Living in a Real Estate Microclimate

Living in a Real Estate Microclimate

You might have heard a real estate commentator, analyst, or even broker or agent utter a relatively recent addition to the real estate lexicon, Real Estate Microclimate is hyperlocal. It is usually used to indicate that all markets are not the same, and do not operate in the same direction at the same time.  Contact Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty for information about your local market.
This was the basis for the widespread belief that it was impossible to have a nationwide real estate recession, because markets are so different.
While that was clearly an overgeneralization, it is the case that we've seen different markets hit their peaks and troughs at different times and to widely varying degrees, based on the peculiarities of their local market. Las Vegas homes have lost about 60 percent of their value since their peak, while homes in Pittsburgh have lost less than 1 percent of their value, on average.
That's hyperlocal.
Nature offers an interesting parallel to this real estate phenomenon: microclimates. Wikipedia defines a microclimate as "a local atmospheric zone where the climate differs from the surrounding area. The term may refer to areas as small as a few square feet (for example, a garden bed) or as large as many square miles."
What creates real estate microclimates?
According to Tara a relatively short list of factors that cause a neighborhood, city, county or state to have its own real estate environment that operates independently from nearby areas or the national market at large:
Jobs: Areas that are job centers and have major employers in the area, with low unemployment rates and current or projected job growth, have different real estate market dynamics than other markets, largely because people want to buy homes where jobs are.
Universities: College-town real estate tends to be recession-proof compared to other towns, as towns anchored by one or more large universities tend to have a relatively steady and robust economic center and a constantly replenished demand for housing both for sale and for rent, in the form of students, faculty and staff members, and the workforce of the businesses that support the school(s).
Population booms: Districts that are experiencing an uptick in population -- whether by birth or by incoming migration -- also often experience their own real estate microclimates. It may come as a surprise that there are many cities and states in the U.S. that are actually experiencing net population decreases, as people move out for various reasons, including lack of jobs and affordable housing. Again, it's all about demand.
Overbuilding: Where homes are vastly overbuilt, as they were at the top of the market in the Sun Belt foreclosure hot spots like Arizona, Nevada, Florida and some parts of California, a microclimate of oversupply can develop.
And there's more -- next week we'll take a look at another set of elements within the ecology of an area's economy that cause it to have an independent real estate market microclimate of its own.
Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty 805-798-3412  http://www.venturacountyhomesforsale.net/  805-798-3412
Tara-Nicholle Nelson is author of "The Savvy Woman's Homebuying Handbook" and "Trillion Dollar Women: Use Your Power to Make Buying and Remodeling Decisions."

Ho To Decide.com Which Gadget to Buy

How To Decide.com Which Gadget to Buy

How To Decide.com Which Gadget to Buy Real Estate and Techi Enthusiast Tami Winbury of Keller Williams Realty shares an article about how she decides.com Upgrades are happening so quickly with hardware as are price reductions on older models. Normally you would never see in a Best Buy ad “Great model, but you should wait four weeks until we mark it down or for the new one to come out”. It is simply impossible to avoid. Buyers remorse seems to be ever more cruel when it comes to technology. Picture this. You have made up your mind that it is finally time to buy a new camera/phone/laptop. You are done photographing your listings with your 5 megapixel point and shoot. Fed up with taking the battery out of your Blackberry four times a day? Once and for all you are going to get rid of that spam and virus filled PC you have been chugging along with for many too many months. Often when we buy new hardware it is an emotional and rash decision. It shouldn’t be. Yes, you may be ready for that new tool for your business, but what if the newest, hottest, shiniest model is coming out in two weeks? A model that will surely be smaller and faster and maybe even worst of all cheaper? Enter Decide.com. Decide.com has created an algorithm based on 1′000’s of data points to make sure that you not so much buy the right device, but more so that you buy it at the right time! As someone who has purchased far too many Apple products in the last 3 years I can tell you that having a service and information like this can literally be priceless. Decide.com even has a great mobile site so that you can access suggestions like “wait for new model” or “wait for price to drop” while at the store. Talk about transparency and giving the sales guy a truly difficult objection to overcome. From what I can tell Decide is currently focused on cameras and laptops, both of which many real estate agents are either in the market for or will be soon. If you decide, pun intended, to browse around Decide.com and happen to find an item that should not be purchased due to the data they have complied you can set alerts as to be notified when the time is right. My first reaction? Super cool site worth spending a few minutes on and remembering for your next purchase. My second is that what if a site like Trulia or Zillow decided to add a similar algorithm to homes consumers were browsing on the web? Can you picture a buyer standing in front of a home with their phone out getting a “Wait 3 months to buy” recommendation? I can… Written by: Chris Smith, Chief Evangelist, Inman News

Mini Mansions are No Longer Instyle

Mini Mansions are No Longer Instyle In America, bigger is always better, right? Our cars, our accomplishments, even our personalities have always been outsized. But the fact is that bigger isn't always better -- at least not when it comes to our houses. Just a few years ago bigger was better. I lived in Huntington Beach in a 1400 sq.ft. home on an 8000 sq.ft. lot and thought I was sufficating. We had a monster sized truck and all the toys you could dream of. It wasn't enough. So we bought an acre of land and a nearly 4000 sq ft. home. We are living large... too large. I am lost in my house and I have too much stuff and clutter. The yard is a whole other beast. The expense of gardeners and water are unreal. Now, you'd think this would be the proverbial dream come true for most people. But like Citizen Kane at Xanadu, we always seemed ill at ease shuffling around all the stuff in the empty spaces in our so-called "home." My husband withdrawals to the office study the size of a normal suburban bedroom, or to the garage, where all his guy stuff is stashed. And I to the kitchen where I hang out with the kids and guests who visit. Not surprisingly, this made me wonder about the use or value of all the rest of all the huge spaces that made up the bulk of living large. The problem with really big rooms is that we human beings are naturally ill at ease inhabiting them. Our primitive brains still feel more secure, and hence more comfortable, in spaces we can traverse in a few steps. In the past, the huge public rooms of mansions served mainly to flaunt their owner's wealth and good taste -- though these attributes don't necessarily go together. Yet even the wealthiest masters of such houses carried on day-to-day life in a much more modest suite of rooms elsewhere in the place. Living in some huge, drafty hall, regardless of how sumptuous the decoration, was no more comfortable then than it is now. Are you interested in homes for sale? Even in the face of this grinding recession, Americans are only slowly turning away from our 30-year obsession with bloated houses, despite the fact that we've already learned this lesson once before. Around the mid-19th century, houses of every class, from mansions to workers' cottages, began to get bigger and bigger. Ceiling heights swelled from less than 8 feet during Colonial times to 12 feet in the Victorian era, while floor plans got more and more complicated. Victorian kitchens grew into complex warrens of three or four rooms. Yet, rather than making their owners happier, these vast houses instead provoked a backlash -- especially among women, who typically got stuck having to keep them up. This disenchantment with the bloated Victorian design ushered in the bungalow homes of the early 20th century, with their credo of "smaller and simpler is better." I miss our little house and little yard where we spent our evenings together. I am so happy to see that Americans have come to the conclusion that bigger is not always better. We no longer drive the monster truck, rather we drive a Prius and often ride our bikes around our new cozy town in Ojai, Ca. We could learn a lot from these downsized homes of a century ago, provided we have the sense to think small for a change. Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty 805-798-3412 http://www.LiveOjai.com http://www.venturacountyhomesforsale.net Arrol Gellner's inspired this story.

Do You Trust Real Estate Agents?

Do You Trust Real Estate Agents?

REALTOR® Notebook

Trust is always an issue between consumers and salespeople. We make money by selling a house, and that causes buyers to question our motives when we say the home is a great property or "now is the best time to buy real estate."

My job is not to deceive buyers, but to present the homes I have listed in the best possible light. Even in today's market, once a listing has been on the market for more than three months, buyers become suspicious that there is something wrong with it.

Buyers have little awareness of what market times should be, or what they once were. First-time homebuyers, in particular, have a negative reaction to homes that have been on the market six months or more.

As an agent, I would love to know: What is wrong with buying a home that has been on the market for six months or two years? There are so many other factors to consider. Where is the home located? How many times has the price been reduced? Has the home had repairs or improvements made to it since it was first listed?

Sometimes sellers will take less money for a home that has been on the market for months or years, and that could be a good thing for a homebuyer.

If a consumer asks me how long a home has been on the market, I give them a complete history. If they ask me the date that it was listed, I give it to them. I provide that information for my buyers on any home they are interested in.

If a home is priced right and is located in the buyers' preferred neighborhood and has the amenities and features that the buyer is looking for, it should not matter how long the home has been on the market.

If I, Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty, am representing the sellers, it is my job to market the home and to make it look as appealing to buyers as possible.

Eventually, consumers will have all of the information about homes on the market that agents have. I think that will be a good thing. Consumers really should not have to ask how long a home has been on the market.

For more information call Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty 805-798-3412

View http://www.liveojai.com to view properties for sale.

Teresa Boardman is a broker in St. Paul, Minn.

Home Search: It Should Be Fun!

When is the Right Time to Buy a House

Is it Safe to Purchase a Bank Owned Home?

Is it safe to buy a foreclosure?

At first, bank-owned houses seemed like some of the best bargains in town, but then the robo-signing controversy made buying seem like a risky proposition.

• 
  It's safe to buy a previously foreclosed-upon house if title insurance is available on it, experts say.
  The "robo-signing" scandal -- in which banks and law firms cut corners on foreclosure paperwork -- caused some lenders to suspend foreclosures this fall while they reviewed their procedures.
  What would happen to the buyer of a foreclosed house if the home previously had been wrongly repossessed?
  
  As long as the new lender and new owner have title insurance, the former owner can't seize the home back.
  The new owner will keep the house, and the displaced former owner might be compensated with money.
  "To the extent that a borrower who was foreclosed upon has recourse, it's against the foreclosing lender, and they can seek monetary damages. But the property's gone," says Mark Skilling, the chief operating officer and general counsel for ForeclosureRadar, an online foreclosure data marketplace.
  "The current owner who got title insurance -- they get to keep the property. They're a good-faith purchaser," Skilling says.
  
  
  Most buy from banks
  That's welcome news for homebuyers who rummage through the bargain bin of foreclosed houses. Call Tami Winbury at Keller Williams Realty for a list of homes for sale, bank owned homes and short sales.
  Few consumers buy houses at foreclosure auctions. More commonly, consumers buy foreclosed properties from the banks that seized them.
  The term for such houses is REO, for real-estate owned by a bank. Some real-estate agents specialize in selling REO properties.
  A good share of REO houses are decrepit. Many sit empty for months before they are sold, and they end up in such bad shape that they are ineligible for mortgages. Investors often buy these REOs with cash, fix them up and sell them, just like the house flippers of the boom years.
  Whether bought from the bank or from a flipper, almost all REOs are listed through real-estate agents.
  Armando Montelongo, the former host of "Flip This House" on the A & E network, says certain phrases in the listing -- such as "completely rehabbed" or "newly remodeled" -- are signs that the dwelling was a foreclosure and is now in good-enough shape to be eligible for a home loan.
  "It's the benefit of buying an REO from somebody who flips properties, versus buying an REO straight from the bank," says Montelongo, who lives in San Antonio.
  

  Properties with a past

  However the foreclosed house ends up in a buyer's hands, issues that lurk in the property's past could "cloud title" -- cast uncertainty on the buyer's ownership rights. Title insurance protects against such defects in the title, such as undiscovered liens, forged signatures or defects in documentation.
  There are two types of title policies. Lenders policies protect lenders, and owners policies protect owners. A mortgage lender always requires a lender's title policy.
  Owners policies are optional and are recommended for properties that have been through foreclosure.
  "From the consumer's perspective, I don't think they have a lot to fear as long as they're able to purchase title insurance on an REO property," says Ivan Choi, national default sales executive for New Vista Asset Management in San Diego. "By and large, the title companies are still out offering policies.
  There have been reports that title insurers have refused to issue policies on some homes foreclosed by lenders involved in the robo-signing scandal. Responding to these reports, Fidelity National Financial -- the largest mortgage insurance company -- issued a statement that "this situation will not have a material adverse impact on its title business."
  
  The statement said "new owners and their lenders would have the rights of good-faith purchasers which should not be affected by potential defects in documentation."
  Those "good-faith purchasers" won't be kicked out of their houses, Skilling says. He adds that Fidelity's message is that "they're still going to underwrite on REO properties."
  This article was reported by Holden Lewis

Top 10 Real Estate Sites

Top 10 real estate websites in 2011

Hitwise: AOL Real Estate growing market share
AOL Real Estate continued its steady upward climb during April in rankings of the Internet's most popular real estate websites compiled by Web metrics firms Experian Hitwise.

Be sure to visit VenturaCountyHomesForSale.net, LiveOjai.com, KellerWilliamsHomes.com to search for local homes for sale, to buy a home in Ojai and Ventura.

After rising from 16th to eighth position to break into the Hitwise top 10 in March, AOL Real Estate continued to boost its audience in April, rising to fifth place with a 2.91 percent market share in the real estate category, Hitwise said.

The rankings of the top four real estate sites were unchanged from March.
The latest numbers from Hitwise show Realtor.com was the most popular real estate site on the Internet in April, with a 6.5 percent market share, followed by Yahoo Real Estate (6.1 percent), Zillow (5.52 percent), and Trulia.com (4.75 percent).
Realtor.com operator Move Inc. announced an agreement with AOL Real Estate in January, in which Move will power the site's homes-for-sale search and coordinate ad sales to real estate agents, brokers and other advertisers.

Zillow and Yahoo Real Estate have a similar alliance, with Zillow managing a common set of for-sale listings on both sites, and ads agents and brokers purchase from Zillow appearing on both sites.
Hitwise's numbers show Yahoo Real Estate and Zillow with a combined market share of 11.62 percent, compared with a combined market share of 9.41 percent for Realtor.com and AOL Real Estate.
Hitwise rankings take into account a number of metrics, including visits, page views, and average visit time.

AOL Real Estate's move up in April bumped Rent.com (2.41 percent market share), Homes.com (2.18 percent) and MSN Real Estate (1.74 percent) down one place in the rankings, to sixth, seventh and eighth places, respectively.

ZipRealty (1.53 percent) hung on to ninth place in the Hitwise top 10, while FrontDoor.com (1.51 percent) bounced back from 57th to 10th place. HGTV's FrontDoor.com began the year riding high on traffic from a sweepstakes competition, which propelled the site into second place on the Hitwise list in January.

Sites on the Hitwise top 10 list captured 35.1 percent of all visits in the real estate category in April, compared to just under 11 percent for the next 10 most popular sites.

Rounding out the Hitwise top 20, Apartment Guide (1.49 percent) fell one position to 11th in April, followed by MyNewPlace (1.19 percent) in 12th.
Rentals.com (1.15 percent) picked up two places in the rankings in April, reaching 13th as it moved past Re/Max Real Estate (1.13 percent), 16th place Apartments.com (1.1 percent), and 17th place ForRent.com (1.03 percent).
Weichert.com (1.11 percent) moved up one position, to 15th, while LoopNet (0.94 percent) and Listingbook Services (0.92 percent) maintained their 18th and 19th place positions on the Hitwise top 20 in April.
HomeAway (0.87 percent) fell three positions to the bottom of the Hitwise top 20 list. Brokerage site Redfin -- which claimed the last spot on the Hitwise top 20 in March -- did not make the list in April.
Three sites entered the Hitwise top 100 in April -- MyCheapApartments.com (57th), Realestatebook.com (93rd) and California Association of Realtors (100). Dropping off the Hitwise top 100 were OwnerWiz.com, Neighborhood Assistance Corp. of America, and LandandFarm.com.

The top 10 ranked search terms were realtor.com, zillow, trulia, REALTOR®, remax, zillow.com, century 21, real estate, homes for rent, and apartments for rent.

Fast-moving websites included Real Tour Vision (up 171 places to 123rd); RE Technology (up 210 places to 237th); Century 21 Town and Country (up 273 places to 421st); TaxSaleList.com (up 113 places to 182); Bridlegate-Ranch (up 859 places to 1,322); Walk Score (up 114 places to 216); Homebuyerassistant.com (up 29 places to 70th); NNY Homes (up 581 places to 1,504); Arizona Multiple Listing Service (up 160 places to 469); and Johnson City Real Estate (up 831 places to 2,008).
For more information about the most awesome Apps. and Websites call Tami Winbury 805-798-3412 www.LiveOjai.com
Inman

Tax breaks for property losses

Tax breaks for property losses Real Estate Tax Talk We've all seen on the news that large portions of the country have been devastated by tornados and floods. Unfortunately, homeowners are not always fully insured -- or insured at all -- against losses due to such events. Fortunately, the Internal Revenue Service can help because uninsured casualty losses are tax deductible. What is a casualty? A "casualty" is damage, destruction, or loss of property due to an event that is sudden, unexpected, or unusual. Deductible casualty losses can result from many different causes, including, but not limited to: Earthquakes, Fires, Floods, Government-ordered demolition or relocation of a building that is unsafe to use because of a disaster, Landslides, Sonic booms, Storms, including hurricanes and tornadoes, Terrorist attacks, Vandalism, including vandalism to rental property by tenants, and Volcanic eruptions. One thing all the events in the list above have in common is that they are sudden -- they happen quickly. Suddenness is the hallmark of a casualty loss. Thus, loss of property due to slow, progressive deterioration is not deductible as a casualty loss. For example, the steady weakening or deterioration of a building due to normal wind and weather conditions is not a deductible casualty loss. When casualty losses are deductible In the case of a home used solely for personal purposes, a casualty loss may be deducted only if: You itemize deductions, Each casualty loss exceeds $100, and The total of all casualties suffered during the year exceeds 10 percent of your adjusted gross income after subtracting $100 from each loss suffered. Losses to business property are not subject to the above limitations. Amount of casualty loss deduction How much you may deduct depends on whether theproperty involved is completely destroyed or partially destroyed, and whether the loss was covered by insurance. If more than one item is damaged or destroyed, you must figure your deduction separately for each. If your property is personal-use property or is not completely destroyed, the amount of your casualty or theft loss is the lesser of: Your property's adjusted basis (usually its cost, increased or decreased by improvements and/or depreciation), or The decrease in fair market value of your property due to the casualty. If your property is business or income-producing property, such as rental property, and is completely destroyed, and the fair market value of the property before the casualty is less than the adjusted basis of the property, then the amount of your loss is your adjusted basis. The role of insurance You may take a deduction for casualty losses to your property only if -- and only to the extent that -- the loss is not covered by insurance. If the loss is fully covered, you get no deduction. You can't avoid this rule by not filing an insurance claim. If you have insurance coverage, you must timely file a claim, even if it will result in cancellation of your policy or an increase in your premiums. If you don't file an insurance claim, you cannot obtain a casualty loss deduction. You must reduce the amount of your claimed casualty loss by any insurance recovery you receive or reasonably expect to receive, even if it hasn't yet been paid. If it later turns out that you receive less insurance than you expected, you can deduct the amount the following year. If you receive more than you expected and claimed as a casualty loss, the extra amount is included as income for the year it is received. Disaster areas Call Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty to find out if you are in a disaster area. Casualty losses are generally deductible in the year the casualty occurs. However, if you suffer a deductible casualty loss in an area that is declared a federal disaster by the president, you may elect to deduct the loss for your taxes for the previous year. This will provide you with a quick tax refund since you'll get back part of the tax you paid for the prior year. If you have already filed your return for the prior year, you can claim a disaster loss against that year's income by filing an amended return. You can determine if an area has been declared a disaster area by checking the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) website at http://www.fema.gov/news/disasters.fema. A great deal more useful information about deducting casualty losses may be found at the IRS website at www.irs.gov. Tami Winbury Keller Williams Realty 805-798-3412 http://www.liveojai.com http://www.venturacountyhomesforsale.net Stephen Fishman is a tax expert, attorney and author who has published 18 books, including "Working for Yourself: Law & Taxes for Contractors, Freelancers and Consultants," "Deduct It," "Working as an Independent Contractor," and "Working with Independent Contractors." He welcomes your questions for this weekly column.