Category Archives: Real Estate

Here We Go Again? Boom Times Are Back, And So Are The Pitfalls

Posted on April 14, 2013 | Leave a comment

WASHINGTON — They’re back after barely a decade: escalation clauses in real estate contracts, “naked” contingency-free offers and lowball-priced listings designed to pull in dozens of bidders and turn routine sales transactions into auctions.

These are all techniques last seen with frequency during the frothiest months of the housing bubble in 2004-05, when prices were rising at double-digit rates, buyers thought they couldn’t lose money in real estate, and mortgage financing was available to anybody who could sign a loan application.

Want to know if the value is there or if the property will appraise. Contact the appraisers at www.scappraisalscom for your appraisal questions. Also want to wave the building inspection? Contact the appraiser at www.scappraisals.com for your cost-to-cure questions.

Now they are reappearing in some of the hottest sellers’ markets from coast to coast — the byproduct of severe shortages in houses listed for sale combined with strong demand by qualified purchasers.

Nationwide, according to surveys of 800-plus local markets by Realtor.com, inventories are down by 16 percent from year-ago levels. But in the hottest areas, listings are down by double or even triple that and prices are moving up fast.

Buyers, meanwhile, are out in droves, scanning newspapers and online realty sites for the latest listings, and signing up for alert services provided by realty firms.

In the San Francisco Bay area, for example, agents say that realistically priced new listings are attracting dozens — sometimes even hundreds — of shoppers to open houses and stimulating bidding competitions with 30 to 50 or more participants.

Bidding wars are also increasingly frequent on well-priced listings in Washington and its Maryland and Virginia suburbs, much of California, Seattle, Phoenix, Las Vegas, Richmond, Boston and parts of Florida, among others.

Disclaimer: for information and entertainment purposes only

Buying Foreclosures Requires Patience, and a Little More Money

Posted on April 13, 2013 | Leave a comment

It’s still possible to buy a foreclosure and make it the home of your dreams. It’s just harder these days.

Investors, both individuals and national corporations, are rushing into the market with the intent of turning foreclosed properties into cash-generating rental units.

Lenders are only slowly listing homes for sale at a time when the general appetite for home purchases is increasing. Demand for properties is leading to bidding wars and higher prices that aren’t necessarily justified by appraisals, putting deals at risk.

Contact the appraisers at www.scappraisals.com for your value and appraisal questions.

All that being said, there are still plenty of foreclosed properties out there. In the 12 months ended in February, more than 20,000 foreclosures were completed in the Chicago area, according to housing analytics firm CoreLogic. Most will become bank-owned and eventually put up for resale.

Homebuyers just have to find the right property. While they have to demonstrate patience in their search, they need to move fast and effectively once they find it.

“The consumer gets burned on a house they really like once or twice,” said Michael Goodwin, an agent at Exit Real Estate Partners. “After that happens, they get war-hardened. The next time they are ready to pounce. Not very often does it wind up being the first house. It takes them getting slapped in the face.”

There was competition for properties a year ago too, but real estate agents say this year’s foreclosure market is different.

Across the board, agents find that foreclosures are being listed at far less than what they will likely sell for, a smart marketing strategy that is having the intended effect of generating interest and multiple bids.

Disclaimer: for information and entertainment purposes only

Californians – Keep Your Lawn But Make It More “Green” Friendly

Posted on April 11, 2013 | Leave a comment

If ever you should decide to redo your garden, sooner or later you’ll likely hear someone say, “Be sure to stay true to the surroundings.” It is one of those stock phrases that architects and decorators often use to suggest that the garden’s design shouldn’t veer far from the style of the home and interior, or that native plants and local aesthetics should be embraced. But for Lisa Gimmy, a landscape architect who has spent the last 20 years designing gardens around Southern California, the idea of staying true to your surroundings goes far deeper. For her, garden design is a matter of seamlessly integrating inside and out, lifestyle and landscape — and her solutions have yielded gardens that are livable above all else.

Does making your landscaping “green” add value to your home? Contact the appraisers at www.scappraisals.com for you value questions.

Many of the gardens she has designed, including the two featured here, belong to midcentury modern California homes. She’s a master at selecting plants and hardscape that not only work with the dry California climate but also with the horizontal lines and hard edges of modernist design. But Gimmy’s philosophy and approach to design is universal, and could just as easily apply to a farmhouse in the Midwest or New England.

More attuned to a home’s ethos and environment than her own personal vision, Gimmy does not have a signature style. It is possible to visit several of her gardens and not immediately realize they are by the same person. “There is not a look,” she says. “My gardens are more about the site, plants and views, and about finding a design that is in sync with the architecture and that allows the clients to live the life they imagine for themselves.”

Category Archives: Real Estate

Here We Go Again? Boom Times Are Back, And So Are The Pitfalls

Buying Foreclosures Requires Patience, and a Little More Money

Californians – Keep Your Lawn But Make It More “Green” Friendly

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