Sacramento, CA

The only person I've ever known who truly loved winter down to the core of her very soul was my mother. She adored winter. She loved the way the sun's glint reflecting off frozen windswept snowdrifts could blind a person. How sub-zero temperatures could cause metal earrings to sting one's earlobes and make the nostril hairs inside one's nose hang like icicles. She's dead now. That's what loving winter does to you.

Me, not so much. I'm not a big fan of winter. In fact, I grew up believing that California and Hawaii were among some of the best places to live in America. Notwithstanding how expensive Hawaii is, that makes Sacramento a dream destination with affordable housing and friendly people. We enjoy mild winters, too, a little snow in the foothills, but for most of the season, I don't even wear a coat.

The biggest problem with winter where I live in Land Park is frost. When those temperatures dip in to the 30s, some of the plants in my garden don't make it. Especially the cacti and succulents. I lost several gorgeous cactus plants last year, and am bound and determined it's not going to happen again this year.

Enter the picture: water wells. I had totally forgotten that we had a stack of these frost protectors in our garden shed. My husband and I used these to get an early start on growing tomatoes when we lived in Minnesota. They worked great. We could get a 30-day jump on everybody else by setting out our tender plants in late April and surrounding them with water wells. Didn't matter if it snowed or temperatures dropped, our plants were protected.

This year, I am protecting my cacti and succulents from frost and have already set up my water wells. See the photo above of my Land Park cactus garden. They look sort of weird, like aliens have taken over the garden, but I'm not losing my plants again this year. Here is a place where you can get them online. This gardening company calls them tomato teepees.

The water wells are made from plastic and feature individual chambers that hold water. So, if one of the chambers is punctured by a cactus thorn and leaks, the rest of them remain intact. They work by absorbing heat from the sun during the day and keeping the plants warm. The secret to filling them is to place a 5-gallon bucket over the plant, put the water well around it and, after it's filled, pick up the bucket. I'll report back in the spring.

Photo: Elizabeth Weintraub

I don't have any problem with multi-tasking except when facing certain types of death-related circumstances. While some people can't walk and chew gum at the same time, I routinely multi-task. It's often the only way to get things done during the day.

For example, I might be brushing my teeth while talking on my cell. It's easy. You can do it, too. You just move the Jawbone off your chin so it doesn't transmit the sound of robust brushing and talk with your mouth full of toothpaste. So what if some toothpaste dribbles down your shirt? It's a small price to pay for doing 2 things at the same time.

I often work simultaneously on 2 computers with multiple windows open. It would be nice if MetroList had the common sense God gave a chimp and worked on cross-platforms, but our Sacramento MLS requires an Internet Explorer browser, so I need to use a PC at times. MetroList doesn't interact well with Java. I'd say 10% of the time when I request a report from MetroList, it freezes, submits a Microsoft error message and then closes out my browser.

While I'm waiting for it to reopen, I can then turn my attention back to my trusty Mac and focus on another project such as firing off a heated email to MetroList, explaining that it needs to fix this problem, which I then delete because I know what the response will be. MetroList will say the problem is on my end, yet when I go to the office and use the computers in our workroom, I get the same error message. It's the price I pay for being forced to work in a PC environment.

Instead of focusing on the irritating nature of MetroList, I prefer to look at how fortunate I am that we have Apple in this world. My Mac Pro makes my life enjoyable and happy. And it gets even better. This month I'll be able to access WinForms on my Mac. Go WinForms. There is always a rainbow in a rainstorm if you look hard enough for it.

Case in point, while driving down Business 80 yesterday, I was talking to a Sacramento seller who is considering a short sale. I meant to exit on 26th Street but for some reason got off on south 99 instead. OK, I was writing down an address and driving. But in my defense, let me say that I wasn't looking at my notepad, I was looking at the road and probably writing on my thigh. The exit to 99 is one huge and very long curve. I said to the caller, "I have the distinct feeling that I should be focusing at the moment on navigating this curve on the freeway exit and should not be writing down your address." She agreed.

She then told me that when she bought this home, she had planned to put down 20% but her agent had advised her to keep her powder dry and use that cash for repairs. So, she took out an 80/20 combo loan through Countrywide, and now her home is underwater. (Ack. Countrywide, the worst short sale to do.) Bear in mind, I pointed out, she would still be underwater whether or not she had put down 20% because values in that neighborhood have fallen more than 50%.

Moreover, it's actually a good thing that she had financed 100% of the purchase price. If she hadn't, and she had taken out a home equity loan for the repairs, she could possibly be facing a deficiency judgment on that second loan right now.

So, that was an excellent move. She has her former agent to thank for that suggestion. It's the silver lining in this situation. It could be worse. Suddenly, the caller felt much better about calling a Sacramento short sale agent. And if I can make my potential client's day better, you know what, mine is better, too.

The Multiple Listing Service statistics were recently published for the month of October and the figures show a very stable residential real estate market. There were 1,716 closed sales for October contrasted with the 1,631 sales that closed in September, a 5.2% increase. Of the October closed sales, 713 (41.6%) were bank owned (REO), 356 (20.7%) short sales and 647 (37.7%) conventional sales. The bank owned sales continue a steady decline since the first of the year and the short sales and conventional sales continue to increase as a percentage of the total.

The median home price increased in October to $185,000 from the September median of $183,000. Over the past six months the median home price has been in the range of $180,000 to $190,000. This is continued evidence as to the stability of our current market.

The last two months of the year should be interesting in terms of sales volume. Now that the tax credit has been extended to April 30, with a 60-day extension if a binding contact is in place prior to the April deadline, the immediate pressure has been taken off of prospective home buyers to enter into a contract and get it closed the prior deadline of November 30th. Will prospective buyers take a breather and perhaps take more time in the home selection process? Only time will answer that question. With low interest rates and low home prices, now is certainly a great time to purchase a home.

Richard Kitowski

visit us at: stepseachday.com

Believe it or not, some home buyers are having a very difficult time buying a short sale in Sacramento these days. You might ask yourself, why is that? Is it because the Sacramento market has limited inventory, which is causing buyers to compete with each other for some of the same homes? Or because lenders are tightening the belt in underwriting and kicking out loans for the slightest discrepancy?

In part, but not in whole.

I propose that the 2 biggest problems buyers face in a short sale situation are pricing and patience. Some buyers don't want to wait for short sale approval because their buyers' agents, for whatever reason, did not properly counsel them and explain that short sales can take, on average, 3 to 4 months to get approved. As a Sacramento short sale agent, when I am working with buyers, as opposed to sellers, I suggest that buyers sign a short sale addendum, which contains a date that is 120 days out.

Some home buyers believe they can demand that the lender quickly respond to their offer. It's not gonna happen. Threats don't work. There is a procedure for the short sale process and, along the way, it can get delayed for reasons out of the listing agent's control. Negotiators quit their jobs, they may become ill or misplace the file, or the PSA, worried over its tax-exempt status, could issue autocratic ultimatums, which then require further negotiation.

The key is patience. Buyers who wait for short sale approval generally receive it. That's evidenced by the growing number of short sales I am closing in Sacramento.

As for pricing, sometimes buyer's agents do not look at the comparable sales or, if they do happen to glance at them, they can't interpret them. In many cases, the short sale price a buyer sees advertised is not the real price. Because unless the bank has already issued approval, known as an approved short sale, it's up to the bank to select the price. And that price is based on comparable sales. Knowing what the bank is likely to accept is not really a big secret or a scary, unknown factor.

An agent called me a few days ago, asking about the price her buyer may need to offer to get that short sale offer accepted. I suggested she look at the comps, because that's where the answer is, staring her right in the face. She argued that some of the homes in that neighborhood sold for less than my seller's sales price and the square footage of those homes were larger. Therefore, she concluded, our short sale price was too high, and she believed her buyers should offer less than asking.

Did she happen to note that a few homes with identical square footage and upgrades as the subject property recently sold for $25,000 more? I guess her eyes wandered all over those comps instead of zeroing in on the exact models. It's like this, say you've got 3 red apples and 12 green apples for comps. The home you want to buy is a red apple. Which is a comparable sale? A green apple or a red apple? Which homes do you think the short sale bank will use as comparable sales?

Now that homebuyers no longer feel pressured to buy a home before the home buyer tax credit expires (because it was extended to April 30, 2010), it seems that the market is a teeny bit quieter in Sacramento. Usually Mondays are the worst day of the week, phone-wise. My cellphone tends to ring constantly on Mondays, generally because buyers are out over the weekend looking at homes. But yesterday, it was eerily silent.

In fact, I mentioned to my husband over lunch that my phone hadn't rung once. Was the market slowing down? He asked me if it was turned on. Duh. Of course, it's turned on because it asked to connect me to my Jawbone. It's illuminated. It's on. See? I showed him my phone. Oh. No bars. Somehow, and don't ask me how, I had managed to turn off my wireless connection. Holy crap. Four hours of phone messages.

I often get asked by media whether the short sale market in Sacramento is improving or getting worse; i.e., meaning is it taking longer to get short sale approval or are the banks and PSAs starting to get their acts together. It depends on which banks we're talking about. If it's a Wachovia short sale, the length of time to wait for short sale approval is still the same -- about a week.

If it's a Bank of America short sale or, worse, the loan originated at Countrywide, it's at least 90 days but it could be 6 to 9 months before approval. Aurora used to be better than it is now. Last spring approval came from Aurora within 6 weeks. I've got a handful of Aurora short sales now that are dragging. Last week, an Aurora negotiator told me that the 60-day approval we expected to receive next week is being pushed to 120 days out.

Lovely. Because CitiMortgage, which holds a second on this property, just issued short sale approval. It is set to expire in 2 weeks. On this particular short sale, Aurora holds the first. I emailed the negotiator to ask him why CitiMortgage would give us only a 2-week window on the approval letter when we don't have approval from the first lender, Aurora. Because this is an all-cash transaction, the buyer could perform, but we aren't going anywhere without Aurora's blessings.

His response? Because we should have had approval from Aurora by now. What was he smoking? His response inferred that we somehow dropped the ball, which is nuts. As a busy yet organized Sacramento short sale agent, I manage the short sale process like a gorilla.

I sense that CitiMortgage is now disguising its approval letters. I mean, the thing looks like an approval for a certain dollar amount, but CitiMortgage is really asking for more money. In this letter, CitiMortgage demanded a 2-week escrow but will agree to extend if it receives an 11% premium on the short-pay. It's not a large amount, about $5,000. So the true payoff is about $5,550. A $550 difference. Which the buyer shouldn't have to pay.

We quickly amended the HUD-1 to reflect the true demand from CitiMortgage and sent it off to Aurora. And this is how an escrow that was slated for approval next week will be pushed to January. But hey, at least my cellphone is working again.