Link Love: Real Estate Happenings & News
Google may be entering the mortgage business. This will give Zillow and other online mortgage giants a run for their money, but I still maintain my stand that it’s always better to find someone local who knows the area, knows the market, and knows the agent so they don’t dare add on unnecessary fees to close.
Check out the latest celebrity real estate activity here.
Realtor Jack from Evanston, Illinois commented on an article about short-sales messing up the housing market in Chicago. His numbers didn’t add up the same as what’s apparently happening in the Windy City. This bring us to the absolute truth that all real estate is local. In one city on the outskirts of Nashville, short-sales, bank-owned, and HUD housing made up 30-35% of properties listed. In other areas, less than 1% are distress sales. The homeowners in the high foreclosure community have been hit really hard and are struggling simply to get showings, but other townships are still fairly healthy. Remember, location location location when you buy!
Speaking of short sales, the Bloodhoundblog has a great post about investors buying these properties.
But the truth is, speculators are the garbage collectors of capitalism. They come in and clean up messes they did not create, returning productive value to underperforming assets.
It you’re looking for a villain in these stories, look to the borrower, to the lender or just to the vicissitudes of life. But it is the speculators who are going to bring the real estate market back to a viable state.
Finally, Shakhammer recently posted a video of the trials and tribulations a customer went through to buy and install his own water heater. It IS a long video, but gives the Sears Company some strong, logical advice. (I hope this link works today!)
[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YF4CqjvSCmA]
