Posted on October 25th, 2008 by Bret Jenkins
Like many, we are carefully reading the tea leaves out their on the broad horizons, especially all things relating to the banking industry and foreclosures.
We believe Bank of America’s announcement earlier this month about a settlement with our Attorney General here in Nevada has positive implications for our real estate market.
Offsetting Foreclosure Headwinds
Bank of America made a formal agreement earlier this month with our Attorney General, Catherine Cortez Masto to make things easier for homeowners under a foreclosure cloud.
As a result of this agreement, approximately 11,000 Nevada Homeowners will keep their homes and avoid a foreclosure based on a tentative agreement between state officials and the Bank of America.
Bank of America Foreclosure Relief
The program is designed to specifically help homeowners who have set up sub prime or pay option adjustable rate mortgages from Countrywide Financial Corp., which Bank of America acquired.
Bank of America has agreed to make loan modifications that would save Nevada homeowners up to $219 Million (approx) through reduced interest payments and for some borrowers, reduced principals. The agreement would also reduce late fees up to $2.2 Million and waive prepayment penalties up to $2.15 Million.
Also, a “soft landing” fund of $4.8 million has been established to help people who need it, if they cannot avoid the impact of foreclosure, in spite of the settlement. Bank of America has also set up a special hotline for consumer with Countrywide loans in place who may need help: 1.800.669.6607. It should be pointed out, the actual pool of impacted consumers has not been selected by Bank of America.
The program is tailored strictly for mortgages for owner occupied homes and it is for sub prime and pay-option ARM (”Adjustable Rate Mortgages) for which the first payment was between January 1, 2004 and December 31, 2007.
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Las Vegas Fits Ideal City Profile for Living and Investing
Posted on October 23nd, 2008 by Bret Jenkins
Recent media reports indicated Americans are opting to buy and/or move to cities that are not geographically spread out with large suburban populations around a city hub.
Many homeowners and investors are opting for cities that are fairly dense in terms of structure with other amenities, as mapped out below. Huge cities with lots of suburban sprawl mean commuters are being forced to pay tremendous amounts for gas to just get from home to the office!
Quick Snapshot on Las Vegas & What we Have to Offer
You can get from one end of Las Vegas to the other in about 20-30 minutes, depending on traffic. Yes, we have traffic on our freeways like any major city - but, we typically don’t have gridlock like larger more spread out cities.
We are growing to the tune of 3-5K people per month but much of this growth is going into our existing city/suburban confines. As most of the land around is Las Vegas is owned by the Bureau of Land Management (Federal Government); so, we can’t keep growing further out into the dessert like other cities.
Our high dessert weather has 250 days of sunshine per year and we don’t get a tremendous amount of fluctuation - yes, it’s hot here in the summertime but a small price to pay for living in paradise.
Our foreclosure-driven market has created levels of affordability that put our homes in reach of most of our population - we think this is a good thing for future growth.
We’ve said it before, but worth repeating, we have something for everyone in terms of amenities here in Las Vegas - we draw the recently retired who want a quiet place to live with great weather but we also attract young marrieds or singles who want a great Sushi bar within ten minutes of home.
Did we talk about Jobs? Yes, times are tough all over but we’ve lived through them before and our economy here has been one of the most dynamic in terms of creating jobs of any city in North America.
We’ve always bounced back and our local market was one of the first to experience the foreclosure downdraft and we can already see signs that we are bottoming and will come out of it first!! Call us today, we have some great deals on Las Vegas Homes.
Recent media reports indicated Americans are opting to buy and/or move to cities that are not geographically spread out with large suburban populations around a city hub.
Many homeowners and investors are opting for cities that are fairly dense in terms of structure with other amenities, as mapped out below. Huge cities with lots of suburban sprawl mean commuters are being forced to pay tremendous amounts for gas to just get from home to the office!
Quick Snapshot on Las Vegas & What we Have to Offer
You can get from one end of Las Vegas to the other in about 20-30 minutes, depending on traffic. Yes, we have traffic on our freeways like any major city - but, we typically don’t have gridlock like larger more spread out cities.
We are growing to the tune of 3-5K people per month but much of this growth is going into our existing city/suburban confines. As most of the land around is Las Vegas is owned by the Bureau of Land Management (Federal Government); so, we can’t keep growing further out into the dessert like other cities.
Our high dessert weather has 250 days of sunshine per year and we don’t get a tremendous amount of fluctuation - yes, it’s hot here in the summertime but a small price to pay for living in paradise.
Our foreclosure-driven market has created levels of affordability that put our homes in reach of most of our population - we think this is a good thing for future growth.
We’ve said it before, but worth repeating, we have something for everyone in terms of amenities here in Las Vegas - we draw the recently retired who want a quiet place to live with great weather but we also attract young marrieds or singles who want a great Sushi bar within ten minutes of home.
Did we talk about Jobs? Yes, times are tough all over but we’ve lived through them before and our economy here has been one of the most dynamic in terms of creating jobs of any city in North America.
We’ve always bounced back and our local market was one of the first to experience the foreclosure downdraft and we can already see signs that we are bottoming and will come out of it first!! Call us today, we have some great deals on Las Vegas Homes.
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