Bill provides tax credit if house is bought soon

I know I already posted today about the lowest mortgage rates, ever! But the good news for first time home buyers just keeps on coming!! If you live in Georgia and you are a first time home buyer, you need to get moving. They just passed a bill giving first time home buyers a $3600 TAX CREDIT but only if you close in the next six months... so come on give me a call!

Bill provides tax credit if house is bought soon
By Walter C. Jones Morris News Service
Friday, March 27, 2009

ATLANTA --- The state could pay those who act quickly to buy their next home under legislation that passed the Senate on Thursday.

House Bill 261, sponsored by Rep. Ron Stephens, R-Savannah, would grant a $3,600 tax credit to people who buy a house in the next six months.

The Senate tacked two amendments onto the version approved by the House: one to include condos and documentation for the taxman, and a second to allow tax refunds to be donated to multiple sclerosis education.

The measure passed 42-4 in the Senate, with supporters calling it an aid to economic recovery.
With the Georgia housing industry suffering a 13 percent slump because of a growing inventory of unsold homes, other industries are being affected, said Sen. Chip Pearson, R-Dawsonville.

"The local hardware store, moving company, paint store, service business and others are all affected by housing, and this legislation has them in mind," he said.

Long-term mortgage rates hit record low

The Atlanta Business Chronicle announced yesterday that mortgage rates have hit the lowest rate, ever. Not only are we at record lows but home prices are down to such a rate that they are now affordable to more Americans than ever before. If these two facts alone are not enough to send first time home buyers running to their Realtors (or Brokers), I don't know what will! Usually with prices and rates, if one is up the other is down.... we are looking at both being low! Give me a call and let's get you in a home before rates climb back up.

I can not remember who first told me this quote but I think it's very fitting for anyone waiting to see if it will drop just a little bit more: "you don't know you've reached the bottom until you've started climbing up the other side and you are looking backwards."

Give me a call and let's get you in your new home! Full story below:

Thursday, March 26, 2009, 2:08pm EDT

Long-term mortgage rates hit record low
Washington Business Journal - by Barton Eckert Contributing Writer


The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rate has dropped to its lowest level on record.

The average rate is the lowest in McLean-based Freddie Mac's weekly survey dating to 1971. Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) says its Primary Mortgage Market Survey shows the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 4.85 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending March 26, down from last week when it averaged 4.98 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 5.85 percent. The 30-year FRM has not been lower in the life of Freddie Mac’s weekly survey, which dates back to 1971 for the 30-year FRM.

The 15-year FRM this week averaged 4.58 percent with an average 0.7 point, down from last week when it averaged 4.61 percent. A year ago at this time, the 15-year FRM averaged 5.34 percent. The 15-year FRM has never been lower in the life of Freddie Mac’s weekly survey, which dates back to 1991 for the 15-year FRM.

Rates for 30-year FRMs peaked last year at 6.63 percent on July 24th. With this week's 30-Yr FRM, the interest rate difference is almost 2 percentage points, which amounts to a savings of about $225 in monthly mortgage payments for a $200,000 loan.

Jenny Pruitt is Merging into Harry Norman

Knew it was going to probably happen at some point but it was officially announced today that my previous company is merging into my current company! I think this is a great opportunity for Harry Norman and very excited to join forces with Jenny Pruitt!

Jenny Pruitt becomes Harry Norman
Atlanta Business Chronicle - by Lisa R. Schoolcraft Staff Writer

Jenny Pruitt & Associates and Harry Norman Realtors have officially merged, taking the sole name of Harry Norman, Realtors.

The move to consolidate started in October 2008 when both residential real estate companies merged their back offices.

The transition from all of the Jenny Pruitt & Associates offices to Harry Norman, Realtors will probably take about 90 days to complete, said Martha Hayhurst, president of Harry Norman.
"The great thing for the consumer, it's the same people," she said. "The expanded alliance of these two companies will make it more dominant in the marketplace."

Harry Norman, Realtors and Jenny Pruitt & Associates are Atlanta-based sister companies of HomeServices of America Inc., an indirect subsidiary of Omaha, Neb.-based Berkshire Hathaway(NYSE: BRKA), which is a large holding company controlled by billionaire Warren Buffett.

Jenny Pruitt & Associates was acquired in October 2001 and Harry Norman, Realtors was acquired in May 2006.

They operated under the holding company HomeServices of Georgia Inc.

"The agents are very pleased and excited on both sides," said CEO Dan Parmer. "We've worked as sister companies for three years and had the same back office and management for a year."
The name change was the next logical step, he said.

The company decided to continue with the brand Harry Norman, Realtors because of its nearly 80 years in the market. Jenny Pruitt & Associates, founded in 1988 by Jenny Pruitt, also has longevity, but agents and management from both companies agreed Harry Norman, Realtors made more sense, he said.

Jenny Pruitt left her namesake company in 2007 to form Atlanta Fine Homes Sotheby's International Realty.

The expanded Harry Norman, Realtors now has 1,474 agents in the market, Parmer said. It has franchises that stretch from Savannah to Highlands, N.C.

There are no plans to consolidate offices in metro Atlanta, Parmer said.

"Harry Norman, Realtors has about four Buckhead offices," Hayhurst said. "His philosophy was always to be where the people are. This way we've just expanded the ability for clients to get to any office."

Renters Lose Edge on Homeowners

Renters Lose Edge on Homeowners
Cost Gap Returns to Historical Norms in Some Markets as House Prices Drop

By NICK TIMIRAOS
The relative cost of owning versus renting is swinging back in favor of homeownership in some U.S. markets, buoyed by several quarters of sharp declines in home prices.

At the height of the housing boom, as home prices surged, demand for rentals started to rise as the gap between owning and renting widened significantly. Even after the housing market soured, apartment demand grew as former homeowners became renters, allowing landlords to push healthy rent increases.

Now, after two years of rapid home-price depreciation, the relationship between the cost of rental payments versus after-tax mortgage payments is tilting toward ownership in a number of metropolitan areas.

Over the past 18 years, after-tax mortgage payments have averaged 26% more than rent payments, according to Green Street Advisors, a real-estate consultancy based in Newport Beach, Calif. In 2006, at the height of the housing bubble, mortgage payments reached as high as 66% more than rent payments. But by the end of 2008, average monthly rent for the largest 50 metropolitan areas was $1,045, compared with after-tax mortgage payments of $1,300, assuming a rate of 5.5% on a 30-year fixed mortgage. That means mortgage payments averaged just 24% more than rent payments, the narrowest gap since 2001.

A new housing development in Las Vegas, a market like several others in the U.S. where the cost equation has shifted in favor of homeownership.

In more than half of the top 50 U.S. housing markets -- including Los Angeles, northern Virginia and Las Vegas -- the ratio is now below its 18-year average. In Los Angeles, for example, mortgage payments averaged 60% more than rent payments between 1990 and 2008. Now, those payments average 30% more than rent.

"We're not saying on an absolute basis that it's cheaper to own a home, but on a relative

basis...owning is looking much more attractive than it has in a long time," said Andrew

McCulloch, a Green Street analyst. While the shift doesn't mean that renters will rush to buy homes soon, "it's not a 'no-brainer' anymore if they're going to rent versus own," he said.
If mortgage rates fall to 4.5% -- and some economists have called for the government to push rates to that level to ease the housing crisis -- mortgage payments would average 14% more than rent payments, a level last reached in 1998.

While lower rates could further boost home affordability, that may not be enough to overcome a psychological barrier for many would-be buyers who believe homes will become even more affordable. "One of the challenges in the housing market is not only affordability but also willingness to buy," said Nicolas Retsinas, the director of Harvard University's Joint Center for Housing Studies. "People are still worried about falling prices."

And lending standards are much tighter than they were during the housing boom, when less-creditworthy tenants left apartments in droves to take advantage of no-money-down financing. At the housing market's peak, nearly one in four renters left to buy homes, said Richard Campo, chief executive of Houston-based Camden Property Trust. That rate fell to near its historical norm of around 12% by the end of 2008. "The nonqualified renters are not moving out this time," said Mr. Campo.

A separate report by Moody's Economy.com also finds that home prices relative to rents are more in line with their historical relationship. Using data that measure average home prices and rent payments for 54 metro areas between 1984 and 2004, Moody's Economy.com estimated that eight markets are "undervalued." In those eight markets, home prices relative to rents are below or within 5% of their historical levels. "The bottom is coming into view," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com, "But we've still got a ways to go."

The report notes that home prices relative to rents remain well above historical levels in 30 markets, including Philadelphia; Portland, Ore.; and Virginia Beach, Va.

Lower prices and interest rates are spurring some buyers to get off the sidelines. Jason Schanta, 37, an independent contractor, has been ready to buy for three years, but he said he waited because Southern California home prices had become "outrageous."

"I'm not an economic guru but I knew the bubble was going to burst," he said. He is ready to buy a $500,000 home if Bank of America Corp.'s Countrywide Financial unit approves a short sale on the property in San Juan Capistrano, Calif. (In a short sale, the lender agrees to sell a home for less than the value of the mortgage.) Mr. Schanta currently rents a three-bedroom house for $2,250 a month, and says that he will pay just $150 more in mortgage payments and taxes for a house that has an additional bedroom and 350 more square feet. "Renting now costs just as much as buying," he said.

Others are finding that they could pay less on their mortgage than they would on rent. Carla Zeineh, 22, and her husband recently began shopping for a home in Irvine, Calif., and discovered that with a 5% mortgage rate, her monthly payment on a $350,000 two-bedroom home with 20% down could be less than the $1,800 month that they pay in rent on their two-bedroom condo

Interesting Idea - Selling New Construction Condos in This Market

Cousins’ new plan to sell condos

Atlanta Business Chronicle - by Douglas Sams Staff Writer


Cousins Properties Inc. thinks it may have found the answer to survive Atlanta’s worst condo market in a generation.

The Atlanta-based developer is launching a buyer-incentive program at 10 Terminus Place, its 32-story condo tower in Buckhead that opened last fall. The incentives include guaranteeing the value of the condos — which average between $600,000 and $800,000 — for the first three years and allowing buyers to walk away during that same time with no damage to their credit.
“We’re taking all the risk out of the equation,” Cousins CEO Tom Bell said. “We’re also letting people see how much confidence we have in this market.”

Ten Terminus is one of 35 condo projects in the hard-hit Buckhead market, where just slightly more than half of 3,061 units were sold at the end of last year, according to real estate market research firm Haddow & Co.

Only 13 of 137 units sold since the 10 Terminus was completed in 2008. Seventeen units are under contract.

The condo market’s struggles are affecting even the high-end units in Buckhead such as those at 10 Terminus, John Williams’ The Mansion on Peachtree and Regent Partners LLC’s Sovereign at 3344 Peachtree.

Of the 11,237 condos available within the intown Atlanta market last year, less than half were sold, according to Haddow & Co.

While other residential developers have offered discounts and lease-to-own programs to spur sales, Cousins is one of the few in position to give buyers the benefits of full ownership from the start of their initial down payment.

The condo tower is one of three buildings rising at Terminus, the 10-acre mixed-use development Cousins launched in 2006. While Cousins carries debt on the two office towers, it does not have a mortgage loan on 10 Terminus, allowing the company to offer steeper concessions.

“What makes this unique is that there is no construction loan,” said David Haddow, president of Haddow & Co. “I’m not saying they are the only one in this position, but they are certainly one of the few. This also obviously shows they believe in their product and Buckhead.”
The 10 Terminus buying incentives begin March 20.

Cousins will finance the condos for a 5 percent down payment. Banks are often requiring 20 percent down payments. Cousins will offer the condos at a 4 percent interest rate versus the typical bank interest rate of at least 6 percent.

One incentive targets people who want a new condo, but can’t buy one because they’re struggling to sell their homes. It’s one of the biggest challenges facing 10 Terminus, Bell said. Buyers who put 20 percent down on a 10 Terminus unit, however, can move in with no payments for a year while they try to sell their homes.Cousins will offer the incentives on up to 25 condos initially, then re-evaluate the program.

The company is just one of many developers fighting slow sales amid the U.S. housing slump.
Cousins originally planned to sell out 10 Terminus by the end of this year, but a tight lending market forced the company to reset its goal to the end of 2011, a move that reduced its rate of return on the $80 million tower by at least 4 percent. Cousins also took a $2 million write-down on the project earlier this year.

Ten Terminus is the only condo tower that Cousins has in its portfolio.
Last August, Cousins and development partner The Related Group sold the last residences at 50 Biscayne, a 54-story, 528-unit luxury condominium tower in Miami, for $30 million, getting out of one of the toughest condo markets in the country.

Good News for Small Businesses!!

Survey: 69% of U.S. small businesses profitable last year

Atlanta Business Chronicle - by Ryan Sharrow

A new survey has found that 69 percent of U.S. small businesses were profitable in 2008.
The survey, conducted by Herndon, Va.-based Network Solutions and the University of Maryland Robert H. Smith School of Business, polled 1,000 small-business owners in December 2008 and January 2009.
Sixty-nine percent of those reporting a profit said their success last year was equal to or better than their performance in 2007. The survey also found that 70 percent of small businesses expect their companies to be in business in five years, as opposed to closing, being sold or transferred.
There are more than 27 million small businesses in the U.S. that employ more than 40 million workers, according to the US Census Bureau.
Nearly 50 percent of the small-business owners surveyed believe the economy will improve or remain unchanged in 2009. And 67 percent of the companies plan to spend the same or increase overall business spending this year.
Companies surveyed were for-profit, privately owned businesses with fewer than 100 employees and had a payroll and/or contributed to at least 50 percent of the owner’s household income.
Seven percent of the companies reported that they broke even last year.
“Small business owners’ optimism during the current economic downturn has a correlation to how competitive they are in being customer oriented,” P.K. Kannan, director of the Center for Excellence in Service at the Smith School, said in a statement. “Those that are more engaged in understanding their customer needs, creating relationships with customers and increasing the value of their customer base through marketing activities and innovations are also those that are the most optimistic.”
The survey is part of a new “Small Business Success Index” launched Thursday by Network Solutions and the Smith School. It is designed to measure the health of U.S. small businesses.

March 2009 News & Notes

My new March newsletter is now available! This month I on the second page I focused on tips to prepare for a new home purchase!!

March 2009 News & Notes

I am a now a Broker AND Buyers are coming out all over!

I know it has been forever since I posted on my blog, but promise it was for good reasons! I've been in the midst of working on my broker's license while assisting new clients on their home purchase. Good news all around. And as of 9:45am this morning, I passed my final exam and can now say that I am an Associate Broker with Harry Norman Realtors!

On to real estate! It looks like we may have finally "hit the bottom". Several different news organizations have come out in recent weeks and said that they believe we are at the bottom and will now start heading back up the other side. Here is the article posted in the Atlanta Business Chronicle:

Lower Home Inventory Levels Indicate Bottom is Near

The overall the number of homes on the market in Atlanta have gone down from a high around 111,000 to around 85,000. Additionally, in the last two weeks four new buyers have asked me to help assist them in their home purchase. So, everything is pointing to an improving market.

For those that keep waiting to see if it will "drop just a little bit lower" remember, you don't know you've hit the bottom until you are heading but the other side and look back...