I’m hearing a new buzz in the office lately… the sound of hope.  Everywhere I turn, agents are being more positive about the market.  One agent just stuck his head in my door to say that he sold a $400,000 listing - had both the buyer and seller sides.  Plus he has another listing for about $120,000 that he’s also found a buyer for.

I’m hoping it’s not the final push for buyers to grab that $8,000 first-time home buyer tax credit from the Feds due to expire at the end of April (well, under contract by April 30th).  My hope is this may be actually the market starting to turn.

I’ve been working at a concession stand at a major arena in my area to raise money for my daughter’s extracurricular activities and talked to one of the stand managers.  He said he used to be a construction worker, but is now in the food industry.  While I’d hate to see him leave because he’s on of the nicer managers, I do hope he can get back into his preferred career.  He thinks construction is starting to pick up.

What do you think?  Just a passing thing or real recovery?

This could be a classic case of the right arm not knowing what the left arm is doing.  A woman had her house repossessed and her parrot taken by a bank contractor who was there to padlock her pad.

The home owner said all her mortgage payments were current and because she - and her parrot - have been traumatized, a lawsuit has been filed.  From MSNBC.com,

…  she suffered irreparable emotional damage and is afraid to set foot in the house. The lawsuit says she eventually regained possession of the bird, named Luke, after repeated phone calls to the bank.

I’m glad Luke has been returned and can definitely understand her nervousness when it comes to returning to the house.  Good luck!

Photo by crispin swan via flickr creative commons.

A huge selling point for many people trying to realize the American Dream of home ownership has been the promise of tax deductions available from the Feds.  Is it really worth it?  What exactly can you claim?

To answer the first question, YES!  If you are turned off by home maintenance, consider a condo or town home where all the outside maintenance is done through your HOA fees.  Otherwise if you’re eligible for any of the home-buyer tax credits now in effect, NOW is the time to get started.  Do not delay because you have to be in a binding contract no later than April 30th.

Besides getting money back from the government for purchases, other homeowners may also deduct their mortgage interest from their taxes as they file the income tax.   In addition to deducting your property taxes, you can also claim the interest on up to $100,000 borrowed on a home equity loan or home equity line of credit, regardless of the reason for the loan, according to Turbo Tax.

What can’t you deduct?

Dues to a homeowners association

Insurance on your home

Appraisal fees for your home

The cost of improvements to your home, except in the relatively rare case where they qualify as a medical expense. (But keep those receipts. They may help you reduce your taxes when you sell your home.)

Want to know more?  Click here.

Just 10 years ago, the absence of mail on Saturdays from the U.S. Postal Service could have caused great hardship on real estate transactions.  We had to mail earnest money checks long distance and other documentation.  Sometimes even closings that occurred were done by mail - received, signed, and mailed back on the same day.  Delays could have potentially caused a transaction to fall through completely.

Today the USPS is considering eliminating Saturday mail delivery.

Last year the agency handled 177 billion items, down from 213 billion in 2006 — and there is little likelihood of an increase in the future. The Postal Service has previously proposed eliminating delivery six days a week, but got a cold reception in Congress.

While I think there could be repercussions on individuals (e.g., no delivery person to check on an elderly person), the fall out on real estate could be minimal.  Most states allow communication to be done by fax, email, overnight delivery - and all allow “in person” delivery.

In my own real estate world, it would just mean that people relocating from out-of-area would be delayed a day or two from getting the information packages I send.  I suppose email will be a good option for them, as well.

Photo by Quigley Brown. Go visit at Flickr for some amazingly beautiful photography.

Oh Miami I feel your pain.  Your real estate values already plummeted almost 50 percent (47.7) over the past three years.  With new predictions out, your houses are expected to drop another 29.2 percent by this September for a total loss of value at 64 percent.  This is according to Moody’s Economy.com and reported by CNN Money.com.

Side note here … when I add 47.7 percent with 29.2 percent, my numbers come out to 76.9 percent.  As a result I’m hoping the projections don’t add up either.  Nationwide, the numbers aren’t much better,

The average home price in the United States will fall by about 6% by September 2011, according to a joint report between Fiserv and Moody’s Economy.com. And that’s after plunging more than 27% in the past three years.

Meanwhile, Miami.  I went in search of homes available in Miami and found one, two, three, fifty … all in what I would describe as terribly expensive.  Homes that cost $500,000 AFTER the market dropped?  $1.3 million?  $10.2 million?  How big was that bubble where real estate is near beautiful ocean, sand and sun?

I dug more and found listings for foreclosed condos in Miami.  The highest priced one is $2.795 million.  The least expensive is $309,900 (with taxes coming in at a jaw dropping $6,879 per year).  I did find a two bedroom, one bath single family resident in the sunny city for $319,000.

Holy cow, Miami! How do people afford to live there with these prices and those taxes? Before I completely gave up finding something affordable in this dynamic city, I went to one more source - Trulia.  At last I found homes that were nice and didn’t cost a fortune.  My favorite?

This $229,000, four bedroom, two bath, 1965 square foot home with the beautiful screened in back porch.

Now we’re talking!  If you want more information about it, contact Keyes Real Estate Company or click here.

When someone “FORKS” over some cash for the house occupied by Edward Cullen and his Twilight family, they won’t have to pay as much as the original asking price.  According to CNN Money, the house - located in Vancouver, British Columbia - was originally listed for $3.3 million.  As a reflection of the housing market adjustment, the price just dropped to $2,998,000.

The home features over 5,000 square feet, five bedrooms, two full baths and two half baths.  You might find some pretty big trees surrounding it - trees that are easy to climb if you’re a vampire!

To see more photos, visit the listing agent’s site here.

I’ve been terribly worried about one of my friends who just received notice of foreclosure.  What has troubled me is where does someone go after foreclosure?  Forced loss of a house has a terrible impact on your credit score and with most landlords now requiring a credit check, how can you find a place to rent?

Key is to find a landlord that only has one or two rental properties rather than a giant apartment complex.  The local paper, craigslist, and family or friends are the best options for where to search.  In addition, you can offer to put down a higher deposit  or prepay several months rent.  If this isn’t an option, find a rental BEFORE the foreclosure hits your credit score.

The challenge is if you’re being foreclosed upon, your credit score likely already has some negative hits from missed mortgage payments.  If you keep paying your other bills, however, it could be viewed positively by a landlord - especially if your mortgage payment was double (or much higher at least) than what the rent payment would be.

Don’t give up hope. It may take a few years, but things will look better.

Although this has nothing to do with real estate or houses - except we’re all tired of shoveling driveways and sidewalks thanks to Old Man Winter digging in permanently - it was too precious to pass up sharing.

Thanks to Newscoma for sharing.

In honor of Mardi Gras, I thought I’d point you to some drama happening in New Orleans right now with it’s infamous NOLA Tree House for artists.

First, it really is an amazing splash of lights and color.  I find it very visually appealing, but also emotionally awesome since I was a child of the 1960’s and 70’s… you know hippies, groovy, cool, artists.  However the surrounding community and the city don’t share the same views because of noise, sanitary, and safety issues.  As a result the city is evicting the residents and ordering the tree house to be disassembled.  From the Best of New Orleans Blog, here are links that tell the story,

Legalize the Tree House! The city sends a cease and desist order.

On the one hand, here you had this magical tree house and a great group of residents that were putting on just killer parties and we thought that treehouse organizers’ efforts deserved coverage and some exposure. On the other hand, how was the City of New Orleans going to react when they saw a tree house on the cover of Gambit with a story about all the crazy parties?

Not Cool: The Art House is Being Shut Down Completely, Residents to be Made Homeless. The marching orders came.

The residents have been giving until 4 p.m. CST to evacuate the home and have been told by the NOPD that if they don’t vacate, they will be considered squatters (an arrestable offense). The Louisiana SPCA is also there because of the dogs owned by some of the residents.

NOLA Treehouse: TREME Civic Association’s Side of the Story. (Key in complaining about the ruckus).

The first rather conspicuous violation of the HDLC rules was the address on the building that was totally not in keeping with the scale or design of the building.The neighborhood organization was not happy with this but felt in time they would be cited by the HDLC and be required to change it. And then the complaints started to come in concerning music being played until all hours on the weekends. Additionally there were complaints about trash on the street and in the neutral ground.

(Lesson learned: Don’t mess with the neighborhood association!)

NOLA Art House: The Fire Department’s Side. (This is the serious stuff.)

On the January 25, 2010, the NOFD inspected the property at 1614 Esplanade and found numerous fire code violations that would put the occupants in harms way in terms of bodily injury and property damage. The life safety and code violations are based on the change of use or occupancy, primary means of escape, electrical code infractions, and the lack of detection, alarms or communication systems to name a few. A copy of the statement explaining these violations was issued to the project property manager on January 25th. An inspection was conducted today and none of the violations were corrected.

That’s all there is, but I suspect it’ll be hard to keep a good artist down.  I think it would be amazing to see another similar structure sometime, but with proper zoning and safety features in place.  Good luck to the artists!

And let the good times roll, New Orleans!

Photo 1 by Justin Gordon from Facebook.
Photo 2 by NOLA ART House from Facebook.

Reading the findings on what annoys people most in offices situations certainly applies to real estate offices, too.  Although agents are not considered regular employees (we are independent contractors), many of us do work daily in the office environment.  What annoys me at the office?  People not cleaning up after themselves, constant stream of people “visiting” (which doesn’t annoy so much as it prevents me from getting my work done), and slow internet connection time.  Each of these made the Top 10 List of Things That Annoy.

What didn’t make my top annoying list is the phrases that annoy people.  They are (with the percentage of people who find them annoying):

• Thinking outside the box (21 percent)
• Let’s touch base (20)
• Blue sky thinking (19)
• Blamestorming (16) (sitting down and working out whose fault something is)
• Drill down to a more granular level (15) (Look into something in more detail)
• Let’s not throw pies in the dark (15) (we need a plan rather than a haphazard approach)
• I’ve got that on my radar (13)
• Push the envelope (12)
• Bring your A-game (11) (Be ready to do something to best of ability)
• Get all your ducks in a row (11)

Sadly, the only three expression I don’t hear regularly are my new favorites:  Let’s not throw pies in the dark, blue sky thinking, and blamestorming.  (I particularly like blamestorming and plan to incorporate it into my daily vocabulary).

Meanwhile, we Realtors always bring our A-game, have our ducks in a row, push the envelope, think outside the box, have you on our radars, and touch base with our sphere of influence as often as we can!  You’ve been warned!

The balloon represents my new blue sky thinking mode!