Wednesday, January 23, 2008

The Current Real Estate Trend

I don't know if you saw the article in Monday's Detroit News entitled "2008 may be brutal again for Michigan real estate," but there were some interesting points made in the article, which was written by Nathan Hurst.

According to Realcomp, which is the multiple listing service most used by Southeast Michigan agents, home sales in our area have fallen 14.4 percent since 2004. But the even bigger news is the average sales price of a home in Southeast Michigan fell 17.3 percent over that same time span, 2004 to 2007. So if your home was worth 200,000 in 2004, today it would be worth 165,400. Yet, as an agent, I'm seeing homeowners and their agents, still trying to list that home for 200,000! The problem with that, is the eventual appraisal. If someone puts an offer in on that home for say 190,000 for the sake of argument and the seller accepts, within a couple of weeks, the appraiser for the buyers mortgage company is going to visit the home. That appraiser will go back 6 months to check recent sales prices in the neighborhood and they'll see that similar homes in that sub have been selling for 165 to 170,000 and they won't be able to appraise that 200,000 listing for it's 190,000 sales price. Thus, the mortgage company won't give the buyer a mortgage and THE DEAL IS OFF!!!! Sellers seem to forget the appraisal process when they price their homes and this was a good example of what COULD happen.

The Detroit News article goes on to say that new home construction in our area is at it's lowest level in 40 years. The article also says 2007 foreclosures were up 65% over 2006 figures.
But there are great bargains out there and of course, if you're a buyer, I'd love to show them to you. They are everywhere and with the Fed cutting interest rates 3/4's of a point on Monday, expect the interest rates on 30 year fixed rate mortgages to fall even further, to record lows, closer to 5% interest than to 6%.

If you'd like to learn more, give me a call at my office number, 248-526-2193 and I'd love to chat with you about the opportunities in today's real estate market.

Thursday, January 10, 2008

It's That Time Again

I haven't blogged anything for just over two months, so I guess it's time to crawl out of my hole, end the holiday break and vacation and put my nose to the grindstone once again!

Good news for buyers! Did you know that mortgage interest rates are back down below 6% on a 30 year fixed? I just spoke with my regular mortgage guy, Dave Tumey of Cambridge Mortgage and he tells me the rate yesterday, was 5.875% on a 30 year fixed, while today it bumped back up to 6% on the nose. So it does vary from day to day. Many in the real estate industry feel there's a lot of pent up demand out there for home buyers so with mortgage rates dropping from the 6.25 to 6.375 they were at a few months ago down to 6% and lower, maybe these buyers will start crawling out of the woodwork, just like I've crawled out of my hole to write this blog! If this is true, it means the poor real estate market we were in since mid 2005 may have finally bottomed out and there's nowhere to go but up. Just don't look for any of those special mortgage rates and "low cost" loans that were out there a few years ago. Such deals almost ran the mortgage industry and the nations economy into the ground!

I guess I'm also obligated to write something about sports so here goes, in no special order. While I've been away from blogging:

Roger the Dodger (of questions that is) has said he didn't do steroids. Do you believe him? I Don't. In his Sunday interview with Mike Wallace, he looked awful clammy to me, like he was ready to sweat bullets at any time. Good thing he wasn't attached to a lie detector then. I can't believe that Andy Pettitte, Roger's good friend and Roger were outed by the same trainer. Then Pettitte admitted to it, but Roger is still in denial.

Lloyd Carr retired as Michigan football coach and Michigan, after a 4 week search, landed Rich Rodriguez as their new head coach. Hey Rich, wanna buy a house? Congrats to Lloyd on a career well done and for that sweet win over Florida on January 1. Now if Rich can find himself a quarterback and replacements for the likes of Manningham, Hart, Arrington and Long, UM might win another 8 regular season games next year! Difficult system adjustments are ahead.

The Lions finished their season, losing 6 of their last 7, thwarting their media critics. I got sick of hearing from the media after the Lions were 3-2, that they'd lose their last 11, to finish 3-13. Then after they were 4-2, they'd lose their last 10 to go 4-12. Finally when they were 6-2, they'd lose their last 8 to finish 6-10. I saw the 2007 Lions season as a 4 win improvement over 2006 and if they win 4 more next year over this years 7 victories, watch out!!!!!

The Wings are the best team in hockey, by far, but Hockeytown has turned into a ghost town as far as attendance goes. Well gee, what did you expect, to win the Stanley Cup in January? Just shows to go 'ya how little the regular season means. It's the playoffs that count and local Wings fans have heard that song before about the Wings being hockey's best, October thru April, only to fall flat in May. And Darren McCarty isn't the answer. It goes far deeper!

Finally, that whopper of a Tiger trade with the Marlins. The Tigers get a 24 year old superstar in the making in Miguel Cabrera and a young 25 year old former Cy Young Award runner up for a handful of unproven prospects. WOW! Print your World Series tickets now Mike Ilitch! Boy the pressure on Jim Leyland in 2008 will be enough to make him smoke. Oh, wait a minute, he already does. The Tigers will be beasts in the Central, but the BoSox lie in ambush.

So that's it for blogging for now. Hopefully it won't take another 2+ months before I have something else to say. But then again, I always have something to say, it's just finding the time to do it in that's hard!