Grace Keng, CRS, e-pro

Buying bank owned homes strategy

This Sunnyvale bank owned home 418 S. Mary Ave was sold quickly with over 20 offers. The asking price is $420,750 and the sold price probably will be over $550,000.

How to buy a good deal of bank owned own homes, you need to follow the following rules:

1). Price and initial deposit. The price is major issue. If you only qualify to buy $430K and try to put an offer to buy a home for the asking price then you will be disappointed. The asking price is like a teaser price which is not the reflect the real price.You need to ask the your agent to run an Comparable Market Analysis which will show the current value that include of homes on the market, pending sales and sold homes in the neighborhood.
The May home's comps shows over $600K with good condition. This home's condition is marginal with non-permitted remodeling work. You need to put a correct purchase price with 3% initial deposit.

2). Contingency period: This the period of time for buyer to inspect the home and find a real estate loan . Don't take longer then 15 days to do those activities.

3). Close the home to be within 30 days after acceptance. The bank usually likes the home to be close within 30 days All cash offer will be the best to them.

Grace Keng of RE/MAX Real Estate Services DRE#00919545 the members of the National Association of Realtors, (NAR),the California Association of Realtors, (CAR), and the Silicon Valley
Association of Realtors, (SILVAR), MLS listings Services, (REIL).

Cupertino is a mid sized city. It is about 45 minutes drive to city of San Francisco. It is close to the heart of Silicon Valley. Cupertino offers a short commute to most high tech firms, including the headquarters of HP, Apple, Trend Micro System, Symantec and Borland. Cupertino has joined Milpitas as the second city in the silicon Valley where the majority of residents is Asian.Cupertino is best renowned for the quality of its schools for good students and teachers with end result of great API scores.

Many schools have won state and national recognition for their academic excellence. The Computer education is one of best part. The Vice President Al Gore once visited theMonta Vista High School and Homestead High was honored at a White House ceremony. While Cupertino schools receive most of the attention, the recreational activities are plentiful as well also.

The city itself offers over 200 activities from cross culture acitivities for different backgrounds to the soccer teams. There are a lot of after-school music programs. Residents enjoy the city events such as the arts and wine festival, Heritage parade , Summer Shakespeare concert, sun down movies , Spring Cherry Blossom festival etc. The Cupertino has 13 parks, a nature preserve, and a racquet club as well as bowling and ice-skating. The local Junior College, De Anza, offers many classes for local community. The Cupertino weather is mild from the winter average temperatures from 50 degrees to summer averages around 80 to 90 degrees.

Cupertino has a wide variety of housing choices. The view homes are more expensive, around 1 to $2 millions in price. The rest city homes are more moderately from a condo of $400k to a single family home for $900,000. This spring I sold a newer Cupertino homes in Seven Spring for over 1.3 millions. While schools receive most of the attention in Cupertino, recreational activities are plentiful as well. Residents enjoy the city events such as the arts and wine festival, Heritage parade and De Anza Days under pleasant skies with winter average temperatures of around 50 degrees and summer averages around 80 degrees. Cupertino is a great place to live!

This above image shows the last total solar eclipse, March 29, 2006.

On July 22 2009 you can see the total eclipse in south asia include of India, China and Japan. This web site http://www.shadowandsubstance.com/ explains the location and how it will happen that it very informative. I will definitely watch them on TV and web also. This one will be the longest one.

Those furry animals can save the property owner's bottom line. The above dog name is my daughter's golden retriver named "Honey". We all love him a lot.

The Pets are an important factor to renters during their apartment search. Nearly 90% of renters who responded to a survey by Apartments.com, said they have a pet and of those that do not, more than half plan to become pet owners within the next year. More than 80% of respondents said a pet-friendly policy played a major role in where they chose to live. About the 60% renters said they would be less likely to rent an apartment requiring a pet deposit and more than half of them said they would pay more than $200 for a pet deposit.

According the San Jose Mercury news that the Silicon Valley's unemployment rate has soared to 11.8% and ths quarter apartment rent has dropped 3.8% to be the biggest declined in the nation. Yes! I do rent to pet owners also.

I found a Cupertino short sale homes asking only $499K today. I rubbed my eyes to see if I come cross a mistake. It is not a mistake! This small 2 bedrooms and one bath fix upper home with over 6000 sf lot. Considering the median sales price of $927,500 for 95014 , this small fixer upper is a steal. A real estate short sale is a type of pre-foreclosure sale in which the lender agrees to sell a property for less than the mortgage owed by the owner.

Yes! This Rancho Rinchonada area of Cupertino home price just like the price durning the year of 2002 or 2003. Accordining the Wikipedia that "Rancho Rinconada is a residential neighborhood in the eastern part of Cupertino, California. It is bordered by Saratoga Creek (just west of Lawrence Expressway), Stevens Creek Boulevard, Miller Road, and Bollinger Road. Cupertino High School, Sedgwick Elementary School, and Hyde Middle School." There are many large newer home up to 1.5 Millions and small home as this one for only $495K. There home owners and flippers built larger homes in this area.

Rancho Rinconda is a unique area. It is the most affordable area in Cupertino . This area has blocks and blocks of inexpensively built homes. As the time goes by some of the larger and newer homes were built in between of those small homes. We all know the value is in the LAND. If you buy this home you can either redevelope or add roomes to it.