J Philip Faranda

I am a big proponent of taking a child to work to see how their mom or dad works. Sometimes, the child will even emulate their parents and become more task oriented afterward. Here, Mark clearly demonstrates how impressed he is with his Daddy.

The $8,000 first-time home buyers tax credit is going to go away after December 1, 2009. This means that if you are in New York and want to take advantage, you don't have much more than 60 days.

"How can that be?" you might ask, since December 1 is almost 120 days away.

Note that I said if you are in New York. New York, unlike many other states, takes far longer to close a real estate transaction, which means that if you wait until October 15 to buy a home you might not close until after December 1, which could cost you $8,000. Lawyers, lenders, title companies, underwriters, insurance, code issues, and a ton of other variables make the Empire State the Glacier State when it comes to timely closings.

We are closing on a house in Connecticut in which the client had their offer accepted 3 weeks ago. That is Connecticut, and it is a cash purchase. If the sale thing were to occur in New York we could possibly still not be under contract.

How much time do you really have? I'd say that to make sure you avoid a last minute delay, that you should make August THE month to get out there and find a home. You can go into September, but you are pushing it if you get too close to October. Remember, plenty of others are doing the same last minute thing and there will be delays from the backlog. 30 days is ample time to find a great house.

If you are in Westchester, Rockland, Putnam or Dutchess, I know of a really good firm to use! I have some excellent buyer agents right now who know how to advocate for their clients.

Forewarned is forearmed. Get out there and find a house. You've got 8,000 good reasons to act soon.

Search the MLS like an agent here. New York's Premier Short Sale REALTOR. Read my short sale bog here. See the New York Photo blog here. J. Philip Serves Briarcliff Manor, Ossining, the River Towns, Westchester County, and the bedroom counties of New York City.

I was caught up in the traffic jam resulting from that horrific wrong-direction accident on the Taconic Parkway that took the lives of 8 people last weekend. I was driving northbound myself, and I found it peculiar that northbound traffic would be so backed up at that time. When I saw that all the cars were diverted to the Saw Mill parkway, I knew this wasn't rubberneckers; there must have been a huge accident. I never imagined it would be so tragic.

I live very close to the entry ramp on Pleasantville Road in Briarcliff Manor where Diane Schuler entered the Parkway in the wrong direction. As the embedded video details, she must have been ill or disoriented; people attempted to get her attention to no avail. Every day I drive by the embankment between the north and south directions where the van crashed. There is s small makeshift memorial that borders on a large patch of scorched Earth in an otherwise green lawn. It is a terrible tragedy for the friends and loved ones of all 8 people who lost their lives that day. My heart aches for all of them.

Search the MLS like an agent here. New York's Premier Short Sale REALTOR. Read my short sale bog here. See the New York Photo blog here. J. Philip Serves Briarcliff Manor, Ossining, the River Towns, Westchester County, and the bedroom counties of New York City.

Do you really need an attorney to buy or sell real estate in Westchester County? I was posed this very question by a first-time buyer recently. I asked Lisa Fantino, attorney, author, and friend, for her perspective.

I cringe each time a realtor tells me the seller or buyer is going to represent themselves in the sale or purchase of a home. I'm a lawyer and I would NEVER represent myself in the biggest financial transaction of my life (not counting law school tuition payments!) I know that we are all looking to cut back these days but why would you look to cut back on a $1,500 fee when the home may cost $500,000 and the realtor is probably getting a $20,000 to $30,000 commission? There's a reason they say "penny wise, pound foolish," saving a little money only to lose a great deal more due to your own stupidity.

The fee you pay your attorney will be your best small investment on this large transaction. Why? The answer is simple - they are the only one looking out for your best interest. Sure, you can listen to the realtor, who may or may not know the history of the house. But your new dream home may hold many hidden secrets and they're not always visible at first blush. So here's some advice from this Westchester attorney before looking for, let alone bidding on, your new home:

1. Work with a real estate agent who listens to your needs. If you are the seller do not let the realtor have the final say on asking price. Take their opinion as guidance and then do your homework. Check the comparables in your neighborhood. They are all easily available now on sites like Trulia.com, Zillow.com and PropertyShark.com.
2. On the other hand, if you are the buyer, make sure you work with an agent who knows what you want and narrows your search down to only those types of listings. You don't need to waste your time. Moving is stressful enough.
3. Placing the bid - In a down economy, many sellers are not realistic in their pricing and the properties are still over-priced. As the seller, know that your house is only worth what someone is willing to pay for it. As a buyer, don't be scared to make a low-ball offer. The worst that could happen is that the seller rejects it.
4. These days many homes are priced "as is." That means it's a take it or leave it offer. Sure you would still be well advised to get a home inspection done but the "as is" condition means that even if the inspector finds something wrong, the seller doesn't want to hear about it. However, once your bid has been accepted, get a house inspector in there PRONTO, before the attorneys get involved and anything is signed on the dotted line. You can still pull out before the contract is signed if the home inspector finds problems and the seller does not want to give you a downward adjustment on the price.
5. So, why do you need an attorney? Have you ever seen a real estate contract? Do you know what all of the boiler plate language means? Do you know what is required by the local building code and state statutes in order to sell a house? What are contingencies and how are they drafted? How much is a fair down-payment and when should it be paid? This is not stuff you can pick up by a quick read of "Closings for Dummies."
6. Have the names of three area lawyers prior to placing the bid. Ask the realtor, neighbors or friends for referrals in advance.
7. Once the bid is accepted, the contract can drag on or speed along at a pleasant pace depending on whom you retain to represent you. Now that is not to say that every delay will be the attorney's fault but you need to know that your business matters to the attorney you hire and that she will give it the appropriate attention.
8. Each party to the deal will have their attorney draft "riders" to the boiler-plate contract, enumerating wants, rights and obligations and then it will be the buyer who signs first and submits a down-payment. This payment is held in escrow by the seller's attorney. If you are the seller and you do not have an attorney, who will hold the escrowed funds? They do not belong to you until the closing is done and the property transferred. If you are the buyer, do not make a check out to the seller; make sure those funds are being held by an attorney or escrow agent until the house is yours.
9. Now comes the fun part - the financing. All cash deals are rare these days but still happen and make everyone at the table smile. However, most people are taking out loans, seeking mortgages from banks which are reluctant to hand out a dime. I have seen people with stellar credit ratings, scores in the 700s, be turned down for a mortgage. Do not shake your head as you read this (I can hear the emptiness rattling around). Banks today are being run by overworked and under-educated clerks. The mortgage departments have been left to the inmates at the asylum and no one knows what is going on. I have had bank clerks tell me they are waiting for me to submit paperwork while I sit looking at a fax from that very person acknowledging receipt of the documents weeks earlier. Closings these days rarely take an hour and have been known to last 6 hours because the bank has yet to fund the deal. Have you ever heard of a "dry closing?" Would you know what to do if that occurs as you sit at the table?
10. These are dangerous economic times we are living in and knowing that there is someone being paid to be in your corner when it hits the fan is a great security blanket when you are writing checks for $500,000 and up! Happy house hunting!

About the author: Lisa Fantino is an award-winning journalist turned attorney with a general and entertainment practice in Mamaroneck, NY. You can find her all over the web at her Lady Litigator Blog; Lady Litigator on Facebook and even on Twitter.

The only thing I'd add is this: if you are buying or selling a home in Westchester, Rockland or Putnam, you can bet that the other side has a lawyer working for them. If they have one, you need one. You never go to a gunfight with a knife.

Most of my postings on short sales have a happy ending. This is not one of those postings.

In late 2008 my office brought in an offer on a distressed, vacant property I had listed as a short sale in Mount Vernon. We did yeoman's work. I listed it and one of my agents brought a string buyer. The client, a victim of predatory lending, was desperately trying to avoid a foreclosure. The home was listed at $219,000 after several price reductions. We were listening to the market. We had hardship. We had a buyer. The short sale package was sent to the lender, who summarily rejected the short sale. Their reason: The loss was too large.

Now, sellers who don't like the bottom line are a proverb. But the market is ambivalent about those issues. The value is the value. The offer the lender rejected was $180,000.

The seller contacted the lender herself and was misled: The offer was $120,000, she was told. Yes and no. The net to the lender was 120k. The offer was 180. Back-payments, back taxes and other expenses eroded their bottom line.

When the listing expired in January, she re-listed it with another company. I spoke with the other agent briefly about getting him the keys. He was a newer agent, enthusiastic and eager. He wasn't fooling around, he told me. He was going to get this thing sold. I wished him better luck than I had.

306 days later, after the price had been reduced to $170,000, I saw that the listing had been cancelled. It was relisted as an REO for $169,900. When the lender denied our short sale in 2008, we warned them that they would never get an offer as good as the one on the table. We were right.

The bank will now be lucky to get $120,000, which will yield them utterly nothing now that they have kept a non-performing loan an additional year, paid the legal fees to repossess, and the property has been vacant & deteriorated another year. A nice lady's finances have been ruined, 2 listing agents have put blood sweat and tears into the vacuum of an ungrateful lender's middle management purgatory, and the neighborhood still has a blighted property. Nobody wins.

This kind of ineptitude is funded by our TARP tax money. Someone should lose their job over this. Mr. Negotiator, I told you so in 2008.

Search the MLS like an agent here. New York's Premier Short Sale REALTOR. Read my short sale bog here. See the New York Photo blog here. J. Philip Serves Briarcliff Manor, Ossining, the River Towns, Westchester County, and the bedroom counties of New York City.