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All Posts Tagged With: "home"

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HUD Scorecard: Home Prices Stabilizing

HUD has introduced a new public information report, a Monthly Housing Scorecard. This is an idea which makes a lot of sense, not only because of what it says but also because HUD includes data from both governmental agencies and the private sector in one place.
The News
To start, and given the events of the past [...]

22Jun2010 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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2009 Home Sales Up, But Values Down

Real estate sales reached nearly 5.2 million in 2009, up 4.9 percent from 2008 according to the National Association of Realtors. The increase was the first annual rise since 2005.
In terms of prices, NAR says for all of 2009, the median price for a single-family existing home was $173,200, down 11.9 percent from 2008. This [...]

26Jan2010 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Real Estate: How To Re-Power US Home Sales

Long ago I was a part owner of a company that produced dual-fuel vehicles — they could run on either gasoline or propane with the flip of a switch. We did a lot of fleet conversions and we even supplied fuel for a number of apartment buildings.
I also used to write about energy and have [...]

28Aug2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Real Estate: What Really Happened To Home Prices

We’re not going to restore the housing market without solid factual evidence to suggest that home prices have started to turn around. A good source for such evidence is the Federal Housing Finance Agency (FHFA), the government body that now oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.
In figures release yesterday, FHFA tells us that in the [...]

26Aug2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Mortgages: Can You Stop Line of Credit Freezes?

The Federal Reserve has published a new guide to home equity line of credit financing — and what you can do if your lender reduces or freezes your HELOC.
To be polite, not a damn thing.
The Board’s 5 Tips for Dealing with a Home Equity Line Freeze or Reduction first tells us the following:
Late Notice
Your [...]

10Aug2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Real Estate: Pending Home Sales Up For Fifth Month

Pending home sales are up for the fifth consecutive month, the first time in six years for such a streak, according to the National Association of Realtors. Pending real estate sales suggest where actual home sales — sales that are not just under contract but which sell and settle — are headed in the short [...]

4Aug2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Home Prices Up — Can This Be Real?

Bet you haven’t heard this in awhile — U.S. home prices rose. They rose for the month of April by .9 percent nationwide according to the Federal Housing Finance Agency’s monthly House Price Index (HPI).
Let’s not go crazy here, the index is 10.7 percent below its April 2007 peak. That said, in an  environment with lousy news followed [...]

23Jul2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Appraisal Worries Really About The Future

Tim writes and points to a number of problems he sees with the Home Valuation Code of Conduct (HVCC). Fair enough. Let’s look at what he offers:
>>>Instead of a majority of valuation assignments going to appraisal managment companies we now have virtually ALL assignments being controlled by these joint venture arrangments. Notice how the market [...]

22Jul2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Home Price Declines Slow, Says Major New Report

Are things getting better with real estate? There’s the mildest hint of good real estate news: Home prices are dropping but not as much as before.
A report just out from First American Core Logic points to an interesting finding: “National housing prices fell 9.2 percent in May compared to a year ago representing the smallest [...]

21Jul2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued
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Appraisers Seek Sensible Reform

There’s been considerable debate regarding the Home Valuation Code of Conduct (HVCC), the agreement to curb appraisal abuses worked out between New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and their then regulator, the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight (OFHEO).
A number of leading real estate and lending trade associations are seeking an [...]

14Jul2009 | Peter G. Miller | 0 comments | Continued