Jim & Cathy Wood Greater Nashville Area Real Estate

Nashville's largest Realtor, Crye-Leike Realtors, Inc. reported Nashville area homes have begun to show again. Stretching back to August of 2008 monthly home showings in the Nashville area had fallen at first below 3,000 showings and then to just barely 2300 in December.

‘These numbers are going to make a lot of Nashville area home sellers very happy" said Crye-Leike's Cathy Wood. Cathy went on to share three reasons for this rebound in Nashville home showings.

First- The Governments new Tax Rebate program for first time buyers. "$8,000 is a lot of money to first time buyer and with the new THDA rules, many Nashville area home buyers can even use it as a down payment".

Second- Cathy noted the current Interest rates available to buyers. " We're seeing mortgage rates at 5% or lower." To the first time buyer that means a $100,000 mortgage for about $500 + Insurance and Taxes. "You can't rent a home in Nashville for that".

For more of this article visit www.NashvilleRealEstateTalk.com

The Nashville average home price dropped to $223,945 from $239,085 This drop was less than half of the 15-18% on average that other cities saw this year.

See the rest of this Post at:

www.NashvilleRealEstateTalk.com

This Morning one of my Clients looking at Foreclosures and Short sale homes in the Nashville Market asked, "Do Sellers accept an offer contingent on my home selling?"

In the current N Real Estate Market, private sellers are happy to take offers contingent on the sale of the buyers home.

With a large inventory of homes on the market, sellers feel that a contingency offer is an offer and shows that someone feels their home has value and is priced right.

Nashville area home sellers will usually reserve the right to continue to market their home though. If they receive another, non-conditional, offer, they may ask the contingency buyer to drop the contingency and move the sale to pending. There is normally a 48 hour period allowed for this, sometimes called a 48 hour Kick-out clause.

If this happens, and the original buyer cannot move to pending ( usually because the buyers home has not sold), the seller will void the contract, return the earnest money and go with the new, non-contingent buyer. This is consistent with Tennessee Real Estate Commission rules.

Short Sale and Foreclosure properties are however NOT private sellers, but Banks and they work differently. Banks as a rule do not accept contingeny on nashville are Foreclosure or Short Sale Properties.

Banks do not want to market their Foreclosure properties while contingencies are in effect because they fear it discourages other buyers.

However, there is one case where Banks will consider this type of contingency.

I will address that in my next Post " Closing Contingencies on Nashville area Short Sales and Foreclosure properties".

People have been asking me about the Nashville and Wilson County Real Estate Markets every day. From the bank Tellers at First Tennessee in Mt. Juliet to my Doctor at West Wilson Family Practice.

"How is your business?" they ask me, knowing I'm a Wilson County Realtor. My standard answer has been "It's okay, but it could be better".

But last week two events crystallized the impact of the Housing Bubble Bursting here in the Nashville Real Estate Market.

On Tuesday in a conversation with a Mortgage Broker In Lebanon TN, he told me that his biggest problem right now in the Nashville housing market is not a lack of funds. Nor is bad credit with potential buyers in Nashville and Wilson County. His "biggest problem right now", he said, is "appraisals coming in below offer price".

He went on to say that in some cases he had seen appraisals $25,000 below what homes had appraised for in the same Nashville neighborhoods as recently as last year.

Keep in mind that the median price of a Nashville home is $160,000 and you can see the effect on the Nashville real estate market.

The second Nashville Real Estate market clarifying event happened on Friday, 3/27. I was at Realty Title in Mt. Juliet for a closing on a home in Gallatin TN, were I represented the buyer.

I remarked to the closing attorney, Kathy Tomlinson, that she had a very full schedule of Nashville real estate closings for that day with 7 on her wall calendar. She told me that there had been 7 "planned" for that day, however; only 4 , including mine. would be closed. The reason? 3 of the 7 Had not appraised for the negotiated sale price and either the sellers had not been willing ( or able) to re-negotiate at the appraised value or the buyers had walked!

These two events have really opened my eyes to the importance of setting the right price on my listings. In the current Nashville real estate market, with many values in flux we as Nashville area Realtors are not doing our jobs when we enable unrealistic prices for our sellers or buyers.

If you're thinking of selling, get an appraisal or at least a very Fair Market analysis from a Wilson County Realtor you can trust.

What a morning, I woke upto find that water pressure in my home was almost nil! We called the water dept and they sent some one over promptly. However; Bad News- He told us ther was a leak on our side of the meter, Ouch!

Fortunately my wife had signed us up for a Home Warranty with AHS ( American Home Shield) last year. We called them and they helped us find a Plumber who could come right out.

They found Greg Rausch of Rausch Plumbing in Beth Page TN.

Greg was in Gallatin and he came right to our house in Lebanon and went to work. He located the prblems , there were 4 things that had all gone wrong because of one $2 part that had been installed wrong years ago.

Anyway Greg worked through the morning and we had water again by mid afternoon.

I plan on using Rausch Plumbing for all of our clients in Sumner and Wilson counties from now on. They did a great job for us in an emergency situation.

Kudos also to AHS, Jeff and Roger Sargent, they helped us to locate Rausch Plumbing and did it quickly too.

Looks like we'll be renewing our contract with them later this year.h