Cape Coral Real Estate

If 2012 is your year for home hunting and purchase, here is a list of 5 things you should consider to do NOW before anything else.

1. 1. Check your credit. And I’m serious about that. Make a copy of your credit report online and review anything that can show negative transaction. Call the credit bureau in charge and fix your problem. There is nothing worse than finding the perfect home at the perfect price, getting ready with the down payment and everything and learn that you have been denied because of your bad credit. So, if there is any problem there, fix it now.

1. 2. Do your homework. Do you research online about 1 month before buying. Check the neighborhood, the market value, compare the foreclosure with the regular market, learn about short sale and see if it’s for you. Shop around for the best terms mortgage out there, call 4 or 5 mortgage broker and compare what they need and they fees/expenses. Ask them what documents you need to be qualified. Ask to be approved for a loan before even getting out to see properties. It’s frustrating to fall in love with a home that is price at $10,000 more than you can afford. Everything else will be disappointing at that point!

1. 3. Fluff up your down payment. Make sure to have a full understanding of the money you have to bring at closing, all fees including. Again, it’s frustrating to be short of a couple of thousands dollars in front of the home of your dreams. Get your finance in place and ready to go.

1. 4. Grow your cash. You’re gonna to move. So double check all that stuff that you didn’t use for the last 12 months or more. You won’t probably never use it ever. So make a big yard sale of that stuff, sell them on ebay or on craigslist and keep the money for your down payment or for some work you’ll need to do in your new home, like painting or new moldings.

1. 5. Be prepared. If you want to purchase a great deal, like a foreclosure, be prepared. I wrote a guideline about being prepared to make an offer on a foreclosure: Cape Coral Foreclosure . I have come across a lot of excited people like kids in front of a toy getting frustrated with those above asking price multiple offers. So being psychologically prepared will help you to handle your purchase.

Once you have everything ready and you have prepared yourself for your 2012 home purchase, feel free to give me a call at 239-240-7346 and I’ll prepare some visits and will help you during your transaction to make it as smooth as possible.

Comments (0) Dec 17 2011

So, you have been looking to buy a home in Cape Coral for over 6 months now. There is something important for you to know.  Stop looking to buy a home right now.  You are wasting your time and energy. Cape Coral properties prices have been increasing for the last 6 months in a row. So, if you’re still looking, it’s not for finding the best deal of the century, it’s already too late. It has to be because you’re searching for the best floor plan or curb appeal possible, but then, the inventory is so wide, if you didn’t find it already, it’s because it doesn’t exist.

Not to mention all the time that is being wasted by professional lending and real estate brokers. They are not your taxi driver even if it’s my second job. They are not the ones to fix your poor credit scores.  They are not the ones to hold your hand every step of the way even if I do it on a daily basis.  They are there to help you not be taken advantage of by someone who is not committed to the home buying process.

Buying a home is a process and it doesn’t take over 6 months to complete.  A Realtor can help you with the home buying process, however, you the buyer must take action to make it become a reality.  Seeing every home that comes on the market for a year is insane!  It’s not that big of a deal to find the house you will come to know as home.  If you see a house you like and it’s within your means, then buy it.  Otherwise, go home and leave everyone alone.

You can read more at 1capecoral.com or in my blog. The time to buy a home was in the last 6 month, with a rock bottom price reached last December 2010/January 2011  or today…not in 6 months. Quit trying to out think the other guy or the sellers. Find what you like and buy it.  If there isn’t anything out there that you like then you probably are not going to find it.

Go home.  Stop wasting your time. Watch some football or NASCAR or a movie anything but get out of the home buying process as you are not a buyer.  You are a looker and you are frustrating people around you that can actually and willingly help you.

The time is ripe to buy a home today.  Interest rates are low.  Prices are still low. In most markets inventory is high.  Sellers want to negotiate on their homes. It’s easy and time for action. And if you think that a home priced below a car’s price is too high, you’ll never buy anything. So, do something else.

If you are angry right now…good.  Here is a way which may help.  Revisit why you wanted to buy a home in the first place and re-motivate or inspire yourself.  If that doesn’t work then forget about it.  You will never achieve your American Dream without concise methodical action on your part.  Now go out there and become a buyer and call me to seriously get started!

Comments (0) Oct 25 2011

Do you think you can write an offer on a Cape Coral foreclosure for sale without the help of an agent? The answer is a big YES!

If you think about it, my guess is you want to save the typical 6% commission that we make. If it’s the case, you are completely mistaken. First, our commissions are not set to be 6%. It’s negotiable. And in the foreclosure and REO world, it’s the bank that decides how much they really want to pay. Most agents doing foreclosure make about 1 to 2% of the closed price as the seller representative. So the buyer’s agent is really doing something like 2 to 4%. In that case, if you represent yourself for that foreclosure home purchase, you’re really saving about those 2 to 4% commission.

Now, prepare yourself to get an accepted offer on that Cape Coral foreclosure house for sale. You will need a few things checked with the listing agent, and I have been in contact with most of them, they use to be very difficult if they are not in front of another agent because they think they’ll have to do all the work believing that you won’t be able to do your part:

• What kind of paperwork do they want?  Typical is proof of funds, pre-approval letter from your bank, etc…
• How many offers are on the property? Maybe it is a multiple offers situation already.
• Is there a mandatory minimum MLS marketing time?
• How do they want to receive your offer?  Fax, website or email.

So, once you have all that done, you’ll be able to put a good offer but you will need to know something important: the price. Don’t google that. You will not be able to rely on sites like Zillow or Trulia for pricing. They are not accurate. Hire an appraiser instead, especially if you do not have access to your local MLS. The point here is that you don’t want to pay too much or too little. Too much and you may overpay for the property and too little,you may lose the home to higher bidder.

You can also read this buying a foreclosure in Cape Coral post for more tips.

Comments (0) Sep 26 2011

I saw the big title in the newspaper today. There had been 656 foreclosure lawsuits filed in Lee County in October, the lowest range in a lot more than three years, according to statistics released Monday by the South West Florida Real Estate Investment Association.

It was a rare ray of hope in a grim situation: The Lee County and Cape Coral  foreclosure rate is normally within the top five metropolitan areas nationwide, with only Las Vegas consistently worse.

October’s variety is down 31 % from September’s 953. Yes, you read me: 31% less than the month before. The pace hasn’t been this slow since quite a long time.  555 had been filed in February 2007 as the wave of mortgage failures that followed the housing boom was just obtaining under way.

Experts stated that the decline likely was part of a long-term downward pattern — but that’s not all.

Foreclosures possibly plunged at least in aspect since for the past month, some banks have been holding off on foreclosures whilst they sort out issues including who truly owns the note and whether attorneys basically read all the paperwork, but the holding was only for 1 week and from 2 banks, including a major one though: Bank of America.

But the recent lender troubles alone couldn’t have caused a drop as sharp as October’s. Bankers “did knock some things out, but in the totality with the trend, no. 10 to 20 percent of your mortgages might be affected,” but not enough to account for the whole drop.

County Clerk of Court Charlie Green said that whatever the trigger, the downward pattern has helped whittle away at a daunting backlog of foreclosures within the court system: Public auctions disposing of properties are now outnumbering new filings.

Only about 14,700 cases are from the pipeline now, Green mentioned, down practically half from the 26,000 when the difficulty peaked at the end of 2008.

Still, he cautioned that there’s a substantial “shadow inventory” of houses that banks are selecting not to foreclose on. “I believe we’re clearing some out, but the banks are holding back.”

But we don’t really know how many far more. Next month will give us a better indication as to whether or not it was a normal trend or lenders stopping until they figure out what the issue with their process was.”

Also the pace of foreclosure doesn’t occur in a vacuum: if the winter tourist season is strong, it will reduce unemployment and keep far more people financially able to keep their homes, which is the case in South West Flroida, which include Cape Coral.

I think it will be only in April, May, June of next year that we’ll see how this season’s sales and the economic effect of your season influenced foreclosures.

A big builder in Cape Coral, stated that whatever the short-term pattern, foreclosures can’t sustain themselves at that pace. It’s going to sooner or later start slowing up. And I think it is happening right now.

Also, the issues with the foreclosure process have made some prospective buyers skittish about buying a previously mortgaged house.

However, while I find it easier to sell to prospective renters a house where owners are living in than a foreclosure, that  non distresses market has a hard time to compete with the foreclosures. Plus, new potential buyers have still a hard time to accept the fact that most of the time, there is a multiple offer situation on every foreclosed properties, ending by an accepted offer above the asking price. Often, those buyers go through a 3 step buying process. The first is the below asking price period where the buyer experience the frustration of being outbid. Then there is the full price offers period of time, which is usually shorter than the first one. Most of the time, the buyers learned their lessons and go the third period, the above asking price offers moment where they finally get a property under contract.

It’s now even more difficult with the decrease of the number of foreclosure and with a possible increase of pricing, even for foreclosures.

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Comments (0) Nov 02 2010

I made a couple of offers this week. Both were full price offers, one on a property in Cape Coral and the other one in Lehigh Acres. Thoses properties were freshly on the market that I put an offer right away. And I said right away, because those offers are number 8 and number 9. I have had no success with the first 7 properties for different reasons: too late or offering a 3% to 10% below asking.

But I learn from my mistake and I was offering a full price, the first day. Well, guess what, My offers are a back up because the banks have accepted what I think are better offers. But again, I will learn from this and will offer more than asking price for the next ones.

The amazing strong SW Florida seller’s market remind me when I was living in Pembroke Pines and had multiple offers the very same day when I put the listing on the MLS. If I was purchasing foreclosures or maybe even short sales, I can easily understand the multiple offer situation. Or maybe I should focus on foreclosed properties and offer twice the price, ending by paying a fair market value. But when it occurs with regular homes, it’s obvious that medias are spreading inaccurate information.

Here in TN, at least East TN, it is still a deep buyer’s market, but without any. I see 20% CAP rate investment properties getting no showing, and therefore, even less offers, or this 3bed/2bath residential with no taker at a mere $25,000, bought from the builder in 2005 for $140,000. Not even investors are showing up to buy those which rent for about $950-$1,100/month!

It seems that few miles will make a huge difference these days…

2207 NE 1st Ave, Cape Coral, FL

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Comments (0) Jan 08 2010