Archive for September, 2007

Watch Out Below – Here Comes Barney Frank and the Feds To Fix The Mortgage Business

If you’re new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!Guys and Gals, we have had a rocky road the past year or so, but that will be nothing if and when Barney Frank and his crew from Congress come rolling onto the playground. We are going to see [...]

26Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 0 comments | Continued

After Fed Rate Cuts, Mortgage Rates Continue To Rise

The world markets celebrated last week when the Federal Reserve lowered the Federal Funds rate a half percent. All but those guys at the 10 year bond market. They got nervous thinking the rate cut was too much and could strengthen their arch nemesis INFLATION.
So to combat evil INFLATION, the interest rates for a [...]

26Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 1 comment | Continued

Real Estate’s Big One Crash – Lennar Down 35 Percent and Now Finally Cutting Staffing

The major homebuilders all look like they felt that they could accelerate through the housing crash and gain market share from their competitors. If all the others had pulled back and 1 went through the wreck (to use a NASCAR analogy) that company might have done well.
Instead we are looking at all of the [...]

26Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 2 comments | Continued

Top 10 Best Places to Retire in 2007

US News and World Report has come out with their annual survey on the Top 10 Places to Retire and the town I live in, Peachtree City, has made the list. After making last years Money magazine survey of best towns in the United States ol’ Peachtree City is doing pretty well. Now all we need [...]

25Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 4 comments | Continued

MIT Facing Housing Cost As Real Estate Market Changes

With the Massachusetts Institute of Technology occupying prime real estate on the Charles River you would think that the housing department would have an easy time with on campus housing, but this article from The Tech shows that housing concerns plague all of us.
The increased utility and maintenance expenses are putting pressure on the housing [...]

25Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 1 comment | Continued

W(h)ine Will Go Well With This Manhattan Neighborhood

Peter Miller, occasional writer at the Huffington Post, writes a diatribe against changes in the businesses in his neighborhood.

My New York City neighborhood is under attack, and not by Al Qaeda. The invaders are corporate chain stores, spreading like a disease through our once healthy community. Dozens of small independent businesses along Broadway, the [...]

25Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 2 comments | Continued

American Home Mortgage Starts Bouncing Escrow Checks For Property Taxes

This is a real Scooby Doo moment.
American Home Mortgage, the bankrupt Long Island lender, is said to have bounced property tax checks in 3 states. Maryland, New York, and Washington are reporting that property tax checks from American Home Mortgage escrow accounts are bouncing which is a huge problem.
When people prepay their property [...]

24Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 0 comments | Continued

Real Estate Success Stories From Cape Cod, Massachusetts

When the news is good we all feel like superheroes ready to conquer the world. However, when the markets turn and things get difficult it is often easy to hang around the water cooler having a proverbial bitch session every day about how things are unfair and impossible.
But all around us there are success [...]

24Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 1 comment | Continued

Historic Oakland Home’s Open House Occurs In Evening

Are you trying to sell homes in a tough market? Then it is time to think outside of the box. Here is a great example of an open house not being shown in the typical Sunday 2–4 window, but instead on a Friday night when the potential buyers would be out and about.

At 9 [...]

24Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 0 comments | Continued

UNC Chapel Hill Gets 4 Million Dollar Grant For Real Estate Education

The real estate market has now shown the power to impact the economy and has a huge place in all of our lives, but 10 years ago the only places that did any teaching on real estate were typically in shopping center store fronts trying to teach would be agents how to pass a test [...]

24Sep2007 | Tom Royce | 0 comments | Continued