What the hell happened to the FHA’s loans in Florida?
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Archive for the 'Investment' Category
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Homes with widow’s walks in Chapel Hill, N.C.; Barnstable, Mass., and Washington.
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Real estate prices in Santa Rosa, California are heading higher. What other cities are projected to enjoy home price gains in 2010?
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Hate the mess your home has deteriorated into but you don’t have the time or means to do a comprehensive redecorating job? Or maybe it’s time to sell your place, but you don’t know how to show it off to best effect?
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Ecologically focused homes for cold temperatures in Colorado, New york, and Massachusetts.
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The national foreclosure rate fell 2% in February from a month earlier, according to an industry report released Thursday, the latest sign that the pace of foreclosures is slowing.
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Lots of people, especially those trying to battle high utility bills, believe in energy-efficient homebuilding.
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Erin and Robert Smith had no problem handling the $2,000 monthly payment on their home … until they lost their jobs.
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Understanding Real Estate Contract Clauses
Many people might argue that investing in real estate is one of the most interesting and exciting ways to save for your retirement and create a steady stream of current income today. Let’s face it, lots of people are addicted to real estate investing! I’ll admit that I’ve been swept up myself in the past.
One thing about real estate investing that makes it different than other forms of investing, such as the stock market for instance, is the fact that real estate investments are much more complicated especially when it comes to closing the sale. If you’ve ever been to a closing then you know what I’m talking about!
There is a sort of mad flurry of paperwork shooting out every which way. There’s papers on the table, there’s papers coming out of briefcases, there’s papers on the floor, there’s papers being passed around from you to the buyer to the seller to the broker to the lawyer back to you again. Initial here; initial there; sign here, and sign there… it can very quickly turn into a madhouse which is why you want to be as familiar as possible with real estate contracts before you go into closing.
That’s why I thought I’d write this article today and explain a few simple clauses that you should expect to see in a regular real estate contract. Hopefully you’ll be able to familiarize yourself with them here and therefore get a leg up when it comes time to battle during closing.
The first clause I want to talk about is the condition precedent clause. This basically says that the purchaser or the seller may want one of a few specific events to occur before a certain obligation becomes fixed. That may be confusing so let me try and give an example. Say the purchaser wants the town to approve building a new park next to your building and you refuse to purchase the building until the town has agreed to build the park.
Once the town has built the park, the purchaser will now be contractually obligated to purchase the building from the seller. You get the idea… these things will be spelled out in the condition precedent clause and obviously this clause won’t be present in all contracts.
The building permits clause is the next one I want to talk about. This is similar to the last clause in that you may require the seller to make sure the building permits are up to date or that the zoning is approved by the city before you purchase the building. These sorts of things will be spelled out in the building permits clause.
Brokerage fees clause. Most people don’t realize that brokerage fees are negotiable and not only are they negotiable between you and your broker but they can even be negotiable between you and the seller. They state which of you has to pay the fees or if you share the fees or any combination of the two. This will be spelled out in detail in the brokerage fees clause section of your contract.
Well fortunately I’ve only touched on three clauses today in this article but hopefully at least they will give you a heads up so that you understand a little bit what to expect when it comes to real estate contract clauses.
Jason Markum has been an article writer online for well over 13 years. When he’s not writing articles, he has a good time running a dinnerware pfaltzgraff web site where he also reviews stoneware dinnerware sets for your home use.
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Jason_Markum
Marketing and Selling Your House is Easy!
Whoever said that, couldn’t have tried selling a house in the 2008-2009 recession. House prices, dependent on buyer confidence and the availability of mortgages, tumbled; the market stagnated and both supply and demand fell off a cliff. We put our house on the market in autumn 2008, pricing it below the estate agent’s valuation. There were some viewers but we didn’t think they were serious prospective buyers. Some were looking for a bargain at distress prices, others were just plain nosey. We rejected a rock bottom offer.
And so it went on, through the winter and into spring 2009. More viewers, no buyers. We dropped the price, twice. Still viewers came and still we had no success. We reached the point where we’d rather stay put than reduce the price again. Then we did what we should have done a year earlier. We put some money and thought into the property. We applied marketing principles. Dark carpets were replaced by new ones, in neutral colours. Dated wallpaper was replaced with a light pastel paper. Pictures came off the walls, treasures were put away. We allowed potential buyers to see the house as a backdrop for their own tastes, not ours.
By this time we recognized that you don’t market a house, you promise a lifestyle. A new front door, slate house name sign, neatly trimmed hedges and lawns, well-tended flowerbeds all gave our house kerbside appeal. We decided that our eagerness to sell was having an adverse effect on viewers so we resolved to focus even more on lifestyle rather than the property itself.
We didn’t put the coffee pot on. Instead, we trusted the next viewers to wander round unaccompanied. They stayed longer and as if by magic, phoned back later to say they’d like to look again. This time I sat in a shady part of the garden, empty mug and Saturday supplements strewn untidily across the table. Our buyers commented that I’d found the perfect place for some peace and quiet. I agreed and they wandered, all the time thinking themselves into our leisurely lifestyle.
We didn’t sell to that couple but they did increase their offer and within two weeks we had another viewer. We did the same thing, depicting a lifestyle instead of trying to sell a house. This couple viewed again the next day, made an offer and we sold. Without the use of simple but effective marketing measures, we probably would even now still be looking for that elusive buyer. I have no idea why it took so long for us to pick up the tools that had been there for us from the very first day.
Footnote:
Contrary to perceived wisdom, we were entirely happy with our estate agents. They were professional and reliable, and went out of their way to help. Fenn Wright, thank you!
Ian Thurgood
http://www.sixtonant.co.uk
Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Ian_Thurgood
