ILoveSoFla.com » Real Estate

Miami Real Estate – Plenty of Housing Data Due Next Week

jenniferwollmann — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 13:20:22 +0000

The S&P Case-Shiller Home Price Index for December will be out on Tuesday followed by the Commerce Department’s new home sales report on Wednesday and existing home sales report on Friday. These three reports will help give Wall Street, and the rest of the country, an idea of how the overall housing market is doing.

Bloomberg’s Foreclosure Index Up 3.8% From One Year Ago

jenniferwollmann — Fri, 19 Feb 2010 00:13:17 +0000

Source: Bloomberg

Are Recent Improvements in Home Sales and Median Prices Here to Stay?

jenniferwollmann — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 19:33:24 +0000

Both on a national and local South Florida level, home sales have been improving and in some areas median prices have actually been increasing. Although we have been seeing a trend in increasing sales and decreasing inventories in Miami-Dade County, Moody’s Investor Services estimates there will be an additional 8% decrease in home prices in 2010 due to an increased number of foreclosures, short-sales, and deeds in lieu of foreclosure sales that will be coming on the market. Moody’s estimates are based on loans that are currently in some form of modification process but that will not be eligible for permanent modification.

Are You Eligible For a Loan Modification?

jenniferwollmann — Sat, 13 Feb 2010 02:02:38 +0000

The Difference between Cost vs. Price

jenniferwollmann — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 23:40:43 +0000

Sellers and buyers of real estate often fixate on what the price of a property is and in doing so, lose sight of the more important factor, cost. Price is what you get for the property if you are a seller and what you pay for it if you are a buyer. However, what affects both seller and buyer on a monthly basis is the cost. In addition to principal, interest, taxes and insurance costs, there are maintenance costs and maybe association fees.

If you are a seller, consider how much it is costing you to carry that property each month you don’t sell it. Based on the inventory of similar properties in your area vs the number of sales, you can calculate how much it is going to cost you to continue carrying that property for the average number of months it is taking to sell properties in your area. I suggest you cut your sales price and take the loss upfront vs slowly cash out each month.

If you are a buyer, realize that there has never been a better time to buy than right now. You have a large number of options, the interest rates are the lowest they have been in decades and there is the government tax credit that expires at the end of April 2010. If you are waiting for prices to go down lower, consider the cost of owning if the prices go down but the interest rates go up. If prices come down 10% more, but interest rates inch up only 1% your monthly payments are going to be roughly the same.

Miami Existing Home Sales Rise in December

jenniferwollmann — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 10:17:00 +0000

Although nationally existing home sales fell in December, sales of single family homes in Miami were up 37% over November. With the median price of both single family and condos down significantly and the expiration of the first First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit coming up in April, sales are expected to continue rising in the first quarter.

Miami Real Estate – Should You Continue Renting Or Buy A Home?

jenniferwollmann — Thu, 21 Jan 2010 01:54:18 +0000

Many economists are predicting a significant hike in home prices over the next 5 years, so if you are a renter who has been debating on whether or not now is the right time to buy, you may want to take a close look at the numbers. In her article, Ten Cities To Go From Renting To Buying, Francesca Levy states that although renting isn’t always cheaper than buying in the ten cities mentioned in the article, home buyers are likely to get a good return on their investment.

Foreign Investors Looking At U.S Real Estate

jenniferwollmann — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 22:08:29 +0000

Now that the residential real estate market appears to have stabilized, investors are starting to look at U.S properties as potential investments. According to Kevin Brass of the Wall Street Journal, groups of investors from Mainland China are still touring properties in the U.S.

With the decrease in real estate prices and the drop in the dollar in relation to other currencies, foreign investors are taking advantage. Shouldn’t you be?

FHA Changing Approval Process of Existing Condo Projects

jenniferwollmann — Tue, 05 Jan 2010 14:35:22 +0000

The following are some of the changes the FHA is making in how they process and accept loans in new and existing condo projects:

The burden of approving a condominium project will shift from the FHA to the lenders
Approved condo projects will need to be re-certified every 2 years
Homeowner’s Associations will need to fill out an FHA Homeowner’s Association Certification verifying that delinquencies are less than 15%
50% owner occupancy ratio will be required on existing approved condos

Robert Shiller Discusses Housing Market Volatility

jenniferwollmann — Sat, 26 Dec 2009 12:11:11 +0000

An interesting article by Robert Shiller, Yale Economics Professor and one of the creators of the Case-Shiller home price index, discusses the idea that perceptions as to land value is what has driven a lot of the housing market increases. He argues that a growing global economy and increasingly transient population that values economic freedom versus the perceived land value will create a more volatile housing market.

What do you think about the issues raised in the article?