May 07
Squatters Cite Laws to Stay in Homes for Free. With the number of vacant homes dwindling, house squatters are getting bolder. They’re moving into homes and staying for free, citing adverse possession law in some states, which allows a person to claim title to an abandoned property after occupying it for a certain amount …
May 06
Latest Real Estate Scam Has Agents on Alert. Scammers are scraping rental listings off the Internet and using real estate agents’ identity from the listings to dupe would-be clients. Practitioners may not even discover it until the clients confront them, demanding keys for a property they believed they rented and had already mailed a …
May 06
8 Best Markets for Flipping Houses. More investors are rehabilitating homes and looking to sell them for profit, a move known as flipping houses. RealtyTrac recently evaluated more than 600 metro areas to find where flipping single-family homes offers some of the highest returns based on the investor’s gross profit. The top eight metros …
May 03
Loan Demand Rises as Rates Fall Mortgage applications climbed 2 percent last week as several key interest rates dropped, the Mortgage Bankers Association reports. Mortgage applications for refinancings, which make up the biggest bulk of MBA’s index, rose 3 percent for the week ending April 26, reaching its highest level since January. Meanwhile, mortgage …
May 03
Housing Price Surge ‘Simply Supply and Demand’. Home prices are rising at the fastest rate in years, with some areas even seeing double-digit increases. “Nobody that I’m aware of anticipated the kind of price growth that we’ve had,” says Budge Huskey, chief executive of Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC. “It’s simple supply and demand.” …
May 02
Strongest Job Markets Have Biggest Home Price Rises Job growth is helping to lift the housing market in key areas. The three cities that are posting some of the strongest price growth year-over-year are also seeing faster job growth than the national average, according to government data. Phoenix, San Francisco, and Las Vegas have …
May 02
Home Ownership Rate Drops to Lowest Point in 18 Years. The U.S. home ownership rate has fallen to its lowest point since 1995, the Census Bureau reports. The home ownership rate dropped to 65 percent in the first quarter, down slightly from 65.4 percent a year earlier. Housing analysts say tight credit conditions, constrained …
May 01
4 Ways to Boost Exposure on LinkedIn. LinkedIn can help real estate agents create a unique and personal professional brand by taking control of the people they connect with, the groups they join, the recommendations they give and receive, and the ways they express their real estate skills and experience. Here’s how: Agents need …
May 01
Renters Say More Buildings Should Welcome Pets. Seventy-five percent of renters say they own pets, yet many are not able to find enough pet-friendly rental options, a new survey of 1,100 renters by Apartments.com shows. Last year, only 43 percent of renters said they owned pets. More than 60 percent of survey respondents say …
Apr 30
Explore Short Sale Lease Back Programs. A Riverside, Calif. real estate broker has debuted a Short Sale Lease Back program. Other organizations are coming up with similar programs to help home owners get back on their feet again after a short sale. Bob Irish, with Lake Hills Realty and CEO of National Short Sales, …
Apr 30
Home Contractor Scams a Growing Concern. Home contractor scams are often on the rise in the spring, and home owners should take steps to make sure they aren’t duped. The scams often target the elderly, with scammers offering to complete yard or household work for money up-front and then never completing the work after …
Apr 29
House Flipping Staging a Comeback? More Americans are once again on the hunt to snag a home at bargain prices, fix it up, and then try to resell it for a quick profit. Home flippers mostly vanished from the market during the housing downturn a few years ago. But with home values inching up, …
