By Nicole Villalpando
AMERICAN-STATESMAN STAFF
Sunday, August 02, 2009
Interior designer Joe Burke and his partner, architect Mark Smith, reconfirmed their intent to sell their grand Tuscan estate on RM 2222.
The four-story, 4,935-square-foot Lake Austin house has been their home and office since it was built in 1981.
Last fall they listed it themselves for $5.8 million. In July, they sought the help of real estate agent Will Steakley of Urbanspace Realtors and relisted the house for $3,795,000.
The couple expects to move downtown once the four-bedroom, 41\/2-bathroon house sells. They are looking at buildings including the Austonian that will allow them to continue to live upstairs from where they work.
"It's almost hard to give it up since we've been here so long," says Joe Burke.
"We just want to go downtown," says Mark Smith.
Visitors enter the 4,935-square-foot castle by crossing the drawbridge and xeriscaped moat into the second floor. Burke and Smith make note of the front doors they say they salvaged from the Littlefield home downtown; the foyer's cherry, oak, walnut and pecan flooring came from a village in Italy.
In the living room, the gold-stained, double flint glass chandelier was made in 1837 for the Andrew Jackson White House, according to the couple's research. Burke and Smith found it in at an antique shop in the Georgetown area of Washington, D.C. That same trip they also brought home an 1817 ruby-stained, double flint glass chandelier that they say hung in the James Monroe White House. Today that chandelier is in the third-story dining area. Both chandeliers convey with the house.
The couple's love of glass art also can be seen in the second-floor dining room's glass sconces that once hung in a home they were working on for Gov. John and Nellie Connally. Another chandelier in the house is an 1880s Waterford gasolier.
Burke and Smith use the second floor as the showroom for the Design Center. The 1,500-square-foot bottom level serves as working offices and storage, but it was originally designed as two apartments with separate bathrooms. The plumbing for two kitchens is in place.
The home's third and fourth floors are the couple's private retreat. The granite-countered kitchen takes in the view of the surrounding hills and the treetops above Lake Austin. The dining area flows into an open living area/bedroom, which leads to the closet room. Built-in drawers line one wall perpendicular to dual walk-in closets.
The fourth floor serves as a guest bedroom and exercise room. It leads out onto a rooftop garden and seating area with a fireplace. The couple has held parties, complete with a band, in this space.
As grand as the house is, Smith's favorite part of the property is the 124-step pathway leading to the boat dock. The side of the hill is rich with flora including wild maidenhair ferns and cypress trees. When not in a drought, waterfalls flow from the cliff.
Central Texas home sales were down 19 percent in May from a year ago, but the market has picked up momentum from the beginning of the year thanks to low mortgage rates and a healthy supply of homes, the Austin Board of Realtors said today.
There were 1,707 home sales in May compared with 2,108 a year ago. It was the highest number since August.
There were 2,132 sales pending to close in June, down only 1 percent from a year ago.
The median sales price dipped 1 percent, to $193,000.
However, unlike the national real estate market, both the average and median sales prices for single-family homes in the Austin area have risen from January, the board noted.
“While we still aren’t completely out of the water, we’re starting to dry off,” said Jay Gohil, chairman of the Austin Board of Realtors. “Factors such as the local economy and job growth are promising for both sellers and buyers.”
There were 9,939 homes on the market in May, down 6 percent from May 2008. Last year, listings had topped the 10,000 mark each month from April through September.
From January through May, sales are down 25 percent and the median price is off 1 percent, the board reported.
The number of homeowners facing foreclosure surged in March as lenders lifted temporary moratoriums and resumed legal actions against delinquent mortgage holders.
Foreclosure filings — default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions — were reported on 341,180 properties in March, 46% more than a year ago and 17% more than February's total, according to the latest report from RealtyTrac Inc., a foreclosure listing firm. (RealtyTrac is a partner of MSN Real Estate.)
Nationwide, nearly 804,000 homes — or one in 159 U.S. housing units — received at least one foreclosure-related notice from January through March, up from about 650,000 in the same period a year earlier, according to RealtyTrac.
The totals for March and the first quarter of 2009 were the highest monthly and quarterly totals recorded since RealtyTrac began issuing its report in January 2005. Foreclosure filings increased 9% from the previous quarter and nearly 24% from the first quarter of 2008.
An unstable job market and faltering economy are magnifying the housing crisis, as delinquent mortgages and foreclosure inventories continue to grow.
More Americans will lose their homes as major lenders resume foreclosing on delinquent borrowers following a temporary hiatus. Big mortgage finance companies such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac temporarily halted foreclosures late last year while they waited for the Obama administration to unveil its economic recovery plan. With details now public about which borrowers qualify for assistance, the mortgage industry has begun foreclosing on ineligible borrowers.
A short sale in real estate is not always a pleasant transaction.
There are many ways to lose a home but signing away ownership in a manner that destroys credit, embarrasses the family and strips an owner of dignity is one of the hardest. For owners who can no longer afford to keep mortgage payments current, there are alternatives to bankruptcy or foreclosure proceedings. One of those options is called a "short sale."
More than half of my sales in Sacramento over the past few years are short sales. That's how prominent short sales have become.
When lenders agree to do a short sale in real estate, it means the lender is accepting less than the total amount due. Not all lenders will accept short sales or discounted payoffs, especially if it would make more financial sense to foreclose; moreover, not all sellers nor all properties qualify for short sales.
If you are considering buying a short sale, there could be drawbacks. For your protection, I suggest that all borrowers:
As a real estate agent, I am not licensed as a lawyer nor a CPA and cannot advise on those consequences. Except for certain conditions pursuant to the Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act of 2007, be aware the I.R.S. could consider debt forgiveness as income, and there is no guarantee that a lender who accepts a short sale will not legally pursue a borrower for the difference between the amount owed and the amount paid. In some states, this amount is known as a deficiency. A lawyer can determine whether your loan qualifies for a deficiency judgment or claim.
Although all lenders have varying requirements and may demand that a borrower submit a wide array of documentation, the following steps will give you a pretty good idea of what to expect.
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Being a member of the Austin community since 1989, I have fulfilled my passion to serve the public in many ways. Recently I decided to go into business for myself and joined RE/MAX's winning team!
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