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Was there  particular feature that made you buy your house?  That sealed the deal?  Was it that specific location?  We always hear the three features one should look for are location location, location.  Or was it how the living room, and dining room integrated with the kitchen?

 When I’m working with buyer clients, I’m often trying to help them decide what to buy a house for; what is important to them.  And when we say location, location, location, what does that mean for them?  There is no wrong answer, as it is all quite specific and personal.

 I’m working with a young couple who have just about nailed that question, and I’m guessing the question will be completely answered in the next few weeks when we find them their home.  For this couple, a good location means close-in, east side.  They are both bike and public transportation commuters.  But more than that, they want to be walkable to great restaurants and food carts and the like.  So, what others might think of as good neighborhoods: Alameda, Rose City, Mt. Tabor, feel too far away to them.

 When Don and I were looking, about ten years ago, we looked in some of those neighborhoods also, but realized, after living four houses from SE 35th Place and Hawthorne, that we were more urban than we’d thought. So when we saw our current home, right on SE 26th (yes, the busy part), the location didn’t bother us, and it’s walkability was a plus.  But what really sold us was the unpainted wood work, including the builtins, fireplance mantle, box beam ceiling and more.  Later, the builder mentioned he’d though of doing the cabinetry and woodwork in in a composite product such that it would have been painted, and asked what we’d have thought. I realized, I probably wouldn’t have wanted the house.  So I guess we bought it for the woodwork.

 Back to my current “young couple” clients.  We saw a house close to upper Division, so with some proximity to The Woodsmen, North Bar, food carts and the like.  It was a decent location.  The house had a wonderful open feeling from the living room, dining room and out onto a really spacious and lovely deck.  We were all drawn to those spaces.  The rest of the house, meh. It was fine, but the upstiars bedrooms were small and the finishes of the house weren’t cohesive.  As a house, it wasn’t anything special, but it was hard to deny the pull of those wonderful living spaces. My clients hung onto that house for awhile, until they were finally freed by someone else making an offer.

 Sometimes though, I think buyers to buy a “package”.  They buy a house that as a whole; location, floor plan, feel and features, makes sense for them.  There may be nothing in particular they love, but the whole thing works.

 How about you?  What did you buy for?

I stopped in yesterday, to drop my taxes with my accountant at, The Epstein Group.  As you might expect of a conversation between a Realtor and an accountant, we quickly got to market conditions and potential tax changes that may effect the market.

 Victor Epstein, as would befit an accountant, has always been very good about keeping up on changes and potential changes in the tax code, and how they might effect his clients.  I am thankful for his attentiveness as I often eke a good little tidbit out of a discussion with him.

 ”Tell your investor clients to sell”, he said.  Now mind you, I am a “buy and hold” sort of a gal, so those are pretty strong words.  The longer version goes something like this.  The “Bush tax cuts” are set to expire, and may or may not be extended.  The Obama health plan (of which I am an ardent supporter) is scheduled to be funded in part by a slight increase in the capital gains tax, and Oregon may be taking a bit from folks’ capital gains also.

 What Victor was saying, or what my conservative ears heard, was that taxes on capital gains (such as those incurred by the sale of investment property) taxes will be going up.  And though we think the real estate prices will be increasing in the next few years, we expect increases in capital gains taxes will outpace any increases in real estate prices.  So if you have an investment property you are planning to sell in the next few years, now may well be the time.  Call me.

 Oh, and take a second to go to Victor’s website and check out the “Irreverent” tab, showing the fictional accountants’ Hall of Fame.  And scroll down for songs about accountants.  Very fun.

Lots of different materials are being used in new and remodeled homes these days.  With them, come new home repair and maintenance guidelines.  The Oregonian’s Homes and Gardens section recently had some good tips.

Limestone and Marble: Acid and grit are the biggest threats to these surfaces, so you might consider sealing them.  Use mild cleansers such as a soap stone cleaner or liquid dish detergent, but go easy.  And avoid cleansers with abrasives, or containing lemon, vinegar or other acids.

Vinyl Windows: Inspect these regularly and clean the window tracks.  Don’t use abrasives and never lubricate with WD-40, use a silicone spray instead.

Crawl Spaces and Attics:  Over the years these spaces are sealed tighter and tighter. What used to be a part of your home’s ventilation system may no longer be.  You’ll want to make extra sure no moisture or water is building up, that will lead to mold.

Hardie Plank/Fiber Cement Siding: Lots of homes are sided with these products, which hold up very well in the Pacific Northwest climate.  But the joints and contact points with windows and trim do need to be caulked regularly to prevent water from getting behind the siding.

Stainless Steel: I love how this stuff looks, and it can be easy to clean, but boy, fingerprints and cooking splatters really show up.  Stainless steel cleansers and polish can help make a barrier against such things.  3M makes a decent product.

Composite Decking:  This stuff is WAY easier to maintain than wood decking, but does need a bit of tending to.  Sweep or hose debris off regularly, and wash at least once a year to prevent mold and mildew.  Power washing may not be a goo idea, and can void some warranties.

Concrete Counter Tops:  Wipe up spills as soon as they occur, use a light dish soap or detergent to clean, and avoid harsh chemicals, such as bleach.  Some consider using a wax to build up a protective film over time, which will create a slick, smooth, easy-to-clean surface. If your countertop begins to show signs of wear and dulling, reapply an additional coat of wax.

You know those bumper stickers, Keep Portland Weird?  Well the real estate market is helping to achieve that mission.The Portland real estate market is just plain weird. 

 Anecdotaly, my office and several others close in have been very hectic.  Many of our buyer clients have written offers ending up in multiple offer situations, losing out.  We’ve seen this both in the lower, first time buyer/investor price range, ($200,000- $300,000) and in the higher move-up range of $500,000 and up.

 Then, out comes the RMLS monthly report with the Portland market stats, which give few if any hints to the market we have been experiencing.  The ony sign of an improving market is that the average sales price came up slightly from March 2011 to April 2011 from $261,100 to $267,300.  The median price also came up from $215,000 to $219,400.

 But…both the number of both pending and closed sales are down, and the number of active listings on the market have increased a tad.

 We know the housing recovery will be long and slow, but …

 Click here too see the full Portland market report.

Trulia, one of the real estate data aggregators,  has  come out with a new, Home Offer Report.  The first report debuted March 31st, 2011;  the end of the first quarter of this year.  The report shows, by area and even zip code, how often prices of listed properties are reduced, what the average percentage of reductions is, and the probability of a second, or ensuing reduction.

Forbes, in conjunction with this report, issued a list of the top ten cities with  the biggest price discounts:

#1 Phoenix, AZ

#2 Mesa, AZ

#3 Minneapolis, MN

#4 Long Beach, CA

#5 Baltimore, MD

#6 Oakland, CA

#7 Las Vegas, NV

#8 Sacramento, CA

#9 San Diego, CA

#10 Tucson, AZ

You can read the full Forbes article here

To access the Trulia interactive map go here.  At a glance, I think the Trulia map looks reasonably accurate.  As this is the first iteration of the report, further reports will speak to accuracy.  Trulia projects this report will help buyers settle on offer prices by anticipating when and by how much a seller might reduce a property price.  I’m not sure the data will be quite  that accurate as every seller’s situation and motivation is different.  I do though, find it an interesting tool.

Most of us are in agreement that the securitization of mortgages ( mortgage backed securities) played a large role in the recent  collapse of the housing market.  Now, some of the folks who brought us mortgage backed securities are offerring a fix.

 Dan Levy and Nadja Brandt, in a posting on Bloomberg, reference a plan by Lewis Ranieri where by banks offer assistance to homeowners, “Ranieri and Kenneth Rosen, a University of California economist and chairman of Rosen Consulting Group in Berkeley, published a five-point plan last month urging banks to reduce debt for qualified borrowers and recognize losses on second mortgages and home-equity lines of credit. They also favor having the mortgage market continue to be backed by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac or a “successor entity.”

This plan differs from current loan modifications, which are based primarily on interest rate reduction and stabilization for homeowners who got in trouble with adjustable rate loans.  Ranieri’s  proposal, instead looks at debt reduction.  When the housing crisis hit a few years ago, a radical idea trotted out, was for banks to forgive the difference bewteen loan balances and current property values.  Presented now by “insiders”, and after a few years of foreclosures and short sales, this plan doesn’t seem “radical”at all.

Portland has the best bike culture, Oregon is one of  the top five states for physical activity, Portland is the fifth most tatooed city (behind Miami Beach, Las Vegas, Richmond Virginia and Flint Michigan), and Springfield, Oregon has the most strip clubs per capita of any city in the United States.  Oregonians are well rested though, ranking 47th in the number of sleepiest states, and we are the sixth skinniest state.

I was surprised to see that Vermont residents are number one in their daily consumption of fruits and vegetables, with three other Northeast states in the top five (Connecticut, Maine and New Hampshire). You’d  think number one would have better access to fresh fruits and vegetables year round.  I suppose absence does make the heart grow fonder.

Today’s Parade Magazine (yes, I do read it with the Sunday Oregonian) had some fun numbers about the United States; all 308,745,538 of us, and our 78 million dogs.

Read the full article and see other statistics here.

My daughter is 14, and fast approaching the time when a family car trip won’t rank on her list of things to do.  But for now, we’re still good.  This timing coincides with my realization, not that I had to think all that hard, that she has not been to Yosemite!  “The Valley” played a big part in my childhood and adolescence, and I really do want to share it with her.  As with many road trips, once you’re driving that way…   So as the trip started taking shape, we decided to add on a visit to my dad’s mountain cabin, located on the eastern slope of the Sierra Mountains, a few hours south of Mammouth.  And since we’re driving, and she’s never been to Crater Lake, we’ll stop there on our way down.  Yet to take shape is the drive back.  Do we just drive the quickest routes and get home in two days?  Or do we take advantage of some of the countryside we could pass through and take longer?

Here are some details.  We’ll leave Portland on a Tuesday morning and drive to Crater Lake for a late lunch at the lodge.  The best route looks to be I-5 to Oregon 58, and then US 97.  Estimated driving time is four hours and fifty two minutes.  I’ll get us reservations for lunch at the lodge to be sure we aren’t disappointed.  After lunch and some sightseeing we’ll head west to I-5 and south.  I’d like to get pretty far that day, but will stop in Yreka for the night.  I don’t want to be too tired and weary for the Mt Shasta portion of the drive.  On a previous trip we stayed  at the Best Western Miner’s Innin Yreka.  It was forest fire season then.  Yreka was full of smoke and our motel over ridden by fire fighters.  This trip will be in mid-August, so this could be a repeat.  My friend Lucy Wainwright Roche does a great song, “Next Best Western”.  We’ll think of her.   

The  next day we’ll get up and out early for the drive to Yosemite.  Our lodging choices, since we were somewhat late in planning this trip were either the tent cabins in Curry Village or the Yosemite View Lodge at El Portal.  We’re meeting family there, and few in our party were excited by the tent cabins, walk to bathrooms and reported presence of pesky bears.  And, The Valley can be quite hot in August.  So we’ll be at the Lodge at El Portal, with a bit of elevation and coolness and access to bathrooms sans bears.  We’ll have three days in Yosemite which will give us ample time for hiking, bike riding and lunch at the venerable Ahwahnee.   As a kid we were always on our way backpacking and didn’t seem to have the money for such luxuries.  I realize that part of these trips with my kid is reliving or re-doing things I did as a kid…my way.  So lunch at The Ahwahnee it is.  I hope she enjoys it.

From Yosemite we’ll head up over Tioga Pass on Highway 120 to Highway 395, and then we’ll head south to Big Pine.  Tioga is the highest highway pass in California, a bit shy of 10,000 feet above sea level.  The drive is spectacular, and nothing like the passes in the Cascades of Oregon and Washington.  Highway 395 meanders though high desert, sheep country and of course past Mammoth Lakes.  We’ll arrive at my dad’s  mountain cabin by early afternoon, and hope not to interrupt his afternoon nap. 

Dad’s cabin sits a short walk above the Big Pine Creek Trailhead.  For years dad rock climbed in this area; Palisades Glacier, Temple Crag and all that.  As a kid we often camped at Third Lake.  In his later years he bought the cabin, which is a Forest Service lease.

A few photos of the peaks up the Big Pine Creek trails:

And lastly I had to include this one of the cabin in winter.  There is a cabin in there:

For now, the plan is, after a few nights at The Cabin, to make a fairly quick drive back to Portland.   Mapquest predicts the drive will take 14 hours and 49 minutes; two days as I’ll be the only driver.  As there are several months between ow and the beginning of the trip, I can imagine a loner route home could emerge.

The April/May issue of Realtor magazine (the trade magazine for the National Association of Realtors) has some great tips both for Realtors and home buyers and sellers.  One that caught my eye is an excerpt from Home Gain’s 2011 Home Sale Maximizer Survey on “Worth-the-Price Fix-Ups”. 

In this market we’ve been saying we’re in a pricing war and a beauty contest.  The market doesn’t seem to reward such big fix ups as kitchen remodels by giving a return on that investment.  And for awhile we’ve been advising sellers not to spend much of  anything on preparing a home for sale.  But smaller projects may have a place. This market has lots of properties in not great shape, combined with buyers expecting the picture perfect, like they see on television, homes.  What to do?

The Realtor article highlights six projects under $1000, and their average expected return.

#1 Cleaning and decluttering; estimated cost: $290, return: $1990. 

#2 Brightening (clean windows, replace curtains, update lighting fixtures etc); estimated cost: $375, return: $1550. 

 #3 Smart staging (rearrange furniture, new accessories etc);  estimate cost: $550, return: $2194.

#4 Landscaping enhancements (bark mulch, add bushes and plants); estimated cost: $540, return: $1932.  

#5 Repairing electrical or plumbing (ground fault interrupt outlets where needed, under sink leaks etc); estimated cost $535, return $1505. 

#6 Replacing or shampooing dirty carpets; estimated cost $647, return: $1739.

In general, buyers are drawn to houses where the seller has put some effort getting their home ready to sell.  Many buyers are turned off by and won’t even consider houses that feel as though they are in disrepair.  Sometimes the difference in doing some work before marketing a home can be the difference in the home selling or not.  Lastly, items that will most certainly be issues in the buyer’s home inspection should be addressed up front.  Some repeat offenders we see in most inspections; working and properly vented bathroom fan, pressure relief valve and earth quake strapping on the hot water heater and improper hand rails (especially on basement stairs).

I’m glad to give your house the once over if you have questions about potential projects. Give me a call.

Through our RE/MAX Regional leadership, I had an opportunity to hear some updates from Bank of America  on their short sale processes. 

As with many lenders, through that lovely process of mortgage backed securities, the majority of mortgages are actually owned by investors; retirement funds, municipalities , private investors and the like.  In the case of bank of America, approximately 72% of their loans are investor owned.  In short sales, Bank of America must confer with and get the approval from these investors.  So B of A is only able to fully negotiate on 28% of their loans.  No wonder this is a convoluted process.

Just before the mortgage crisis first hit, in 2006, Bank of America had four people working in their loss mitigation department.  Today they have approximatley 2800.  We see this reflected in their approval times.  In 2009 it took an average of 65 days to get an approval on a short sale.  Today that number has dropped to 51 days.

In tracking foreclosures vs. short sales, Bank of America has found they get an average of 18% more return on a short sale vs. taking the house to foreclosure.  In time, one can hope investors will get with the program and be more willing to work with short sales.  We were assured that investors make their decisions completely based on what will bring them more money (or less loss as the case may be).  So while we often think a cash sale might be more attractive than a financed sale, the approved short sale will always be the one that nets the investor the most money.

Lastly, most short sales these days do not consider the sellers remaining debt as paid in full, nor their obligation fulfilled.  Instead, the seller is considered to still owe that difference between the loan amount and the sale price.  We’ve been wondering if and when we’d start seeing lenders going after that deficiency.  Bank of America says, at least for their loans, whether or not to pursue the deficiency will be up to the individual investors.  So we won’t be seeing  any blanket policies on deficiencies.