Get Regular Check-ups

Following his heart surgery last week, after an issue was discovered during his annual physical, President George W. Bush encouraged everyone to get regular check-ups.

Another important checkup that should be done on a regular basis and can be just as beneficial for your finances is an annual homeowner advisory. Why would you treat your investment in your home with less care than you treat your car or even your HVAC system?

Consider investigating the following:

• Know the value of your home by obtaining a list of comparable sales in your immediate area as well as what is currently on the market for sale.

• Have you compared your assessed value for tax purposes to the fair market value in order to possibly reduce your property taxes?

• Even if you’ve refinanced in the last two years, can you save money and recapture the cost of refinancing in the time you plan to remain in your home?

• Have you considered reducing your mortgage debt with low-earning cash reserves that will not be needed in the near future?

• Have you considered investing in rental homes in good neighborhoods to increase your yields and avoid the volatility of the stock market?

• Recommendations of repairmen and other service providers from a trusted source who deals with them more frequently than you do.

Our goal is to create a lifelong relationship to help you be better homeowners. We want to be your “go to” person whenever you have a real estate question. We want to help you not only when you buy and sell but all of the years in between.

We want to provide good, consumer-based information about homeownership on a regular basis through email and social networking. If it benefits you by helping you be a better homeowner, hopefully, you’ll consider us your real estate professional for life.

Anytime you or your friends need help, please call. Knowing where to get the answer is just as important as knowing the answer. If you’d like information on any of the items we suggested, please let us know.

All my best,

Myra Spano, REALTOR®

 

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About the Author:

 

Myra Spano is a service and results oriented real estate agent with her client’s goals as top priority.  Myra is recognized as a top producing agent in her office in Virginia Beach and enjoys working with both buyers and those selling their homes.

 

For information about purchasing a home in Virginia Beach, visit her website.  This site is focused on homes available for sale in Hampton Roads, Virginia.  Email, call or text to make an appointment begin your home search.

 

If you are considering selling your home in Virginia Beach or one of the surrounding areas, visit the seller’s website to request a Free Market Analysis of your property.

 

Myra Spano & Prudential Towne Realty is awaiting to provide the real estate guidance you need.  Contact us now to make your home dreams come true!

Where Is It Invested?

You’ve saved for a rainy day or retirement. Congratulations but don’t get too comfortable yet; where is it invested? It’s estimated that over 25% of Americans have their long-term savings in cash instead of investments like stocks, bonds or real estate.

The memories of the financial crisis of 2008 are recent enough to understand why some people may want to avoid the stock market and real estate. Even though Wall Street and housing have rebounded considerably, uncertain investors are sitting on their cash. However, trying to avoid a bad decision can have serious costs too.

If your money is not earning at least at the current inflation rate, you’re losing the purchasing power of your dollars. Bankrate.com estimates the average money-market deposit yields 0.11% and the average five-year certificate of deposit currently yields 0.78%.

Rents are continuing to rise and there is a shortage of good, affordable housing. Single family homes have a significant advantage over many other types of investments. They have high loan-to-value mortgages available at fixed interest rates for long-terms on appreciating assets with distinct tax advantages.

The cash flows are considered to be one of the most attractive features of rental properties. Some investors think of it as a growth stock that pays substantial dividends. In the example shown below, a $125,000 rental with an 80% loan-to-value mortgage at 5% that rents for $1,250 per month, has a positive cash flow before taxes of $3,000 a year.

The rate of return on rental property can be substantially higher than other investments while allowing the investor control that isn’t available in alternatives.

All my best, 

Myra Spano, REALTOR® 

 

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About the Author:

 

Myra Spano is a service and results oriented real estate agent with her client’s goals as top priority.  Myra is recognized as a top producing agent in her office in Virginia Beach and enjoys working with both buyers and those selling their homes.

 

For information about purchasing a home in Virginia Beach, visit her website.  This site is focused on homes available for sale in Hampton Roads, Virginia.  Email, call or text to make an appointment begin your home search.

If you are considering selling your home in Virginia Beach or one of the surrounding areas, visit the seller’s website to request a Free Market Analysis of your property.

 

Myra Spano & Prudential Towne Realty is awaiting to provide the real estate guidance you need.  Contact us now to make your home dreams come true!

It Can’t Hurt to Wait, Can It?

It’s been said that more money has been lost due to indecision than was ever lost because of a bad decision. Regardless of whether you agree with the statement, delaying the decision to buy in today’s market is going to cost the buyer more.

Home prices have gone up considerably in almost every market in the country in the past year and while inventories are beginning to grow, prices are expected to continue to rise. Mortgage rates jumped 1% from the beginning of May to now. They could easily reach 5% by the end of the year and continue to rise in 2014.

Many of the financial experts in the country believe that the economy will not be strong until rates are in the 7% area.

The two components that move the cost of housing are price and mortgage rates. Escalation of either one will have an affect but when both are going up simultaneously, it is dramatic. It can literally eliminate buyers who could have purchased earlier.

The following example shows what would happen to the payments on a $200,000 home if the price were to go up 3% at the same time that the mortgage rates went up 1%. Not only would the payments go up by $150.81 per month, the price of the home would be $6,000 more. Even though the down payment may not change much, the new owner would have to borrow more money. By not acting, it is costing them more in price and payment. The loss of the appreciation would have been equity had they purchased prior to the rise in price.

Check out the Cost of Waiting to Buy to see what the effect will be using your own projections.

All my best, 

Myra Spano, REALTOR® 

 

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About the Author:

 

Myra Spano is a service and results oriented real estate agent with her client’s goals as top priority.  Myra is recognized as a top producing agent in her office in Virginia Beach and enjoys working with both buyers and those selling their homes.

 

For information about purchasing a home in Virginia Beach, visit her website.  This site is focused on homes available for sale in Hampton Roads, Virginia.  Email, call or text to make an appointment begin your home search.

If you are considering selling your home in Virginia Beach or one of the surrounding areas, visit the seller’s website to request a Free Market Analysis of your property.

 

Myra Spano & Prudential Towne Realty is awaiting to provide the real estate guidance you need.  Contact us now to make your home dreams come true!

Mortgage loans for the nascent home buyers – Vital essentials you need to know

It is needless to say that all first time home buyers haven’t ever gone through the intimidating experience of purchasing a home and they’re often advised about the hard way that making a single wrong decision can take a costly and stressful toll on your future financial life.

Buying a home involved different steps like getting pre-approved for mortgage loans, finding the right mortgage agent, looking for the right home that is within your means, following a frugal budget while repaying the loan and facing some sort of financial challenges. Are you scared by reading the aforementioned steps? Well, you need not fret as once you get a grip on the process, everything will tend to fall in its place.

Check out some vital essentials that you need to know about the process of taking out a mortgage loan, being a nascent home buyer.

• There’s more than just making the mortgage payments: Whenever the novice home buyers feel that they’re ready to take out a mortgage loan, they immediately take the plunge. But the fact is that just because they can afford the monthly mortgage installments doesn’t make them ready to own a home as there’s more to it than making just the monthly mortgage payments. Taxes, home owner’s insurance fees, maintenance costs, property insurance, water and electricity bills are some of the other costs that are added as a bonus when you buy a home mortgage loan. Moreover, insurance costs and property taxes tend to rise every year. So, even if you think that you will be bear the mortgage loan now, ensure whether you’ll be able to bear them throughout the term of the loan.
• Always seek professional help to stay safe: When you’re someone who is new to the home buying game, you’ll probably need the assistance of a trustworthy loan officer, a lawyer or might be a reputable real estate agent who can guide you through the process of locating a home and a mortgage loan. If you take the risk of venturing into this game all on your own, this won’t be rather a wise idea. Hire an agent after checking out the references from the previous homebuyers and then take the decision of hiring him.
• Search for the mortgage first and then for the home: If you were of the notion that homebuying begins with searching for a home, you were wrong. Homebuying actually begins with getting pre-approved for a mortgage loan unless you’re rich enough to pay down the entire money in cash for your house. Most often it is seen that the first time homebuyers get scared to get pre-qualified for a mortgage but this shouldn’t be the case. You might approach an FHA lender for getting a loan that is backed by the FHA if you don’t have a huge down payment and a stellar credit rating.
• Never burn out all your savings for the down payment: When you’re a first time homebuyer, you tend to listen to all that which is advised to you. People usually scare you about the practice of qualifying for the PMIs when you fail to pay down 20% of the total loan amount. But this shouldn’t force you to shell out all that you have in your savings account for making the right down payment. Being left with no savings is a curse and this will also take a toll on your future payments.

So, when you’re about to purchase your first home, you must be super excited. Don’t spoil the deal by taking any wrong steps. Keep in mind the above mentioned tips so that you may avoid the most common mistakes that can wreak havoc to your personal financial state.

Author Bio:  Shane is a financial writer,he has also made notable contributions through various articles written on different subjects related to the real estate industry.This article is about the Mortgage loans for the nascent home buyers.

If I’d Known…

We’ve probably all said or at least thought “if I knew then, what I know now, I would have done things differently.” We should have stayed in school longer. We should have listened to our parents. We should have bought Apple stock in 2002 for $8.50 that sells for $400 today. Or we could have bought gold in 2000 for under $300 for a four-fold profit today.

Years from now, if we look back at 2012, we may say that it was the best buyer’s market ever. Even now, in 2013, it’s apparent that both housing and mortgage prices are going up and they may never return to the record low levels.

The housing affordability index, which is considered to be good at 100, had increased to over 200 this past December, January and February. Shrinking inventories and rising prices in most markets have caused the index to fall to 172.7 for May 2013.

This market applies equally to acquiring a home to live in or a home to use as a rental. It is estimated that about 30% of the property purchased last year was done by investors. It is understandable because the positive cash flows far exceed most other investment alternatives.

Homeowners moving up in a rising market may sell their home for more by waiting but it will also cost them more for a new house. Typically, a person buys a 50% larger home when they move up. If they wait for prices to go up 10% on the $150,000 home they’re selling, they’ll realize $15,000 more but will pay $22,500 more for the new home purchase. They’ll actually net $7,500 less by waiting for prices to go up and may have to pay a higher mortgage rate too.

The question homebuyers and investors alike are faced with today is whether they will be saying years from now that they seized or missed an opportunity of a lifetime.

All my best, 

Myra Spano, REALTOR® 

 

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About the Author:

 

Myra Spano is a service and results oriented real estate agent with her client’s goals as top priority.  Myra is recognized as a top producing agent in her office in Virginia Beach and enjoys working with both buyers and those selling their homes.

 

For information about purchasing a home in Virginia Beach, visit her website.  This site is focused on homes available for sale in Hampton Roads, Virginia.  Email, call or text to make an appointment begin your home search.

If you are considering selling your home in Virginia Beach or one of the surrounding areas, visit the seller’s website to request a Free Market Analysis of your property.

 

Myra Spano & Prudential Towne Realty is awaiting to provide the real estate guidance you need.  Contact us now to make your home dreams come true!