The first on my list of haunted homes is that of the Lilian Place which is located in Florida, Daytona Beach to be exact. This house was created in the late 1880’s. In all of Daytona Beach, the Lilian Place is actually one of the oldest you will find around. It is currently a quaint bed and breakfast but note here that looks can be rather deceiving. Apparently this haunted home was constructed on top of a burial ground that was used by the Indians which of course is prime territory for strange occurrences. All sorts of interesting paranormal activity has taken at this Victorian style home which includes lights turning off as well as on and a ghost that was simply dubbed Lucille. She has been seen by many visitors who have decided to vacation here. Lucille seems to not have caused a problem, just going about her business at Lilian Place I suppose!

The second selection on my list of haunted homes is located in Long Island, New York. It is called Raynham Hall and is open to the public. It once housed British soldiers during the Revolutionary War. One in particular, which is that of a Major refuses to leave. For some odd reason, employees of Raynham Hall have noticed the scent of cinnamon with no explanation. Orbs have been seen in pictures that have been taken here and EVPs have disclosed sounds such as screams that cannot be heard with the naked ear. Then of course there is the ghost that has been dubbed the “Brown Lady”. Her apparition was actually caught on film here when pictures were snapped during the early 1930’s.

Schwarz, the CEO of StagedHomes Inc, was a pioneer in home staging back in the early 1970s and has used the techniques to sell properties ever since. “The goal of home staging is for the buyer to mentally move in,” Schwarz says. “If they cannot mentally feel and see themselves living here, you’ve lost them.” Schwarz offers six simple tips to help home sellers better position themselves in a sluggish market.

6 easy ways to make your property more appealing to buyers:

Get them inside. The first thing a prospective buyer notices about a home is not the living room but the front yard. A lot of people think staging is the inside only, we’ve got to stage the outside to get them inside. So cut the grass, trim the hedges, rake those leaves, sweep the sidewalks, and power-wash the driveway. And make sure you don’t have too many potted plants scattered around the property.

Pretend you‘re camping. Schwarz says a cluttered room will appear too small to buyers. “Clutter eats equity,” she says. Schwarz tells homeowners to go through each room of the house and divide their belongings into two piles: “keep” and “give up.” Items in the “keep” pile will be used to stage the room, while those in the “give up” pile should be stored elsewhere. “Pretend you are camping,” she says. “When you go camping, you are not taking all those books, right?”

The decluttered rooms may appear bare to the seller, but the buyer won’t think so. “We are not selling your things…. We are selling the space,” Schwarz says. “And buyers cannot visualize when there is too much stuff in the room.” Decluttering a home’s outdoor spaces is important, too, she says.

Balance hard and soft surfaces. When staging a particular room, it’s essential to have a good balance of hard surfaces, such as a coffee-table top, and soft surfaces, like a carpet, Schwarz says. For example, a room with a cushy, 7-foot-long sofa, a love seat, and four La-Z-Boy recliners has too many soft surfaces and not enough hard surfaces. “The room is sinking,” she says. “It’s all too heavy.” Instead, consider getting rid of the La-Z-Boys and the love seat, replacing them with two wingback chairs. “If you have hardwood floors but no rugs, it’s too hard,” Schwarz says. “So you want to add a rug.”

Work in ones or threes. Schwarz recommends arranging items on top of hard surfaces in ones or threes.

You would place three items – say, a lamp, a plant, and a book- on top of a larger hard surface, like an end table. “You take away the plant and the book, it’s too bare,” she says. “But if you put 10 things on it, it’s overdone.” The three items should be closely grouped together in a triangle shape. “I draw a triangle for my clients,” Schwarz says. “I say, ‘Here is the end table – let’s superimpose a triangle on top of it.’ ” For hard surfaces with less area, however, a single item will do.

Decide from the doorway. Since would-be buyers will get their first impression of each room from the doorway, homeowners should use that perspective to judge their staging work. “Do your work, go back to the doorway. Do some more, go back to the doorway,” Schwarz says. That way, you’ll be better able to ensure that each room appeals to buyers.

Make your place “Q-Tip clean.“ A properly staged home should be immaculate – “Q-Tip clean,” as Schwarz puts it. “I mean Q-Tips getting dead flies out of your windowsill [and] going around the bottom of your toilet on the floor,” she says. The purpose of ensuring the house is spotless is more than simply making it presentable. If a home is unkempt, a buyer will wonder what other, less visible problems may come with the property, Schwarz says. “They’ll say, ‘Gosh, if they live like this, what don’t they take care of that I can’t see?’”

The paper’s authors caution that their statistics are not exact and should be taken primarily as an indication that there is a looming problem, one that needs to be addressed. The 26% figure comes from a series of consumer surveys that feed into the Booth Chicago/Kellogg School Financial Trust Index. In December 2008 and again in March 2009, 1,000 people were surveyed and asked, among other things, if they knew anyone who had defaulted on a mortgage, and if they knew anyone who had defaulted on a mortgage even if he or she could afford to make the monthly payment. By taking the ratio of the two answers, the economists calculated that more than a quarter of defaults are, as they put it, "strategic."

Notably, other survey data included in the paper suggest the percentage of intentional defaults may be much lower than 26%. The researchers also asked if respondents themselves would welsh on their mortgages if they were $50,000 underwater. Among the people for whom $50,000 represented less than 10% of their home’s value, none would walk away. However, once $50,000 represented between 10% and 20% of the house’s value, 5% said they would walk away, and when the shortfall reached 50% of home’s value, a full 17% said they would.

When the shortfall amount in question was $100,000, the walk-away responses accelerated at a faster rate. Some 7% of people said they would intentionally default when a $100,000 shortfall represented less than 10% of their house’s value. Once that shortfall represented between 50% and 60% of the home’s value, an entire 25% of respondents said they would walk away. The hesitation to intentionally default when the theoretical amount of negative equity was $50,000, even when representing the same percentage of a home’s value, may relate to the high fixed costs that come with walking away, such as moving.

A US-wide popular real estate classified web portal that provides its users with quality real estate property search and sales opportunities has implemented new system architecture. Now the information storage if fulfilled with a highly performing virtual cluster technology. The solution has several important advantages, namely:

• Unprecedented query processing speed

• Limitless opportunities of the information database expanding

The solution enables the system to withstand extremely heavy loads. Currently we process over 150-200 thousand queries to server every day. Here we count only queries to the main project functionality, excluding static content, such as photos, styles, scripts at javascript, etc. The load that can be withstood by the server approximates to over 700-900 thousand queries daily without introducing any architectural enhancements, though the architecture optimization possibility is embedded into the system.

According to the chief Fizber.com developer Alexander Yarosh: “It is rooted in our development philosophy to introduce the latest technology innovations and enhance the project functioning. We believe that the switch of our database storage to virtual cluster technology will contribute to better Fizber.com functioning, thus providing our users with better service. Fizber is that very project where the power of innovation if fully unleashed”.

It is important to state that Fizber developers did their best to never appear at the technology sidelines. New enhancements, additions, and improvements are being constantly introduced within the project flow. It is obvious that virtual cluster technology is not the end of the system improvement process.

About Fizber.com
Fizber.com is a state-of-the-art real estate classified web 2.0 website, providing its users with vast opportunities for real estate property buying, selling, and advertising in the U.S. Fizber.com boasts of full U.S. coverage that quickly connects buyers and sellers from all parts of the country. Fizber.com is by all rights considered the best real estate property search engine, trusted business partner and high quality services provider. Prospective homebuyers can browse the property database, available at www.fizber.com, at no charge.

The Good

Here are a few of the reasons why now is a better time to buy a home than it has been at any point in the past few years:

Tax Credits

In the stimulus plan signed by President Obama, there is a first-time home buyer tax credit of $8,000, provided that you stay in the home for 36 months. This isn’t a tax deduction like your mortgage interest, which reduces your taxable income – a tax credit actually reduces your total income taxes owed. In addition, some states, such as California, are offering tax credits for home buyers that will further reduce your tax liability. Keep in mind that the federal program ends on December 1st of this year, and while it could easily end up being extended, it isn’t a given.

Rates last week dipped to an all-time low when the Fed announced that it would continue buying additional mortgage backed securities. Even though they ticked back up slightly in the past few days, with full income documentation and good credit, you can easily get down to 4.5% on a conventional 30 year fixed if you have 20% down, and if you want to get into an FHA loan, you can more typically get around 5.0% with a down payment of only 3.5%. Be careful when shopping for rates online, and think twice before giving out personal information. It is far better to ask friends and family for a strong personal recommendation, and use the information that you see on sites such as bankrate.com to approximate where your rate should be. Keep in mind that everyone’s scenario is different and there are a lot of new rate adjustments for conventional loans that didn’t exist in prior years, so you can easily end up paying 1 point (or percentage of the loan amount) for a loan that might cost your friend zero points for the same rate on the same day with the same lender.

Because You Don’t Absolutely Need to Buy

The best time to shop for a home is when you don’t need to. You can be as aggressive as you want to on your offer, and time is on your side because prices aren’t going to go back up overnight. If you are patient, you can find a home that you love, and just make sure that you can comfortably afford it and have a long-term plan to keep the property.

The Bad

These are factors that should not be driving your motivation to purchase a home right now:

Timing the Market Bottom

The same advice that applies to the stock market applies to the housing market. Don’t try to time it. If you have played around with the stock market in the past year and tried to catch a falling knife in the hopes of maximizing your return, you can probably look at the scars on your financial statements and let it serve as a reminder not to time the bottom. The turnaround in prices is gradual, and you are not going to miss out on an instant, overnight spike in real estate prices, no matter how fast the bank-owned properties are selling locally.

The Illusion of the Discount

Perhaps a new development popped up three years ago and was so shiny and perfect that you would have taken a third job to afford it. Now, the model that you love has popped up for $400,000 and all of the recent sales were at $450,000. In a stable market, that is great, but if you live in a declining market, you have now become the new comparable sale that any listings in the development in the near future will be measured against. So, if you buy this place for $400,000, and your new neighbor decides to move, they now will likely be advised by their real estate agent to price their property at or below your price in order to sell quickly. The same holds true for purchasing bank-owned properties. Bank-owned sales may be somewhat less frequent and given slightly less weight in determining the next sales prices in your neighborhood. However, if you buy in a neighborhood with a relatively high level of short sales and foreclosures, that great deal you just got on the bank-owned property just set the bar lower for the whole neighborhood.

The Ugly

If you don’t know what you are doing or have enough of a cash reserve to justify the risk, this real estate market can eat you alive, especially if you are short-sighted.

Fix It and Flip It

Unless you are lightning fast, experienced at managing renovation projects and holding plenty of cash that you are comfortable risking, that late night real estate fix-and-flip infomercial that was recorded in 2003 should not be considered your ticket to financial freedom. Of course there are gurus who have been waiting for this opportunity, and you are driving around listening to Robert Kiyosaki on iTunes with your Bluetooth intact looking for the bargain of the century. Just do your research, and don’t think that any particular property is the last opportunity you will ever have to get a great deal.

Until you see your local median price leveled off or even slightly increasing for a few months consecutively, you are dependent on sweat equity, which in many cases is wiped out by a few homes in the neighborhood going into foreclosure and further reducing home prices. Again, this market has become hyperlocal, down to the subdivision. In Orange County for example, prices for stronger neighborhoods may be down only 10% in the last year while properties less than a mile away have been cut in half or more in extreme cases.

Are you really ready?

How much are you paying now for rent? You should look at a good principal and interest calculator or talk to your lender to get the whole picture, including monthly amounts for taxes, insurance, any applicable homeowners association dues, and any applicable mortgage insurance. This is important even if you plan on paying taxes and insurance on your own (rather than impounding them and making monthly payments to the lender) because you will want to make sure to budget monthly to set aside for these expenses. So, if you are paying $1,500 currently for rent, and the new home will be $2,500, put your budget to the test and see how well your finances run when you put the amount of the increased housing expense (in this case $1,000) into your savings account. Take it out right when you pay your rent, and don’t touch it. This is a great test of how much you can really comfortably afford, and of course has the nice side effect of padding your savings for a few months before you start shopping for a home.

Of course, if you have a long-term plan to be in the home, the fluctuations and potential decrease in value in the near term doesn’t need to get you down, as the only price that matters is the price you are able to sell for when you need or want to move.

Info from http://www.mint.com/

We don’t recommend you try to time the housing market but, if you’re in the market for a new home, it helps to pay attention to its cyclical nature. When times are hard, prices drop and the market becomes more attractive. When more people get in, prices naturally rise. While there are still deals to be had, this map shows that some of the regions that were hit hardest by the housing crisis in 2007 and 2008 have begun to bounce back in early 2009 with increased sales numbers. With sale prices of homes plummeting as much as 50% in some regions, more people have been jumping into the market with hopes of getting a great deal, especially with 30 year fixed rates falling below 5% for the first time in recent memory. The metropolitan areas that are highlighted are those with the highest percentage of change in median sales prices, for better or worse. The highest percentage increases in home sales are in areas where prices have dropped the most over the past year, which is an encouraging sign as bargain hunters see new opportunities. Further, the decrease in prices and attractive housing credits have finally made it possible for many first-time homebuyers to afford a home in the once red-hot areas like Orange County, Phoenix, and Las Vegas. While there are only six states that have experienced increases in sales volume in the past year, most of those positive changes have been drastic. Arizona has seen a 50% jump, California over 80% and Nevada an impressive 117% increase from 2008. Depending on where you live, the housing market may be in either a boom or bust cycle. Let us know in the comments how real estate is looking in your hometown, whether it is on the map or not.

1. Invite interested buyers to visit your property again. Prepare the FSBO property for the next visit of interested buyers. Make sure every single corner of the house is clean and presentable. Set a comfortable atmosphere in your home. This next visit is make-or-break in a For Sale By Owner – it will determine whether the interested buyers will go on with the purchase or find another property.

2. Greet the interested buyers cordially the moment they arrive in your FSBO home. Offer them drinks. Allow them to go around the house once again without getting in their way. However, escort them as they tour the house so you could answer any questions they might have. Be patient in answering particularly when they have numerous questions. Remember that asking many questions is a good sign as it means that they are interested in the buying the FSBO property. Be honest when you answer their questions.

3. When the buyers show interest and ask you about the next step, be prepared with your answer. This is the time for the buyers to make their offer and formally put it in writing. It is important that you have copies of necessary contract forms which you will give interested buyers. Otherwise, simply knowing where to get the contract forms would be enough. Watch out for subtle signs. If the buyers say that they would want to discuss the sale, it might mean that they want to negotiate about certain terms. Only when there is formal writing that the transaction becomes official.

4. When the buyers want to negotiate the price of your FSBO home, do it in formal writing. Avoid any verbal negotiations. If they ask you the lowest price you are willing to counter-offer, before you declare any amount, ask for their entire offer first and request proof that they are qualified for the mortgage.

Simple Tips on Dealing with FSBO Buyers:

• Be friendly. Treat your potential buyers well.
• Be professional. If your buyers have negative comments regarding the FSBO property, think of them as something that you have to improve and work on instead of taking the comments personally. They could turn out to be helpful later on.
• When there are discussions with interested buyers, keep them calm. Avoid confrontations. An FSBO sale is supposed to work for both the seller and the buyer.

1. Little or No Appreciation as Market Bottoms

In parts of the country hardest hit by 2007 – 2008 foreclosures such as California, Michigan and Florida, prices will continue to soften. In scattered markets, the bottom will already have been reached by April but media won’t report it until late summer, after a trend has been established.

There will be no more dramatic price drops such as those 30% to 50% declines we saw between 2006 and 2008. But the market will not stabilize in 2009. Furthermore, consumer confidence will continue to fall, and more people will find themselves out of work.

On the bright side, employed home buyers with good credit will find 2009 is an excellent time to buy.

2. Housing Inventory Will Fall

Sellers will withhold listings from the market or cancel listings that don’t sell within 90 days. Although persistent demand will come from first-time home buyers and investors, inventory will fall. Falling inventory will not drive up the prices.

The number of homes for sale in states such as California will decrease by 45% or more from the same months in 2007. New home starts will fall by the wayside, and the construction industry will see at least another 10% in layoffs.

Although fewer homes will be available for sale, those sellers will be motivated to sell.

3. Bank Will Rent Out REOs

In an effort to drive up housing prices, banks will slowly release their REO inventory to the market and price those homes at 5% to 20% under comparable sales. Banks will be under great pressure to cut losses and increase revenue. Although state charters prohibit banks from renting out bank-owned homes, banks will find a way to work around this prohibition.

By transferring title from bank-owned homes into holding companies, banks may find a loophole that will allow them to rent out homes instead of putting them on the market. This maneuver will let banks receive income while waiting for the market to turnaround.

To rent the homes, banks will be forced to fix them up.

4. Buyers Will Compete in Multiple-Offer Situations

Due to limited inventory, coupled with pseudo pricing on short sales and foreclosures, more buyers will find themselves competing over the attractive listings. It will not be unusual for sellers to receive 20 or more offers on these listings.

Multiple offers may drive up the prices to market value but buyers will refuse to pay over market value. The stiff competition will cause frustration and confusion among buyers who will find themselves going head-to-head with investors. Cash buyers will win every time over buyers who need financing.

This means it will be more important than ever for home buyers to hire an excellent negotiator.

5. Rental Rates Will Increase as Demand Increases

Surging numbers of home owners will lose their homes in 2009, which will turn former home owners into tenants. Some home owners will walk away from their residences, deciding that home ownership is not worth the aggravation, and return to living in rentals.

Because new construction will be at a standstill, existing inventory will serve as shelter. There will be fewer rental homes available than the demand will dictate, which will put upward pressure on rental rates. Sellers who are unwilling to take a hit on their sales prices will put their homes on the market as rentals, but that won’t provide enough inventory to fulfill demand.

It’s a good time to be landlord.

An entire village, complete with two blacksmiths, a shop and a cricket club, has been put up for sale for a cool £22.5 million.

Nestling in the rolling countryside of the North Wessex Downs, Linkenholt is the archetypal English village. Now, for a cool £22.5 million, it could all be yours, as the entire village – including every house in it – goes up for sale.

The historic village of 22 houses and cottages is part of a 2,000 acre estate which will go on the market later this month.

It is located in the Test Valley, north Hampshire, near the borders with Berkshire and Wiltshire – a region officially designated by Natural England as an area of outstanding natural beauty

Among the properties included for sale are a cricket pitch and pavilion, which doubles as the village hall, a large three-storey manor house, and a village shop run from the front room of one of the homes.

Also included in the sale are two properties from which agricultural blacksmiths operate, a commercial shoot, farming land, and an educational activity centre for children.

The only property in the village not owned by the estate is its church, St Peters, which dates back to the 12th century but was rebuilt significantly in 1871. It still holds services, on the third Sunday of each month.

Tina Abbott, 59, who runs the village shop from her home, has lived in the village for 39 years.

She said: "We understand that whoever buys the estate will get everything, lock stock and barrel. It has got to be someone who will run it like it is now.

"It used to be a really close knit community because everyone living here worked on the farm estate. It isn’t quite like that now. But is still a wonderful place to live.

"If you go quarter of a mile outside the village in any direction, you can look around you and not see another living soul."

All the properties are currently rented out, including the manor house, and all the tenants will be able to remain in their homes after the sale. The Trust has said it intends to sell the estate whole, rather than break it up.

Villagers said the current tenants of the manor house were Swedish, with connections to the Swedish royal family.

Ray Smith, former head keeper on the estate, said the King of Sweden had been to the village to go shooting.

"They are great friends. I shook hands with the King when he came over. The estate is very good for shooting. I imagine that will be what sells it."

Colin Boast, who runs Linkenholt Forge, said: "It would be nice if the new owner would come and live on the estate. It would be good if they lived here and could oversee it all."

He added: "There is a lot of history here. There has been a forge here since the year dot. And the people here are so friendly. Everyone knows everyone else. There are a lot of characters in the village who go back years."

The estate is currently owned by a charitable trust, set up by Herbert Blagrave – a keen cricketer, racehorse owner and trainer and one time president of Southampton Football Club – and his brother, Peter. Herbert Blagrave, who owned the land, died more than 20 years ago.

The Herbert and Peter Blagrave Charitable Trust was set up to provide funds for organisations helping disabled children and injured jockeys. It also set up the activity centre on the estate to help children learn more about the countryside.

The Trust is selling the estate in order to reinvest the proceeds and will continue to function, as well as to run the activity centre at Linkenholt.

The village has around 40 inhabitants, all of whom will receive booklets from the estate, informing them of the sale plans.

The village is being sold through estate agents Jackson-Stops and Staff. A spokeswoman said: "The trust wants to reinvest in a more diverse portfolio. The estate will definitely be sold as a whole."

She said an asking price had not yet been decided upon, but experts have put the value at between £17.5 and £22.5 million.

One industry expert, who knows the estate well and who asked not to be named, said: "The buyer will likely be a private individual. There are still people with money about.

"A year ago, the price might have been about £3 million more. It has dropped, but not dramatically.

"Estates of this size and quality in the "super prime" league are rare beasts. They don’t come on the market very often.

"People are backing agricultural land as something that is going to rise in value. And this area is close to the M4 corridor and aesthetically very beautiful. The real draws are its location, its shoot and its farming. The cricket club is a nice little bonus."

Why Do Sellers Go Into Foreclosure?

Sellers stop making payments for a host of reasons. Few choose to go into foreclosure voluntarily. It’s often an unpredictable result from one of the following:

• Laid-off, fired or quit job
• Inability to continue working due to medical conditions
• Excessive debt and mounting bill obligations
• Squabbles with co-owner, divorce
• Job transfer to another state

Negotiating Directly with Sellers in Foreclosure

Investors who specialize in buying foreclosures often prefer to purchase these homes before the foreclosure proceedings are final. Before approaching a seller in distress, consider:

1. Foreclosure proceedings vary from state to state. In states where mortgages are used, home owners can end up staying in the property for almost a year; whereas, in states where trust deeds are used, a seller has less than four months before the trustee’s sale.
2. Almost every state provides for some period of redemption. This means the seller has an irrevocable right during a certain length of time to cure the default, including paying all foreclosure costs, back interest and missed principal payments, to regain control of the property. For more information, consult a real estate lawyer.

1. Many states also require that buyers give to sellers certain disclosures regarding equity purchases. Failure to provide those notices and to prepare offers on the required paperwork can result in fines, lawsuits or even revocation of sale.
3. Determine whether you’re the type of person who can easily take advantage of a seller’s misfortune under these circumstances and / or put a family out on the street. Oh, critics will argue it’s just business and sellers deserve what they get, even if it’s five cents on the dollar. Others will feign compassion and trick themselves into believing they are "helping" the home owners avoid further embarrassment, but deep inside yourself, you know that’s not true.

Buying a Home at the Trustee’s Sale

Check with your local county office to find out how sales in your area are handled, but common threads among those I see in Sacramento are:

• No loan contingency
• Sealed bids
• Proof of financial qualifications
• Sizeable earnest money deposits
• Purchase property "as is"

Sometimes buyers are not allowed to inspect the house before making an offer. The problem with buying a house sight unseen is you can’t calculate how much it will cost to improve the structure or bring it up to habitable standards. Nor do you know if the occupant will retaliate and destroy the interior. On top of that, you may need to evict the tenant or owner from the premises after you receive title, and eviction processes can be costly.

Because you might want to think twice about making an offer on a pre-foreclosure, short sale home. It’s not as simple as you may believe, and very few can close in 30 days or less.

Many of my Sacramento home buyers have waited 4 to 6 months to close on a short sale, sometimes longer.

What is a Short Sale?

A short sale means the seller’s lender is accepting a discounted payoff to release an existing mortgage. Just because a property is listed with short sale terms does not mean the lender will accept your offer, even if the seller accepts it.

Be aware that the seller need not be in default — to have stopped making mortgage payments — before a lender will consider a short sale. A lender may consider a short sale if the seller is current but the value has fallen. The seller may have over-encumbered, owe more than the home is worth, so a discounted price might bring the price in line with market value, not below it.

Check the Public Records

Do your research before making an offer to purchase. Your agent can find out who is in title, whether a foreclosure notice has been filed and how much is owed to the lender(s). This is important because it will help you to determine how much to offer.

If there are two loans, you could have a problem. The first mortgage lender’s position is protected by the second lender, unless the second lender does not want to foreclose. If a seller owes $160,000 on the first and $40,000 on the second, offering $160,000 leaves nothing for the second. The first will need to give something to the second to gain its cooperation.

Hire an Agent with Short Sale Experience

It’s one strike against you if the listing agent has never handled a short sale, but it’s even worse if your own agent has no experience in that arena. You need an experienced short sale agent.

An agent with experience in short sales will help to expedite your transaction and protect your interests. You don’t want to miss any important detail due to inexperience or find out your transaction is not going to close on time because no one has followed up in a timely manner.

Prepare the Seller for Lender Demands

A lender is not going to agree to a short sale unless the seller has no equity and is unable to repay the difference between your sales price and the existing loans. Sellers need to provide a hardship letter to the lender. Sellers may also owe taxes on the amount of debt that is forgiven.

A seller I know once demanded that the buyer slip the seller $1,000 to be given the right to purchase the seller’s property. We said no. This is fraud. The lender legally pursued that seller. Do not be lured by sellers who suggest this practice. In a short sale, the seller receives no money because the lender is losing money.

Submit Documentation & Purchase Offer to Lender

Once the seller has accepted your offer, send it to the lender for approval. You do not have a deal until the lender accepts. Also, send the lender a copy of your earnest money deposit. Do not be astonished if the lender asks you to increase it.

In addition, the lender will want to see that you have your own loan available and you are preapproved. Send a preapproval letter to the lender. It will help if your agent sends a list of comparable sales that support the price you are offering to pay for the home.

Give the Lender a Deadline

Make your offer contingent upon the lender’s acceptance. Give the lender a time frame in which to respond, after which, you will be free to cancel. If the lender is under no pressure to make a decision, the paperwork will sit on an underling’s desk.

Some lenders submit short sales to committee, but most can make a decision within two to three weeks, providing you have submitted the offer to the individual in decision-making capacity. Get a name and phone number for the appropriate contact at the lender. Don’t send an offer blindly to a department.

Expect Commission Negotiations

Regardless of the commission the seller has agreed to pay, the lender is actually the entity paying the commission. The reason is the seller is not receiving any money with which to pay a commission. Since the lender is losing money, the lender will likely negotiate the commission directly with the listing broker, who will then share the commission with your agent.

If you have signed a buyer’s broker agreement with your agent, ask if the agent will waive the difference due or you might have to pay it out of your pocket. Some brokers feel it is unfair to penalize the agent, but the lender is calling the shots.

Reserve the Right to Conduct Inspections

Generally, the lender will not pay for customary items that a seller would pay. These include home protection plans for the buyer, buyer credits of any kind and pest / termite inspections. A buyer will be asked to purchase the property "as is," which means no repairs.

It is extremely important that a buyer obtain a home inspection and pay for other types of inspections such as pest, roof, sewers, septic tanks, chimney or fireplace inspections. Do not waive your right to obtain these inspections and make your offer contingent on approving them.

However, they are also similar because without knowledge about handling foreclosures, short sales and REOs, you could find yourself in dangerous territory. For example, while most short sales are foreclosures, not all foreclosures are short sales. To further complicate matters, REOs are not short sales either, but some intended short sales can end up as an REO.

What is a Foreclosure Property?

A foreclosure property is a home in foreclosure — when a notice of default has been filed in the public records. It means the owner has stopped making mortgage payments and the lender has given notice that unless the payments are brought up to date, it will sell the property to the highest bidder.

Lenders can foreclose for other reasons, but the most common reason lenders file a notice of default is when a borrower is at least two payments in arrears.

If the home owner does not bring the loan current, the lender will take the property away from the owner. The final step the lender takes after a certain period has passed is to try to auction the property at a public sale.

Not all homes that fall into foreclosure go to public sale because owners have the right to make up back payments up to a point, the time which varies from state to state.

Real estate investors and home buyers see profit in buying foreclosures because they can often buy the property for the amount owed, picking up the home owner’s equity for free.

How California law Affects Foreclosure / Short Sale Investors

States have varying laws governing foreclosures and some follow California law. To completely understand your rights as a foreclosure buyer, contact a local real estate lawyer. However, realize that for a long time in California, a real estate agent could not represent a foreclosure investor if all of the following four statements were true:

• The home qualifies as the seller’s personal residence.
• The property is a single family home or 2 to 4 units.
• A Notice of Default has been filed in the public records against the property.
• The investor buyer will not occupy the property.

However, if any of those four statements were false, an agent in California would be allowed to represent buyers, especially if the buyer was going to occupy the home. But to represent an investor, CA law requires that a real estate agent post a bond. No such bond is available in the state of California. Therefore, as a pre-foreclosure investor in California, many buyers were forced to act on their own.

A California court ruled in 2007 that the bond requirement was unenforceable. The California Association of Realtors then made available a special package of forms that agents can use to represent investors. Realize, as an investor, you are required to comply with the Home Equity Sales Act. Among other requirements, sellers who are in foreclosure have the right to rescind (cancel) a transaction within five days. Investors must give the seller notice of that right, including a copy of the form that will let sellers cancel.

Failure to comply with the Home Equity Sales Act carries severe penalties, including a provision that gives the seller the right to cancel the sale up to two years after the sale to the investor has closed and get the property back. You read that correctly. Two years.

As an investor, before you decide to buy a home in foreclosure by making up the back payments to the lender, giving the seller a few dollars and recording a deed, call a real estate lawyer.

What is a Short Sale Property?

A short sale occurs when a home owner is in foreclosure but before the property goes to public auction. Under a short sale, a lender must agree to accept less than the amount that is owed on the property.

Unlike a foreclosure, investors typically buy the home for even less because investors are not paying off the existing loan nor making up the back payments. Investors are striking a deal with the existing lender to take less than what the lender has coming to avoid dealing with a foreclosure.

It’s a myth that lenders are not going to make a deal with an investor unless the seller has fallen behind on the seller’s obligation to make timely mortgage payments. Sellers don’t need to be in default for a short sale to occur. For a buyer who wants to occupy the home, buying a short sale makes financial sense.

What are REOs – Real Estate Owned?

• Buying an REO is similar to buying a short sale except the property is already owned by the lender.
• The property was acquired by the lender through a foreclosure action.
• Often lenders will sell repossessed homes for less than the past loan balance.
• Bank-owned properties are called REOs, meaning real estate owned by the lender.

Banks end up owning the property when nobody at the public auction bid enough to cover the amount owed against the property. REO homes are often considered the best way to buy a distressed property because the seller is already out of the picture. It’s just the investor, the investor’s agent, the bank and the bank’s agent who are negotiating the transaction. Some REOs can be purchased directly from the lender.

For more information, seek the advice of a real estate lawyer.

Some Home Buyers Should Buy Immediately

Well, here is why:

• If you are a seller who wants to move up to a more expensive home in a down market, now could be the best time. The longer you wait to sell, the lower the price of your home could fall.
• If you can arrange for alternate housing, a smart strategy is sell now, wait a few months, then buy your new home.
• If you sell and buy simultaneously, you’ll still be ahead of the game because the price reduction on the purchase is greater than the loss on the sale.

Consider the "Loss" on Selling Your Present Home

For example, say your present house is worth $300,000, but because of high inventory and few buyers, you must reduce your price by 10%. So, instead of receiving $300,000, you would get $270,000 and "lose" $30,000.

Consider Your Real Profit

Now, consider this. Say you bought this home 10 years ago and paid $100,000. You’re still ahead $170,000, less costs of sale, aren’t you? (This ignores monthly payments, but you would make those if you were renting, too.)

Consider the "Savings" on Buying Your New Home

If you are planning to move up to a $500,000 house, which is located in the same distressed market, you could probably buy that house at that same 10% discount or $450,000. This would mean you had saved $50,000.

Review of Selling and Buying Numbers

1. So you "lost" $30,000 on the sale of your home
2. But you "made" $50,000 on the purchase of your new home
3. Doesn’t that put you $20,000 ahead?

Don’t Forget the Impact of Interest Rates

Which way are interest rates moving? Are they moving up or moving down? If interest rates are near an all-time low and beginning to inch upwards, waiting could cost you more than you would think. You might not be able to afford to buy a home at any price.

FACT: Each 1/2 point increase in your interest rate gives you $25,000 less in purchasing power.

FACT: Each 1 point increase in your interest rate gives you $50,000 less in purchasing power.

FACT: Each 2 point increase in your interest rate gives you $100,000 less in purchasing power.

Look at the Differences Among Purchase Prices versus Interest Rates

If you put down 20% and qualify for an 80% loan, here are your principal and interest payments on the following purchase prices:

• $425,000 sales price, at 8.25% interest, your payment is $2,554.
• $450,000 sales price, at 7.75% interest, your payment is $2,579.
• $475,000 sales price, at 7.25% interest, your payment is $2,592.
• $500,000 sales price, at 6.75% interest, your payment is $2,594.
• $525,000 sales price, at 6.25% interest, your payment is $2,586.

The payments are almost identical. However, the home you can afford to buy a 8.25% is $100,000 less than the home you can afford to buy at 6.25%. If you wait for prices to further decline, the perceived value could be lost due to higher rates.

All other recessions since 1929 lasted a period of two years or less. Many of those recessions shared falling stock prices, high interest rates, high unemployment rates and a loss of consumer confidence, along with one other common trait: They were all good times to buy real estate.

Buying Homes in the Midst of a Housing Recession

When prices fall, the question is not really how low can they go but how much real estate can you buy before they go back up. If you are buying a home during a housing recession, getting a good price is just as important as being able to hold and ride out the housing recession.

Here are tips that can help you make a wise decision and capitalize on falling prices:

• Buying in a Down Market

  How to figure out if it makes financial sense for you to buy when prices are falling. If prices haven’t hit bottom yet, how to tell where the bottom is likely to rest, and why it might not really matter.

• Looking at Overpriced Homes

  In depressed markets, it’s not unusual for some sellers to price their home too high. If you spot a home that’s been languishing on the market, it might warrant a second look. Here’s how to tell.

• Buying Distressed Sales in a Housing Recession

  Foreclosures, short sales and REOs: differences. Buying distressed properties under market value. Which is more profitable for a buyer — short sales, foreclosures or real-estate-owned (REO’s)? How CA law affects foreclosure sales.

• Before Buying a Short Sale

  Before you buy a short sale, read about your rights. Why the seller’s lender needs to approve a short sale and how to understand what is involved in closing short sale transactions.

• Buying Post Foreclosures: REOS

  How to buy a foreclosures / REOs from the bank. Negotiating offers for bank owned homes. Difference between REO homes and short sales. Hiring an agent to buy REOs.

A story told by Erica Ferencik that deeply reflects the current situation and its roots.

All I wanted was a good job I couldn’t lose. I didn’t realize I’d end up bringing down the global economy…

It’s a terrible thing to come to terms with, but I am the reason the world is in an economic tailspin. Me, alone. All those foreclosures, short sales, bank failures, job losses, bailouts, plummeting stocks, the ripple effect into Europe, China, even Madoff: all my fault. Moi. That last house I sold at 253 Carrington Way? That was the tipping point, I’m convinced. I sold it for $657,500 in August 2005, and now Zillow is damning it at $537,000. I would weep to call the owners now and say, hey, want a market analysis? Sound like fun? I know, you’d rather shove shards of glass under your fingernails, I hear you.

In any case, I’m your neighborhood real estate agent, and I’m really, really sorry.

And to think it all began so innocently. Nine years ago, back in the early aughts, it felt like the right thing to do, getting that real estate license. Laid off from three (count ‘em, three) publishing jobs, I was looking for a job I couldn’t lose. I asked a couple of real-estate friends what they thought about their job security.

“Do they lay off real estate agents?” I asked.

There was a stifled guffaw. “You could murder a couple people, but if you had some good listings in the bag, you’re probably fine.”

It was between a real estate license ($200) and an MBA ($65,000). I did the math and, boom, I was a real estate agent.

Those early years were insane. I hit the ground running, holding on for dear life to a market taking off like a jet plane. You could send out a mailing — or an ad, or a flier, possibly just a phone number — and get 20 calls on it. My phone would not stop ringing. Countless e-mails burned my eyes night and day. People were crazed for houses, lusting after them, bidding up and up and up, clawing at each other just to get the house. It was a frenzy of nesting, a compulsion to cocoon, to own no matter what. Houses were hoarded like porn, lunged and pawed at like food dropped into villages at wartime.

And we as real estate agents were, what? Mindless spokes and wheels in a transaction? Pawns in some mad game? Satan’s evil linchpins? The instigators of the world’s demise? I’m still not sure. Regardless, we drove around like maniacs with our buyers to “just listed” properties — i.e., they came on the market half an hour previous — took a jog through some mediocre house, then sprinted back to the office to advise our clients not just how to write an offer, but how to write one that would be accepted. That is, teach them how to punt and feint: make the offer good for an hour only to force the sellers’ hand; show up at first light with the paperwork and a check to greet the sleepy homeowner getting his newspaper (à la “Sopranos”); strike all contingencies. Or last but not least: bid blind with an escalation clause. That is, bid $5,000 or $10,000 over the highest amount offered, whatever that happened to be. Basically: tie a cloth over your eyes and just throw money.

But those full price or 10K-over asking offers didn’t always cut the mustard, especially if there were four of them on the table. We’d suggest to our buyers to make it personal: to go for the Lifetime moment. To show up in person at the bidding table holding the hands of their adorable children; to pen missives such as: “The minute I crossed the threshold of your beautiful home, I knew this was the one. Your home is just like my grandmother’s. She died last week.” (This is where you well up, OK?) “But she would have loved to see me buy a house just like yours. Here’s $500,000 for your home assessed at $350,000, please take it, oh please, I’ll do anything.”

Houses of all kinds, in any shape at all, were selling instantly, even “psychologically impacted homes.” I’ll never forget one horrid slab ranch where there’d been a murder. The listing broker hadn’t even bothered to remove the police tape from around the house before offers began pouring in. In total, five bids rolled in on the home, each at least 5K over asking, with the winning bid striking the mortgage as well as the inspection contingencies. I heard the sellers threw in the ghost as well.

By 2002 my office was brimming with new, fresh-faced agents from every walk of life: software engineers, teachers, retail store owners, landscape architects, all manner of escapees from the corporate world, ready to learn on the fly and cash those commission checks as fast as possible. More seasoned agents cast them flinty glances as if to say: “Have you ever heard of a real estate cycle? Sure we’re flyin’ high, but strap on those seat belts, kids, this roller coaster is going down.”

But no one was paying attention then. We relative newbies thought this was just the way things were. Wake up, work, crash, repeat. There were lavish Christmas parties, over-the-top award ceremonies deifying top producers who were making truly crazy money, new cars in the lot, fresh duds on our backs, and no one really felt the sting of the check on all those dinners out. Let’s put it this way: The bon temps roo-layed. We had 10 phone lines, and at times they were all ringing at once.

Did we make money? Yes. Did we work for it? Yes. I worked seven days a week for months at a time. I lost 10 pounds, lived on PowerBars, filled my gas tank two, three, four times a week. I answered my phone in the bathroom, at weddings, funerals, my birthday surprise party, while eating my PowerBar, even at a wake. I worked on holidays, weekends, many times up at 6 and dropping by midnight. Once I lost a bid for my buyer clients, let’s call them the Smiths, because I had slipped home at noon to take a shower, having had no time in the morning because of a painfully early home inspection. I left the phone outside the shower stall, but I guess I never heard it. An hour later I saw the call, called them back and found them furious: Their dream home had come on the market, they were standing in the open house, and where was I? Showering? By the time I got there, breathless and wet-haired, the owners had already signed another offer, $18,000 over asking. Mrs. Smith wept, Mr. Smith cursed, then fired me. I felt sick. The guilt was actually worse than the lost commission. Their American dream shattered by me.

Predatory loans? We thought they were just “creative,” a term not at all pejorative back then. I don’t even think the term “predatory loan” existed until it was time to lay down some serious blame, as in 2007 and on. In any case, I had some lower-income clients who were part of this collective insanity. That is, everyone had drunk the same Kool-Aid, so they wanted a house as badly as everyone else. I actually rooted for them to get a loan, any kind of loan, to get them into the house they wanted. They had a 3-year-old daughter and one on the way, and both worked two jobs while trying to learn English, which they were picking up with astounding speed. We aggressively house-hunted, bid and got the house, and they were ecstatic and very grateful to me, even though the house, at just over 850 square feet, could barely contain them. There were tears and hugs at the closing, where my phone rang and rang and screamed some more.

So yes, back then it was a piece of cake to pay my bills and put something away, but my hair was falling out, I was so stressed. I was not a great partner to my husband. Most of my friends had given up on seeing me. Even my cats didn’t recognize me when I dragged myself home at night.

Now, my cats not only recognize me, they wish I would get a life, as does my husband. My hair is back in place on my head.

My office is filled with empty cubicles; phones are answered on the first ring. Papers flutter about on empty desks. Of course the economy is terrible, but something more is going on. It’s eerie. Even the top brokers are sleeping late, reading more, and wondering what the hell to do. Award ceremonies have been canceled. Holiday parties are ancient history. Just as for everyone else, the future is impossible to predict because the combination of elements in play is unique.

In the wee hours, the faces of my clients parade before my eyes. Sleepless, I get up and see what their home is worth now; pray that they still have their jobs. Then I Google “best paying jobs of the future” and read: dental hygienist, database administrator, systems analyst. I have a good cry and go back to bed.

I’ve checked in on my lower-income clients and thankfully they’ve both kept their jobs, but their home would be a short sale if we had to put it on the market now. They told me they’ve made ends meet by inviting a relative up from New York to stay and pay some rent by living in their already crowded home. I can’t imagine which room they’re putting him in.

The Smiths: They’d hired another agent to come to their rescue after I took that fateful shower, and had had no problem overbidding on another home. Now their home is one of the dozens of foreclosures in town. Days on market: 342. Price changes: five and counting. Just the other day I read that Mr. Smith’s company was slicing employees like cheese from a giant wheel.

What am I doing now? I take depressing classes on the labyrinthine procedure of conducting short sales, orchestrate foreclosures, show buyers countless homes before they confess they’d like to “maybe wait a year or two,” watch sellers break into tears as they sign a listing contract. Try to figure out how to market myself via social networking, which gags me, but what can you do? Lord knows, I live to Facebook, Twitter, tweet, blog, gather, LinkIn, YouTube, Gawk, Boing Boing, friend, Rain Actively, Digg, Xanga, Squidoo, Top Produce, and MySpace my way into the hearts of my buyers and sellers.

My phone has been, for all intents and purposes, silent for weeks now. I keep checking to make sure it’s on. Sometimes I’ll make a few calls just to use up those minutes I’ve already paid for. Today I ran into an agent from my office in our local drugstore whom I hadn’t seen for months. She told me she’d gotten a job at American Girl. She’d been a full-time real estate agent for 26 years. I asked her how she liked retail. “I love it,” she said unconvincingly. “People are so happy when they’re buying dolls.”

Huh?

Another real estate friend has gone back to doing trade shows for medical products.

A downtown agent got a job in a fancy French restaurant where he hasn’t worked since college (”when the aprons fit”). Now he says he’s one of those waiters standing in the corner staring out the window waiting for customers, the ones he felt sorry for walking by the restaurant on his way to show houses in 2004.

Other friends complain about getting pink slips. At least they’re getting a pink slip. (Unemployment, anyone? Maybe even COBRA? A pipe dream for us commission-based folks.) There’s something a tad respectful about a pink slip. It says: You had a job, now you don’t anymore. As opposed to crushing silence and empty in boxes, which mean, I guess it sure looks like/isn’t this a dead ringer for/heads up: you don’t have a job anymore.

Last week, my phone actually rang. I nearly had a heart attack. It was a real live potential seller. A neighbor from down the street with a horse property — not the most common thing in my hood but there are a few. She said that, “among others,” she would be interviewing me, a few high-end brokers from neighboring offices, and three horse property specialists. Can we say “disincentivized by the competition”?

I tried to rally. How can I get around the fact that I’ve never sold a horse property? I suppose I could show up in jodhpurs, compliment the seller on her tack barn (”Great saddle choice! I love this kind, don’t you? You know … leather“), put hay in my hair. Whatever it takes to get the job. After all, my last paycheck was in October. Holy deeded manure pile!

Desperation has become a familiar face; at times it even stares back at me in the mirror in the morning. But I don’t think I’m alone. As the orchestra plays, sliding down with all of us on the tilting deck of the Titanic, I can see it now: my fellow real estate agents and I wishing each other well as we call out, “Hey, see you at American Girl!” or, “I hear Orange Julius is hiring. You go, girl!”

So if you hear whinnying or see me cantering about town on a some fetching filly, not to worry. That’s just me trying to get the listing, along with everybody else.

1. The Pay Me First Scam

Some foreclosure rescue scammers ask customers to pay them fees in exchange for delaying a foreclosure. It’s actually illegal for foreclosure rescue companies to collect fees before performing a service. They should be paid after negotiating new loans or monthly payments.

Unfortunately, some homeowners find out the hard way that paying companies before they perform a service leaves them without money or a home. The Star-Telegram reports on one San Francisco-area mortgage broker advertised foreclosure avoidance workshops on Craigslist. For a $2,500 upfront fee plus a $2,000 monthly payment, Freedom Financial Solutions claimed it would halt foreclosures by finding legal violations in homeowners’ mortgage agreements.

Instead, Cheryl Ann Montero, owner of the company, took an ownership stake in her clients’ houses, then filed for bankruptcy, which suspended foreclosures. Montero, who ended up delivering nothing to her clients, made off with $52,000 before declaring bankruptcy herself.

2. The Title Transfer Scam

This scam involves transferring the title of your home to the foreclosure rescue company. This is a very, very bad idea. If your name is not on the title, guess who owns your home? Hint: It’s not you.

Rip-off Report reader Cheri had a scam like this happen to her. Facing foreclosure, she contacted a mortgage rescue company. The scammers executed a buyback scheme that would allow her to re-purchase her house at a different appraisal value. In order to finish the deal, they said they needed to put someone else’s name on the title of the home. Cheri would be a trustee, “guaranteeing” her that she would maintain control of the property while staying inside a renter.

It turned out Cheri’s name never made it to the title. She was paying down a mortgage on a home she no longer owned. The scammers made off with the title, possibly some equity, and the willingness to evict her from the house.

3. Sending Mortgage Payments to a Fake Address

Some scammers ask to receive your payment in place of the lender. They claim they have a special relationship with the lender, or can renegotiate your mortgage if you send them payments. This is sketchy, to say the least. One California scammer, for example, made $1.2 million by pretending to be a lender—then fled to his native Mexico.

If someone tells you to ignore your lender letters, or to send the payments somewhere else, run the other direction.

4. Fake Lender Letters

Some fraudsters have taken to forging major lenders’ letterhead and convincing homeowners to sign up for “official” loan modification services. Mail, envelopes, and letterhead may look exactly like the lender’s, but the content will be fraudulent.

The Lake County News reports that one Los Angeles ring even filed a fictitious business permit. The swindlers forged lender and government envelopes with “Final Notice” written on the outside. The letters inside told homeowners that if they sent in their mortgage information, they could apply for a home rescue program.

Once homeowners applied, they received a confirmation note and a set of forged lender documents. In the meantime, they were instructed to send their mortgage payments to a “Payment Processing Dept” located at a scammer’s PO box, where the money was stolen.

5. The Obama Rescue Plan Scam

The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that some rescue companies are charging as much as $3,000 to modify customer loans under the new Obama relief plan. The truth is that you can find out about rescue plan yourself, either online at MakingHomeAffordable.gov, through the Homeownership Preservation Foundation at 995hope.org, or by calling 1-888-995-HOPE.

Just as stock investors console themselves in knowing that today’s troubled market doesn’t really matter if they don’t sell now, homebuyers who put down roots won’t worry about selling at a loss should real estate prices slide further.

But since you actually live in a home, life can get in the way of even the best-laid hold strategy. A job offer in another city, a marriage, a divorce, a new baby — all are life turns that can force a housing change.

Nevertheless, life goes on, and you may be contemplating a move. Indeed, the government is dangling an $8,000 tax credit to entice first-time buyers. Here, experts weigh in on how buyers should consider getting time on their side.

Although he now works as a fee-only financial planner, Richard Kahler spent 30 years as a real estate agent. During most of that time, "the standard rule of thumb was that you’d have to stay in a home at least two years to recoup the costs (of buying and selling)," he says.

Kahler’s hometown of Rapid City, S.D., had not seen dramatic upswings in prices, but modest, steady appreciation. Prices are now flat, says Kahler, who adds, "Today, I would be telling someone (to stay in their home for) three to five years, depending on the market."

Although the National Association of Realtors reports that historically, home prices rise 1.3 percent above the rate of inflation, there have been more dramatic down and up cycles.

A study published in 2001 from Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies found that homeowners who are most likely to profit from a sale are those who buy at the trough of a cycle and hold at least one year through the next price upswing.

Right now, given the inventory of homes for sale and the spate of foreclosures around Sacramento, Calif., Kevin Young of Young Wealth Management in Davis, Calif., advises his clients to plan to stay for five to eight years. "I don’t know if we are at the bottom, and there’s tremendous uncertainty about the future," he says.

Foreclosures and price drops are a much greater problem in places like California, Florida and other select areas rather than in the nation as a whole, according to University of Virginia urban planning professor William Lucy.

Look at actual sale prices in the neighborhood you’re interested in, says Lucy, adding that such information is typically available from the county record or assessor. The future is never sure, but examining price movements can help buyers define their timeline, Lucy says.

Young buyers, especially, might find that the home they can buy now won’t fit their needs later.

According to 2007 U.S. Census abstract data, at age 18 a person could expect to move another 9.1 times in his or her remaining lifetime, compared with 2.7 expected moves for 45-year-olds.

Another old real estate rule, or oft-repeated maxim, is "buy the biggest and best you can." The idea is that if young buyers purchase a home that can accommodate them years later, they’ll save by not having to move again. While this advice dovetails with a theory experts endorse — holding a home and steadily paying off the mortgage is the surest route to housing wealth — financial planners generally frown on "stretching" to afford a more expensive home.

Barry Korb of Lighthouse Financial Planning in Potomac, Md., says he counseled one couple who wanted to spend about 55 percent of their income on housing. "I asked them how they’d handle their car loans and credit card debt," he says.

Lenders are now focusing more on those questions, says Bedda D’Angelo, president of Fiduciary Solutions in Durham, N.C. Even if borrowers want to borrow big, the new and more conservative lending standards probably wouldn’t allow it, she says.

To stimulate homebuying, the federal government is offering a tax credit worth up to $8,000 to first-time buyers who fall below certain incomes and who buy during 2009.

Young says this credit might spur some buyers to act before year-end. Still, if buyers don’t think they’ll be able to stay in an area long enough to avoid the risk of selling at a loss, it can be more prudent to rent.

Indeed, there’s a newfound, more deliberate approach to homebuying and home owning. "The world has changed," says Nicolas Retsinas, director of the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.

During the boom years earlier this decade, Retsinas says, there was a distorted emphasis on profit, and homes were "purely for buying and then selling." Now there is a "refocus on the consumption value of homes," he says, meaning that homes are to "consume" — or live in and enjoy — for as long as possible.

Mortgage rates rose modestly after falling to record lows the past two weeks.

The average 30-year fixed rate increased 7 basis points, to 5.2 percent. A basis point is one-hundredth of a percentage point.

This week’s average 15-year fixed rate — a popular option for refinancing — rose 2 basis points, to 4.75 percent.

The average jumbo 30-year fixed moved up 8 basis points, to 6.76 percent.

Adjustable-rate mortgages also rose this week. The one-year adjustable-rate mortgage increased 5 basis points, to 5.26 percent. The popular 5/1 ARM moved up 4 basis points, to 5.27 percent.

Argentina: Centro, Buenos Aires

USD Price: $149,000

Bedrooms: 2 Bathrooms: 1

This place is fully remodeled and right in El Centro, 2 blocks from Teatro Colon.

Chile: Villarrica, Region 9

USD Price: $110,000

Bedrooms: 3 Bathrooms: 3

This house is in the town of Villarrica, and has world-class backcountry terrain all around.

Russia: Chystye Prudy Area, Moscow

USD Price: $152,000 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 2 Bathrooms: 2

Right in the center of Moscow.

South Africa: Jeffrey’s Bay, Eastern Cape

USD Price: $152,200 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 5 Bathrooms: 3

This pad has a barbecue, garden, and you’re close to one of the sickest surf spots in the world.

Australia: Deniliquin, New South Wales

USD Price: $144,400 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 5 Bathrooms: 3

A full on 27-acre farm near thetown of Deniliquin. Extremely affordable Australian hom  loans are also available.

Portugal: Evora, Alentejo

USD Price: $150,500 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 2 Bathrooms: 1

Ыweet village of Viana do Alentejo.

Indonesia: Lovina, Bali

USD Price: $107,000 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 4 Bathrooms: 2

A straight-up private villa on Bali with mature palms / banana trees and some kind of ’split level swimming pool’. Ridiculous.

Croatia: Porec, Istria

USD Price: $150,700 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 3 Bathrooms: 2

A 3-bedroom apartment with beach only 3 minutes away, along with the yacht marine of Cervar village.

Czech Republic: Prosek, Prague

USD Price: $144,000 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 2 Bathrooms: 1

A newly renovated apartment with 74 m2 of living space and a 6-minute commute via subway to the city center.

New Zealand: Foxton

USD Price: $125,500 (approx.)

Bedrooms: 4 Bathrooms: 2

Funky designed4 bedroom home.

From recommending wall colors, repairs and decluttering, to careful arrangement of furniture, art and accessories; we guide you through the process to do it yourself, or we take care of all the details for you.

To get the most for your home, you need potential buyers (and their agents) to feel it’s a “hot property”.

These 10 low cost tips will get you started. Even if you’re not moving, you will find they make your home more relaxing and enjoyable to live in.

Get rid of clutter!

Pick one closet or area at a time so the task isn’t as daunting. Look at every item with a very critical eye and ask yourself why you’re keeping it.

Forget about hanging onto items for a garage sale. Pick your favorite charity and donate it. You paid for these things long ago, why not just give them away to others who REALLY need them?

You’ll probably have to edit the same closets a number of times to really whittle them down to the “essentials”. If rooms and closets still look cramped, rent a storage locker.

Watch where the eye goes

There are speedy and low cost solutions to many of the little problems that together make a home seem shabbier than it needs to.

Walk along each corridor and into every room and check where your eye is drawn (better yet, ask a critical friend or family member). If the eye is drawn to the chipped white paint on the door frame, take some “white out” and fill it in. If it’s those old nail holes in the wall, see if you can hang a picture to cover them.

Glue any peeling wallpaper. If it’s really horrible and you can’t afford the time or money to fix it properly, hang pictures and strategically place baskets. You won’t cover the problem entirely (which would be wrong anyway), but you will draw your audience’s attention away from the problem and onto something more visually pleasing to focus on.

Clean, clean and clean again

Most mortals can’t live in a spotless environment all the time. This can be one of the more stressful aspects of having your home on the market— but it’s worth the effort to sell your home for top dollar. You can hire a professional service to come in and deep clean everything; then take 20-30 minutes each day to maintain it.

Appliances should sparkle even if you’re not including them with the house. After all, you might throw them in later as a negotiating tool. Counter tops, taps, sinks and bathtubs should be shiny and free of water spots.

If you have a pedestal sink, don’t forget the dust that collects on top of the plumbing where it attaches to the wall. If the whole sink is spotless and the taps aren’t dripping, it will look new!

Dust shelves and vacuum or “Swiffer” the floors. Naturally, all beds should be made. At a recent open house for a home listed over $500,000 (and over 60 days on the market), they hadn’t even bothered with these two simple steps! It made you wonder what bigger things had been neglected.

Remember clean windows let in more light and look newer. Hire a service if you have to— it’s worth the investment.

Let in some air

Open some windows for at least 10 minutes. There is nothing worse than walking into a stuffy house or one that smells of smoke and pet odors.

Let in some light

It might be mood lighting to you, but if you’re trying to sell your home, keep it bright! Dimly lit rooms tend to look small and dingy— especially during the day.

If you have a particularly dark room, consider investing in a floor lamp that will bounce light off the ceiling.

If your walls are so dark that they’re sucking up all the light, consider repainting. You can even buy a small can of a lighter shade of your wall color, mix it with glaze and rub it onto the wall. It will reflect light and give the room a more open feeling. This approach saves much of the preparation and clean up involved in repainting.

Don’t forget fresh flowers.

You don’t need to spend a fortune to have fresh flowers throughout your home. Even a daisy in a bud vase brightens a bathroom counter. Ask your florist which blooms last a week. You can also use potted flowering plants that are in season for a low-cost solution.

Don’t use plastic or obviously fake flowers, especially in an expensive home!

Carefully consider music

Soft background music can help create a soothing environment and camouflage neighbor and traffic noise. But make sure the volume is very low. Blaring TVs are definitely a no-no, but you’d be surprised how many people leave them on for showings!

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From recommending wall colors, repairs and decluttering, to careful arrangement of furniture, art and accessories; we guide you through the process to do it yourself, or we take care of all the details for you.

To get the most for your home, you need potential buyers (and their agents) to feel it’s a “hot property”.

These 10 low cost tips will get you started. Even if you’re not moving, you will find they make your home more relaxing and enjoyable to live in.

Get rid of clutter!

Pick one closet or area at a time so the task isn’t as daunting. Look at every item with a very critical eye and ask yourself why you’re keeping it.

Forget about hanging onto items for a garage sale. Pick your favorite charity and donate it. You paid for these things long ago, why not just give them away to others who REALLY need them?

You’ll probably have to edit the same closets a number of times to really whittle them down to the “essentials”. If rooms and closets still look cramped, rent a storage locker.

Watch where the eye goes

There are speedy and low cost solutions to many of the little problems that together make a home seem shabbier than it needs to.

Walk along each corridor and into every room and check where your eye is drawn (better yet, ask a critical friend or family member). If the eye is drawn to the chipped white paint on the door frame, take some “white out” and fill it in. If it’s those old nail holes in the wall, see if you can hang a picture to cover them.

Glue any peeling wallpaper. If it’s really horrible and you can’t afford the time or money to fix it properly, hang pictures and strategically place baskets. You won’t cover the problem entirely (which would be wrong anyway), but you will draw your audience’s attention away from the problem and onto something more visually pleasing to focus on.

Clean, clean and clean again

Most mortals can’t live in a spotless environment all the time. This can be one of the more stressful aspects of having your home on the market— but it’s worth the effort to sell your home for top dollar. You can hire a professional service to come in and deep clean everything; then take 20-30 minutes each day to maintain it.

Appliances should sparkle even if you’re not including them with the house. After all, you might throw them in later as a negotiating tool. Counter tops, taps, sinks and bathtubs should be shiny and free of water spots.

If you have a pedestal sink, don’t forget the dust that collects on top of the plumbing where it attaches to the wall. If the whole sink is spotless and the taps aren’t dripping, it will look new!

Dust shelves and vacuum or “Swiffer” the floors. Naturally, all beds should be made. At a recent open house for a home listed over $500,000 (and over 60 days on the market), they hadn’t even bothered with these two simple steps! It made you wonder what bigger things had been neglected.

Remember clean windows let in more light and look newer. Hire a service if you have to— it’s worth the investment.

Let in some air

Open some windows for at least 10 minutes. There is nothing worse than walking into a stuffy house or one that smells of smoke and pet odors.

Let in some light

It might be mood lighting to you, but if you’re trying to sell your home, keep it bright! Dimly lit rooms tend to look small and dingy— especially during the day.

If you have a particularly dark room, consider investing in a floor lamp that will bounce light off the ceiling.

If your walls are so dark that they’re sucking up all the light, consider repainting. You can even buy a small can of a lighter shade of your wall color, mix it with glaze and rub it onto the wall. It will reflect light and give the room a more open feeling. This approach saves much of the preparation and clean up involved in repainting.

Don’t forget fresh flowers.

You don’t need to spend a fortune to have fresh flowers throughout your home. Even a daisy in a bud vase brightens a bathroom counter. Ask your florist which blooms last a week. You can also use potted flowering plants that are in season for a low-cost solution.

Don’t use plastic or obviously fake flowers, especially in an expensive home!

Carefully consider music

Soft background music can help create a soothing environment and camouflage neighbor and traffic noise. But make sure the volume is very low. Blaring TVs are definitely a no-no, but you’d be surprised how many people leave them on for showings!

PR: wait… I: wait… L: wait… Cached: wait… wait… Rank: wait… Traffic: wait… Price: wait… C: wait…

Renting out makes good business for all house owners. Renting out can be a significant part of monthly income, which is usually a good help in many ways, besides taking care of house maintenance expenditure. However, there is another side of a coin to be taken into consideration. Renters tent to appear victims of their landlords. Since they are not property owners, their rights are oftenly violated.

Laws protecting tenants and landlords have become very complex by now. It is not an easy deal to learn and remember, or even undersand your rights. Anyway, there is one basic rule to follow not to appear back at the bottom of the ladder. Careful reading and estimation of your rent agreement will prevent you from supplementing a list of horror renting stories with your own. Understanding your state law and the terms of your lease are your best guarantees against future problems.

You don’t have to be expert in landlord-tenant law to protect yourself. Just brush up on your rights and read your lease before signing the dotted line. Here the 15 basic renter’s rights to know to protect yourself from land-lord’s dishonesty:

1. The Fair Housing Act makes it illegal to deny housing to a tenant on the grounds of race, color, sex, religion, disability, family status, or national origin.

2. Residential rental units should be habitable and in compliance with housing and health codes—meaning they should be structurally safe, sanitary, weatherproofed, and include adequate water, electricity, and heat.

3. Many states limit the amount landlords can charge for security deposits. (See this page on Nolo.com to find out if yours is one of them.)

4. A landlord should make necessary repairs and perform maintenance tasks in a timely fashion, or include a provision in the lease stating that tenants can order repairs and deduct the cost from rent.

5. A landlord must give prior notice (typically 24 hours) before entering your premises and can normally only do so to make repairs or in case of an emergency.

6. Illegal provisions in a rental agreement (provisions counter to state law) are usually not enforceable in court.

7. If a landlord has violated important terms related to health, safety, or necessary repairs, you might have a legal right to break your lease.

8. If you have to break a long-term lease, in most states landlords are required to search for a new tenant as soon as possible rather than charging the tenant for the full duration of the lease.

9. Damage or security deposits are not deductible for “normal wear and tear.” Some states require that a landlord give an itemized report of any deductions.

10. Most states require landlords to return refundable portions of a security deposit within 14 to 30 days after the tenant has vacated the premises, even in the case of eviction.

11. Landlords usually can’t legally seize a tenant’s property for nonpayment of rent or any other reason, except in the case of abandonment as defined by law.

12. Landlords are legally prohibited from evicting tenants as retaliation for action a tenant takes related to a perceived landlord violation.

13. A landlord cannot legally change the locks, shut off (or cause to have shut off) your utilities, or evict you without notice; eviction requires a court order.

14. If a landlord makes life so miserable for you that it forces you to move, it may be considered “constructive eviction,” which is usually grounds for legal action.

15. In many states, it’s illegal for a lease to stipulate that the tenant is responsible for the landlord’s attorney fees in case of a court dispute.

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Utilized in building and construction applications throughout the world, many civilians, workers and military personnel are still being exposed to asbestos. A naturally-occurring mineral, asbestos was used in the 20^th century in many applications such as insulation, piping, brake lining and flooring. Asbestos made its name because of its resistance to fire and heat properties.

Homes and buildings built before 1980 still have the potential of containing asbestos materials. Individuals who work in the real estate industry, home renovation or in construction should be aware that asbestos exposure can cause many health concerns. A fatal, but rare asbestos lung-ailment known as mesothelioma is caused by asbestos exposure. There are a number of factors that can impact how someone responds to mesothelioma treatment and how their life expectancy will be affected. These include age of diagnosis, latency period and cigarette smoking. With a latency period that lasts 20 to 50 years, it is difficult for physicians to give an accurate mesothelioma prognosis.

Removal of asbestos in public facilities, workplaces and homes must be performed by licensed abatement contractors. The Environmental Protection Agency has further standards in asbestos removal. The type of professional will depend on the type of product and what needs to be done to correct the problem. These inspectors will assess the situation and oversee the work of all contractors involved and determine whether suspicious materials are present. Make sure to ask the companies to verify licensing and its employees. The equipment used must be able to protect family, workers and community from the release of airborne asbestos fibers.

With increasing technology and public initiatives, green alternatives exist which allow for an asbestos free environment. Insulation alternatives should be given consideration, such as: cellulose, cotton fiber and lcynene. Cotton fiber is made from recycled batted material and treated to be fireproof. Research suggests that the use of recycled building materials can reduce energy costs in the home up to 25 percent annually. Not only will these asbestos alternatives reduce energy costs, they allow a lifestyle that promotes a clean, free of health damaging materials.

There’s no shortage of markets throughout the country that will sustain double-digit declines in housing vales in 2009 as the credit crisis widens to include many more areas of the U.S.

Hard hit by auto industry lay-offs, Detroit leads the Forecast of Worst 25 Market list for the year followed by Southern California’s Inland Empire, which includes Riverside and San Bernardino counties. The epidemic of foreclosures is projected to continue to impact the areas harshly through 2009.

Nearly two years ago, Housing Predictor forecast that home values would average total deflation from 50 to 70% depending on what markets. Especially hard hit metropolitan markets and areas close to major urban areas will sustain the worst deflation.

The Central Valley of California is experiencing huge drops in home values, which places third on the list with Stockton followed by Greater Los Angeles and Miami. The surplus of condos for sale on the market will put a drag on Miami through at least 2010. In all, nine California markets were named to the list, more than any other state.

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See a very useful video guide presented by best real estate agents on the preliminary activities of house buying.

But how does one choose a real estate agent? Here are a few helpful hints:

1. Interview candidates from different agencies. Look into their qualifications. How many years have they been on the job and how competent are they? Have there been any complaints filed with the State Board of Realtors? Finally, how compatible are you? There’s no underestimating the importance of personality when choosing a real estate agent.

2. Do they know the neighborhood? Is the agent familiar with the housing market in the areas you’re looking to buy or sell? Agents with a history of transactions in neighborhoods that interest you will know what’s available and in what price range. If you’re listing your property, a good agent will know the market well enough to set an optimum asking price attractive to both seller and buyer.

3. Keep in mind when choosing a real estate agent that he or she has access to a powerful tool — the Multiple Listing Service (M.L.S.) that inventories all available properties by region. A skilled agent can use the MLS., plus their own experience, to locate homes in neighborhoods matching your property wish list — such as a quality school system, convenient shopping or close highway access. A great source for MLS. information is Fizber.com.

4. What level of customer care will you receive? A real estate agent is your business partner in a huge financial undertaking, so you’ll want to choose a real estate agent that is always ready, willing and available. Be sure that communication stays open and phone calls are returned. Some agents employ assistants to handle much of their legwork. If this is the case, be certain your agent is the one present and accounted for when it comes time to check the contracts and close the transaction.

5. Know what you’re signing. Take the time to read through all of the fine print if asked to sign a working contract with an agent.

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***

We spend time and finances on updating our cars, our computers and most every area in our lives; however, often the home is neglected. Many people feel the best way to update the home is just to move into a new one; however, with a few repairs, renovations and upgrades the home can become new again and offer many more years of comfort and security to your family. Taking the time to improve the look of the home and making sure the home is in good working order will also increase the market value if you choose at some point to sell it and move.

When beginning your renovations start with the simple and more obvious repairs that will not cost you a lot financially such as repairing leaky faucets and pipes, adjusting a sticking door and securing the squeaky wood floor. These simple repairs will certainly improve your home and will also provide a sense of accomplishment and build confidence when faced with larger repairs.

Larger renovations such as tackling the décor of the home will come along the way as you address each room. Avoid ripping everything out right away and take the time to choose the manner in which you want to address your changes. Instead of replacing your kitchen cabinets try re-facing them for an affordable new look. Is your old porcelain kitchen sink looking dull and worn? You may want to update to a stainless steel sink or possibly look into discount kitchen sinks to update your kitchen without going over budget. A few small changes such as this can really change the look and feel of your kitchen.

In other rooms a simple color change will add a fresh new look, adding paneling or installing new lighting can have the same effect as well. Often we find that we are more dissatisfied with our home’s appearance and have become bored with the look more than being dissatisfied with the home itself. Making a few cosmetic changes can help curb the boredom and give you a fresh excitement in your living space.

Other changes that you make can have drastic advantages in energy savings. Begin by paying attention to your gas and electric meters to get a grasp on your usage and how you may be able to save. Investing in a bit of caulk can save you in heating costs. On a colder day you may want to light a stick of incense and hold it up to the edges of all windows and doors. The smoke from the incense will tell you if you have air leakage. If you have air leaks along the window or door edges you will know where to caulk to seal out the cold and seal in your heat. Have your furnace serviced each year to ensure its safety and efficiency. Wrapping your heating ducts and your hot water pipes with an insulating wrap will also help make your home more efficient and save you in energy costs.

Finally you may find that the simple changes such as color schemes, re-facing cabinets and replacing your leaky faucets, while improving appearances and efficiency, is just not enough. You are ready for some drastic changes in your home and are willing and able to invest more money into your home. The best place to invest is the bathroom and the kitchen.

Updating a bathroom will often include replacing the major fixtures such as the sink and cabinetry, the bathtub and shower as well as the toilet. Not ready to go that far? You can get a brand new look for your bathroom by installing a new floor, updating your bath surround with ceramic tile and exchanging the shower curtain for shower doors. This will offer a fresh new look to your bathroom and increase the value of the home.

The kitchen updates will nearly always add to the value of the home and is an ideal place to invest. Solid surface countertops such as granite, marble or Corian offers a seamless beautiful look to any kitchen and with the solid surface countertop you can add a beautiful undermount kitchen sink. A sink such as this offers a smooth transition from counter to sink and provides a lifetime of beauty and service.

Additional improvements to the home may be replacing carpeted floors with hard wood or laminate flooring in some rooms or adding carpet to other rooms. Installing a fireplace or central air can offer a modern and comfortable feel to your home as well. Finishing off the basement and adding an egress window can offer square footage to your home if you feel you are running out of space.

Author’s Bio:
Cedric Crumbley lives in Des Moines, Iowa with his beautiful wife Angelica. He enjoys running, reading and writing. Growing up he developed a love for kitchen sinks which led him to publish his first website eminent-kitchen-sinks.com.

1. First of all, provide your forwarding address to the post office. It is advised to make it 2-4 weeks ahead of the move.
2. Don’t forget to cancel the newspaper.
3. Make a full list of friends, relatives, and colleagues who should be notified of your move.
4. Arrange to have utilities disconnected at your old home and connected at your new one.
5. Remember to notify the charge cards, magazine subscriptions, and your bank about your moving to another place.
6. Find out the weight of the things you are going to take with you, because moves are usually billed according to weight.
7. Clean out appliances and prepare them for moving, if applicable.
8. Check insurance coverage for moved items. Many movers only cover what they pack usually.
9. Check with your condo or co-op about restrictions on using the elevator or particular exits.
10. Have a "first open" box with the things you’ll need most-toilet paper, soap, trash bags, scissors, hammer, screwdriver, pencils and paper, cups and plates, water, snacks, and toothpaste.

And, if you’re moving to another town

11. Consider special car needs for pets when traveling.
12. Let a friend or relative know your route.
13. Ask friends for introductions to anyone they know in your new neighborhood.
14. Get copies of medical and dental records and prescriptions for your family and your pets.
15. Get copies of children’s school records for transfer.
16. Carry traveler’s checks or an ATM card for ready cash until you can open a bank account.
17. Empty your safety deposit box.
18. Put plants in boxes with holes for air circulation if you’re moving in cold weather.

But after a few enquiries, you soon realize that it’s not so simple after all.

In a hugely competitive market, building societies and banks are continually updating and extending their range of mortgages. The list is already extensive enough to baffle all but the most determined.

The most important points are how you pay back the capital you borrow and how you pay the interest on it. See the list of most frequent mortgage rates types:

Variable rates – This means you pay the going rate on your loan. The mortgage rate changes every time interest rates change or, as in most cases, the overall effect of any interest rate changes is calculated once a year and payments are altered accordingly. Whatever kind of mortgage you start with, it is likely to change to variable rates at some point.

Fixed rates – The interest rate is fixed for the period agreed – often two to five years. These are ideal for budgeting or if you think rates might increase. You do not benefit if rates fall, and will face penalties if you try to quit. Very low rates may tempt you, but they can be used to trap you into paying over the odds. See  check how long you will have to stay with the lender before you can switch without penalty.

Capped rates – These are fixed, but if rates fall you pay the lower rate. Such deals can be a good buy for budgeting.

Cash back deals – This is when lenders offer money back if you take out a particular product.

Discounted rates – Under this type of mortgage the borrower is offered a discount off the lender’s variable rate. The rate paid will fluctuate in line with changes in the variable rate. The discount applies over a set term.

The choice of the most suitable mortgage rate should depend on the answers to the following questions:

· How much can I afford to borrow?
This deals with such questions as “What will the cost be each month?” and “What fees will I have to pay?”

· How can I tell which mortgage rate is best for me?

· What is the best type of mortgage for me?
This deals with how to understand the jargon, such as “What do fixed rate, variable rate, discounted or low-start, and flexible mean?” and “Will this mortgage suit my circumstances now and in the future?”

· How should I repay it?
“Why are you trying to sell me an endowment policy, or a pension or an Isa?”, “Why is it best for my circumstances?” and “What commission are you being paid?”

· Can I make lump sum payments to reduce the size of the loan?

· Are there any redemption penalties?

· Does this mortgage come with compulsory insurance?

· What other charges will I have to pay?

· What happens if I can’t pay?

· What about the small print?

I do hope that the information was useful.

And just to give you that added edge over the Joneses, we’ve compiled 77 tips that will push your home further along the path to not only feeling good, but also looking great.

Stop reading beyond this, if you can pull this one off…

1. Beg, plead, cajole, wheedle, bribe – use all your powers of persuasion to get your home on any one of those makeover shows on television – Extreme Makeover, Trading Spaces, and if you’re unbelievably lucky, The Oprah Show. Once Nate Berkus steps in your door, you can bet your last buck that your home’s value shoots up to the stars and beyond!

Or else…

Small drops of water make the mighty ocean…

2. Add appeal with more storage space, be it in the kitchen, bathroom or even the garage. A place for everything and everything in its place makes for a tidier and better-looking home. Hanging wall storage systems are not going to make a significant dent in your budget.
3. Trade in those old, leaky faucets for shiny new ones.
4. Throw out those old light fixtures, brighten up your space with new bulbs that also bring down your power consumption.
5. Spruce up your cabinets with a fresh coat of paint, or, if they’re dirty, take a brush and soap to them, get those dirty fingerprints out, and get them looking as good as new.
6. Clean, shake up your carpet, get them looking as good as new again.
7. Make sure all the latches and bolts work, that the hinges are well-oiled and don’t make creaky noises.
8. Put in new blades in your fans, or just clean out the old ones.
9. Use throws in colors that match the room to cover up worn sofa and chair upholstery.
10. Get a plumber and electrician to make sure your wiring and pipes are in the right places and working just as they should.
11. Dust, vacuum, and clear those cobwebs away on a regular basis.
12. Degrease your oven, clean up your refrigerator.
13. Open windows, fresh air, and artificial fresheners (or scented candles) do wonders for a smelly bathroom.
14. Change the filter in your air-conditioner to avoid that stale, musty smell when it’s turned on.
15. Take care of those minor repairs that crop up every now and then immediately. Proper maintenance saves you quite a bit on expensive restoration and renovation.
16. If your home is cluttered with knick-knacks and furniture, put some of it away in storage. Larger spaces create the impression of a bigger house.
17. Hang a large mirror in the living room; it creates virtual space besides adding to overall appeal.
18. If you’re looking to add an extra wall, sometimes, a well-styled room divider may suffice to create two separate rooms instead of one large one.
19. Plain old cats and dogs or exotic pets – you may love them, but their inherent odors may not be acceptable to all. Get rid of those smells.
20. If you have green fingers, apply them to window boxes and hanging baskets to generate a riot of colors that add quaint charm to your home.
21. When choosing tiles, countertops, paint, cabinet doors, or kitchen appliances, go with colors that will stand the test of time even as fashions come and go. Opt for neutral, rather than flashy shades.
22. If you have a fireplace, make sure it is the center of the room. Rearrange the furniture around it.

A little, but not a lot extra…

23. Reface cabinet doors, especially those that are peeling and fading.
24. Dress up more than just your salad in the kitchen – make sure your appliances’ colors match. More often than not, it’s just a question of ordering the right colored panels.
25. Redo your bathroom floor – new vinyl tiles or sheet vinyl make a world of difference.
26. Replace chipped tiles in your shower and tub, re-grout if needed.
27. A new toilet seat is a small, but useful expense.
28. Replace your bathroom fan with a bigger one to get rid of moisture more quickly and prevent mold. T
29. Put in new towel rods and toilet paper holders.
30. Fresh paint on all your walls does more than brighten up the rooms.
31. Make the inside of your home more comfortable with dehumidifiers.
32. Glaze the inside of your windows to save on heating and electricity expenses.
33. Make sure your house is water and wind proofed. Check for broken roof tiles/slates, blocked drainpipes, and get them fixed at the earliest.

Going all out…

34. Replace your entire kitchen cabinetry/countertop.
35. Install a fancy island; this separates your cooking and preparation spaces, and helps you stay more organized.
36. Still using your grandmother’s cooking range? Update your kitchen appliances; treat yourself to the latest, swanky innovations available in the market.
37. Install a new bathtub, toilet, shower.
38. Plaster the bathroom walls with vinyl paper, and put in a new ceramic tile floor.
39. Add a few extra cabinets for your toiletries and medicines.
40. Purchase that Allstate hurricane insurance policy you’ve been considering for some time.
41. Make your kitchen and bathroom not only environment-friendly, but also safe to use for children and the elderly.
42. Treat your feet to the latest in flooring material, from exotic hardwood to heated tiles that warm your soles.
43. Install the Jacuzzi with all the bells and whistles and multiple jets that looked so good at your friend’s home.
44. Increase your storage space – walk-in closets in your bedroom, large areas in your garage to stow your bicycles and other stuff, and roomier cabinets and larders in your kitchen.
45. An empty basement with lots of clutter? Turn it into a TV den, or, if you are a sommelier, it’s the perfect wine cellar.
46. If your fireplace has a mantel, consider modernizing.
47. Use materials of good quality when building or replacing things.

Adding additional appeal…

48. Remember those days when you fought over who got to use the bathroom next? And banging on the door to get your sluggish sibling/child out? Build that extra bathroom to add more comfort and order to your daily routine.
49. Quantity is desirable when it’s a question of bedrooms. And before your mind wanders into realms beyond the scope of this list, let me explain – a three-bedroom home is much more valuable than one with just two. So if you have that extra den, put in some closets, add a bed, and voila, a bedroom is ready.
50. A loft is a great way to add more room to your home without compromising on existing space. Cozy, comfortable, and convenient way to increase your living space.
51. Garages and off-street parking spaces are desirable additions to a home.
52. Consider converting your attic into an extra bedroom.
53. A patio or an outside deck is an option to consider if you are looking for external appeal.
54. Home theaters, gyms, game rooms and computer rooms are becoming trendy these days. Extra room to spare? Put in that big screen, set up your sound system, and throw in a few cushions to add comfort; or just make space for a computer table and all the paraphernalia that surround it; or set up your treadmill and exercise bike, sweat it out and get fit in the comfort of your home; or treat yourself to a ping pong or foosball table, have friends over, and have yourselves a gaming party.

Beauty is sometimes skin-deep…

55. Your home may have the perfect interior, but if the outside sucks, let’s face it, people are just going to drive by. Start the cosmetic makeover by cleaning up your yard first; get rid of old junk lying around, trim the hedges, mow your lawn, and rake up those leaves.
56. Paint the fence (or railing) surrounding your house, and get those broken boards and bars fixed. The walls could do with a coat or two too.
57. Spruce up your front door – a fresh coat of paint, a new knocker, or even a shiny knob – they work wonders. And make sure your doorbell works!
58. Make sure the address number is in a readable, visible font. Stylized curves may not be those easiest on the eyes.
59. Paint that mailbox; better still, pull it out and put in a new one.
60. Recoat your driveway. Pull up those weeds in the cracks between the tiles, and clean up the mold and mildew.
61. Uproot those dead and dying plants and shrubs.
62. Add new vinyl and siding to replace those shoddy ones.
63. Shake out not just the dust from the welcome mat, put in a new, bright one that says more than just welcome.
64. Wash your windows – you wouldn’t believe how much of a difference one coat less of grime will make.
65. Clean the roof – get a professional to help.
66. Chop those tree branches that tempt entry through your house’s windows.
67. Add subtle lighting effects that make your home look appealing in the dark from the outside.
68. Use those hard-earned dollars on the features that are visible rather than on those that must be used to be appreciated. At times, a look is all it takes for instant attraction.

Permission to putter, peel or paint…

69. Before you pull out that first tool, check local zoning laws to find out if you are allowed to remodel or make alterations. You may need separate permits for electrical, plumbing, and mechanical jobs.
70. Also ensure that you speak with a construction or semi truck attorney (link) as they can help you avoid liability and costs.
71. Be very careful when tearing down walls to create larger spaces; you don’t want to pull down those load-bearing walls without a second thought.
72. Finalize your plans before you start carrying them out, and get the opinion of a professional appraiser to check if all the changes you’ve chalked out are worth it.

Enough is enough…

73. Don’t go overboard and build additions that are not necessary. Make sure your home is as good as, not better than, the rest of the houses in your neighborhood. While a swimming pool might earn your neighbor’s envy, it’s not necessarily going to add value to your home.
74. Retain the essence of the original – modern is not always good. Avoid taking out traditional fixtures like stained glasses and putting in new-fangled replacements that do not blend with the fundamental core of the house.

Final words of wisdom…

75. You may be a jack-of-all-trades, but it’s wiser to hire a professional to take care of most of the suggestions in the above list, if you wish to save yourself the considerable time and cost that are associated with repairing botched jobs.
76. It’s your home after all, so make sure you choose the right people to help you increase its value. Shop around, find out the best (not necessarily the costliest) in the business, and check their references before inviting them to have a go at your home.
77. And last, but not the least, make sure that the value you add reflects the worth of the house. You may end up spending thousands of dollars only to realize that you have not improved your home’s monetary market worth by much. So tread with caution.

She sizes up its charms, snaps some pictures, sets the price, writes a seductive ad, shows the house aggressively, negotiates the offers, and sees the deal through to the end. Sure, it’s a lot of work, but she’s getting a nice cut. On the sale of a $300,000 house, you’ll typically pay a 6 percent agent fee of $18,000. That’s a lot of money. But you tell yourself that you never could have sold the house for $300,000 on your own. The agent knew how to – what’s that phrase she used? – “maximize the house’s value.” She got you top dollar, right?

A real estate agent is every bit the expert. She is better informed than you about your home’s worth, the state of the housing market, even the buyer’s frame of mind. You depend on her for this information.

As the world has grown more specialized, countless such experts have made themselves similarly indispensable. Doctors, lawyers, contractors, auto mechanics: They all enjoy informational advantage. And they use that advantage to help you.

Right?

Information can be a beacon, or information can be a cudgel; it depends on who wields it and how. In any transaction, it’s common for one party to have better information than the other. In the parlance of economists, this is information asymmetry. There’s value in asymmetry; it’s the reason why someone, such as a consumer, will pay someone else, an expert, for his knowledge.

Of course, sometimes an expert might manipulate his advantage for his own benefit. If your doctor suggests that you have an angioplasty – even though current research suggests that angioplasty often does little to prevent heart attacks – your first thought won’t likely be that the doctor is using his informational advantage to make a few thousand dollars for himself or his buddy. But as David Hillis, an interventional cardiologist at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center in Dallas, explained to The New York Times, a doctor may have the same economic incentives as a car salesman or a funeral director or a mutual fund manager: “If you’re an invasive cardiologist and Joe Smith, the local internist, is sending you patients, and if you tell them they don’t need the procedure, pretty soon Joe Smith doesn’t send patients anymore.”

Or consider these findings of a 1996 medical study: Obstetricians in areas with declining birthrates are much more likely to perform cesarean section deliveries than obstetricians in growing areas – suggesting that when business is tough, doctors may try to ring up more expensive procedures.

The Internet, of course, is all about smoothing over these asymmetries; in one industry after another, from life insurance to used cars, the Web has eliminated the expert’s upper hand by giving once-exclusive information to the online masses. But some industries have been slow to change – real estate among them.

The best way to observe information asymmetry at work is to measure how an expert treats you versus how he performs the same service for himself. Real estate provides the perfect opportunity, since housing sales are a matter of public record, and real estate agents often do sell their own homes. Recent data covering the sale of nearly 100,000 houses in suburban Chicago show that more than 3,000 of those houses were owned by agents.

Before plunging into the data, a question: What is the agent’s incentive when selling her own home? Simple: to make the best deal possible. Presumably, this is also her incentive when selling your home; after all, her commission is based on the sale price. And so your incentive and the agent’s incentive would seem to be nicely aligned. But commissions aren’t as simple as they seem. First of all, a 6 percent commission is typically split between the seller’s agent and the buyer’s. Each agent then kicks back half of her take to her agency. Which means that only 1.5 percent of the purchase price goes directly into your agent’s pocket.

So on the sale of your $300,000 house, her personal take of the $18,000 commission is $4,500. Still not bad, you say. But what if the house was worth more than $300,000? What if, with a little more effort and patience, she could have sold it for $310,000? After the commission, that puts an additional $9,400 in your pocket. Yet the agent’s additional share – her personal 1.5 percent – is a mere $150. So maybe your incentives aren’t aligned after all. Is the agent willing to put out all that extra time and energy for just $150?

There’s one way to find out: measure the difference between the sales data for houses that belong to real estate agents themselves and the houses they sold on behalf of clients. Using the information from those 100,000 Chicago homes, and controlling for any number of variables – location, age and quality of the house, aesthetics, and so on – it turns out an agent keeps her own home on the market an average of 10 days longer and sells it for an extra 3-plus percent, or $10,000 on a $300,000 house. When she sells her own house, an agent holds out for the best offer; when she sells yours, she pushes you to take the first decent offer that comes along. Like a stockbroker churning commissions, she wants to make deals and make them fast. Why not? Her share of a better offer – $150 – is too puny an incentive to encourage her to do otherwise. So her job is to convince you that a $300,000 offer is in fact very good, even generous, and one that only a fool would refuse.

This can be tricky. The agent doesn’t want to come right out and call you a fool. So she merely implies it – perhaps by telling you about the bigger, nicer, newer house down the block that has sat unsold for six months. This is the agent’s main weapon: the conversion of information into fear. Consider this true story, related by John Donohue, a law professor who in 2001 was teaching at Stanford University: “I was just about to buy a house on the Stanford campus, and the seller’s agent kept telling me what a good deal I was getting because the market was about to zoom. As soon as I signed the purchase contract, he asked me if I would need an agent to sell my previous Stanford house. I told him that I would probably try to sell without an agent, and he replied, ‘John, that might work under normal conditions, but with the market tanking now, you really need the help of a broker.’” In five minutes a zooming market tanked. Such are the marvels that can be conjured by an agent in search of the next deal.

So a big part of a real estate agent’s job is to persuade the homeowner to sell for less than he would like while at the same time letting potential buyers know that a house can be bought for less than its listing price. To be sure, there are more subtle means of conveying this information than blatantly telling the buyer to bid low. The Chicago study also reveals how agents exert influence through the listings they write. A phrase like “well maintained,” for instance, is full of meaning to an agent – the house is old but not quite falling down. A savvy buyer will know this (or find out once he sees the place), but to the retiree who is selling the house, “well maintained” might sound like a compliment, which is just what the agent intends.

An analysis of the language used in real estate ads shows that certain words are powerfully correlated with the final sale price of a house. This doesn’t necessarily mean that labeling a house “well maintained” causes it to sell for less than an equivalent house. It does, however, indicate that when an agent labels a house “well maintained,” she is subtly encouraging a buyer to bid low.

So consider the terms in the box on the previous page: A “fantastic” house is surely fantastic enough to warrant a high price, right? What about a “charming” and “spacious” home in a “great neighborhood!”? No, no, no, no, and no.

In fact, the terms that correlate with a higher sales price are physical descriptions of the home itself: granite, Corian, and maple. As information goes, such terms are specific and straightforward – and therefore pretty useful. If you like granite, you might like the house; but even if you don’t, “granite” certainly doesn’t connote a fixer-upper. Nor does “gourmet” or “state-of-the-art,” both of which seem to tell a buyer that a house is, on some level, fantastic.

“Fantastic,” meanwhile, is a dangerously ambiguous adjective, as is “charming.” These words, it turns out, are real estate agent code for a house that doesn’t have many specific attributes worth describing. “Spacious” homes, meanwhile, are often decrepit or impractical. “Great neighborhood” signals to a buyer that, well, this house isn’t very nice but others nearby may be. And an exclamation point in a real estate ad is bad news for sure, a bid to paper over real shortcomings with false enthusiasm.

If you study an ad for a real estate agent’s own home, meanwhile, you see that she emphasizes descriptive terms (especially “new,” “granite,” “maple,” and “move-in condition”) and avoids empty adjectives (including “wonderful,” “immaculate,” and the telltale “!”). She patiently waits for the best buyer to come along. She might tell this buyer about a house nearby that just sold for $25,000 above the asking price, or another house that is the subject of a bidding war. She is careful to exercise every advantage of the information asymmetry she enjoys.

But even the agent’s advantage has been eroded by the Internet. After all, anyone can now get online and gather information about sales trends and housing inventory and mortgage-rate tremors. And recent sales data is starting to show the results. Agents still get a higher price for their own homes than for comparable homes owned by their clients – but since the proliferation of real estate Web sites, the gap between the two prices has shrunk by a third. The information has been set loose.

Ever since his father had passed away three years ago, the family of five had struggled. It wasn’t because his mother didn’t care, or try, there just never seemed to be enough. She worked nights at the hospital, but the small wage that she was earning could only be stretched so far.

What the family lacked in money and material things, they more than made up for in love and family unity. Bobby had two older and one younger sister, who ran the house hold in their mother’s absence. All three of his sisters had already made beautiful gifts for their mother. Somehow it just wasn’t fair. Here it was Christmas Eve already, and he had nothing.

Wiping a tear from his eye, Bobby kicked the snow and started to walk down to the street where the shops and stores were. It wasn’t easy being six without a father, especially when he needed a man to talk to. Bobby walked from shop to shop, looking into each decorated window.

Everything seemed so beautiful and so out of reach.

It was starting to get dark and Bobby reluctantly turned to walk home when suddenly his eyes caught the glimmer of the setting sun’s rays reflecting off of something along the curb. He reached down and discovered a shiny dime. Never before has anyone felt so wealthy as Bobby felt at that moment.

As he held his new-found treasure, a warmth spread throughout his entire body and he walked into the first store he saw. His excitement quickly turned cold when the salesperson told him that he couldn’t buy anything with only a dime.

He saw a flower shop and went inside to wait in line. When the shop owner asked if he could help him, Bobby presented the dime and asked if he could buy one flower for his mother’s Christmas gift. The shop owner looked at Bobby and his ten cent offering.

Then he put his hand on Bobby’s shoulder and said to him, “You just wait here and I’ll see what I can do for you.” As Bobby waited he looked at the beautiful flowers and even though he was a boy, he could see why mothers and girls liked flowers.

The sound of the door closing as the last customer left, jolted Bobby back to reality. All alone in the shop, Bobby began to feel alone and afraid. Suddenly the shop owner came out and moved to the counter.

There, before Bobby’s eyes, lay twelve long stem, red roses, with leaves of green and tiny white flowers all tied together with a big silver bow. Bobby’s heart sank as the owner picked them up and placed them gently into a long white box.

“That will be ten cents young man,” the shop owner said reaching out his hand for the dime. Slowly, Bobby moved his hand to give the man his dime. Could this be true? No one else would give him a thing for his dime!

Sensing the boy’s reluctance, the shop owner added, “I just happened to have some roses on sale for ten cents a dozen. Would you like them?”

This time Bobby did not hesitate, and when the man placed the long box into his hands, he knew it was true. Walking out the door that the owner was holding for Bobby, he heard the shop keeper say, “Merry Christmas son.”

As he returned inside, the shop keeper’s wife walked out. “Who were you talking to back there and where are the roses you were fixing?”

Staring out the window, and blinking the tears from his own eyes, he replied, “A strange thing happened to me this morning. While I was setting up things to open the shop, I thought I heard a voice telling me to set aside a dozen of my best roses for a special gift. I wasn’t sure at the time whether I had lost my mind or what, but I set them aside anyway.

Then just a few minutes ago, a little boy came into the shop and wanted to buy a flower for his mother with one small dime.

“When I looked at him, I saw myself, many years ago. I too, was a poor boy with nothing to buy my mother a Christmas gift. A bearded man, whom I never knew, stopped me on the street and told me that he wanted to give me ten dollars. “When I saw that little boy tonight, I knew who that voice was, and I put together a dozen of my very best roses.” The shop owner and his wife hugged each other tightly, and as they stepped out into the bitter cold air, they somehow didn’t feel cold at all.

May this story instill the spirit of CHRISTmas in you enough to pass this act along.

Have a Joyous and Peace-filled season.

Goodness is the only investment that doesn’t fail.

Merry Chritmas!

Traditionally, spring is the hottest season for real estate. Sales peak in April and May and stay strong in June and July. It’s a good season for families to move, between school terms and while the weather is warm.

Anyway, is it really not worth trying to sell a house in winter? Many real estate experts state, that winter season can be that very time, when a house can be sold easily and for very good money. People tend to think that nothing happens in December, but people still need to move at this time. Because so many people think it’s a bad time to put a property on the market, there’s often a shortfall in the availability of certain types of homes. The winter period can actually be the best time to sell, as you are more likely to get a sale without reducing the price.

There is no doubt that about two weeks before Christmas the number of people searching for property drops drastically. But, come January, there’s a massive surge in traffic visiting property websites, as this is the month when most people are looking to buy. Now’s a great time to think about selling, as there are many potential buyers in January and February, with little property available on the market. I’d suggest putting your place on the market in December and, though there probably won’t be many viewings, you will have a wealth of interest come the New Year.

A house is by need, the most important investment for the vast majority. You resort to acquiring loans and spending on your life savings just to be able to support that investment. Which is why it is vital to PROTECT your investment. Thats where Home Insurance comes in. You can choose from so many different providers within your local area. But choosing is not quite an easy task. You must go over various companies’ terms to fully understand what the insurer is capable of providing you in times when it is mostly needed. Standard coverage spans through damage to your house and the items and appliances inside. The policy covers damages caused by fire, smoke, lightning, snow, frozen pipes, theft and many others. The standard liability for the damages range from $100,000 to as high as $1 Million. You should take note and list all the valuable items that may be kept inside the house. These tings arent covered by Home Insurance policies but you can certainly scout for insurers for these special type of valuables. Special endorsements are provided for calamities like flood and earthquakes because these are typically not included in the standard home insurance coverage.

Fizber.com will now offer its one million visitors over 2,900 new home community listings in Southern California and over 12,000 new home community listings in over 40 states.

Miami Beach, FL (PRWEB) December 9, 2008 — Fizber.com, the leading real estate property listing website in the United States and ModelHomeTour.com, a California-based website created by the Building Industry Association of Southern California (BIA/SC) have come together to offer the largest online inventory of new home community listings in the country.

ModelHomeTour.com has developed the largest and most comprehensive content of new home communities throughout the United States and is providing such information to Fizber.com.

Fizber.com now includes new home communities built by some of the nation’s largest home builders. Consumers visiting Fizber.com can now access this new home data by entering a city’s name or zip code and choosing “new construction” in the house type section.

Julia Foster, Fizber.com’s VP Marketing, says: “This partnership will allow Fizber.com to extend its real estate property listings by including new homes, thus providing our customers with more alternatives. This alliance will make it easier for home buyers, investors and real estate agents to search and find details about available new homes and new home communities.”

Teen Flores, the co-founder of icanbuy.com, the search engine that provides ModelHomeTour.com’s content, added: “Our new partnership with Fizber.com allows ModelHomeTour.com to offer its services to an audience of more than one million potential customers through the listings on Fizber.com. It will broaden the list of our clients, and it will bring new opportunities.”

Paul Dix, chief operating officer of BIA/SC, added, “The relationship with Fizber.com is part of our overall strategy to expand the online availability of new home content to consumers and provide the homebuilding industry with the greatest possible exposure for their communities.”

About Fizber.com
With home listings throughout the United States, Fizber.com strives to connect buyers and sellers more effectively. The site receives more than one million visitors monthly and offers to list for-sale properties on a multiple listing service for a $349.95 flat fee, to submit property ads to a variety of property search engines for a $299.95 flat fee, and a package of both services for $499.95. Prospective homebuyers can browse property database, available at www.fizber.com, at no charge.

About BIA/SC
Established in 1923, BIA/SC is a non-profit trade association representing nearly 2,000 member companies involved in planning and building Southern California’s communities. Learn more at biasc.org.

About icanbuy
Founded by a former home builder and a software development and technology expert, icanbuy is a computer solutions firm providing the next generation of search capabilities for the online real estate and mortgage lending markets. Our new home portal allows our clients to provide consumers with the ability to search for a home based on their financial profiles, learn their purchasing power and pre-qualify for loans – all in real time. Learn more about our company at icanbuy.com.

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Here’s an apartment to beat all of the other little boxes out there. Welcome to London, home of possibly the smallest apartment in the world. A FORMER storage cupboard is now a 62 square foot flat has all the necessities: a platform bed on a raised platform accessed by a ladder, bath, wardrobe, and kitchenette (if you can call it that). The rent? Only $247 a week.

The flat was created in 1980 by a freeholder of the building who lived in Carlisle but frequently visited London on business. The current owner bought it in a poor state of repair for next to nothing and it stood empty for several years.

London real estate agent Gordon Blausten, who helps finding roomers says: “The flat is suitable for a young person with an active social life. It is well located for the fashionable shops of Ledbury Road, Westbourne Grove and Portobello Road.”

Another way out to survive in the todays busy and very expensive time has come to the mind of Piercy Conner Architects. They have created a high-density housing solution especilly for living in the conditions of high population pressure. The one-bedroom microflat measures just 32.5 m2. Taking inspiration from yacht design, the architects made use of every available inch of space, incorporating a small double bedroom, a pod containing a shower and toilet, storage space, and a kitchen / living area that provides access  to a cosy balcony for two. Ceilings are 2.8 metres high to provide an enhanced feeling of space and maximise natural light from floor to ceiling windows. Besides being space efficient inside, its modular construction can be installed in spaces above commercial developments like supermarkets or public car parks. In developing the Microflat, Piercy Conner proved that it is possible to combine good design and efficient construction to arrive at affordable housing solutions for first home buyers, who are often hardest hit when housing affordability is compromised in large cities.