How to Beat the Tax Credit Deadline
How to Beat the Tax Credit Deadline
It’s not too late for a determined first-time home buyer to take advantage of the $8,000 federal tax credit, which expires Nov. 30.
Scott Voak, a San Diego practitioner specializing in first-time buyers, helps potential buyers target homes that can close quickly. To identify those properties without touring them, contact the listing agent with blunt but important questions that aren’t likely addressed in the listing.
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
How to Beat the Tax Credit Deadline
How to Beat the Tax Credit Deadline
It’s not too late for a determined first-time home buyer to take advantage of the $8,000 federal tax credit, which expires Nov. 30.
Scott Voak, a San Diego practitioner specializing in first-time buyers, helps potential buyers target homes that can close quickly. To identify those properties without touring them, [...]
Basic Features Appeal to First-Time Buyers
First-time homebuyers are forcing home builders to think frugal by penny-pinching on upgrades.
Nearly 50 percent of new homes sold in the first six months of 2009 cost less than $200,000, the largest share for the first six months of a year in five years. The average size of new homes fell to 2,065 square feet, the smallest since 2000.
“The high end isn’t moving, so builders have to dumb-down their designs and put in Formica kitchens and the bare-bones carpeting,” says Brian Bethune, an economist at IHS Global Insight.
The barebones approach is helping builders that focus on first-time buyers improve their profits. Standard Pacific Corp. has more than doubled its stock price and Meritage Homes Corp. is up 84 percent.
Source: Bloomberg, Kathleen M. Howley and Daniel Taub (08/06/2009)
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
Luring First-time Buyers – 5 Tips to Beat the Competition, Sell Your Home
RISMEDIA, June 19, 2009-(MCT)-A federal tax credit of up to $8,000 is nudging many Americans into buying a home for the first time, good news for those trying to sell one.
Still, selling a home isn’t easy in most markets today. To get the typical first-time buyer to bite and submit an offer, a house has to stand apart from the competition – and there’s a lot of it, including foreclosure homes that are selling at hefty discounts.
One big thing working in favor of the traditional seller: A lived-in, maintained home is easier for buyers to imagine themselves living in than a vacant foreclosure. That has great appeal for someone buying a home for the first time, for practical and financial reasons.
“First-time buyers are skeptical of buying homes that need improvement. Sellers certainly don’t need to remodel the kitchen, but they want to make sure that their home showcases very well,” said Eric Mangan, a spokesman for ForSaleByOwner.com. Full Story..
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
Foreclosure and Short Sale Discounts Weigh Down Metro Area Median Prices
First-time home buyers responding to improved affordability conditions, and lower prices of foreclosures and short sales, impacted metropolitan area median home prices in the first quarter, while existing-home sales remained sluggish in many parts of the country, according to the latest survey by the National Association of Realtors®.
With first-time buyers accounting for half of all purchases during the first quarter, 134 out of 152 metropolitan statistical areas1 reported lower median existing single-family home prices in comparison with the first quarter of 2008, while 18 metros had price gains.
Many buyers sought deeply discounted distressed sales – foreclosures and short sales – which accounted for nearly half of transactions in the first quarter and weighed down median home prices in most markets.
The national median existing single-family price was $169,000, which is 13.8 percent below the first quarter of 2008 when conditions were closer to normal. The median is where half sold for more and half sold for less, but distressed homes typically are selling for 20 percent less than traditional homes and are downwardly skewing median prices. Full Story.
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
6 Reasons Why It’s Still a Good Time to Buy!
The housing market is looking healthier. Here are six reasons why now is the time to jump into the market.
1. Uncle Sam is willing to help. First-time buyers (defined as anyone who hasn’t owned a home in the last three years) are entitled to a maximum $8,000 tax credit; interest rates are at record lows; and the Federal Reserve is doing its best to make mortgage loans available. (Sign up for a Webinar to learn more about the home buyer tax credit)
2. People have to live somewhere. About 800,000 new households are formed each year in this country, ensuring that the housing market will tighten, even if the economy doesn’t soar.
3. Borrowers leverage their investment. If you put $10,000 into the stock market and it earns 10 percent, you’ve earned $1,000. If you put $10,000 down on a home and its values increases 10 percent, you’ve made $10,000.
4. When prices come back up, you’ll have instant equity. In parts of the country where foreclosures have driven down prices, better times will mean the price of the home you buy will rise rapidly.
5. Mortgage costs stay the same. If you get a fixed-rate mortgage, the monthly payment stays the same – while everything else, including rent, goes upward.
6. You own it. There is something comforting in the notion that your home is your own. You can paint it any color you want, let the dog run in the back yard and hang a swing for the kids in the front.
Source: The Wall Street Journal, June Fletcher (03/27/2009)
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
First-time Buyers Drive February Sales.
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Existing-home sales increased in February, reversing losses in January, according to the latest report by the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS®. However, sales activity remains relatively soft, reflecting additional layoffs and buyers waiting for housing provisions in the economic stimulus package to take effect, according to NAR.
Existing-home sales— including single-family, townhomes, condominiums and co-ops—rose 5.1 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.72 million units in February from a pace of 4.49 million units in January. Existing-home sales are 4.6 percent below the 4.95 million-unit level in February 2008. Seasonal adjustment factors are more volatile in winter months, but sales rates over the past few months show dampened sales activity, according to NAR.
Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, says first-time buyers accounted for half of all home sales last month, with activity concentrated in lower price ranges. Full Story.
Front Gate Properties, We’re selling the BEST Real Estate in Aiken, SC.
