Found 18 blog entries tagged as real estate.

When you check into the latest real estate listings in Coastal Delaware, you come away with an accurate snapshot of our current market. But when you are thinking of the future, and where values might be headed, it’s also useful to think nationally.

Useful, yes: but careful! There is a tendency to mentally equate the equities market averages – Dow Jones, S&P, Nasdaq – with the real estate market. They are certainly related: one of the causes of the 2008 Dow plunge was the collapse of the subprime mortgage market, which led to the glut of foreclosed homes in realty listings. Yet, the two markets are far from identical. 

According to Yale University professor Robert Shiller, the number one driver of the value of realty listings is momentum. If the prices…

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The recent annual National Association of Realtors® get-together opened with a grand gathering to hear what some economics heavyweights would say about coming conditions in the country.

You could hear a pin drop through most of it – despite the huge size of the auditorium. Our Rehoboth Beach real estate market is never in total lockstep with the national picture – but it certainly is affected by it. Economists are forced to play a guessing game, but the best are pretty good at it.

Wells Fargo’s senior economist Mark Vintner had good news and bad news. For those who have Rehoboth Beach real estate already in their ‘owned’ portfolio, despite the downturn of recent years, he thinks they own one of the few top-notch inflation-proof investments. “Real…

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FSBO: “For Sale By Owner” -- it can be a siren’s call when you first mull over the prospects for selling your house.  A Rehoboth Beach FSBO listing promises to allow a homeowner to sell without even consulting any local real estate agents! Depending on a home’s final sale price, the commission saved looks to be substantial.

While there are certainly theoretical attractions to the idea of working on your own, time and again statistics prove it is not only more efficient to work with a real estate agent -- it also frequently nets sellers more at the bottom line. There are logical reasons why it works out that way. They are the same reasons why only one in ten homes are successfully sold as FSBOs.

First off, while it may seem easy to arbitrarily pick a…

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When you have survived a career loss or made it through a foreclosure, it can take a while before you have picked yourself up and dusted yourself off. At that point, you may have been momentarily relieved to find that you have a lot of company. Nevertheless, sooner or later, it’s time to bounce back.

One of the universal hurdles almost everyone in this position faces is how to go about stepping up to secure their next home. One of our Rehoboth Beach rentals is always a choice, but for many, an unsatisfying one. As always in any other than boom times, cash is king -- and if you don’t have it, your options are limited.  Today’s would-be buyers who lack funds for a down payment (or have a credit deficit) do sometimes have another alternative: a lease…

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One of the key factors serious buyers eye when appraising foreclosed homes for sale in the Rehoboth Beach real estate market is condition – the shape those properties have been left in. The Federal Housing Administration has weighed in with a program that can materially affect how that condition – good or bad – will finally affect the bottom line: it’s known as the FHA 203 (k).

If you are among those currently looking at Rehoboth Beach foreclosed homes for sale, the 203(k) can make a big difference.  Here are some points that might influence your decision:

First in line is whether the program is applicable. HUD tells us that for a local property to be eligible, it must be a one- to four-family dwelling that has been completed for at least one year.…

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How about this for a stunner: each and every day for the next 17 years, more than 10,000 American "baby boomers" will hit retirement age. That is based on 65 being considered retirement age (although many 65-year-olds I know haven’t the slightest intention of abandoning their careers anytime soon). Nevertheless, the impact that this demographic wave will have on everybody is bound to be substantial.

In the housing industry, even seniors who are anything but retired will be gravitating toward newer, smaller homes that better fit the lifestyle of adults whose children are now out on their own. So some fine-tuning of property listings will be in order. I expect more Rehoboth Beach property listings to start emphasizing smaller footprints and some other…

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In August, the number of new foreclosures listed nationally barely crept upward -- even as average sale prices leapt dramatically. Realtytrac compiles the numbers, and they show a sizeable 10%+ jump in foreclosure sales prices from July to August. Of course, homes listed as foreclosures and short sales still close at prices markedly lower than homes sold in traditional transactions, but that rise in price seems to say that more buyers are feeling confident that a home purchased now will look like a wise move in the future.

If you have been looking at the distressed property market in the Delaware Resort area, these numbers suggest that the short sale and foreclosure possibilities are still being created -- and that the value they represent is getting a…

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Nationally, the supply of the bank-owned properties for sale has been trending down -- potentially good news for anyone and everyone with an interest in Rehoboth Beach real estate. Competition from the glut of foreclosed properties has had the effect of driving down home sale prices, so any drop in the number of Rehoboth Beach short sales and REO (bank-owned) properties will remove that downward pressure.

If the trend continues, it should also affect even the bank owned properties themselves. A drop in supply will increase competition for the bargains they represent. But this is why alert bargain hunters should keep their pencils sharpened. As retail merchants understand, just slapping a ‘SALE!’ sign on an item may help it sell -- even if it isn’t…

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