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September 9, 2009

Free Mortgages? Nope – but a free book about mortgages!

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

From now through October 31, 2009, I’m offering a copy of  Straight Talk About Mortgages – the Book available for free!

Why?  Because I want to.   That’s reason enough for me, how about you?

Click here to download your copy:

Straight Talk About Mortgages The Book

I’d like to ask two favors in return for a free copy:

  1. Once you’ve had a chance to read it, let me know what you think of it.   Just send me an e-mail at tvanderwell@straighttalkaboutmortgages.com.
  2. Take a minute, think of someone you know who might be thinking about buying or refinancing their house and send a copy of the book on to them.

Thanks, enjoy!

Tom Vanderwell

September 8, 2009

Big Vampire is watching you — but every day is another chance at grace

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

This came in for a trackback on my NAR tax-credit video post:

http://hottopics.blogs.realtor.org/2009/09/08/
my-nar-tax-credit-video-“tell-the-natio/

The link resolves to an https address — in other words, a secret inner-sanctum blog. They won’t stand up for themselves in the clean, clear light of day, but they’ll piss and moan to each other in private.

It’s not that they’re gutless, mind you — or not merely gutless. So much the worse, they know they’re wrong — and they still won’t do the right thing.

How horrifying to spend your whole life thinking you’re one of the good guys only to discover that you are every bit as corrupt as Charlie Rangel, immersed snout-deep in the corporate welfare trough, turning a million mostly-innocent entrepreneurs into cheerleaders and lobbyists for even more legislative piggishness, turning three hundred million innocent Americans into cannibal’s fodder for your million-vampire-feast.

Who killed liberty in America, the last best hope for freedom on this Earth?

Was it Alexander Hamilton and the Whig/Federalist/Republican party, the original champions of corporate welfare?

Was it Andrew Jackson and the Democratic party, who wanted freedom for everyone — so long as you’re not black, brown, red or yellow? Or was it Lyndon Johnson and the modern Democratic party, who want freedom for everyone — provided you’re not an American?

Or was it the National Association of Realtors, who helped to turn a nation of hard-working, hard-charging, fiercely independent people into a gaggle of sniveling beggars, who can no longer even imagine paying their own way in life, who spend all their time concocting new ways to despoil their neighbors.

With every passing day, we are that much closer to being a nation of vampires, and it was the National Association of Blood-Sucking Vampires who first taught us to attempt to live by plunder instead of production.

But as much as I despise what they have done, still I feel for them as people. So I’ll offer up this much as a salve for the scabs they can’t stop themselves from picking at:

Redemption is egoism in action.

When you discover you have behaved badly, either willfully or inadvertently, there are three things you must do:

1. Admit your error Read more

September 8, 2009

Is Social Media Marketing Worth The Effort ?

by

Commercial Real Estate Finance Expert
Structured Debt and Equity
Licensed Real Estate Broker in AL, CA, and FL

Author website

Greg Swann and I are working together, later this week.  We’re meeting in Phoenix to do some video work (mostly Q & A stuff), discuss the what we want BloodhoundBlog Unchained to look like,  and host a discussion about SMM at the  Phoenix Association of REALTORs (with Kerry Melcher).

We KNOW social media marketing works because we’re both busy but we really want to start measuring the efficacy of each effort.  BloodhoundBlog Unchained is a labor of love.  Our profits have been miniscule but we learn so much from the process of hosting the conference.  Hobby or not, we’re still committed to producing the premier three-day workshop, about online real estate and mortgage marketing, in the industry.

One of the reasons Greg and I have such a great partnership is that we approach the same issue from completely opposite camps.  Many of you have seen us “do our bit” about filling the funnel vs. pure pull marketing. I’m gonna let y’all in on a secret; we both practice what the other preaches.

I watched the forced registration issue with great interest.  I’m spending thousands of dollars to have a similar IDX for mortgage rates developed.  Naturally, I want to recoup the thousands as quickly as possible without threatening the customer to the point of having her click away.

I’ve watched people preach expertise about SMM who have never dealt with a bad Yelp rating, never engaged a stranger about their profession on Facebook, and haven’t monitored their blog comments in a year.  We’re all trying to find the highest and best use of our time while providing good content for the stranger who graces our websites with a question.

I want those people to become prospects, then customers, then clients, then sneezing fans but I don’t want to spend all day wired to the laptop or answering questions via e-mail.

Our critical mission is to find out what works and what doesn’t.  Most of the ideas we develop come from questions in these little workshops we do. People ask us questions and Greg and I try to find the answers.  Those answers usually come from you; we Read more

September 6, 2009

BloodhoundBlog.TV (12 Trailers…)

by

Retechulous...

Author website

Set Your RSS DVR. BloodhoundBlog.TV is almost ready to roll. We’ll be announcing the initial channel lineup in the coming days, but for now we dare you to resist the urge to spend the next 30 minutes or so with eyes glued to the 12 “trailers” below…

Click to view each vid in a popup…

[tubepress mode=’playlist’, playlistValue=’C40E2D660311A60F’, resultsPerPage=’40’, description=’false’, thumbHeight=”90′, thumbWidth=’120′, tubepress orderBy=’published’]

September 6, 2009

My NAR tax-credit video: “Tell the National Association of Bloodsucking Vampires to go to hell. It’s where they belong.”

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

Want to know what Realtors can do to help resurrect the American economy? They can get the hell out of the way, that’s what.

Here’s my entry in the Al Lorenz/Don Reedy NAR tax-credit video contest.

Think you can do better? Please do. And tell everyone you know in the media to latch onto this with every tooth they have left in their dainty little lapdog jaws.

This used to be a free country. Whether or not it ever is again depends on what each one of us does now…

September 6, 2009

Queen for a Day

by

Realtor, Renaissance Man

Author website

Stop whatever you’re doing (and in this case you’re reading my post), and make sure you’ve read Al Lorenz’s most recent Pulitzer Prize winning article. Well, technically it’s not a Pulitzer Prize winner, but when you consider this year’s actual Pulitzer winners, I think Al’s expose is as clear thinking, well reasoned and as well penned as some of these touted journalists.

An Al Lorenz and Geno Petro I am not, so what you’re going to get from me is a more visceral playing out of what Al so succinctly writes about in his article.

Greg Swann commented in Al’s post with:

“And: Where is the NAR on all this? Almost always on the side of the expropriation of property rights, of course.”

And now, Greg, Al, and everyone, here’s NAR’s response to this most important, intricate and far reaching debate. I’m calling it “Queen for a Day”, based on an old TV show that used to captivate American TV viewers because of its “Robin Hood” approach to the world around us. Got a problem? We’ll take care of you. Need a helping hand? If you get enough applause (i.e. demonstrate that you need, don’t have, and want), you win.

I couldn’t make this up. Here it is, straight from NAR:

NAR wants YOU to create propaganda for THEM, to use on YOU, to benefit THEM.

Al writes near the end of his article:

“The thing to fear is what is already happening every day in both my neighborhood and yours as our property rights are peeled away by each group of citizens wishing to take something away from the others. Remember the end game when you celebrate the tax credits for home buyers and lobby for more.” (My emphasis)

Will the 1.1 million NAR members play the PR game, or will this group of 1.1 million members rebuke NAR and celebrate, discuss and learn from Al Lorenz and his expose on the government takeover of real estate?

If you’re a NAR representative who was involved in the making and dissemination of the “Let’s Read more

September 5, 2009

Bidding A Tearful Goodbye To An Old Friend

by

Associate Broker

Author website

Sometimes Life’s End Brings Meaning To Life

If you don’t like mushy posts – now is a good time to move along.

Back in the Spring of 1998, my sister was involved in some sort of charity work that prompted her to call me up one day and say, “I’ve found a cat for you!”

“What kind of Siamese cat is it?” I replied.

“Well… it’s not a Siamese cat – but she’s a really cool cat,” she shot back.

“Sis, you know I’m a cat snob…”

“Doug, the cat’s owner is on his deathbed. His family can’t take the cat. He has attended to all of his affairs – and his cat is the last detail he needs to attend to. She’s a really cool cat!” my sister insisted.

So I agreed to take on this full-grown female feline.

When she arrived, my sister couldn’t remember her name – but that didn’t matter. She was big and fat and colored black and white like a Gateway computer box… so I named her Gateway.

I took her to the vet to make sure she was okay, and the vet told me that she thought she was five or six years old at that time – and in good health… other than being rather heavy.

For the first few months, she kept to herself – often hiding under my end tables. When I would try to pick her up, she would hiss at me and act like she would bite me… so I gave her plenty of space – after all, I didn’t know how she had been treated in the past.

I remember the first time I let her go outside… a neighbor was walking his Great Dane, and Gateway ran up to that dog sideways – trying to look as big and menacing as she possibly could – with her fur standing on end. It was truly comical, as she had no claws – and that dog could’ve made an hors d’ oeuvre out of her.

Over the years, Gateway and I became the closest of friends. She asked for very little, but gave in ways that are hard to measure. She Read more

September 5, 2009

The Government takeover of Real Estate is well underway

by

Realtor, Media Mogul

Author website

Earlier, there was a discussion of the possibility of a government takeover of real estate brokerages. We had a bit of a lively discussion about the possibility of a governmental takeover of real estate brokerages.  But I’m here to tell you, it will never happen because in the end, the government will have no need for brokerages.

The government takeover of all real estate is already pretty far along.  Growth management, shorelines management, local municipalities, county, state and federal regulations have all taken unprecedented freedoms from landowners and redistributed them to government in the name of the “public.”  Many cities’ zoning codes are in the process of not only defining what uses to allow for land in their jurisdictions but they are implementing design standards that strictly control how such structures must look.  In the county that I live, government already owns 88% of all the land and that percentage is increasing.

Oppressive property taxes in many areas are themselves rent on the land from the government who believes itself to be the true owner.  Don’t pay those taxes and you quickly find out who really owns the land.  Generally based on assessed valuation, property taxes in periods of increasing value are a tax on an unrealized gain to the property title holder who is then taxed on the gain, as both a capital gain and an excise tax, when it is realized.

You may remember a Supreme Court ruling in Kelo vs. City of New London in 2005 that greatly expanded eminent domain to include seizure of privately owned property for redevelopment and resale to other, more politically favored, private owners or developers!  Since that ruling governments can, and have, taken private lands for any reason, including simply selling them to preferred private owners.

The drumbeat continues.  The new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development is using Fair Housing laws as justification for new requirements he is placing on cities and developments to provide diversity of housing to obtain a “fully integrated society.”  “New Urbanism” and “Smart Growth” are simply terms for the latest planning fads of social engineering under the guise of “public” Read more

September 5, 2009

Even though much of the current real estate “news” is really just hype, there can still be good reasons for you to be in the market

by

Suburban Phoenix Real Estate Broker

Author website

This from my Arizona Republic real estate column (permanent link):

Get a load of all that great housing news! Median prices are up! Sales volumes are up! The prognosis for the future? Up, up, up!

Here’s a different take: If it looks, walks and talks like hype, it’s probably hype.

Are houses selling well, compared to a year ago? They are — but the federal government is giving first-time home-buyers $8,000 in free money to buy houses right now. If that tax credit is not extended or replaced with something even more generous, the music will stop on November 30th.

And while median home prices may be up, prices for homes that normal working people actually buy are flat at best — and they have been trending downward since December of 2005.

But what about the shortage of available homes you have read about? What about the multiple offer scenarios, with homes selling for thousands of dollars over list price?

What would you expect to happen when you artificially stimulate demand at the same time that you artificially limit supply? We should be doing what your grandpa used to call “a land-office business.” Instead, even with $8,000 in free money, prices are still trending downward.

And that artificially-limited supply — all of the foreclosed homes that banks are withholding from the marketplace — will flood the market sooner or later.

If you’re in the real estate market right now, what you should do depends on your circumstances.

If you’re a seller, make a deal. Your carrying costs will almost certainly exceed any gain you can hope to realize by waiting out the market.

If you’re a first-time home-buyer, jump. If you’re not under contract by October 15th, you’ll probably miss out on the tax credit — and houses are not easy to get, taking account of the artificially-limited supply.

Buying with a loan? Interest rates are low for now, but they may not stay that way.

Buying all cash? Sit tight. As sweet as prices look right now, it seems likely they’ll get a lot sweeter when the banks finally release all the homes they’ve been hoarding.

 
Spread the word: Click here for a Read more

September 4, 2009

Jobs Report – did I call it wrong?

by

Mortgage Officer

Author website

Okay, so far this morning, the market has reacted in a very volatile but not significantly changed manner to the jobs report.   Essentially the jobs report came in pretty much where the market expected.  

So, did I call it wrong by recommending a shorter term lock and a long term float guideline yesterday?   I don’t think so for a couple of reasons:

  1. We’ve passed the major economic hurdle for the next few weeks without any news that is going to significantly lower rates.   Between that and the fact that the new Reg Z rules essentially require locking in your rate at least 1 1/2 weeks before closing, it makes sense, if you are closing soon, to grab a rate and be done with it.
  2. One of the “big guys” at PIMCO was on CNBC this morning talking about how this is a “sugar high” rally that is based on inventory and cost control and stimulus funding (isn’t that what stimulus is supposed to do?) but that it won’t last.    When reality hits, the stock market will adjust and the adjustment won’t be pretty.    That has two potential options:  1) It would force money into the bond market driving down rates, or 2) It could cause money to jump to cash (remember last fall?) and everything would be really ugly.   So I expect there is still some lower rate potential in the next 60 to 90 days.

Have a good weekend!

Thanks!

Tom Vanderwell

September 3, 2009

Speaking of Liberty

by

Realtor, Renaissance Man

Author website

For months now I have watched the political field of action, players, on-lookers, naysayers and pundits. Is there no clarity?

My highest regard for that clarity sometimes springs from this very site, its authors, contributors and readers. So today, I introduce again a contributing voice to the clarity that originates from reason, Ayn Rand.

Watch her eyes throughout this. She understands what is to come in the form and substance of the questions, and when given the opportunity, she is clear, resonant and reasoned. Oh, and she’s right by the way.

September 3, 2009

Would Consulting An Expert Produce Superior Results For You?

by

Real Estate Investments Broker

Author website

Preface: The year long retooling of my firm’s infrastructure is now well into its second year, mercifully nearing the finish line. To my great joy, I’ve rediscovered the Old School working definition of what an expert is. They not only know what they’re doing, they know why what they do works — producing, be still my heart, RESULTS. Or, in BawldSpeak, Skinned Cats. Expert recognition hint: Next time you’re talkin’ with somebody you suspect is an expert, pay attention to how many answers they supply to questions you never in a million years woulda known to ask. Then ask yourself in how many disciplines do you count yourself as an expert?

Ah, and there’s the rub.

When I first learned about the Lord’s game, baseball, the Dodgers and Giants had only been in California for a couple years. There was no Chavez Ravine — well, the ravine was there, but not much else. When a player was described as great, we all knew what it meant — he was, um, great. Now? Gimme a break. A shortstop up from the East Toilet Seat, Idaho AAA farm club makes a decent play on a sharply hit grounder two steps to his right and he’s the next Ozzie Smith — ‘What a great play that was!!’ Now, in baseball, as in all elite sports, the concept of greatness has no meaning whatsoever.

It’s like the Hall of Fame. Some of the players spoken of in the same sentence as the HOF are almost insulting to the Hall. It’s the Hall of Fame, not the Hall of the Really, Really Good. Again, the concept of true greatness has been watered down to the quality of prison gruel. Willie Mays was a great player. Is there a center fielder today you’d mention in the same breath as Willie?

The same goes with the concept of experts directly or indirectly related to real estate.

These days the concept of expert is shown no respect. If a guy’s in a room with 30 people and is three chapters ahead of the others in the marketing ‘book’, Read more

September 2, 2009

Love in the Time of Obama: Life after the Cybersecurity Act of 2009

by

Rust Belt Realtor

Author website

-Amazing Grace, I once was lost, but now I’m found. This was a goner in the meltdown and for some reason I didn’t keep a copy. Thank you, Cheryl Johnson for finding it in the Google cache. It’s not brilliant writing, but it is something I’m pleased with, so, I’m reposting. Thanks for your indulgence.  -TL

A letter to Brian Brady, sent via private courier since the government has seized control of the internet.

Dear Brian-

So sorry to hear Maggie didn’t get into the college of her choice. It’s okay, though. I’m sure the government school she’s in will give her the education she needs to function well in our new society. Never forget we need highly-skilled workers, Brian.

I don’t know if you are aware, communication being dicey right now, but we have moved to some acreage in a remote part of Ohio. Like so many Midwest cities, ours went bankrupt, was taken over by the State and our neighborhood was rezoned as a Construction Reuse Reclamation Area under eminent domain. Thousands of our brick homes were recycled for government buildings and stimulus projects. We were given free homes within the city of Dayton as part of it’s Vacancy Infill Plan, but we chose to move elsewhere. We can manage as a small self-sufficient farm and are hidden from the road, since our carbon offset tree plantings are located there. We’ve begun bartering with neighboring farms, and use horseback to travel, as our carbon emissions quota is limited and we need them for our farm equipment, and our cows keep farting. I won’t complain, though. We get to see the land this way.

The only problem we have is when the Czarina of Food Safety shows up to our farm. I know she thinks she is doing the right thing, but the problem is that she grew up in southern California and never set foot on a farm until she was Gulaged decommissioned relocated here to be an inspector. I’m not sure, but it feels like she is unhappy living in Ohio farm country and takes it out on us. I guess when she Read more

September 2, 2009

Introducing Manny Fae and Merry Fac

by

Commercial Real Estate Finance Expert
Structured Debt and Equity
Licensed Real Estate Broker in AL, CA, and FL

Author website

“Plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose“- Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Carr, 1849

Hat tip to Matt Graham and Adam Quinones of Mortgage News Daily

You gotta hand it to the powerful Mortgage Bankers Association of America (MBAA).  What they lack in imagination, they make up for in chutzpah.  The MBAA released its report “Recomendations for Future Government Role in the Core Secondary Mortgage Market“.  This six page report (the other six pages are pictures and such) essentially suggests that the Federal Government charter “Mortgage Credit Guarantor Entities” (MCGE) with a mission to purchase whole loans from originators and issue securities for purchase by investors.

These MCGE’s will be different from the existing GSE’s inasmuch as they:

  • require originators to retain 5% of the risk of the underlying loan values in the form of “set aside” capital
  • will be subject to “strong and effective regulatory oversight”
  • will only guarantee “core” mortgage products (30 and 15 year fixed rate loans)
  • will issue securities with the “explicit” guarantee of the full faith and credit of the United States Treasury rather than the former “implicit” guarantee

The MBAA did recommend that the existing infrastructure of the “outdated” GSEs be used to establish new MCGEs.  It recommends that initially, the number of MCGEs to be established should be…

two or three.

As I’ve said before, I criticize too much.  As a taxpayer, I should be outraged but as a mortgage banker, I’m keeping my mouth shut;

I want to be President of Manny Fae before I retire.

PS:  Read the whole report here.  Pages 5-10 are the meat of the proposal with lots of pretty pictures and footnotes on the other pages.

PPS:  Look for the more powerful National Association of REALTORs (NAR) to offer immediate support for and pledge lobbying efforts  for the establishment of MCGEs

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Inventing Real Estate 2.0

Welcome to BloodhoundBlog, the national real estate industry marketing and technology weblog written by, for and about real estate professionals. Better yet, welcome to the wired world of real estate. We are busily inventing Real Estate 2.0 – technology, marketing, service and salesmanship. Like all Bloodhounds, we are smart, frisky and fiercely independent. We've built a spot on the earth – beloved over all – where each one of us can be who we are, no matter who that might be. We are committed to an idea of excellence that will flush the bums, the con-men and the crybabies out of the real estate industry. If you yearn to have your failures excused, your moral lapses absolved or your boo-boos kissed, seek elsewhere. But if you are sick to death of mediocrity – welcome home. Read all about us, subscribe to our feed and steel yourself for the hunt. We work hard, we play hard, we learn everything we can – and we bow to no one.

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