I’m pleased to announce that we are no longer a part of the Realty World, Northern California franchise.  No longer being part of the corporate world, we are back to being your home town real estate company, locally owned and operated. We are also using our original name, John O’Dell Realty.

With the advent of the world wide web, there is no need for being a part of a corporate franchise. Along with our own web site, we can provide you with large exposure on many other websites, such as Realtor.com, Trulia and others, to mention just a few. Of course your property is also listed  on the Nevada County Multiple Listing service.  We also have direct access to all of the Bay Area  MLS’s and beyond, along with most of the Northern California MLS’s. Currently we are working with clients buying property in the Bay Area, along with our clients here in Nevada County.

In further news about our company, I am pleased to announce that we have two new agents, Suzette Pool, Realtor® and Mary Northwood, Realtor®, Broker/Associate.

Along with further news,  we now doing property management. The name of the new company is Success Property Management, owned by Suzette Pool and myself, John O’Dell.  Success Property Management manages all types of property from residential homes and apartments to office buildings. Between Suzette and I, we have a combined rental management experience of over 25 years.

We want to thank our clients that has helped us to be successful for these many years.

I never did like to rent a home, it seems like I was just throwing money out the door every month and paying off the landlords mortgage, plus putting some money in his pocket.

I realize that we had a run up in home prices that put almost everyone out of the market or they bought more house than they could have afforded. Times have changed and there are some really good bargains out there.

The bargains are getting so good in Nevada County, that the lower price homes often have multiple offers.  I’ve placed several offers for clients in homes that were from $200,000 to $500,000 below the original price.  Yes, $500,000 that’s not a typo.  A lot of homes are now selling below replacement costs.  It’s time to buy now, to own your home and not pay off some land lords mortgage.

And finally, a home is an investment. When you rent, you write your monthly check and that money is gone forever. But when you own your home, you can deduct the cost of your mortgage loan interest from your federal income taxes, and usually from your state taxes. This will save you a lot each year, because the interest you pay will make up most of your monthly payment for most of the years of your mortgage. You can also deduct the property taxes you pay as a homeowner. In addition, the value of your home may go up over the years. Finally, you’ll enjoy having something that’s all yours – a home where your own personal style will tell the world who you are.

Nevada County, CA

The Nevada County Multiple Listing Service (MLS) breaks Western Nevada County into various areas. As a result, I can give you sales data for different regions of Nevada County. The data that I give you below represents the time period difference in sales from July 2009, to the same period last year. Different areas of Western Nevada County depreciated faster than other areas, with some areas decreasing in value as much as -27%

Here’s the residential sales data broken down by areas, July 2009 (current period) July 2008 (one year ago):

• Alta Sierra

Current period 99, Last year’s sales 104, Median price this year $306,000 – Decrease in value -27%

• Grass Valley

Current period 251, Last year’s sales 297, Median price this year $270,000 – Decrease in value -19%

• McCourtney

Current period 20, Last year’s sales 23, Median price this year $412,750 – Decrease in value -12%

• Nevada City

Current period 166 Last year’s sales 156, Median price this year $356,450 – Decrease in value -17%

• Peardale/Chicago Park

Current period 29, Last year’s sales 25, Median price this year $395,000 – Increase in value +3%

• Penn Valley

Current period 51, Last year’s sales 51, Median price this year $335,900 – Decrease in value -7%

• Rough & Ready

Current period 7, Last year’s sales 4, Median price this year $290,500 – Decrease in value -19%

• South County

Current period 48, Last year’s sales 38, Median price this year $387,500 – Decrease in value -17%

• Lake Wildwood

Current period 99, Last year’s sales 38, Median price this year $350,252 – Decrease in value -26%

• Lake of the Pines

Current period 66, Last year’s sales 71, Median price this year $323,550 – Decrease in value -20%

So there you have it, by different areas. Areas with limited sales such as the Rough & Ready can have the median prices skewed. One or two large or small sales can change the median price drastically. If you have any questions, contact me, John J. O’Dell 530-263-1091

Prices in Nevada County residential property continued to drop overall from July of this year compared to July of 2008. Overall, there was $290,919,175 in residential sales compared to $355,118,054 for the same period last year. The median price dropped from $414,858 to $347,989. Sales decreased only 2% compared to a median price drop of 16% for residential sales.

Sales in Nevada County have continued to increase in the last few months which is the other side of the coin.  As prices drop, homes become more affortable, creating an affortable residential market. Investors continue to be a large part of the residential sales.

In further good news,  the National Association of Realtors®, stated that existing home sales increased nationwide four months in a row for the first time in 5 years.

According to national average commitment rate for a 30-year, conventional, fixed-rate mortgage fell to 5.22 percent in July from 5.42 percent in June; the rate was 6.43 percent in July 2008.

The national median existing-home price3 for all housing types was $178,400 in July, which is 15.1 percent lower than July 2008. Distressed properties continue to weigh down the median price because they typically sell for 15 to 20 percent less than traditional homes.

Single-family home sales increased 6.5 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.61 million in July from a pace of 4.33 million in June, and are 5.0 percent higher than the 4.39 million-unit level in July 2008. The median existing single-family home price was $178,300 in July, which is 14.6 percent below a year ago.”

Notice that the median price is 49 percent higher in Nevada County than the national average median price. We are still doing relatively well and sales are increasing as the price of homes go down.

Smart investors are continuing to take advantage of the present foreclosure market. I don’t have an exact figure of how many foreclosures there are in Nevada County, but I just had one of my investors open escrow on two foreclosed homes in Nevada County. With some existing home prices under $200,000 in the county, there are some buying opportunities that are hard to pass up if you have the money to invest and willing to ride out the present downturn in real estate.

As a further example of what’s happening in the real estate market, a real estate development company has formed a $6 million fund to buy bank-owned homes in Antioch, Pittsburg and Bay Point. The company intends to spend about $100,000 per home, including rehab and than renting them out for $1,200 to $1,500 per month. They hope to turn around and sell them within five years and doubling their money.

According to SF Gate

“Some investors quickly flip the distressed homes. For instance, St. John’s Capital Group, a real estate investment firm in San Jose, bought about 115 foreclosed California homes in recent months, fixed them up and immediately sold them to first-time buyers for returns of about 10 percent.

St. John’s gets deep discounts by buying delinquent mortgages from lenders and finishing the foreclosure process, or by bidding at courthouse-step foreclosure auctions.

“We think the market is still going down, so we are against holding for an extended time,” said CEO Edwin Yeh. He is raising a $50 million fund to invest in foreclosures.”

So there you have it, some investors want to flip and others want to rent and hold until the market changes. Want to join the investors, let me know, I can help you.

Home sales continue upward in Nevada County, increasing by 7% for the period April, May and June of this year compared to the same period last year. Nationwide, they have continued upward for the fifth consecutive month, the first time in six years for such a streak, according the National Association of Realtors®

The Pending Home Sales Index, a forward-looking indicator based on contracts signed in June, rose 3.6 percent to 94.6 from an upwardly revised reading of 91.3 in May, and is 6.7 percent above June 2008 when it was 88.7. The last time there were five consecutive monthly gains was in July 2003.

Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said a combination of positive market factors is fueling the gains. “Historically low mortgage interest rates, affordable home prices, and large selection are encouraging buyers who’ve been on the sidelines. Activity has been consistently much stronger for lower priced homes,” he said.

“Because it may take as long as two months to close on a home after signing a contract, first-time buyers must act fairly soon to take advantage of the $8,000 tax credit because they must close on the sale by November 30,” Yun said.

Here are the regional figures from the Pending Home Sales Index:
• The Northeast rose 0.4 percent to 81.2 in June and is 5.8 percent above a year ago.
• The Midwest increased 0.8 percent to 89.9 and is 11.6 percent above June 2008.
• The index in the South jumped 7.1 percent to 100.7 in June and is 8.9 percent higher than a year ago.
• In the West, the index rose 2.9 percent to 100.4 but is 0.2 percent below June 2008.

Nevada County homes sales increased in the three months of April to June, 2009 compared to the same period in 2008 by 14%. Sales for the three month period in 2008 were 203 housing units compared to the three month period in 2009 of 231 housing units. However, the average sales price dropped 17% in the three month period of 2008 which was $417,250 compared to $345,931 for the same three month period in 2009.

In addition the number of foreclosure proceedings started against California homeowners fell slightly in the April-through-June period compared with the prior three months, but remained higher than last year. The dip from earlier this year occurred as lenders and their loan servicers took time to revise procedures and priorities in an environment of continuing home price depreciation, economic distress and mortgage defaults, a real estate information service reported.

Lenders sent out a total of 124,562 default notices during the second quarter (April through June). That was down 8.0% from the prior quarter’s record 135,431 default notices, and up 2.4% from 121,673 in second quarter 2008, according to MDA DataQuick. The San Diego firm tracks real estate trends nationally via public property records.

“There is a perception that the housing market is dragging along bottom, that it probably won’t get much worse, and that the lenders need to get serious about processing the backlog of delinquencies, either with work-outs or foreclosure. We’re hearing that some lenders and servicers are doing just that, hiring more people to do the necessary paperwork. That means the foreclosure numbers will probably shoot back up during the third quarter,” said John Walsh, DataQuick president.

The median origination month for last quarter’s defaulted loans was July 2006, the same as during the first quarter. A year ago the median origination month was April 2006, so the foreclosure process has moved three months forward during the past 12 months.

Selling a home fast in today’s market is somewhat of a challenge. Here are six ways to expedite a sale.

1. Cut the asking price to 10 percent to 15 percent below what comparable properties in the neighborhood are selling for. Pricing your home at current market price in a declining market is almost a guarantee that your home will not sell.

2. Spruce up the outside. First impressions, like a first date, make or break a sale. Update the landscaping. Power-wash the exterior and paint the door.

3. Spruce up the inside. Store all your nick-knacks. Get rid any clutter, make the inside a model home. Stage the home so people coming to view your home can make their own impression of the home, not your motifs. Examples, updated light fixtures and carpet, current paint colors, slipcovers for dated furniture.

4. Appeal to first-time buyers. Advertise on younger consumers’ favorite Web sites, such as Facebook and Twitter. Hire a photographer to shoot the house with a wide-angle lens so the rooms look bigger in online photos. We offer this service to all of our clients free of charge, including taking a video of your home to go onto YouTube and post your home on 32 websites.

5. Price the house in the lower end of the range. A $299,000 house is in the high end of the $250,000 to $300,000 range but a $301,000 home is in the low-end of the $300,000 to $400,000 range.

6. Do what you can to make the deal close quickly. Be ready to move, offer to pay part of the closing costs, and/or throw in a year’s worth of association fees.

What has been your experience in selling a home quickly? Let me know.

Thomas Hastert

Once he got his broker’s license he proceed to engage in hard money lending in direct conflict with the law, making construction loans without fully funding them, a felony.

In addition, Hastert pleaded no contest to 62 counts of embezzlement, offering and selling unregistered and unqualified securities by false and incomplete communications. According to the Attorney General of California amounting to $20 million lost by his clients. That’s a lot of money to handle and lose. A standard fee for the mortgage broker Hastert is to charge is about 3 percent of the loan amount which means Hastert would have pocketed about $600,000.

Hastert’s attorneys and the California Deputy Attorney General Keith Lyon had reached a plea bargain that would have given Hastert five years in state prison. Normally that type of sentence means two and one-half years and he’s out of prison.

However, at the sentencing Judge Sean Dowling rejected the plea agreement and came back with his own sentencing of eight years and four months. Hastert’s attorney refused the new sentencing and demanded a jury trial.

I met Thomas Hastert some time ago, while he was an attorney. I did some investigations (as a civil engineer) for Hastert regarding building code violations for some of the real estate cases that he had. My impression of him at that time was that he was a nice person and I had no idea that he would resort to what he did. What does a person like that think? We have the Bernard Madoff, the Sir Walter Stanford’s who look you in the eye with a smile and steal your pocket book at the same time.

What do you think?

California is imposing a 90-day moratorium on housing foreclosures under a new law that takes effect Monday, June 15, 2009.

The law is expected to make lenders try harder to keep borrowers in their homes. Loan companies must prove they tried to modify the delinquent loans before they can begin foreclosing.

But supporters acknowledge the California Foreclosure Prevention Act won’t stop thousands of foreclosures from eventually happening. There have been more than 365,000 foreclosures in California since early 2007, with many more already scheduled.

The law will largely press lenders to follow the Obama administration’s Making Home Affordable Program that began in March. That encourages lenders to cut interest rates or rewrite loans to 40-year terms to get payments below 38 percent of a borrower’s monthly income. Other options include reducing principal and tacking missed payments to the back of the loan. Under the law, California officials also can encourage short sales or deeds in lieu – options in which banks accept less than owed – for borrowers who want to leave or don’t qualify for modifications.

In summary, here’s what will happen starting Monday:

• Lenders will submit applications to the state outlining their loan modification programs. That gives them a 30-day exemption from a moratorium.

• If the state OKs a lender’s program, the firm is permanently exempt from the 90-day delay on foreclosures.

• If the state rejects the program as inadequate, a lender has 30 days to upgrade it and be reconsidered.

Leyes said consumers will be able to see a list of lenders that comply with the state’s requirements by mid-July.  

Source: The Sacramento Bee