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Nailing the REO purchase offer

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Friday, September 18, 2009.

Flickr photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/icanchangethisright/3444212567/" target=blank>bradleygee</a>.

Q: I've made offer after offer on bank-owned properties. The last time I was outbid, I was really disappointed because I loved the house! I was really hoping it would fall out of escrow, so I kept an eye on the listing, thinking there was a small chance it would come back on the market. Instead, it just disappeared.

I asked my agent to follow up on it about 45 days later, and she told me that it sold, but the sale price was less than I offered! I'm not sure if this was an inside job (e.g., the listing agent sold it to her own client to get a double commission), but I'm thinking of calling up the listing agent and giving her a piece of my mind. What did I do wrong? more...

Breaking buyer's remorse

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Thursday, September 17, 2009.

Q: I just decided to start looking for a condo to buy. I met this real estate broker who I had heard really good things about, and I feel like she has really listened to what I said I wanted. The first place or two I saw were very much like what I envisioned myself living in. So, I started to make an offer -- I even had her write it up.

But I kept thinking up things I wasn't sure about, problems that might come up if I moved forward, and questions I wanted to know the answers to, especially about the homeowners association (HOA). My agent got some answers for me, and others she said we wouldn't be able to find out until after we got into contract. more...

Utility allowed to raze home's trees

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Wednesday, September 16, 2009.

Flickr photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/no3rdw/2172875874/">no3rdw</a>.

In the case Emily Rutherford v. Columbia Gas Transmission Corp., the gas company owned a utility easement across a portion of landowner Rutherford's property. In order to service the gas line under the easement, the gas company needed to cut down seven trees belonging to Rutherford, who then filed suit seeking an injunction prohibiting the trees from being cut down.

The district court ruled against Rutherford, and declared that the gas company had the right to cut down the seven trees on her property. more...

Buy now or forever hold your tongue

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Tuesday, September 15, 2009.

Image courtesy of <a href="http://www.wiley.com/WileyCDA/WileyTitle/productCd-0470455861.html" target=blank>Wiley</a>.

Former Robert Allen "No Money Down" seminar instructors Chantal Howell Carey and Bill Carey create an Allen-esque energy around building wealth through real estate in their latest investment manual, which is as timely as its title is long: "The All-New Real Estate Foreclosure Short-Selling Underwater Property Auction Positive Cash Flow Book: Your Ultimate Guide to Making Money in a Crashing Market."

After first sketching out the data on how many foreclosures have and will likely take place, creating a sense of urgency for would-be investors to execute the book's real estate investment plan in the next 48 months, the Careys go on to explicate the basics of the foreclosure process and short-sale transactions. more...

In love with home, not location

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Monday, September 14, 2009.

Flickr photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/mugley/3034518506/">mugley</a>.

I never understood the appeal of the accident-and-explosion genre of television show. You know, those hour-long, testosterone-mongering episodes comprised of scene after scene of car wrecks, airshow disasters and building demolitions gone wrong. In fact, while showing houses last weekend, near a street known for amateur (read: illegal) auto racing, my client and I witnessed one of these underground racers cause a six-car crash worthy of one of those shows.

I heard the vroom of his engine and hesitated to make my turn; good thing, too -- about four seconds later ... more...

Life insurance a mortgage lifeline

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Friday, September 11, 2009.

Q: I co-owned a home with my mother, who passed away about seven years ago. She had put my name on title before she died, but didn't really tell me anything about the mortgage situation except that I needed to pay the bank X number of dollars per month. I didn't realize that the mortgage would adjust. It did adjust, though, and the payment increased -- and around the same time, I lost my job.

A friend connected me with a hard-money lender, who bailed me out of that really bad loan for a year until I was able to refinance it with a regular mortgage lender. He also gave me about $50,000 I used to fix up the place. more...

Home purchase hit with surprise fee

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Thursday, September 10, 2009.

Q: I'm a single mother, and have worked for several years to save up enough money for the down payment on a house. I've paid every single bill on time for years now, and my credit score is in the high 700s. However, about four years ago, my now-ex-boyfriend abandoned a car I had helped him buy. My credit was better than his, so we put both of our names on the title and the loan so he could get a better rate and lower payment. When we split up, I took my car, and he took his, and he promised to keep the payments up. Of course, he didn't pay the bill and the car was repossessed.

There is an open, but old, collections account for the $2,000 he failed to pay. I'm not paying it, as a matter of principle ... more...

Lender cleared in foreclosure lawsuit

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Wednesday, September 9, 2009.

In the case Warren v. Countrywide Home Loans, homeowner Reginald Warren defaulted on his mortgage, and lender Countrywide Home Loans foreclosed on the property. Prior to the foreclosure, the homeowner requested that Countrywide verify the mortgage debt. Countrywide, however, failed to respond to the homeowner's debt verification request and proceeded with the foreclosure sale.

The homeowner filed suit, claiming that Countrywide's failure to verify his mortgage debt prior to the foreclosure sale violated the federal Fair Debt Collection Practices Act 15 USC §1692g(b) [FDCPA, the "Act"]. more...

The real economics of homeownership

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Tuesday, September 8, 2009.

Last week, I read a New York Times article that gave me pause. The premise was that many of the penny-pinching and belt-tightening measures Americans have implemented would stick around for a generation. The quote that caught my eye in particular was from a young, single female attorney, who expressed that the mortgage/housing/foreclosure crisis had changed her opinion that homeownership was an inherently valuable experience. She said that now she was OK with being a lifelong renter.

As a real estate broker, that comment was like a blow to my solar plexus. more...

Buyers' bizarre expectations

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Tuesday, September 8, 2009.

It's always been a source of annoyance for me when people talk about the real estate market like it's the stock market. They say it's "good" or "bad," in a blanket fashion, when they typically mean that it's good or bad for sellers. In fact, a market that is good for sellers is inherently less favorable for buyers, and market dynamics that favor buyers are less kind to sellers. So, it's never really a bad market for everyone and, to be glass-half-full about it, it's always a good market for someone -- whether that someone knows it or not.

But lately, I'm seeing less of this problem. There's a new popular misconception in town. It suddenly seems de rigueur for both sides to think that the market is great -- so great, in fact, that real estate consumers seem with increasing frequency to think that they can have it all, sometimes getting upset or even irate when they receive an explanation as to why that's not realistic. more...

Failed by seller disclosure

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Friday, September 4, 2009.

Q: I bought a property in Florida about two years ago. Apparently, there were lots of pending problems with the property that the seller did not disclose. I've had to pay heavy assessments, and think that it's only fair to hold the seller accountable for the lack of disclosure at the time of purchase. I'm trying to decide how to proceed on that, but am interested to know what you think I could have done differently.

A: When listing agents work with sellers, they often say, "disclose, disclose, disclose." With buyers, the mantra is different: diligence, diligence, diligence.

Of course, every buyer is absolutely, 100 percent entitled to know any "material" information about the property that the seller knows, or should know, in time to make an informed decision whether to proceed with the purchase of a property. more...

My perfect escrow

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Thursday, September 3, 2009.

As you know by now, I'm on a mission to bust the myth that real estate agents and their preferred service providers are sitting around in back rooms rubbing their hands together and cackling with sinister glee as they formulate evil plots to boost their own profits at their buyer clients' expense.

In reality, what most agents want is for their buyers to get what the buyer wants -- a home that is a good value, in good shape (or in the shape the buyer believes it's in), with a smooth buying process and on-time closing.

When it comes to escrow companies, these service providers have a huge degree of influence on the buyer's experience and the outcome of a transaction. more...

Buyers fight commissions on new homes

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Wednesday, September 2, 2009.

In the case Blough v. Holland Realty Inc., four couples contracted with new-home builders and subdivision developers to have new homes custom-built on particular lots in several Boise, Idaho, subdivisions.

The builders and developers had pre-existing agreements in place with exclusive real estate brokers, whereby brokers would receive a fee or commission on every lot sale and, also, every new home constructed in the respective subdivisions. more...

Life, liberty and financial happiness

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Tuesday, September 1, 2009.

Image courtesy of <a href="http://us.penguingroup.com/nf/Book/BookDisplay/0,,9780143115267,00.html?strSrchSql=Richard+H.+Thaler+and+Cass+R.+Sunstein/Nudge_Richard_H._Thaler" target=blank>Penguin</a>.

Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness -- the inalienable rights of every American. Does this mean that Americans view property and the pursuit of happiness as essentially interchangeable? I'll buy that. Why, then, do so many of our consumer decisions -- from what we eat to the mortgage loans we borrow -- result in disease and unhappiness?

In "Nudge: Improving Decisions About Health, Wealth and Happiness," happiness researchers Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein explore just this question, then provide lots of ways we can all "nudge" each other toward making happiness-creating choices. more...

Buyers need dose of real estate 1.5

By Tara-Nicholle Nelson, Monday, August 31, 2009.

Flickr photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/trekkyandy/309494981/" target=blank>trekkyandy</a>.

Over the last few weeks, I've had several buyers walk in my office doors suffering from Real Estate Agent PTSD: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. They've worked with other agents who were, shall we say, a poor fit for them -- let's just leave it at that. And most of them were apparently very introspective about why exactly the relationship didn't work, leading them to apologize in advance for some personality flaw of their own that they believed might have been the deal-killer to their previous Realtor relationship: more...

"I'm sorry -- I think I must be too picky."
"I have to tell you up front, I really don't like to be stood up. It's just a pet peeve. Sorry!"
"I'm very nervous about making such a big decision. I think my nerves must have run her off."

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