putting the amount of money that you will have to use for a house payment into a separate bank account. Save that money rather than spending it for those months, and see how you do at managing your other bills with only the money that is left.”

Don’t forget to take taxes into account when calculating, cautions Doebler. She also advises not to leave out the not-too-distant future in these estimates. If children come into the picture, can you still afford this house on what might become a single income?

Lynn Ballou, CFP, Principal of Ballou Plum Wealth Advisors, points out other costs that might be overlooked by unsuspecting home buyers during the initial stages: homeowner’s dues (“in our area, $250 a month is pretty average”) utilities including the cable for TV and internet, water and garbage, property insurance (“In California, a $1 million umbrella policy can run you $200 ” $350 per year”), moving, furnishing, and maintenance of the home.

Oh yeah? Prove it! When Andy Payment of Atlanta, Georgia applied for a mortgage, it was an ordeal. He recalls several back-and-forths with the lender to demonstrate that they had the money to put down on the home and pay the mortgage in the short term.

Among the hoops they had to jump through: Hold the down payment (5%, in his case) plus closing costs in a savings account for more than two months and provide bank statements to demonstrate that it was earned and not gifted. “We didn’t realize this was necessary, so only sent statements for our checking/savings accounts (vs. 401(k), stock, other liquid assets).” He also had to hold two months of mortgage payments in savings to demonstrate we could pay the actual mortgage.

How’s that credit score looking? Six months is a good amount of time to start preparing your finances in anticipation of buying a home, Cunningham says, because it takes time to clear up old forgotten debt and have it cycle through to the credit report and score.

First she recommends that the buyer should get credit reports from all three bureaus, to avoid any surprises, and review them all for inaccuracies, which must then be disputed.

“Make sure that any old negative information that should have rolled off, has. Pay off any lingering old bills that you’ve forgotten about. If you’re behind on any payments, get caught up.”

Next, check your credit score, which you’ll want to nudge up to as high a number as possible. This is where paying down your debt comes in, aiming for an amount that doesn’t equal more than 30% of your line of credit.

Cunningham offers the tried and true credit score advice: “Make sure that you have at least three open and active lines of credit. You need this many for the credit score to have enough data to crunch. The model also likes for you to have a good mix of credit. For instance, an open-ended account (general purpose card), a closed-end account (car payment) and a personal loan. This demonstrates that you can handle multiple types of credit responsibly.”

Finally, here’s a piece of less traditional credit wisdom, courtesy of Chip Poli, owner of Poli Mortgage Group, Inc. “Credit reporting sites supply a score calculated by something called ‘VantageScore’ and it trends much higher than the FICO scoring used by the mortgage industry. Consult with your loan officer and find out what your true credit score is. It’s vital to start the prequalification process early.”

How much can you pay up front? “One obvious tip: start saving,” says Cunningham. “Even if you qualify for a low down payment loan, the lender will still want to see that you have significant savings. This is a further protection for them against loss, and demonstrates that you can weather a financial hiccup if one should come along.”

The more money you can put down as a down payment, the lower your mortgage will be. “I personally cleaned out my IRA for the down payment (as long as it’s under 10K you don’t get penalized) because I’m young and can boost it up again,” says Weiner.

Now, sit. Stay! Part of proving your mortgage-worthiness is demonstrated stability, so prospective home buyers should plan to stay put in their current living situation and job. “I can’t tell you how much hassle I got because I switched jobs a few times in the past two years,” says Weiner, who had changed careers and moved during that time. “I actually had to write a letter to the underwriters explaining why I changed jobs so much!”

Fortunately, home buyers of the future now have plenty to keep them occupied while staying put.

PRLog (Press Release)  “  Feb 17, 2011  “ Home sales in the seven-county metropolitan Chicago real estate market showed encouraging resilience in January even though total home sales slipped 3.7 percent below the level recorded in the same month of 2010, according to an analysis by RE/MAX.Looking at data on home sales recorded by Midwest Real Estate Data, LLC, the regional multiple listing service, RE/MAX reports that January home sales totaled 3,834 units, down from 3,980 units in January 2010.œJanuary sales numbers are usually the lowest of any month of the year, but they can be a harbinger of what is to come as the housing market moves into the busy spring season, explained Jim Merrion, regional director of the RE/MAX Northern Illinois real estate network.  œA year ago, the spring market was quite active, helped greatly by the federal tax credit offered to homebuyers.  This year there is no tax credit, yet January sales were at a very comparable level to last year™s.  That suggests buyers are returning to the market and that home buying activity this spring has more upside potential than many expert observers currently believe.Merrion noted that one reason for the relatively encouraging sales numbers in January was the steady pace of distressed property sales, which includes short sales and lender-owned foreclosures.  Distressed properties accounted for 48 percent of sales in January, the most since February of last year when distressed sales represented 49 percent of the total.There were 1,847 distressed sales across the metro area in January, compared to 1,855 a year earlier and 2,206 in the prior month.   Foreclosures represented 33 percent of all sales, while short sales accounted for 15 percent.œWe don™t want to read too much into the fact that January home sales were 26 percent lower than in December, Merrion said.  œA substantial December-to-January decrease has been the pattern in recent years.  Even when the market was just about at its peak, January sales in 2006 were 31 percent lower than December sales in 2005, and the smallest December-to-January sales decline since then was 20 percent in 2006-2007.Sales of attached and detached homes performed quite similarly in January, both coming in 3.7 percent lower than the prior January.  However, in terms of prices and the time required to sell a home, the differences between the attached and detached markets were more pronounced.For detached homes, the median price (where half of all homes sold cost more and half cost less) rose to $175,000 in January, up from $172,500 a year earlier, and the average time those homes spent on the market fell from 174 days in 2010 to 171 days this year.   For attached homes, the picture was quite different.  The median price fell to $133,400 from $180,000 a year ago, a 26 percent decline.  The average time required to sell one of those attached homes increased to 188 days from 166 days.œWe™ve noticed in the last couple of years that the percentage of home sales represented by distressed properties tends to peak during the first quarter of the year.  As we move into the spring and summer seasons, sales of non-distressed properties pick up, and that tends to have a positive impact on prices, said Merrion.Although January sales activity in the metro area as a whole was quite similar to that seen a year earlier, sales levels varied significantly in local markets.  Three of the seven metro counties, DuPage, Kane and Lake, saw sales increase, while four counties, as well as the City of Chicago, recorded decreased sales.DuPage County sales were up 21.8 percent to 453 units, the largest gain reported, while Kendall County sales fell 23.5 percent to 62 units, and sales dipped 15.4 percent in Chicago, with 1,066 homes changing hands.  Results for the other counties were as follows: Cook 2,300 units (-8.1 percent), Kane 256 units (+6.7 percent), Lake 340 units (+4.3 percent), McHenry 140 units (-9.7 percent) and Will 283 units (-6.3 percent).

You say tomato, I say tomahto. You say remortgage, I say refinance. Yup, you guessed it. They both mean the same thing. The only difference is œremortgage is the term used primarily in England where as œrefinance is used in America. Since the housing crash hit, more and more people are searching out for a new loan once their existing rate starts adjusting. This is typical for those who went with a 3 or 5 year ARM instead of locking in a 30-year fixed.Has your number been called yet in the UK or are you just looking for a better overall mortgage rate? If so, now is the time to start looking while interest rates are still reasonable. The hardest part is finding the right person or loan broker to work with (at least in my experience) but with the internet at your fingertips, it™s much easier.As I mentioned in my previous post about researching  home insurance  policies, using a search engine comparison site is the best way to compare and find deals catered for you. This is also true when it comes to just about anything these days. Before I order things online, I use shopping comparison sites like  Froogle. When I™m searching for health insurance I™ve used  ehealthinsurance.com. Now, if you™re living in the UK and looking for a  remortgage, I would try a site like  remortgage.com.Remortgage.org makes it easy to speak with a mortgage professional for free advice regarding a remortgage in the UK. After completing 3 steps on their site, you™ll get access to one of their professional remortgage brokers. They will then answer your questions regarding advice on a mortgage or remortgage in the UK. I have yet to personally try them out since I don™t live in the UK but their site is pretty clean and useful which presumably means their staff is professional too.

Property investment  has greatly increased in popularity over recent years. Lenders offering tailored mortgage products have helped feed this ever-growing industry. Many individuals, groups and companies are now being advised to invest in UK and Overseas property as an alternative to using conventional pension funds. Amazing returns on investment have been realized. Rather than making a profit on the capital you invest, the use of mortgages allows profits to be made on the full property value with comparably minimal capital outlay.It is plain to see how just one of the above factors would be sufficient to stir great interest in property investment.No matter what your reason is for choosing  property investment, there are several crucial factors to consider before searching for the right property.There are many methods which can be applied to property investment, dependent on your goals and what you want to achieve. Without going into further depth and variation, this can be broken down into two general aims:

1. Buy to Sell “ Buying and selling investment property within the short term for profit.
2. Buy to Let “ Buying and letting to achieve a rental income and accumulate equity, normally over the mid to long term.

It is important to decide which route to go down, as this will very much depend on the property most suitable to invest in and how best to set this up.Property investment can be extremely rewarding but should only be entered into with due care and consideration. There are many crucial factors to consider which will determine which direction you will move in when considering the endless property investment possibilities.Careful consideration must be given to location. You must decide if you wish to invest in your local area which you may be more familiar with, or invest in a current œhot spot which may provide more attractive investment options.The more adventurous investor may be interested in  overseas property investment. A great deal of care and research should be given to any investment property proposition, particularly when looking overseas where the purchase process, tax liabilities, etc. could be very different to the UK.Property price must also be considered, with widely varying properties available at all levels of investment. Investors tend to be guided by the capital they wish to invest in any one property.A mortgage broker or lender will be able to advise you on how much you can borrow to invest in property, along with any further costs or fees involved. A Solicitor can also advise you on the legal costs, disbursements (local search fees, etc.) and stamp duty cost if applicable.Once these factors have been considered, the next step in property investment would be to search for suitable properties and undertake the essential research to minimize risk and maximize profit.You can never do too much research. Speak to local agents to get feedback from the perspective of property professionals.Properties which are ideal for investment will inevitably sell quickly. Time consuming research can unfortunately result in astute investors missing out on some great investment opportunities. The internet can be a great place to carry out a large portion of the required research in a fraction of the time.The above serves well as an introduction to property investment and the first steps which should be undertaken. By gaining a good perspective of your goals and aims and by not deviating from your chosen investment plan, you should form a solid basis for successful property investment.

How might home buying change if the federal government shuts down the housing finance giants Fannie Mae  and Freddie Mac?If Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were closed, homeownership in America could change greatly.

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage loan, the steady favorite of American borrowers since the 1950s, could become a luxury product, housing experts on both sides of the political aisle say.Interest rates would rise for most borrowers, but urban and rural residents could see sharper increases than the coveted customers in the suburbs.Lenders could charge fees for popular features now taken for granted, like the ability to œlock in an interest rate weeks or months before taking out a loan.Life without Fannie and Freddie is the rare goal shared by the Obama administration and House Republicans, although it will not happen soon. Congress must agree on a plan, which could take years, and then the market must be weaned slowly from dependence on the companies and the financial backing they provide.The reasons by now are well understood. Fannie and Freddie, created to increase the availability of mortgage loans, misused the government™s support to enrich shareholders and executives by backing millions of shoddy loans. Taxpayers so far have spent more than $135 billion on the cleanup.The much more divisive question is whether the government should preserve the benefits that the companies provide to middle-class borrowers, including lower interest rates, lenient terms and the ability to get a mortgage even when banks are not making other kinds of loans.Douglas J. Elliott, a financial policy fellow at the Brookings Institution, said Congress was being forced for the first time in decades to grapple with the cost of subsidizing middle-class mortgages. The collapse of Fannie and Freddie took with it the pretense that the government could do so at no risk to taxpayers, he said.œThe politicians would like something that provides a deep and wide subsidy for housing that doesn™t show up on the budget as costing anything. That™s what we had with Fannie and Freddie, Mr. Elliott said. œBut going forward there is going to be more honest accounting.Some Republicans and Democrats say the price is too high. They want the government to pull back, letting the market dictate price, terms and availability.œA purely private mortgage finance market is a very serious and very achievable goal, Representative Scott Garrett, the New Jersey Republican who oversees the subcommittee that oversees Fannie and Freddie, said at a hearing this week. œNo one serious in this debate believes our housing market will return to the 1930s.Still, powerful interests in both parties want the government instead to construct a system that would preserve many of the same benefits, with changes intended to minimize the risk of future bailouts. They say the recent crisis showed that the market could not stand on its own.œThe kind of backstop that we have now, if it didn™t exist, we would have had a much more severe recession  and a much sharper fall in home values, said Michael D. Berman, chairman of the Mortgage Bankers Association, which represents the lending industry.Hanging in the balance are the basic features of a mortgage loan: the interest rate and repayment period.Fannie and Freddie allow people to borrow at lower rates because investors are so eager to pump money into the two companies that they accept relatively modest returns. The key to that success is the guarantee that investors will be repaid even if borrowers default ” a promise ultimately backed by taxpayers.A long line of studies has found that the benefit to borrowers is relatively modest, less than one percentage point. But that was before the flood. Fannie, Freddie and other federal programs now support roughly 90 percent of new mortgage loans because lenders cannot raise money for mortgages that do not carry government guarantees.One prominent investor, William Gross, the co-head of Pimco, the major bond investment firm, has estimated that he would demand a premium of three percentage points to buy such loans ” a cost that would be passed on to the borrower.Proponents of a private market want the government gradually to withdraw its support, allowing investors to regain confidence. They argue that interest rates would eventually settle into roughly the same patterns that held before the financial crisis.Some supporters of government backing also like the idea, believing that it will demonstrate the need for a backstop.œI myself am eager to see whether there needs to be a guarantee, said Representative Barney Frank  of Massachusetts, a crucial Democratic voice on housing issues.

Fannie and Freddie also make ownership more affordable by allowing borrowers to repay loans with fixed-interest rates over an unusually long period. A person who borrows $100,000 at 6 percent interest will pay $600 each month for 30 years, compared to $716 each month for 20 years.  The 30-year loan first became broadly available by an act of Congress in 1954 and, from then until now, the vast majority of such loans have been issued only with government support. Most investors are simply not willing to make such a long-term bet. They prefer loans with adjustable rates.

Alex J. Pollock, a former chief executive of the Federal Home Loan Bank of Chicago, said such loans would remain available in the absence of a federal guarantee, but they might be harder to find. And lenders might demand a larger down payment. Or a better credit score.That would be a very good thing, said Mr. Pollock, now a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.Longer terms make ownership affordable only by increasing the total cost of the loan, because the borrower pays interest for a longer period. Moreover, Mr. Pollock noted that over the last several years, borrowers with adjustable-rate loans paid less as interest rates fell, while those with fixed rates kept paying the same amount for devalued homes.œOne of the reasons that American housing finance is in such bad shape right now is the 30-year mortgage, he said, noting that such loans are not available in most countries. œFor many people, it™s not at all clear that that™s the best product.Fannie and Freddie also allow a wide swath of the American public to borrow money at the same interest rates and on the same terms. Borrowers who did not meet their standards were forced to pay higher interest rates to subprime lenders, but the companies essentially persuaded investors to treat a vast number American families as if they were interchangeable.They took messy bunches of loans, with risks as variable as snowflakes, and created securities of uniform quality, easy to buy and sell. The result was one of the most popular investment products ever created.And in its absence, experts on housing finance say that fewer borrowers would qualify for the best interest rates.Susan M. Wachter, a real estate professor at the University of Pennsylvania, said a new government guarantee was needed to preserve a homogenous market.œThere needs to be a systematic way of preventing fragmentation, said Professor Wachter. œThat™s what we need a bulwark against. Because if there isn™t, it will occur.The government seems least likely to maintain a final set of benefits ” leniencies in loan terms that taxpayers effectively have subsidized for borrowers.Fannie and Freddie slashed the requirements for down payments in recent years, saying that they were helping people with minimal savings become homeowners. Two-thirds of the borrowers whose loans were guaranteed by the companies from 1997 to 2005 made a down payment of less than 10 percent. But borrowers who invest less default more often. The Obama administration has said that it wants the companies to demand a minimum down payment of 10 percent.A quirkier example is the ability to œlock in an interest rate. Fannie and Freddie permitted lenders to make such promises at no risk because the companies had already obtained commitments from investors. In the companies™ absence, borrowers seeking rate locks may need to pay for them.

Buyers in markets around the U.S. are snapping up homes in all-cash deals, betting that prices are at or near bottom and breathing life into some of the nation’s most battered housing markets.Cash buyers represented more than half of all transactions in the Miami-Fort Lauderdale area last year, according to an analysis from real-estate portal Zillow.com. In the fourth quarter of 2006, they represented just 13% of deals. Meanwhile, downtown Miami prices rose 15% in 2010 from a year earlier, according to the Miami Downtown Development Authority.  

The percentage of buyers in Phoenix paying cash hit 42% in 2010”more than triple the rate in 2008, according to Raymond James’s equity research division.Nationally, 28% of sales were all-cash transactions last year, according to the National Association of Realtors. The rate was 14% in October 2008, when the trade group began tracking the measure.The jump in real-estate purchases made with cash is another sign of the revival of animal spirits in the U.S. economy.The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 69.48 points Monday, or 0.6%, to 12161.63, and the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index rose 8.18 points, or 0.6%, to 1319.05.Monday’s announcements of $13 billion in acquisitions lifted stocks on hopes of more deals, share buybacks and dividends as companies regain momentum in an improving economy.

The two stock indexes have soared more than 80% since early March 2009.

The Federal Reserve reported that Americans increased their use of credit cards in December for the first time since August 2008, showing that consumers are getting less skittish about opening their wallets. Investors also were soothed Monday by encouraging signs in Egypt, including last weekend’s reopening of banks.Residential real estate has been slower to bounce back than stocks, but the presence of apparent bargains is luring in newly confident buyers.Richard Stoker, a retired sales executive, recently plunked down cash for two condominiums in Miami Beach, and plans to close on one more in coming days. He loves the complex’s ocean views, four swimming pools and activities such as yoga and Pilates.But what also motivated the purchase, said the 73-year-old, was that “the prices were just irresistible. Florida’s been hit pretty hard.” To pay the $1.8 million, $1.2 million and $1 million prices on the condos, Mr. Stoker and his wife, Jane, cashed out of some financial investments and sold a Roy Lichtenstein painting and an Alexander Calder mobile.Mr. Stoker could have taken out mortgages, but decided to pay cash. “It was a good time to lighten up in the art market and take on real estate at a favorable price,” he said.The harder a market has been hit, say economists, the higher the percentage of cash deals. Last summer, piano teacher Virginia Hall-Busch told a real-estate agent she met through the Rotary Club to keep her posted on deals on historic houses in Stone Mountain, Ga.A few days later, Ms. Hall-Busch, 62, got a call about a 1918 bungalow with three bedrooms and one bathroom listed for “short sale,” which in the real-estate world means at a price lower than what’s owed on it. The home had been on the market for $159,000, then dropped to $129,000 and then to $79,900.“I offered them 50,” she said. “I figured, it wasn’t like I needed a place to live. I can afford to be a little cocky here.”Ms. Hall-Busch closed in October for $52,500 and began renovations within weeks.“When you have a bad economy, it’s hard on lots of people,” she said. “But right now if you’ve got the money to put down on a house, long term it’s going to be good thing.”Some of the cash purchases reflect a tight lending environment, where even people with good credit and ample down payments are sometimes turned away for conventional borrowing.“The rates are great but the underwriting is brutal,” said Henry Schlangen, an agent with real-estate firm Pacific Union International who buys and sells for clients, mainly in Napa Valley, Calif.“They hang these people upside down and shake them till they see what falls out of their pockets. So people are buying with cash and maybe they’ll ‘refi’ later.”Mr. Schlangen, who deals in higher-end properties such as vineyard estates, estimated that 95% of his deals last year were all-cash, up from about half in previous years. “The deals that are consummating, these are buyers who feel they got a great deal,” he said, noting a surge of buyers from China.Cash buyers can often command 5% to 10% more off the asking price than a potential buyer using a mortgage, said Mohammed Siddiq, a real-estate professional in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. Sellers prefer cash deals since they close more quickly and avoid risks such as a buyer’s job loss or a bank’s changing its mind.And while many buyers making low-ball offers dig their heels, Mr. Siddiq said he has started to see bidding wars and slightly increasing prices.Nationally, it isn’t clear whether prices have bottomed. The Case-Shiller index of housing prices in 20 cities showed a steep decline in prices until 2009, when they appeared to bottom and began to trend upward. But in the second half of last year, prices began falling again. A Zillow index, meanwhile, never noted the uptick.Since mid-October, Canyon Ranch in Miami Beach, the development Mr. Stoker bought into, has sold 35 units, with a third of the buyers from overseas and many others retiring from the Northeast.The Stokers have a home in Potomac, Md., but spend most of the year in Florida. Mr. Stoker doesn’t plan to rent out any of his new properties, saying he and his wife will live in one with two dogs, his son might live in another and the third will house an older dog and guests.

4 Important Points That Will Get Your House Sold!

 1) TEAMWORK

Your home is a major financial investment, and your relationship with your Realtor should be a full partnership where your needs and wishes are heard, and you receive detailed and dependable feedback on the progress of your sale.   Your agent has a responsibility to source this feedback from the agents who have shown your home, and to communicate this to you so together you can make the right decisions about what to do next.   How well did this accur the last time you had your home up for sale?

***Hot Tip***

    Every Seller Can Boost a Property’s Exposure!

    1.   Make your house easy to show.

• Consider installing a lock box.
• Allow showing times that are convenient to buyers.

    2.   Usa a “For Sale” sign, where permitted.

    3.   Create a Good First impression by:

• depersonalizing furnishings and decor so prospects can visualize themselves in your home;
• emphasizing curb appeal;
• keeping large pets at a distance.

****************  

 2) PRICING

Did price work for or against you?

Tje “right” price depends on market conditions, competition and the condition ofyour home.   Pricing it too high is as dangerous as pricing it too low.   If your home doesn’t compare favorably with others in the price range you’ve set, you won’t be taken seriously by prospects or agents.

You’ll get the facts when you see the statistics!

To help you to establish a realistic selling price for your home, ask your agent to provide you with an up-to-date competitive market analysis to give you:

• a review of comparable homes recently sold or currently for sale,
• an idea of how long other homes have been listed, in order to calculate an average time in which a home can sell in today’s market,
• a review of homes whose listings have expired, to understand what issues were at play.

Note: There is no mention of how much you paid for your home or its improvements.   Like any other investment, the market value is determined by what a willing buyer will pay and a willing seller will accept.

For this and other industry articles and opinions, go to www.mschicagorealestate.com.

When You Decide to Sell

If you and your spouse decide to sell you home, it will be important to work together through a professional to maximize your return.   Differences aside, you both should be present when a listing contract is put together.   Both of you should understand and sign this contract, and both should be active in the ultimate negotiations.

When You Buy Your Next Home

Use the proceeds from your previous home or buy-out to determine an affordable price range for your next home.   Maintain a clear focus on getting the right home to suit your new situation.   You may wish to review with an agent who offers a house-hunting service to help find a home that matches your new home-buying criteria.

For this and other real estate articles and news go to http://www.mschicagorealestate.com/

4 Options

You have 4 basic housing options when in the midst of a divorce:

1. Sell the house now and divide up the proceeds.
2. Buy out your spouse.
3. Have your spouse buy you out.
4. Retain your ownership.

It’s important for you to understand the financial implications of each of these scenarios.

1. Sell the House Now and Divide Up the Proceeds.

Your primary consideration under these circumstances is to maximize your home’s selling price. We can help you avoid the common mistakes most homeowners make which compromise this outcome. As you work to get your financial affairs in order, make sure you understand what your net proceeds will be – i.e. after selling expenses, and after determining what your split of the proceeds will be. Note that the split may not be 50/50, but rather may depend on the divorce settlement, the source of the original downpayment, and the legislative property laws in your area.

2. Buy Out Your Spouse.

If you intend to keep the house yourself, you’ll have to determine how you’ll continue to meet your monthly financial obligations, if you now only have one salary. If you used two incomes to qualify for the old loan, refinancing on your own might be a challenge.

3. Have Your Spouse Buy You Out.

If you are the one who is leaving, you have the opportunity to start again in new surroundings with cash in your pocket. However, be aware that if the old home loan is not refinanced, most lenders will consider both you and your spouse as original co-signers to be liable for the mortgage. This liability may make qualifying for a new mortgage difficult for you if you decide to purchase a home, even though you won’t have legal ownership.

4. Retain Joint Ownership.

Some divorcing couples postpone a financial decision with respect to the home and retain joint ownership for a period of time even though only one spouse lives there. While this temporary situation means you have no immediate worries in this regard, keep your eye on tax considerations which may change from the time of your divorce to the time of the ultimate sale.

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