It looks as if our legislators in Washington are finally making positive steps toward fixing the house mess by including housing legislation in the Economic Stimulus Bill.
Yesterday, the Lieberman/Isakson Amendment was included in the senate version of the Economic Stimulus Bill by a unanimous voice vote. This amendment would provide a Tax Credit to all home buyers at the rate of 10% of the sales price up to a limit of $15,000. The credit would be available for a one year period to all purchasers of primary residences.
Dave Liniger, co-founder of RE/MAX International has this to say about the proposed legislation:
"I feel that these provisions represent real economic stimulus. They will put money in the hands of millions of homeowners, increase sales, stabilize home values and add more revenues to local communities in the form of property taxes.
I urge each of you to contact your senators and representatives to let them know that you believe these provisions are essential components of any stimulus bill. You can go to the official Senate http://www.senate.gov and House http://www.house.gov web sites to locate the email and phone number of your legislators."
This has passed the Senate, but the entire bill does need to go back to the House, and be signed by the President. There could be many changes before this happens, or not pass at all.
But is it light at the end of the tunnel for Greenville home buyers and would help the housing crisis immensely as you can imagine.
Visit LizFreeman.com to learn more about buying a Greenville home.
Strategies To Get The Best Deal When Buying A Greenville Home
Below are 5 powerful strategies to help you get the best deal when buying your Greenville home:
1. Don't Get "Pre-Qualified!" Get "Pre-Approved"
Do you want to get the best house you can for the least amount of money when buying your Greenville home? Then make sure you are in the strongest negotiating position possible. Price is only one bargaining chip in the negotiations, and not necessarily the most important one. Often other terms, such as the strength of the buyer or the length of escrow, are critical to a seller. In years past, we always recommended that buyers get "pre-qualified" by a lender. This means that you spend a few minutes on the phone with a lender who asks you a few questions. Based on the answers, the lender pronounces you "pre-qualified" and issues a certificate that you can show to a seller. Sellers are aware that such certificates are WORTHLESS, and here's why! None of the information has been verified! Unknown problems can surface for example: recorded judgments, child support payments due, glitches on the credit report (due to any number of reasons both accurately and inaccurately), down payment funds that have not been in the clients' bank account long enough, etc. So the way to make a strong offer today is to get "pre-approved". This happens AFTER all information has been checked and verified. You are actually APPROVED for the loan and the only loose end is the appraisal on the property. This process takes anywhere from a few days to a few weeks depending on your situation. It's VERY POWERFUL and a weapon we recommend all of our clients have in their negotiating arsenal.
2. Sell First, Then Buy
If you have a house to sell, sell it before selecting a house to buy! Let's pretend that we go out looking for the perfect house for you. We find it and you love it! Now you have to go make an offer to the seller. You want the seller to reduce the price and wait until you sell your house. The seller figures that's a risky deal, since he might pass up a buyer who DOESN'T have to sell a house while he's waiting for you. So he says OK, he'll do the contingency but it has to be a full price offer! So you see, you paid more for the house than you could have because of the contingency. Now you have to sell your existing house, and in a hurry! Otherwise you lose the dream house! So to sell quickly you might take an offer that's lower than if you had more time. The bottom line is that buying before selling might cost you TENS OF THOUSANDS of dollars. We always recommend that you sell first, then buy. If you're concerned that there is not a house on the market for you, then go on a window-shopping trip. You can identify possible houses and locations without falling in love with a specific house. If you feel confident after that then put your house on the market. Another tactic is to make the sale "subject to seller finding suitable housing". Adding this phrase to the listing means that WHEN YOU DO FIND A BUYER, you will have some time to find the new place. If you don't find anything to your liking, you don't have to sell your present home.
3. Play the Game of Nines
Before house hunting for Greenville home, make a list of nine things you want in the new place. Then make a list of the nine things you don't want. We call this "NINE OF THIS AND NONE OF THAT". You can use this list as a scorecard to rate each property that you see. The one with the biggest score wins! This helps avoid confusion and keeps things in perspective when you're comparing dozens of homes. When house hunting, keep in mind the difference between "SKIN AND BONES". The BONES are things that cannot be changed such as the location, view, size of lot, noise in the area, school district, and floor plan. The SKIN represents easily changed surface finishes like carpet, wallpaper, color, and window coverings. Buy the house with good BONES, because the SKIN can always be changed to match your tastes. I always recommend that you imagine each house as if it were vacant. Consider each house on its underlying merits, not the seller's decorating skills.
4. Don't Be Pushed Into Any House
Your agent should show you everything available that meets your requirements. Don't make a decision on a house until you feel that you've seen enough to pick the best one. Review the Multiple Listing printout with your agent to make sure that you are getting a COMPLETE list. In the late 1980's, homes were selling quickly, usually a few days after listing. In that kind of market, agents advised their clients to make an offer ON THE SPOT if they liked the house. That was good advice at the time. Today there isn't always this urgency, unless a home is drastically under priced, and you'll know if it is. Don't forget to check into the SCHOOL DISTRICTS of the area you're considering. Information is available on every school; such as class sizes, % of students that go on to college, SAT scores, etc. You can get this information from your agent or directly from the school.
5. Stop Calling Ads!
A word of caution - agents create ads solely to make the phone ring! Many of the homes have some drawback that's not mentioned in the ad, such as traffic noise, power lines, or litigation in the community. What's not mentioned in the ad is usually more important than what is. For this reason, we want you to be very careful when reading ads. Remember that the person writing the ad is representing the seller and not you! The most important thing you can do is have someone on your side looking out for your best interests. Your own agent will critique the property with an eye towards how well it meets your needs and will point out any drawbacks you should know about. So whether you decide to work with us or not, pick an agent you feel comfortable with and enlist the services of that agent as a buyer's broker. Then you become a client with all the rights, benefits, and privileges created by this agency relationship, and you're no longer just a shopper. Did you know that many homes are sold WITHOUT A SIGN ever going up or an AD EVER BEING PUT IN THE PAPER? These "great deals" go to those people who are committed to working with one agent. When an agent hears of a great buy, who do you think he's going to call? His client, who he has a legal obligation to work hard for, or someone who just called on the phone and said "keep your eyes open"? So, to get the best buy on a property, we always recommend that you hire your own agent and stick with him.
To learn more about buying your Greenville home, visit our website LizFreeman.com or give us a call, 252-717-5206.
Greenville NC Real Estate Market Statistics - January 2008
Trulia.com reports the average list price of a Greenville NC home was $191,580 last week. $190 and .1 percent lower than the previous week.
The median sales price for mid-January was $145,000, unchanged from January 2008.
The average price per square foot was $80, also unchanged.
854 homes are for sale in Greenville NC.
There are 92 foreclosures.
For more information on Greenville NC real estate, visit LizFreeman.com or give us a call at 252-717-5206.
Greenville Real Estate: Short Sale Tips
In the current Greenville real estate market, there has been a lot of buzz around "short sales." What is a short sale, exactly? A short sale is when a lender agrees to accept a mortgage payoff amount less than what is owed in order to facilitate a sale of a property by a financially distressed owner - in essence, the lender forgives the outstanding balance of the loan.
There are pro's and con's to short sales on both sides of the deal. For the seller, credit history is seriously damaged, but not as badly as it would be by foreclosure. Sellers also walk away with no profit, which makes it difficult to purchase another home. For the buyer, the property comes at a reduced price, but it also generally comes with its fair share of problems, and there is a considerable amount of "red tape" to get through to complete the purchase.
The short sale buying process can be a confusing one, especially for a first-time short sale buyer. Check out this helpful article from BankRate.com and see 10 Steps for Short Sale Buying below:
Identify potential short sales
To learn more about investing in Greenville real estate, please visit LizFreemanHomes.com. For more personalized service, please call me today at 252-717-5206.
Search all Greenville real estate and homes for sale!
For the first time since the spring of 2006, sales of existing homes in Pitt County have increased in consecutive months. That's not enough to signal a recovery to a bumpy housing market but does provide a glimmer of hope, local real estate agents said.
Sales of existing homes in the Greenville area were up 6 percent in March after a 31 percent gain in February, according to the North Carolina Association of Realtors — the first consecutive increases since May (37 percent) and June (29 percent) in 2006. But sales are down compared to 2007 — 174 units sold in March are 33 percent off the 2007 total of 254.
"Our market is down from where it was a year ago at this time," David French, president of the Greenville Pitt County Association of Realtors said. "It is beginning to respond. I firmly believe that the fuel situation is going to limit our recovery. But activity's picked up, and it should be picking up this time of the year. I don't think we will come anywhere near the numbers that we had last year probably through the second quarter of the year."
An encouraging sign is the average sales price for single-family homes rose about 6 percent in March to $176,208. Including townhomes and condominiums, the sales price dipped less than 1 percent from $145,063 to $144,407 from March a year ago.
"Townhouse prices are actually up this year," Richard Lane, broker-in-charge at Prudential Prime Properties, said. "Condos have been hit the hardest so far. Condos are down slightly in price and number of closings. ... But townhouses and condominiums, at this stage, are a minor player in the market compared to single-family."
Lane said extensive media coverage on problems in subprime lending and foreclosures have created fear and hesitation among potential home buyers. He said investing is still safe but advises buyers to talk with a lender first and borrow conservatively.
"Everything has been doom and gloom, we're going to hell, it's going out of business, the United States is going to cease to exist and all that stuff," Lane said. "Markets go up and down. There's nothing new here. It's up and down just like it's always been.
"If you try to look at any market on a microscopic level, you're going to get off course. You have to look at it on a long-term, broader perspective. If you do that, then you'll make better sense out of what your investment is going to be.
"I think consumers have been a little bit frightened because of the economic news," Lane added. "The fact of the matter is, if you're borrowing conservatively and safely, there is mortgage money readily available and sellers are very motivated right now to sell their homes, whether it's new construction or existing homes. So if you're a motivated seller and you're a motivated buyer, the marketplace is right to jump in. There are opportunities in this marketplace, just like there are in the stock market and other commodities."
Some builders have felt the squeeze and adjusted to a saturated market by scaling back. Bill Clark of Bill Clark Homes in Greenville said the market will need time to shed an oversupply of available homes.
"We don't sell, we don't build," said Clark, who builds and markets homes in Greenville, Fayetteville, New Bern, Havelock, Raleigh, Wilmington and Myrtle Beach S.C. "Everybody doesn't do that, which is unfortunate. As long as this big supply stays on the market, then the market is going to be, as far as from our point view, a weak market for us. But when you flip that around, it's a great time to buy a house because it's a buyer's market."
Clark said last fall he had begun re-examining all areas of operations, comparing costs in each of the markets he builds.
"This is not going to be corrected overnight," Clark said. "We may have hit bottom. But when you hit bottom, it takes you a long time to start going back up. So I think we're going to coast about the same we're doing right now through '08, and in '09 it's going to get a little better, but the next time we are going to see a good market, in my opinion, is going to be 2010."
By Mike Grizzard
The Daily Reflector
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Liz, owner of The Liz Freeman Team, specializes in residential real estate in the Greenville area.
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