Category: Blog

Mortgage Rates To Rise?

 

While we wrapped up 2014 with mortgage rates at near historic lows (30 year fixed mortgage rates at 3.87%), things are almost certain to change soon. According to the Mortgage Bankers Association, mortgage rates should be around 5% by the end of 2015, and they aren’t alone in their thinking. The financial website Investopedia echos those predictions and recently had the following to say:

“Barring another financial and housing market implosion, and if the economy continues to improve, expect interest rates to rise in the latter half of 2015. If they do jump to the 5% range it will be a modest hike when compared to historical averages. Rates will still be far below the approximately 8.5% 30-year fixed-rates mortgages have averaged since 1971 when Freddie Mac started tracking them. Rates averaged 6% in the years leading up to the recession.”

Our friends at KCM have provided the following chart that lists the mortgage rate projections from the Mortgage Bankers Association, Freddie Mac, Fannie Mae and the National Association of Realtors:

 

Home Winterizing Checklists

The cold has arrived and with it can come damage and wasted energy. But some simple and low cost maintenance and weatherproofing tasks can save you money on your energy bill and keep the damaging weather where it belongs…outside your home!

Many homeowners think that winterizing their home will be prohibitively expensive and labor intensive. The good news is that neither needs to be the case. While the checklist of points you should cover each season can seem daunting, most of what needs to be done can be achieved for a few hundred dollars or less, depending on your home and how often it has been maintained.

Some Of The Items To Get Your List Started

  • Gaps around exterior doors
  • Improving window insulating using easy and low cost kits
  • Weather-stripping
  • Heat and air conditioning filter replacement
  • Front and back door threshold sweep strips

Continue reading “Home Winterizing Checklists”

Holiday Home Staging Tips

This may be the most wonderful time of the year…but as we all know, that doesn’t usually extend to the Real Estate market. If you aren’t putting a painful dent in the down payment fund with all that shopping, then you’re busy with party after party, family in town for visits, etc. For all of its seasonal traditions, December is not traditionally the season for Real Estate. For that reason many home sellers understandably feel that putting much effort into staging or prepping their homes during the holidays is just that…too much effort. Well they would be wrong. Because that just means that those who ARE looking are very serious indeed…and definitely intend to buy.

This doesn’t mean a lot of extra work beyond what you are already doing. Just a holiday twist on your attention to detail will do quite nicely. Follow these holiday home staging tips and find your stocking well stuffed when the fat man comes to town, or at least a home buyer with a fat wallet!

Stage Your Home, Not a Revival

Remember that while this may be a very spiritual time of year for you, many of your potential home buyers are likely to have a different take on it than you. Don’t beat potential buyers over the head with anything too religious in nature, but just some neutral holiday cheer and good will. You are out to sell your home, not convert the buyer.
Continue reading “Holiday Home Staging Tips”

Mortgage Mistakes To Avoid

Before jumping in the car to pick out the perfect home to buy, take a few minutes to read and go over these mortgage mistakes that are made far too often and usually end up costing homeowners BIG TIME! At this time of year, and when planning the most important purchase of your life, the last thing you want to do is end up with a fat lump of coal in your stocking that you’ll be paying on for years!

1. All Mortgages Are NOT The Same!

If the last 6 years have taught us anything it’s that you don’t want to be stuck with the wrong mortgage as these can cost you dearly. Find out what all your mortgage options are. Then make a full side by side comparison of each to find out which is right for you. Don’t forget to factor in worst-case scenarios and always plan to have some emergency savings to deal with such contingencies.

Tip: Use our Mortgage Calculator to help you make the most accurate estimates before you begin the process.
Continue reading “Mortgage Mistakes To Avoid”

Austin Housing Market Update Seeing Green

Austin Real Estate Keeps Improving

Austin Home Sales Way Up While Prices In February Reach Record High.

Austin Home Sales and the Real Estate Market in general have swum out to sea long enough looking for that elusive break heading back they can start riding to the more stable shores we’ve come to long for. ABOR has just released the latest Multiple Listing Service report and according to the Austin Board of Realtors®, just under 1800 single-family homes were sold in February throughout the Austin area. That’s a 9% increase over the prior year during the same time. The Median price for one of our amazing Austin area homes was just over $230,000, also a big jump over same time last year to the tune of an 11% increase. Not such a weird place now, huh?

Says Bill Evens, ABOR President for 2014, ““The Austin-area housing market continues to be strong and home buyers remain aggressive. Sales are increasing year-over-year and rising home starts have begun to offset Austin’s shrinking housing inventory. These factors taken together make it look like we will have a great real estate year in 2014.” Continue reading “Austin Housing Market Update Seeing Green”

Helpful First Time Homebuyer Tools

 

After all the preparation, hard work, saving and planning, buying your first home is easily the most important and exciting purchase of your life thus far. However, once you start the process of buying a new home or condo, you’re going to quickly realize that the entire process can be difficult, confusing and at times totally overwhelming. All the more reason you need every tool at your disposal to ensure that everything goes smoothly. To that end we have assembled a short list of tools that all first-time home buyers should make use of.

Free Credit Reports
Knowing your credit score, if you’ll be able to qualify for financing and for how much is obviously the most important starting place for potential first time homebuyers. Many who haven’t been through this process before have no idea what their credit score is and just assume that the info on their report will be accurate and good enough to secure a loan. Not so. It’s vital that you know exactly what is and isn’t included on your report and what your score is. Free credit report sites like FreeScore.com and FreeCreditReport.com are great resources (and free!) that will give you a clear understanding of what potential lenders are going to see when determining your credit worthiness. While paid services will give you a more detailed look at your score, free services such as these are more than enough and certainly get the job done.

Mortgage Info
After what the Real Estate Market and the nation in general has gone through over the past 5 years due to the mortgage meltdown, knowing and really understanding the various types of mortgages available to you is vital. There is a wealth of information online regarding mortgages and doing a quick search will bring up thousands of results. You can weed through these for a few weeks or make it a lot easier and visit Mortgage101.com instead. In addition to information about the various home loans types, here you’ll also find lender directories (including bad credit lenders, VA and FHA home lenders), current mortgage rates and help finding a Realtor.

Licensed Realtors and Buyer Agents
While Do It Yourself in home repairs and upkeep has become the norm and can be very rewarding, DIY Real Estate is a road fraught with danger and should always be the road less travelled. Licensed Realtors and Buyer Agents are a vital part of the home buying process, and for good reason. First and foremost a Realtor or Buyers Agent is solely representing you the buyer, NOT the home seller. They know the market better than you, they know local laws and regulations that relate to home ownership better than you, they are paid by the owner when the house closes and thus cost you NOTHING, and if you hit any type of snag throughout the process, a Realtor can best help you deal with any situation that arises.

Programs and Assistance
The Real Estate Market has changed quite a bit over the past few years due to the economy. Getting financing for a new home or condo is more difficult now and higher down payments are now the norm. This puts additional financial burdens on the first-time home buyer, thus knowing what programs and other assistance is out there and available to you is so vital. Take a little time to familiarize yourself with any and all home buying credits and/or home buyer grants that are available to you in your particular state. HUD’s Local Home Buying Programs is a great place to start.

Schools
A tool that is indispensable to all homebuyers with children is the ability to easily check out available schools in a particular area. If buying a home in a given school district or close to a specific school is important to you (football parents here in Austin know exactly what I’m talking about), then the School Finder at Education.com and wealth of info at GreatSchools.org will certainly be of great help. From district and school stats, rankings, test scores, area maps, student-teacher ratios, and full contact info for all, both of these sites are a must to all first-time homebuyers with kids.

Photo: StockMonkeys.com