The foreclosure rate of loans originated over the last few years has been LOW!
If the strict underwriting continues, we will only see an occasional foreclosure from now on. We’ll be telling our grandkids about how back in the day there was this guy who ran a video-cam through hundreds of them!
A certain foreclosure-subscription company is always rattling their sabre about any uptick in notices. The headline for this article is: Early Stage Foreclosure Filings up Nationwide and in Most States:
http://www.mortgagenewsdaily.com/12102014_realtytrac_foreclosures.asp
But with the banks engrossed with loan-modding anyone who can fog a mirror, the only thing that matters is how many actual foreclosures are being completed. Buried deep in the article:
The dip in total filings was due to a 10 percent reduction in bank repossessions or completed foreclosures compared to October. A total of 25,249 properties were taken into bank inventories or REO, down 17 percent from November 2013.
It was the 24th consecutive month in which completed foreclosures were lower on a year-over-year basis.
The national count of completed foreclosures has been dropping for two years straight! Bill showed how delinquencies have been tapering off too:
Regardless of how it happened, it looks like a soft landing that will last – at least as long as rates are ultra-low.
Here is how the local San Diego County numbers look:
It’s a slow week for real estate, so let’s mention the biggest news in San Diego today – the Padres made the trade for Matt Kemp:
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2014/dec/11/padres-dodgers-agree-trade-kemp-grandal/
An excerpt:
Kemp carries significant risk. Over 2012 and 2013, he missed 145 games due to shoulder, hamstring and ankle injuries. Last season, he was moved from center field, struggled in left and eventually settled in right. At the plate, though, he began to recapture his form in the second half, hitting .309 with 17 home runs and 54 RBIs.
He should bring some real chemistry to the clubhouse too. Remember he was Dodger that was so bent out of shape about Greinke getting his collarbone broken that he went after Carlos Quentin in the tunnel after the game:
Quentin is on the Padres 2015 roster, and has an option for 2016. I wonder if they will be rooming together?
This is a set of three songs, but it’s the first one that you’ll remember.
My Ever-Changing Moods, from 1983 when they were in their prime:
Looking forward to a great 2015! From MND:
Mortgage rates moved only slightly lower today, but it was enough to bring the end-of-day average to the lowest in more than a year an a half.
For the record, there were lower rates available on the morning of October 15th, but markets moved so much during the day that the last rate sheets of the day weren’t quite as strong as today’s. Similar rates were also seen at the end of the day on December 1st.
The demand is strong enough that every seller is getting a few looks, especially in the beginning. Hopefully your agent has your listing on Zillow, but even if they don’t, buyers are going there to evaluate. You’ll see their viewer count of your home is rising, and you’ve had plenty of visitors – but no offers.
What’s wrong?
It could be one, some, or all of the items below, but no matter what the problem is, you can fix it.
Photos are lying. Once inside the house, buyers discover the truth about floor plan, condition, small rooms, etc., and are disappointed.
Something is wrong that buyers can’t see in the photos or Google Maps. Bad smell, barking dog, surly neighbors, noise, etc.
Agents are using your house to sell the one down the street. If there are competing listings nearby, the best buy will be the next to sell, and then buyers will expect that yours should be worth less.
Your furniture is ugly. Buyers aren’t known for having great vision, and the anti-staged look is hard to ignore.
Your listing agent has a bad reputation. There are agents who have burned every bridge they ever crossed. Other agents might show the house just to satisfy their buyer, but won’t go too far to sell them on it.
Price is wrong by 5% to 10%. It doesn’t matter if you have ‘comps’; those are guideposts, not guarantees.
Why are buyers being so fussy? Because you are asking them to pay a lot more for your house than you did. If you want to entice them, then fix what’s wrong, or just lower the price to compensate.
If you don’t care if you ever sell, then just wait. It’ll happen someday.
The MLB winter meetings are in San Diego this week, and Ned Colletti, the former GM of the Los Angeles Dodgers got rolling about negotiating contracts around the 8:00-minute mark. He mentioned knowing what to expect from the agents – it’s good to know which agents will treat you right, which is vital in real estate sales. You don’t have to be a baseball fan to appreciate:
P.S. The Matt Kemp-to-Padres deal is rumored to be dead.
Hat tip to BF!
“All the scenes in this video were captured around sunrise over a period of four months, from August to November of 2014. Shot entirely using a GoPro HERO3 Black Edition camera (1080p, 60fps, Medium FOV) mounted on a DJI Phantom 2 Quadcopter with Zenmuse H3-3D 3-axis gimbal. Edited using Adobe Premiere Pro CS6.”
Realtors tend to use industry jargon in their contracts, and regularly you’ll see the term, ‘COE + 3’ in a counter-offer coming back from a seller. It means they get to occupy the home for three more days after the close-of-escrow date, at no charge – and usually no other written agreement.
Agents are very casual about these arrangements, because everything usually goes fine and the sellers move out as agreed. They’ve never seen one go bad.
For buyers, it’s a nightmare waiting to happen.
An example: The seller (who was a realtor) was buying another home that was virtually brand new. The buyer of her house agreed to the COE + 3 days, figuring that was plenty of time for them to move out. But once the seller closed on the new home, she found that it needed modifications/improvements to suit their needs.
She hung out the buyer for two weeks, without compensation.
If it is a hot property and fresh on the market, the buyers don’t have much bargaining power and get stuck with COE + 3, whether they like it or not.
What can you do?
1. Don’t agree to COE + 3 days, especially if tenant-occupied.
2. If you do agree, then bargain with the listing agent that it’s in everyone’s best interest to complete our SIP form that spells out the terms of tenancy.
3. If the listing agent refuses to include the SIP, then he/she is crazy – if the sellers don’t move after their three days, then the agent will get sued for damages too. But how hard can you press them if they are threatening to take another offer? Make the deal, and hope for the best.
4. If you can include the SIP, be careful about the terms. Use the form to ensure they move out as agreed, not to make a couple of extra bucks on 3-days’ worth of rent. Sellers get bugged about renting their own house, and asking for a security deposit really sets them off. I’ll forego both, and instead add a note at the bottom that any holdover rent past the three days be at least double the norm as an incentive to move. Sellers always object to the amount, but I’ll point out that it doesn’t cost them a dime if they move as agreed. The form covers other specific terms too; including maintenance, insurance, utilities, and buyer entry.
5. Do your final walk-through at the last minute, and if you don’t get a warm fuzzy feeling that the sellers are about to move, then don’t close escrow.
Back in the day, we used to hand-carry a sellers’ proceeds check from one escrow company to the next for their closing – and they weren’t cashier’s checks. It took an extra day or two to get the next escrow closed, so it was natural to give the sellers the time to close and move into their new home. But today there is no reason to COE + 3, because we wire funds, and close concurrently every chance we can, even with different escrow companies involved (has to be the same title company).
Listing agents who insist on adding COE + 3 are just being tough guys and wanting to show everyone who the boss is – or on brain-dead automatic. Unfortunately, they must be ignorant to the liability they are forcing on their sellers and themselves.
If you get stuck having to accept a COE + 3, be cautious about making your moving plans for an exact date. If the sellers don’t move in three days, keep track of your expenses/damages and prepare for small-claims court – where you will win 100% of the time. If you have to evict, it’s not the end of the world – it’s a three-month inconvenience for which you should be reimbursed.
A listing that just closed escrow had this in the confidential remarks:
Seller will pay 6% commission if property is sold at $735,000 or higher; seller will pay 5% if property is sold for less than $735,000 – commission to be split 50/50 between listing and selling brokers.
In this case, the home sold for $715,000, but the agents can still say they made a decent living – and the seller can say he got a break on the commission for accepting a lower price (the list price was $735,000).
I love the idea of our pay being performance-based.
If listing agents promise to deliver a certain price, and they don’t, then sharing the pain with the seller would be a fair proposition.
Likewise, if a seller wanted to incentivize agents to sell the house for retail (or retail-plus), then the paying of an additional reward, or bounty, could make a difference.
The new purchase contract we were discussing? Yep, the buyer-agent’s commission is still not disclosed anywhere – buyers will never know if their agent got a bonus.
P.S. There is a category on our MLS to specify ‘yes’ or ‘no’ to a variable commission, which serves as an alert to the buyer-agents that the listing agent has an incentive plan, and/or a dual-agency discount.
Are you looking for an experienced agent to help you buy or sell a home?
Contact Jim the Realtor!
CA DRE #01527365, CA DRE #00873197
