Steve Holderfield's Real Estate Blog

The Dinosaurs that survived adapted to the new realities.  I’ve been selling real estate and managing Realtors for many years and the one thing that I have learned is that to survive in this business Realtors need to be adaptive to the ever changing real estate market. We have experienced the most mind bending changes in the market in recent years, with the collapse in home values and all the regulatory changes that have happened and that continue to hit us. Imagine what it would be like for a Realtor, for example, to simply attempt to do business the same as we did in 2000, today in 2010. You’d go broke and you wouldn’t serve your clients well. An example of this is short sales. Prior to about 1995 I hadn’t ever done a traditional short sale. In those days we called them a “Cram-Down”, where we negotiated with lenders to get them to accept less than the amount owed. The process in those days was much different than today. Since 1995, as a manager of larger offices, I think I have probably participated in the negotiations on over 200 short sales on both on my own transactions as well as transactions instituted by agents under my supervision. Additionally, in an effort to serve my clients and my agents more deeply, I have become qualified as a Certified Distressed Property Expert, (CDPE) through my participation in intensive training. My point is that this kind of adaptation is what is necessary for a Realtor to succeed… to serve his or her clients deeply. Without adapting you just become irrelevant.

I think the need to adapt is really a part of everyday life today if you own or hope to own real estate in this new world we all find ourselves in.   An example of the need to adapt is property values…  If you have discovered that your home’s value is less than your debt on your home or you are having trouble making your mortgage payment or feel distress approaching… now is the time for you to adapt to the realities of this market. You do have options, but time is of the essence. The faster you take steps to adapt, the better the outcome will be for you. To learn more, go to www.morethanashortsale.info.

The banks are back in the business of foreclosure, Remember last year that many banks had voluntarily instituted moratoriums on foreclosing on homeowners. Well this moritoriums have now pretty much expired and we have a surge in foreclsoure activity. Read more: http://www.dsnews.com/articles/california-foreclosure-sales-soar-in-march-2010-04-19.

So what do you do if you feeling that distress is approaching and you are worried that you can’t continue making your mortgage payment? To make matter worse, you may have discovered that you owe more on your home tham its worth in today’s market. Well you do have options. Consider having us negotiate a short sale with your lender. To find out more go to www.morethanashortsale.info. We have successfully negoatiated short sales with most major lenders and can help you. Remember, you do have options and the quicker you act the better the outcome will be. Contact us today if you need help.

We all have been reeling from the tumult we have had here in the California real estate market. Values in most markets have dropped 40% or more in recent years. With the massive federal debt that has been created in an attempt to improve our markets we all have been fearing the inevitable rise in our interest rates, perhaps to higher than acceptable levels to most buyers. We in the real estate community have feared a huge increase in our interest rates which would stall any recovery in the market. We have received some recent good news about interest rates which is really welcomed. Read on… http://www.dsnews.com/articles/upward-climb-comes-to-halt-as-mortgage-rates-ease-2010-04-15

Time will tell if this trend will hold. If you are on the fence… my advice is to buy now as we have the lowest values in years and more importantly you can still get a mortgage at historically low levels … around 6%!

I have written that our real estate recovery will be an up and down trip resulting in several seemingly positive moves followed by a turn to the negative side of things. We have some evidence of this from recent foreclosure activity as compared to a year earlier:

http://www.dsnews.com/articles/loss-mitigation-efforts-arent-keeping-pace-with-loan-defaults-lps-2010-04-12

A friend of mine has been chosen by a bank, who will go un-named, to market about 150 properties for them in Solano County this year. Could it be that the banks are finally planning to bring all the “phantom inventory” we’ve all been wondering about, to the market?

If so, we could be in for another market drop… but finally we could have more inventory to present to our buyers. There’s always 2 sides to every story. Many experts have estimated that the banks have held back about a years worth of home inventory from the market. This action or lack of action has actually created an artificial shortage of available listings around the country. Home prices have actually risen a bit due to the lack of inventory and many expect that these recent gains would be erased if the banks brought all this inventory to the market.

So hang tight the coming months should be interesting to see if the banks do put all the foreclosed homes that they are holding to the market and what the reaction of the market will be.

http://www.dsnews.com/articles/white-house-to-announce-plans-cut-mortgage-principals-2010-03-25

More government means less freedom and unintended consequences that are hard to predict. I’m not saying that the government intends to do harm… it just seems that they can’t predict what the results of their actions will be.  When it comes to the government, in my opinion, less is really more.   It seems to me that the more they try to fix things the longer we have to deal with this financial crisis. I say, let’s let the 100% effective law of natural consequences do it’s good work. There is nothing more sure to affect human behavior in a positive way than letting somebody have to deal with the natural consequences of making a mistake.

Previously I have said that the Real Estate Market will continue like a roller coaster with many ups and downs… here’s more proof of what I’m saying when I say that this crazy market is not over yet: Texas Posts Nation’s Largest Monthly Foreclosure Increase: Study… http://www.dsnews.com/articles/texas-posts-nations-largest-monthly-foreclosure-increase-study-2010-03-25

My advice is to grab onto all those old common sense behaviors that used to be so typical of our country…

• don’t spend what you can’t pay for
• live a little below your means
• save some for a rainy day
• say what you mean and mean what you say
• take responsibility for yourself… Don’t expect others or the
• overnment or anybody else to pay for your needs
• sacrifice for the worthwhile things you want and need

Basically, if I were a little younger I guess I would say, “Quit your whining and Man up!” These are times that require that old work ethic… work first and play later as I used to tell my kids. It is only through these kinds of conservative behaviors that we will survive this mountain of individual and Governtment debt that we have amassed as a nation. Success will only come from working hard… for a long time. Consistency is the key to our future success. We can’t get to the destination we desire over night. It will take some time, hard work and our corporate the refussal to quit.

We just can’t seem to keep home sales rolling. It will continue to be a roller coaster ride… watch for many ups and downs going forward as far as home sales and values.   Houses have become homes again and the quicker we all realize that homes should never have been treated like a credit card the better off we’ll all be. Read on:

http://www.dsnews.com/articles/existing-home-sales-fall-again-in-february-nar-2010-03-23

It seems that homes values have been hit the hardest in areas of the country where homes were the most “over valued” before the bubble burst in 2006. Makes sense, but read on to learn what areas were hit the hardest: http://www.dsnews.com/articles/collapse-in-home-prices-hits-overvalued-markets-hardest-2010-03-19