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The First Time Home Buyer’s Tax Credit has had a great impact on the housing market this year. In the industry we have watched the market get better every quarter this year, due in large part to the numbers of first time home buyers that came into the market to get their %8,000 tax credit. The question in the minds of the professionals across the country was whether or not the market would sustain itself without that credit. Because of the rising unemployemnt rates and the weak consumer confidence, there was a real concern that the stimulus was going to go away before the need for it had dissolved!

Two weeks ago I traveled to Washington DC, along with 48 other Realtors from across the country, to meet with members of Congress and discuss an extension of the First Time Home Buyer’s Tax Credit so that we could continue the positive impact it has had, and hopefully spur the economy as people bought paint, carpets, fixtures, furniture, and the thousands of other little things that are bought everytime a home sells. . The feedback from the congress was positive about the desire to extend, but there was hesitation from some of the memberswho wanted to make sure they knew where the money would come from to pay for the tax credit. With time running out for the existing tax credit ending November 30, 2009, I didn’t believe there was anyway this could get done before the deadline.

Boy was I wrong! Yesterday the Senate voted 98-0 to pass an extension until April 30, 2010. Today the House voted 412-12 to pass it. (I’ll let you know in a future blog who the 12 representatives were that voted against it) All we need is President Obama’s signature and we are good to go. That is expected to happen very quickly. In addition, they have modified the current criteria to increase the income limits and also include current homeowners. .

In real simple terms, here’s what we have:

1. First time buyers get the same $8,000 credit under the same terms
2. Current homeonwers may receive a $6,500 tax credit if they have lived in the same residence for at least 5 consecutive years in the last 8 years.
3. There are higher income limits to the program allowing more people to participate

There’s still more, but here’s a great chart that easily explains everything – but the bottom line is that buyer’s have until April 30, 2010 to find a home and enter into a contract that will settle prior to July1, 2010 – and hopefully by then the market will have corrected itself.  In any case, smart home buyers are going to be out to take advantage of this limited window of opportunity.  Or at least I think so – we’ll see how the market reacts over the next few months.

So the whole thing to learn here for me is that our government can be very quick to respond and move important legislation through. It makes me feel that our voice counts and reminds me that when there is an important issue we need to call, email or visit our elected officials, and get everyone you can, to do the same.  It sure worked this time!

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• Realtors group says pending home sales climb (latimesblogs.latimes.com)
• Homebuyer Tax Credit: Congress Gives New Buyers A $6,500 Break (huffingtonpost.com)
• #Realestate Housing bottom behind us, experts say (visionaryrealtynews.com)
• It’s (Almost) Official: Home Buyer Tax Credit Extended, Expanded (blogs.wsj.com)

Tired of “wire clutter” where your mobile phones, MP3 players and gaming devices compete for outlet space?

The Powermat may be your solution.

The Powermat is a 12-inch long wireless battery charger that’s conspicuously missing  “plugs”.  Instead, it uses magnetic induction to safely recharge up to 3 devices at once.

Just place your phone(s) on the pad and they charge automatically.

The Powermat debuted at the 2009 Consumer Electronic Show and was reviewed in video.  The reviewers had many positive comments on the Powermat, but highlighted some negatives aspects, too. Give a look and see what you think.

Powermat retails for $99 on Amazon.com and is usually shipped for free.

The national housing supply fell to a 2-year low last month, according to the National Association of Realtors®.

At the current sales pace, existing home inventories would sell out in 7.8 months — 30 percent faster versus November 2008.

For a 10-month window, that’s a major housing supply reduction and it helps to explain why multiple-offer situations have been so common lately.

Moreover, the same report from NAR showed sales activity reaching its highest point since July 2007, too.

If you’re looking for evidence that the long-standing Buyers Market is ending, this month’s Existing Home Sales report might be it.

Even median sales prices — typically dragged lower by distressed and foreclosed properties — declined at its slowest pace in a year.  The market may have turned a corner.

Home prices are rooted in the basic economics of supply and demand.

• When supply outweighs demand, home prices fall
• When supply lags demand, home price rise

Since March 2009, the market has been moving in the right direction.  Low mortgage rates, ample housing supply and a first-time home buyer tax credit fueled buy-side demand so that home prices are now rising in many U.S. markets.

If home supplies stay on this path into 2010, expect home prices to rise even more.

Image by reeltor99 via Flickr

Its hard to decide what to write about this morning. Last night the Phillies faced the Yankees in the World Series for the first time since 1950 (when the Whiz Kids took on the New York Team) and they won – even though the game was in New York. That’s really exciting for a city where sports are such an important part of our history and our culture, not to mention that it was an auspicious start for a historic series, the first World Series repeat in the team’s history.

If that weren’t enough, there was news yesterday that the Senate had reached agreement on extending the $8,000 first time homebuyer’s credit until June of 2010 – with a potential $6500 tax credit for people that had bought and owned homes for 5 years or more. In our city, where prices are moderate, first time home buyers are a major part of the real estate market, and those amounts are significant to home buyers that news is incredibly good.

We have already seen the real estate market improve every quarter of this year to date, stimulated by the tax credit, great mortgage rates, and moderate prices. Though the lack of mortgage liquidity negatively impacted the attempts of some buyers to gain entry to home ownership, on the whole , the true worry was whether the gains in the market would be sustainable – with the extension of the tax credit through the spring, that question would be answered.

Now the next question for buyers is whether they will be smart enough to act early and avoid the inevitable upward pressure on price that such activity should create, and whether the mortgage market will increase credit liquidity amid the signs of economic recovery.

Of course for this week in Philadelphia,more people may be worrying about whether the Phillies can sustain their early lead this evening in New York, and then Saturday and Sunday night when they return to Philadelphia 😉

Housing Starts on single-family homes gained last month, marking the 8th time that’s happened this year.

A “Housing Start” is a home for which the foundation has been excavated and, considered alongside other key market metrics, September data suggests that the housing market stabilization is complete.

Momentum in housing is overwhelmingly positive:

• Homes under contract are soaring
• National home supplies are way down
• Home values are up in a lot of markets

Despite the positive news, the press is calling September’s Housing Starts data a “bummer“. Citing a drop in monthly building permits, the media purports that housing will slow in the months ahead.

The conclusion may be right, but the rationale may be wrong.

The probable cause for fewer permits isn’t that the housing market is overdone. It’s that home builders are choosing to exercise caution given the pending expiration of the First-Time Home Buyer Tax Credit and a still-growing number of foreclosed homes.

It’s unclear what housing demand will be beginning in December and the last present a builder wants for the holidays is an excess of inventory.

It makes sense that building permits are down, in other words. In our marketplace, where new homes are not the most significant part of the housing inventory, unlike primarily new home communities like areas of Nevada, a Florida, the increase or decrease of housing starts may be less significant in any case.

Looking back at February of this year, there’s a host of signs that housing is on the path to recovery. Now, that path won’t be a straight line and there’s bound to be setbacks, but September’s Housing Starts is not one of them.

Housing Starts are up 40 percent on the year. Which does indicate that at the very least we have passed the bottom of this contraction.

IMG_0745, originally uploaded by reeltor99.

Well maybe not everybody, and maybe not quite recovered yet, However a consensus of several major real estate groups says that 2010 is the time for the expansion of the real estate market. According to several studies, the market of 2009 will mark the end of the real estate “contraction” and next year will mark an expected increase of almost 10% with a projected total of 5.403 million units closed in 2010 compared to an estimated 4.929 million units registered in 2009.
The compilation of housing forecasts released was released earlier this week on Real Estate Economy Watch.com. The Web site , operated by former NAR economist David Lereah presented the September housing forecasts of the National Association of Realtors, the National Association of Homebuilders, the Mortgage Bankers Association, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and then calculated the consensus (mean) prediction for each major housing measure for the group as a whole.

Of course the impact of foreclosures on the market, and the renewed activity of investors and home buyers looking to take advantage of the well priced inventory, combined with the $8,000 tax credit have positively impacted the market this year. Local tracking indicates that each quarter this year so far has seen increases in sales activity. However the tax credit is currently due to end in November, and if it is not extended, the impact on the marketplace will have to be seen to be judged.
The article goes on to say “At present, the housing sector is experiencing a recovery in home sales and housing starts. Both measures are meaningfully above their January cyclical lows. Home price movements are also improving. Home price declines on a year over year basis have decelerated in monthly reporting, while home prices have increased in recent months on a monthly basis.” In our local market area, where prices were not reduced as drastically as some parts of the country, this impact is good news for homeowners and a caution for home buyers that want to take advantage of the current combination of low rates and attractive prices.
In the meantime, as things seem to get brighter, we can’t forget that miracles do sometimes happen. After all the Phillies are in the World Series for the 2nd year in a row!

Over time, towel racks tend to come loose from sheetrock walls.  And, sometimes, they separate completely.  The good news is that making repairs is easy — it’s something you can do yourself with a little instruction.

In this 2-minute video from ExpertVillage.com, a professional contractor shows that with just a drill and some butterfly anchors, re-securing a towel rack can be a basic handyman job.

So, before you call a professional to rehang your towel rack, watch the video and consider making the repair yourself.

An escrow account is a designated savings account into which funds get deposited for a specific purpose.

With respect to real estate and home loans, escrow accounts are used to pay real estate tax bills and homeowners insurance payments.

Escrow accounts are managed and disbursed by lenders.

When a homeowner “escrows” his mortgage, along with his scheduled monthly mortgage payment, he must also send an additional payment to the lender equal to 1/12 of the home’s annual real estate tax bill plus 1/12 of the annual homeowners insurance bill.

By sending a pro rata portion of the tax and insurance bill each month, the homeowner’s escrow account will always, in theory, have enough funds to make payments in full as tax bills and insurance premiums come due.

I don’t mean to be sexist in the title of this post, especially since there are so many women involved in the organizations, both charitable and social media centered that are the focus of this post, but the term is a natural when you talk about Philadelphia and charity at the same time.

I attended the last month,  the Philadelphia chapter of the Social Media Club, organized by Gloria Bell and Annie Heckenberger to discuss the charitable efforts of BlameDrewsCancer , Twestival Philadelphia, and the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network as well as the use of social media in general for charitable purposes.

I always enjoy the SMCPhilly meetings, the people are interesting, the topics are fun, and its generally a good time as well as a learning experience. This time was even a little more special for me though.

First the panel talked about what they do. Twestival is a social media charity from the ground up, created because of  the popularity of twitter.  Their web site says

A Twestival or Twitter-Festival is a global series of events organized by volunteers around the world under short timescales, which bring people offline for a great cause.

The concept was a great success. Again, their website really says it best;

The first Twestival Global was launched with a tweet on 8 January 2009 and barely a month later on 12 February, there were 202 cities around the world hosting events to benefit charity: water.  Over 1,000 volunteers, crowdsourced through Twitter, contributed their skills, over 10,000 people participated globally and countless others donated or used their creativity to ensure 100% of all proceeds went direct to charity: water projects.  The total raised in one day was over $250k through these events and online donations; resulting in 55 wells with more than 17,000 people served in Uganda, Ethiopia, and India.

During the meeting the conversation focused on Twestival Local, an event taking place here on September 12, 2009 to benefit Gift of Life Family House, a non-profit organization providing temporary lodging and supportive services to transplant patients and families in our area. As of this writing, the local twestivals have raised over $233,000 and still have 40 cities left to report.

BlamedrewsCancer , while a serious cause, is a response to the challenges faced by Drew Olanoff after he was diagnosed with cancer on May 20th 2009. Its explained on the organization’s website

On May 20th, 2009, Drew Olanoff was diagnosed with cancer.

Ever since that day, Drew has blamed everything on his cancer. Losing his keys, misplacing his wallet, Twitter being slow, the Phillies losing, etc.

Why? Because you have to beat up on Cancer to win… and you can help out.

Blame Drew’s Cancer for anything you want by tweeting with the hashtag #BlameDrewsCancer and it’ll come here. When Drew beats Cancer we hope to have sponsors that will donate a dollar for every participant to our partner, LIVESTRONG.

The campaign here is again based on social media engagement with off-line participation in events like a blame-a-thon that was held on September 9

The whole concept is both courageous and whimsical at the same time. Having lost my mother, father, sister and other family members to cancer, this one has a real warm spot in my heart.

The Pancreatic Cancer Action Network is a more traditional charity, using social media to reach out and engage their community through social media, and as a result, they have different challenges. Its interesting to me to see the difference between their approach to community building, and the evangelistic style of BlameDrewsCancer , a difference that is as much geenrational as it is social media based.

And the SMC Philadelphia crew has to get a little love here too for setting up the opportunity for these groups to share the challenges, success, and techniques to help communities help themselves “do well by doing good” Though the causes are all different and their approach to community building and community service are all different, they are all terrific causes, fueled by volunteers and all worthy of your support. I hope you give it…

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• Cancer, comedy and a cure: (pulverblog.pulver.com)
• HOW TO: Do Good on Twitter (mashable.com)
• Twitterers prepare for Twestival (guardian.co.uk)
• Today’s the day: Blame Drew’s Cancer with the all-day Blame-A-Thon! (downloadsquad.com)