About Long Beach's Bluff Park

So you have been out there looking at homes... You have found your DREAM home. You do not want to miss out on the $Tax Credit$... You do not want to lose this perfect house right??? Now what is next??? It's time to get started with the financial and contractual side of the purchase

.

Let Ricardo the REALTOR, CENTURY 21® professional guide you through this process. Purchase contracts vary in length and terms from state to state, and within a state, from locality to locality. Because you and the seller have different goals, rely on your CENTURY 21 agent's experience and expertise. He can bring order and calm to the process and will know what questions you may not know to ask to help you reach a favorable outcome. Multiple offers on the same home are not uncommon, so you may only get one chance to make an offer that the seller will consider. That's why it's important to think carefully about your strategy. In most cases it is better to have your real estate professional negotiate the offer. If you have any personal interaction with the homeowner, don't give out any information about your move, your current housing status, financial status or your feelings about their property - positive or negative. This could hurt you in future negotiations.

Please contact me with any questions or concerns regarding any of your Real Estate transactions. I can help you.

Sincerely,

Ricardo "The REALTOR" Perdomo
562.533.4003
www.RicardoTheRealtor.com

Long Beach, Ca. FHA loans may net you more when refinancing your home. Wherein, conventional Fannie and Freddie are limiting cash out refinances to 75% of a property's value. FHA loans may go as high at 95% of the homes value; however, if you cash out more then 85% of the homes value, you will definitely have to do a second appraisal. This can add a lot of costs to the regular refinance. For example, a typical FHA appraisal costs between $350-$400 and this must be paid up front. If you double that, you are expending between $700-$800 upfront before the loan closes. This is a considerable sum which is really only going to protect the bank by doing an extra certification of value on a home.

As an illustration, let's say you own a property that today appraises for $300000.00, pretty much the maximum you can get out of the property utilizing conventional financing is $225000.00; however, if you were to opt for an FHA loan should be able to cash out up to $285,000.00. This is a difference of netting $60,000.00 after the loan records.

Stock markets fell yesterday and Treasuries rallied after Treasury Secretary Geithner did not address the specific concerns on the minds of traders: what banks will do with toxic assets, how illiquid assets will be removed from balance sheets, and how to stem the decline in home prices. Currently, the Ten Year yield is at 2.82% (2.94% yesterday). 30 year fixed rate mortgages are about the same on where the market closed yesterday.

Yesterday was a "traditional" day where stocks went down and bonds went up. There's only so much money in the world, right? Locks volumes were heavy, but apparently the Fed buying mortgage-backed securities helped prices, and mortgage rates did well. A lot may happen in the next 3 business days, especially with an early bond market close Friday ahead of the President's Day Monday holiday.

Only economic news is the trade deficit. The U.S. trade deficit narrowed in December to the smallest in almost six years, with both exports and imports declining for the fifth straight month as consumers worldwide pulled back their spending. The gap between imports and exports shrank 4 percent to $39.9 billion, from a revised $41.6 billion deficit in November that was wider than previously estimated, the Commerce Department said today in Washington. "Trade is collapsing globally; whether it's imports or exports, there's a net benefit from trade that lifts all economies, and we're losing that now," said Christopher Low, chief economist at FTN Financial in New York. "We'll see a rise in protectionist sentiments."

As you know, the Senate passed the Stimulus bill yesterday. And now it goes to the conference committee to work out the differences between the House and Senate version. Assuming they are successful, the final bill is hammered out, and voted on by both the House and Senate and is then presented to the President to sign. And the President has asked for a final bill to be on his desk by this Monday. Here is a link for the summary of the bill.

Kirk Mulhearn, a Long Beach real estate broker and Professional Mortgage Planner may be contacted at: 562-989-4608 ext. 110

You may subscribe to this blog at: www.longbeachrealestateandloans.com

Long Beach, Ca. A friend of mine recently attempted to do a loan modification with Washington Mutual because of a pending divorce and hardship. Because he was not late in mortgage payments, he was refused by the bank. This seems to be a common trend with banks these days; for whatever reason, either they are overwhelmed with modifications, foreclosures and short sales or they are are just understaffed, they are refusing to make offers with borrowers who are not behind in payments.

The question for a homeowners in this situation is whether or not to pay their mortgage in order to position themselves to just get to the negotiation table? I will say this for sure, that if you do not pay your mortgage, it will affect you credit scores, negatively. Remember, that even though you may have a legitimate hardship, that it is often the bank's position that they will offer terms to you only at their pleasure. One mistake that homeowners make is that they accept the first offer that banks make to them. Nationwide, almost 50% of all loan modifications are turning back into foreclosures because homeowners are not properly negotiating affordable terms with their bank.

President Obama signaled at last night's press conference that he would be open to expanding the $700B stimulus plan. CNBC is carrying the speech live by the Secretary of Treasury Bank bail out plan and as he is speaking I am watching the equity market drop 200 points which is not encouraging. The new plan will most likely include more capital for banks, financing for as much as $1T of consumer spending and business loans, and public funding for investors willing to buy certain distressed assets. There is a $32B 3yr note auction today. Right now, the futures market is pricing in a 68% chance that the Fed keeps rates somewhere between 0 and .25% until at least June 24th, 2009. Currently, the Ten Year yield is at 2.94% (3.01% yesterday)

Fortunately we are seeing some buying in the fixed-income markets, and rates have crept back down. Yesterday, in a speech, FHFA Director Lockhart said Fannie/Freddie may need more than the $200 billion already pledged by the US Government if the housing market continues to deteriorate. Once again there is no scheduled economic news, but rates have dropped and 30 year fixed mortgage prices are better by .250 or more.

Now we turn our attention to ensure you are using the proper language and new name when referring to the TARP program. The Obama administration plans to revamp the Troubled Assets Relief Program under its new name, the Financial Stability Plan, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner will announce criteria for stress tests that banks must undergo before receiving federal funds to ensure they have the ability to lend. Among other requirements, banks will be forced to disclose how the money is spent and how many assets are purchased, show that the money is funding new loans, limit executive compensation, wait until the funds are repaid before buying healthy banks and adopt programs to curtail foreclosures. What is in a name, everything

Kirk Mulhearn, a Long Beach Real Estate Broker, and Professional Mortgage Planner, can be reached at 562-989-4091 ext. 110 Subscribe to the blog at: www.longbeachrealestateandloans.com

Long Beach, CA. Recently, Housingwire.com, a web based real estate site covered the big story that Fannie Mae announced earlier this month that they would allow renters to stay in their homes after the foreclosure process has been consummated.

Potentially homeless and hapless ex-homeowners would have a few options including:

"Cash for Keys," wherein they would receive a lump sum of money to leave the house in tact, broom swept, and trashed out. Normally, banks pay between $2000.00-$4000.00 to get people out of the property. This helps the banks market properties because they can easily be shown when they are vacant.

The article is continued at: http://www.longbeachrealestateandloans.com/

Long Beach, CA. Equity market is doing the yo yo today as we were down on Tuesday, up on Wednesday and we are down over 200 points on Thursday. Bond market is imitating the same thing. Bond market opened favorable and now has turned negative in the last 30 minutes. 30 year fixed rate mortgages are now worse .25% in price from yesterday. Housing Starts and Building Permits fell more than anticipated to record lows as credit continued to become less available; weekly jobless claims printed at a 26-year high. LIBOR is now at 2-week highs due to concern that policy makers are running out of options to stem the financial crisis. Right now, the futures market is pricing in an 86% chance that the Fed keeps rates somewhere between 0 and .25% until at least April 29th, 2009. Currently, the Ten Year yield is at 2.52% (2.47% yesterday). There is no relevant economic data scheduled for release tomorrow, so I would not be surprised to see more weakness in bonds and pressure in mortgage rates. It is becoming clear that the market is quite concerned about the amount of debt that the government will need to sell to meet goals that the new administration is expecting

Regarding our interest rates. Remember we have an artificial market. Our only buyer of mortgaged backed bonds is the Federal Government. The New York Fed continues to buy mortgage-backed securities, although today's amount is not known. Origination still appears to be in the $1-2 billion/day range. Certainly this has helped keep conventional mortgage rates somewhat low, although the market wonders if they government is the only buyer out there. Mortgage security prices are back to where they were two weeks ago, at best, but our investors have changed their profit margins to slow down lock volumes, or make up some profit ground for losses suffered in 2008. As one Wall Street firm put it, "The current MBS market is not about convexity or extension issues. It's about the Fed's commitment to keep the 30yr mortgage rate as close to 4.50-5.00% as possible for as long as possible...if Treasury rates climb, the Fed will be forced to buy $10-12BB a couple days in a row vs. their recent pace of $3-5BB per day." But when they run out of money to buy - what then. That is part of the dilemma the market is asking itself. Time will tell.

Contact Kirk Mulhearn for all of your mortgage needs at: 562-989-4608 ext. 110

Subscribe to this blog at: www.longbeachrealestateandloans.com