Lawrence Yun - NAR Chief Economist foresees Denver’s Housing Turnaround

Denver’s housing market is not as bad off as most of the rest of the country is what I believe and have been reporting. The same will hold true for 2008. We’ll see the Denver markets improve faster than most. Prices will remain stable, no up’s or downs.

On Wednesday, Lawrence Yun, chief economist and senior vice president of the National Association of Realtors presented his 2008 real estate forecast to the Jeffco Board of Realtors in Lakewood Colorado. “All markets are local and the bleak national market conditions do not represent what is happening in the Denver area. The one thing that may be holding back your market is buyer pessimism. You have very strong affordability” Yun said. 

“Interest rates are basically at a 45 year low” and he reminded us that buyers have a bad attitude based on false beliefs fueled by the press and that the mistakes of Wall Street are in the past, not related to home buying now or in the future.

 Mr. Yun noted that if there is a recession, interest rates will go even lower making Denver housing even more attractive. Denver would weather a recession better than the country as a whole because of the educated work force here.Yun also noted however that the high number of foreclosures  will continue this year.

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Good golly, I just post about Cherry Creek arising from a former garbage dump and the gossip in the press is that BritneySpears is buying in Cherry Creek. Best hope for everyone’s sake, that is a rumor!

The 57 acre Denver garbage dump is now the Cherry Creek Mall. Think about that!

Denver Colorado’s first “suburban” shopping center was originally conceived around the year 1925 by architect Temple Buell to answer land use problems for the “sprawl” of suburban Denver. Formal plans for the CHERRY CREEK SHOPPING CENTER were announced in 1946. In 1950, ground was broken.The completed shopping center opened in 1953.

In 1988, a major mall expansion began and the all-new, enclosed, 1.2 million square foot mall was erected in their place. CHERRY CREEK MALL, opened in August 1990, and has become the most upscale shopping center in Metropolitan Denver and one of the most successful in the nation.

In 1968 W.C. Muchow, famed Denver architect designed and built one of Cherry Creeks first upscale residential “town homes.” If you know Cherry Creek, you know what’s happened since. Now the primest of residential real estate complimented by the “Mall,” dining and shopping in Cherry Creek North has caught of the eye of many as place to call “my second or third home.” Read the rest of this entry »

The press and news reports are screaming “the sky is falling, the sky is falling” about the real estate market.  The only thing falling are interest rates!

Mortgage interest rates, reported by our beloved Freddie Mac fell to the lowest level in  a month, matching rates from more than a year past! Sure this could give investors reason to worry about about a possible ressession, but let’s face it money investors worry about everything!

30 year fixed rate mortgages averaged 6.07% The Adjustable Rate Mortagage (ARM’s) were unchanged and remain at 5.9%.

Yes, most neighborhoods in the Denver area real estate markets have suffered with declineing prices and slowed activity. The facts remain that homes are selling and there are many homeowners who need to sell. The banks are loosening up and understand they MUST sell to reduce their number of REO’s (real estate owned) as they anticipate the next wave of foreclosures.

Buyers,  sitting on the bench waiting to get in the game should seriously think about getting in shape, ready to buy in this amazing real estate market place.  Getting in shape?  Yep, get ready to buy, prepare yourself for the marketplace in order to optimize you ability to purchase.

So what to do to get in shape: First talk to a great lender with a long track record. Stay away from the fast talkers and promises of way below market interest rates. Then, think about your “wish list.”  Your written wish list is a must. Write it down then prioritize it. Include everything you want to find in your new home, from number of bedrooms, bathrooms, lot size, architecture, square footage to neighborhood schools, room sizes and everything else you can think of. Now reorder the list from “must have” to “really want” to “it would be nice to have.” Prioritizing will really make you think about the property so that when you begin your property search you will have a heighten understanding of what is important to you. Read the rest of this entry »

Well I’ll be…another New Year’s Day. The Rose Parade, 6 bowl games on TV and when the day is over, what have we got but another new year.

A year, that in just 11 months and 30 days you’ll be saying “wow, where did the year go? Glad that one is over!”  Well, don’t let that happen! Make this the year what you want it to be. A great 2008!

Forget about the mortgage crisis. Forget about the foreclosure numbers. Stop reading the bad press about real estate.  Ignore the Iraq war. Don’t pay attention to who is leading today for the party’s nomination. Forget about about teaching George W to read.  Instead pay attention to the positive.

Last year was horrible year for a lot of real estate agents and mortgage lenders. Gayle and I had a great year. We even sold 2 homes in the last week of December. Why?

Why?  Because we have written goals! Because we have a plan!  If you read our earlier posts you’ll know that our plan and our goals are ready to go for 2008!

So, what’s my point here. I say no matter what you do, no matter who you are, write down your goals for 2008. What do you want for you in 2008! What about your family? What about your finances? What about….what about? Write it down. Think and rewrite. Outline a plan for goal achievement.  Then share your goals and your plan with a partner. Make sure they will hold you accountable. Try it, you’ll see. Need help with the how to for your goals or your plans. No problem. Google GOAL WRITING and get to work.

You will have a great 2008. Happy New Year!

Help make Denver a safer place. I’ve already checked the list and photos and do not recognize any former real estate agents or mortgage brokers.   VIEW THE MOST WANTED! Please read this information about the annual “sting” to get the bad guys off the street.

DENVER - Police have released the names of the 50 most wanted people in the metro area and they need your help to catch them.Denver Police are part of a 20-agency partnership that composed the list. The crimes range from murder to escape and child sexual assault.

The most wanted list is released annually and authorities arrested 68 percent of the people on last year’s list. They’re expecting arrests from this year’s list to come quickly. “I bet you we make arrests tonight if we make the five o’clock news,” said Gerald Whitman, Denver Police Chief. “That will be good. The sooner we get it out, the more people who get to see this. Tonight when they go out or at home getting ready to go party, they may come across these people.”

If you have any information on someone in the 50 most wanted, call Crime Stoppers, at 720-913-STOP (7867).

Your tip could be worth a reward of up to $2,000. Police advise citizens not to attempt to apprehend anyone on the list.

(Copyright KUSA*TV, All Rights Reserved

The National Association of Realtors membership roles are declining. Why? Real estate markets almost everywhere are in turmoil. An abundance of listings, the mortgage crisis and many buyers still fence-sitting waiting for whole bubble to burst.  The days of fast and easy transactions are gone. Loan criteria is tight and tightening. Appraisals are coming in low. Property inspectioners uncover often costly needed repairs and owners, especially bank owners, are unwilling to make the fixes.

So, no more “fast money” for agents who got into the business for just that! That’s a blessing. Let them go and stay gone. Better agents with more education, better customer service,and advanced marketing techniques who understand their fiduciary responsiblities to their buyers and sellers will tough it out, as in past down markets. 

Many times this year while attending a closing, the Colorado ceremony to celebrate the passing of the deed and signing the lender and title company documents, I felt the lack of communication, trustworthyness and misdoubt between the other client and their agent who “represented” them. Those agents often taking phone calls during the closing or their rudeness by leaving room to go work on another “deal”  make me think and wonder if this is the way they treated their clients from the start.

Jeff Rickard at 1760 Mortgage Guide asked me to be a guest speaker on his mortgage blog and talk about how to find a good agent to represent a home buyer’s best interests. I offered Jeff’s readers 12 points to consider when choosing a real estate agent. To find out more read Not Just Any Realtor.

I am not an economist or futurist, however my observations regarding the Colorado ecomony have been confirmed by the University of Colorado Leed’s School of Business economist Richard Wobbekind.

 I have experienced my share of the up’s and down’s of the Colorado economy and housing markets over my past 33 years in business here in Denver. I know that when the real estate markets on the coasts are taking a beating, Colorado’s markets pick up.  Sure the foreclosures and tighter than tight credit standards will continue to mess with our housing markets, but we will shake it off better than almost anywhere next year as our economy begins to booms again because of oil, gas, mining and technology. Read about the natural gas boom and how it will impact Colorado in today’s Rocky. Remember the oil boom of the 80’s and the positive impact it had on the entire state?

 Colorado will feel a small “boom” at that but enough of a boom in 2008 to put us out front of the national economy! Watch for the growth to start next year as related business and professional service provide jobs to support our growing economy.

The Denver Post reported that more than 100 economists, academicians and business leaders contributed to the 2008 Outlook. At the 2008 Colorado Business Outlook held Monday in downtown Denver, Mr. Wobbeking told the audience “Continued moderate gowth is on tap for the state.  Colorado will definitely not enter a ressession.” 

The jobs outlook continues to be strong as the State of Colorado continues to beat the national job growth index.  Unemployment will rise some as the Colorado population grows.

Look for more than a 100,000 new residents in 2008 pushing the state population over 5 million! A new record.

The economists suggest that inflation in the Denver metro area will  continue to move downward from 2.9% to 2.7%.

Banks are skiddish about investment lending. I think this turn upward for the state’s economy will provide the confidence needed to allow for substantial investment in the real estate markets, both residential and commercial. So what should you do. Buy real estate of course!

Today, from the Associated Press: Hundreds of thousands of strapped homeowners could get some relief from a plan negotiated by the Bush administration to freeze interest rates on sub-prime mortgages that are scheduled to rise in the coming months.(article)  Please, read that again…COULD get some relief. Remember the “Katrina victims could get relief in days” headlines.  

Strapped homeowners MUST GET relief or 1000’s more will fall into the foreclose pit in the months to come. I say bail-out the people not the banks. It’s time for a bail-out for the borrowers who fell into the traps set by lenders as a direct result of the greed of Wall Street investors. Sure, there are some exceptions for the bail-out…those who beat the lenders at their own game through fraud and deception!

It doesn’t matter whether it is Denver or Las Vegas, Phoenix or Des Moines no community needs more foreclosed homes and condominiums.

I know what foreclosed, empty, forgotten, unkempt homes mean to a neighborhood; loss of pride of ownership and declining values.  Foreclosed properties wasting away on the real estate market for months at ridiculous prices that make no sense.  Why? Bankers are doing their corporate due diligence by attempting to recapture their lost assets, $ money $, for their shareholders. Not just the money loaned, but the unpaid interest with penalties on top of penalties, servicing fees, attorney’s fees, REO management fees and several charges I never heard of before. After months of due diligence for their shareholders and neglect for the properties, realistic pricing may become a reality. The process of buying a foreclosed home is often difficult and leaves the home buyer responsible for everything!

Banks and their 3rd party property managers are not good neighbors!  They don’t mow the lawns, mend falling fences, shovel the snow or drain the swimming pools. They don’t care about falling prices of homes nearby, or the impact of unpaid HOA fees. 

Bail-out the strapped borrowers. Hold the banks responsible to maintain and care for the properties they’ve already acquired through the foreclosure process. America needs no more foreclosed homes and the banks don’t either.

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