You are currently browsing Penny’s articles.
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Consumer sentiment rose to its highest level in more than four years in May as Americans stayed optimistic about the job market, while higher income households expected to see bigger wage increases, a survey released on Friday showed.
The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan’s final reading on the overall index on consumer sentiment rose to 79.3 from 76.4 in April, topping forecasts for 77.8 and an initial May reading of the same.
It was the highest level since October 2007.
“Unfortunately, consumer confidence is still extremely vulnerable to a reversal, as occurred in the past two years,” survey director Richard Curtin said in a statement.
“While their most optimistic expectation for job growth could go unfulfilled without much harm, if the recent slowdown in job growth persists in the months ahead, it could form the basis for a third retreat in confidence.”
Half of all consumers said the economy had improved during the past year, while buying plans for vehicles and household durables also improved. The gauge of buying plans rose to 132 from 126.
Higher income households anticipated a 2 percent income increase in the year ahead, while lower income households expected just a 0.3 percent gain.
The survey’s barometer of current economic conditions jumped to 87.2 from 82.9, while its gauge of consumer expectations improved to 74.3 from 72.3.
The indexes were at their highest levels since January 2008, and July 2007, respectively.
The survey’s one-year inflation expectation eased to 3.0 percent from 3.2 percent, while the survey’s five-to-10-year inflation outlook dipped to 2.7 percent from 2.9 percent.
http://news.yahoo.com/may-consumer-sentiment-highest-more-4-years-142300756–business.html
Monday, May 21, 2012— Washington and the housing market are never far apart. Experts ranging from real estate professionals to the members of the Federal Reserve have reported that the state of the nation’s economic recovery relies heavily on a housing recovery.
According to the latest Legislative and Political Forum held at the Realtors 2012 Midyear Legislative Meetings and Trade Expo, housing will play a large part in deciding the outcome of the 2012 presidential election.
NAR President Moe Veissi, broker-owner of Veissi & Associates Inc., in Miami. “We believe efforts that help creditworthy homebuyers obtain mortgage financing and allow more people to stay in their homes or avoid foreclosure through streamlined short sales are important for a housing and economic recovery.”
For the majority of Americans, their home is their largest asset and the foundation of their familial stability. Taking steps to ensure homeowners keep their homes helps those not only those owners but also home values across the nation.
Federal Reserve Governor Elizabeth Duke also commented on the need for a healthy real estate recovery. She noted that the health of housing is the strength of the overall recovery.
When would-be buyers are worried about job security they aren’t thinking of buying. When potential buyers can’t access credit they can’t buy homes.
“Unfortunately, some buyers who would like to purchase a home are unable to do so because they cannot obtain a mortgage,” said Duke. She said the tightening of credit standards is apparent in the credit scores of borrowers, noting that the median credit score of borrowers rose from 700 in 2006 to 760 in 2009, where it remains today.
Duke added that tight credit standards have made obtaining a mortgage particularly difficult for first-time home buyers, since they tend to be younger than other homebuyers, and have lower credit scores and fewer financial assets.
http://realtytimes.com/rtpages/20120521_realestateoutlook.htm
 |
| Fleur de Lys Mansion in Los Angeles is America’s most expensive residential listing at $125 million. Photo: Forbes.com |
It’s difficult to decide where to look first when stepping out of the private elevator that leads into shoe heiress-turned-songwriter Denise Rich’s New York City penthouse apartment. A multimillion dollar art collection that includes an Andy Warhol painting of Marilyn Monroe and a Roy Lichtenstein sculpture grace the grand parlor, while the floor-to-ceiling windows offer surreal views of Central Park below.
Occupying the top two floors of Fifth Avenue’s white-glove Parc Cinq cooperative, the 12,000-square foot penthouse boasts seven bedrooms, 11 bathrooms, three kitchens, a wood-paneled library with wet bar and staff quarters. The master bedroom suite has a movie projector, a fireplace, and his-and-hers bathroom suites. The huge “hers” closet has jewelry safes tucked behind mirrors and a wall equipped for shoes that opens to expose a second hidden space storing more Manolo Blahniks. On the lower level lies an air-conditioned recording studio bedecked with platinum albums and pictures of Jessica Simpson and Mary J. Blige. There’s a private rooftop garden and once for a party, the wraparound terraces were iced over for skating.
All of these outrageous amenities, in the biggest Fifth Ave apartment to ever come to market, help justify an asking price of $65 million, making it the most expensive co-op for sale in the U.S. and one of the most expensive homes currently on offer in general.
To compile our list of the most expensive homes on the market in America right now, we sorted through listings on Realtor.com, Sotheby’s International Realty, the Corcoran Group, Christie’s International Real Estate (and its affiliates), Coldwell Banker Previews International and others. By sticking to MLS listings we may be missing out on some mega-mansions: Some ultra-expensive homes never officially hit the market — their owners choose to shop quietly for wealthy buyers through well-connected brokers.
 |
| The One57 Penthouses list for $115 million and $105 million with views of Central Park. Photo: One57 |
While the $65 million Denise Rich is asking for her pad may seem steep, compared to luxury condos in the Big Apple, which lack restrictions notoriously associated with co-ops, it’s somewhat of a deal. Nearby on the south side of Central Park, a grand ballroom-turned-penthouse condo at the Ritz Carlton is listed for $77.5 million. The 10,882-square-foot apartment includes four bedrooms, a library, a media room, a museum-quality display room and terraces overlooking the park. It’s the personal residence of Christopher Jeffries of Millennium Partners, the real estate developer who converted part of the Ritz to condos.
Both apartments came to market shortly after former Citigroup chairman Sanford Weill’s 15 Central Park West penthouse sold to Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev for $88 million, a record for a condo, raising the confidence of high-end home sellers and developers.
 |
| The former Beverly Hills estate of William Randolph Hearst is listed for $95 million. Photo: Hilton & Hyland | L.M. Ross |
“That has had an immediate effect on the value of other very high-end condos in the area,” says Hall Willkie, president of Brown Harris Stevens. His firm represented the Weills in that deal and currently represents Jeffries’ apartment as well as the $90 million Woolworth Mansion on Manhattan’s Upper East Side. He says several trophy apartments listed by the firm are enjoying bidding wars right now.
Luxury real estate agents in Palm Beach, Fla., are hoping that the upturn in New York means better times are on the way for them. “It’s just a matter of time until New York’s robust home buying trickles into Palm Beach since this is the secondary market for those buyers,” asserts Kathleen Coumou, a senior vice president at Christie’s International Real Estate.
 |
| The Woolworth Mansion in NYC lists for $90 million and includes 20,000-square-feet of space. Photo: Brown Harris Stevens |
In Los Angeles, uber-expensive mansions abound. And opulence atop more than an acre of land will really cost you. Take Fleur de Lys, the 4-acre, 35,000-square foot faux French chateaux down the street in Holmby Hills from the Manor (the home formerly known as America’s most expensive for sale) is the most expensive on the West Coast, with an asking price of $125 million. Owned by Suzanne Saperstein, the ex-wife of former billionaire David Saperstein, the extravagant palace boasts 12 bedrooms, 15 bathrooms, a ballroom that fits 200 guests, two kitchens, a 50-seat theater, a 9-car garage – even a three-quarter-mile jogging track.
 |
| Rancho Dos Pueblos in Santa Barbara, CA lists for $84 million and includes 2,175 acres of property. Photo: Realtor.com |
But is it worth $125 million? With the exception of the Beverly House, the bankruptcy-addled William Randolph Hearst estate that’s listed for $95 million, it certainly out-prices its local competition, which includes four Los Angeles County spreads priced between $50 million and $65 million.
Many pricey properties on our list used to have higher price tags. Versailles, a humongous 90,000-square foot, unfinished Windermere, Fla., estate fashioned after the palace of Versailles, was listed for $100 million upon completion, but it now can be had for $65 million as is, or two-thirds complete, or $90 million finished. In some cases, pricey properties of years past have simply vanished from the sale block, with their owners perhaps waiting for a more opportune time to sell.
http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/americas-most-expensive-homes-for-sale-2012.html
Size up the market before you list
With home prices back where they were ten years ago and sales still sluggish, it seems as if sellers can’t catch a break. But if you want to sell your home this year, there are glimmers of hope. In January, the National Association of Realtors reported that sales of existing homes nationally rose slightly from the year before and were also higher than in three of the preceding four months. Plus, the inventory of existing homes for sale fell 21% from the year before.
But even if you have less competition and better prospects, today’s buyers are still a tough sell. They’re nervous and risk-averse. They want a home in move-in condition, with all the upgrades completed, because they know they can’t count on a quick increase in the home’s value to help them recoup money they spend on improvements. They try to negotiate a steal from list price. “You must find a way to improve the condition or lower the price until a buyer pulls the trigger,” says Leigh Brown, an agent with Re/Max in Charlotte, N.C.
How long will it take to sell your home? You can get a rough idea by looking at the average “days on the market,” preferably for your neighborhood and price tier. You’ll find that and other market statistics on the Web site of the local Realtors association or from an agent. You may have some advantage if your home is in a desirable location because, say, it’s in a good school district or close to jobs.
As a seller, you may have your own issues to grapple with — not the least of which is thinking your home is worth more than it is. Gayle Henderson, an agent with Re/Max in Phoenix, recommends that sellers play “buyer for a day” to check out the competition in their neighborhood. It will help you be more realistic about the price you set for your home.
Above all, find a good agent. Don’t interview just one candidate — that’s a mistake that two-thirds of sellers make, according to the National Association of Realtors. In addition to a history of successful sales in or around your neighborhood, you want total honesty — even if it’s painful to hear that you must spend money in order to sell.
In 2010, sellers nationwide paid an average commission of 5.4%, reports Real Trends, a real estate consulting firm. If an agent or the agent’s firm wants to be able to represent you and a buyer in the same transaction in order to collect the full commission, try to negotiate the rate down by one or two percentage points.
Get your home in shape to sell
To hook buyers and reap the highest possible price, you must clean, declutter and stage your home, inside and out. Cotty Lowry, an agent with Keller Williams, in Minneapolis, tells his sellers that they should expect to spend two to four weeks preparing their home for sale, and be ready to spend as much as 2% to 3% of its list price on improvements. Lowry tells balky sellers that spiffing up the place could cost them less than having to make an initial price reduction.
As a first step, Lowry says, you should hire a home inspector for a “pre-inspection” to identify all the issues that would otherwise turn up in a buyer’s inspection. Get a termite inspection, too. (The report would count toward any closing requirement.) Each will cost you $300 to $400. The inspections give you the opportunity to make repairs so buyers won’t reject your home out of hand or use problems to negotiate against you.
Charlotte, N.C., agent Leigh Brown says that you may also need to invest in improvements that buyers now expect as standard features. In many markets that means granite countertops and hardwood floors, even in starter homes. All other things being equal, those two features will put you head and shoulders above your competition. Ask your agent to check the features of recently closed and pending sales. You’ll know what amenities you need to match, or what you can do to sell faster, even if you can’t raise your price.
Expect to get advice about spiffing up your home from agents and their stagers. But you can begin preparing your home using the checklists in the “Home Sale Maximizer Guide” by HomeGain, a home-marketing Web site. Stagers declutter if you haven’t, rearrange furniture to improve traffic flow and create a sense of spaciousness, and make sure your décor doesn’t shout your personal tastes. Home sellers spend an average of $1,800 staging a home, but the cost can be $5,000 or more. Agents may provide the service as part of their fee.
Staging proved critical to the sale of Tim and Kristel Barber’s home, in Minneapolis. They thought that their four-bedroom, four-bath home had everything a buyer could want, including high-end finishes and a hot location in the city’s Linden Hills neighborhood, where million-dollar homes were replacing tear-downs. But the sticking point for buyers was a long, narrow living room.
The Barbers first put their home on the market in March 2011, but by October, after several price cuts and an attempt at staging, it hadn’t sold. So the couple got serious: They moved their four children and belongings to their new home, and a stager brought in new furnishings throughout and redesigned the living room to create a welcoming entryway and a seating area with smaller-scale furniture. A month later they got an offer. Altogether, the Barbers spent $6,200 on two stagings.
Price it right and negotiate
No agent can guarantee that your house is worth x and will sell for z. Instead, you and your agent should scrutinize all the comparables (current listings of homes for sale, recently closed sales and pending sales in your neighborhood) for the past six months that are similar to your property. Agents must visit comparables in person to accurately assess differences that will influence desirability, price and whether they really are your competition, says Francie House, an agent with Seattle broker Windermere.
If you want to start with a price at the high end, be prepared to lower it within a certain length of time or number of showings, based on your agent’s experience. While sellers may think that a price reduction suggests weakness, Lowry says it shows buyers and their agents that sellers are flexible. Plus, it will generate automatic e-mails to buyers and inclusion on agents’ “hot sheets,” which prompts renewed interest and showings.
Negotiate the price. To head off a price reduction, try offering perks that add value for the buyer without costing you too much. But wait to include the incentives until you make a counteroffer, or else your tactic could backfire. For instance, buyers may want you to cover
part of their closing costs. But if they know too early that you’re willing to ante up the money, they’ll expect you to reduce your price by that much – and still ask for closing costs later.
If the buyer gets a mortgage backed by or sold to Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, the agencies’ rules will limit how much of the buyer’s closing costs you can pay. If the down payment is 10% or less on a principal residence or vacation home, you can cover up to 3% of the closing costs; from 10% to 25%, 6%; and 25% or more, 9%. With VA financing, you can pay all closing costs, plus up to 4% of the sales price for other buyer costs or to pay down debt so that the buyer will qualify for a mortgage.
Perks in lieu of price cuts. When you make a counteroffer, instead of a price reduction you can try to offer something that adds value for the buyer without costing you too much. Your agent can ask the buyer’s agent, “What’s important to your buyer? What do they need?” says Leigh Brown, an agent in Charlotte. The possibilities include a flexible closing date, a home warranty (about $400), paying homeowners-association dues for some period of time or offering appliances or furniture that you don’t want or don’t want to move.
Qualify the buyer. The best offer isn’t always the one with the highest price. It’s the one that will close, and that means buyers must assure you they will qualify for the financing they need. A preapproval letter (the buyers have qualified for a loan based on an application and some documentation) from a known, creditable lender beats a prequalification letter (a ballpark estimate of what the buyer can afford). If you receive an offer with only a prequalification, your agent can call the buyer’s lender to scope it out. Or better yet, ask the buyer for permission to get financial details from the lender.
You could ask buyers to sign a financing addendum to the purchase contract. The buyer must agree to be fully approved for financing and ready to close in a set amount of time — typically two weeks to a month — before the scheduled closing. If the buyers and their lender don’t meet the deadline, the seller can cancel the contract.
http://www.kiplinger.com/magazine/archives/how-to-sell-your-home-fast.html?topic_id=35
More Affordable To Buy in 98% of Major Metros
by The KCM Crew on March 27, 2012
Last week, Trulia released their Winter 2012 Rent vs. Buy Index. In the index, they report that:
“After years of home price declines and tightening rental markets, home ownership is now more affordable than renting in all but two of the 100 largest metros – even in expensive real estate markets such as New York, Los Angeles and Boston.”
The two metros where renting was more affordable were Honolulu and San Francisco. However, Trulia explains that, even in these markets, buying a home:
“…might make sense for people who plan to stay in their next home for at least five years and can benefit from the mortgage-interest tax deduction.”
This rent/buy ratio favors buying more so then at almost any time in history. In a recent article, Forbes Magazine quotes Jed Kolko, Trulia’s chief economist:
“Certainly prices have continued to fall nationally, but rents have been rising so this would be the lowest price-to-rent ratio that we’ve seen.”
Bottom Line
It might be time to talk to a local real estate professional about the possibility that buying a home makes sense for you and family.
http://www.kcmblog.com/2012/03/27/more-affordable-to-buy-in-98-of-major-metros/
 |
| Architects and designers redefine what’s possible with shipping container homes. Photo: Architecture and Hygiene. |
A trend in recycling structures not traditionally considered “real estate” is changing how potential home and business owners, not-for-profit organizations, government agencies and the U.S. military view shipping containers.
The use of rudimentary containers to ship cargo began in the late 17th century. By the 1950s, Malcolm McLean of Sea-Land Shipping, pushed by the U.S. military to standardize their design, was building strong, uniform, theft-resistant, stackable shipping containers that were easy to load and unload by truck, rail and ship, and easy to store.
In 2005, an estimated 18 million containers made a combined total of about 200 million trips. Many containers measure 20 feet or 40 feet in length, and a 40-foot-long shipping container offers 304 square feet of floor space.
A trade imbalance has led the containers piling up around U.S. hubs, and storing them increases the cost of doing business.
One response to the problem: Re-engineer the containers. As architects and designers around the world evolve and refine creative reuse, containers are reshaping as disaster-relief shelters, coffee shops, student housing, custom homes, retail towers, even storing physical books after they are digitized.
 |
| The richly furnished interior contrasts to the minimalist, industrial exterior. Photo: Architecture and Hygiene |
Living in former shipping containers may have begun as a fringe novelty, but it is far from such these days. Many entrepreneurs are exploring new niches amid the growing assortment of shipping container-based structures.
Alex Klein of Container Home Consultants Inc. has been involved in shipping container conversions for 30 years, while Heather Levin said she appreciates container homes after noticing how much of her hard-earned dollars went to a bank as mortgage loan interest.
 |
| This container house in France was completed in 2010. Photo: CG Architects, France |
Victor Wallace of ContainerHomes.info authored the free downloadable book, “The 30 Most Influential Shipping Container Homes Ever Built!” His website presents extensive tutorials and videos for container conversions and also offers a free download of the book with designs from around the world.
21st Century Homes & Structures builds modular homes and claims it is the “original approved shipping container home manufacturer in New York… certified since 1985.”
 |
| A colorful, lego-block-esque apartment complex in England. Photo: plentyofants|Flickr |
That company reports that its modified shipping containers are “eco-friendly, (energy-efficient), hurricane-resistant, pest-free, affordable and green.” The company offers units in sizes ranging from 480 square feet to 1,280 feet, and prices starting at $89 per square foot. That does not include excavation site work and foundations. The company offers turnkey packages and ships throughout the U.S.
An Argentinian-born woman living in California identified by faircompanies.com as “Lulu” (no last name given), was reportedly forced by the recession to downsize, and found and modified a free shipping container. She took a couple of months to gather mostly recycled components to remodel the unit, faircompanies.com reported, and it took another month to convert the original 360-square-foot space into a home for herself and her small daughter.
 |
| Container homes can take on more conventional shapes as well. Photo: Alex Klein, Container Home Consultants Inc |
With hot water on demand from a small camping device, and camping stoves for cooking, Lulu noted that her home features a separate bathroom and second bedroom, and she plans to add a teahouse and a greenhouse.
Sure takes “green building” to another dimension.
http://realestate.yahoo.com/promo/dream-homes-that-come-in-a-crate.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The battered housing market looks to be on the mend as buyers make a tentative return and house prices stabilize.
Sales of new homes in February fell from January but jumped more than 11 percent compared with the same month last year and prices rose, according to data released on Friday that was in line with other recent signs of a slow recovery.
Big challenges lie ahead, most notably in the form of a glut of unsold properties – many of them foreclosures – and tight lending by banks. But even if the recovery is slow and bumpy, the worst of the six-year slump seems to be over.
“The housing market is slowly coming back. It’s still a depressed market, but it’s getting better. We have a long way to go,” said Patrick Newport, an economist at Global Insight in Lexington, Massachusetts.
New home sales slipped 1.6 percent to a seasonally adjusted 313,000-unit annual rate in February, the lowest since October, but were up 11.4 percent in year-on-year terms, the Commerce Department said.
The median new home price jumped 8.3 percent to an eight-month high of $233,700. Compared with February last year, the rise was 6.2 percent.
The report rounded off a week of mixed U.S. housing data and followed a similar pattern seen in the bigger market for existing homes – sales also fell in February, but stayed close to their highest level in nearly two years and prices rose for the first time on a yearly basis since November 2010.
Realtors say they are seeing higher traffic volume and are moving more houses off the market than a few years ago.
“My listings are selling much more quickly compared to the past few years, even approaching 2007 pre-crash levels,” said Lindsey Sanders, a Realtor with Muffley & Associates in Atlanta.
“I began seeing a meaningful uptick in open house traffic last summer and it has continued to improve. I think this is a combination of sellers finally becoming more willing to ask market prices for their homes instead of bubble-level prices.”
Builders tell a similar story. An index measuring confidence among homebuilders held at a near four-year high this month and they anticipated an increase in sales over the next six months.
While the pace of home construction fell last month, permits for future projects approached a 3-1/2-year high. Much of the activity is concentrated in the multi-family segment, as demand for rentals soars.
SPOTTY RECOVERY
The recovery remains spotty. According to CoreLogic, for every two homes sold, there is one that could be foreclosed. It estimated the so-called shadow inventory of homes at 1.6 million in January, down from 1.8 million a year ago.
KB Home, the fifth-largest U.S. homebuilder, on Friday said net orders for new homes declined 8 percent in its first quarter as cancellations rose.
“Don’t expect this to be a broad-based, rocket-ship recovery,” said KB Homes Chief Executive Officer Jeff Mezger on an earnings call. “The overall housing market is better, but this is definitely a localized recovery … and in some cases, it’s a zip-code-by-zip-code recovery.”
KB’s order decline was in sharp contrast to the strong order growth reported by other U.S. homebuilders, including D.R. Horton, Pulte and Lennar, who have forecast an improving housing market.
While the pace of new home sales held above 300,000 units for a sixth straight month, they are just over a fifth of their 1.389 million unit peak reached in July 2005.
“Mindful that more healing needs to be done, we expect new home sales in 2012 to post their first annual increase in seven years, rising 12 percent,” said Sam Bullard, a senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Last month, the inventory of new homes on the market was unchanged at a record low 150,000 units. At February’s sales pace it would take 5.8 months to clear the houses from the market, up from 5.7 months in January.
New home sales last month surged in the Northeast and West but slumped in the South and Midwest.
New home sales account for about 7 percent of the overall housing market and face stiff competition from the used home segment despite low levels of stock.
“Buyers have been able to take their time as they have little fear that prices or rates will get away from them. Mortgage rates, though, are beginning to rise slowly and that could continue through the rest of the year,” said Joel Naroff, chief economist at Naroff Economic Advisors in Holland, Pennsylvania.
“Add price increases to that and there is a little more urgency to the decision. So while investors may be disappointed by this report, I think better times are just about here so be a little more patient.”
http://news.yahoo.com/home-sales-slip-prices-8-month-high-143754718.html
