Fair Oaks, CA

Congratulations.... you want to sell your home. And you are right, you have done some amazing upgrades, and your home IS special.  It IS worth more than anyone else's.... ;o)

But this is the time to get real. Why?  Because you are going to get your hopes up, you're going to exhaust yourself cleaning and painting, and packing up all that stuff you've accumulated.  And you are going to put up with realtors coming by at all hours, and making appointments and not showing up.  It's frustrating and a lot of work.

But it's quadruply frustrating if you do all that work... get your hopes up... make new plans AND THEN YOUR HOME DOESN'T SELL because it's overpriced!  Bummer.... Way Bummer, in fact. Actually it's even worse if it's goes into escrow, but it won't appraise.  Dang their appraisers.... they have their heads up their.....

Hold on now.  They are not the problem.  I promise.  They've got rules and guidlines, and they are only doing their job.

So how do you assure that your home will sell AND appraise, especially after putting in all that work, and putting up with all those pesky agents with their buyers.

Check out the following video and you'll find out how. You'll also see how good I look in blue how to how to adjust your expectations to what will most likely happen. And if it doesn't make sense.... call me.  I'm here to help.

To check out homes for sale in the Fair Oaks area, click here.

"What the heck is she talking about", you say? FHA has a killer loan "add-on" where you can save money by borrowing money to upgrade your heat and air unit, windows, insulation and other energy efficient products. It's pretty cool... (or hot, if you get a new heater!)

"So stop with the mumbo jumbo and give me the details!" Ok, here's an example. You are buying a $200K bank repo using FHA financing, with a nearly dead heat and air unit (or missing!), ugly aluminum single pane windows that are drafty, a measly 2" of matted down insulation in the attic, and a rusted out water heater blowing orange water into your kitchen sink. But it's a good deal and you want it. Here's where the EEM loan (Energy Efficient Morgtage) does it's magic.

You plan to put down 3 1/2 % (that what FHA allows) and get a loan for $193,000. You can tack on up to 5%, or $10,000, to upgrade items that will save you more money in energy savings than they cost. Take the insulation, as an example. An energy audit rates the house for energy efficiency. The audit shows that adding 24" of insulation will save $20 a month in heat and air bills. The $1,000 is added to your loan, so you will now owe $194,000, which has added $6 a month to your payment. But it saves you $20 a month, resulting in a $14 savings. Brilliant, huh?

The energy audit (done during the early stages of your loan, hopefully) will suggest the most efficient upgrades, and you can pick what you want, up to the 5% figure, as long as the aggregate savings is more that the cost. So, let's say you want to put in pretty new dual pane windows, which don't have a very high energy savings, but look way cool and really upgrade the look of your home. If you also upgrade the insulation (which has a very high return), your aggregate savings may be enough to qualify you.

You do not need to qualify for the additional loan amount (because it is saving you money), and all the actual work must be done after you close escrow. (And, no you can't pocket the money and not do the work.... nice try!)

If you think you might want to buy a home with this type of extra help, call me and I'll explain the details. It is a really slick way to take advantage of our low prices, yet get cosmetic and energy efficient upgrades, without needing to come up with extra money. This one's a no-brainer!

flickr photos by Mattwitmer and Redteam

First, I'm sorry you are in this predicament. None of us dreamed of this when we plunked down our original down payment on our shiny new home. But this is life... there are no guarantees.

If you have already tried a loan modification, or if a modification just won't help you due to your circumstances, you might consider a short sale, rather than allowing your home to be foreclosed upon. It will be up to your lender, or lenders, and they will require you to have a hardship that prevents you from paying your debt, but if you have a hardship, a short sale can offer some advantages over a full-on foreclosure.

First of all, after a short sale, you may be able to rebuy more quickly ... like in 2 years. With a foreclosure it will take from 5 to 7 years. I know that seems like forever, but time will pass.

Second, your credit score will be tanked less with a short sale, in the neighborhood of a 50 - 100 point decline, in addition to the dings from you late payments. A foreclosure will drop your FICO score in the 200 - 300 point range, for at least 3 years. This varies tremendously, depending on circumstances, and on how your lender reports it, so remember this is a generalization.

Your short sale may or may not show on your credit history, while a foreclosure is a public record for 10 years or more.

A short sale is particularly attractive if your job entails a security clearance. A short sale usually will not raise a red flag for a security clearance, while a foreclosure has a much higher likelihood of causing the revokation of your clearance. Talk about a double whammy - lose your house and your job (if your job is dependent on your clearance). You don't want that.

The killer can be a deficiency judgement that can threateningly follow you for 4 years or more from your first missed payment. You have more negotiating room with a short sale, and are able to negotiate for "full settlement" of your debt, although the banks are getting devious on this one. Wtih a foreclosure, there is no negotiation. The bank retains the right to file a deficiency judgement for four years after your first missed payment. (A deficiency judgement means you still owe the money, even though you don't own the house anymore. With a judgement, they can attach your wages, your future car... anything you try to buy. Only payment of the judgement or bankruptcy eliminates the judgement.)

Bottom line... this is tricky stuff. It's way out of our comfort zone, and it truly is a can of worms. If you are upside down, or are having trouble making your payments due to a change in your ability to pay, get help. My suggestion?... find out then weigh your options. I first send my clients to an attorney who specializes in short sale/ foreclosure options, to assess their exposure and their risk of legal and tax consequences. With his guidance, we develop a plan that works for them, then either proceed with a loan modification, short sale, or foreclosure. It shouldn't cost more than a few hundred bucks for the consultation, but can help you avoid a very costly mistake, and is the only way to get proper legal advise... realtors are not attonrneys or accountants, and should not be giving you legal or tax advise.

Again, I'm sorry for your pain. This is tough. But not doing anything may be tougher on you in the long run. Find out your options, and take action to minimize the impact on your future. Don't be one of the 70% of foreclosed homes who never even tried to do a short sale.

And remember, this too shall pass.

flickr photo by Bethany L King

For the last 15 years or so I've enjoyed playing golf with my son and it has been a pleasure to watch him grow and improve and far surpass me. At times I wonder what it would take to keep up with him on the golf course in the coming years, however I think I've stumbled across the ultimate inspirational golf story for the middle aged male psyche. Click on the link below to read about the exploits of the "World's Greatest Golfer", a 5'3" older gentleman from Asia, and no, it's not Tiger Woods hunched over. Working on your handicap? I don't wanna give away the punchline but you're about to meet the golfer who has shattered the meter on that scale...FORE!

P.S. This superhuman "athlete" also rolled a perfect game 300 his FIRST time out bowling. And my son and I thought we were pretty good at that too. Check out the photo of his physique and tell me what you think his training secret is.

If he wasn't so preoccupied with running a nation he'd be an obvious shoe-in for being a one-man Olympic team. Move over Michael Phelps, he's only gonna be limited by his inability to be in more than one event simultaneously.

http://www.oobgolf.com/content/fore+play/1-211-Kim_Jongil_Best_Golfer_in_the_World.html

If you get Wall Street Journal's columnist Yoder & Son in your paper, check it out this morning. I'm in it.

I love this guy. His post is always about an issue he is having with his son, Isaac, who is just graduating from high school. Steve writes the first half of the article from his perspective, then Isaac writes the second half, always on a topic about Isaac's upbringing. Isaac's viewpoint always impresses me, being well-thought out, responsible, with the kid slant you still want to see.

Recently they wrote about whether Isaac should work for money his first summer out of high school, or travel and seek adventure. The Sunday it appeared, I hopped from my chair and slammed a out my response to them. It appeared in this morning's column....

"I vote for travel and mind-expanding experience," writes Sally Dunbar of Fair Oaks, CA. "If you were a slacker, Isaac, I would vote for the job, because that would be the lesson for you to learn. But you are not... Go do something fun, out of the box." She herself left college for nine months to go backpacking in Europe, and came back "supercharged for life." When her daughter graduated from college, she says, "I advised her to not look for a job 'til the end of the summer. 'Travel, as far as you can go,' was my advice." Her daughter went to Thailand for a month, and eventually found her dream job as a financial analyst."

Once, Dear Abby had a column about something I was HOT HOT HOT about. I fired off an email without much thought to the consequences. It involved working women who made more than their husbands, but downplayed the role of the husbands. That fried my tires.

I wrote about all that my husband did as a volunteer for our community - build school playgrounds, install play structures, fix the flipping sprinklers on our local softball fields, coach softball... on and on. Imagine my surprise when the next Sunday, there it was. And here I thought they made that stuff up. As my face turned beet red, and prickly sensations took over my head, I caught the eyes of my daughter. I silently slid the paper over to her. I'll never forget the look on her face as she recognized her Mom's unidentified writing.

So enjoy your Sunday paper. And if you feel like resonding to a columnist, go for it. There really is someone out there listening.

Have you ever written a columnist and been published?

flickr photos by Larry he's so fine, Phil Moore and Enrico Fuente

&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&&

Check out my other posts that might be of interest.....

HOME BUYERS AND SELLERS..........Buying a Home, Selling a Home, Loans, What Happens if....

LOCAL INFO................................. Fair Oaks, Carmichael, Sacramento, Folsom, Citrus Heights

ABOUT SALLY DUNBAR.................. How I learned to...., Personal stuff, My Wordless Photos

OTHER STUFF............................... Inspiration, Attitude, Humorous Stuff, Charity, the Economy

TECHNOLOGY, BLOGGING ............. Active Rain, Technology