Santa Clarita Real Estate Blog

This week’s real estate headlines included record-breaking profits from some key banks. This week’s news is really no surprise, we all knew that the banks weren’t really losing money hand-over-fist, despite the amount of short sales and foreclosures they’ve been processing. The banks reporting record-breaking 2010 profits: JPMorgan Chase Posts $17.4B Profit for 2010: An [...]

Buyers should pre-qualify for a home loan as the first step of their home search. As Realtors, we’ve often heard potential home buyers say that our ‘job’ is to show them homes, regardless of whether they are qualified to actually buy the home or not. This is counterproductive for a variety of reasons, for both [...]

Buyers need to close on time, or the short sale transaction may be canceled. Wells Fargo has announced that its investors, including government-sponsored entities (GSE’s), have requested that they halt extensions on short sale transactions. Short sales that close by the date on the approval letter are safe from further action it appears. However, if [...]

Experts say that decline in California foreclosure activity is not just a seasonal decline. New foreclosure filings, including Notice of Default (NOD) and Notice of Trustee Sale, declined significantly in December 2009 as compared to the prior month. While Notices of Default dropped a significant 17.5% during December 2009, they actually dropped 32.5% on a [...]

Proposed changes in FHA loan rules will increase downpayment amounts and loan fees, and decrease closing cost allowances. H.R. 3706, the so-called FHA Taxpayer Protection Act of 2009, is expected to raise the minimum downpayment amount for FHA homebuyers from 3.5% to 5% and reduce the amount of closing costs that can be financed into the mortgage. [...]

Sprouts will bring more healthy food choices (and hopefully lower prices) for Santa Clarita residents. Sprouts Farmers Market has a new location coming soon to the Valencia area, apparently to take up residence in the old Mervyn’s store location in the River Oaks Shopping Center across from the Valencia Town Center Mall sometime in 2010. Sprouts carries [...]

Low-cost fix-up and staging strategies for sellers who are on a budget. Let’s face it, Santa Clarita homebuyers are getting spoiled these days with model homes and professionally staged homes to view, so often they’re expecting every home they look at to be close to model-perfect before they’ll consider buying. What’s a seller to do [...]

Violations of FHA origination and underwriting requirements may lead to lenders losing their ability to issue FHA loans. Both FHA and Ginnie Mae have withdrawn their approvals for Lend America (also known as Lending Key and Ideal) based on numerous violations of FHA origination and underwriting requirements. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s [...]

First Look program aims to build stronger communities by allowing owner occupants a better chance at buying foreclosed properties. Fannie Mae’s new First Look program gives non-investor homebuyers a 15-day edge over investors for newly listed foreclosure properties. This is great news for homebuyers who have had troubles getting their offers accepted when competing against all-cash [...]

16 Reasons to List Your Home For Sale During the November and December Holidays. Many sellers think that the Holiday Season is the worst time of year to sell a home, with busy schedules, time off for family gatherings, and fewer buyers looking to buy. However, in reality the Holiday Season may be one of the [...]