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Buyer's Markets: Time for Listing Agents To Earn Their Money
One of the most common things I'm seeing as I roam about the East County looking for bargains: Agents not doing their jobs. Even when there were 40-plus sellers per buyer, single family detached homes that are priced appropriately were...
Multiple Mortgage Inquiries Do Not Drop Your Credit Score
>broker incurred 19 inquires in 1 week dropping my score. B.S. I'd go the full Penn and Teller on this one if I wasn't trying to stay family friendly. The law is clear on this one, and practice is fully...
Nightmare Mortgages and Self-Destructive Behavior
This article started with another one of those desperate consumer fishing calls a while ago. Loan standards have tightened since then (In my considered opinion, over-tightened and the lenders and Wall Street will figure it out within a couple years)....
Why Sellers Should Counter All Reasonable Offers
I just got off the phone with an agent who claims to have three offers on the property, but he doesn't want to counter the offer. He just wants my client to voluntarily throw more money (or more something)...
The Tollbooth Model of Real Estate Agency
Over the last couple of decades, there's been a rising movement, mostly on the part of those who want a piece of real estate agents business, to sell agents as a toll booth. Tollbooths sit there, guarding the entry to...
Financing Tricks and Calculating What You Can Really Afford in a Home Loan
(Note: the available loan options have shrunk since this was first written, and the rates are significantly lower right now, but the main point is calculating what you can and cannot really afford) Hi Dan, I am a first time...
There's No Real Way to Take The Complexity Out of Real Estate
Every so often I get e-mail asking why real estate transactions are so complex. Matter of fact, I have this discussion with most clients at some point. The answer is, "Because real estate transactions for a lot of money, and...
The Economics of Housing Development
The genesis of this article is Something's Gotta Give, a report (.pdf format) from the Center For Housing Policy. Furthermore, there is an article in the Washington Times from UPI that connects the dots on the tactical level. The...
How to Effectively Shop For A Listing Agent (Part I)
This is the final article in this series, and the most difficult. The reason is very simple: Unlike shopping for buyer's agents or shopping for loans, you have to make a binding choice - it is in your best interest...
"Buy and Bail" or Buying One Home Before Foreclosure on Another
This has been a noticeable phenomenon for quite a while in San Diego. I've been loath to talk about it because I didn't want to be giving fraudsters ideas. Most lenders have now put into place safeguards against this measure....
Rental History and Payment Shock in Applying for a Mortgage
First, I just got engaged, and my fiancee and I have been discussing what we want in a house after we get married. It will be the first house for both of us. She spent the last two years...
The History of Suburban Housing
For at least the last thirty years, I've been hearing "affordable housing" advocates yammer about the high cost of housing, and how working families can no longer afford "decent" housing, which they apparently consider to be the three or...
Mortgage Lenders Don't Want to Compete on Actual Price
Yet that is exactly what you want them to do. To avoid competing on price, they have all kinds of distractions they offer to make life more convenient, but not cheaper. They offer automatic payment options, the convenience of having...
Why You Want To Price Your Property Correctly From Day One
This article is for sellers who want to put their property on the market priced too high "just to see if we can get it." I know where sellers get this notion. A lot of people are out there...
Negative Equity and Short Payoff Scams
Saw a sign driving: "Negative Equity? Sell and Get cash!" Notice that it doesn't claim that you can do so legally. I saw another of these signs on the way to the office this morning. When things are going sour,...
CBB: The Art of Setting Buyer's Agency Compensation on a Listing
First off, let me make something very plain. All a CBB (Cooperating Buyer's Broker compensation) can do is give good agent an incentive or disincentive to look at the property. A high one will not, by itself, sell the...
Title Insurance, or Preventing Fifty Ways to Lose Your Money
Yes, I've always kind of liked Paul Simon. But this post was inspired by something I ran across from a title company. And just to make certain you realize what I'm saying, it's fifty ways to lose your money if...
Fixing The Real Estate Mess - Proposing Some Small Changes That Would Make A Huge Difference Over Time
Yesterday, I published the first half of this article, describing the issues currently preventing a return to a more normal real estate market, and the facts that any proposed solution needs to be built upon. At a quick recap, the...
Fixing The Real Estate Mess - My Grunt's Eye View - Proposing Some Small Changes That Would Make A Huge Difference Over Time
Yesterday, I published the first half of this article, describing the issues currently preventing a return to a more normal real estate market, and the facts that any proposed solution needs to be built upon. At a quick recap, the...
Why Sellers Should Counter All Reasonable Offers
I just got off the phone with an agent who claims to have three offers on the property, but he doesn't want to counter the offer. He just wants my client to voluntarily throw more money (or more something)...
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