Investment property
Just because you are on a shoestring budget doesn"t mean you have to be
Peter G. Miller
Your company has just transferred you to Washington, D.C. The problem is, you currently live in Chicago and know little if anything about your new hometown. You have two weeks until your scheduled start date in D.C. That leaves you with little time to find an apartment. So you turn to the Internet and try your hand at three national apartment-search sites: Rent.Net, AllApartments, and Apartments Plus. And how do you fare?
According to recent figures released by the Commerce Department, the multifamily market lifted total housing starts 3.0 percent in October to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.229 million units as the downswing in the single-family housing market continued. Total starts were down 16.4 percent from a year earlier.
An influential committee leader in the House of Representatives is planning a post-summer surprise for millions of Americans whose houses contain 3,000 square feet or more of interior space: A proposal to take away their mortgage interest deductions.
The current economic climate has dramatically changed the real estate landscape. Locally, in the Portland/Vancouver metro area in the 12 months ending May 31, 2008, only 2% of the homes sold were Bank Owned or Short Sale properties. In the 12 months ending May 31, 2009, it was 11%. Today, 16% of the properties on the market for sale fall into these categories. In some markets around the country these statistics and trends are even more staggering.
Community design trends are moving toward greater accessibility to public facilities, such as transportation and commercial activities, so reports the American Institute of Architects (AIA). In its recently released Home Design Trends Survey, the AIA found that neighborhood design trends favor more mixed-use activities with infill and other higher-density development, and with dedicated areas for recreation and open space. In addition, traditional design of neighborhoods and homes with upscale exteriors, and windows and porches to encourage more street-level interaction, also are gaining in popularity.
New home construction is healthy in most markets across the world. So, too, is the development of commercial properties. Plus, available federal funding in the U.S. for highway and transportation construction will continue to move this sector forward in the coming years. This is the good news. A healthy real estate market equates to a healthy global economy. The potential bad news is with consumption predicted to rise and dependence on foreign imports rising, will cement production, the key ingredient in concrete, be able to keep pace with demand?
You would expect a home remodeling website"s survey to be a self-serving survey if it reports home remodeling is on the ups and custom home purchases are on the outs.
It"s impossible for an educational book to match the content dynamics of a website.
Here"s a book review for a couple of good causes -- kids and Habitat For Humanity.
The Obama administration put heavy pressure on the country"s largest home loan servicers last week to speed up modifications of hundreds of thousands of homeowners" mortgages.
If you live in a sprawling suburban neighborhood, you and your children have a greater chance of weighing more and developing higher blood pressure than
One of the biggest differences between the city and the suburbs is sidewalks that go somewhere.
If you thought you read the last "Top Towns" list, think again.
According to industry experts, the formal living room is becoming a thing of the past as new-home buyers, always seeking more living space, are sacrificing it for additional square footage in the kitchen and family room.
In building housing for seniors, many of the successful developers focus on creating livable environments while being sensitive to residents" physical needs.
New-home buyers in the West are purchasing larger homes and prices are
It’s a silent, but colorful metamorphosis..
In 1990, Centex, the nation"s largest builder, closed on 7,549 houses.
The National Association of Home Builders is reporting that sales of new homes rose in June by 11 percent.
Modular homes are gaining in popularity while offering several advantages over traditional site-built homes. For those short on time and money, a modular home may be just the answer.
A growing number of people are getting into the swing by buying a home at one of the nation"s many new golf communities.
The United States has decided to play hardball over softwood. As a result, real estate likely will be plunged even further into a recession that is already slowing new construction and weakening sales.
Although the number of proponents of environmentally-friendly construction practices is growing, it"s still not easy building "green."
Saving for your retirement home has been tough, but finally you can build the dream house you always wanted.
In the not so distant future, Internet technology companies would have us believe that we"ll turn on the oven to bake a roast, video-cam in on the kids doing their homework, adjust the thermostat, pull down the shades and turn up the lights -- all without leaving our cubicle at work.
New home auctions often, but not always, result in savings
Energy is the buzzword these days. Ever since deregulation was instituted, that silent entity upon which we have relied (and perhaps taken for granted) for generations is now in peril, especially in California, where utility companies are in huge trouble, hinting of possible bankruptcies and seeking rate hike approvals across the board.
Do you have a reliable system to get information to your HOA members quickly and accurately? Do you request suggestions and feedback? These are all signs of a proactive management style. Proactive managers welcome communication because it lets them know whether they are on track or derailed. As the saying goes, "The light at the end of the tunnel may be the headlight of an oncoming train." Better to know sooner than later.
Retro-chic is not dead. Just as Americans began having the yen to reproduce art deco and other blasts from the past in decorating, so new homebuilders are re-introducing timeworn, old fashioned concepts within new home designs. It seems the again popular front porch and country kitchen just aren"t enough to bring simpler times into our high-tech lifestyles; now even production homebuilders are coming up with a collection of smaller niche-spaces within their designs that may be old concepts, but scream of novelty nonetheless.
Hearings and debate continued almost non-stop last week on Capitol Hill as House leaders pushed controversial legislation to create a Consumer Financial Protection Agency with far-reaching powers affecting mortgages and real estate.
Known since its inception in 1917 as the "Frontline of Innovation," Quantico Marine Base is located in one of the frontlines of real estate recovery across the country, this one in one of the hottest markets in Virginia.
Any Baby Boomer who downed enough buttered popcorn would remember the scene
In an eye-opening article of the January 2000 BUILDER Magazine, "A New Dawn",
Can we somehow envision a world of electric cars, quietly streaming by,
It must first be said that, although I produce regular cyber-columns on new
What do you want in new home? To build a home to suit? Move into a model? Whether you build or move into a "spec" home, you want the process to be as quick and easy as possible, and that is why hiring a Realtor will help you work with builders.
Scenario #1:
Many builders these days are on a quest to find products that are easier to
In many industries, it"s easy to lose sight of the main purpose (besides
Something looks vaguely familiar. Is it the arrangement of the rooms as you
Everyone"s got a pet peeve. And after being immersed in new home construction sales, marketing, and verbal glory of it for well over a dozen years, there will always be one scenario that drives me up a piece of drywall. That"s the new home builders" habit of buying a piece of subdivided land and, long before any formal "right to sell" documents are on the
How long is a lifetime warranty? How long does "new" stay "new?" New home
Water, water, everywhere! Sounds great in the middle of the summer, but
Toto, I Don"t Think We"re in Kansas Anymore . . .
An upgrade #5 carpet with a #2 pad. Some extra telephone and TV outlets. The
Is everything truly negotiable in real estate? You can "make your best
Don"t have a lot of time to find a new home, but want to make sure you"ve
Will it be the "Van Gogh " Plan at The Impressionist Series, or the "Prairie Glen" at Homes on the Range? It’s truly a toss up. After all, you have chewed up and spit out all the model homes in your price range. and it has come down to two. You just can’t make up your mind between the two. They are comparable in pricing, square footage, amenities, and lot size. What will help you make that all-important final decision?
This can"t be Hawaii. There are no T-shirt shops; no crowded restaurants, no
Anything new usually carries the buzzwords "cutting edge", "latest
Upon entering the model home sales office (is this really going to be
Mary Cook, president of Chicago-based Mary Cook & Associates Interior
Considering the amount of lumber that goes into the average home -- nearly 16,000 board feet and 6,000 square feet of structural panels for a typical 2,000-square-foot home -- it"s little wonder that arborists are concerned about a shortfall of trees.
Cities are beginning to discover that their greatest natural resource - people - are right in their own backyard. New developments are underway to restore decaying and abandoned areas to vital economic and residential centers to attract new residents and bring homeowners back from the suburbs. As the major attraction of these developments, the town square is being reintroduced as the gathering place for the community to conduct business, shop and be entertained.
It never ends.
Follow up the federal Do Not Call registry with a Do Not Track list for those who shop online from home and elsewhere.
Put a stop to those postal mailed mortgage offers that begin
It"s never easy to be the messenger of not-so-good news, but it apparently has fallen upon "the media" to bear the bad tidings of the slowing market and all that it entails.
One of the most important aspects of the investment game is creating a positive cash flow from your rental properties. The basic principles apply: buy low/sell high; cover your monthly expenses with your monthly rental payments; go to the bank a happier, richer person.
Question: Three weeks ago, I signed a contract to buy a single family house. I had the house inspected and the inspector advised me to get a termite inspection. The termite company determined that although there were no active termites in the house, there was a lot of damage -- both in the attic and in the basement.
If Green Acres is the place you want to be, a new report can help you trade in city life for a slice of rural America.
Many of the richest people in the world have earned their wealth through real estate. That"s why real estate investing is touted as the avenue to riches, but while it is estimated that 80 percent of the world"s wealth is held in real estate it is owned by a very small percentage of the population -- less than 20 percent, according to a new book on real estate.
I"ve been looking online at the value of real estate and the process has been illuminating -- arguably not accurate or especially useful, just illuminating.
It"s difficult to imagine that mounds of cash might be a problem, but in some circles a surplus of coins is raising a concern: What to do with real estate dollars now that the housing market in some areas is slowing.
Peeking at an online real estate discussion group, the question came up (and I"ve heard it before), is it bad to take a referral for my mortgage broker from a real estate agent? The quick answer is – no problem.
Strong real estate markets and thriving local economies foster a diversity of business niches across the range of industries in an area. These mini- and micro-ventures hold clues for potential economic and social redefinition of communities when good times come to an end.
Buying a home in a community governed by a homeowners association is a lot like buying a share in a closely held, publicly-traded real estate holding company governed by an ever-changing regulatory system and managed by inexperienced volunteers -- your neighbors.
Median home prices in the Golden State fell in September by 2 percent to more than 4 percent slashing $8,000 off the price of condos and $25,000 of the price of single-family detached homes in September.
Rate locks are key to keeping the lid on lending costs when interest rates begin to take off -- as they have for the past month and a half.
At a time when home values are soaring in most metro areas, along comes The New York Times with the thought that renting may well be a better financial choice than buying.
Silicon Valley"s housing market is changing gears and it"s not clear if the market is switching into reverse or banging the clutch for another run up in prices. In August, the median price of single-family detached homes regained the $10,000 the market lost in July and tied the record high $760,000 median, which was first set in June, according to Richard Calhoun, broker/owner of Creekside Realty in San Jose.
Question: I signed a contract for the purchase of a single family house, and settlement is scheduled for this week. The seller"s broker has just advised me that they do not plan to sell us the house. No reasons have been given, but we suspect that the seller now believes that the contract sales price was too low. What should we do?
Should the bubble pop on the owner-occupied housing market and foreclosures sweep the West, as some predict, former home owners won"t have problem finding a decent place to rent to hold them over, as "Go West, young man" takes on new meaning.
Property line issues have suddenly cropped up in the emails I"ve received in the past few weeks. It appears that homeowners are more aware of their property lines (specifically if a neighbor is violating it) during the spring and summer months than at other times. As we get out there and trim limbs (from the neighbor"s big oak tree), mend the fence (which is actually the neighbor"s), and try to clean up unsightly encroachments on the line, we become aware that the guy next door hasn"t kept up with his property and now the problem is personal.
The year always ends with a mad rush to close home buying deals.
When disaster strikes, humans react in different ways, but most will experience anxiety and stress. How one copes with that stress and anxiety differs from person to person.
It"s not something you probably give much thought about if you have a newer home but if you"re in an older home its lead-based paint should be a concern.
It is a sign of the times: Terrorist insurance for your rental properties. While you may or may not find this type of coverage necessary, protecting yourself and your property should be top of mind.
One of my distinct recollections from childhood -- all of the butterflies seen during summer. Despite my admiration for them -- the truth is that I didn"t pay that much attention to the many varieties of butterflies that visited my neighborhood.
Residents this week were still shoveling out from a rare, early October, winter-like storm that buried some communities in more than two feet of snow in a region from the Great Lakes area to the Northeastern Seaboard.
Blue tarp remains a makeshift roof for tens of thousands of homes across the Gulf Coast region, the Army Corps of Engineers is still plugging holes in New Orleans" levees, and the oil and gas industries are still cleaning up from last year"s hurricane devastation.
As New Orleans and the Gulf Coast area undergo reconstruction, building codes for homes and public buildings should include "passive survivability" designs that allow them to serve as livable refuges should a Hurricane Katrina-level crisis return to the region.
A few weeks ago, an enthusiastic publicist trying to promote a product e-mailed me with a novel idea about something called "universal design."
The end of the year is upon us and with it a series of benchmarks and yardsticks that are easy to measure. As one example, we are soon to make New Year"s resolutions -- and not long after we are fairly certain to break them.
For a very long time the nation has been divided by a fundamental question: What do we do about large houses?
There"s no doubt Canadians are spending millions on renovations, but are they investing in the right things? Is every renovation loonie generating the maximum increase in property value?
If there is anything "good" that has come of killer Hurricane"s Katrina and Rita, it"s that the massive storms have sent millions of home owners scurrying to determine if they have enough insurance coverage should a major catastrophe strike in their neck of the woods.
Ontario residents were asked to reduce their use of electricity in the province this week as a combination of the hottest summer in years and limitations on supply threatened the reliability of the system. It"s the fourth time this year that an appeal to conserve energy has been issued.
Question: I live in a community association and am a member of the architectural control committee. We are unclear about the term "Architectural Guidelines"? Are such guidelines only for guidance? Do they have the same force as our legal documents? Is disregard of a guideline ipso facto a violation? How should guidelines be enacted?
The country received a group lesson last week on eminent domain, the practice of government taking property from private land owners for public use. In review, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in favor of the town of New London, Connecticut, to condemn private homes for private developers to demolish an older community and redevelop it into a multi-use project, to include business, shopping and upscale housing, primarily for economic reasons.
When a home buyer signs up for a mortgage on his or her property, that means a termite inspection will soon occur on the property. In most contracts, you"ll find an order for a termite inspection. It"s negotiable who will order and pay for the inspection, but you"ll have one regardless, especially if you have a mortgage.
The three greatest bones of contention within a homeowner association are pets, parking and people. Pets are particularly irksome because to non-pet owners they"re animals, but to the owners they"re family. These opposing views are a setup for conflict.
For years, there have been efforts by some insurance companies to shift exposures between condominium master policies and unit owners policies. This tug of war has intensified in recent years, as the master policy insurance market has hardened (harder to get and more expensive). Master policies provide coverage for common property and, often, unit fixtures.
Communication is essential for the harmony of your homeowner association. Do you have a regular newsletter that is informative and timely? Do the owners read it? Is it worth reading? More often then not, most HOA newsletters are "throwaways." It doesn"t need to be that way. With a bit of imagination, they could be both informative and fun to read.
We have probably all done it before, set off our own alarm system. While having the system can certainly be very comforting, home alarms can be a nuisance for police. All too often, police are being tasked with responding to home alarm systems that have been falsely activated.
If you are in the market for your first home, consider a rigorous program of home buying and ownership education first, because your purchase doesn"t come with an operating manual.
News this week that real estate agents will soon have an emergency preparedness guide to hand to new home buyers came as both a welcomed surprise and fodder for another idea whose time has come.
The number of electronic payments has surpassed the number of check payments for the first time in the nation and consumers -- along with trees -- are reaping benefits.
The vast majority of foreclosure auction investors pick up one to a handful of units a year at most, then either rent them out or fix them up for eventual resale. Typically they also troll for distress situations, pre-foreclosures and "ugly" houses.
I hate to share the news with you, but your house is a liability. This month, my house has cost me more than $2,000. On the other hand, it has grown in value, at about a rate of 1.5 percent this month -- that would be roughly $2,000 as well -- but it"s still a liability. Let me explain.
While it"s crucial to know how your municipality"s planning and zoning restrictions affect what you want to do with your house, they also are important when deciding whether to actually buy a house. More than a few people have purchased homes with remarkable views of nature, thinking they"d be admiring that scenery forever, only to discover a couple of months or years later that the view was about to be turned into a home, office building or apartment complex.
WASHINGTON, D.C. - Most homeowners -- 75 percent of them -- have a 20 percent or greater equity stake in their homes and that"s plenty to cover a significant drop in home prices.
I was in Pasadena, Calif., a few years back, waiting for my wife"s business trip to end so she, the boys and I could head to the Grand Canyon for a camping trip.
You"ve heard the horror stories -- buyers move into their newly purchased home and not long after, a huge catastrophe occurs. Maybe the plumbing goes bad, the roof leaks or electrical systems go awry.
I have a lot of tools; more tools, in fact, than I have jobs for.
A survey that reveals most homeowners have never used their home equity is being used to suggest they should, but unfortunately skips advice to the contrary.
Determining your net worth provides any tax-paying person a snapshot in time of how you"re doing in building wealth. As one gets older, this snapshot becomes more and more important. Will there be enough money at the end of my life to pay for prolonged care and living expenses without having to work to the Last Day? Fortunately, we do have some control in the matter.
Hurricane season is upon us, so it"s time once again to attempt to minimize the effects of high winds and heavy rains on your property.
I could really stand to find a million bucks in change under my sofa cushions -- but 65 cents is all I came up with on my last search. So that means I have to find money the hard way: by earning it or saving it. Here are a few ways to turn spare change into sizeable savings in the three most-used areas of your home.
As the unofficial start of the summer season kicks off this holiday weekend, many parts of the country will begin to heat up, meaning now"s the time for an air conditioning audit and getting your unit into shape before the scorching heat sets in.
Although the population in the United States and electricity production continue to increase, water use is staying steady, according to a new report
The first house my husband and I bought looked like a dud. On a corner lot in an old Florida neighborhood, the ficus hedge that surrounded the property was thin, gangly, and well over 12 feet high. Someone"s great idea of using areca palms as foundation plants grew into a ridiculous mistake -- the mature, feathery palms now obscured the windows and masked any incoming sunlight.
Once you buy a house, chances are you"ll soon be buying new furniture. With all the expenses attached to homeownership, coupled with the one-time expenses that come in the first year decorating and furnishing the house, it"s important to carefully plan your furniture purchases.
If you"ve recently gotten married or divorced, have improved your kitchen, or made your home safer, then the insurance industry says you should review your homeowners policy. You might be eligible for lower premiums, or you may need to increase your coverage so you"re not underinsured.
For the fifth consecutive year, an annual consumer protection survey finds home improvement and contractor-related complaints among the top five consumer gripes in 2002, landing in the number two spot behind automobile sales.
It was a nice little home, recently painted with a new roof. When I drove up to the curb, my first impression was the same as the buyer"s, but then I noticed the planters.
Q: We have investment property (a single family house) which we have rented out for a number of years. We have found another property that we would like to rent out for a couple of years and then ultimately move into it as our principle residence. Our current investment is on the market, but we have not been able to sell it yet. Is there any way that we can purchase the new property and still have it treated as a Starker exchange?
If you want to put the brakes on transportation costs, steer clear of making Dallas-Fort Worth, Anchorage, Houston, San Francisco, Seattle, San Diego and Minneapolis-St. Paul your home town.
Do your doors or windows jam when you try to open them? Are your walls or doors cracked? If so, it could be a sign of something more serious - foundation problems.
SNOWBIRD ALERT! Is it possible for you to own more than one home but have no “principal residence” for federal capital gains tax purposes? A federal district judge in Arizon has ruled that the answer is yes--and that could be upseting news or the millions of Americans who own multiple houses and hope to pocket tax-free gains when they sell each of them.
If you"ve been renting in a building where utilities were included as part of your rent, you may be a bit startled the first time you see your new home"s utility bills. New home owners often are so excited about having a place of their own that they tend to forget not only about home maintenance costs (usually 3 percent of your home"s cost each year, according to Columbus, Ohio, financial planner Edie Milligan), but also about monthly utility bills.
Last week, I did a segment on dishwashers on a new show called “Your Morning,” which airs Monday through Friday on the Comcast cable network on the East Coast.
I just came back from a convention of home inspectors, and the topic of the event was MOLD.
It"s not everyday you go looking for a mortgage.
A pilot program aimed at the nation"s estimated 6.8 million non-owners with "thin" credit files is being tested in the nation"s capital, where an alliance of public and private entities have pledged $200 million to get the initiative started.
The chairman of a key congressional committee has provided new details on his controversial plans to deny mortgage interest deductions to people who own large homes.
Although no one has exact numbers, the fallout from the mortgage market morass will be just as devastating for the brokerage sector as it has been for the rest of the industry, according to a long-time analyst who keeps tabs on that part of the business.
GreenPoint Mortgage Funding is the latest mortgage company to shut its doors this year. Credit card giant CapitalOne, headquartered in the shadow of Washington, D.C., announced the immediate shutdown of GreenPoint, its loan origination subsidiary. Talk about a good idea gone bad -- CapitalOne just bought the company December of last year.
Following again in the footsteps of federal regulators, state financial overseers are bringing new subprime regulations to state lenders not regulated by the feds.
I have owned a small mortgage company for more than 15 years and have been writing mortgage columns for more than ten years. One observation is becoming more unsettling to me: The mortgage industry is becoming more irresponsible in its business practices and advertising.
It"s not just the subprime stew that helped slide the housing market into a slough. Housing is also mired in a muskeg of failing "Alt-A" mortgages.
Immensely popular in some geographic areas, while unheard of in others, the zero cost refinance program deserves a full explanation. In short, qualified borrowers can forego the payment of the traditional closing costs associated with a refinance in exchange for a slightly higher interest rate -- usually about one quarter percent. These closing costs include such items as title insurance, county recording fees, appraisal fees, lender underwriting fees, attorney settlement fees, and so forth.
With all this recent talk about hybrids it"s no wonder refinance applications are up. People are seriously thinking about getting out of them and into fixed rate mortgages. Even though their adjustment period won"t take place for another couple of years. What gives?
Federal money policy agencies have opened for public comment new guidelines for subprime mortgage underwriting to ward off the growing number of subprime defaults and foreclosures.
I received an e-mail from a first time-home buyer who was referred to me by a real estate agent who is helping her in the house hunting process. The e-mail was a simple request that she be qualified for the maximum loan amount possible. She also requested that I send her a schedule of my company"s rates and fees.
Usually I"m asked this question in reverse, but after a little thought I said to myself, "You know, that"s really a good question."
Did you pay a point or an origination fee when getting your mortgage? How about a mortgage broker fee, did you pay one of those? Did you pay all three? If you didn"t pay an origination fee, then how did the mortgage broker get paid? Didn"t use a broker? Aren"t brokers and bankers the same? Aren"t points and origination fees the same?
Good loan officers are hard to find. You can get all the referrals you can handle, but they don"t count until the "rubber meets the road." Or your lock registration reaches the lock desk.
Has your phone started to ring yet? Maybe there are more than a few postcards stuffing your mailbox these days. Or perhaps your loan officer flat out just calls you on the phone and forgoes all the marketing stuff. Why all the chatter? Why, to refinance out of your adjustable rate mortgage, that"s why. And of course, if you do have an adjustable, you should consider looking at getting out of it.
Foreclosure -- it"s a word that conjures up awful feelings in homeowners and is getting plenty of national attention.
[Note: To follow is an excerpt of an interview with William A. Lederer, author of "The Ultimate Real Estate Investing Handbook," "The Ultimate Landlord Handbook," and "The Ultimate Property Management Handbook." To listen to the show archive or download an MP3, go to www.IncomePropertyInvestmentTalk.com/040809.]
As interest rates creep up, first-time buyers are finding that specialty loans are in many cases the key to getting them the home they want.
True to form, federal financial regulators lived up to their warnings of impending proposed guidelines for lenders offering nontraditional mortgage products deemed too risky to a growing segment of home buyers and lenders" portfolios as well.