Housing Comes Out of Hibernation

Spring is officially here, and that signals an awakening of all sorts, including the housing market. The numbers indicate an upswing not just due to the season, but compared to the slump of the previous few years. Housing starts are up 19% over the past year. Not only that, but they are up 34% in […]

This is a sort of continuation of the article I shared with you last week indicating good news about short sales for real estate investors. The government has reached a $25 billion settlement with the five biggest mortgagers over robo-signing practices. This move is expected to increase the amount of completed short sales. With this […]

This is good news for anyone who is looking to get into the rental property business. Zillow recently released their Zillow Rent Index which examines the home rental markets around the country. Despite falling home values, the median rent rate increased 3% from January 2011 to January 2012. That 3% number is much higher in […]

There are certain characteristics or traits that every successful real estate investor looks for in an area before buying a home, whether to rehab, retail or wholesale. Knowing these five things can make a significant difference in the success of your exit strategy and in turn, impact on your profits. These are all things that […]

Last week, CoreLogic reported that the number of homes currently in the shadow inventory is roughly half the number of those currently in the visible inventory. On top of that, about half the shadow inventory has not made it into the foreclosure cycle yet. Altogether, the total shadow inventory includes 400,000 REOs, 410,000 already in […]

Recently, CoreLogic released their annual National Foreclosure Report. Corelogic is a leader in providing financial, real estate and consumer data used by top industry experts. In this report, they provide information on foreclosures by month, total foreclosure inventory and delinquency rates. Their findings include the five states with the highest foreclosure rates. The leaders are […]

This is good news for real estate investors. Last month, three Senators (Murkowski, Scott Brown and Sherrod Brown) together proposed a bill called the “Prompt Notification of Short Sale Act,” which, in essence, is designed to speed up the short sale process. It would require “a written response from a lender no later than 75 […]

Last week, Bank of America announced that they were reducing the amount owed for 200,000 underwater homeowners. This is huge for the homeowners, because it means a chance to eliminate the underwater portion of their mortgages. The anticipated average reduction is $100,000. Homeowners are eligible for the reduction if they were at least 60 days […]

According to the analytics firm, Capital Management, the housing crisis will actually end this year, thanks to looser credit standards and availability for borrowers. Borrowers are required to have a credit score of 700 or higher to obtain a mortgage loan. This is consistent with numbers from a year ago. In addition, banks are “lending […]

Even though there are signs of hope in the economic recovery, the housing market still has a long way to go. Of the 55 million mortgage holders in the US, industry experts predict that as many as 10 million will default by 2018. While there have been some attempts by the government to reduce the […]