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Houston: Looking to 2012

Monday, February 20th, 2012

Did Houston have a picture-perfect 2010? Well, not exactly, but there are more than a few reasons to look forward to what the Houston real estate market has to offer in 2012.

Houston in 2012 will enjoy a stronger real estate market, thanks to steady increases in the energy-related job market. It was this market that kept real estate agents busy leasing commercial property and showing homes to relocating individuals.

Housing in Houston in 2012 may see about a 5-percent increase as we head into the upcoming year, and the median price of a Houston home is expected to increase from 2 to 3 percent this year. Although these numbers are lower than what we may expect historically, they are still showing a steady growth in the Houston housing market.

Foreclosures in Houston

Since 2010, foreclosure postings and actual foreclosures have declined, and most real estate experts expect these declines to further accelerate in 2012. These declines are likely attributed to the tight lending standards that took place starting in 2009. It is also likely that the financial industry has finally started to make headway in their backlogs of foreclosures resulting from the recession.

It is clear that in order to begin seeing a turnaround in the real estate market lenders must deal with the foreclosure problem, which has been a strain on the industry since 2009. It is also important to understand that lenders will experience issues now for foreclosures that occurred three years prior, meaning that they are just now facing the music from the steep increase in foreclosures in 2009.

Home Loan Lending in Houston

The national mortgage market is still expected to decline in 2012 about 25 percent, although the large markets in Texas, such as Dallas and Houston, are expected to outperform national averages due to the strong job markets found here.

Houston continues to experience increases in its energy sector, which always buoys along the real estate market.

There are plenty of good reasons to look forward to a healthy real estate market in Houston in 2012, so many real estate experts will be keeping a close eye on this market in the months to come.

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Homebuyers Can Be Victims of Houston Home Mortgage Fraud

Wednesday, July 6th, 2011

The FBI, and the US attorney general have been on a mission since 2005 to arrest, and convict any person involved in committing fraud by deception when it comes to home loans. Even though a homebuyer has nothing to do with the scheme that many mortgage brokers are a part of, they can lose their homes all the same. There might even be some jail time involved until it can be proven that the consumer had nothing to do with the crime in the first place. It is unfortunate that this happens to unsuspecting people looking to buy their next or even first home, but greed is the deciding factor when it comes to any white-collar crime.

What happens in most cases, a married couple or even an individual will come into a lending institution to get approval for a home loan. The agent or broker will run their credit checks, and look at everything pertaining to their income, and backgrounds. They already know that these prospective applicants cannot be approved for a loan, but instead of telling them no, they falsify the records that they submit on the application to the host loan grantor to ensure approval.

Everything seems fine for a while, and the homeowners are happy to have received the loan, and have settled into to their new lives of home ownership. Then one day an FBI agent shows up at their front door and delivers the news about the loan being illegal due to the falsified information that was listed on the application. Usually these investigations are launched when a certain loan brokerage in the Houston area are having too many defaults under their name.

This causes an immediate foreclosure on the home, and the buyers are not only out of a place to live, they have lost their down payment, and all the closing fees that go along with the purchase. This happens more than some might think, and as home sales dwindle across America, these loan agents are becoming desperate to maintain certain levels of income from their commission on deals that they close. This is a very hard crime to prevent in the first place, as it is done without the applicants seeing the flawed information, and there is no way they can verify that the real documents were sent.

The outright defiling of the great American dream is happening all too often and is financially destroying families left and right. One way of verifying that the company cutting the check for you loan has the right information, is to contact them directly once approval is received, and ask for a copy of the application to verify it’s correctness.

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What Will Two Hundred Thousand Buy Today?

Monday, June 27th, 2011

Well quite a bit actually, and right now if a person has great credit and a down payment they can buy a dream home for two hundred thousand dollars. The State of Texas has always had more affordable housing, even in the luxury end of industry, but if you take that same amount and try to buy a home in Chicago, New York, or Hawaii, and you will not receive very much for your money. Currently a studio apartment on East 54th street in New York is going for $319,000.00, and that does not include the $568.00 monthly maintenance fees.

Right now a home shopper in the Metro area can find three bedroom two and one half bathroom homes that are new construction from the $121,000.00 range and up. Dual income households can easily afford the monthly mortgage payments, and up keep costs. One problem is that those typical thirty year mortgages are harder and harder to come by today. Most home loan lenders want bigger down payments, and a fifteen-year term. They are still gun shy from the fall out of all those sub-prime loans that were approved in the 2000s.

If you do not mind the commute, some super custom luxury homes, in areas like Spring, The Woodlands, Conroe, Magnolia, and Tomball are widely available. The Spring Texas area has been voted one of the most affordable and best places to live by many real estate, and financial publications in recent years. It is perfectly situated for work, outdoor activities, dinning, and entertainment. Add all those previously mentioned attributes to a reasonably, or below market priced home, and you have your own personal nirvana.

Prices remain extremely high in the Galleria, Hedwig Village, Memorial, and Spring Branch area, and unfortunately, $200k is not going allow for the purchase of a mini mansion or personal compound anytime soon. However, looking further west there also seems to be homebuyers frenzy out toward the Cypress, Texas area, and many PGA designed golf courses are popping up out there too.

For persons relocating their families to the Houston Metropolitan area, you will be like a kid in a candy store when you start shopping for a home. The overall lot sizes, options, and amenities in most suburban neighborhoods outshine any state in the Union when it comes to the bang for the buck factor.

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Are You Having A Tough Time Buying A Home in Houston Right Now?

Thursday, June 23rd, 2011

Well you are not alone with this issue, and many people would love to move out their apartment, or rented home, and start living that “American Dream”, of being a bona-fide homeowner. There are many reasons that people are not qualifying for home mortgages in the Harris County and surrounding areas right now, and some consumers will have multiple reasons preventing them from buying their dream home. There is a huge inventory of available homes all over the Metroplex, but even lowering the prices on them does not seem to make them move any faster to a sale.

Debt To Income Ratio

There are stricter standards being laid out as this is being written, and the old sixty percent debt to income ratio will no longer be tolerated. The new figure that Fannie Mae has put into operation is forty five percent, which cuts down on the consumer’s buying power quite a bit. The government and the lending industry as a whole know that all to often homebuyers, mortgage agents, and realtors will try to force a sale on a home that cannot be afforded. In a perfect world your housing costs would not run over twenty-five percent of a person’s annual income. This is a figure that is from the 1970s and 1980s, and people do not mind being drowned in debt currently.

Foreclosures

This has put many people in the rental market, and there currently not any home loan companies that will take a chance on someone that has already lost their home due to financial difficulties. For these future homebuyers, it would be wisest to get out of debt and rebuild their credit file, and score for a purchase a few years down the road. It is also a good time to just completely get out of debt, so when your credit is restore, there will only be the house note on your debt to income ratio.

Mortgage Lenders Missing The Closing Dates

This issue has everyone involved in the home buying process enraged currently. Home loan companies are given a closing date, and they agree to it, but just as quickly they will add, “but we cannot guarantee the date”. What happens is that the closing day comes, and the lender has not responded, or worse yet the day before, they have new issues about the loan, and they will need more time to let the borrow correct the situation. No one really understands the stall tactics, at all, but it is making home sellers rich, because the can refuse to extend the closing date, and just pocket the earnest money that was put down.

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A Stay-Cation May Be More Desirable When You Live At Cinco Ranch

Monday, June 13th, 2011

The real estate market in Houston has never been more competitive, and planned communities are pulling out all the stops to ensure they get a share of those property sales in the future. Cinco Ranch has really raised the bar when it comes to quality of life, and self contained entertainment. Every where a Cinco Ranch resident turns they have resort like amenities that are nothing less than breath taking to say the least. Cinco Ranch is like Disney World with luxury homes intermingled around all the attractions.

Usually any planned community will have a swimming pool or two, but the water features in this slice of paradise challenge vacation resorts built for family fun. To call anything in the Cinco area a pool is understatement, as they are more like “Water Entertainment Features”, there is something for any age level in your family. They even have fishing in the five lakes, but it is noted on their website that all anglers must practice catch and release.

Do you want to go to the beach without having to travel down to Galveston? That is no problem, as C.R. has it’s own beach with lagoon for you and whole family to catch some rays, and further your outdoor living experience. The kids have a couple of water park features where they can run around umbrellas that double as fountains let them get wet for fun, and to stay cool, plus another area that has two story water slides for some exhilarating slide and splash activities.

The Beach Club by far can create many great family memories, as you and the kids can build sand castles right at the waters edge. The water and sand are not seperated so you have more of a beachfront experience than most manmade beach areas usually offer. There are also the standard neighborhood pools that are closer to everyone’s home, but getting out to the The Lake House Pool will by far be most fun the whole family can have at one location. There is even a big screen display to watch movies at night while splashing around in the pool.

The real estate offerings at Cinco Ranch and all the superb amenities make this a great choice for any age range, and the school system in Katy Texas is second to none, when it comes to your child’s education.

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Do Not Even Think About Lying On Your Houston Home Mortgage

Tuesday, May 17th, 2011

The Houston real estate market seems to be a lot healthier than the rest of the United States right now, and people still have their dream of owning a home. There are times when a person wants something so much, they will lie to reach their goal, and that is happening quite frequently in H-Town lately. Apartment dwellers that cannot wait to purchase a stand alone home are being very bold in they way they fill out their home loan applications, and this is going to cost them dearly if they are successful in obtaining a mortgage with incorrect data. The mortgage industry as a whole has tightened the reins on approval even more over the last few years, and people are pushing the envelope in what they must do to be approved.

Since most loans are secured with the guarantee of the Federal Housing Administration currently, people inflating their incomes, and having others verify the lies all fall under eye of the federal government. Ten years ago, they could not tell who was lying on the home loan application more, the broker, or the applicant, and the truth is both were doing it without the other knowing. Now more exhaustive background checks are being done on home mortgage documents, and the odds are that you will be doing a few years in a federal prison for what you might have thought was just a little white lie.

It is not worth the few months or even maybe two years of living in a home of your own, to only losing it, and possibly your family, and all personal possessions. This type of crime brings down the full weight of the US District Attorney, FBI, and the Internal Revenue Service on your head. Climbing out of such a scenario and rebuilding your life will take years if not decades.

Do yourself a favor and use the time when you cannot qualify for a home loan, to clean up past credit infractions, get more education for a better paying job, and get that credit score up to 750 if not higher. Staying out of debt will also help in getting to that place you need to be for buying a home as well.

There is a reason there are certain guidelines for mortgage approval, and the lender will know if you fit the guidelines when telling the truth. Dishonesty about income will only help for a few months, because in reality the funds from your real monthly salary will not be able to cover the loan payments anyway.

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The Devil Is In The Details When Selling Your Home

Wednesday, May 11th, 2011

After living a in single family home for over a decade, we tend to get a little lazy when it comes to home upkeep, and those annoying water drips, or slow evacuating drains are overlooked most of the time. People then panic and have a long list of “Honey Do’s” all of a sudden when it comes time to sell their house, or vacation property. The cost of repairs when items are taken care of when they need fixing is a lot less pricey than having to hire a contractor to come in at the last minute and help.

You see these before and after type of home staging shows on the Home and Garden television network where they have a group of realtors come in and inspect a property to see why it’s not selling. Many times, it is the overall decor of the home that is not appealing, but cracked floor, and counter tiles, or chipped bricks on the fireplace will be glaring warts on your home when prospective buyers are doing a formal walkthrough. The wood-trim around doors and windows may be faded or scratched up from years of pets putting their paws on them and scratching the surface. As you can see the to-do list is getting bigger than you thought it might.

The most important room in the house currently is the kitchen, followed by the bathrooms. If they are dated, and dingy then do not be surprised if shoppers do an about face, and leave before even inquiring about the asking price. It is fairly normal to spend fifteen to thirty-thousand dollars on fixing up, and properly staging a home for the most possible buyers currently. If this is not in your budget, then chances are you will have to take a large chunk of your selling price off the table.

People in general are not that creative when it comes to making a home appealing, but they know what they like when they see it. Therefore, if you have the creativity of a fence post then seek immediate professional help. Your agent can give you all the references needed to get the repairs, proper decor, and overall exterior rejuvenation done, and create a showplace that people cannot wait to buy.

If you want to kill any chance of your agent working their magic, then stick around for the open house. This is the kiss of death, as other real estate agents, and prospects will be very open about their comments concerning your home, and even if you are thick skinned it makes for awkward moments that could reduce the chances of moving the property. So take the family and make it a day at the Zoo or nearest water park while the open house is in operation.

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Home Prices In Houston Texas Are Rising Despite National Averages

Tuesday, May 10th, 2011

February brought a surprise to many real estate professionals as the housing prices rose more than they ever had in history for that particular month. It is quite confusing to most, as the sales for single-family homes are still muted slightly, but the prices continue to rise. This could be that many are speculating on the oil and gas industry creating more well paying jobs in the near future, as the price per barrel of crude oil continues to rise currently. Texas is surely blessed right now as far as a much stronger economy than most of the US is currently having to weather.

It is definitely a buyers market still, but for first time homebuyers, the signals are mixed for those that are almost at a point of being able purchase right now. Even though Oil prices are high, that means that even Houstonians are going to have to shell out five dollar per gallon prices that are on their way. Household budget in general wane when taking a monetary hit like that, and could cause some homebuyers to pause their real estate hunting for now. When you hear stories about people having to get personal loans to buy fuel to drive to work that is a red flag that should heeded.

For those who have the funds on tap to buy a home in the Houston Metro area right now, the timing could not be more perfect, as many luxury custom homes can be found at near wholesale prices. This is also a great time for real estate flippers that can wait out the market, and let prices naturally rise back to where they were just a few years ago.

Jobs are being added daily and from 2010 to 2011 the oil and gas sector added nearly sixty thousand jobs in the Bayou City. The real problem for brokers and agents is finding the perfect storm for a sale, and that means having the properly priced inventory, and prospective homeowners that have excellent credit. The fall out of foreclosures that has taken place over the past thirty six months has tarnished credit scores, and forced many to search for apartments, since they can no longer qualify for a home mortgage. Sadly now there is an apartment shortage, and landlords are requiring excellent credit to be approved for a lease.

The home prices have lowered but so have salaries, so if people can get their credit scores back up to the mid seven hundred range, a save up a decent down payment, then they should have no trouble purchasing a home.

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Get Out Of Debt Before Shopping For Houston Real Estate Part Two

Wednesday, May 4th, 2011

This is the next installment on getting out of debt in order to get approved for a new home loan. These are just old fashioned “common sense” guidelines, that many will balk at, but will really help in getting back to a realistic financial condition.

The next step is downsize what you are buying at the grocery store, and the first thing to go is all those processed foods, and prepared meals that save you time, but charge you three times as much as cooking yourself. In addition, it will not kill the family to not have meat on their dinner plate a couple of times a week. Beans and rice with some flour tortillas will be hot, and nourishing, and the more you can save in these small ways will add up to big amounts of money to payoff that snowball of debt. Next cut way back on all the snacks, paying five to seven dollars for a ten ounce bag of “gourmet chips” is insane, and just a plain waste of personal funds.

Forget going out to the movies for the duration, and introduce family movie night at home. It only costs a dollar to rent a DVD from one of those big red boxes in front of the local McDonalds or Walgreen’s. A couple bags of microwave popcorn will only cost about thirty cents each, and have iced tea, Kool-Aid or water as a beverage. There for about two bucks everyone can enjoy a movie, or even two without dropping sixty to ninety dollars at the movie theater.

This next subject might get a little touchy especially with teenagers, but the cell phones have either got to go away, or be reduced to the most basic plan available. Spending several hundred dollars a month so everyone in the household can surf the net, and send text messages on an unlimited basis is just a waste of time, and money. Explain to your children why you are doing this, and it is for the overall good of the family’s financial future. Then tell them that if they need to text, and send photos, or update their Facebook pages all the time, then they need to get part time jobs to pay for their own service plan.

It will be tough at first, because everyone is going to be taken out of their comfort zone, and the children will declare they are victims of child abuse because they cannot have everything they want when they want it, but everything will level out, if you stick to your plan.

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Get Out Of Debt Before Shopping For Houston Real Estate Part One

Monday, May 2nd, 2011

Salaries are down, and so are home prices, but there are so many people burdened with large credit card debt that they could not get approved for a doll house loan, much less a Houston home mortgage right now. People have become so accustomed to getting what they want when they want it, they are actually shocked when not being approved for a new home loan. The level of entitle in the United States is so out of proportion that many are getting a wake up call when they are shopping for Houston real estate right now.

Sure the prices are great, and custom homes are being sold at spec home builder prices right now. But if you cannot get a loan due to your Debt to Income ratio, then take a step back, and look at your personal life, and start devising a plan of getting out of debt before even thinking about looking at another home with a for sale sign in the front yard. There are plenty of great systems in place currently that can give you a plan, or guide in knocking out all debt in as little as six months or over a period of a few years.

This means cutting out all those extras that you, your spouse, and kids think they need on a daily basis. Create a spreadsheet or list on what your current monthly spending is, and what your income is currently. If you are like most people in this country, the spending is higher than the paycheck or checks coming in to the home. Start cutting out luxuries immediately. No more five-dollar coffees, and three-dollar muffins on the way to work, eat cereal with your kids and have some quality time. Take your lunch, and save the ten to twenty you are blowing each day. Make a food budget, and only cook at home, eating out is one of the biggest killers of family financial independence.

Next, cut out services like mowing, house keeping, magazine subscriptions, and take your cable down to the most basic package. Doing chores around the home is what Saturdays were made for, and it will not hurt the whole family to pitch in to get everything accomplished. Also, absolutely stop going on weekend getaways, sure everyone deserves a break every now and again, but that is only if they can afford it at the time, and not putting it on their credit cards.

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