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Category: Real Estate (page 60 of 266)
The shadow inventory has been a topic of interest with almost every agent I talk to lately. Most believe it is large and few understand why it isn’t in the marketplace rather than held by the banks. Russell Shaw recently wrote about the shadow inventory being gibberish. It is an interesting article and one I recommend reading.
I rarely disagree with Mr. Shaw, and rather than do so now I’ll simply suggest that we are talking past one another. As I read it, he is suggesting that this inventory doesn’t exist because it is, for the most part, out there already; just not listed as REO. He makes it quite clear, however, that he is not talking about foreclosures still to come. (Apologies to Russell for over-simplifying.) This is where we begin to part ways. I submit that the shadow inventory must necessarily include not only actual REOs (or REOs not listed as REOs), but the entire picture.
More to the point, if we look at all the homes that have been foreclosed on, are in foreclosure and should be in foreclosure, we are left scratching our heads and find ourselves back to the same question: why aren’t the banks taking these homes in, putting them on the market, and selling them? (I’m talking here especially about those homes where people have stopped making their payments and continue to live for 6, 12, even more months.)
MORTGAGES IN DEFAULT
Here’s a graph courtesy of the New York Times:
Sources: Federal Reserve Board and Mortgage Bankers Association, via Haver Analytics
That is an awful lot of mortgages in foreclosure; but add to that that lower line – of mortgages in default and not yet in foreclosure – and the numbers are staggering (again, think of people staying on a year after they’ve stopped making payments). So no matter what we call it, the question remains: What are the banks doing? Why aren’t these mortgages foreclosed? Why isn’t this inventory on the market?
I know all real estate is local and there are plenty of areas around this country where the last thing agents want Read more
Thankfully the Obama administration is doing everything possible to stamp out this dreaded disease………
Redfin.com CEO Glenn Kelman is in Scottsdale today and tomorrow for the MLSCOVE Conference, a gathering of MLS executives from all over the country.
Glenn made time for Cathleen and me this morning, buying us breakfast and regaling us with stories of the not-always-smooth path Redfin is traveling.
In real life, the man has a sweet and gentle — even beatific — nature. We saw this when he spoke at the first BloodhoundBlog Unchained event, winning a hostile audience over with a quiet, unaffected honesty.
That shone through again this morning, and, allowing time for Glenn’s son and our pets, we spent most of our time talking about real estate marketing issues: REOs versus short sales, new builds versus resale, the prospects for recovery, etc.
It’s funny, actually, to talk this way, because Glenn Kelman is a star in the real estate firmament, but in person he is fun and personable and very empathetic. Whatever our past differences, I respect and admire what he has been able to achieve with Redfin in such a short time. It was an honor to be able to spend some time with him.
iPad is the real estate kiosk. I found this leaked video from December. The earth moved for me when I saw the guy change the kitchen cabinet finish. The 3D CAD interior design idea has been around for a while, but now you can put it in HER purse so SHE can redecorate your listing while waiting at the car wash. Then we go viral from the app store. She can then collaborate with all her friends and they all can redecorate my listing. One of them will buy it or redecorate some other house on my IDX site and buy that. Now I see.
Here’s a true fact: I’m pretty much disgusted with the RE.net — which denomination I quarried with my own hands, back in my early days on the apellation trail. By now, just about everything looks to me like hoke, smoke, hustle and jive — smirking vendorsluts and the clueless suckers who can’t stop themselves from pridefully posturing about having procured their own plundering. I know that’s not fair — or not entirely fair — but it often seems to me, lately, that everything I have ever hated about the real estate business is successfully infesting the on-line world.
This will fail, all of it, in the end, and I’ll say why in detail when I get time. But for now I persevere by holding my nose and holding my ground. Whether it is the seemingly harmless simian chatter of net.monkeys desperate to prove their ape-titude to all the other net.monkeys or the craven schemes of hack vendors looking for just one more gullible fool to make their month, I’m well sick of it all. I haven’t looked at a feed-reader in many months, and my Twitterverse consists of my Best Beloved, Cathleen, and Teri Lussier.
The rest of the net, however, is a different thing. I’ve been following Apple tablet posts for months, and The Unofficial Apple Weblog is the only blog other than BloodhoundBlog whose client I have on my iPhone. On and off last week, and in greater earnest today, I’ve been looking for decent iPad posts from the RE.net.
Not hard to foresee, but Agent Shortbus doesn’t get it. Typically insipid kibitzing with no real understanding of the revolution the iPad will bring to the entire universe of commerce.
But, alas, the Shortbus set doesn’t have the vision to come up with a truly idiotic argument against using mobile devices to market real estate. This honor was earned by Rob Hahn, an attorney in New York City who doubles as a vendorslut consultant or a consultant to vendorsluts or some bizarre combination of the two. Realtors follow his musings religiously, apparently because they confuse being an attorney with being a Realtor, and Read more
I give away a lot of killer marketing ideas here, but I never worry about the competitive implications.
For one thing, I believe to the core of me that it’s raining soup, that wealth is pouring out of the skies and almost none of us is smart enough to reap that bounty.
But, second, I have learned through years of experience that, no matter how good my ideas are, almost nobody will ever follow through on them. We learned to sell, most of us, from people who believed to their cores that real money comes from laziness and lies. My way of marketing looks too much like work, I surmise, for people to adopt it in big numbers.
So much the better for me, I guess, although, to be frank, I would rather see Realtors doing more to earn the business — and the trust — of their clients.
In any case, here’s a way of thinking about marketing my way, a style of salesmanship based on integrity, transparency, follow-through and client satisfaction.
So: Start here: Build an iPhone/iPad app for your business. (See there? I just lost almost everybody!) The app has to be mission-critical and laser-focused on what your clients really need. Not — with emphasis — more idiotic self-promotion. If you’re not delivering something of value — in the estimation of your target-marketed end-users — you’re wasting your time.
Then get it on their iPhones and iPads. It ain’t easy, so you have to do it relentlessly. Ideally, everyone who can be expected to use you in the future — and to refer you to their friends and family members — should have your app on their iPhone or iPad.
Now you have the perfect means of staying in contact with those folks going forward. I’m not talking social networking, and my thinking is that drip marketing is probably a waste of effort. If they don’t unsubscribe, they’re going to ignore you except when they need you. It’s a pull-based marketing world, and your clients only really want to hear from you when they have a real estate need — not when you have a Read more
Ultimate Real Estate Search Kiosk
I just caught this. I would like to have one of these in every terminal of each airport to catch relocation buyers and refugees from the west coast as they arrive in Houston. As the cost comes down, maybe in the grocery store right in front of the Re/Max office?
How are we ever going to top this?
Oh, yes. It’s real. Mrs. Buyer said, “I don’t even want to think about what happened in that room.” My risposte? “Nothing happened in that room!”
But: Even so: It’s an interesting real estate problem, isn’t it? It would be $500, at most, to repaint that room. And yet every buyer who has seen it will have been revolted. What’s the cash value of that revulsion? At least $15,000 off the comps — and it’s still not selling…
by Brian Brady
Commercial Real Estate Finance Expert
Structured Debt and Equity
Licensed Real Estate Broker in AL, CA, and FL
The FHA suspended the 90-day flip rule as of February 1, 2010, for a period of up to one year. I’m not so sure lenders are going to play ball, though. I’ve found that lenders are implementing the 90-day seasoning rule for all loans, not just FHA, these past six months.
I warned the readers on Bigger Pockets about my observations and offered this advice:
If you purchase a property that looks like a good flip opportunity, you should be careful to not enter into a residential purchase agreement (RPA), from an enthusiastic buyer, for at least 91-days from the date the deed was recorded. I’m certain there will be instances where certain lenders will follow the HUD policy to the letter of the law but for now, I’d enter every potential flip planning for a minimum 90-day holding period before you market the property.
Bigger Pockets has a lot of experienced investors and speculators who read the articles there. Ryan Hinricher suggested that some lenders may be playing ball:
This is probably going to go both ways. I would imagine some lenders will continue with overlays despite the 1 year suspend on the rule. As an investor who was an underwriter, the best thing to do is understand if your lending sources are going to work with the suspension or ignore it. My thoughts = lender by lender. I’m planning on flipping many deals within 90 days.
Ryan’s comment proves that there are no absolutes in lending, especially today. While I think my observations are indicative of a growing trend, I imagine that a few lenders will follow the HUD guidelines to the letter and fund those transactions. My guess is that those lenders will charge a premium for those transactions, costing the buyer/borrower more money for the risk involved.
Should real estate scavengers, who buy distressed properties and remarket them at a profit, wait the 90 days to enter a residential purchase agreement or consider a “buy-down”, so that the lenient but more expensive lenders’ terms are consistent with “market rates”?
Take me home
Do you still buy magazines and books? Or are you hell bent on reading everything on the internet? Do you love statistics? Has Google Maps got you salivating for bigger and better satellites? Do you love good graphs better than sex? Is a bigger IDX better? Do you want to be completely plugged in, connected, always on line?
Well it turns out that I guess I’m more dog than human sometimes, especially when it comes to what makes a great web presence, and how best to graft a marketing strategy. I’ve spent some time today, you see, smelling other dogs beeeeehinds, and I think I’ve picked up the scent of something y’all might want to bury for a rainy day.
The scent I’ve picked up is either the Finding or the Discovering scent. I think it may be important to think about these two concepts as you put together your marketing, for your Web presence, and maybe more importantly, your belly to belly presence.
Turns out, you see, that people are still buying magazines. Though through the internet we can get all the information on who’s doing what to whom, how they’re doing it, why it shouldn’t be done, and where we can go to get more information on everything we just digested, people are still buying and reading magazines. Wonder why?
Turns out that people simply like to discover things, not just find them. Magazines, you see, lie around waiting for just the right moment to spring into our consciousness. Sure, you want the 4 bedroom, 2 bath home in Elevado Hills, with view, pool and lots of land, but sitting in front of an agent’s IDX (even the good ones) just isn’t the same as opening “San Diego Magazine” and seeing a home just like the one you imagine living in. Or you’ve been watching the statistics from a great blog site or newsletter from Brian or Scott or Mark or Tom on rates and terms and the market in general, and you’re educated and knowledgeable because of this. Read more
Strictly anecdotal — and I would be delighted to be wrong about this.
First, the inventory of the homes I track for investors has been rising slowly but steadily since mid-October. Not an obscene increase, but sales are way up as prices have wallowed in more or less the same place since last March or April. A lot of investors are calling “bottom!” with their cold, hard-to-come-by cash — and yet available inventory is going up, not down. And prices? In December, way down.
Then consider this: I have an REO negotiation going on in a condo community where the quantity of the one floorplan my buyers are interested in jumped 50% in two weeks, from 13 to 20 units just like that, all of them priced right or within shooting-down distance.
It seems to be getting easier and easier to get just the right deal for buyers. Even in overbuilt Phoenix, last summer and early fall played like a seller’s market, but by now it feels to me as though the table is swiftly turning.
And all of that leads me to wonder if we’re finally seeing the much-hypothesized, much-denied shadow inventory.
Am I seeing my own shadow, or is there something going on?
I was thinking this weekend about all of the rumors about Trulia and Google buying them and all of that. I was thinking as well about how both Trulia and Zillow are both seeming to be angling to be the next Realtor.com…
What does that mean…trying to be the next Realtor.com….hmmm…my mind hearkens back to a certain Russ Shaw post here in October of 2007…something about a pencil sharpener. When they say they want to replace Realtor.com, they MEAN it! It is about folks standing in line to take money from REALTORS…right? If not that, then what?
If Trulia is not lining up to give us a ..ummm…sharpening (dare I say that?) then their valuations should NOT include ANY REALTOR MONEY. So here’s the contest:
This contest is for someone to explain in the comments below HOW Trulia is going to generate enough revenue to justify a $300 Million valuation (that is an arbitrary number – just guessing here, boys!) given their current burn rate AND
The contest winner cannot allow ANY revenue to come from REALTORS. Revenue can come from current CPM rates for ads on their site, but how much of their site would need to be covered with ads to generate that revenue? Not sure but my offhanded guess is about 125% of the above the fold area. Revenue can come from other creative ideas. Just not from the REALTORS wallet. 😉
The Prize: 1 hour SEO consultation with me.
See- I don’t get it. I wouldn’t pay $150MM for Trulia let alone $300MM or (heaven forbid) $500MM …so what gives?
Please submit contest entries below!
One last thing: The only thing “stoopider” than a Trulia valuation of that size would be Realtor.com’s valuation of $1.81 per share (it was down at $0.89 when Russell Shaw proposed buying them out…)
To say anything at all would be way too much. From the Wall Street Journal:
“The remedy here is…as I believe this committee will be recommending, abolishing Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in their current form and coming up with a whole new system of housing finance,” said Rep. Barney Frank (D., Mass.), the chairman of the House Financial Services Committee.
His comments initially rippled through bond markets on concerns that the government might pull away from the mortgage market. Many believe that’s unlikely and that any revamp would include continued government involvement. The government took over the companies in September 2008 as loan losses mounted.
Some Republicans have argued that the companies should ultimately be reduced in size and privatized, while at other end of the spectrum, some analysts have recommended turning the companies into government agencies. But several industry groups and academics have suggested that the government is likely to continue playing at least some role in the future of the companies.
One such report came from analysts at Standard & Poor’s this past week. “It’s hard for us to imagine” how enough capital could be attracted to replace Fannie and Freddie with stand-alone private companies that would be able to offer low-cost funding for 30-year fixed-rate mortgages, the analysts wrote.
Some analysts have argued that starting from scratch could create more problems than they would solve, in part because Fannie and Freddie own or guarantee around half of the nation’s $11 trillion in home mortgages. “Blue sky ideas are great, but they take a long time to happen,” said Mahesh Swaminathan, senior mortgage strategist at Credit Suisse, at a conference last month. “When you have $5 trillion of agency mortgages, you can’t really orphan them.”
Mr. Frank, who didn’t elaborate on forthcoming recommendations, said last month that one possible revamp could merge some functions of Fannie and Freddie that overlap with the Federal Housing Administration into the government mortgage-insurance agency.
So this is the year that time management is going to be crucial for me. If I cannot gain control over my time, then I’m likely to stay mired in my own particular mode of real estate mediocrity, and that would suck rocks.
But, not to worry for I have found a tool that I think will be helpful to Realtors, and while I’m just getting started with TimeDriver, the response from clients and colleagues is “Wow! I love that.” And that’s plenty reason to keep a tool around, but I’m beginning to see how I could use it for a lot of real estate applications. Bloodhound Disclaimer: I don’t get any kickbacks for sharing this. There’s no affiliation program that I’m aware of, and I’m not in contact with the company except I signed up and use it. I simply want to share a tool that I’ve found useful.
TimeDriver is called a personal scheduler. From their site:
TimeDriver is a revolutionary appointment invitation system that will compel your customers and community to schedule time with you. By embedding a “schedule now” button in email messages and on Web pages, you’ll drive more appointments with fewer hassles than ever before.
Basically, it’s an online calendar that you set up to schedule time as you want. Your clients can then access the calendar through a unique url, and they can schedule time with you themselves, bypassing the flying email and phone tag time sink. It gives the client control and that’s a good thing in a real estate transaction, right? You can also push clients to schedule their own appointments with “Schedule Now” embeddable buttons. TimeDriver will then sync the appointment with your Outlook or Google Calendar, with plans to bring SalesForce and Lotus Notes on board as well. Butwaittheresmore! TimeDriver will then send you an email, alerting you when an appointment is scheduled, and reminding both of you when the appointment is approaching.
The first time I saw TimeDriver was when I called a photographer to schedule an appointment. She sent me the link to her TimeDriver calendar. It was an empowering experience to schedule Read more