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Tag Archives: business of real estate

Flashback Friday… Mortgage Thoughts…

Friday, 29 October 2010 08:43
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Ken Marrero and Ken Cook (right)

Ken is on the right Image by The Ken Cook via Flickr

Over the last few weeks I have worked with a few buyers that have had questions about mortgages, pre-approvals and “the process”…  Oddly, as I was looking for a post from last year, I stumbled onto a collection of Ken Cook (the mortgage dude, not the weather dude) posts I had highlighted about those very things.

I assembled a few quotes from 3 of Ken’s (then) recent posts and linked back to them for more info.  He puts out a LOT of great info about the mortgage side of real estate, and he is my “GoTo Guy” for financing.

So, wander back and see a few “Mortgage Thoughts from Ken…“.  Let me know what you think.

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Lawrenceville, GA Market Report, September 2010

Tuesday, 26 October 2010 08:06
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This map shows the incorporated and unincorpor...
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Market stats for Lawrenceville, September, 2010, indicate that there are 16309 properties on the market. Overall, there is about an 9.8 month supply of properties, with sales weakening since June. Sales dropped off dramatically this year compared to last.

In the sub-$200k arena, there are 1273 listings, with about a 8.6 month supply of homes. Sales accelerated through June, but then fell off as the tax credit was slated to end.  While inventories are down from just a couple of years ago, for the recent past, they are still high.

Between $200k and $400k, there are 292 listings for sale, and about 18.3 months of supply.  Sales have slowed dramatically, if unevenly, since June.  And sales were down compared to last year.

From $400k to $600k, there are 27 homes on the market. The absorption rate is around 4½ years.  However, with the level of sales in this segment, a couple of sales added or subtracted can have a HUGE impact.  There were no sales for July, August or September, and only three in the two preceding months.

In the $600k to $800k arena, there are 12 listings, with about 36 months of supply.  As with the next lower priced segment, a couple of sales makes a big difference and there were only two sales since November, 2009 (One each, April and July).

Above $800k there are 5 homes listed and not enough sales data to give an accurate absorption rate.  There hasonly been one sale in this range in the last 24 months, according to FMLS.

Lawrenceville is in Gwinnett County, GA, just outside of Atlanta. As of the 2000 Census, there were 22,937 people in Lawrenceville, but that is only including people in the city limits, and there has been a lot of growth since 2000 in Gwinnett County (2008 estimates from the Census Bureau peg population around 29,000). It was incorporated in 1821. Lawrenceville is home to Central Gwinnett High School, and also has students that the Mountain View and Archer clusters. It is also home to Gwinnett Technical College and Georgia Gwinnett College. Another recent addition to Lawrenceville is that it is home to the Gwinnett Braves, playing at the Gwinnett Stadium on GA20 between I-85 and GA316. Possibly the most famous resident of Lawrenceville was Oliver Hardy. As a small boy he lived in Lawrenceville with his parents for a short time. Lawrenceville was also home to Junior Samples. Some of its other residents included Jeff Francouer, Brian McCann and Jennifer Ferrin.

I have a page dedicated to Lawrenceville Market Data.

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Lilburn, GA Market Report, September 2010

Monday, 25 October 2010 08:46
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This map shows the incorporated and unincorpor...
Image via Wikipedia

Market stats for Lilburn, September, 2010, indicates that there are 443 properties on the market (as of September 30th). Overall, there is about a 9.8 month supply of properties.  Lilburn is actually mid-pack among cities in Gwinnett County.  Absorption Rates had been improving since March, until September.  In fact, in March there was 15.3 months of inventory.

In the sub-$200k arena, there are 273 listings, with about an 7.7 month supply.  This represents most of the sales in the market area, and reflects the same improvement in inventory levels, continuously since March.  And, one other thing to keep in mind is that sales were strong compared to September 2009 (32 v 25).

Between $200k and $400k, there are 146 listings for sale, and about 19 months of supply. This segment has also been getting stronger each month since March, until this month.  There were only 2 sales in September 2010, compared to 11 last year.

From $400k to $600k, there are 20 homes on the market. The absorption rate is around 15 months. There was one more sale in September 2010 (1) v September 2009 (0) as this year, but there were no sales in this segment in May, June or July this year.  Last summer was much stronger overall.  With just a few sales, just one or two can make a huge difference.

Above $600k, there are 4 listings, but too few sales to have any sort of reliable number of months of inventory.  There has been one sale in the last three months, but prior, there had only been a few other sales in 2010 (January, March and August).  One of the listings is above $800k, and there is no market activity in the last 12 months for that range…

Lilburn is in Gwinnett County, GA, just outside of Atlanta.  As of the 2000 Census, there were 11,307 people in Lilburn, but that is only including people in the city limits, and there has been a lot of growth since 2000 in Gwinnett County.  It was incorporated in 1910.  Lilburn is home to Parkview High School, and also has students that the Brookwood, Berkmar and Meadowcreek clusters. It is also home to Killian Hill Christian School, Providence Chrisian Academy, St. John Neumann Catholic School and Parkview Christian School.  Possibly the most famous resident of Lilburn is General Beauregard Lee, a groundhog with a better winter prediction record that Puxatawnee Phil up in PA. Dominique Wilkins, formerly of the Atlanta Hawks also lives in Lilburn.

I have a page dedicated to Lilburn Market Data.

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Finished or Unfinished Basements…

Thursday, 21 October 2010 08:15
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Map of Georgia highlighting Gwinnett County
Image via Wikipedia

I had the opportunity to sit in on REData Center‘s presentation about the state of the Gwinnett County Real Estate Market for the 3rd Quarter at NAMAR (Northeast Atlanta Metro Association of REALTORS) on October 18th.

One of the findings that was presented wasn’t a shock to me, but it was a shock to some of the other real estate professionals that were there.

Finishing a basement doesn’t really add to the value of the home in the eyes of a buyer…

I know that there are all sorts of news stories about the RoI (Return on Investment) of basement finishes… among other things.  Generally, they seem to give the seller credit for between 30 and 50¢ for each dollar spent.  This might be true in the case of appraisals, but doesn’t hold true for purchases.

In my experience, in talking with buyers and helping them prepare offers on homes, I have found that the basement is VERY important, but that the finish doesn’t really impact the price that buyers are willing to pay.

The space represents potential.  Often, the potential is “squandered” by the home-owner… meaning that they put in a media room when the buyer would have preferred bedrooms, or bedrooms when the buyer would have preferred a media room.  Or they put in drop ceilings when the buyer would have preferred dry-wall… or any of a number of options.

The bottom line is that I would NEVER advocate for a home-owner to NOT finish their basement because of future plans to sell, but I WOULD caution them that they should do it because it fits THEIR needs and lifestyle.  Don’t expect it to pay back financially, but rather, expect it to pay back in the enjoyment of your home.

*another difference between appraisals and Comparative Market Analyis…*

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Wayback Wednesday… A DNS

Wednesday, 20 October 2010 08:34
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The Burled Arch in Nome, Alaska, the finish li...
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In racing, a DNS means that a car Did Not Start.  One could say that it is even worse than the dreaded DNF (Did Not Finish).  Not making it to the Starting Line is definitely worse than not making it to the Finish Line.

But for Housing Starts, it is a good thing…  at least it is here and now.

Two years ago I wrote a post about how Housing Starts had fallen to their lowest level in 17 years.  Now, we are close to the lowest recorded levels.

But there is still too much inventory.  I know, looking at the listings numbers, we are WAY down from where we were a few years ago.  In the Atlanta area we are below 70,000 listings.  A couple of years ago, we were over 120,000 listings.  But, sales have continued to slow.

The statistics look better, and frankly, we need to NOT compare sales data to the period from about 2004-2007… it wasn’t sustainable.  But we need to get the stats up from where we are.

The first step is to deal with excess inventory.  And just like the first step to getting out of the hole is to stop digging; if there are too many houses, building more doesn’t help.

Link to original post from 2008.

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