Spillover Costs of Foreclosure

A report released early this week spells out the wider impact of foreclosures. Researchers at the Center for Responsible Lending (CRL) note that almost $2 trillion in property value has or will be lost by residents. It doesn’t even include equity losses due to foreclosures, which have been estimated at $7 trillion.


Foreclosures have brought down property values across the country. Your home has been affected even if there are no foreclosures in your neighborhood (which would be pretty rare, I think). That value reduction means that while you’re paying lower property taxes, your municipality and school system is getting less money, too. If there are many foreclosures in a given area, there can also be blight and crime issues that come into play.

We all know intuitively that foreclosed homes are not a good thing for neighborhoods. Unfortunately, there are still a lot of them sitting out there, many that haven’t even been listed.

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Helpful Technology – Batch Picture Resizing

Every now and then you come across a program that makes life so much easier that you wondered how you lived without it. Maybe it’s a widget or gadget for your desktop or your Smartphone. Perhaps it’s an app on your Nook or Kindle. Maybe it’s a full blown suite of products for specific needs.



from www.softorbits.com

One that I couldn’t easily live without is the Batch Picture Resizer by SoftOrbits. In Real Estate, we take a lot of pictures. My high-res photos are great for printed materials, but cumbersome or even unusable for upload to the multilist system (MLS), clients and web sites. I was using a very basic re-sizing function that was part of my operating system until I discovered Batch Picture Resizer.

I can now select, drag and resize an entire folder of pictures in one action. Since my source photos are 3008 x 2000 pixels (usually around 2MB in size each), the time needed to individually resize photos was awkward and frustrating.

I downloaded the free trial not expecting a whole lot, to be honest. We’ve all had that experience – download, try, uninstall, delete, keep looking. But this program was different. I can resize by pixels or percentage of the original. While not overwhelming in terms of functions, it allows for renaming files by adding either prefixes or suffixes to the original file, or adding a watermark. It has ample folder handling functions to keep your pictures organized, and will do rotations easily, too. At an affordable $29.95, it was a no-brainer for me to purchase this program.

If you deal with a lot of photos on a regular basis, you should consider evaluating this program on a free trial basis. I think you’ll be happy with it.  Do you have a particular program that you can't live without? I'd love to hear about it.

Great House, Acreage - Howell Schools

Introducing 3098 Coon Lake Rd, Howell MI 48843.

This newer home (Built in 2003) has a full basement, HE water heater, water softener, 200 amp electrical service and a 3 car garage.  It is a modular home (built to the same codes as an on-site built home) on 3.06 acres, although there is a natural gas easement that runs through the property.  The lot size is irregular.

It's been repainted, recarpeted, new kitchen appliances installed, gutters have been replaced and the house power washed.  Three bedrooms, 2 full baths, 1792 sq ft of living space in a private setting, yet just minutes from the I-96 ramps at Pinkney Rd (D 19). Howell Schools. 

See the entire listing on my website by clicking here.  And while you're there, check out my new map-based MLS search functon, too!

I am a full-time real estate professional at Preview Properties, PC.  Contact me at 810-220-1478, through my website, or my facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/MichiganRE.

Closed Sales – Financing Types Through September 2012

We’ve all heard some recurring sound bites about this year’s housing market in SE Michigan and especially in Livingston County. Inventory and time on market are down, average and median sales prices are up, and the total number of sales is up.


While I am a very active listing agent, I also work with buyers. And I know from my experience as well as discussions with other agents that it’s difficult to find a financeable house in the $125,000 and under price range. If you do find a house that’s ‘ready to go’ you can be sure there will be multiple offers. If it needs some work, it likely won’t qualify for government loan programs – FHA and USDA Rural Development. And of course, these are the programs that many people need to enter the housing market.

Instead of repeating this past month’s stats, I delved into the difference between the kinds of loan instrument used for January through September 2011 vs. the same period in 2012. Here’s what I found.

Cash sales went up only nominally YTD. They represented a little over 23% of total sales in 2011 and are a little over 24% in 2012. Since cash purchasers come largely from investor-owners, is this showing us that investor action is leveling off? Hard to say, but certainly the lower inventory likely has a role to play in this market segment.

Conventional mortgage sales went up from 34.4% YTD in 2011 to 37.45% YTD in 2012. With mortgage rates at an almost ridiculous historic low  I would have expected more of this type of sale, but first-time buyers usually don’t qualify for a conventional mortgage, so they likely have little representation in this segment.

All FHA loan sales (includes the FHA 203K renovation program) dropped from 24.61% in 2011 to 21.5% this year. And the USDA Rural Development program loan sales went up slightly from 7.5% of all sales in 2011 to 8.58% in 2012. When you combine the FHA and USDA RD programs, my stats show that they were a combined 32.12% of sales in 2011 and represent a lower 30.1% usage in 2012. So at least in this market, closings with government loans are down on a percentage basis.

My personal experience with FHA and Rural Development buyers has been that the properties appraise at a value of or above their sale price, but the underwriters for government loans are being very, very picky, in some cases bordering on the insane. I know that there are a lot of buyers out there that are pre-qualified for these programs, but finding a home that is in financeable condition is tough. And banks have been slow to correct the deficiencies needed for the financing of foreclosure properties, even if it’s only a few thousand dollars in repairs.

If you’re considering a home sale or purchase, please call me for a confidential meeting to discuss your goals. I’d love to help you with your real estate needs. Let me put my market knowledge to work for you.

7323 Norcrest, Brighton - $121,900



7323 Norcrest 48116

 This home comes with privileges to all sports Ore Lake.  2234 sq ft, 4 beds, 3 full baths and a one car detached garage.  It is a bank-owned home, but has just been renovated. 

Work includes a new roof and gutters, replacement siding, new kitchen appliances, new vinyl flooring, carpet and a complete repaint - inside and out. Located in the Ore Lake Shores subdivision, your access to the lake is via a community lot. 

Brighton schools, close to M-36, this home is priced at an affordable $54/sq ft! It is not inside a flood zone according to the latest FEMA flood hazard maps.

For information on this, and other homes in the area, please contact me through my web site, http://www.realestatemich.com/10/listing/22680.