Archive for February, 2009
If you served in the armed services and are looking to buy a home in Seattle, you’re in luck. The government wants to say thanks for your time served with special financing options on your home. VA loans offer some of the most attractive incentives for home buyers.
- In King County you can get 100% financing, for homes up to $550,000.
- No Down Payment
- The loan is fully assumable. This means that when you go to sell the home, if interest rates have gone up, the buyer can simply assume your loan at today’s interest rates. Example: If you have a VA loan at today’s rate of 5.5% and go to sell in five years. If interest rates have gone up t0o say 7%, a buyer could assume your loan at 5.5% interests and save thousands of dollars. A really nice selling feature. to put your home ahead of the competition.
- The seller can pay your closing costs and even pay discount points to get your interest rate even lower.
- Seller can also pay up to 4% of other costs for you such as: Funding Fees. property taxes, insurance,
- Under VA loans the seller can also pay off other credit debt for you and even purchase gifts for you such as appliances, TV’s etc.
The bottom line here is that if you are a veteran, there is no reason not to own a home. give me a call if you think you may qualify and I’ll be happy to put you in touch with a mortgage expert to explain all the ins and outs.
VA loans offer the best financing options available.
Take advantage if you can.
Related Posts:
Best Financing Options for Seattle Home Buyers: FHA Loans
I’m always here to help if you need it.
Rob Graham, Accredited Buyers Representative
Windermere Real Estate
206-321-6349
Popularity: 1% [?]
Everyone wants to know what is happening with Seattle home prices. Here are two charts showing single family homes and condos separately.
Single family homes took another dip in January to $386,000. The lowest price we have seen in quite some time. Keep in mind that a dip in January is quite common as it is typically the slowest month for real estate closings. January did however see a dramatic increase in pending transactions as buyers encouraged by an impending stimulus package and perhaps inspired by a new president, came off the sidelines and bought up a significant amount of inventory. This should help stabilize the decline and may signal improvement as we head into spring.
Condo numbers look like this:
A slightly different story for condominiums in Seattle. While we did see a drop off from December to January similar to single family homes, the median home price for condos was above the levels seen for most of last year. The median condo price for January was $324,000.
After a dip in the fall, buyers seem to be buying condos again. This is good news for construction and the condominium market as a whole. It would appear that in the wake of the current financial crisis, Seattle home buyers are more willing to consider buying a condominium as an alternative to buying a single family home. Recent tax incentives to first time home buyers will only make this trend more attractive.
Myself and many of my colleagues are seeing a dramatic increase in activity. The phone is ringing and many buyers are beginning to emerge from hyphenation. Some are lured by the $8,000 first time home buyer credit that exists for 2009, but most just feel that the recession has to end at some point and that we may be at or near the bottom.
They tend to still be cautious though. Seattle home buyers are doing their homework and making smart purchases, asking for less then the listing price and negotiating for the maximum seller allowances on closing costs.
Related Posts:
Seattle Housing Statistics: Days on Market, Inventory
Seattle’s January 2009 Housing Statistics: Homes for Sale, Sold and Pending
Give me a call if you need help.
Rob Graham, Accredited Buyers Representative
Windermere Real Estate
206-321-6349
Popularity: 3% [?]
So as a regular feature here on Seattle Home Buying Guide, I thought I would highlight specific neighborhoods, and show you trends in that specific area. For my first neighborhood market report I have chosen Ballard or more specifically the 98117 zip code. Ballard is a neighborhood growing up rapidly. Just in the past ten years it has seen rapid growth of condos as well as the loss of such treasured icons as the Sunset Bowl and the Denny’s.
It remains however a highly sought after neighborhood for Seattle home buyer’s so here is how the current numbers shake out for Ballard.
- Currently there are 52 homes for sale in 98117.
- 18 homes have sold in the past 30 days.
- There are 25 homes pending (expected to close in the near future)
Already there are some interesting numbers. Inventory (the relationship between homes for sale and how fast they are selling) shows only 3.1 months available. That would suggest a balanced market if not a slight advantage for the seller. Hard to believe in all that we have heard in the media that there are actually neighborhoods that are close to being seller markets.
Also of particular interest is the number of pending transactions. This would suggest that in the coming months there will be even fewer homes on the market in Ballard.
Here is an overview of the median home in Ballard
- Bedrooms: 3
- Bathrooms:2
- Square feet: 1900
- Median Sale Price: $420,000
- Average time on market: 80 days
80 days to sell a home is better then the 105 days that the overall metropolitan Seattle area is seeing.
The $420,000 price tag may surprise some people. This is not to suggest that the median home price in Ballard is $420,000 just that the homes that have sold in the past 30 days averaged $420,000. This is somewhat typical of the market right now. We are seeing a lot of bottom feeding. Buyers are grabbing up the bargain homes while it is more difficult to sell the higher the price point of a home.
If you would like to see a specific neighborhood highlighted, please feel free to ask. Also, if you would like to receive a list of homes available in any area in any price range, feel free to ask or click on the icon below to set up your own free search.
Give me a call if you need help.
Rob Graham, Accredited Buyer’s Representative
Windermere Real Estate
206-321-6349
Popularity: 2% [?]
A few days ago I wrote a post about what earnest money is and how much Seattle Home Buyers should offer in earnest money when making an offer on a home. If you would like to read that post here is the link:
Earnest Money: How much should a Seattle Home buyer offer?
The next question my home buyers always have is:
After I make the offer, what are the situations that I can get my earnest money
back if I decide not to buy?
Seattle home buyer’s, in particular first time home buyers have a lot of fears around loosing their earnest money. Fair enough. Lets talk about the kinds of things you can include in your purchase and sale agreement that would allow you to get your earnest money back.
The biggest opportunity to walk away from a real estate transaction with no strings, is the inspection addendum. The inspection addendum, allows you a period of time of your choosing, (usually a week to 10 days) to do any inspections on the home you like. This can include, a whole house Inspection, pest inspection, sewer scope, lead based paint inspection, neighborhood review, etc. During this time you can literally walk away from the home for any "subjective" reason of your choosing and have your earnest money returned to you. The inspection addendum allows the greatest flexibility for a buyer. This is why many of the other aspects of a real estate transaction don’t even kick into motion until this part of the purchase and sale agreement has been satisfied.
The next most common out for a buyer is the financing addendum. The financing addendum specifies the nature in which you expect to pay for the home. This is valuable information for the seller to know so they can have some confidence that you will be able to purchase the home. It also allows you the opportunity to walk away from the sale if for some reason you don’t qualify for the specified financing prior to close.
So for example, if you state that you will be putting 3.5% down and qualifying for an FHA loan, and will be asking the seller to pay $8,000 in closing costs, but 10 days prior to the closing you find out you no longer qualify for the FHA loan, you can walk away from the offer and your earnest money will be refunded to you.
Title Addendum: When property changes hands a title search will need to be done. The results of that title search will show all parties that have any legal interest in the property. If you include an title addendum in your purchase and sale agreement, you have the right to review that title report and if anything shows up on the report that you are not happy with, you have the right to ask the seller to correct it, or walk away from the home and have your earnest money returned to you.
If you are planning to purchase a condominium, townhouse or single home that includes a homeowners association, you also have the right to review what we call the CC&R’s. CC&R’s stand for the covenants, conditions and restrictions. They specify the rules for living in a given community. They include pet restrictions, restrictions on remodeling, painting, quiet hours, etc. If you are purchasing a condo these will include recent minutes of the board meetings, and a spreadsheet showing where all the money from home owner dues are being kept and any special projects that are planned for the future. This is all valuable information you will want to review and be comfortable with. If you find that you can’t have your dog in your condo, you can rescind your offer and have your earnest money returned to you.
So there you have it. Keep in mind that if something happens unexpectedly to you or your family and you need to walk away from an offer prior to closing, we can always request that the seller return your earnest money to you out of the goodness of their heart. they are under no obligation to do so , but I have seen it happen.
Give me a cal if you need help.
Rob Graham, Accredited Buyer’s representative
Windermere Real Estate
206-321-6349
Popularity: 2% [?]
Here are a few more statistics for the Seattle Metro area for the month of January 2009.
Days on Market:
This graph is pretty easy to understand. It shows how long it is taking homes to sell on average for a given month. January shows 105 days on average to sell a home. The same was true for December. If you want to see the silver lining, after 6 straight months of increasing time on market we finally had a leveling off. This is especially noteworthy when you consider that January is typically the slowest month of the year. Still 105 days is a long time. Also, keep in mind that that is the average time for the homes that sold. This does not take into consideration the fact that in the neighborhood of 50% of listings did not sell at all last year. So looking at it this way, these are actually the lucky 50%.
Inventory:
This chart requires a little bit of explaining. Inventory is what we use when we are talking about it being a buyer’s or seller’s market. Inventory is the relationship between how many homes are on the market and how fast they are selling. We usually talk about inventory in terms of months. The current inventory number for the month of January based on pending sales is 6.0 months. What that means is that if no more homes came on the market, at the current rate of sale all the homes currently for sale would be exhausted in 6 months.
So what kind of market is that? Surprisingly a very weak buyer’s market. Here are some general guidelines:
0-3 month’s of inventory = Seller’s market
3-6 months of inventory = Balanced market
6+ months of inventory = Buyer’s market
The logic goes like this. The more homes available and she slower the rate of sale, the more it favors buyer’s. The fewer homes and the quicker the rate of sale, the more it favors sellers.
The ranges are disputable but I think most people would be surprised to see that we are not as buyer friendly as we once were and if current trends continue will be in a balanced market in Seattle sooner then later. In fact, looking more specifically at specific areas of Seattle, NE Seattle, NW Seattle, and W. Shoreline, are already experiencing a balanced market. Is this a temporary glitch or will more neighborhoods follow? Only time will tell.
I’ll do my best to keep you posted.
Related Topic:
Average Seattle Home prices January 2009
Seattle’s January 2009 Housing Statistics: Homes for Sale,
Sold and Pending
Give me a call if you need help.
Rob Graham, Accredited Buyers Representative
Windermere Real Estate
206-321-6349
Popularity: 2% [?]
ABOUT
Call today for a free consultation on how you can find the home of your dreams. 206-321-6349 or simply visit my web site www.robgrahamrealestate.com
