Barbara Adams, Realtor SRES SFR

If you are buying a bank owned home, you can now choose your own title and escrow company per new law enacted to protect buyer's interest and insurance on the property they are buying.

You cannot be charged an advanced fee for loan modification services by an agent or attorney from 2010-2013.

Mortgage brokers now owe their clients a fiduciary duty to put the interests of the clients first before their own interests, they now join Realtors in this fiduciary relationship to clients.

Changes have been made to the amount of home equity protected in Homestead declarations for single and married persons.

Mortgage fraud is now a crime in California.

The law that makes Landlords give a 60 day notice to terminate to month to month tenants who have lived there for over one year has been extended.

New federal mandates for FHA appraisers to be state certified in order to conduct FHA appraisals.

Many new appraisal, lender and FHA and VA regulations have been affected by new federal and state laws as of January 1, 2010 (today), because of this, please expect a period of adjustment to all the new requirements, escrows time periods and other factors will be affected in the coming weeks.

Interest rates are not expected to remain steady after the first quarter of 2010.

Home buyer federal tax credits will expire in the coming months.

Mortgage disclosure laws and waiting periods after any and all changes in the loan application will cause delays in the closing of the escrow. Do not make firm plans to move until you are certain that the escrow is actually closing.

Be prepared to provide your lender of choice with a myriad of documents and statements of your financial status, these document requests can come anytime up until the day of closing, employment checks and inquiries, last minute credit checks will be the norm instead of the exception.

New regulations in the disclosure of reverse mortgage details are mandated.

Please consult with your Realtor, attorney, mortgage consultant or tax specialist for more detailed information on all the new laws that affect your position.

In order to get better leverage, more opportunities for buying a home, shop for a home during times when other buyers may be pre-occupied with other activities, such as a major holiday.

Anything you can do to improve your chances at getting into a home with fewer competing buyers enables you to shop without as much pressure, take advantage of not having as many or perhaps no competing offers too.

Historically, buyers and sellers delay making decisions to buy or sell until after their holiday activities are over with, once they return to work, their holiday visitors have gone home and their home decorations are put away.

In fact, for sellers it is very advantagous to have your home on the market during the holidays to take advantage of the most serious buyers, ones who may have been transferred into the area and plan to move their families in after the holidays and others who want to move their school-aged children during a holiday vacation or semester break.

As today the interest rates are at historical lows, there are fewer obstacles in your way of making a wise purchase before the bulk of the buyers who intend upon taking advantage of the first time and repeat home buyer tax credits which will expire if they are not in escrow by the end of April 2010.

You will be ahead of the game by taking advantage of any home sellers such as banks which may be very motivated to get inventories off their books by years' end.

If you are an FHA buyer, appraisal procedures will change as of Jan 1, 2010, you will see that this will insert certain delays due to the new implementations after the first of the year.

Getting your bid in on a good buy on your chosen type of home in today's market is easier when you have more choices.

Work with a savvy agent who knows what will work when you are making an offer.

Make the comittment to hire a buyer's agent, together you can build a system of trust and understanding of what you want, and a comittment of time and research on the part of your own buyer agent will reap you their dedication and ability to become familiar with your likes and needs in a property and you will become aware of how they can provide you with exactly what in your desired price range and what you want at the same time.

Hire experience, drive home to a winner. No more waiting endless months to find nothing at the end of the wait.

You may have requested a loan modification and been told by your bank that it has recomended that you qualify for a short sale, just give me a call. You deserve dignity and care in the handling of your listing. No embarrassing sign will be installed in your yard, discretion and utmost concern for your privacy is ensured.

The process is lengthy and should be discussed at length. Call me today for a confidential meeting to discuss the process. Homes are selling and short sales can succeed, they do not need to be stressful. Your situation is unique.

Short sale simply means I market your home, find a buyer who is willing to pay current market value for your home, we present the buyer's offer to your mortgage holder and request that they accept that offer as payment for your current loan, they pay the costs of sale and your life can move on.

Foreclosure is the result of waiting far into the process, your home can still go onto the market as a short sale to prevent a foreclosure from your credit record.

Banks are more willing to agree to this sort of settlement due to government assistance with this process.

Call me for a consultation today!

It is becoming increasingly difficult to find active listings that match the needs of my buyer clients in the Vacaville single family home market. This shows a local housing recovery and a healthy increase in the number of homes sold. December 2008 more than double the number of homes sold in Vacaville than the year before in December.

Foreclosure actions have been on hold for a few weeks and banks are supposed to be working with homeowners in distress situations but expect more NODs soon. Banks have been actively working with short sale offers and REO bank owned homes have been going into escrow with multiple offers.

Currently there are 296 single family homes (@ $177/sf average list price) on the market in Vacaville today Feb 3, 2009. (Prices range from $79,000 up to $1,375,000 with the average 1911sf home priced at $350,719).

FHA minimum down payments were increased to 3.5% on Jan 1st, 2009, the max limits for these loans was capped out at $400,200 after almost 9 months of being at $417,000 in Solano county.

Energy efficient mortgages and more agreeable REO banks have put the bank owned homes into better condition for today's buyers.

Don't forget to procure a one year home warranty on these homes since they are buying properties with few disclosures on them by the banks' own admission, they are not the occupants, banks don't know the condition of the homes.

Write to your congressman/woman and let them know that it would surely be a good thing that if at some time the current family living in that home could be given the same offer/opportunity as the buyers are offered in a short sale or REO purchase, many people have time and many times much money invested in that home and are just as likely deserving of consideration. Keeping the homeowner in their home is not a bad thing.

Kaiser hospital has built a green building in North Vacaville, they have nearly finished it, and yet again this year they have delayed the opening until next year. Bad economy is not helping it, but we still like seeing our new hospital because we know they must someday open it, because there it is.

Last month, November 2008, they did open up some of the medical specialty offices in the new hospital. This place is built green and it is green. SCIF, State Compensation Insurance just opened up a new, large office complex of buildings, put the solar panels up over the parking lot, shading the employees' cars, this will serve as a nice surprise in the summer when the employees get into their cars after working all day and the car is not so hot in the summer sun.

Located in Vacaville California, one of the greenest spots in America in the right winter months, the beautiful hills that surround Vacaville are gently rolling green hills, the rest of the year they are the golden hills.

Vacaville is fast becoming the green and solar capital of the United States as it boasts many solar power stations installed at several local companies most recently including Mariani Fruit which is one of the original Vacaville mainstays in the days when Vacaville first became a settlement for the modern inhabitants of the 1800s when Juan Vaca and Juan Pena first brought their families here to live, relocating from New Mexico, they found the beauty and soil to be perfect for growing fruit and planted their families and their orchards here.

The city of Winters maintains a perfect balance of soil, weather and farmers who support and grow the finest walnuts in the world, Mariani Fruit handles the bulk of the walnut harvest and processing with a facility in Winters to be near the growers and their main packaging and transportation center in Vacaville where they just energized their new solar plant on site.

Also, Alza Corp or as they are now known as Johnson and Co, also operate their own solar array in Vacaville, not more than a mile from Mariani Fruit.

P G & E sub-station in Vacaville also offers natural gas pumps for those cars that use that fuel, and other electric car charging stations are conveniently located all over the bay area as well. Vacaville, Dixon, Davis and West Sacramento fully support the alternate fuels of the cars being developed in our backyards at the West Sacramento Fuel Cell Conglomerate building.

Experimentation of alternate ways to power vehicles will put California in front.

Solar power is such an interesting way to harvest electrical energy from the sun. It consists of a plate that is chemically layered with certain types of minerals and chemicals, they interact by differing from each other, and when exposed to the sun, they displace this difference and send it thru the wiring that is attached to the plates, if not used immediately by the load of a building or vehicle, this energy is instantly lost, so it must either be sent back to the electric grid if not used, or stored in batteries, since the power created is dc power, converters are used to change the power into AC current. If the power is sent to the grid, the power company is allowed to buy it directly from you, however interesting is that this will fast become another issue in the future as the power companies are already not willing to pay us the same amount of money per kilowatt hour as they charge us to get it. Legislation will have to address the issue. I believe the power companies are arguing that it costs money to take in power when their business is to sell power, not to buy it in small quantities from the general public.

Lastly, Vacaville is becoming the center of northern California for the number of solar homes they are building and have built in recent years. Most of these builders are installing a special roof tile that has the solar layers built right into them. Not all the roof tiles have the solar panels in them, and the power generated does not usually send the power back to the power company, but it sure helps with the bill! They call this spinning the meter backwards, and if you ever want to find out something interesting, try going out to your meter someday, have someone in the house turn lights and appliances on and off while the other person watches the meter spin. You will notice that the speed at which that wheel spins is in direct relation to how many things are on in your home, and they are not all equally as powerful at spinning the meter, your energy sucking appliances or the hanging light fixture with 9- 100 Watt bulbs may impress you when you watch it spin your meter! Power consumption is costly, with a little experimentation perhaps you can reduce your energy costs at home!