Register Real Estate Advisors

Join us this Thursday from 6-7pm at Register Real Estate Advisors for a Home Buyer Seminar. This seminar is for both first time home buyers and repreat home buyers. These can be resale home buyers and new construction home sales. If you have thought about purchasing a home you need to know about representation in the real estate market. You also need to know the process for buying a home. If you know someone that will benefit from a real estate seminar, please forward this information to them. The seminars will be held at 1614 Louetta Rd. Ste I Spring, Texas, 77388. These informative seminars will be hosted by Realtors and will sometimes have guest speakers such as Title Company Representatives, Lenders, Inspectors, Appraisers, and other industry experts. We hope you will attend and bring your questions!

This Thursday Register Real Estate Advisors will be hosting a Credit Seminar. This seminar will focus on credit issues that keep buyers from qualifying for a mortgage and help them correct credit issues so they can purchase in the future. If you thought home ownership was out of your reach, come listed to experts explain how you can get qualified to purchase a home. If you know someone that will benefit from a real estate seminar, please forward this information to them. The seminars will be held at 1614 Louetta Rd. Ste I Spring, Texas, 77388 from 6-7pm. These informative seminars will be hosted by Realtors and will sometimes have guest speakers such as Title Company Representatives, Lenders, Inspectors, Appraisers, and other industry experts. We hope you will attend and bring your questions!

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (Joint Center for Housing Studies) – A stalled housing recovery and concern over the pace of economic growth nationally will likely generate only modest gains in home improvement spending this year, predicts a Harvard-based housing research center.

“Given all the economic uncertainty that we’re seeing nationally, the home improvement recovery is expected to be rocky,” said Eric S. Belsky, managing director of the university’s Joint Center for Housing Studies. “Spending patterns through the remainder of the year are expected to reflect recent volatility in the housing market.”

Said Kermit Baker, director of the center’s Remodeling Futures Program, “Recent softness in the housing market and continued pessimism among remodeling contractors point to a slowdown in the remodeling market toward the end of the year.”

The center’s Leading Indicator of Remodeling Activity (LIRA) projects annual growth slowing throughout the year, with spending up only 0.2 percent in 2011.

The LIRA is designed to estimate national homeowner spending on improvements for the current quarter and subsequent three quarters. It provides a short-term outlook of homeowner remodeling activity and is intended to help identify future turning points in the business cycle of the home improvement industry.

If the latest technology and entertainment options are important in your new home, add the following questions to your buyer’s checklist.  This is interesting information I got from the REALTOR Magazine Online and reprinted with permission of the National Association of REALTORS.  Visit the Consumer Electronics Association ( http://www.ce.org/techhomerating ) for a complete Tech Home Rating Checklist.

1.  Are there enough jacks in every room for cable TV and high-speed Internet hookups?  Does it include U-Verse if that’s important to your family?

2.  Are there enough telephone extensions or jacks?  Most people use their cell phones these days, but some still want a phone in every room, including the bathrooms.

3.  Is the home prewired for a home theater or multi-room audio and video?

4.  Does the home have a local area network for linking computers?

5.  Does the home already have wiring for DSL or other high-speed Internet connection?

6.  Does the home have multi-room lighting controls, window-covering controls, or other home automation features?

7.  Does the home have multi-room lighting controls, window-covering controls, or other home automation features?

8.  Is the home wired with multi-purpose in-wall wiring that allows for reconfigurations to update services as technology changes?

Today rates went up…our Real Estate Research Center at Texas A&M said it was coming…

(COLLEGE STATION, Tex.) — Mortgage interest rates are low right now, but don’t expect that to last. When the government quits buying mortgage-backed securities, rates will head up and away.

Dr. Mark Dotzour, chief economist for the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University, explained why mortgage rates were so low at the end of 2009.

“First, the global consensus among bondholders appeared to be that inflation will remain low in the United States for an extended period. This caused the ten-year U.S. Treasury rate to fall to between 3.2 and 3.6 percent for much of the second half of 2009.”

With extraordinary levels of federal deficit spending,  Dotzour said it is unlikely that the low-inflation scenario will be popular when the economy starts to rebound.  Consumers should expect mortgage rates to rise when signs of improvement appear.

A second factor contributing to the low mortgage rates is the Federal Reserve Bank’s unprecedented purchase of nearly all the mortgage-backed securities issued by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac in 2009, he said. Totaling more than $1 trillion for the year, this program has been extended through the end of March 2010.

“The Fed has never done this before in its history, “said Dotzour. “They are doing this to stimulate the economy by keeping mortgage rates as low as possible. When the Fed stops buying these securities from Fannie and Freddie, mortgage rates are likely to increase, possibly quite abruptly.”

How far will rates go up when the Fed terminates its buying program?  Dotzour said that question is difficult to answer precisely, because this has never been done before. But many experts think that rates could move up one-half to 1 percent.

“The combination of extraordinarily low mortgage rates and current price levels are making homes extremely affordable to American families. In fact, national and Texas housing affordability indices indicate that homes are more affordable than ever. But this will not last. When the economy recovers and the Fed stops purchasing mortgages, rates will rise.”

To read more on this subject, see Dotzour’s article in the January 2010 issue of Tierra Grande magazine.

NEW YORK (McGraw-Hill) – The value of Texas construction starts will advance 16 percent to $52.5 billion this year, according to the 2010 Texas Construction Outlook from McGraw-Hill Construction.

Growth is expected for each of Texas’ major metropolitan areas: Austin is expected to climb 30 percent, Houston 17 percent, Dallas 16 percent, El Paso 8 percent, and San Antonio 6 percent.

Other highlights from the report:

• Housing starts in Texas are expected to advance 31 percent to $21.8 billion in 2010, with single-family housing growing 31 percent and multifamily housing gaining 34 percent.
• Nonresidential construction starts will slip 1 percent to $17.6 billion, suffering from declines in commercial and industrial starts.
• Federal stimulus funding will assist public works and utilities construction as starts rebound 21 percent to $13.1 billion in 2010.

I have added a Glossary of Contruction Terms to my web site that will be helpful if you are building a new home or buying a new construction home.  This list of terms was compiled by the Champions School of Real Estate.  From the front page of my site you can click on GLOSSARY. Then, on the right hand side of the page you will see Click Here for Glossary of Construction Terms.  I have completed the comprehensive course of study in Successful New Home Sales Representation so that I can assist buyers with new construction builds and purchases.