Tuesday, February 15, 2022

There are 96% Less Homes For Sale Today in Metro Denver Than in 2008

 Check out this graph. In 2008 there were over 26,000 homes for sale in the Denver metro area. In 2019 there were 9,600 homes for sale. Today there are right around 1,000. That is 96% less than 2008, and 89% less than 2019! 

This is the smallest amount of inventory in metro-Denver history (well, perhaps after the year 1800). We are not in a bubble crisis, we are in an inventory crisis... 




Thursday, February 10, 2022

During Inflation, Savers Lose and Borrowers Win

 



Inflation, inflation, inflation. Why does it seem like everyone is talking about inflation? Well, for one thing, inflation is currently at a 40-year high. Yikes. And for another, inflation directly affects YOUR hard-earned money. It's important to try to understand how inflation does this, but with all the fear-mongering of the media, what may not be as discussed is how you can actually benefit from inflation.

The long and short of it is this: that during times of inflation, savers and lenders are losers, and debtors and investors are winners. Sound crazy? Read on. 


What is inflation, and why does it matter to YOU?

In simple terms, inflation is the decline of purchasing power of a given currency over time. The value of the dollar has been debased--we've printed too many dollars, and as the US Debt Clock shows, we are almost at $29,000,000,000,000 (trillion) in national debt, and counting. Another way to look at it is when the amount of spending and income grows faster than the production of goods, prices rise, this is inflation. Inflation is now at 6.2%, a 31-year high!


During inflation your money sitting in the bank goes down in value, right now at 7.5% per year (at least)! That means you must invest your money at a 7% annual return just to break even. If you don't, you are losing 7.5% per year! What does that mean? If you have $100,000 sitting in the bank, you are losing $7,000 per year, so next year your hard-earned money will be $92,500! And if you invest it and make 7.5% returns, it will only remain at the original $100,000. Crazy! 

So how can real estate not only protect your money but maximize your profits during inflation? So glad you asked!



There are 3 ways that real estate can maximize your wealth during inflation.

1. This first concept blew my mind when I learned it. Just as your $100,000 sitting in the bank loses $7,500 per year, so does your real estate debt. If you borrow $100,000 from the bank today (instead of giving them your hard-earned $100,000 which represents thousands of hours of work!), your debt also loses the same inflation percentage per year, right now 7.5%! The best part is, the bank doesn't make you pay in inflationary-adjusted terms (tomorrow dollars), but only your original amount(yesterday's dollars). So next year I would only owe the bank $92,500, minus any payments I made. WOW. You can see how this hurts lenders, but very much helps debtors!

You make money in your sleep!

2. If you use that loan to buy real estate, real estate follows inflation, meaning if cost of goods and services go up, which they do during inflation, the cost of real estate prices also goes up. Your home or investment property will appreciate as well!

You make money in your sleep!


3. Just as real estate prices go up, historically rents go up as well. Rents have skyrocketed lately because of supply and demand issues, but historically rise during inflation as well. 

You, once again, make money in your sleep!


And none of this includes the tax benefits of real estate!

So, when you buy cash-flowing real estate with long-term fixed interest rate debt, the Inflation Triple Crown that you win is: Price InflationDebt Debasement, and Cash Flow Enhancement (click for great video explanations).

Learning about these concepts epitomizes financial education.

You get to utilize a concept that impoverishes most people... and ethically turn it into your financial advantage.

TAKE AWAY HACK:

*Don't watch your money ERODE in your bank account! Invest it in cash-flowing real estate using debt which will be debased during inflation!

Do the opposite of what most consumers do. 

Real Estate, meet Crypto.


The truth is, real estate and crypto have already met, and have become fast friends. Consumers can now buy homes with crypto, get a mortgage in crypto, and even save for a downpayment in crypto.

Furthermore, real estate is becoming tokenized to offer secured fractionalization and liquidity. The title industry is exploring blockchain technology for solving old-world title problems. NFT mortgages are happening in the Metaverse. On and on it goes. I know, this sounds like I'm writing this from the year 3,000, but it's happening now. The current crypto market cap is over $2 trillion, with a 24-hour trading volume of $107 billion. And there is over $212 billion locked in the decentralized financial world (dApps, a different world from Bitcoin). 
 

Despite the volatility of cryptocurrencies, they continue to be gain adaption and momentum, especially in real estate. “Holders of cryptocurrency can buy any property on or off the MLS, Equator.com or Hubzu.com by selecting PremiumTitle as their title and escrow company and sending their Bitcoin, Litecoin, Dash, Ethereum or Bitcoin Cash to a ForumPay wallet for conversion.” Furthermore, a recent Redfin report shows that 12% of first-time homebuyers used crypto to help save for their down payment. This is up from 5% in 2019.

It's not far-fetched to say that Real Estate and Mortgage Lending helped give birth to crypto.

It all starts in the crash of 2008. After much irresponsible lending and borrowing, a huge oversupply of housing (32,000 homes for sale in metro Denver alone in 2007, vs. a mere 1,087 houses right now😩. To think 77% of consumers believe we're in a housing bubble🤦), the greed of banks and Wall Street via false mortgage security ratings by rating companies (watch The Big Short), stocks and real estate prices crashing, then the government bailing out said banks and insurance companies using taxes paid by its citizens....well, you may lose any last trust you had in the system after this point. As one author put it:

"There are millions of people in the world whose entire jobs are to simply do this: verify trustworthiness. Insurance companies, banks, legal firms, universities, regulatory agencies, and government programs have massive office buildings full of nothing but people doing this trustworthy verification thingall day every day. And they do this because we have no other better way to do it. And because these groups of thousands of people are required to do this, the process is corruptible because it is human."


Enter Satoshi Nakamoto, inventor of Bitcoin. In his (or their) fascinating Whitepaper, Satoshi addresses the inherent problem of 2008 as a problem of a "trust economy," that a whole economy dependent on 3rd party institutions (which at the end of the day put their financial and personal interests before their customers') is an economy which is always vulnerable and inefficient. He proposes, 

"What is needed is an electronic payment system based on cryptographic proof instead of trust, allowing any two willing parties to transact directly with each other without the need for a trusted third party." (Satoshi Nakamoto, Bitcoin: A Peer-to Peer Electronic Cash System)

Thus the revolutionary invention of Bitcoin, and not long after, several other cryptocurrencies and blockchains with different purposes and goals. As you know I absolutely love real estate, however, it continues to be one of the most archaic industries in the world, right there with digging for dinosaur bones and collecting baseball cards (both still extremely valuable)! The inefficiencies of real estate along with so many other industries still using paper(😵) and "trust" which are wholly vulnerable to error, hacking and fraud (healthcare, insurance, legal, voting, charity, cyber-security, and of course, the financial industry), can and will benefit tremendously from blockchain and smart-contract technology.

Real estate and Bitcoin have a lot more in common than meets the eye, first and foremost they are not the US Dollar, which is being printed like it's a Monopoly game. The US Dollar has significantly deflated in value especially over the last 2 years, but real estate and cryptocurrency are assets and have significantly increased. Inflation is hitting 40-year records, and people are looking for safer alternatives than holding depleting cash.

Even JP Morgan, who just last year called Bitcoin worthless and a fraud--an understandable and loud critic of Bitcoin--recently came out with an analysis saying Bitcoin could very well go to $150,000 in the long term(😯). And entire major countries are now changing their stance--recently India, and now Russia, are legalizing Bitcoin. El Salvador, which has a 70% population which don't have bank accounts, became the first country to recognize Bitcoin as legal tender. And many analysts are predicting several other 2nd and 3rd world countries will follow suit. 

 


So, what does this all mean for me, Jonathan?
Well, I'm not a financial advisor, who would just tell you to invest in your 401k and the stocks he/she gets a commission on anyway LOL!), but I would say with absolute conviction to educate yourself and pay attention to these trends (read or watch a video on the book The Bitcoin Standard). As far as becoming involved, once again, do your own research, but it is becoming almost common strategy even by big hedge funds and investors to keep at least 1%-3% (some say up to 5 and 10%) of your portfolio into cryptocurrency, especially Bitcoin and Ethereum, and the other top 20 coins. DeFi protocols are also a whole other rabbit hole one can travel down. I'm not saying buy $100,000 NFT's or virtual real estate (yet), but educate yourself (WSJ has great short videos all about blockchain, NFT's, Metaverse, etc). This is internet in the late 90's. You will thank me later. Oh, and don't foget to watch what everyone is renaming as the Crypto Bowl this Sunday!

And, of course, buy real estate. I don't care where you buy it, just buy it. You will thank me later.      

Tuesday, November 2, 2021

Showing Trends Show 2021 Still Higher Than Previous 4 Years

 The Denver House Guy Lesson of the Day:

What Showing Trends Teach Us About Demand


(Click to enlarge)

This very interesting showing graph showing the amount of showings per listing. 

2021 is still averaging much higher showings per listing than the previous 4 years, even in 2020. 

This shows that demand is even higher than supply in 2021 than in 2020, or previous years. 

No bubble in sight, no crash in sight. 

Supply and demand are the crystal ball of real estate! 

Monday, September 20, 2021

When was it more affordable to buy a house: 1977, '81, '90, '06 or 2021?

 


Check out this Time Magazine cover from 1977 (that looks like it could very well be from today!):




Keith Weinhold had a great article on affordability throughout the years. Housing inventory and affordability is not a new problem in the United States. Just ask your parents and grandparents how much they stretched (not paid) to buy their new home. 

In 1977:
The median housing price was $48,800. 
BUT, 1977's median income was less than $14,000. 
AND mortgage interest rates were 8.9%, only to go up to 18% in the 80's!😱

Today, many people think that the price of housing has become high again.

But we need to understand housing affordability in the context of "consumer house-buying power."

First American's Real House Price Index helps. It shows that today's real house prices are now 42% below the 2006 housing boom peak. Wow!

It considers 3 big factors of:
-today's nominal house price,
-today's household income
-today's mortgage interest rates.

Basically it is more affordable to buy a house today than from 2000 to 2008:

 

Today's "nominal" house prices are well above the housing boom peak, but real, house-buying power-adjusted house prices remain 42% below the 2006 housing boom peak! 

House-buying power has benefited from a long-run decline in mortgage rates and the slow, but steady growth of household income. Since the housing boom peak in unadjusted prices in 2006, the average 30-year, fixed mortgage rate has fallen by approximately 3.3 percentage points, from 6.32% to 2.98%. Over the same period, nominal household income has increased 55%. The dramatically lower mortgage rates and higher income levels mean home buyers in June had 129% more house-buying power than in 2006. House-buying power matters because people buy homes based on how much it costs each month to make a mortgage payment, not the price of the home. (credit Keith Weinhold and First American)


This Chart Will Blow Your Mind!


This amazing chart is a historical index comparing monthly mortgage payments dollar for dollar by year since 1969! Which means that dollar for dollar today the monthly principal and interest mortgage payment is only 48% of what it was in January 1990! And only 26% of what it was in 1981!😱🤯

Denver Adjusted Home Price Index, showing prices when getting mortgages are really only $300k in apples to apples comparison with what interest rates and prices were in 1990! 



Adjusted for Inflation, Denver prices are actually only $290k:


Bottom Line: Yes house prices have gone up, but so has affordability and buying power because of record-low interest rates and higher incomes. 

Thursday, December 3, 2020

Denver Metro Real Estate Continues All-Time Records as Demand for Home in COVID-19 Increases




With months of inventory dropping to an even more historic low, the most coveted gift this holiday season is a new home.

In November, the Greater Denver Metro housing market continued to boost all-time records, with median days in MLS for detached single-family homes at a very speedy five days, representing a tie of the lowest number on record, having seen five days only five times ever before.  

Active listings for both attached and detached single-family homes came in at 3,415, surpassing the previous low set in December 2017 of 3,854. There was additionally a record-high for November average close price for combined single-family detached and attached properties, and detached single-family homes at $549,756 and $615,766 respectively. The previous record for combined single-family detached and attached properties was in 2019 at $486,012. 

While the holiday months do generally see a decline in inventory, months of inventory this particular November hit another record-low at just .71, easily beating October 2020’s former lowest record at .81. For the single-family detached market, Denver only had 1,755 houses currently available for sale, representing just .51 months of inventory. This means, in theory, if no houses were put on the market for two weeks, there would be nothing left to sell.

Wednesday, October 7, 2020

2 Colorado Cities Among Money's Best Places To Live In 2020


Colorado is once again home to two of the 50 best places in the United States to live, according to a new ranking by Money Magazine. The annual list, released last week, ranks communities based on factors such as safety, cost of living and diversity.

Out of communities on this year's list, Parker ranked No. 2, and Broomfield ranked No. 18.

To determine this year's Best Places To Live, Money analyzed a list of 1,890 communities with a population of at least 25,000. The publication then analyzed 115 separate data points on each community's economy, housing market, education system, employment, weather and more.

Reporters then researched each location to ensure the statistics were an accurate representation of each community. 

Here is the top 20 list:

  1. Evans, Georgia
  2. Parker, Colorado
  3. Meridian, Idaho
  4. Rockwall, Texas
  5. Columbia, Maryland
  6. Westfield, Indiana
  7. Syracuse, Utah
  8. Franklin, Tennessee
  9. Woodbury, Minnesota
  10. Morrisville, North Carolina
  11. Ashburn, Virginia
  12. South Windsor, Connecticut
  13. St Peters, Missouri
  14. Chelmsford, Massachusetts
  15. Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin
  16. Mount Laurel, New Jersey
  17. Woodstock, Georgia
  18. Broomfield, Colorado
  19. Abington, Pennsylvania
  20. Midlothian, Virginia

Wednesday, September 9, 2020

Metro Denver Has Two Spots in Top Ten 'Work From Home' Counties in U.S.


Colorado is in the top 10 again, twice.
The real estate industry is closely watching the remote work trend as it could have a big influence on clients' future homebuying decisions. More Americans have been working from home due to the COVID-19 pandemic, but some areas of the country may offer more prime remote work conditions.

Colorado has 2 spots in the top 10 according to a new study on the best places to work from home, released Tuesday by the National Association of REALTORS®.

NAR assigned “Work from Home” scores to 3,142 U.S. counties, identifying the best places for working remotely. The study considers internet connectivity, the percentage of workers in office-related jobs, home affordability, urbanization, and a county’s population growth.

“The coronavirus pandemic greatly accelerated the number of workers who are able to work from home,” says NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun. “Possibly a quarter of the labor force may be permitted to work from anywhere outside of the office even after a vaccine is discovered—compared to only 5% prior to the pandemic—and this will greatly change the landscape of where people buy homes.”

Texas leads all states with seven counties among the top 30 for remote work, followed by Virginia with four, and Colorado and Georgia with three each.

NAR identified the following top 10 counties for working from home, out of 3,142 counties:

  1. Forsyth County, Ga.
  2. Douglas County, Colorado
  3. Los Alamos County, N.M.
  4. Collin County, Texas
  5. Loudon County, Va.
  6. Hamilton County, Ind.
  7. Williamson County, Tenn.
  8. Delaware County, Ohio
  9. Broomfield County, Colorado
  10. Dallas County, Iowa

“With some organizations expanding remote work options and as more people show an ability to remain productive from home, we may see buyers see larger properties that offer space for a potential home office and other features that have become more valuable as a result of this pandemic,” says Vince Malta, NAR’s president. “The growing trend and historically low mortgage rates are spurring potential home buyers to consider a broader range of options and rethink what’s important to them in the long term.”

The growth of remote work will undoubtedly have an impact on the commercial real estate and office sector too, potentially changing the future office sizes and locations.

“The commercial real estate outlook appears uncertain as office spaces may get smaller and organizations consider moving from having a central business district headquarters to several suburban satellite offices,” Yun says. “However, in the retail sector, one can reasonably expect to see some growth in the number of smaller stores in the top 30 counties coming at the expense of similar establishments near downtown office buildings.”

-National Association of REALTORS, Realtor Magazine

Thursday, August 20, 2020

Denver Among Top 5 Markets in US Doing Better Now Than Before the Pandemic


There's no point in sugarcoating it: The U.S. economy is a hot mess. The continuing coronavirus pandemic has led to scores of business closures, the worst unemployment since the Great Depression, and the steepest economic contraction on record. 

Yet, despite it all, the U.S. housing market has come back—and then some. After monthslong pauses in many parts of the country, bidding wars and offers over asking price have returned. Cooped-up buyers seeking larger homes and wanting to cash in on record-low mortgage interest rates are battling it out over a very limited supply of properties for sale. Median list prices are up more than 9% over last year, a result of the lack of homes on the market, according to weekly realtor.com® data. (The median home price nationally rose to an all-time high of $349,000 in July.)

“Housing tends to be immune from economic downturns and slowdowns," says realtor.com Director of Economic Research Javier Vivas. That's excluding the past recession, which was caused by a housing bubble. “Right now we’re seeing markets recover faster where they’re able to contain the virus better. Markets with strong technology sectors have been more resilient.” 

So where are these comeback kids—the housing markets rebounding the most since the start of the COVID-19 crisis? 

Realtor.com found that more than half of the largest metropolitan areas have recovered from their pandemic lows.

A score of 100% means the market is performing the same as it was in January. Anything higher shows how much better it's doing. (The list was narrowed to just two metropolitan areas per state to ensure geographic diversity.)

These are the markets that have recovered the most since the beginning of the COVID-19 crisis:

  1. Boston, MA, 122.52%
  2. Seattle, WA, 113.73%
  3. New York, NY, 112.74%
  4. Philadelphia, PA, 112.35%
  5. Denver, CO, 111.66%
  6. San Francisco, CA, 109.27%
  7. Los Angeles, CA, 108.78%
  8. Las Vegas, NV, 107.710%
  9. Rochester, NY, 106.61%
  10. Memphis, TN, 105.9%
-Realtor.com

Monday, July 20, 2020

June 2020: Most Pendings in Denver HISTORY (!?)


Metro Denver hit an all-time record in June: highest number of homes that went under-contract EVER, with 7,676 homes/townhomes/condos that went pending in June. That is 27% more than June 2019, and the most in any month in Denver HISTORY! I'm seeing this first-hand as I've been in constant bid-wars for buyers and receiving multiple competing offers for sellers, all $15,000 to $30,000 over asking-price! It's a ruthless shark-frenzy out there, but fortunately I've been able to make my buyers the winning offer, and get my sellers extremely high offers and excellent terms for their homes. One of my listings had 12 extremely strong offers in less than 30 hours! This is actually not a seller's market: it is hyper-seller's market. 

What is causing this HUGE demand for housing
in an unstable economy?
I think one of the main reasons for this huge demand in housing is the experience of the quarantine. Families and roommates are much more aware of the need for the security of a home during things like a global pandemic, and the necessity and functionality of different spaces in a post-COVID world: spaces where kids can play or do school work, offices where adults can actually work in peace (which aren't the master bedroom...or bathroom lol!), basements which can provide a whole other recreational flex space, backyards to be able to get out of the house, garden, and enjoy sunsets and cooler evenings. The psychology of a home and our understanding of it is returning back to its original value and essentiality: it is so much more than a place to store your stuff and sleep, or be "tiny": it is your safe place where much of life actually happens.


A few other interesting stats:
  • There were 57% more closings in June than May (COVID-induced lull for May)
  • There is half a month of inventory from $200k to $500k which is about as scarce as it gets in real estate. There is 1 month of inventory from $500k to $750,000.  $750k-$1MM has 2 months of inventory (still a hot seller's market), and $1MM+ has 4.3 months of inventory, which actually represents a "balanced market."
  • The averaged closed price was 2% higher than June 2019 at $509,736
  • The average number of active listings from 1985 to 2019 was 16,376. There were 6,383 active listings at the end of June.
  • 2,427 homes went pending in the last 7 days. There are currently 8,237 homes under contract. June's all-time record may be broken by July. 
  • There are only 5,573 active homes for sale right now.
  • Interest rates are at 3.125% today for a 30-year loan! 
Who is this market good for: renters to get in at lowest interest rates in history, and sellers to upgrade from small home to bigger home, realize serious equity, and have a similar monthly payment on the bigger home because of their equity and low interest rates. 

Saturday, June 6, 2020

Some Economists Claiming this as Shortest Recession in History

Jobs Numbers and Unemployment rocked the news this week with numbers that defied the recession.  ADP Jobs Report came out first on Wednesday SIX million lower than expected pushing the Nasdaq just shy of a record high and recouping all of its losses for 2020.  
Thursday's Jobless Claims released on Thursday on the other hand showed while initial claims dropped again, the continuing claims rose as some returned to work, but others are hanging onto their COVID unemployment pay.
Friday's May Unemployment Rate took the prize though.  Surprising almost everyone by dropping from 14.7% in April to 13.3% in May.  Many economists were expecting the bottom to hit in May.  The report showed we hit the bottom in April instead.  We had a gain of 2.5 million jobs as restaurants, hotels, and yes.. even Universal Studios reopen.  Let's face it.. American's want to travel, we want to be entertained.  

Did the stock market know before the economists?  Seems so!  Watch out though.. Greed returns to Wall Street as the Fear-Greed Index just tipped over to Greed this week.  Are we in store for a correction? 

Regardless, the metro Denver housing market is still strong, with less than 2 months of inventory, and buyers and sellers coming back quickly, seen by multiple offers on many new listings.   

Lending Programs RETURN

As the economy settles, the forbearance curve flattens and the financial markets become more stable, we are seeing loan programs return.  Such GOOD NEWS for our clients. 
  • Jumbo loans are back for buyers and refinance clients up to an 80% loan to value and a 720 credit score
  • CHFA and our other state DPA programs return with NO restrictions!  This is the program I am most excited about as we help more people move into home ownership and building wealth.
  • Renovations loans are back in full hammer swing!
  • Broker loans and Non-QM are slowly returning as well.
All of those first time home buyers did NOT go away!  In fact, loan applications for FTHB had a 50% less decline than move-up buyers in April, and are DOUBLE the amount of repeat homebuyers in May. Inventory is low, and demand is high. The housing market is as strong as ever. 

Wednesday, May 27, 2020

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac will allow borrowers who took forbearance to refinance their mortgage


While many people were speculating that the millions of mortgage forbearances would lead to a foreclosure wave, this is more evidence against that assumption. 

-Housing Wire: The most recent data shows that there are approximately 4.1 million borrowers in forbearance on their mortgage, but a lack of clarity in the wording of the CARES Act was leaving many of those borrowers unable to take advantage of the recent record lows in interest rates.
But that’s not the case anymore.

The Federal Housing Finance Agency announced Tuesday morning that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac will now allow borrowers who went into COVID-19 forbearance to refinance their loan or buy a new home with the support of the GSEs as long as they’ve made three straight months of payments after their forbearance ends.
That’s much different from the previous thinking that a borrower may not be able to get another GSE mortgage for as many as 12 months after they exit forbearance.
The CARES Act stipulates that mortgage servicers “shall report the credit obligation or account as current” on any loan that goes into COVID-19-related forbearance.
But, as HousingWire’s Kathleen Howley reported last week, some borrowers were seeing notations on their credit reports like “Account in forbearance, payment deferred.’’
That was creating a problem for borrowers who were ready to exit forbearance or those who got put into forbearance by accident. As Howley wrote, the sentiment among loan officers was that any notation of “forbearance” on a borrower’s credit file would prevent them from getting another GSE-backed mortgage, either through a refi or buying a new home, for 12 months.
Now, the GSEs are shaving nine months off of that waiting period, which would allow more borrowers to take advantage of the market’s low interest rates instead of being shut out for a year.
According to the FHFA, borrowers are now eligible to refinance or buy a new home with GSE backing three months after their forbearance ends as long as they’ve made three consecutive payments under their repayment plan, or payment deferral option or loan modification.
Also, borrowers who went into forbearance (either of their own volition or by accident, as happened to some borrowers) but continued to make their mortgage payments are eligible to refinance or buy a new home as long as they are current on their mortgage.
Here, from Fannie Mae, are more details on how borrowers who either requested and/or accepted forbearance may be eligible for a refi or new mortgage:
Under the temporary eligibility guidelines, effective immediately, homeowners who missed payments and entered into a loss mitigation solution – such as a repayment plan, payment deferral, or loan modification – are eligible for a new refinance or purchase mortgage after three timely payments.
There is no waiting period for borrowers who missed payments due to a COVID-19 financial hardship but have since completed reinstatement by repaying the full amount of the outstanding payments missed during the forbearance period.
There also is no waiting period for borrowers who requested forbearance due to a COVID-19 financial hardship but ultimately were able to make all their payments in full and on time.
“Homeowners who are in COVID-19 forbearance but continue to make their mortgage payment will not be penalized,” FHFA Director Mark Calabria said. “Today’s action allows homeowners to access record low mortgage rates and keeps the mortgage market functioning as efficiently as possible.”
But that’s not the only change the GSEs announced today.
Last month, Fannie and Freddie announced that they would begin buying loans that went into first-payment forbearance, meaning those where the borrower went into forbearance within one month of the loan closing.
That policy was set to expire on May 31, but the FHFA said Tuesday that the GSEs are extending it through August 31, 2020.
“The Enterprises are now able to buy forborne loans, with note dates on or before June 30, 2020, as long as they are delivered to the Enterprises by August 31, 2020 and have only one mortgage payment has been missed,” the FHFA said Tuesday. “FHFA and the Enterprises will continue to monitor the impact of the coronavirus national emergency on the housing finance market and update our policies as necessary.”

Friday, May 15, 2020

2019 vs 2020: Let's Compare Showings and Newly Added Listings

Good chart from First Alliance Title of showings this time 2019 vs 2020, and newly added listings this time 2019 vs 2020. After stay-at-home orders were lifted showings sky-rocketed even passed 2019 numbers (because of less houses to see), and newly added listings started increasing.


Monday, April 6, 2020

Understand How the Coronavirus Stimulus Package Can Help You







The National Association of Realtors made an easy-to-understand summary of all the relief and aid in the $2 trillion Coronavirus Stimulus Package.  

Whether you are a home-owner, business-owner, employee, renter, or student, THIS CAN HELP YOU. 

Check out details below: