About Orange County, FL

This month we have had the pleasure of helping many buyers purchase their first home to investment properties. As an reo listing agent I have the insider tips and tricks it takes to get my buyers deals accepted on bank owned homes in the Orlando area. Let's take a look at the amazing deals this past month that my buyers have had the opportunity in purchasing. Values represent homes in their current condition.

Address Purchase Price List Price Appraised Value

Beechdale Ct $50,000 $67,500 $85,000

Sugar Bend Dr $18,000 $30,000

Belhaven Dr $200,000 $200,000 $222,000

S Old Mill Dr $130,000 $135,000 $137,000

Cunningham Dr $38,000 $39,000 $46,750

If you are ready to purchase your first home or investment property allow Heather Joubran and her team at Heather The Realtor show you how they cannot not only get you the best deal on a bank owned home, but get that deal accepted. We have a long list of REO/ Bank Owned Properties in our own inventory for quick purchase too!

Don’t lose your home to foreclosure. These smart homeowners didn’t. Instead, they put their home on the market as a Short Sale.

Properties have been listed and sold by various MLS members.

Data drawn from the My Florida Regional Multiple Listing Service.

Because the payoff of a loan will be ‘shorted’ by a significant amount, the mortgage lender must approve a Short Sale. Handled properly, the likelihood of successfully selling your house as a Short Sale is high. Once the Short Sale is behind you, you can often get on with your life with hardly a backward glance.

A Short Sale is nothing more than putting your house up for sale in the usual manner, waiting for a qualified buyer just like any other home seller would, facing a few extra hurdles, filling out additional paperwork, waiting a bit longer for the closing to take place, and finally moving out and moving on.

Real benefits come with selling your house as a Short Sale. Among them are: 1) substantially reducing or completely eliminating financial liability, 2) minimizing damage to your credit rating, 3) emerging from bad credit quicker than you would with a foreclosure, and 4) having a sense of satisfaction that you’re taking care of the problem proactively and responsibly.

You are running out of time to vote for www.RealEstateOptimist.com. Tomorrow is the deadline to choose David Welch's Orlando Real Estate Blog as the top real estate blog in Orlando. Google already says David Welch has the top two blogs for Orlando real estate. Check for yourself, just google "Orlando real estate," and see who has the top two spots. This is organic not paid results. Thank you for your vote.

Orlando Real Estate, David Welch Real Estate Optimist, As Seen on HGTV's House Hunters

As a first time home buyer there are generally many stresses that come along with purchasing that first home, almost like planning a wedding. You want everything to be perfect, you want the whole thing to be beautifully orchestrated and when it's not just right, when one little thing goes slightly in the wrong direction first time home buyers tend to freak out and go into panic mode.

With the right Buyer's Agent in your corner this shouldnt be the issue. The Realtor is there to help asses your fears and the situation and disseminate the problem. A good agent often times wont even let you know the hurdles or problems that occurred just like a good wedding planner.

So here are some tips from working with hundreds of first time home buyers like yourself that might help calm your fears or anxiety.

1. Take a deep breath and step back for a second. There will most likely be a few events that arise in the process of purchasing your first time home that feel like major hurdles or road blocks. Remember when you have a good agent that is what they get paid to do is take care of those speed bumps and get you towards your finish line. So take a deep breath, now if your agent sucks completely freak out and RUN! (just kidding)

2. If you are unsure about a step in the home buying process or just want affirmation on purchasing your Orlando home ASK dont be afraid to speak up and say I dont understand or could you affirm something has been done, when will or should this take place. Sometimes even the best of agents can forget to mention something or often get caught up in their day to day Real Estate lingo and might say something you dont quite understand.

Remember no two deals are alike but your Orlando Buyers Agent has the training and knowledge to get you through your hurdles and on your way to home ownership. So it's important to not just choose any agent. It's important to interview the agent make sure you guys are going to mess and even throw in a scenario or two to see how that agent might react. You are spending your hard earned money on your new home and want to make sure your agent is working hard for you!

Heather Joubran 407-810-6304 Heather@HeathertheRealtor.com www.HeatherTheRealtor.com

Reuters reported that housing starts fell over 10% in October compared to the rate being built in September. At least a part of that was caused by a huge drop in multi-family. These types of project are up and down, and with commercial real estate on its heels right now it does not surprise me that these projects are so volatile right now. The single family side of the equation has to be evaluated in the context of everything that is going on. The first time home buyer tax credit was quickly approaching expiration, and I believe earlier in October there was sentiment that it might not be extended. Although talk of extending the credit has been around since July and August, what seemed like a sure thing ran into some challenges. First, the deficit for last fiscal year came in at a whopping $1.4 trillion. Second, there was not a lot of evidence that the tax credit was creating a turnaround as much as helping to stabilize the housing market. Third, news broke in October, I believe, that there were 100,000 suspected fraud cases related to the existing credit.

I believe that this growing sentiment that the credit might be extended guided some buyers toward resales. Even when it became apparent the credit would be extended and expanded there were rumors out there that if you contracted before December 1st, you would not qualify for the new credit. This type of misinformation, could have also had the effect of buyers putting off decisions to contract for a new home if they were hoping to take advantage of the new tax credit provisions. Maybe I am completely off base with my analysis of this situation, but here in Orlando we saw tremendous sales in October with more than 2,200 sales closed last month and nearly 4,000 contracts (not offers, contracts) written in Ocotober. I believe that was the most contract written so far this year. I continue to say if banks will start making decisions on short sales, REO's and getting loans closed we will get through this faster and healthier. Orlando continues to post around 9,000 pending sales, while our active inventory remains around 16,000.

Orlando Real Estate, David Welch Real Estate Optimist, As Seen on HGTV's House Hunters