Categoriesinfo for buyers

Fannie Mae Extends Incentives for Buyers

Fannie Mae (FNMA/OTC) announced the expansion of incentives to encourage sales of HomePath REO properties to owner occupants. Now through October 31, qualified buyers and selling agents can receive financial incentives on sales of HomePath properties, which can be found at www.homepath.com. The incentives are part of Fannie Mae’s commitment to neighborhood stabilization, and are available on sales to buyers who will reside in the home as their primary residence.

“Supporting homeownership and stabilizing neighborhoods are critical to helping the housing market recover,” said Ed Neill, Senior Vice President for Credit Loss Management at Fannie Mae. “Our previous incentives have been effective in securing owner occupants for these properties. By encouraging homebuyers who will make these properties their long-term home, these expanded incentives will help to stabilize communities.”

The expanded incentives offer qualified homebuyers up to 3.5 percent of the final sales price to put towards closing costs. In addition, selling agents representing the owner occupant buyer can now receive a $1,200 bonus. The incentive must be requested in the initial offer. Eligible initial offers must be submitted on or after June 14, 2011 and must close by October 31, 2011. Investor sales are not eligible for the incentive.

HomePath properties offer buyers a wide selection of options, including single-family homes, condominiums, and town houses. HomePath properties may also be eligible for HomePath Mortgage and HomePath Renovation Mortgage financing, which offers homebuyers an opportunity to purchase with as little as 3 percent down…

If this is HomePath is something you are intersted in, please call me and I will send more information your way.

Regards,
Domenica

CategoriesWashington real estate

Real estate is local

Windermere Real Estate is proud to partner with Gardner Economics to provide this analysis and commentary on the Western Washington real estate market. This report is designed to support Windermere owners and brokers as they educate buyers and sellers about the realities of the housing market.

I have the benefit of Annual (at minimum) live updates from Matthew Gardner as well as quarterly and periodic reports thanks to my association with Windermere.  I am always happy to pass on the great information I receive from this and other resources.  If you had a chance to read my quarterly report last month you’ll see that this is a bit more broad and looks at the entire NW region.  We hear plenty on the national front, but it’s more important to look at the regional and local real estate market.  It’s always good to bring everything we hear nationally into perspective.  As the old saying goes… “Real estate is local!”

Click HERE to take a look at the report.

Enjoy your week!
Domenica

Categoriesevents

2nd Annual Shredding Party!

Please join me and Windermere West Seattle as we clean up the world at our Spring Clean Event. We will have a high speed shredding truck to shred your personal documents and you may also bring your old computers, monitors, cell phones or televisions to be recycled by InterConnection.org—all free of charge. Refreshments will be served inside our office. Please contact me for details.

June 4, 2011
10:00 am to 1:00 pm
Windermere West Seattle
4526 California Ave SW
Seattle, WA 98116

Drop off will be in the parking lot behind our office, off 42nd.

Domenica

Categoriesquarterly report

At long last… Seattle Digs Quarterly Report!

I am so pleased to share my first Seattle Real Estate Quarterly Report.  Please take a look and let me know what you think.  I am very interested in feedback and would love to continually improve the format and the content over the next year.

Inside you’ll find information and synopsis of the first part of this year.  As well as graphs and visuals to show you what’s been happening in most Seattle neighborhoods.

Click HERE to download the PDF and watch for a paper version in the mail!

Categoriesfinancing

0% Down financing a thing of the past you say?

It’s all well and good for buyers that rates are still crazy low and prices have not yet started to climb.  But what if you don’t have any money for a down payment?  Everyone knows there aren’t any zero down mortgage programs anymore.  And the low down payment mortgages have super expensive mortgage insurance tacked on to the monthly payment right?

Well I came across two programs this week from two major (and seemingly stable) banks that might just offer a great boost to qualified buyers who would love to own a home but don’t have a lot of cash.

One program is offered by Wells Fargo (many of you know one of my favorite clients is a loan officer at Wells Fargo).  So I asked Ryan Carroll to send over some information.  Check out his flyer here: Removed at request of Wells Fargo. He also sent me an interesting loan comparison chart that you can access here: Removed at request of a Wells Fargo.

Merrick H. Tam with Key Bank brought another program to my attention this week.  I’ve never worked with Merrick so I can’t vouch for him, but he did take the time to call me and let me know about what seems like a great option for buyers.  View his flyer here: Key Bank Flyer.

Please don’t hesitate to give me a call if you are curious about the process of buying and would like to find out if it’s an option for you.

Categorieshome values

2010 Luxury Home Market Report

The 2010 Luxury Home Market Report is now available to my clients.  2009 saw sharp declines in the Puget Sound upper end housing market but 2010 showed a marked increase in sales and prices for this segment.  The Luxury Home Market Report has all the details including year over year sales, prices and days on market(DOM) etc.

If you would like to discuss the report or have interest in the current market data for any segment of the real estate market please give me a call.  I’d love to grab a coffee and talk numbers with you!

Categoriesemergency preparedness

Are you ready?

In light of the recent and ongoing disaster in Japan I thought it might be time to visit the subject of emergency preparedness. Maintaining and improving our homes is very important. But let’s be honest. How much of a safe haven will your home be if everyone who lives there isn’t safe and prepared when something goes wrong?

I’ve been doing a lot of reading and browsing the internet about home emergency preparedness this week.   The best site I came across has a setup guide to help create a plan to make sure you are well supplied and prepared in the event of an emergency.

I encourage you to spend some time preparing your home for such an emergency while the issue is close at hand.

And of course I’ve been thinking a lot about how to help.  The American Red Cross is always a very good option for donations in situations like these.  With the Red Cross’s long history of effective aid and integrity you can’t go wrong.  I didn’t come across any local and accessible volunteer opportunities in my searches.  Let me know if you hear of any, I might be able to join you.

My heart continues to go out to everyone affected by this catastrophe.
I wish you all peace and safety!
Domenica

Categoriesgoing green

Arghhhh . . . Yellow Pages!

I know this isn’t exactly hard hitting real estate news. I don’t know about you, but I can’t stand that pile of yellow paper, three feet high, left on the porch each year. I actually heard a friend retell an experience of chasing the delivery person back to their car trying to give them back. Just to be waved at and told where to put them (if you know what I mean).

So it’s not hard hitting real estate news. But sheesh, I need to do my part to stop the madness! Unless of course you enjoy the many good uses for the yellow pages, such as booster seat, door stop, fire starter, home security weapon, nursing stool, percussion instrument, paper mache material, spider killer . . .

Want to stop delivery of Yellow Pages, White Pages, Phone Books? Opt out of Yellow Pages HERE and stop the delivery of printed directories you don’t want to receive.

Hope this saves you a wet and messy trip to the recycle bin this year!

Sincerely,
Domenica
Windermere Real Estate

Categoriesfinancing, info for buyers

Rates vs Price

Many buyers are considering whether to buy a home NOW or wait to see if prices come down a bit more.  We wanted to clarify for our clients the most important variable in this equation: interest rates.  The majority of buyers need financing to purchase their home.  Interest rates are what buyers should be focused on, not prices.

Here is an example that illustrates the point clearly, based on our listing at 3236 41st Ave SW offered at $440,000:
With 20% down and a credit score over 700 buyers currently qualify for a 30-year fixed rate loan with a rate of 4.375%.  The monthly Principal and Interest (PI) payment on a loan of $352,000 at 4.375% would be $1,760.17.

If we adjust for interest rates rising while keeping the payment at $1,760.17/month and 20% down you can see how higher rates will affect your purchase power:

January 2008: 30-year fixed rate 5.5%. At that rate a payment of $1,760.17/month qualifies a buyer for a purchase price of $387,024.57.  $52,975.43 less than today.
August 2008: 6.5% = purchase price of $347,740.75.  $92,259.25 less than today.
May 2000: 8.5% = purchase price of $285,949.18.  $154,050.82 less than today.

It is entirely possible that interest rates will climb to 8.5% within the next few years.  While this is still a decent rate, historically speaking, you can see it makes a huge impact on a buyers buying power.  It would take a 35% reduction in home values to make up for the $154,000 difference an 8.5% rate would make to buyers.

Today’s incredibly low interest rates have created an amazing opportunity for home-buyers, and we just wanted our clients to know.

Warm Regards,
Domenica
Windermere Real Estate