Burbank Real Estate Agent Ana Connell

The FAA (Federal Aviation Administration) ruled this week against the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena (Bob Hope Airport) Authority's application for a mandatory curfew from 10pm-6:59am. The news released this week, for those of you, like me, who have been following this issue for many years is disheartening, but not surprising.

To give you some background, Burbank, Los Angeles and Glendale residents have been advocating for this curfew since the 1970's. There is currently a voluntary curfew in place, but residents would like to make it mandatory as they see a risk of increased air traffic in the future.

On the good news front, this was the first application ever to make it through the entire FAA review process. The problem is that if the FAA rules for this curfew, then other smaller airports such as Van Nuys and Ontario Airports would be able to ask for the same treatment. The reason for the denial is that the FAA said the curfew would hinder business in the air and on the ground.

The next step appears to be litigation, which is supported by our local city officials and Congressman Brad Sherman. The request for a mandatory curfew would exclude medical, emergency and a number of cargo flights.

There are approximately 180,000 residents in Burbank, Glendale and Los Angeles who live under the flight paths and the area homeowners are committed to getting this curfew in order to maintain their quality of life.

If you are a first time home buyer, you will want to know who is expected, typically, to pay for what expenses in the home buying transaction process.

This list is intended as a guide and keep in mind that everything is negotiable and you can ask the seller to pay for certain fees or closing costs.

Typical buyer expenses:

• Title insurance premium for the Lender’s policy

• Half of the escrow fee

• Document preparation fee, if applicable

• Recording charges for all documents in buyer’s name

• Buyer notary fees

• Tax proration from the date of acquisition

• All new loan charges, with the exception of any lender requires seller to pay

• Interest on new loan from date of funding to 30 days prior to first payment date

• Assumption or change of records fees for taking over an existing loan

• Beneficiary statement fee, if assuming existing loan

• Inspection fees, which include property, roof, plumbing etc.

• Fire insurance premium for first year

Your realtor should help guide you through the offer and counter offer process so you are informed and can safely negotiate the appropriate costs/fees.

Here are the current stats for Burbank homes-active and pending sales:

Active - 109 Properties

Pending Sale - 76 Properties

Active and Pending - 185 Properties

The Housing Market Index report came out yesterday and showed a 2 point increase over April's report.

This follows on the heels of a 5 point jump in April's report.

Yesterday this news was viewed as a very positive sign for the future direction of the housing market. Fast forward to today, the Housing Starts report came out and showed that starts fell dramatically going to lows not seen since 1959. Housing Starts fell 12.8% in April, 8.5% in March.

The pain was felt most in the Northeast, Midwest and South as the West showed the best news with a 42.5% increase in starts.

To put these numbers into context you need to realize that this(Housing Starts) statistic is a lagging indicator, meaning that it takes a while for any rebound to actually show up in these numbers. Having said that, inventories in many parts of the country are very high. Again, real estate is local, very local.

Here in the Burbank/Toluca Lake/Glendale real estate areas inventory is high in some of the higher price points, but if you look at the 400-550k market, inventory is not bloated at all. Properties that are priced well are selling quickly as there are many buyers at this price range.

This market is unlike any we've seen before and can be very confusing for both buyers and sellers. There is no doubt that pricing is key to selling properties quickly. The take away should be that these numbers can be interesting, but really don't tell you much about your real estate area.

If you really want to know what's going on in a particular neighborhood and at specific price points you need to drill down and study the inventory, recently sold homes, pending homes to gain insight on the true picture. Ask your realtor if there are multiple offer situations, if so at what price points. All of these statistics help give you a much better picture, which is important for sellers looking to price their home for a quick sale and for buyers wanting to present offers that get accepted.

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As you can see, not all areas are created equal when it comes to homes for sale and actual homes sold.

While some of our local areas are mirroring the national statistics there are a few areas that are had healthy sales and price increases as compared to March 2008.