Estate House

Home Architectural Design

2011-03-26T09:22:00.001-07:00

Home Architectural Design

Contemporary Open View House – First Crescent by SAOTA

Posted: 26 Mar 2011 12:35 AM PDT

The aims of First Crescent were to design a dramatic memorable house with specific aesthetic considerations and to have the flexibility that it could be either partially or completely rented out. The house projected as a contemporary design suit along fantastic site to creating an elegant response. This double storey house was positioned centrally on [...]

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Tossa de Mar by Soler – Morató Arquitectos

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 06:55 PM PDT

Located on a cliff on the Costa Brava, this splendid residence built overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, which develops an extensive functional program from the different levels of adaptation orographic. The house accessed via top of the plot, with different architectural volumes integrated into the wonderful views of this unique and full of native vegetation. The [...]

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Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-26T07:45:00.001-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

The future of IHB news and real estate analysis

Posted: 26 Mar 2011 03:30 AM PDT

We are preparing for some exciting upgrades here at the IHB. Today, I'll talk about some of these changes and why we are making them.

Irvine Home Address ... 51 STOWE Irvine, CA 92620
Resale Home Price ...... $949,900

Here I am, on the road again
There I am, on the stage
Here I go, playing star again
There I go, turn the page

Bob Seger -- Turn The Page

Life is always moving forward. It's time for us to turn the page and embark on a new era at the IHB. But first, a look at one of the reasons we are looking to enhance the IHB experience.

Flawed housing data might mask depth of woes

Critics say Realtors' monthly report overly optimistic

By John W. Schoen Senior producer -- March 25, 2011

Two high-profile reports on home sales this week confirmed that the housing market is still mired in a deep slump with prices still falling and sales activity sluggish at best. In fact, the market may be in much worse shape than even those numbers suggest.

Figures from the National Association of Realtors that are among the most closely watched indicators on the housing market have been called into question by economists who say they may overstate existing-home sales activity by up to 20 percent.

The issue is more than just an academic dispute among economists. Without a working barometer, it's hard to see the next storm coming.

It's time to take this task away from the NAr and create some bloated and inefficient government bureaucracy to collect and disseminate this data instead. I would rather deal with the problems of government waste than realtor duplicity.

"It's very important for the industry but also for policy makers," said Mike Fratantoni, head of research at the Mortgage Bankers Association, one of the groups that is challenging the Realtors' data.

"Folks at the Fed and at the Treasury and anyone involved in economic policy throughout government are very concerned about the health of the housing market. So if your primary indicator is giving you an overly optimistic reading, that's cause for concern," he said.

It's only a concern for those interested in the truth. Accuracy is not as important to realtors as creating a false sense of urgency.

The Realtors, a trade group of licensed real estate agents and brokers, concede that there has probably been some "upward drift" in its numbers since the unprecedented collapse of the housing market in 2006. But Realtors spokesman Walter Molony says the group's data still accurately track the monthly ups and downs of home sales, providing valuable insight into sales trends.

"In terms of broad market characterizations, it's really not that big of a deal," said Molony.

Not that big a deal? They grossly overstate housing sales numbers to manipulate buyers for purely self-serving reasons, and this is not big deal? I'm sure it's not... to them.

But if the data is as badly flawed as critics fear, it could be a big deal for home buyers and sellers because it could mean prices are more likely to head even lower. That's because an unrealistically optimistic assessment of the pace of home sales could be artificially buoying home prices.

The possible breakdown of the barometer couldn't come at a worse time for the housing industry. After signs of life last year — helped by generous government tax breaks—there are ominous signs that those incentives simply pulled future sales forward.

According to the Realtors, sales of existing homes fell nearly 10 percent last month, snapping three months of gains. Sales of new homes, which are tracked by the government, plunged in February for a third straight month to the lowest level in records dating back nearly 50 years.

Analysts have theorized that new-home sales have been hurt because prices of existing homes have fallen more quickly, making them relative bargains. But analysts have been unsettled by data suggesting that the housing market is headed into another leg down for sales and prices.

"This is really unknown territory for us," said Evan Barrington, head of economic analysis at The Stephenson Company, a market research firm. "We haven’t been through this before."

'Upward drift'

One reason for concern about the Realtors' data is that when assessing the outlook for future sales, forecasters rely heavily on the inventory of homes on the market, which is generally expressed in number of "months' supply."

That number is derived by comparing the number of unsold homes and the current pace of sales. Prices tend to be fairly stable when the market has about six to eight months' worth of unsold homes. Tighter supplies tend to push prices higher, bigger supplies tend to depress prices.

According to the NAR's latest monthly data, the number of unsold homes in February represents an 8.6-month supply at the current sales pace, based on an annual sales rate of 4.88 million.

But other measures — including mortgage data tracked by the mortgage bankers, show a much lower sales pace. Private research firm CoreLogic, which counts closings filed in more than 2,000 counties, says the pace of home sales in February was just 3.6 million units on an annual basis. If true, that means the inventory of unsold houses is more like 17 months' supply, or roughly double the level reported by the NAR, according to Mark Fleming, chief economist at CoreLogic.

"(Overstating the pace of homes sales) makes a big difference in terms of that month's supply measure," said Fleming. "That implies significant downward price pressure — which we're actually observing. Prices are falling month over month — and year over year again — at a pretty significant pace at the moment.

So what could account for such a substantial overcounting of home sales?

The desire to lie. realtors feel the need to puff the market with bogus statistics. The rest is merely the mechanics of the deception.

To begin with, monthly statistics like home sales data are the murky underpinnings of economics - a prime example of why it's called the "dismal science." Almost all economic statistics — from widely watched employment data to more obscure measures of industrial output - are only estimates based on data samples that are designed to stand in for a more complete reporting that would take months or years.

In the case of NAR's existing home sales report, the association polls about 40 percent of its members and logs sales based on the widely used Multiple Listing Service. Up until 2010, it periodically "benchmarked" its data based on the more complete count conducted by the U.S. Census.

Unfortunately, the Census dropped several key questions about housing in the 2010 Census, which left the NAR without that data set to recalibrate its own data series.

"That kind of threw a monkey wrench in the works for us," said Molony.

The collapse of the housing industry may also have played a role, according to housing economists who are talking a closer look at the data. One theory is that the consolidation of the housing industry also brought a consolidation among real estate agencies that the NAR's model hasn't kept up with. An agency used in the NARs sample, for example, may have increased sales because it acquired smaller agencies, not because sales in that market rose.

Offering excuses only hides the reality that the NAr knew their methods would inflate the numbers, and they chose to deceive the American people because the numbers were not what they wanted them to be.

Moloney said the NAR is working with the Federal Reserve, Fannie Mae, the Federal Housing Finance Agency, the MBA, Corelogic and academic economists to get its monthly sales data back on track.

"It's a normal process, but now we have to obtain a consensus with a lot of parties," he said.

That could be a big challenge, given the number of businesses that keep an close eye on the NAR data.

The housing industry's outsized role in the U.S. economy touches thousands of businesses whose sales rely heavily on the level of home sales. From appliance makers to home improvement centers, businesses have to decide month-to-month how many workers to hire and how much inventory to stock. The NAR's monthly number is one of the most critical pieces of data they rely on to make the right decision.

"These data really do have a real world impact," said Franatoni.

Data is important, isn't it?

It's a shame the NAr has gone down the path it has. Few reliable sources of real estate analysis and information exist, and few signs the NAr is going to become one of them. That leaves a void. Uncharted waters buyers must navigate without a reliable guide. It's a void we seek to fill here at the IHB.

We are in the process of assembling our own private database of housing and related economic statistics. Over the next several weeks as I have time to digest the new information, I plan on a number of new analysis posts to truly illuminate the activity in our local housing market.

I have no agenda to spin the data. Let's see what is really going on. I want to be accurate. People can make their own decisions and draw their own conclusions from accurate data. If approached without the built-in bias of a realtor, data analysis can be revealing rather than deceiving.

I will still have a dog in this hunt. I do run a business that makes money from real estate transactions. I am subject to the same biases as any other human being. I sell real estate, but I am not a realtor. The truth needs no salesman. I will present data as accurately as I can. If reality motivates you to buy or rent, the IHB can help you. I have no desire to manipulate data in order to make a quick buck. This is a part-time hobby for me, not my livelihood.

What about the OC Register?

I recently gave the OC Register grief because The OC Register Says California had no real estate bubble. It's a legitimate beef when a supposedly impartial newspaper starts permitting realtors to revise history with self-serving bullshit.

I probably would have overlooked that silly article in the past. I was once on the cover of the OC Register. I think much of their reporting is very good, particularly Marilyn Kalfus who I think does outstanding work.

Did you see their recent blogger anniversary series?

I wasn't noteworthy enough to make their list. ~~ sniffle, sniffle ~~ Perhaps they forgot about me? Their readers haven't. Note September 2010 when IHB stood atop the list.

I don't know how compete.com does their traffic counts, so I can't comment on the accuracy of their data.

How is the IHB unique?

When I started writing for the IHB in February of 2007, I had a simple message: don't buy, prices are going to crash. It was an important news story to a population gripped with the insanity of a financial mania. The message stood out, and the blog readership quickly grew.

I put a great deal of time and effort into writing a series of analysis posts which became the basis for my book, The Great Housing Bubble. It was my the equivalent of a doctoral thesis in real estate economics. My credibility on real estate is evidenced by the book, the daily writing here, and the fact that I predicted a market decline, and explained why it was going to happen. I could have been lucky.

in order to stay relevant and change with the times, I need to provide you a compelling reason to come back. I hope you enjoy my writing and my cartoons, but coming back for a good laugh isn't all I have to contribute. With this new data, I can provide a unique view into the workings of our local housing market.

Data analysis is core strength

I have some skill in data analysis, and with the collective wisdom of the blog that shines through the astute observations, we will come up with some compelling ways to look at data. Many of the silly arguments that dust up in the comments can be put to rest with data.

For instance, are heavy-cash buyers supporting house prices in Irvine? With data, we can answer this question. I am getting the median home price and the median loan amount history back to 1988. We will be able to trace exactly how down payments have fluctuated over time. We can correlate changes in the down payment with changes in price. If down payments go up when prices go down, then heavy cash buyers are indeed keeping prices up.

I have no idea what the truth is. I haven't looked at the data. This tempest in a teapot has been whirling in the comments for months. Wouldn't it be great to know the truth?

How many homes did the Irvine Company really sell?

Do you remember the recent news article where the Irvine Company claimed they sold 1,200 homes? Well, they didn't actually sell that many homes, they "signed 1,234 buyers" whatever that means. According to DataQuick, there were 643 new homes sold in Irvine in 2010.

The blue line above is the raw data, and the red line is the trailing twelve months as a moving average. The smoothing effect of the moving average reveals the underlying trends in new home sales.

I didn't realize they sold so few new homes after the 2001 recession. The bubble rally years of 2002-2004 were not as lucrative for new home sales as I would have thought. It looks like late 2004 through 2005 was a very profitable period for them. They sold a lot of houses at peak prices. From July 2004 to December 2006, they sold 2,455 homes.

The utter collapse of sales in 2008 is apparent. After recording two sales in January of 2009, there were zero sales in February and March of that year. In all of 2009, there were 90 new homes sold in Irvine. The average since 1988 is 52.5 homes per month.

The good news is that the trend is decidedly up. It's hard to go below zero.

What data is coming?

That is probably a follow-up post all to itself. I am getting data down to the zip code level for most items. For the MLS data, we are grouping builder codes into neighborhoods to overcome the clumsy village codes in the local MLS. Knowing the median price in Northwood is not as useful as seeing the difference between Northwood Pointe, Northwood I and Northwood II. Granularity of data is important for it to be meaningful.

I have closed sales, asking prices, rents, sizes, ages, and a number of other data points all broken down by zip code, village, and neighborhood. We will be able to identify high-equity neighborhoods and high-debt neighborhoods. We will be able to rank villages and neighborhoods desirability as measured by median and $/SF for both resales and rentals. Which do you think is more desirable, Turtle Rock or Turtle Ridge? The numbers will tell us.

Where is the data coming from?

I am getting data from three sources:

MLS listings and transactions raw data
Dataquick
Various public sources

No NAr nonsense data or projections. I am using raw MLS data which is subject to its own errors. The information I am getting from Dataquick is one level removed from the raw data, but Dataquick's reputation for accuracy is good, certainly better than the NAr.

I also discovered a great source of public data at the St Louis Fed. They call the system FRED for Federal Reserve Economic Data. They go to the various government agencies, compile their data, and put it in a consistent format so data analysts like me can use it. If you are in to data, this site is a treasure.

How will Shevy get involved?

I didn't handle the announcement of the brokerage well. I thought the shock value would be interesting and positive. I was wrong. Unfortunately, that put Shevy in a difficult circumstance to share is perspective on the market. We are going to change that.

Shevy has been working daily with IHB clients since 2009. Our sidebar has testimonials from IHB clients on the quality of his work, and his sales volumes have been fantastic. In other words, he has satisfied a lot of IHB clients.

We have asked Shevy to start writing posts we will air on Sundays. He may not write every Sunday, but he will share his experiences working with clients. It's a perspective on the market I don't have.

Do you like the Shevy graphic? I was inspired by the common interpretation of Raphael's The School of Athens: "these two central figures gesture along different dimensions: Plato vertically, upward along the picture-plane, into the beautiful vault above; Aristotle on the horizontal plane at right-angles to the picture-plane (hence in strong foreshortening), initiating a powerful flow of space toward viewers. It is popularly thought that their gestures indicate central aspects of their philosophies, Plato's his Theory of Forms, Aristotle's his empiricist views, with an emphasis on concrete particulars."

i believe Shevy will contribute much to the IHB conversation.

That Mille Fleurs you're waiting for has a squatter in it

The myth of Irvine's high end immunity continues to prove wrong. The reality of squatting to boost prices is inescapable.

Today's featured property isn't supposed to exist. All the heavy-cash buyers with stable finances are allegedly holding all of Irvine's prime properties. Apparently, there are still a few posers out there.

This property was purchased on 5/3/2005 for $1,247,000. The owners used a $935,200 first mortgage, a $186,750 second mortgage, and a $125,050 down payment. I thought this would be a tale of woe from a peak buyer. Nope. These owners got some HELOC booty.

On 2/6/2007 they refinanced with a $1,218,750 first mortgage and a $225,000 HELOC. The total property debt is $1,473,750, and they managed to extract $351,800 -- unless you don't believe they maxed out the HELOC. In that case, they only got out $126,800, which recoups their down payment.

They quit paying about two years ago.

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 02/11/2011
Document Type: Notice of Sale

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 12/18/2009
Document Type: Notice of Sale

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 09/17/2009
Document Type: Notice of Default

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 09/17/2009
Document Type: Notice of Rescission

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 07/07/2009
Document Type: Notice of Default

During the next recession, if I fall on hard times, I hope I am allowed to squat in a Mille Fleurs. As for the buyer waiting to pay for the house, too bad.

Irvine House Address ... 51 STOWE Irvine, CA 92620

Resale House Price ...... $949,900

House Purchase Price … $1,247,000
House Purchase Date .... 5/3/2005

Net Gain (Loss) .......... ($354,094)
Percent Change .......... -28.4%
Annual Appreciation … -4.5%

Cost of House Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$949,900 .......... Asking Price
$189,980 .......... 20% Down Conventional
4.79% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$759,920 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$192,011 .......... Income Requirement

$3,982 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$823 .......... Property Tax
$450 .......... Special Taxes and Levies (Mello Roos)
$237 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$105 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$5,598 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$964 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$949 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$347 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$119 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$4,151 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$9,499 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$9,499 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$7,599 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$189,980 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$216,577 .......... Total Cash Costs
$63,600 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$280,177 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 51 STOWE Irvine, CA 92620
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beds: 5
Baths: 3
Sq. Ft.: 3650
$260/SF
Lot Size: 5,339 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Residential, Single Family
Style: Two Level, Contemporary
Year Built: 2005
Community: Woodbury
County: Orange
MLS#: P775061
Source: SoCalMLS
Status: Active
On Redfin: 1 day
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
New Listing (24 hours)
This elegant Mediterranean style 5bd 4bth home is located in the prestigious Woodbury Community in Irvine near 405 & 5 fwys. Mille Fleurs Plan 1 (Giverny) built by Standard Pacific homes offers plenty of upgrades that include ADT alarm system, corian countertops, built-in BBQ & fireplace, Koi pond, and many more ammenities. Truly resort style living. Hurry, wont last!!!

Top Box Design

2011-03-26T07:35:00.000-07:00

Top Box Design

L.B. Landry High School in New Orleans, United States
Houston Ballet Center for Dance in Houston, United States
Priory Church in Wales Primary School in Brecon, United Kingdom
Forest School, Major overhaul for school in Riga, Latvia
Polish and Classical Philology Faculty Library of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland

L.B. Landry High School in New Orleans, United States

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:58 PM PDT

Designed by Eskew+Dumez+Ripple, L.B. Landry High School is located in New Orleans, United States. This new high school for the Louisiana Department of Education Recovery School District was part of a post-Katrina ‘quick start’ construction program to accelerate the replacement of five damaged schools within an extremely aggressive timeline (6 months for design and 20 [...]

Houston Ballet Center for Dance in Houston, United States

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:47 PM PDT

Houston Ballet Center for Dance that located in Houston, United States, was designed by Gensler. Houston Ballet's Center for Dance is a visual reminder of Houston's commitment to the performing arts and a living billboard for dance. Gensler's design draws inspiration from a proscenium stage, showcasing classes and rehearsals through large windows into double-height-volume rehearsal [...]

Priory Church in Wales Primary School in Brecon, United Kingdom

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:38 PM PDT

Located in Brecon, United Kingdom, Brecon, United Kingdom was designed by Petersen Williams LLP. The requirement of the Governors for their new school was that it would provide; 'children of the next generation and of the locality, with a school which encapsulates all that is expected to ensure a fitting environment for education in the [...]

Forest School, Major overhaul for school in Riga, Latvia

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:32 PM PDT

Designed by Arhitektu birojs Forma , SIA, Forest School is located in Riga, Latvia. Reconstructing and adding new buildings to schools can be a challenging project type, but the creative expression of the designer is often severely limited by strict program requirements and financial limitations of a municipal client. Nonetheless, the architects efforts succeed in [...]

Polish and Classical Philology Faculty Library of Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan, Poland

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:25 PM PDT

The Polish and Classical Philology Faculty Library of Adam Mickiewicz University designed by APA Jacek Bulat is located in Poznan, Poland. The architects’ aim was to design of a functional and modern building, restrained in form and yet adjusted to the historical function and context. The have have concentrated on the future building users – [...]

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

2011-03-25T15:14:00.001-07:00

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

Dunvegan Residence : Unique Triangle Facade House by Hariripontarini

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:52 AM PDT

Designing the unique residence need great capability and creativity idea for the best result and different then others. Dunvegan Residence : Unique Triangle Facade House by the Hariripontarini in Toronto Canada is the example. When looking this house, the triangle facade house to be the center interest of the whole design. He is very smart and creative to combine the house facade, interior and the exterior surrounding it so that produce the great result of the modern home design and interior. Entering the vestibule, stairs lead through a library to second floor bedrooms and a third floor studio with an adjoining outdoor terrace. Cherry wood bookshelves, with accents in stainless steel are knit into the stairs. The interior aims to provide a comfortable and practical atmosphere for a modern family. Front and rear courtyards are connected by a gallery wall, running through the dining and sunken living room. The exterior palette of rubble stone, copper detailing, stucco and cedar shingles and siding knit the house seamlessly with its neighbours.

Ridge House : House with Dry Creek Walley in Sonoma County, CA

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 07:48 AM PDT

Here, CARY BERNSTEIN ARCHITECT proudly designed the Ridge House : House with Dry Creek Walley in Sonoma County, CA. This house located at the remote area and surrounded by the forest making the house so fresh, quite and eco friendly. All room of this house designed with open concept and reinforcing the primary relationship to the landscape. A large deck and continuous exterior walkways create outdoor rooms and circulation paths which expand the experience of the interior. This house designed adjusted the modern of style live people which everything modern people wanted available such as :a new pool, spa, outdoor shower, olive orchard and bocce ball court. If You want to find the quite, relax and lonely, this modern creek house design suitable to stay after a whole day working.

This Photographer's Life

2011-03-25T09:49:00.000-07:00

This Photographer's Life

Ad Space Giveaway in “The Beacham Series” worth $750

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 07:01 AM PDT

It’s that time again! “The Beacham Series” magazine is in full production mode for our Spring 2011 issue, which promises to be the best ever! “The Beacham Series”...

This Photographers Life (Architecture + Interior Design)

Home Architectural Design

2011-03-25T09:30:00.001-07:00

Home Architectural Design

Tropical Villa Design – Villa Allegra by Oppenheim Architecture + Design

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 11:44 PM PDT

The Villa Allegra was designed by Oppenheim as perfect summer getaway which offers exoticism and shelter from tropical climate. Multiple rooms, both interior and exterior, have been added to this two-storey house and minimal alterations were made to the existing structure. The house is entered via large volume where a reflecting pool and oculus align [...]

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Top Box Design

2011-03-25T07:46:00.001-07:00

Top Box Design

Fitzroy High School in Melbourne, Australia
Barwon Health Teaching, Training and Research Facility (TTR) in Geelong, Australia
The Cairns Institute – James Cook University in Cairns, Australia
Robina Community Performing Arts Centre in Robina, Australia
Advanced Engineering Building in Brisbane, Australia

Fitzroy High School in Melbourne, Australia

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:55 PM PDT

Designed by McBride Charles Ryan, Fitzroy High School is located in Melbourne, Australia. To the occupier the building was shaped from the interior out; an initial block of program was pushed and pulled to create a series of peninsulas within the large learning studios. The intent was to create spaces within spaces, studios that could operate [...]

Barwon Health Teaching, Training and Research Facility (TTR) in Geelong, Australia

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:50 PM PDT

Barwon Health Teaching, Training and Research Facility (TTR) designed by Billard Leece Partnership is located in Geelong, Australia. Deakin University and Barwon Health's TTR creates an integrated education and research precinct on the site of Geelong Hospital in Victoria's second largest and fastest growing city. Optimising the natural gradient of the site, the building provides [...]

The Cairns Institute – James Cook University in Cairns, Australia

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:38 PM PDT

The Cairns Institute – James Cook University that located in Cairns, Australia, was designed by Woods Bagot. The aim of this project was to put The Cairns Institute and James Cook University (JCU) on the international stage to attract post-graduate students from around the globe and to enable the university to draw a high calibre [...]

Robina Community Performing Arts Centre in Robina, Australia

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:25 PM PDT

Designed by Lightwave Architectural, Robina Community Performing Arts Centre is located in Robina, Australia. Robina CPAC acts as a precedent in what can be achieved in terms of low budgets and high-quality design. It provides multi-purpose areas for community hire and school use for training, sports, performance and meeting areas as well as a purpose [...]

Advanced Engineering Building in Brisbane, Australia

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:13 PM PDT

The Advanced Engineering Building designed by HASSELL is located in Brisbane, Australia. The Advanced Engineering Building (AEB) at the University of Queensland will be a state-of-the-art engineering education building with flexible teaching and learning spaces. The multi-purpose building will have the appropriate mix of learning, workplace and social areas. The building also acts as a 'live [...]

Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-25T07:31:00.001-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

Time to clear shadow inventory grossly understated

Posted: 25 Mar 2011 03:31 AM PDT

NAr measures shadow inventory and reports it on the same months-of-supply metric. What about the other homes? Don't they count?

Irvine Home Address ... 1 TRADITION Pl Irvine, CA 92602
Resale Home Price ...... $595,000

You never listen to the voices inside
They fill your ears as you run to a place to hide
You're never sure if the illusion is real
You pinch yourself but the mem'ries are all you feel
Can you break away from your alibis
Can you make a play will you meet me in the dark...

Billy Squire -- in The Dark

The NAr and lenders both want to convince potential buyers a problem exists with shadow inventory. They want to keep both this inventor and buyers in the dark.

Shadow inventory rocked by foreclosure snafu

by CHRISTINE RICCIARDI -- Monday, March 21st, 2011, 5:08 pm

Foreclosure time lines and an abundance of distressed home sales are causing wide fluctuations in shadow inventory across the country.

The National Association of Realtors released state-by-state data on shadow inventory Monday, calculating the data in relation to distressed property sales. On the whole, Capital Economics estimates there are 5.3 million homes in limbo between foreclosure and the sales market. Standard & Poor's states it could take up to 49 months to clear the shadow inventory books. However, the NAR numbers indicate which states are in better shape to unload these properties based on the respective proportion of distressed sales.

Florida holds the largest shadow inventory across the U.S., with more than 441,000 residential properties caught between foreclosure and the sales market, according to NAR. California is a far second with almost 228,000 residential properties constituting the shadow inventory. Shadow inventory properties are sold as distressed sales.

NAR attributed growing shadow inventories to the ramifications of recent disruptions to foreclosure time lines. Some states are having more trouble than others in moving these properties into foreclosure. For example, a mortgage in Florida is delinquent 638 days on average, the second longest time line in the country. The only state that tops that is New York where the average loan is delinquent 644 days before its cleared through the foreclosure process. New York currently holds the fourth largest shadow inventory of 107,500, according to NAR.

NAR reported that the length of the foreclosure process in Florida and California jumped 156% and 157%, respectively, since 2008.

Still, two states commonly seen as poster children for the foreclosure and housing crisis are faring much better in terms of clearing out shadow inventory. Nevada and Arizona both rank in the top 26 states with the largest shadow inventory. However, among those 26 states, they rank 11th (Arizona) and 16th (Nevada) for their level of shadow inventory, behind many states that are supposed to be in recovery, including Texas.

I am not surprised Nevada is not in the top 10 for shadow inventory. Lenders are processing foreclosures there. Wherever they decided to allow people to squat -- like California -- shadow inventory dominates the landscape.

"This is largely due to their shadow inventory moving somewhat faster through the pipelines and comprising larger share of existing sales," NAR said. Distressed sales comprised 69% of existing home sales in Nevada in the fourth quarter of 2010 and 55% in Arizona. (Full national stats available by clicking chart below.)

NAR reported early Monday that distressed sales nationwide increased to 39% of all existing purchase transactions in February. The median sale price is hurt by this type of sale, as well as the number of cash transactions that took during the month. The median sale fell 5.2% compared to one year ago to $156,000, NAR said.

Notice the NAr buries that little tidbit at the end of their press release. Perhaps they figured people wouldn't notice prices are falling again.

NAR determined it will take 29 months to clear shadow inventory in Florida, 11 months to clear in California, 34 months to clear in New York, seven months to clear in Nevada and nine months to clear in Arizona.

In Wyoming, the state with the smallest shadow inventory, it will take 13 months to clear the 1,837 homes in limbo. Nevada ties Mississippi for the shortest time frame to clear the shadow inventory at seven months. New Jersey has the longest time line at 51 months, according to NAR.

Write to Christine Ricciardi.

Follow her on Twitter @HWnewbieCR.

Why I believe the NAr is wrong

When the NAr calculates the months of inventory, they divide total inventory by the monthly sales rate to compute the number of months it would take to clear the existing inventory if no new properties were added. They use the same methodology to measure the months of inventory of shadow inventory. This measure is supposed to say something about how long the shadow inventory problem will be with us, but in typical NAr style, they rely on this measure to downplay the real seriousness of the problem.

In the real world, there are only so many buyers, and even if lenders put every distressed property on the market at once, prices could not be lowered enough to absorb that much supply. Lenders must slowly release this inventory or prices crash. Further, in the real world, when the composition of sales is more than 40% distressed properties, prices also fall. Therefore, lenders must manage the flow of properties to be no more than 40% of sales to keep prices stable.

When the total market inventory is around six months, lenders cannot add to total inventory without prices going down. The distressed properties become an additional 40% which pushes months of inventory to double digits where it is now. It has remained elevated for the last four years.

Realistically, shadow inventory can only be liquidated at 40% of the monthly sales rate. If you take the NAr estimate of 11 months of shadow inventory in California -- which is a joke -- and divide it by 40%, and the months of inventory balloons to 27.5.

The NAr measure of shadow inventory months of supply understates reality by 150%. The Standard and Poor's estimate of 49 months nationally is far more realistic. Four years from now, we will begin liquidating the long tail of distress that will follow this crisis into the later half of this decade.

Bankers allow each other to squat

One of the most infuriating facts about shadow inventory is its epicenter: the New York MSA. Boneheads in New York think their market is immune as it is one of the few where properties still routinely trade at peak prices. Little do they know that this price stability is an illusion created by shadow inventory.

Shadow inventory to push foreclosures to new heights

by JACOB GAFFNEY -- Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011, 3:57 pm

"The shadow inventory in the New York MSA will take the longest to clear — 130 months as of fourth-quarter 2010. That is at least twice as long as it will take in any of the other top 20 MSAs and 2.7 times the average time to clear for the U.S. as a whole," the S&P report states. "This is primarily due to very low liquidation rates in New York."

What the hell is this? Very low liquidation rates? Why is that? Could it be that bankers don't want to hurt their own property values? What other reason could there be? Assholes.

The previous Ponzis

Many Ponzis from the housing bubble left their cash cows to the bagholder to pay off. The previous owners of this property got the better end of the deal.

The bought the property on 4/16/1999 for 265,500. The used a $212,200 first mortgage and a $53,300 down payment.
On 3/21/2001 they obtained a stand-alone second for $100,000. I hope they didn't spend it all in one place.
On 3/20/2002 they went in for their annual cash infusion. The refinanced the first mortgage for $285,000 and added a stand-alone second for $57,000.
On 6/3/2003 the refinanced with a $300,000 first mortgage and a $80,000 HELOC.
On 3/19/2004 they refinanced the $300,000 first mortgage.
On 7/29/2004 they refinanced with a $333,700 first mortgage.
On 3/4/2005 they refinanced with a $380,000 first mortgage. Then it gets weird.
On 6/8/2005 they refinanced with a $380,000 first mortgage.
On 7/13/2005 they refinanced with a $380,000 first mortgage.
On 10/20/2005 they refinanced with a $380,000 first mortgage.
On 2/16/2006 they refinanced with a $380,000 first mortgage. I wonder if one of the owners was a mortgage broker churning their own mortgage for fees? I have never seen four refinances for the same amount before.
Total mortgage equity withdrawal was $167,800.

After riding the equity wave for six years, they sell to the current dreamers for $525,000 on 12/18/2007.

The current dreamers

With aggregate prices in Irvine below $330/SF and falling, how do these owners realistically expect to get $397/SF for a corner lot at a busy intersection?

Based on when these people bought -- the market dropped more than 10% in 2008 -- they will be lucky to get near their asking price.

Perhaps that special buyer will come along who appreciates the unique attributes of this tract home and offers more than its asking price. ~~ giggles ~~

Irvine Home Address ... 1 TRADITION Pl Irvine, CA 92602

Resale Home Price ... $595,000

Home Purchase Price … $525,000
Home Purchase Date .... 12/18/2007

Net Gain (Loss) .......... $34,300
Percent Change .......... 6.5%
Annual Appreciation … 3.8%

Cost of Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$595,000 .......... Asking Price
$119,000 .......... 20% Down Conventional
4.79% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$476,000 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$120,272 .......... Income Requirement

$2,495 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$516 .......... Property Tax
$125 .......... Special Taxes and Levies (Mello Roos)
$99 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$0 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$3,234 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$423 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$594 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$218 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$99 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$2,534 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$5,950 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$5,950 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$4,760 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$119,000 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$135,660 .......... Total Cash Costs
$36,900 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$172,560 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 1 TRADITION Pl Irvine, CA 92602
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beds: 3
Baths: 3
Sq. Ft.: 1500
$397/SF
Lot Size: 5,162 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Residential, Single Family
Style: Two Level, Other
Year Built: 1999
Community: West Irvine
County: Orange
MLS#: S652679
Source: SoCalMLS
Status: Active
On Redfin: 1 day
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
UPGRADED Detached 3 bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms home that is strategically located close to award-winning Myford Elementary & Pioneer Middle School. Cul-De-Sac location. Designer upgrades include elegant hardwood, tile flooring, custom carpet, and recess lightings. Cozy & warm living/family room with a fireplace. Spacious kitchen features 5-burner cooktop range, stainless steel appliances, oak cabinetry, reverse osmosis, instant hot water and granite countertop. A huge master suite with walk-in closet that is big enough to be a bedroom, dual vanities and a shower in the master bathroom. Powder room with pedestal sink, and convenient upstairs laundry. Hardscaped backyard, great for entertaining families & friends. NEW insulated garage door, NEW faucets, NEW mirrors in the upstairs bathrooms. A/C & heating unit were recently serviced. NO HOA & LOW Mello Roos (approx. $1,500/ yr)

The Real Estate Bloggers

2011-03-25T04:06:00.001-07:00

The Real Estate Bloggers

Top 10 Cities Losing Population Since 2000 in the United States

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 06:36 AM PDT

To watch majestic cities decline is never fun. New Orleans took it’s hit with the natural devastation of Hurricane Katrina and can come back, but what will happen to great cities like Detroit that are crumbling under the mismanagement of auto executives and union representatives?

The rust belt cities have taken a huge hit during the last decade as industry leaves and people flee for better opportunities. The crashing of cities like Cleveland and Cincinnati have slid under the radar of Detroit’s epic fall. Even mighty Chicago has lost 200,000 residents.

What is even worse for these cities is they all have huge public works infrastructures that are driving taxes even higher as their populace flees. Most of the cities are highly unionized in both the public and private sector so there is very little flexibility to improvise and improve their lot.

Instead, they watch their mobile, productive citizens flee and are left trying to keep the cities moving forward.

What mayor will be the next Ozymandias? (Poem below)

Top 10 Cities Losing Population Since 2000 in the United States

City             2010        +/- Since 2000     % Change  New Orleans     343,829         -140,845        -29.1 Detroit         713,777         -237,493        -25.0 Cleveland       396,815         -81,588         -17.1 Cincinnati      296,943         -34,342         -10.4 Pittsburgh      305,704         -28,859         -08.6 Toledo          287,208         -26,411         -08.4 St. Louis       319,294         -28,895         -08.3 Chicago         2,695,598       -200,418        -06.9 Baltimore       620,961         -30,193         -04.6 Santa Ana`      324,528         -13,449         -04.0

Via US Census bureau via the WJS

OZYMANDIAS

I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear:
“My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.

Thanks for reading this post. If you would like to see more articles like this, please come visit The Real Estate Bloggers. where it was originally published.

Top 10 Cities Losing Population Since 2000 in the United States

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Home Architectural Design

2011-03-24T09:34:00.001-07:00

Home Architectural Design

Art Gallery House – Prahran House by Nervegna Reed + PH Architects

Posted: 24 Mar 2011 06:27 AM PDT

The client, an Art Gallery director, asked for a contemporary home on a narrow inner city allotment. The house was to have two bedrooms plus an extra study that could be used for visiting artists to stay in, and was also to include a private subterranean gallery. The house extends over 3 levels; the entry [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Top Box Design

2011-03-24T07:46:00.000-07:00

Top Box Design

Kirkeparken High School in Moss, Norway
Creative Media Centre – City University of Hong Kong in Hong Kong
MDIS Residences @ Stirling in Singapore
Curtin Stadium, Timelessness and flexibility in Perth, Australia
The University of Queensland School of Veterinary Science in Gatton, Australia

Kirkeparken High School in Moss, Norway

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 09:15 PM PDT

The Kirkeparken High School designed by LINK arkitektur AS is located in Moss, Norway. The school covers an area of 22,000 sq m and is centrally located right next to the oldest church in the district dating back to 1860. The school is home to several multipurpose halls for culture and arts, a picture gallery, [...]

Creative Media Centre – City University of Hong Kong in Hong Kong

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 09:11 PM PDT

The Creative Media Centre for the City University of Hong Kong that located in Hong Kong, was designed by Leigh & Orange Limited. Provides facilities that make the University to the first in Asia to offer the highest level of education and training in the creative media fields. The Centre will house the Centre for [...]

MDIS Residences @ Stirling in Singapore

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 09:05 PM PDT

Located in Singapore, MDIS Residences @ Stirling was designed by ONG&ONG Pte Ltd. The hostel wings are joined by community link-bridges, allowing for student interaction. The skyrise garden adopts a contemporary garden setting to create an open, user-friendly environment for student activities. The floor plans are designed with a modular structural grid, and the various [...]

Curtin Stadium, Timelessness and flexibility in Perth, Australia

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 08:59 PM PDT

Designed by CHRISTOU Design Group, Curtin Stadium, Timelessness and flexibility is located in Perth, Australia is an elegant solution for a multipurpose sport, recreation, examination and events space, a distilled form that clearly expresses a variety of functions. Bold, solid, transparent north-south layers and a luminous sports hall creates create a strong landmark for the [...]

The University of Queensland School of Veterinary Science in Gatton, Australia

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 08:53 PM PDT

The University of Queensland School of Veterinary Science designed by Architectus is located in Gatton, Australia. The Architectus project for the University of Queensland‚Äôs School of Veterinary Science required the consolidation of the University‚Äôs animal research groups from UQ‚Äôs main campus in the Brisbane, Australia suburb of St. Lucia to its rural Gatton campus, 90km [...]

Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-24T07:15:00.000-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

Why do people buy homes? Why shouldn’t they?

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 09:30 PM PDT

The deflating housing bubble has done little to curb American's enthusiasm for owning real estate. However, the collapse has provided people sound reasons for not buying a house.

Irvine Home Address ... 8 WHITECLOUD Irvine, CA 92614
Resale Home Price ...... $700,000

Hey it’s good to be back home again - you know it is
Sometimes this old farm feels like a long-lost friend
Hey, it’s good to be back home again
I said hey it’s good to be back home again

John Denver -- Back Home Again

The need for shelter is basic as is the desire for community. In the United States, this translates into a desire to take on a very large mortgage to buy real estate. These basic human emotions drive much of the activity in real estate markets.

Most people buy because it is the right time for them. Their career, age, family circumstances all come together to push people toward ownership at different times. Some are fortunate and buy at the bottom of the real estate cycle. Some are not so fortunate and buy at the peak.

The most damaging aspect of our current system is the price volatility. It capriciously rewards some and destroys others. Home price volatility creates a culture of Ponzi borrowing and dependency. The goal of government policy should be price stability, but lately it seems their goal is price maximization.

Why Some Americans Will Always Buy

Seven Reasons We're Buying and Four Reasons We're Not

By Julia Edwards and Edmund L. Andrews
Wednesday, March 23, 2011 -- 12:28 p.m.

Although the housing bubble and bust may have shattered notions that home prices have nowhere to go but up, Americans haven’t lost their love for owning a home. In the latest Allstate/National JournalHeartland Monitor poll, homeownership ranked second, just behind raising a family, in people’s definition of the American Dream. Despite new home sales' drop to a record low, about four-fifths of respondents said that owning a home is still a better financial decision than renting, and nearly nine in 10 homeowners say would buy their home again.

Those results also underscore the extent to which Americans see buying a home as a deeply personal decision. It seems the decision to buy a home is made from the heart, while the decision to rent comes from the wallet.

That is a great way to look at the situation. Most people want to buy and own. Those who look rationally at the costs often chose to rent, not because it's the most emotionally pleasing choice, but because it's the most financially sound decision. Those who chose to rent recognize that being house poor is its own form of unhappiness that so takes away from the joy of ownership as to make it undesirable.

We reveal the top seven reasons why Americans are still drawn to owning a home, and the four reasons that make them hesitant to buy, according to the Heartland Monitor poll.

Reason to Buy No. 7: Getting a tax deduction

Only 2 percent said they considered the tax deduction for homeowner’s a reason to buy a home. That number may come as a shock to members of the Obama administration, who designed the first-time homebuyer tax credit, now expired, as an incentive to bring more buyers to market.

That is a surprisingly low number. Nationally, only about a third of home owning taxpayers take the home mortgage interest deduction, but the proportion in Irvine will be much higher. For high wage earners borrowing upwards of a million dollars, the tax deduction is very motivating.

Reason to Buy No. 6: Following in your parents’ footsteps

Following the path of mom and dad tied with a tax deduction among participants. Only 2 percent said they considered it important to own a home because they had grown up in a house.

I suspect this number is so low because people are unaware of their true motivations. So much of our behavior is subconscious, and the familiarity of house and home provides a psychological anchoring to real estate that runs very deep.

Reason to Buy No. 5: Being part of a neighborhood and community

Putting down roots in a community was a reason to buy a home among 6 percent of participants.

This is another area where Irvine is a special subset of buyers. Many people chose master planned communities like Irvine because they want neighborhood involvement. The number may only represent 6% of America, but it is much higher among readers of this blog.

Reason to Buy No. 4: Acquiring an asset you can pass along

The security that used to come with owning a tangible property may have faded, but 9 percent of participants said they still consider it a reason to buy a home.

Our society has become so mobile that people have come to recognize the impermanence of all living arrangements. We no longer buy family homes and stay there through our passing.

Personally, I plan to acquire several investment homes to pass on to my son. I guess I am one of the 9 percent.

Reason to Buy No. 3: Making a good, long-term investment

Although foreclosure rates may tell us otherwise, 13 percent still believed that owning a home is a good, long-term investment.

The question is a bit vague and misleading. All the terms are up for interpretation: What is good? What is long-term? And what is investment? I believe a good long-term investment is an income property with an 8% cap rate in today's market. Some believe a good long-term investment is a speculative flip in the North Korea towers. Over the very long term, real estate values rise in nominal dollars along with inflation. Is that good?

Reason to Buy No. 2: Building equity rather than paying rent

Building equity was the strongest of all financial reasons to own a home. Twenty-six percent of participants said they would own a home to build credit through a mortgage payment rather than earning less credit through paying rent.

The reason people want to own the home is to obtain appreciation. This nonsense about paying down a mortgage is not what people really think. No California Ponzi believes they have to reduce the balance of their mortgage. Mortgages are made to get larger.

realtors like to spin this as "throwing money away on rent." Of course, they ignore the fact that they are throwing away much more money renting the bank's money, but the tax deduction makes it all okay, right?

Reason to Buy No. 1: Having a place to raise a family

An overwhelming 40 percent said that raising a family in a place of their own was the ultimate factor in their decision to buy. The housing market may rise and fall, but the value of the home to the American family seems set in stone.

People have come to equate ownership with stability. Unfortunately, our concept of ownership has been perverted into money rentership. Ownership with a huge mortgage is tenuous compared to renting. Capricious landlords evicting good tenants are much less common than robo-signing lenders evicting delinquent borrowers.

The timeless and the new

The reasons listed above are timeless. No matter when an article like this is written, the above reasons will be on it, and they will be just as compelling to buyers. The new are the reasons not to buy. These are a direct response to the collapsing housing bubble.

Reason Not to Buy No. 4: Entering into many years of debt

The bursting of the bubble and the horror stories that followed made 13 percent of respondents hesitant to agree to pay the high price of a home.

Five years ago, nobody cared about debt levels.

Reason Not to Buy No. 3: Losing the flexibility to move if you need to find a new job

In our mobile society and fickle job market, 21 percent said they would be hesitant to lock into a place that they may not be able to sell should they have to move to take a job.

Five years ago, everyone assumed you would simply sell your house for a huge profit if you needed to move.

Reason Not to Buy No. 2: Risking you home losing value if real-estate prices drop

“Price Reduced” signs cropping up in the yards of neighbors desperate to sell led 21 percent to back away from buying a home that could sell for less than the price they paid for it.

Five years ago, with exception of a few of us crazy bloggers, very few people believed prices could go down.

Reason Not to Buy No. 1: Monthly mortgage payments are too high

As opposed to the familial emotions that made 40 percent lean toward homeownership, the harsh realities of high monthly mortgage payments was the ultimate reason that 40 percent of participants said they would not buy a home.

The last reason is why house prices still need to come down. Despite the low interest rates, the cost of ownership is still too high in many markets.

What's it like to be immobile?

Today's featured property is an example of reasons number 3 above. People who buy now, or who bought since 2009, are facing the problem of a flat or declining market. When prices don't go up, people have to pay the sales commissions out of their down payment. That was their money rather than the market's. When free money from the appreciation fairies doesn't materialize, owners generally price their properties to accomplish three things:

Provide negotiating room to lower price,
Pay the realtor, and
Get their down payment money back.

Hence, we see properties priced just over breakeven like today's.

I want every buyer looking today and over the next two or three years to be forewarned that they could find themselves in this situation. And reinforcing risk #2 -- dropping prices -- it could even be worse.

Imagine this is your house. What would you do?

Irvine Home Address ... 8 WHITECLOUD Irvine, CA 92614

Resale Home Price ... $700,000

Home Purchase Price … $660,000
Home Purchase Date .... 3/20/09

Net Gain (Loss) .......... $(2,000)
Percent Change .......... -0.3%
Annual Appreciation … 2.8%

Cost of Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$700,000 .......... Asking Price
$140,000 .......... 20% Down Conventional
4.82% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$560,000 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$141,986 .......... Income Requirement

$2,945 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$607 .......... Property Tax
$0 .......... Special Taxes and Levies (Mello Roos)
$117 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$82 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$3,750 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$714 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$696 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$258 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$117 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$2,716 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$7,000 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$7,000 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$5,600 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$140,000 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$159,600 .......... Total Cash Costs
$41,600 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$201,200 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 8 WHITECLOUD Irvine, CA 92614
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beds: 4
Baths: 2
Sq. Ft.: 1860
$376/SF
Lot Size: 1 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Residential, Single Family
Style: Two Level, Cape Cod
Year Built: 1980
Community: Woodbridge
County: Orange
MLS#: S652539
Source: SoCalMLS
Status: Active
On Redfin: 1 day
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Location, Location! One block from the Lake. .. 4 bedrooms, 2.5 bath single family detached home in premium 'inside the loop' location. Walk to award winning elementary and middle school or perhaps stroll to the lake and enjoy the view or activities at the South Lake Beach Club/Lagoon. Rarely on the market, this spacious Wildflower model has an open floor plan, cathedral ceilings, newer Low E dual paned vinyl windows throughout, newer roof. Separate living room with charming inglenook seating area with own fireplace, large slider window and door invites the entertainer's backyard into the room. Kitchen has updated stainless steel appliances, countertop, tile flooring and recessed lighting - separate family room flows from the kitchen with built in shelving. Bathrooms have updated glass shower doors and lighting fixtures. Closet organizers in all bedroom closets. Great location, great house, come see and make it your home.

Mission Viejo 2bd/1.25ba 1,000 sqft condo - $249,900

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 09:00 AM PDT

We've got a new Exclusive Access Property. It is a 2bd/1.25ba 1,000 square foot condo (single level, first floor entry, 1 car attached garage) in Mission Viejo priced at $249,900. If you are considering purchasing this to rent it out, the seller is interested in leasing the home back for a year. This home is not yet on MLS but will be in 7 days.

If you want to learn more about this property, please contact us:

949-769-1599
shevy@idealhomebrokers.com

The Real Estate Bloggers

2011-03-24T04:06:00.001-07:00

The Real Estate Bloggers

9.6 Percent Drop in Home Sales Nationwide in February 2011

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 04:39 AM PDT

Remember that housing recovery that was supposed to happen this spring? Well, according to the numbers released by the National Association of Realtors, it is not going to happen very soon.

The numbers reported for February, 2011 were rough to say the least. Experts were predicting a drop of 4 percent however we saw the number plummet 9.6 percent. This is the lowest number of homes sold in 9 years. The inventory of homes for sale jumped to 8.6 months.

Overall, the numbers are even rougher to the experts than they appear. The reason why, interest rates. The Federal government is doing everything it can to keep interest rates low including having the Federal Reserve buying up the debt they accumulate. This can only go on so long and then we will see a big bump of interest rates.

When that bump hits housing costs will skyrocket removing even more people from the marketplace.

This was the window the economists and the government was expecting housing to improve and help pick up the economy. It looks that that is not going to happen in the near future.

The National Association of Realtors said Monday sales fell 9.6 percent month over month to an annual rate of 4.88 million units, snapping three straight months of gains.

The percentage decline was the largest since July.

The median home price dropped 5.2 percent in February from a year earlier to $156,100, the lowest since April 2002.

“If the price declines persist, even with the job market recovery, that could hamper recovery in the housing market,” said NAR chief economist Lawrence Yun.

Compared with February last year, sales were down 2.8 percent.

Oversupply of homes and a relentless wave of foreclosures are pressuring prices, holding back recovery in the sector, whose collapse helped to tip the U.S. economy into its worst recession since the 1930s. Foreclosures and short sales, which typically occur below market value, accounted for 39 percent of transactions in February, up from 37 percent the prior month.

All-cash purchases made up a record 33 percent of transactions in February.

Thanks for reading this post. If you would like to see more articles like this, please come visit The Real Estate Bloggers. where it was originally published.

9.6 Percent Drop in Home Sales Nationwide in February 2011

Existing Home Sales Plummet in July, Down 27 Percent While analysts were expecting an annualized existing home sales level...
Pending Sales For May 2010 DOWN 30 PERCENT Robbing Peter to Pay Paul. That is the result of...
Short Sales and REO Properties A Drag on the Real Estate Market If you are wondering why we are not recovering like...

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

2011-03-23T15:13:00.001-07:00

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

Cool Teen Girl Study Desk Design and Lay Out by Pbteen

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 08:51 AM PDT

These cool teen girl study desk collection provided by Pbteen, a high reputation furniture store frome US that have already created various models for teen girls. The designs have already answered all the girls need. This study desk created have been well adjusted with suitable colors and materials. Thus, if you are inspired with one or two teen girl study desk for girls featured then you don't need the find the profesional designer interior to design teen girl study desk and arrangement. They have designed the study desk included the accesories and arrangement. Just take one of them for your girls mentioned and and you'll be surprised that a dramatic change you've never imagined will soon come to your girl room. Please visit the Pbteen for more details information.

Home Architectural Design

2011-03-23T09:42:00.001-07:00

Home Architectural Design

Natural Landscape House – Birchview House by Prototype Design Lab
Luxury Joc House by Nico van der Meulen Architects
Point Piper House by Popov Bass Architects

Natural Landscape House – Birchview House by Prototype Design Lab

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 02:16 AM PDT

The Birchview House is a project that introduces a narrated landscape into an otherwise flat site. The relationship between the interior and natural environment outside is blurred by continuous planes of floor-to-ceiling glass in key spaces, and accentuated by the movement of textures and colors from outside to inside. The elegant palette of natural materials [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Luxury Joc House by Nico van der Meulen Architects

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 01:32 AM PDT

The Joc House was designed by Nico van der Meulen on a 10 000 square foot parcel of land. Situated on the north side overlooking a game reserve, it offers breathtaking vistas and surroundings. Upon arrival, a carriage entrance serves as a safety arrier and later gives way to the large glass main door. Behind [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Point Piper House by Popov Bass Architects

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 11:06 PM PDT

The house built on beautiful but challenging site, which has irregular shape that drops vertically from the street edge and offer views to the harbors. As a response to the neighboring context, the street elevation adopts a modest, organic form and utilizes materials such as sandstone and timber in an undulating pattern. The low profile [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Top Box Design

2011-03-23T07:16:00.001-07:00

Top Box Design

La Trobe University – Shepparton Campus in Shepparton, Australia
Forbes Center for the Performing Arts in Virginia, United States
Ellacombe Foundation Unit in Torquay, United Kingdom
Research Building Complex V on The University of Kyoto Katsura Campus in Kyoto, Japan
Vaagen and Sandnes Culture Academy in Sandnes, Norway

La Trobe University – Shepparton Campus in Shepparton, Australia

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 09:22 PM PDT

Designed by Gray Puksand, La Trobe University – Shepparton Campus is located in Shepparton, Australia. Consistent with the influences of modern pedagogy the design of this building demonstrates a didactic aesthetic. The environmentally responsive form, refined surface treatment and confident use of colour display an iconic vision for collaborative learning. La Trobe University, G.O. TAFE [...]

Forbes Center for the Performing Arts in Virginia, United States

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 09:17 PM PDT

Forbes Center for the Performing Arts that located in Virginia, United States, designed by local architect Hanbury Evans Wright Vlattas + Company with Performance Architecture and Theatre Projects, the new Center replaces an antiquated multipurpose auditorium and an experimental black box theatre with a single structure that houses five venues. The highly flexible 186,000 sq [...]

Ellacombe Foundation Unit in Torquay, United Kingdom

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 09:10 PM PDT

Located in Torquay, United Kingdom, Ellacombe Foundation Unit was designed by Kay Elliott. The £0.6M Foundation Unit has been designed to create a welcoming education and assist with behavioural management for a school with a significant intake of children with emotional and social problems. It consists of a double-height, open-plan teaching area connected directly to [...]

Research Building Complex V on The University of Kyoto Katsura Campus in Kyoto, Japan

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 08:59 PM PDT

Designed by Showa Sekkei,Inc, Research Building Complex V on The University of Kyoto Katsura Campus is located in Kyoto, Japan. This facility is part of a project undertaken by the University of Kyoto, to develop new research buildings on the Katsura Campus, which is home to the Graduate School of Sciences. Research Building Complex V [...]

Vaagen and Sandnes Culture Academy in Sandnes, Norway

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 08:54 PM PDT

The Vaagen and Sandnes Culture Academy designed by LINK arkitektur AS is located in Sandnes, Norway. The project exhibits a tight simplicity that reflects the corresponding rationale informing the internal configurations. At the same time, individual building sections give a dynamic and power to the campus. ‘With its stooping and leaning extensions spreading themselves over [...]

Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-23T07:10:00.001-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

As trusted experts realtors are responsible for their bad financial advice

Posted: 23 Mar 2011 03:30 AM PDT

realtors take advantage of their status as trusted experts to manipulate buyers, and they feel no responsibility when their statements are exposed as lies.

Irvine Home Address ... 7 THORNWOOD Irvine, CA 92604
Resale Home Price ...... $549,000

You're so good at stretching the truth,
into a sugar coated lie.
Everyone takes a bite.
I have been dining with the enemy.
It was a wolf in sheep's clothing.
Now it's so clear to me.
Oh-hhh-ohh

I've had enough of your games
if you're not trembling, you'd better be
cause we're gonna be the end of you
I've had enough of your games
I'm gonna show them who you really are
And I can tell you right now, it won't be pretty

The Providence -- Wolf In Sheep's Clothing

There are some things that never made sense to me. I remember when I first read about prejudice, slavery, and segregation in grade school. I didn't understand how people could treat each other that way. It still doesn't make much sense to me.

Realtors are liars. We all know that, yet we tolerate and even encourage the behavior. Why would anyone want to hear bullshit? Apparently some people do. That doesn't make much sense to me either.

I proposed regulating the realtors in The Great Housing Bubble. Now others are calling for restrictions on realtors ability to represent financial performance.

Dr. Brent White of the University of Arizona has been featured in IHB articles on a number of occasions: Should You Walk Away from Home Debt? -- Dec 21st, 2009; Strategic Default Is Merely Collecting On Home Price Protection Insurance Sold By Lenders -- Apr 30th, 201; The Latest Lie about Strategic Default: Borrowers Are Emotional Fools -- Jun 1st, 2010. He has consistently been right about the housing bubble.

Since Dr. White's paper is so long -- and so good -- I am reprinting it with some edits for brevity with limited commentary. I am not indenting and italicizing the quoted text to make it easier for you to read. What follows is not my original writing.

Arizona Legal Studies

Discussion Paper No. 11-10

Trust, Expert Advice, and Realtor Responsibility

Brent T. White The University of Arizona James E. Rogers College of Law

March 2011

Abstract: Real estate agents benefit from the trust associated with portraying themselves as real estate experts, yet are generally not legally responsible for the advice that they give. This lack of legal responsibility is at odds with psychological propensity of individuals to trust perceived experts. It also creates a genuine moral hazard, fueled the housing market bubble and contributed to the suffering of homeowners whose real estate agents encouraged them to buy as the market began to burst. In response to this problem, this article proposes a new regulatory regime requiring real estate agents to choose between two paths: (1) accept legal liability when they negligently, recklessly or intentionally make inaccurate or misleading pronouncements about a home’s value or investment potential; or (2) embrace their role as “salespersons” and refrain from offering advice or opinions about the real estate market to their customers.

TRUST, EXPERT ADVICE, AND REALTOR RESPONSIBILITY

Introduction

As the housing crisis enters its fourth year, national home prices are down over 30%, more than 11 million homeowners are underwater on their mortgages, and over 6.5 million homeowners have already lost or given up their homes to foreclosure. Over 4 million more homes are in the pre-foreclosure process - and most economists predict that the crisis has yet to run its course.

Public discussions over the causes and responsibility for the housing crisis have focused primarily on homeowners, who are said to have bought homes that they could not afford; lenders, who are alleged to have been irresponsible in their lending practices; and the government, which is alternatively accused of meddling too much in the mortgage market or failing to regulate the market when it should have. Largely lost in this discussion has been the role of the real estate brokerage industry in both stoking the housing bubble and then delaying public recognition that the bubble had burst.

Moreover, while homeowners, lenders, and the government - and by extension taxpayers - have all taken significant losses due to the housing meltdown, those in the real estate brokerage industry have borne no financial responsibility for their role in creating the housing bubble and burst. This includes not only the National Association of Realtors (NAR), but also individual real estate agents. Indeed, even real estate agents who knowingly conveyed overly-optimistic forecasts for the housing market and intentionally gave misleading advice to their clients have escaped responsibility for the financial suffering caused by their actions in the wake of the housing collapse.While such real estate agents may be a minority, even the most unscrupulous agents escape responsibility - as courts generally treat real estate agents as mere salespersons, who are simply not responsible for their advice or opinions.

Courts’ treatment of real estate agents as mere salespersons is at odds with most agents’ self-description as professionals who have specialized expertise on the housing market and who owe a fiduciary duty to their clients. Court decisions are also detached from the concrete reality of real estate transactions in which buyers hire and trust real estate agents to guide them through the complex process of purchasing a home. Indeed, literature from the cognitive sciences suggests that, because homebuyers are generally novices making complex decisions on the basis of limited information, real estate transactions are exactly the type of transactions where individuals are most likely to hire and trust a perceived expert.

This discrepancy between homebuyers’ psychological propensity to trust perceived experts and the legal rule that a buyer may not reasonably rely upon his real estate agent’s advice, creates a genuine moral hazard in which real estate agents benefit from the trust associated with portraying themselves as real estate experts, yet avoid responsibility for the advice that they give. This discrepancy is made more problematic by the fact that many buyers are likely unaware that their real estate agents bear no legal responsibility for their advice and opinions, and buyers are thus likely to place undue reliance upon their agents’ recommendations.

In response to this problem, this article suggests two possible paths: (1) fully professionalizing the real estate agent’s role, including regulations subjecting agents to legal liability when they negligently, recklessly or intentionally make inaccurate or misleading pronouncements about a home’s value or investment potential; or (2) de-professionalizing the real estate agent’s role by requiring mandatory disclosures to buyers that real estate agents are “mere salespersons” and barring real estate agents from offering advice or opinions as to a home’s value or investment potential. But - as the housing meltdown has shown - the middle path, in which real estate agents may represent themselves as professional experts but are treated as mere salespersons when it comes to legal liability, is both untenable and unfair.

The Rhetoric of Homeowner Responsibility

Looking back to 2005 and 2006, when the United States was in the throes of the housing bubble, it seems remarkable – if not downright foolish - that so many people in overpriced markets were willing to pay hundreds of thousands more for average-sized homes than those same homes would have sold for just a few years before. Moreover, in order to do so, these home buyers were willing to take on mortgage payments that frequently required all of their disposable income and were two to three times more than they would have paid to rent a similar home. Now that home prices have come crashing down, many of these homeowners find themselves throwing all of their disposable income into homes worth much less than they owe.

Any sympathy for these homeowners aside, they made the decision to purchase their homes. Thus, the common view holds, they must bear the consequences of their actions. They should have known that paying three times more for a mortgage than they could have paid to rent the same house was simply unwise. They should have foreseen that hugely inflated home prices might decline. And they shouldn’t have been so careless in taking on the burden of a mortgage payment that required all or most of their disposable income. If they now find themselves in a terrible predicament, it’s one of their own making. They signed their mortgage knowing full well that they were taking on a huge financial responsibility – and, if they now regret that decision, they have no one to blame but themselves.

This argument has great emotional appeal, as it ties into the American ethos of personal responsibility and the angst in some quarters that Americans are increasing losing sight of this value. This American ethos holds that ultimate decision-making responsibility lies with self. Messages of personal responsibility are big winners when it comes to the public dialogue related to underwater homeowners.

Indeed, many underwater homeowners themselves believe that they should accept responsibility for their mistake in buying at the wrong time. They blame themselves for being foolish - for not seeing this coming. If they hadn’t been in such a rush to buy a home, if they had listened to that voice inside themselves telling them that housing prices seemed crazy, if they had done some more research about the state of the housing market before making such a big decision, if they had bought a more modest home and not put all their eggs in the homeownership basket, and – better yet – if they had just rented instead, they wouldn’t find themselves in this mess.

The “Buyers Agent”

Such self-recrimination aside, it’s not typically the case that homebuyers make their decisions in isolation. While the ultimate decision may be their call, potential homebuyers are subject to a variety of outside influences including family, friends, and – critically – real estate agents (aka, “realtors”). Indeed, over 79% of homebuyers work with an agent in purchasing a home. As self- described experts on the housing market, buyer’s agents serve a variety of functions including assisting buyers in finding a suitable property, preparing an offer, and negotiating with the seller. Agents also typically advise the buyer as to an appropriate price, and whether the property is a good investment.

... Buyers may worry, for example, about whether they are purchasing at the right time or making a good financial decision by investing in real estate. This was particularly likely to be the case when housing prices reached the stratosphere during the boom and a reasonable person might have questioned whether it really made sense to buy at those prices. Anxieties are also likely to be pronounced now in a declining market, when a buyer might reasonably worry that the market still has a ways to go to hit bottom. Buyers in both situations will typically turn to their real estate agents for advice and reassurance. Real estate agents not infrequently respond – both in booming and declining markets - by assuring their clients that it is a “great time to buy,” and that buying a home is a wise and safe investment. Real estate agents will also typically offer some rationale why this is the case.

Because most buyers lack the perceived knowledge or experience of their real estate agents, buyers frequently trust their agents’ opinions and representations on such matters. Indeed, the buyer has probably engaged the agent for their expertise. Many successful agents work hard to further cultivate this trust throughout the relationship, including the sense that the agent is not simply “a salesperson,” but rather “a reliable adviser who cares more about the customer than the transaction.” If the agent succeeds in engendering this trust, it can pay “back in spades” at decision time, when the buyer is called to trust the agent as the “expert.”

But while homebuyers are called to trust real estate agents as experts, real estate agents also sell houses for a living. This dual role as advisor and salesperson creates an inevitable conflict of interest for real estate agents. For example, if a real estate agent had told her clients in 2005 and early 2006 that some of the country’s most prominent economists believed that housing prices were unsustainable or, in late 2006, that these same economists were arguing that home prices were headed for significant declines, her clients might have decided not to buy. If too many of her clients made this decision, the realtor could not have earned a living. It’s not good business to tell prospective homebuyers that the housing market may crash.

While highly-conscientious real estate agents might have nevertheless issued such warnings, many undoubtedly did not. Such agents were not necessarily acting nefariously, as many agents may have truly thought that residential real estate was a great investment. Like most homebuyers, many real estate agents didn’t see the crash coming. One doesn’t have to look far to find real estate agents who lost their own shirts in the housing collapse. Many real estate agents, however, must have at least heard the warnings that the real estate market was headed for trouble – and, if they didn’t, they weren’t paying attention.

NAR Spin

While an average person, caught up in their own lives and deluged by information in the internet age, might not have been aware of this debate, a real estate expert should have been - at least in order to be worthy of the expert label. Indeed, these warnings so alarmed those in the real estate brokerage industry that the New York Times reported that in August of 2005 that Robert Shiller had already “become the bugaboo of the multibillion-dollar real-estate industry. Its executives, like many Wall Street economists, say that low interest rates and a growing population will keep house prices rising, even if future increases are smaller than recent ones.” In other words, at least some experts in the real estate brokerage industry were well aware of the housing bubble warnings – and actively dismissed them.

The NAR, in particular, tended to discount any concerns about the housing market in 2005, 2006, and even well into 2007. The persistent line of the NAR during the height of the housing bubble was that there was no bubble - and that buyers should jump before prices got even higher. Moreover, as the housing market began to weaken in 2006, the NAR’s chief economist, David Lereah, explained that the market would land on a “high plateau” in 2006, and that the market was just leveling out, “headed for a soft landing.” Lereah argued that home prices had never declined on a national level before, and that worries of a national bubble bursting were absurd:

I’m getting tired of all these doomsayers. We live in houses, and our houses are not going to crash. This isn’t the stock market.... Local economies are relatively healthy. There’s job creation – this isn’t a scenario where bubbles burst. Can there be one or two or three or several local markets where prices actually go down? Yes. But to generalize for 30 markets or the whole real estate marketplace – that’s absurd.

Once prices did start to decline on a national level and continued to do so into 2007, the NAR assured its members and prospective buyers each month - for months on end - that the housing market had hit bottom and prices would soon begin to rise again. As Mr. Lereah would famously declare in March of 2007: “It looks like we've bottomed out. . . . When it's all said and done, this contraction in housing is probably going to be the least severe contraction we've ever had, which is going to surprise a lot of people.” Prices continued to decline for over three years thereafter, declining an additional 23% by July 2010. ...

... Given all the indications of trouble in the residential real estate market beginning in late 2005, the NAR has been criticized for repeatedly dismissing concerns of a bubble and for not warning buyers that it might, in fact, not be a good time to buy:

By being such dishonest brokers of information, the NAR has now made themselves look ridiculous. No one knows what the future will bring, but consistently absurd spin offered up by the Realtor group not only does a disservice to the public, but is now working against the interest of Realtors themselves.”

Indeed, after leaving the NAR, Mr. Lereah himself admitted that he had put a “positive spin” on the housing numbers:

I worked for an association promoting housing, and it was my job to represent their interests. If you look at my actual forecasts, the numbers were right in line with most forecasts. The difference was that I put a positive spin on it. It was easy to do during boom times, harder when times weren't good. I never thought the whole national real estate market would burst.... [Looking back] I would not have done anything different. But I was a public spokesman writing about housing having a good future. I was wrong. I have to take responsibility for that.

The Blind Leading the Blind

Mr. Lereah’s admission of having spun the numbers aside, one can understand why many individual real estate agents - most of whom have no training as economists or as investment advisors - might have believed what they were being told by the NAR’s chief economist. As such, an agent might have understandably decided that there was no need to mention to his clients in 2005 and 2006 that some economists were predicting a bursting of the bubble and huge price declines to follow – assuming of course that the agent was paying attention to these warnings.

While this may seem reprehensible in retrospect, individual real estate agents would have had a powerful psychological need to believe that there was no housing bubble - and later that prices would land softly. This need would have arisen from the fact that a real estate agent who did not believe these things, yet failed to advise her clients that buying a home in 2005, 2006 or 2007 was a risky proposition, could not have seen herself as ethical and honest individual. However, an agent who advised her clients that buying a home was risky would have likely driven many clients away.

In other words, a real estate agent’s built-in conflict of interests – and the psychological need to see herself as ethical and honest person - would have consciously and unconsciously motivated her to selectively perceive information that supported her belief that residential real estate was a good investment and to discount information that did not. Confirmation bias, disconfirmation bias, and the tendency of individuals to engage in motivated reasoning are well-documented in scientific literature - and it’s safe to assume that real estate agents suffer from the same psychological biases as all other human beings. [The OC Register Says California had no real estate bubble.]

Additionally, real estate agents as a class would have been susceptible to herding behavior, which refers to the tendency of individuals to go along with the crowd – often despite their own misgivings. A real estate agent who had his own doubts as to the sustainability of the housing market would have been confronted by the apparent fact that few of his fellow agents agreed. If most other real estate agents were bullish on the housing market, an agent might reasonably have concluded that he must be wrong about his doubts – especially to the extent that he was not sure about his own judgment in the first place. Few individuals will stand alone and reject the reasoning of their cohort. Ironically, however, the more individuals who cast their own judgments aside and go along with the crowd, the stronger the herding behavior becomes, even though many – or even the majority – of the real estate agents in the crowd may have heard the warnings about the overheated housing market and privately feared that the herd was about to run off a cliff.

Given these psychological biases, one can also understand those real estate agents who, once the housing market began to soften, told their clients that the market was just leveling out, and would not decline. Moreover, to the extent that real estate agents believed the “all real estate is local” mantra,80 they might have felt justified in keeping any concerns or negative information about the national housing market to themselves, so as long as the buyer was not paying more than local “market prices.” In short, it’s understandable that many realtors may have chosen in 2005 and early 2006 to “accentuate the positive” and to say nothing to their clients about signs of trouble brewing in the housing market. Some might also have genuinely felt certain that their clients were making a good investment. ...

Walking Away Scot-Free

Unlike buyers, who have been stuck in underwater homes, and lenders, who have also taken significant losses, the NAR has walked away scot-free from its role in contributing to the housing crash and the losses that its inaccurate advice caused homebuyers. Moreover, real estate brokers and agents have kept the billions of dollars in commissions, including $100 billion in 2005 alone, generated, at least in part, from assurances to their clients that the prices they paid for their homes actually reflected the homes’ value and that buying a home was a good investment. Indeed, the NAR indicated to the New York Times that it is not aware of any case where a real estate agent has been held liable for inaccurate representation as to a home’s value or its investment potential. Westlaw and Lexis-Nexis searches similarly reveal no cases holding real estate agents liable for price or investment advice – and many that do not.

Real estate agents generally escape liability because courts treat them as mere salespeople, or connecters of sellers and buyers, who bear no legal liability for their pronouncements about the health of the housing market or their investment advice, including statements affirmatively guaranteeing a buyer a positive return on their investment. Courts also generally refuse to hold realtors responsible when they misrepresent a property’s fair market price - or mislead investors as to a property’s rental value. Instead, courts typically hold that matters of price are matters of opinion, not fact; that the buyer is assumed to have done their own research; and that the buyer is not entitled to rely upon their agent’s opinions. Courts generally find that, absent fraud or non-disclosure of a material“fact,” real estate agents are not responsible for their opinions, no matter how wrong or recklessly given. In short, courts echo the popular view that homebuyers have no one to blame but themselves for their decision to purchase their house.

... But one might question why, if a real estate agent negligently, recklessly or intentionally made inaccurate pronouncements about the housing market or gave misleading investment advice to his client, the agent should completely escape personal responsibility for his actions – either for the advice itself or for offering opinions as to matters outside his expertise. It is unclear why the ethos of personal responsibility does not extend to the agent. Moreover, absolving real estate agents of responsibility for their advice creates a genuine moral hazard in which agents profit from the buyer’s purchase of a home, but bear no risk if the advice that they gave to induce that purchase is wrong, or intentionally misleading. Real estate agents risk other people’s money – and get paid even if the agent knows that the risk is reckless, or downright foolish.

Treating real estate agents as mere salesmen also runs counter to their self-description as professionals and to their representations to their clients that they owe them a fiduciary duty to look out for their best interest – an obligation that a mere salesperson does not have. Nevertheless, courts seem to assume that homebuyers do or should understand that, despite their agent’s protest to the contrary, their agent is no different in principle than a car salesperson. Everyone knows not to trust a car salesperson to look out for their best interests. Puffery is to be expected and one should enter a car lot at their own risk. As far as most courts are concerned, the same apparently goes for hiring a real estate agent. ...

Choosing a Path

At a basic level, courts’ descriptions of what individuals should do when making complex financial decisions about whether to purchase homes (i.e. – ignore the opinions of their agents) is at odds with what people actually do (which is to seek and trust expert advice). Moreover, most people likely hire a real estate agent without any knowledge, or reason to suspect, that their agent’s “false statements concerning the market are held to be matters of opinion, judgment, seller’s talk” - and that their agents are not legally accountable for the advice that they give.

This approach is not only detached from the concrete reality of real estate transactions, but also fundamentally unfair to buyers, who are doing exactly what an amateur who must make a complex decision typically will do: engage and trust an advisor that they believe to be a qualified expert to guide them through the process. In addition to leaving unsuspecting homeowners without redress, not holding real estate agents to account runs counter to notions of professionalism and the ethos of personal responsibility.

There are two basic ways to address the discrepancy between homebuyers’ psychological propensity to trust their real estate agents and the general legal rule that buyers may not reasonably rely upon their agents’ advice. The first path is to change the legal rule, fully professionalize the real estate agents’ relationships to their clients, and formalize their fiduciary duty. The second – and opposite – path is to bring the real estate agent’s role in line with the legal rule, which means de-professionalizing the realtor-client relationship and clearly delineating real estate agents “mere salespersons.”

The first path may find the most support with real estate agents, as there has been and continues to be a substantial movement among real estate agents to professionalize their vocation. Indeed, as previously discussed, the NAR markets “realtors” as professionals and many real estate agents tend to see themselves as professionals, rather than mere salespersons. But despite strides toward professionalization, the real estate brokerage industry has still resisted legal responsibility when real estate agents negligently or recklessly offer inaccurate advice, or even intentionally manipulate their clients into making poor decisions.

If real estate agents are to be treated as “professionals,” however, they should be subject to regulations similar to those to which other advisory professionals are subject. As an analogous profession, for example, investment advisors have an “affirmative obligation” under the Investment Advisors Act “of utmost good faith and full and fair disclosure of all material facts to their clients, as well as a duty to avoid misleading them." Investment Advisers must also be competent, “have reasonable and objective basis for investment recommendations,” and must ensure that that “any investment recommendations are appropriate considering the client's financial objectives, needs and situation.” ...

Regardless of a client’s ultimate decision, being a professional carries an obligation to be vigilant in fully advising clients of the risks associated with purchasing a home (particularly in an inflated or declining market). Professional advisors should not, as the NAR Realtor Magazine suggests, push their clients “off the fence” by misleadingly suggesting that renting costs 7 times more than owning, or by telling them that they can “pretty much count on” appreciation of inflation plus 2 percent. Professional advisors should not practice scripts that “accentuate the positive” or engage in any form of puffery. Rather, they should soberly caution clients about potential negatives and positives and help clients dispassionately weight benefits and risks. And they must put their clients’ interests ahead of their own at all times, even if it means losing the sale or the client. In other words, if professionalism is to be the chosen path, real estate agents must accept a fundamental change in their role in real estate transactions. They must also give up the benefits of being mere salespersons, including the benefit of being largely free from legal liability.

If professionalism comes at too great a cost, real estate agents could embrace their role as salespersons,171 not only when sued but also when representing themselves to clients. Indeed, given that real estate agents are unlikely to agree as to the best path, there could be two categories of agents: “real estate advisors” and “real estate brokers” - just as there are investment advisors and stock brokers. In this two-tiered system, real estate advisors would be free to represent themselves as professional real estate experts (provided that they could demonstrate sufficient knowledge of real estate valuation, real estate investment and housing market economics). Such advisors might be in high demand to buyers looking to make wise purchasing decisions. But in exchange for the trust of buyers, real estate advisors would be required to accept potential legal liability similar to that of investment advisors.

Real estate brokers, on the other hand, would bear no responsibility for customers’ unwise purchasing decisions – aside from being required to disclose known material facts and defects about the property itself. In exchange for this free pass, and to protect buyers, brokers under such a system would be barred from representing themselves real estate advisors, as “professionals,” or as “experts” possessing specialized knowledge in real estate. Rather, brokers would be limited to representing themselves simply as salespersons. As salespersons, brokers could still provide many helpful services, including helping their customers find a suitable home, analyze and select neighborhoods and schools, and navigate the closing process.

But brokers would be strictly prohibited from offering advice or opinions as to the appropriate purchase price for a particular property, the current state or direction of the real estate market, or whether purchasing real estate is a wise investment decision. Broker training would emphasize that brokers are not to volunteer such opinions, and must respond to questions seeking such opinions by telling their customers that they are not legally allowed to offer an opinion. Brokers who broke this rule should also be strictly liable if their advice or opinions turned out to be inaccurate. ...

Conclusion

The above discussion is not intended to disparage the majority of real estate agents who work conscientiously and ethically for their clients. Rather, the proposals in this article are all forward-looking and borne of the recognition that real estate agents – like homebuyers, mortgage brokers and banks – played a significant, if unwitting, role in creating the housing bubble and burst. In others words, by drawing lessons from the past, the proposals are designed to prevent its reoccurrence. Moreover, the hope is to engage real estate agents in discussing these forward-looking proposals - and not to punish them for past mistakes.

That said, it must be recognized that many homeowners might not currently be stuck in underwater homes if more real estate agents had listened to that voice inside themselves telling them that the market was crazy, had sought to educate themselves about the dangers of an inflated market, and had advised their clients that they might want to sit it out. Additionally, much suffering could have been avoided if the NAR had been a more objective purveyor of information to the public and to its members - instead of a cheerleader for the housing market encouraging potential buyers to get in before the “window of opportunity” closed.

A genuine moral hazard underlies the current role of real estate agents and the NAR. This moral hazard fueled the housing market bubble and contributed to the suffering of many people that the NAR and its realtor members encouraged to buy homes as prices began to decline. Unfortunately, the legal system allows real estate agents to benefit from the trust associated with portraying themselves as professionals, yet to avoid the consequences of the advice that they give – no matter how reckless or objectively misleading that advice may be. Other than their reputation, real estate agents have no skin in the game. They profit if people buy, but suffer no loss if they buy in error. This state of affairs is unfair to unsuspecting buyers and runs counter the ethos of personal responsibility. It should continue no more.

Real estate agents should be required to choose between two paths: (1) fully professionalize their role, including accepting legal liability when they negligently, recklessly or intentionally make inaccurate or misleading pronouncements about a home’s value or investment potential; or (2) embrace their role as “salespersons” and refrain from offering advice or opinions about the real estate market to their customers.

[end of academic report]

I fought the urge to add to Dr. White's already lengthy report with my agreeing comments. He laid out the case for regulating realtors clearly and backed it up with rigorous research. I highly recommend reading the unabridged version.

I think they got it all

I've been trying to find other interesting stories in the property records, so I pass on a number of run-of-the-mill HELOC abuse properties. Today's featured property stood out because these owners managed to extract the maximum value out of their tenure in this house.

The property was purchased on 3/31/1998 for $263,500. The owners used a $255,500 first mortgage and a $ 8,000 down payment. They never owed this little again.
On 9/21/1998 they refinanced with a $261,000 first mortgage and withdrew most of their down payment.
On 11/12/1998 they obtained a stand-alone second for $50,000. These owners had lived in the house only 8 months before they got their first $50,000 in free money.
On 12/28/2000 they refinanced with a $284,000 first mortgage and a $71,000 stand-alone second.
On 1/8/2003 they refinanced with a $396,000 first mortgage.
On 1/23/2004 they refinanced with a $489,250 first mortgage.
On 5/3/2005 they obtained a $70,000 HELOC.
On 2/16/2006 they obtained a $576,000 first mortgage and a $72,000 HELOC.
On 3/7/2007 they made one last trip to the home ATM for a $572,000 first mortgage and a $143,000 stand-alone second.
Total property debt is $715,000.
Total mortgage equity withdrawal is $459,500.
Total squatting time is about two and a half years so far.

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 11/23/2010
Document Type: Notice of Sale

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 08/09/2010
Document Type: Notice of Default

Foreclosure Record
Recording Date: 12/04/2008
Document Type: Notice of Sale

This one is bad. Think about the unceremonious fall from entitlement this family is about to endure. This property has been supplementing this families income from the day they moved in. They created a mountain of Ponzi debt, defaulted the moment the ATM was shut off, and they have been allowed to squat ever since. It will come as a big shock to them when they have to start paying for their housing. They're accustomed to the house paying them.

Irvine Home Address ... 7 THORNWOOD Irvine, CA 92604

Resale Home Price ... $549,000

Home Purchase Price … $263,500
Home Purchase Date .... 3/31/98

Net Gain (Loss) .......... $252,560
Percent Change .......... 95.8%
Annual Appreciation … 5.7%

Cost of Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$549,000 .......... Asking Price
$109,800 .......... 20% Down Conventional
4.82% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$439,200 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$111,358 .......... Income Requirement

$2,310 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$476 .......... Property Tax
$0 .......... Special Taxes and Levies (Mello Roos)
$92 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$82 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$2,959 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$392 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$546 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$203 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$92 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$2,315 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$5,490 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$5,490 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$4,392 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$109,800 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$125,172 .......... Total Cash Costs
$35,400 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$160,572 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 7 THORNWOOD Irvine, CA 92604
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beds: 3
Baths: 2
Sq. Ft.: 1458
$377/SF
Lot Size: 4,416 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Residential, Single Family
Style: One Level, Cottage
Year Built: 1978
Community: Woodbridge
County: Orange
MLS#: S652285
Source: SoCalMLS
Status: Active
On Redfin: 1 day
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Single story home located in the Woodbridge Village of Irvine. Spacious open floor plan with a large living room and a cozy fireplace. Upgraded kitchen with granite counter tops and newer cabinetry. Upgraded bathrooms, crown moldings, custom paint. Two car garage with driveway.

Mortgage Fraud Blog - 10 new articles - In This Issue...

2011-03-22T21:32:00.000-07:00

Mortgage Fraud Blog sends update emails once per week. You can change this setting to receive updates more or less often by following the link at the bottom of this email. The Mortgage Fraud Blog website is updated every business day and you can always get the latest news by visiting www.mortgagefraudblog.com.

Mortgage Fraud Blog - 10 new articles

In This Issue...

Real Estate Unit Takes Down Large Mortgage Fraud & I.D. Theft Scheme
3 Indicted for Elaborate Mortgage Fraud Scheme
Real Estate Developer Admits Fraud Charges
Real Estate Investor Admits Bid Rigging
Former Mortgage Lending Supervisor Admits Fraud
Woman Arrested in Foreclosure Assistance Scam
Employee of Phony Mortgage Rescue Company Sentenced to Prison
Agent Admits Making a False Statement to Bank
California Loan Mod Company Sued in Minnesota
Alabama Mortgage Fraud Indictment Unsealed
Search Mortgage Fraud Blog

Real Estate Unit Takes Down Large Mortgage Fraud & I.D. Theft Scheme

After a two-year investigation, four indictments charging 17 people with more than 108 crimes were handed down for their roles in mortgage fraud and identity theft schemes that stole more than $20...

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3 Indicted for Elaborate Mortgage Fraud Scheme

Brian C. Dupree, Marc Canty and Rashid Wilson have been indicted by a Clarke County, Georgia, Grand Jury on three counts of racketeering for conspiring to commit theft by fraudulently inflating real...

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Real Estate Developer Admits Fraud Charges

James Summers, St. Charles, Missouri, pled guilty to multiple fraud charges involving his Cool Springs development in St. Charles County.

According to court documents, Summers owned and operated...

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Real Estate Investor Admits Bid Rigging

Gregory L. Jackson, a real estate investor, pleaded guilty to conspiring to rig bids and commit mail fraud at public real estate foreclosure auctions held in San Joaquin County, California.

Read the whole entry »

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Former Mortgage Lending Supervisor Admits Fraud

Teresa Kelly, 35, Ocoee, Florida, a former operations supervisor in Colonial Bank's Mortgage Warehouse Lending Division (MWLD), pleaded guilty to conspiring to commit bank, wire, and securities fraud...

Read the whole entry »

• Email to a friend • Article Search •

Woman Arrested in Foreclosure Assistance Scam

Tara Denise Bonelli, 31, Santa Cruz, California, was arrested by agents from the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service, Criminal Investigation. A federal grand jury in San...

Read the whole entry »

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Employee of Phony Mortgage Rescue Company Sentenced to Prison

Michael Martino, 47, Bloomfield, New Jersey, was sentenced to a year and a day in prison for his role in a mortgage fraud scheme carried out by the owner and employees of Elite Financial...

Read the whole entry »

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Agent Admits Making a False Statement to Bank

Darlene M. Adkins, 65, Springfield, Illinois, a real estate agent, entered pleas of guilty to concealing assets in a bankruptcy proceeding and making a false statement to a bank. Sentencing is...

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California Loan Mod Company Sued in Minnesota

Meredian Financial Corporation, a California-based mortgage lender and broker, is the subject of a lawsuit filed in Minnesota, which alleges that the company charged Minnesota homeowners thousands of...

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Alabama Mortgage Fraud Indictment Unsealed

Joan C. Teeters, Foley, Alabama, and Jonathan Marc Nattier, Foley, Alabama, have been charged in a 14-count mortgage fraud indictment, returned in February 2011, by a federal grand jury, and recently...

Read the whole entry »

• Email to a friend • Article Search •

Rachel Dollar represents lenders in mortgage related litigation. She is a shareholder at Smith Dollar PC. Ms. Dollar is a nationally recognized speaker on the topic of mortgage fraud, is licensed to practice law in California and maintains offices in Santa Rosa, California.

Mortgage Fraud Blog is co-sponsored by Smith Dollar PC and Interthinx, the leading provider of fraud services and solutions for the mortgage industry.

Legal Disclaimer. The information and notices contained on Mortgage Fraud Blog are intended to summarize recent developments in mortgage fraud cases and mortgage banking matters nationwide. The posts on this site are presented as general research and information and are expressly not intended, and should not be regarded, as legal advice. Much of the information on this site concerns allegations made in civil lawsuits and in criminal indictments. All persons are presumed innocent until convicted of a crime. Readers who have particular questions about mortgage banking, mortgage fraud matters or who believe they require legal counsel should seek the advice of an attorney. The creators, editors and sponsors of Mortgage Fraud Blog do not intend to create a confidential relationship or an attorney-client relationship by communication via or arising from this site.

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Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

2011-03-22T15:25:00.001-07:00

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

Manhattan : Modern Glossy Black Kitchen and Organization by Composit

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 08:50 AM PDT

Glossy black give the dramatic impression of the modern kitchen design and organization. The contrast color between the black kitchen finishing with the white interior surrounding look so inviiting, strong and make the atmosphere different. Designed by the D. Lo Scalzo Moscheri for the composit, If the common kitchen make your booring so the characteristic of the color maybe perfect for you. This kitchen designed with a lot of storage for keeping the glass, wine and others kitchen equipment. Connected the mini bar make you can take breakfast there. So, If You are planning ti remodell your old kitchen with the new one, this Modern Glossy Black Kitchen and Organization could be your first consideration.

Awesome Sea Ranch Residence Design by tgharchitects

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:48 PM PDT

Having weekend in the romote area very comfortable for people to avoid the daily routine in the big city. Awesome Sea Ranch house by the tgharchitects is the best options for weekend for the family. Located above the Pacifc Ocean View with the creepes tree surrounding make this ranch very quite and fresh to stay after working a week. This ranch house build by the wood and brick as the main materials to make the home warmer and rustic look. The L-shape of the house creates a wind protected outdoor room within the larger landscape.

Architecture Directory

2011-03-22T11:52:00.001-07:00

Architecture Directory

The Affeldt Residence by Studio-A Architecture in South Carolina

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 12:56 AM PDT

Set within a half-acre beachfront site, on the earliest developed areas of Hilton Head Island, South Carolina, this 5,000 square foot residence is really perfect for a telecommuting couples with growing childrens. Called Affeldt’s residence, this oceanview houses was built and designed stunningly by a local firms, Studio-A Architectures, provides generous spaces for large scale [...]

Home Architectural Design

2011-03-22T09:29:00.001-07:00

Home Architectural Design

High Detail Low Budget – Mosman House by Popov Bass Architects

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 11:38 PM PDT

The program decided for new single family that took advantage of the wide north facing site and potential views. The building is designed as a private home for the long term use of its owners with a high level of finish and detailing within the budget requirements. The architectural response is a calm building that [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Top Box Design

2011-03-22T07:27:00.001-07:00

Top Box Design

Nordahl Grieg Highschool in Bergen, Norway
Single family house, looks to blend seamlessly with natural habitat in Varna, Bulgaria
The Christie Patient Treatment Centre in Manchester, United Kingdom
Kigali masterplan, Urban Planning in Rwanda
Woodberry Down – Kick Start Site 4 in London, United Kingdom

Nordahl Grieg Highschool in Bergen, Norway

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:29 PM PDT

Designed by LINK arkitektur AS, Nordahl Grieg Highschool is located in Bergen, Norway. This new school has room for 800 students. Whilst the pupils and staff are provided with a superb teaching facility, the project, covering an area of 14.000 sq m, has a simplistic design which is well embedded in the landscape. Universal design and [...]

Single family house, looks to blend seamlessly with natural habitat in Varna, Bulgaria

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:24 PM PDT

Single family house, looks to blend seamlessly with natural habitat that located in Varna, Bulgaria, was designed by Dizarh. The day zone is found on the first floor and the night zone with two bedrooms occupies the second floor. An interesting accent of the plan design is the double height of the living area and [...]

The Christie Patient Treatment Centre in Manchester, United Kingdom

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:14 PM PDT

Located in Manchester, United Kingdom, Christie Patient Treatment Centre was designed by AFL Architects. This building was to be of the highest architectural quality, create a strong new entrance to the hospital and achieve a BREEAM 'Excellent' Rating. The building has been designed to have a relationship with the existing buildings on site, both visually [...]

Kigali masterplan, Urban Planning in Rwanda

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:09 PM PDT

Kigali masterplan, Urban Planning is located in Rwanda. Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda, has grand plans. Donna Rubinoff, the city's Director of Urban Planning, tells a story of how the Rwandan President visited Denver and on seeing a city panorama from the top of one of the city's towers was inspired to recreate his [...]

Woodberry Down – Kick Start Site 4 in London, United Kingdom

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 09:00 PM PDT

The Woodberry Down – Kick Start Site 4 designed by Rolfe Judd Ltd is located in London, United Kingdom. Rolfe Judd, acting for Berkeley Homes, has secured planning permission from the London Borough of Hackney for a further landmark development comprising 170 new homes on the eastern edge of the Woodberry Down Masterplan site. Kick [...]

Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-22T07:16:00.001-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

One in eight: Nevada has 167,564 empty houses

Posted: 22 Mar 2011 03:30 AM PDT

Nevada has a great many empty homes, and after my experiences flipping occupied properties, I will be happily focused on the empty ones.

Home Address ... 7625 VELVET MIST ST, LAS VEGAS, 89131
Resale Home Price ...... $95,900

Don’t ask me how, but guess who hit the big time.
Don’t look now, but guess who’s back in town.
It’s so easy, don’t even have to try.
You’re the winner you can take the prize.

Loverboy -- Lucky Ones

In the cleanup phase of the Great Housing Bubble, the lucky ones are those profiting from recycling the dead carcasses from yesteryear. I have been sifting through the debris in Las Vegas for about six months now. For a variety of reasons, I have been mum on my activities, but today I am going to share some anecdotes and lessons learned from my new adventure.

The most important of these lessons relates to the topic of today's featured article. According to the US Census Bureau, there are 167,564 houses in Nevada. That's a lot of empty homes -- which is good if you want to survive as a flipper. Occupied homes are troubles magnified. Buying them is harmful to your financial health.

The pros and cons of occupied properties

Buying occupied properties at auction is always riskier because you never know what will happen with the previous occupants. I purchased two occupied houses for investors who were able to enjoy positive cashflow from the first month of ownership, so there are potential advantages. Since occupied properties have more risk, they have appealingly large margins -- at least they look like they have large margins. When you factor in the lost time and the potential for litigation or damage by the occupants, houses with people in them are something to be avoided.

Squatters on my dime

I have one property I purchased in November, and the former owners are still squatting there. The former owners pulled an interesting legal move. They had the wife file for bankruptcy in her maiden name a few days after the foreclosure auction, and they put the property into the estate. Well, our search didn't pick up the bankruptcy because it wasn't in the owners name, so we began foreclosure proceedings. Late in the process, the bankruptcy attorney accuses us of harassment, and we have no idea what he is talking about.

Once we discovered the suit, we had to initiate our own suit to have the property removed from the bankruptcy proceedings. They didn't own the property when they filed, so they can't obtain protection from the bankruptcy court to stay there. If they had filed before the foreclosure, they would have had other rights, but if they had filed before the foreclosure, it would have shown up in a title search, and I wouldn't have bid on the property.

The cost of all this legal maneuvering is expensive. The time to properly evict these people has been costly in two ways. First, the declining market means my resale price is declining while i wait. in addition, I have opportunity cost on money tied up in a non-performing asset. I am not a bank. I can't amend, extend, and pretend I am making money. I either sell quickly for a profit or I don't profit.

Ye ol' crack house

By far the most bizarre story I have is a property I purchased in October.

Back in 2005, a recent Salvadoran immigrant obtains his citizenship. With his workman's salary and a penchant for liar loans, he puts together an empire of 8 properties in Las Vegas from 2005 to 2007. The last of these properties was his crown jewel -- the property I bought.

The property is in a older Las Vegas neighborhood called Spring Valley. The neighborhood is dominated by ranch style houses ranging from 1,400 SF to 1,800 SF. It has seen better days, but this is not a bad neighborhood. It is mostly median income middle-class families trying to get by.

My property is the large 5 bedroom home at the end of a cul-de-sac. It is the only one in the area with a large pie shaped lot with an outbuilding and RV parking. Back in 2007 when Vicente the Fox, our recent immigrant, bought this property with his liar loan, it was the finest property on the street.

Vicente the Fox began using his large property as a salvage yard. He put individual locks on all the bedroom doors and leased out the rooms to boarders and skimmed their rent. He tried to convince them to keep paying him even after I bought the house.

The boarders were united by their love for crystal meth. There is no evidence this place was used as a meth lab -- thankfully -- but when the constables came by to evict the last boarders, they confiscated a cigar box full of used pipes and other paraphernalia. In the two weeks after we took possession the house was broken into three times.

The amount of junk on this lot is staggering. There are eight automobiles on this property, and none of those are in the garage because the garage was full of stuff. All eight cars are in the back and side yards. There were 4 working refrigerators on the property, a dirt bike, an air conditioner, anything and everything you can imagine, and lots of it.

I call our former owner Vicente the Fox because he carefully avoided us whenever we tried to serve him formal eviction papers. He didn't live at this house, and his former address is an apartment where he skipped out on the rent. However, since I was unable to serve him, I could not fully divest him from the property and the junk sitting on it.

He teams with a local ~~attorney~~ bandito to shake me down for wrongful foreclosure, stealing his property, and so on. Since I couldn't get him served, his weak case was strong enough to tie me up in court for a while. I settled.

Surprisingly enough, it turned out in my favor because when I let him back on the property to get his stuff, he cleared out much of the garbage along with the stuff of value. My worst fear was him picking over the good stuff and leaving me with a $5,000 mess to clean. He took a number of paint cans and other items that would have required me to bring in special disposal teams.

There is no good resolution for this property. I will lose money on the deal, and Vicente the Fox will have a roving pile of garbage scattered at friends and acquaintances houses all over town.

Eventually, this property will get sold. Hopefully, it will be to a good family that restores it as the jewel of the neighborhood. That's the outcome I want.

Flippers are maligned for bringing down the quality of life in neighborhoods. The reality is that the delinquent former owners are the ones who brought down the neighborhood. Flippers like me are the ones taking back the crack houses from rent-skimming former owners and putting families back into them.

After those two experiences, it's easy to see why dealing with vacant properties is much preferred. I'll focus on the empty ones. There are plenty to choose from.

Nevada's boom ends in record number of empty homes

(AP) – 6 days ago

LAS VEGAS (AP) — The promise of palm tree groves and low-priced real estate lured Alan and Katherine Ackerly across the Rocky Mountains from Denver to Nevada in 2004, where thousands of new houses beckoned brightly as any neon sign.

They came to buy their retirement home. But the real estate bust took its toll, with a flood of short sales and foreclosures in the market, and last month the Ackerly's dream home was foreclosed on, too.

"I pretty much gave it back to them," said Alan Ackerly, a 57-year-old electrician who stopped paying his mortgage because he owed more than the house was worth.

The Ackerly's home is now among a swelling number of abandoned houses in Nevada. There were 167,564 empty houses in the state last year, according to newly released U.S. Census data, more than double the number in 2000. The number of vacant homes represents about one out of every seven houses across Nevada.

I haven't looked into the Census Bureau's methodology, but that number sounds a bit too big, doesn't it? There are unquestionably a large number of vacant homes, but that many?

The figures are another striking example of how the housing crisis has pummeled Nevada, casting a new light on the severely weakened market after years of boom.

One result is an increase in code violations. In Clark County, home to Las Vegas, such complaints nearly doubled from 2008 to 2009 and the median price of resale homes dropped to $115,000 in January.

That put's their median somewhere in the late 90s. The Las Vegas market is the apocalypse bubble bloggers predicted would occur in every market. As a reaction to Las Vegas, lenders decided it was wiser to build a huge shadow inventory. The likely have saved themselves a great deal of strategic default.

Neighbors call to complain of abandoned houses, stagnant pools, wild yards and unsecured doors, said Joe Boteilho, the county's code enforcement chief. But the neighborhoods of newly constructed homes are not facing the same blatant signs of disrepair seen in other foreclosure-ravaged states such as Florida, Michigan and California.

It has been a deep plunge for Nevada. Once a leader in job creation and construction, the state had the highest foreclosure rate in the country in January. Delinquent mortgages, meanwhile, are on the rise, with Las Vegas, Reno and Carson City all in the top eight cities per capita in a national real estate study published last month.

Strategic default will dominate the Las Vegas housing market for the foreseeable future. With prices stuck 60% below the peak, late buyers have little or no hope of getting back to breakeven in their lifetimes. How many of you are willing to work 20 years to pay off a mistake like that?

More than 16 percent of Nevadans relocated to new residences within the state in 2008 alone, the highest mobility rate in the nation, the Census data shows.

"We were the hottest market in the nation in terms of the shape of the bubble, how fast it went up," said Nasser Daneshvary, director of the Lied Institute for Real Estate Studies at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. "And, of course, when something goes up, it comes down hard, too."

The growth fueled by tourism and the gaming industry has yielded few winners. Short sales and foreclosures have slashed homes prices, ravaged neighborhoods and fueled unemployment in the construction sector, one of Nevada's primary industries. The jobless rate is 14.2 percent, and the state's estimated budget gap starts at $1.5 billion.

In Fernley, the fastest growing city in Nevada from 2000 to 2010, the only sign of construction in recent months was a new Walgreens and a Catholic church. One in 49 homes is in foreclosure.

"It was just very explosive," said Mayor LeRoy Goodman. "We hit bottom."

The economy had become overly dependent upon construction. This cruel purging has wiped out everyone in real estate and construction. When activity returns, it will feel like a huge resurgence compared to the severe contraction of 2008. The industry will regrow into a smaller economic engine utilizing less of the workforce. Perhaps they will only build one mega-resort at a time for a while.

This in what was once the land of plenty. The expansion of glass towers and sprawling casinos on the Las Vegas Strip saw a 3.8 percent unemployment rate statewide in the beginning of 2000. Over the next decade, Nevada would grow by 35 percent, the fastest rate in the nation.

Men and women in hard hats carved homes into mountainsides, raised superstores from the dust and wedged plush golf courses into the desert. The state's residential properties grew by more than 40 percent to 1.17 million homes during those years, affording Nevada the youngest housing stock in the country in 2009, according to the Census data. In Clark County, the school district saw an average of 10 new schools a year at its peak growth.

The people who are down on Las Vegas forget its phenomenal growth prior to this recession. Las Vegas is not Detroit. Detroit watched the auto industry leave with no replacement to fill the void. The economic engine of Las Vegas is gaming and sin.

My wager is that vice will be popular in the future and people will continue to flock to Las Vegas for its vices. Therefore, Las Vegas will recover, and so will its real estate market. I could be wrong. I could lose my bet on Las Vegas's future.

As houses and condominium towers rose from the ground, so did prices. The median home price went from $150,000 to $300,000 between 2000 and 2007, according to a University of Nevada, Las Vegas study.

"It was a new town," said Dennis Smith, president of Home Builders Research, a Las Vegas real estate firm. "There was money everywhere. Everyone wanted to invest in Vegas."

The state's growing wealth and relaxed lending practices allowed workers with limited incomes to gain home ownership. In many cases, these were the same people who later faced foreclosure. Most Nevadans who lost their homes earned between $24,000 and $72,000, according to a homeowners survey published by the Nevada Association of Realtors in January. Roughly 60 percent said they lost their jobs first, then their homes.

I would like to see that NAr study. I know several who strategically defaulted there because their mortgage was too big relative to the value. Perhaps they are the other 40%? The strategic defaulter's there aren't hiding their faces in shame.

The crash came in 2008, when unemployment passed 7 percent for the first time during the decade.

Even so, nearly 74,000 new homes were built in 2010, according to Census data. Realty companies said there are still buyers who prefer newly-built houses.

A general recovery seems far away. The state's Foreclosure Mediation Program helped more than 4,200 homeowners since its creation in 2009. Nearly 2,000 of those owners were able to keep their properties.

More short sales and foreclosures are projected to further depreciate homes values across Nevada in 2011. Census data to be released starting in June was expected to highlight the state's robust renters' market.

The rental market is strong because many people were booted out in a foreclosure, but they still had jobs, so they stayed in the area and rented. If there were a major exodus from the area -- as is happening in Detroit -- then rents would decline along with prices.

"This year will be the worst," said Rep. Shelley Berkley, D-Las Vegas, who co-chairs the Democratic Caucus Housing Stabilization Task Force in Washington. "The unemployment rate is not going down. The values of the homes keep going down and the ability to pay your mortgage is just not there."

The Ackerly family moved into a rental house after they defaulted on their mortgage. The value of their $240,000 North Las Vegas home was worth $80,000 by the time they left. Unlike some of their neighbors, they didn't take the new kitchen cabinets, or the palm trees they had planted in the yard, or any of the other improvements they lovingly made to the house after they moved in.

"We were done with it," said Alan Ackerly.

The things people take and leave behind

One of the properties I bought in March had the kitchen stripped out by the former owners. It's an empty room with a pipe hole in the wall.

For some reason, people like to leave vacuum cleaners behind. Perhaps they don't want the dust from a foreclosure in their new house? I don't know. But I find one left behind in nearly every property.

I had one property where the former owner removed every doorknob in the house, but then they left them in a pile on the floor and didn't take them. In that same house, they took the garbage disposal. What's the resale value of a used garbage disposal?

The owners of today's featured property left it broom clean. They even left a note on the water softener telling the next owner it needed service. Who does that? Who leaves a maintenance note on a property they are losing in foreclosure? Good people. That's who.

The virtue of quick processing

In early March, with B of A coming off its Nevada moratorium, I had a few properties in escrow, so I decided to deploy the last $200K I had available. The number of properties pushed through the Las Vegas auction site in March to third parties has been remarkable. I picked up five this month. Any rumors of an end to the foreclosure problems in Las Vegas will be dashed when the March foreclosure numbers are announced. Remember you heard that here first.

On March 2nd, I bought two properties, and with a new sense of urgency rivaling a FedEx operation, we got one of the two properties on the market two days later in time for weekend showing.

214 Mariposa, Henderson, NV 89015

We still had work to do on this property. Basically, I decided to list the property while we were working on it to see what happened. Worst case is that I turn off some potential buyers who see it before it is ready. I wouldn't do that here in Irvine, but Las Vegas is a different market, so I thought I would try it.

Early the next week, even before Jacki gets crews out to start work, an interested buyer makes an as-is offer within $5,000 of my asking price. Since I was just about to embark on a $5,000 renovation, this offer was a no-brainer, and I took the deal. I was in escrow within eight days of the auction.

That was eye opening.

I realized I had been operating as if I were flipping in Irvine or Orange County. In Las Vegas time-to-market is more important than quality of presentation. The properties in my existing inventory -- the stuff that is losing value as it ages -- all show very well. We focused a great deal of attention on small details, and likely overspent what we should have to make these properties show well. It hasn't made a difference. Price is what sells in Las Vegas. Get to the market quickly and less expensively than your competition, or you lose money.

As good as good can get

This week as I was patting myself on the back for the quick flip, I took the money from some recent closings and bought three more properties. The featured property below was purchased on Friday, March 18, 2011. That's last Friday.

On Saturday, Jacki has the locks changed, took a few photos, and installed the Supra key. Sunday morning some prospective buyers looked at the property. Monday morning (yesterday) we got a full asking price offer which I have accepted.

Four days from auction purchase to full-price offer. We may open escrow today. It doesn't get better than that.

Home Address ... 7625 VELVET MIST ST, LAS VEGAS, 89131

Resale Home Price ... $95,900

Home Purchase Price … $67,100
Home Purchase Date .... 3/18/2011

Percent Change .......... 34.3%
Annual Appreciation … 515.1%

Cost of Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$95,900 .......... Asking Price
$3,357 .......... 3.5% Down FHA Financing
4.23% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$92,544 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$18,154 .......... Income Requirement

$454 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$83 .......... Property Tax
$8 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$280 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$825 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$41 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$128 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$5 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$12 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$673 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$959 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$959 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$925 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$3,357 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$6,200 .......... Total Cash Costs
$10,300 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$16,500 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 7625 VELVET MIST ST, LAS VEGAS, 89131

Beds: 3
Baths: 2
Sq. Ft.: 1,241
$/Sq. Ft.: $77
Lot Size: 4,356 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Single Family Residential, Detached
Year Built: 2003
Community: Lynbrook
County: Clark
MLS#: 1129717
Source: GLVAR
Status: Exclusive Right
On Redfin: 1 day
Cumulative: 2 days
New Listing (24 hours)
-------------------------------------------------
MOVE IN READY! Not a Short Sale or REO. Quick Response from Seller. 1-Story Home, 3 Bedroom, 2 Bath in a gated community. Neighborhood near Schools, Shopping, Dining, Parks and Recreation. Charming Open Floor Plan with lots of Natural Light.

Flipping Out

I hope enjoyed my Las Vegas anecdotes. As you can see, most of my time and energy have been devoted to that end. I don't think I have revealed any trade secrets or given my competitors any valuable information. Perhaps a few may be dissuaded from trying when they know how hard it really is.

It's a hard business, and if you don't know what you're doing, you can quickly lose a lot of money. It requires a lot of time, money, patience, the ability to accurately value property, and a working understanding of real estate law. It can be a lucrative business if you can figure out before the opportunity disappears.

Surviving the turnover of the first group of properties, I feel like I have the team and the systems in place to do well. I am looking forward to the rest of 2011. For those of you interested in my fund, I'm sorry, but it is closed to new investors. Maybe next year....

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

2011-03-21T15:08:00.000-07:00

Great Home Design, Architecture and Interior

Smooth Organic Bedding Design Inspired by Home-Decorating-Co

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 08:24 AM PDT

Organic materials is very trend for all aspect now since the organic materials very enviromental freindly and reduce the global warming that to be most dangerous threat for the future. For the home design and interior like a bedding, organic materials to be the trend too. By using the bedding organic materials, We can keep our health, since organic bedding materials free from the toxins (pestiside) that We can avoid it when sleeping and breathing. Organic materials soft and smooth and will not harm or irritate sensitif skin. Dreamsackbedding have designed the smooth and graceful bamboo dream organic bedding design for Home-Decorating-Co with various models, theme and color that might could be your reference to choose right organic bedding for your bedroom. Their organic bedding is a clean, refined look that makes it an elegant addition to any bedroom decor. Please, save our planet and keep your family healthy by using organic bedding materials.

Home Architectural Design

2011-03-21T09:18:00.000-07:00

Home Architectural Design

Florida Beach House by Iredale Pedersen Hook Architects

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 02:18 AM PDT

This modern holiday house sited in front of Western Australia Florida Beach. The project emphasizes and focuses on the immense Indian Ocean. All space is aligned and extruded through a strict dialogue of plan and section revealing the intensity and variety of this great ocean. This house captures dying qualities while screening the occupants from [...]

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Irvine Housing Blog

2011-03-21T07:55:00.001-07:00

Irvine Housing Blog

Defining qualified residential mortgages: a battle over minimum down payments

Posted: 21 Mar 2011 03:33 AM PDT

The battle lines in the fight to create a stable housing market is being waged over minimum down payment requirements on qualified residential mortgages.

Irvine Home Address ... 2306 SCHOLARSHIP Irvine, CA 92612
Resale Home Price ...... $254,900

Oh but ain't that America for you and me
Ain't that America somethin' to see baby
Ain't that America home of the free
Little pink houses for you and me

John Mellencamp -- Pink Houses

America was a frontier country. People flocked to America from Europe for the opportunity to own their land, something denied to most living in post-feudal Europe. The idea of having a piece of property with your own pink house is deeply woven into the American culture. it's part of our history, and to this day, many identify home ownership with being American.

I wrote about our modern perversion of ownership in Money Rentership: Housing and the New American Dream. Questions of our concepts of financing and ownership are coming to surface in Washington as we take up debate on down payment requirements for the new qualified residential mortgage.

Homeownership should not be part of the American Dream

Posted by Nin-Hai Tseng, writer-reporter
March 15, 2011 8:30 am

Most banks want to securitize loans made to borrowers buying homes with little money down. Did we learn nothing from the financial crisis?

Lenders did learn from the financial crisis. They learned they can underwrite unconscionable loans to make a quick buck at origination, and when the loans go bad, the government will cover their losses. Why would lenders want to change that system? Keep that in mind as you watch the lending lobby posture in Washington to game the rules in their favor.

In an attempt to fix some of the problems that caused the housing bubble and financial crisis, banking regulators are coming up with new mortgage lending rules that will address what lower-risk quality mortgages should look like. The goal is to let lenders sell so-called "qualified residential mortgages" to investors without having to retain the risks.

The question the Treasury Department must now answer is what makes a qualified mortgage? Regulators including the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency are pushing for a 20% down payment on such loans. While the big banks like Bank of America (BAC) and JP Morgan Chase (JPM) have not formally weighed in, their lobbyists at American Bankers Association and the Mortgage Bankers Association say that requirement is far too high and would price many buyers out of the housing market.

The most pernicious lie in real estate lending is that restricting access to loans prices buyers out of the market. The hidden assumption is that bids must always be raised because prices never go down. If the government chose to enact the most Draconian standards possible, it may reduce sales volumes at current pricing, but it does not price buyers out of the market -- it prices sellers out of the market. As credit tightens, asking prices need to go down for transactions to occur.

Lenders want to make the largest loan possible at the highest interest rate they can. That is their business model. Of course, they would also like the borrower to repay that money, so pushing loan balances up too high leads to Ponzi borrowing, widespread insolvency, and a catastrophic market crash as we have witnessed. However, lenders don't care about the risks as long as Uncle Sam backstops them. They will push for the ability to make the largest loans they can and pass the risk off to whoever they can.

The debate will have broad implications for how homebuyers finance their mortgages. During the housing boom, many Americans took out home loans with little to no money down. When prices fell steeply following their mid-2006 peak, many borrowers didn't have enough equity to cushion the blow, leading to record foreclosures nationwide. Meanwhile, the big banks and investors holding these risky loans suffered huge losses.

We have witnessed many tempest-in-a-teapot issues like robo-signer that flare up and go away without long-term impact on the housing market. This issue is different. The minimum qualifying standard on this loan is going to become the bedrock of mortgage finance. If we get this wrong, we will rebuild the mortgage market on a weak foundation.

Joseph Pigg, vice president and senior council of the ABA, says the 20% proposal is much too narrow and he worries it could further hamper demand for homes, especially when the fragile real estate market is still recovering. And while a heftier down payment generally reduces the risks of a loan, he says, other factors such as income, credit score, and the property's location determine the quality of a loan.

Yes, there are other factors besides the down payment that impact loan quality. There are undoubtedly many buyers who put less than 20% down that will not default on their loan. So what? We are talking about establishing a minimum threshold for all loans. It should be a conservative measure with little or no real risk exposure. Lowing down payment requirements for this loan shifts risk from lenders to the US taxpayer who will end up paying the bills if we create another unstable Ponzi scheme.

But perhaps it's time to question whether homeownership should even be part of the American Dream.

Tighter mortgage lending rules could return the housing market to the way it was in the 1970s, when homeownership was much lower and virtually all homebuyers put down at least 20% of the value of the house. Standards began changing around the 1980s as home prices appreciated significantly and mortgage financing became more sophisticated.

Sophisticated?

Financing has become more sophisticated... sophisticated at creating new Ponzi schemes.

Finance professionals view lower lending standards as progress and tightening lending standards as regression. For an industry of parasites trying to siphon the cashflow from all the world's assets, that paradigm makes sense. In reality, their progress generally amounts to some new Ponzi scheme. I wrote in The Fallacy of Financial Innovation,

"Many in the lending industry think their work is like science that continually advances. It is not. It is far more akin to assembly line work where the same widgets are pumped out year after year. When lenders start to innovate, trouble is brewing. The last significant advancement in lending was the widespread use of 30-year amortizing loans that came into favor after World War II. Prior to that time, home loans were interest-only, short-term loans with very high equity requirements (50% was most common.) This proved problematic in the Great Depression as many out-of-work owners defaulted on their loans. A mechanism had to be found to get new buyers into the markets and allow them to pay off the loan. The answer was the 30-year, fixed-rate amortizing loan. To say this was an innovation is a stretch as this loan has been around as long as banking has existed, but it did not become widely used until equity requirements were lowered. The lenders were willing to lower the equity requirements as long as the loan was amortizing because their risk would decline as time went by and the loan balance was paid off."

Lenders used to originate loans with an assumption of flat pricing. The reasoning was that they didn't know if that borrower may not be compelled to sell within months of purchase. They wanted to be sure they could discount the sales price, pay a sales commission, and still recover their capital. That meant at least a 10% cushion from day one. Twenty percent was better.

During the housing bubble, the originators of the Option ARM made the assumption that house prices would go up 3% per year every year because past history confirms that house prices rise with inflation. As a lender, if you believed the value of your collateral was rising 3% per year, you could originate with low down payments, increasing mortgage balances, and the whole host of problems the Option ARM created because even when the loans go bad, the loss severities would be low due to the increasing value of the collateral. Hah. That didn't go as planned.

Borrowing against the increasing value of an asset destabilizes the price of that asset. Once aggregate debt levels get too high, a financial disruption can cause prices to crash which in turn spawns wave after wave of strategic default which drives house prices well below fundamental values. The upward frenzy of rally buying is closely mirrored by the downward spiral of default, foreclosure, excess supply and lower prices which causes more default.

It's easy to see why bankers would gripe about the 20% minimum. Smaller loans translate into smaller profits, and a smaller market for securitized mortgages. And lenders can fully securitize only qualified mortgages -- any loans made without the designated down payment can still be sold, but the lenders would have to retain 5% of their value on their books.

Wells Fargo (WFC) is the one exception among the banks on this rule -- it's arguing for a 30% down payment for qualified mortgages. Wells executives call it skin in the game, but smaller lenders are calling it an unfair competitive advantage -- as one of the largest lenders, Wells would be able to tolerate more risk on its balance sheet from the many borrowers who won't be able to afford such a down payment.

That is fantastic. With internal division on policy, it will be much harder for the lending lobby to push a 10% down mortgage.

Certainly a 20% down payment -- much less a 30% one -- isn't easy for many homebuyers, especially as unemployment stays unnervingly high. The average loan-to-value ratio for January 2011 was 73%, which means borrowers on average put 27% down, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

The Irvine bulls always tout the high down payments of Irvine buyers as a sign of special interest by FCBs. Apparently, averaging more than 20% down is normal for real estate markets. Considering almost of third of homeowners own outright, it isn't surprising some amount of ported equity moves from property to property keeping down payments up. Perhaps Irvine is not that special after all?

But while home sales have started to tick up slightly, demand is mostly coming from cash-rich investors who are scooping up foreclosed properties at bargain prices, not from first-time buyers. Economist Paul Dales of Capital Economics recently pointed out that more than two-thirds of existing home sales since last summer were made to cash buyers or investors, while a mere 6% were sold to first-time homebuyers.

Maybe the answer isn't to give borrowers more leeway, but less. Given all we've learned in the years following the housing crash, perhaps a little time travel back to the 1970s might not be so bad. During the boom years, many lenders passed on their mortgages, including all of the risk, to speculative investors. That proved disastrous, leading to a banking crisis and a housing bubble that all too quickly went bust.

It will be painful to endure a longer, deeper housing crisis that could come from tighter standards. But do we want to relive the nightmare that got us here?

I wholeheartedly agree with the author's contentions. Returning to sane lending standards is not regression, it is progress from where we are today. Lending lost its way. The billions in losses prove that. We need to retreat to what works. Some may chose to view that as going back to the stone ages. I prefer to view it as a return to fiscal sanity and a stable housing market.

Nearly $500,000 for a one bedroom apartment condo?

The Jamboree Corridor condos were 20 years before their time, just like the prices of 2006 in general. These condos don't make sense. They never did. Even after a 50% decline in prices and below 5% interest rates, these properties still don't make sense. The prices on these properties are only now reaching rental parity -- and these properties should trade at a discount to rental partiy because it is not a place people want to live long term. This is a great 20-something apartment, but it makes for a less desirable family home.

My data service doesn't pick up this particular address, but the details of who lost what isn't important. The lender didn't likely require a big downpayment, so the first mortgage is taking a big hit.

The assymetric nature of drawdown

People who study financial markets and portfolio returns note an interesting phenomenon regarding returns on financial investments: losses are more devastating to returns than slow gains. This property has declined nearly 50% in value since it was purchased in 2006. So when the property goes back up 50% in value, will it be back up to the peak?

Nope. A 50% decline requires a 100% increase to offset it. By the time peak buyers see values reach their entry points, buyers from today will have accumulated $250,000 in equity. Timing does matter.

The frenzied rally of the Great Housing Bubble saw double-digit appreciation for several consecutive years. Depending on the market, most of all of that gain was wiped out in two-years of double-digit declines in 2007 and 2008.

The savvy buyer who picked up this great investment undoubtedly expected double-digit appreciation from his starting point. This should be reselling for a $1,000,000 by now. instead it's REO hoping for a quarter of that.

Irvine Home Address ... 2306 SCHOLARSHIP Irvine, CA 92612

Resale Home Price ... $254,900

Home Purchase Price … $478,500
Home Purchase Date .... 6/12/06

Net Gain (Loss) .......... $(238,894)
Percent Change .......... -49.9%
Annual Appreciation … -13.0%

Cost of Ownership
-------------------------------------------------
$254,900 .......... Asking Price
$8,922 .......... 3.5% Down FHA Financing
4.82% ............... Mortgage Interest Rate
$245,979 .......... 30-Year Mortgage
$51,703 .......... Income Requirement

$1,294 .......... Monthly Mortgage Payment

$221 .......... Property Tax
$0 .......... Special Taxes and Levies (Mello Roos)
$42 .......... Homeowners Insurance
$310 .......... Homeowners Association Fees
============================================
$1,867 .......... Monthly Cash Outlays

-$121 .......... Tax Savings (% of Interest and Property Tax)
-$306 .......... Equity Hidden in Payment
$16 .......... Lost Income to Down Payment (net of taxes)
$42 .......... Maintenance and Replacement Reserves
============================================
$1,499 .......... Monthly Cost of Ownership

Cash Acquisition Demands
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
$2,549 .......... Furnishing and Move In @1%
$2,549 .......... Closing Costs @1%
$2,460 ............ Interest Points @1% of Loan
$8,922 .......... Down Payment
============================================
$16,479 .......... Total Cash Costs
$22,900 ............ Emergency Cash Reserves
============================================
$39,379 .......... Total Savings Needed

Property Details for 2306 SCHOLARSHIP Irvine, CA 92612
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Beds: 1
Baths: 1
Sq. Ft.: 0738
$345/SF
Lot Size: -
Property Type: Residential, Single Family
Style: One Level, Modern
Year Built: 2006
Community: Airport Area
County: Orange
MLS#: P774302
Source: SoCalMLS
Status: Active
On Redfin: 2 days
------------------------------------------------------------------------------
REO Bank Owned - New complex near John Wayne Air Port between Irvine and Newport Beach. Excellent amenities include tennis courts, pool, spa, BBQ area, basketball court A rare opportunity Make you best offer.

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The Real Estate Bloggers

2011-03-21T04:10:00.001-07:00

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America’s Top 10 Most Empty Cities in 2011

Posted: 20 Mar 2011 08:33 AM PDT

Vacancies, empty homes, zombie subdivisions, foreclosures, and REO. This is the real estate story of 2011 and as usual some cities are fairing better than others. The city of Orlando takes the crown as the most empty American city with an amazing 23 percent of their apartments empty and 4.3 percent of their homes unoccupied.

The recession is just magnifying the problem in these cities as their is not enough demand for housing and the relocation market is restricted. Add in an overabundance of inventory and you have these cities sitting empty.

America’s Top 10 Most Empty Cities in 2011

Orlando – Home Vacancy – 4.3% Apartment Vacancy – 23.6%
Las Vegas – Home Vacancy – 5.5% Apartment Vacancy – 13.5%
Memphis – Home Vacancy – 4.7% Apartment Vacancy – 16.1%
San Bernardino – Home Vacancy – 6.4% Apartment Vacancy – 10.4%
Dayton – Home Vacancy – 3.3% Apartment Vacancy – 26.4%
Phoenix – Home Vacancy – 3.4% Apartment Vacancy – 15.5%
Houston – Home Vacancy – 2.6% Apartment Vacancy – 14.5%
Jacksonville – Home Vacancy – 3.1% Apartment Vacancy – 10.4%
Tampa St. Petersburg – Home Vacancy – 3.7% Apartment Vacancy – 9.4%\
Detroit – Home Vacancy – 2.9% Apartment Vacancy – 15.6%

via Forbes

Thanks for reading this post. If you would like to see more articles like this, please come visit The Real Estate Bloggers. where it was originally published.

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