New Trend: 20-Year Mortgages

While 30-year fixed rate mortgages are still the most popular term for home loans a new trend of 20-year mortgages is gaining momentum and has become a realistic option for borrowers and especially those refinancing. Basically a 20-year loan term is an option to lower ones interest rate and shorten the term of the loan. This of course results in higher month payments than a 30-year, but with interest historically low the 20 year mortgage has actually become an affordable option. MSN Real Estate has taken a full look at this new trend in home loans so click here and check out the full article to make sure you are choosing the right loan term for you.  

Help for Our Idaho Clients Seeking Loan Modification or Worried about Foreclosure

Beginning September 1, thanks to a new law, Idaho homeowners will enjoy further protection when seeking loan modification. With a loan modification you take the mortgage you now have and change the interest rate and payment requirements.According to the Better Business Bureau,

"The new law also allows homeowners to request a meeting with their lenders to discuss foreclosure prevention options."

“Homeowners in foreclosure or in danger of foreclosure should familiarize themselves with the rights this new law affords them,” Attorney General Wasden said. “To help homeowners and lenders understand the law, my office created a webpage dedicated to mortgage loan servicing and foreclosure issues. It is available at www.ag.idaho.gov.”

According to the news release, the law requires lenders to notify homeowners whether they qualify for a loan modification within 45 days of a modification request. Lenders may not proceed with a trustee’s sale during the 45-day period. Homeowners also will receive written notice of the date and time of a future trustee’s sale if a scheduled sale date is postponed.


This is good news. Imagine your frustration if, while trying to avoid foreclosure and all its implications, you request a loan modification and never hear back from your lender. Foreclosure proceedings appear to go on without your knowledge or understanding. What a feeling of helplessness!

Please take a moment to read the entire press release, courtesy of the Spokane Better Business Burea, which includes names of real estate reports that are offered for homeowners in distress, phone numbers for help obtaining a mortgage modification [(888) 995-HOPE.]and more.

For more information about avoiding foreclosure, exploring alternatives or short sales, please visit Spokane's Best Short Sale site or request a copy of Nine Alternatives to Foreclosure.

March showing job growth

The Employment Security Department is reporting a slight rise in the jobless rate for March. Presumably some of these jobs are temporary census jobs. (Employing census workers contributed to a huge jump in employment numbers nationwide.) Nevertheless, it's still good news.

From the press release:

March job gains marked the second time in three months the state has posted positive job numbers. That’s on the heels of 13 consecutive months of job losses stretching from the end of 2008 to the end of 2009.

In addition, mortgage delinquencies fell in March for the second month. (Hat tip: Wall Street Journal (requires subscription).)

For some commentary on this data, try Barbara Kiviat's post at TIME.

This could be a minor but important indicator of the housing market. Buyers and homeowners are starting to remodel again. Even where there is less demand, that decrease is, er, decreasing.

The article in RIS Media cites data from the most recent American Institute of Architects’ Home Design Trends Survey.

You might enjoy reading the lists the five most popular bathroom and kitchen remodels, too.

In fact, here are the five most popular kitchen products and features:

-Recycling center, a designated place to put cans, papers, etc., which could be in the form of a nook or even part of the lower cabinetry
-Larger pantry space
-Renewable flooring materials
-Renewable countertop materials
-Computer area/recharging stations, dedicated to such tasks as recharging laptops, cell phones and PDAs.

Three Things You Can Do With the Extended Home Buyer Tax Credit

1. Talk to your parents about selling their house. If (you or) your folks, like many of ours, have owned their home for years and years, they are in a unique situation to sell, actually make a profit and still find another house at a great price.

2. Stop sweating over that short sale. Are you one of the thousands of buyers taking advantage of the tax credit and trying to get your short sale closed? You aren't alone! Now you don't have to worry about getting it closed before December 1.

3. Buy. These tax credits are sweet, but they won't last forever. It's hard to imagine a better time to buy. When you're at the bottom, there's nowhere to go but up.

No Federal Income Tax Due on Principal Mortgage Debt Forgiveness

Here is an innovative way the government is encouraging home owners to "short sale" their home (rather than be foreclosed upon) and helping keep them out of bankruptcy court.

The IRS has created an exemption from its general rule to treat debt forgiveness as ordinary income. In the past, a lender that reduced the payoff amount on a home would 1099 the Seller for the amount of debt forgiveness. Under the new law, there is no federal income tax due on debt forgiven on a loan that is secured by the Seller's principal residence, provided that the loan was made to acquire, construct, or substantially improve the principal residence.

A refinance of that type of loan also qualifies for the exemption.

Sorry, the rule doesn't apply if you pulled money out of your house to pay for something like a vacation and got debt relief on that loan.

The exemption applies to any portion of loan debt forgiven beginning January 1, 2007 through December 31, 2009. Put another way, it doesn't matter when the loan was made; what matters is when a portion of the debt is forgiven.

Just Listed in Northwest Spokane

This attractive Northwest Spokane Rancher is move-in-ready.

Beautiful wood floors throughout most of main level. Fireplace in living room. Family room and large unfinished laundry area in the basement. Built-in storage space all around the home!

Priced at just $133,900 for three bedrooms, 1 bathroom and a wonderful basement, this is a areat find at this price!

Click here to learn more.

Searching Spokane Washington Real Estate Just Got A Lot Simpler

If only "picking" out a home were this easy.

Well, it just got easier.

With our new, state-of-the art "Key Word Search," you enter search parameters using key words, helping you hunt down amenities and property types you're looking for and weed out what you're not! Combined with # of bedrooms, bathrooms, location (or whatever), this brand new feature provides you with an incredibly efficient property search tool!

Some common keywords:

Investment
Short Sale
RV Parking
Single Level
Energy Star
Lease Option

Try it today! Use the advanced search to combine key words with search parameters like price and location (click here) or a quick search to search homes and properties by key word only.

Reaching Generation Y: "Why" You Should Try Spokane's Best

From the Spokane Home Builder's Association:

Generation Y relies on e-mail, the Internet, PDAs, BlackBerrys and other electronic devices and, for many, these technologies are their preferred method of communication. In addition, studies show that eight out of 10 Generation Y home buyers use the Internet to research their home choices.

Once they have narrowed their choices, they expect their requests for more information to be answered quickly and for those answers to be personalized ― they don’t want to wait a week or two for a generic response.

I wonder if Generation Y'ers mind being labeled? We're cautioned about defining home buyers (empty nesters, seniors, minorities, etc), but when it comes to young people, the rules seem to change.

There is a lot of truth here, though. We find that a lot of our younger buyers use our automated home search tools and rely more heavily on email. Undoubtedly many of our clients are also using social networking sites like Facebook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Blogger.

To that end, we now provide our sellers with the tools and expertise to integrate their home’s listing to any number of websites, increasing exposure to potential (and potentially younger) buyers. Here are some examples:

 Through our relationship with Realbird.com, you can use social book-marking or networking services to save and share your personalized listing website. Forwarding to friends, family or prospects is easy and encourages viral marketing.

 Your listing is featured on our blog using a handy program called a “widget” that is regularly updated and user-friendly.

 We have all the information and coding available to help sellers imbed a beautiful slideshow of their listing onto their blog, website, Facebook profile—or just about any site !

This Just In

Home Price Appreciation by market area. Spokane is included.

Housing Predictor: Spokane Market Still Appreciating

"...But Portland, Oregon, Boise, Idaho and Spokane, Washington in the Pacific north-west have been added to the top 25 markets for their rapid growth and healthy local economies. "

Spokane, Washington is Number 22 on the list of 25 Fastest Appreciating Markets.

According to HousingPredictor.com, "...despite news reports that the entire nation's housing markets are depreciating, many states have housing markets that are appreciating strongly."

If you read our blogs you know that we have been cautious about jumping on the "housing bubble burst bandwagon." Indeed, in most markets, we view the "burst" as a return to normal, a market correction.

We urge you to contact us sooner, rather than later, if you're on the fence about investing in Spokane. Our first-timers and our most savvy investors are turning a profit. Why not you?

More Good News for Spokane

Northwest retailer G. I. Joes is opening another Spokane store, according to the Spokane Journal of Business. The store will employ between 45 and 55 workers.

Another G.I. Joes is already being built just west of the Spokane Valley mall.

Click here for the full article.

How Angry is Spokane?

MensHealth.com has ranked the 100 angriest US Cities.

Their criteria?

The percentage of men with high blood pressure, from the CDC's Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System; FBI rates of aggravated assaults; Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers on workplace deaths from assaults and other violence; traffic-congestion data from the Texas Transportation Institute; and speeding citations per state from the Governor's Highway Safety Association.

I nearly thought Spokane hadn't made the list, but there, tucked between #67 and #69 is Spokane.

It's hard to imagine we're an angrier city than San Francisco, CA.

(In other news, click here for a ranking of most charitable U.S. cities.)

H/T Dustbury.