Vacant Homes

The number of vacant homes for sale in the United States set a new record in the first quarter of 2008, the U.S. Census Bureau reported Monday.

The Census Bureau reported that 2.9 percent of U.S. homes or 2.28 million properties, not including rentals, were vacant and for sale. It was the highest quarterly number as far back to 1956 when records of such vacancies were first kept.

The West had the biggest gain in vacancy rates among home owners, rising to 3.2 percent in the January-March period from 2.6 percent in the same quarter a year earlier. Vacancy rates inched up in the Northeast and remained steady in the Midwest and South.

From my recent house hunting trips with clients I know there are a good deal of vacant homes, many of them short sale or bank owned properties in the Sacramento area. Of MagnumOne Realty’s current active and pending listings only 40 percent are occupied..

We are starting to hear about squatters moving in but have not had any direct experience with this issue.

Visit my website at http://www.jalone.com/.

Good News Sacramento

Get this, now is the time when inventory of homes on the market traditionally increases and should continue to so as we move into summer but inventory is remarkably stable right now. Even with the large numbers of foreclosures in the Sacramento area during the first quarter we are seeing inventory staying right around 15,000 and even edged down last week. We still have more “For Sale” homes than wanted to achieve a balanced market but the fact that it is not increasing rapidly as it has in the past two years is very good news. For sellers the icing on this cake is, believe it or not, according to our friends at HousingTracker the median asking price has actually increased in the past week. For the week ending yesterday, the median asking price was $307,000 up $2,000 from the previous week.

Bank Owned Nightmare

We just lost out on a great house because of how an overworked agent manages her bank owned listings. Check out my weekly column at Rocklin & Roseville Today, “Buying bank owned can be a pain!”

More Foreclosure Pain

It is just a number but when you think about the families having to move from their homes and lives disrupted, 5,278 foreclosures in Sacramento and surrounding counties during the past three months is staggering. For more details about the Sacramento foreclosures check out my column, “Foreclosures Skyrocket, “over at Rocklin & Roseville Today.

Speaking about my weekly local real estate column at our largest online newspaper it can now also be found at Sacramento Today, which is a new and rapidly growing online newspaper. I have been writing this column and updating it at least weekly since December 2005 and proud of my affiliation with the Rocklin & Roseville Today and now with Sacramento Today.

Mid-Week Report

I must have forgotten to knock on wood last week when I babbled on about For Sale Declines and being amazed that inventory of homes on the market in the Sacramento area were declining and prices were holding steady. I just surfed over to HousingTracker to take a look at inventory and prices this week and was surprised again, for a different reason.

It wasn’t surprising to see inventory creeping up as there are 148 more single family and condo homes on the market this week than last. After all this is the traditional time of year we always experience increases in homes being sold. What did surprise me was the median asking price. For the past five weeks it has been hovering around $309,000 and I thought for sure with all the buyer activity we are seeing it might stay in that range. According to HousingTracker the median asking price for a home in the Sacramento area for the week ended April 14 dropped to $305,000, a 1.2 percent drop in a single week.

Other Items:
1. Welcome to our newest agent at MagnumOne Realty, Tina Farinas. You can learn more about Tina and her business at www.tinafarinas.com.
2. Kara Green will be hosting an Open House at Megan Way in Sacramento on Saturday, check our website for details (map).
3. On Sunday, Tina Farina will be at Latigo Court in Roseville hosting an open house. Check back on the website later today and see the photos of this great home (map).
4. Hope you all remembered to file your tax returns or request for extension yesterday!

Help for Home Buyers

Assistance programs have been around for years but are re-emerging now that most lenders require down payments before they will finance a home. Check out my latest column, “Down Payment Assistance,” over at Roseville & Rocklin Today where I write about a few of the programs we have used, how they can benefit both buyers and sellers and where to get more information.

Not Hot but....

Here we are on Wednesday of the week where we are expected to get some 80 degree weather during the coming weekend. That feels good to me and so does what is starting to happen in the Sacramento and Roseville real estate market. Check out my column, “Warmer weather brings out buyers,” over at Roseville & Rocklin Today and see why I am starting to feel optimistic.

For Sales Decline

Okay, make me officially amazed! Inventory has not started growing like it normally does this time of year, it has actually declined. According to our friends over at HousingTracker, the number of homes on the market in the Sacramento area has declined 2.9 percent in the past month and now stands at less than 15,000 for the first time since the low last spring of just over 13,000. This trend if it continues could make for an interesting second half of the year.

While inventory is declining or at least holding steady during the past few weeks the median asking price for homes has been hanging in the $309,000 range for the past five weeks. As of April 7 it was at exactly $309,000 down .3 percent in the past month. Asking prices seem to be showing signs, albeit weak signs, of stabilizing.

If there was any doubt about buyers getting active it was erased this past weekend when I showed a house one of my clients was interested in. Since it was loaded with Realtor cards I called the listing agent to get a status update. Believe it or not within two days of being on the market she has received 22 offers and said she was not taking any more! As we were leaving, two other agents were pulling up with their clients.

I want to be optimistic

There are many industry professionals and local agents clamoring about a recovery of our troubled Sacramento real estate market but I am feeling cautious because I have been dealing with so many shorts sales and foreclosures. It is nice to hear about agents being busy and see some houses move so check out why I am not smiling in my weekly column, “No Smiles Yet” over at Roseville & Rocklin Today.

By the way, the publishers of Roseville & Rocklin Today, have just launched Sacramento Today and we are working out the details for my weekly column to appear there. I’ll keep you posted when and where it will be.

Today is Friday, I think and it has been a very busy real estate week for us and we are looking forward to some downtime over the weekend and maybe even getting outside a bit.

More Help from Washington?

Yesterday the Senate announced that it had reached a bipartisan compromise on a plan to aid families facing foreclosure. This is good news as the lawmakers have been unable to reach agreement on some of the key provisions already passed by the house.

The compromise includes:

· Foreclosure aid. A $4 billion package to aid communities hard hit by foreclosures and mortgage delinquencies. Local governments could use the funds to buy and rehabilitate foreclosed homes at a discount.
· Government-backed mortgages. Increased loan limits for FHA- guaranteed mortgages.
· Financial counseling. About $100 million in new funding for housing counseling for troubled families.
· Tax credit. A $7,000 tax credit, over two years, for buyers of foreclosed homes or properties on which foreclosure action has been filed.
· Business tax relief. Authority for home builders and other firms that are losing money to reclaim taxes paid up to four years ago vs. two years now.

The Mortgage Bankers Association applauded the plan, saying it would "keep at-risk borrowers in their homes."

April Fool's Day Jokes

It's April 1st again and that means there are some crazy things flying around the Internet. Some of it is difficult to tell if it a joke or not but most of it is fun. Here is a list I found earlier with links to some April 1st jokes.

· The BBC's Flying Penguin's - this one is the best April Fools' joke out there this year. You can watch the video here .
· CNET has TechCrunch acquiring TigerBeat and renaming it CrunchKids.
· Google and Sir Richard Branson launched Project Virgle and plan to colonize Mars. See also the Google Blog announcement.
· PizzaHut has become PastaHut.
· Search the future with Google Australia's gDay technology.
· Too busy to search? Let someone Google for you.
· Catch up on your old email with Gmail Custom Time. You can only send mail back in time as far as 2004. "Gmail utilizes an e-flux capacitor to resolve issues of causality."
· Scribd will scan all your documents and publish them on the Internet for free. (via Boing Boing)
· Bungie's next project is a LEGO version of Halo.
· PirateBay is relocating to the desert of Sinai.
· Orkut is now Yogurt.
· Many more Google created or inspired April Fool's jokes listed here.
· LifeHacker has a list of harmless geek pranks for those who want to prank their friends without causing permanent damage.