Category Archives: Cross River NY

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How can I make a worn wood floor look new again? | Cross River Homes

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Sunlight, dents and foot traffic can all take their toll on a wood floor,  causing it to appear worn and resulting in reduced stain color. But with a few  key supplies, you can revive worn wood flooring without heavy-duty sanding. (See  below for an instructional video on how to refinish a worn wood  floor.)

How to Refinish Wood Floors

Start refurbishing your floor by finding a wood stain that matches the color  of your existing floor. If you can’t find an exact match, choose a color that’s  slightly darker. Experiment with the stain by rubbing it into a 1- or  2-square-foot area to see how it looks. The best wood stain I’ve found for this  job, Minwax PolyShades, is actually a stain and sealer combination.

Stained floors need some kind of protective coating over the stain. The  easiest coating to apply is oil-based urethane with a satin sheen, but — just as  you did with the stain — you’ll have to experiment with the product before  coating the entire floor. You don’t want to find out later that your urethane is  incompatible with your stain, which would cause it to peel and pucker. Apply two  coats of urethane over the 1- or 2-square-foot section of floor you stained, and  then live with it for a week.

If both the wood stain and the coating are compatible with the wood, you can  tackle the whole floor. Start by giving the wood a light sanding with 120- or  180-grit sandpaper in a 1/4-sheet finishing sander to roughen any remaining  urethane slightly, then vacuum every last bit of dust and dirt off of the floor  before rubbing in stain. Wearing rubber gloves, rub the stain everywhere, giving  special attention to dented, scratched and worn areas. Let the stain dry for a  day, and then apply two coats of the protective urethane (apply the second coat  after the first coat dries). If all goes well, you’ll end up with a distressed  but elegant floor that looks even better than a freshly sanded floor.

Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/green-homes/how-to-refinish-wood-floors-zm0z13onzsor.aspx#ixzz2mzNBRbym

How to Assess Your Own Site for Solar Potential | Cross River Homes

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With  the current federal tax credits and some local utilities offering incentives,  tapping into solar power is more affordable and pays off sooner than it did four  years ago. Before you bring a solar energy expert out to your house, take some  time to check your site yourself. Evaluating your home for solar is simple: Just  follow these four easy steps.

Check  your paperwork. To be eligible for the solar  incentives from the government and/or utility companies, the person who owns the  system (you) must own the property where the solar array will be installed. The  utility account for the property must be in your name as well.

Check  the orientation. Southern-facing roofs are optimal; west-facing is  the next best. Do none of your roofs face the best directions? Fear not. There  are solutions. Many people use pole mounts and racked panels to maximize their  solar production.

Check  your view. Even a little shading can create a big problem. There are  systems designed to deal effectively with some shading but there is a limit.  There are ways to deal with shading challenges. Obvious solutions are mounting  panels to poles or racks. For one Olympia, Wash., family the best place for  their system was in their backyard. So, they built a pergola and used the  photovoltaic panels as shading.

More  dramatic (and often less desirable) solutions to shading would be removing trees  that cause shading. A good solar installer will be able to give you a reasonable  estimate of how effective tree removal would be before you  break out the chainsaw.

Check  your structure. Outside: If solar panels will be installed  on your roof, you need to take a good look at the roof itself. If the roofing is  due to be replaced in the next 10 years, get it replaced before you have solar  installed. To save money, roofers can replace just the area where solar panels  are being installed. The rest of the roof can be replaced down the line.

 

Your  roof and its supporting structure needs to be in good condition. Solar panels’ additional weight is minimal, but damaged and/or aging roofs require a different  approach. If your roof is sagging, bowing or crumbling, getting your home safe  and solid should be the highest priority.

Inside:  Your home’s wiring needs to be up-to-date. The panels’ electric requirements are  pretty low, but it’s best to make sure your home’s system is able to handle the  additional needs.

Read more: http://www.motherearthnews.com/renewable-energy/how-to-assess-your-own-site-for-solar-potentialzb0z1311zacai.aspx#ixzz2mhvS0TmT

Housing market gets some upbeat news | Cross River Homes

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U.S. single-family home prices rose in September and posted their strongest  annualized gain in 7-1/2 years, a closely watched survey said on Tuesday.

The S&P/Case Shiller composite index of 20 metropolitan areas gained  0.7 percent in September on a non-seasonally adjusted basis, matching the  Reuters forecast.

Earlier, the Commerce Department said permits for future U.S. home construction rose to their highest level in nearly 5-1/2 years in October.

“Housing continues to emerge from the financial  crisis: the proportion of homes in foreclosure is declining and consumers’  balance sheets are strengthening,” David Blitzer, chairman of the index  committee at S&P Dow Jones Indices, said in a statement.

“The longer  run question is whether household formation continues to recover and if home  ownership will return to the peak levels seen in 2004.”

Prices in the 20  cities rose 13.3 percent year-over-year, the strongest gain since February 2006,  topping expectations for a 13 percent year-on-year advance.

Meanwhile, the Commerce Department said building permits jumped 6.2 percent to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 1.03 million units. That was the highest rate since June 2008. Permits increased 5.2 percent in September.

August’s permits were revised to a 926,000-unit pace from the previously reported 918,000 units. Permits lead housing starts by at least a month.

The Department postponed the release of housing starts and completions for September and October until December 18 because the collection of data was affected by a 16-day shutdown of the government last month. November data also will be published at that time.

The partial shutdown of the federal government also delayed the publishing of the September and October permits reports.

Economists polled by Reuters had expected building permits at a 930,000-unit rate in October.

While permits are not counted in gross domestic product (GDP), they are a key indicator of economic activity and the sturdy gains in both September and October should ease concerns the housing market recovery was stalling.

Higher mortgage rates have slowed the pace of home sales, but demand for accommodation as household formation continues to recover from multi-decade lows is expected to keep residential construction supported.

Home resales fell in October for a second straight month and confidence among single-family home builders has ebbed somewhat since nearing an eight-year high in August.

Permits for the multifamily home sector surged 15.3 percent in October after increasing 20.1 percent in September. Permits for buildings with five units or more reached their highest level since June 2008.

Single-family home permits, the largest segment of the market, increased 0.8 percent after falling 1.9 percent in September.

 

 

http://www.nbcnews.com/business/some-good-news-housing-market-building-permits-leap-2D11658882

How to Optimize Your YouTube Video for Maximum Traffic | Cross River Realtor

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When companies plan their marketing strategies, they often make the mistake  of ignoring YouTube as a possible channel for lead development. Social media,  PPC and other fields are accepted as vital, but YouTube? How much marketing use  is the world’s foremost provider of cute kitten videos?

Actually, YouTube represents fertile ground for lead generation. People tend  to forget YouTube is in fact a social platform just like as Facebook and Twitter  with sharing capabilities, comments and likes as part of its features. While the  video site’s search page is now the second most popular search engine (and  thanks to Google’s acquisition of YouTube, intricately connected to the number  one search option).

Why Upload to YouTube?

Many companies choose to host their videos on their own websites instead of  uploading media to YouTube and then linking within the website. This is, quite  frankly, a mistake.

Why?

  • The video adds value to your website, but only enriches user experiences if  people visit the site.
  • A video hosted on your own website only gets viewed by people who come to  your site, limiting how many people find and view it.
  • If you let YouTube host your videos, people are more likely to find them,  and if their response is favorable, they’re more likely to visit your site for  additional information.

Social Media Strategies and YouTube

Many of the social media strategies used on Twitter and Facebook work equally  well on YouTube. YouTube users can:

  • “Like” and “Favorite” individual videos
  • Leave comments
  • Subscribe to channels

This much like following Tweets or Liking a Facebook page. These  features offer opportunity to engage your audience in dialogue, and not just in  the comments section. Your videos give your company a human face no amount of  tweeting and Facebooking can match, because the viewer sees and hears you. Some  videos spark video responses, offering opportunity for a very public and  interactive dialogue.

 

 

 

 

Read more at http://www.jeffbullas.com/2013/11/26/how-to-optimize-your-youtube-video-for-maximum-traffic/#LSB1b7Q3bqLuDDpS.99

Faucets at $1,000 Abound as Home Equity Spigot Opens | Cross River Real Estate

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A year ago, New Jersey contractor Michael Mroz’s customers were focused on saving money when renovating kitchens and baths, he said. Now, with a resurgence of home equity lending, they’re ready to pay for the best.

“People don’t want granite countertops — they want marble costing at least 25 percent more,” said Mroz, owner of Michael Robert Construction in Westfield, an affluent town less than an hour’s commute to Manhattan. “Money is so cheap today, people can splurge on $1,000 faucets.”

Spending on home renovations is rising to records as banks such as Wells Fargo & Co. and JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM) increase lending for home equity lines of credit, or Helocs, after property prices this year gained at a pace not seen since the last housing boom. Heloc originations could rise 16 percent this year and reach another five-year high in 2014, according to Mustafa Akcay, an economist for Moody’s Analytics, powering the earnings of Home Depot Inc. (HD) and boosting the economic expansion.

Helocs are making a comeback as the housing market recovers enough to make the junior mortgages a safer bet for banks more than seven years after the beginning of the housing crash that saddled them with billions of dollars of losses. The median price for an existing home probably will gain 11 percent this year, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association in Washington, after plunging about 33 percent during the crash.

‘Enormous Impact’

“The biggest use of Helocs is renovations, and the biggest spur for renovations is Helocs,” said Kermit Baker, director of Harvard University’s Remodeling Futures program in Cambridge, Massachusetts. “When the two fuel each other, it has an enormous impact on the economy.”

After home prices began rising in 2012, the number of Americans with negative home equity — those who owe more on their properties than they are worth — began tumbling. At the beginning of last year, that was the case with almost 16 million home loans. By the third quarter of this year, that number had dropped to 10.8 million, property data firm Zillow Inc. said in a report last week.

“There is an increase in the amount people are willing to spend on their homes as the values go up,” said Joe Emison, chief technology officer at BuildFax, a real estate data company. “A lot of them feel in a better position today as the job market and the economy has improved.”

Bank Holdings

Helocs typically are held by banks in their mortgage portfolios rather than being sold in the secondary market to be securitized by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, common for primary home loans, said Keith Gumbinger, vice president of HSH.com, a mortgage data firm in Riverdale, New Jersey.

 

 

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-25/

 

For 2014 listen to your clients, neighbors and smart friends | Cross River Homes

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It isn’t even December yet, and I’m already tired of the holidays and of reading about what I need to do to be successful in 2014.

Usually the articles are about the three, five, eight, 10 or 14 things that I need to do. Before throwing caution to the wind and taking all of that wonderful advice, I like to consider who is writing it and why. There are plenty of armchair real estate quarterbacks who just know what we need to do to be successful.

They give advice and never have to implement any of the ideas. Right now I can’t see any reason why 2014 will be very different from 2013. I think the tight inventory of homes for sale will loosen up a bit, and interest rates will rise slightly, as will home prices. Real estate is local, so that last sentence may not apply to your market. Here are 10 things I think everyone should take into consideration as they plan for 2014:

1. The Internet is not going to replace most real estate agents, and it isn’t going to go away.

 

 

– See more at: http://www.inman.com/2013/11/22/tune-out-generic-advice-on-how-to-succeed-in-2014-and-listen-to-your-clients-neighbors-and-smart-friends/#sthash.cjZ4CeAZ.dpuf

Realtor.com survey reveals a surprising number of buyers planning all-cash deals | Cross River Real Estate

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Prospective homebuyers hoping to buy a home in the next four months say the lack of inventory is their biggest challenge, but many believe winter is a good time to buy because sellers are motivated to sell and more willing to negotiate.

That’s according to a survey of more than 1,300 visitors to realtor.com conducted from Nov. 7-16, which found 45 percent of buyers in the market said there’s not enough inventory in their price range.

The survey also found that a surprising number of prospective homebuyers — 19 percent — are planning to do all-cash deals.

Of those planning to buy without taking out a mortgage: 29 percent said they are downsizing to a smaller or less expensive home. 26 percent are relocation buyers. 11 percent are moving up to a bigger or more expensive home. 11 percent are buying a vacation home.

But most of those surveyed said they’ll need a mortgage to finance their home purchase.

Among that group, most did not have the 20 percent down payment that would allow them to qualify them for a conventional loan backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac without having to also purchase mortgage insurance.

More than 1 in 10 of those surveyed (13 percent) said they were planning to put just 3.5 percent down (the minimum down payment on FHA-guaranteed loans). Only 22 percent said they’d be able to make a down payment of more than 20 percent, which would allow them to avoid purchasing mortgage insurance.

 

 

 

 

– See more at: http://www.inman.com/2013/11/20/despite-inventory-shortages-homebuyers-looking-for-bargains-this-winter/#sthash.r748HRyT.dpuf

Florida Sinkhole Destroys Another Pair of Homes | Cross River Homes

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Florida’s porous limestone geology claimed two more victims last week as a 50-foot sinkhole opened up in a Dunedin, Florida, neighborhood. Awakened at night by a loud sound, the family first feared an intruder, homeowner Michael Dupre told a reporter: “I grabbed a rifle and start walking through the house so I could see what was going on,” he said. “And I hear the banging. … As I approach the back of the house and I see our back screen room just sticking out 3 feet off the ground, I knew instantly it opened up.” (The full report by Shyann Malone, WTSP-TV, Tampa-St. Petersburg, Fla., is carried at the USA Today website: see, “2 houses likely lost because of Florida sinkhole.”)

Ironically, repair work at the location had just begun a few days before, according to a report in the Tampa Tribune (for the full story, see: “Sinkhole swallows parts of two Dunedin homes,” by Stephen Thompson). The paper reports: “The Dupre family has been engaged in a months-long court battle with its insurance company, Citizens Property Insurance Corp., after a sinkhole was discovered on the property two years ago, said the family’s attorney, Jason Salgado.” Citizens had proposed a repair plan calling for a deep-compaction grout injection, at an estimated cost of around $100,000, the paper reports, while the family was holding out for a more costly intervention that would have involved shallow grouting as well, along with a possible installation of support pilings.

Nature beat the engineers and lawyers to the punch, however; last week, demolition and backfill was the only work being done. Most of the Dupre family’s household possessions were lost, USA Today reports (for the full story along with TV coverage by Eric Glasser of WTSP-TV, see “Crews demolish 1 home that Fla. sinkhole claimed“).

Sinkholes are widespread in Florida, USA Today notes—and especially common in Dunedin, where the city actually maintains a list of sinkhole locations. The majority of Florida sinkhole reports come from a region sometimes called “sinkhole alley,” which includes the counties of Hernando, Hillsborough, and Pasco.

But as the Los Angeles Times notes, Florida’s geology makes sinkholes a risk throughout the state, experts say (see “Is there any place in Florida safe from sinkholes? Technically, no,” by Soumya Karlamangla). Still, events like this one stand out: “The people who have been around the city for quite a while, in excess of 30 years, have no recollection of anything ever this big, probably by a factor of three or four times,” Dunedin city engineer Thomas Burke said. “For us, this is a major, major situation.”

Going forward, Floridians may have more and better information about the sinkhole risk in specific locations: This month, the Florida Geological Survey started a study that experts hope will result in a detailed statewide map of the risk—eventually. The Suwanee Democrat reports on that story here: (“Florida Geological Survey begins sinkhole vulnerability study“). “Field work commenced with documenting multiple sinkholes on private landowner’s property in the pilot study area of Suwannee, Columbia, and Hamilton counties,” the Democrat reports. “The data will be part of Geologic Information System data that will be compiled and processed in the study … The project is a three year study that will produce two maps: one in the pilot area and the other statewide. The pilot study is slated to end in May 2014, at which point the statewide assessment will begin.”

 

 

http://www.jlconline.com/erosion-control/florida-sinkhole-destroys-another-pair-of-homes.aspx

 

JPMorgan reaches $4.5B settlement over mortgage-bond claims | Cross River NY Homes

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Mega bank JPMorgan Chase (JPM) reached a $4.5 billion agreement with 21 major institutional investors Friday to resolve legacy mortgage-backed securities issues.

The institution made a binding offer to the trustees of 330 RMBS trusts issued by Chase and Bear Stearns — a firm taken over by JPM in the wake of the financial crisis.

The settlement represents another critical step in the bank’s efforts to resolve mortgage-related legacy matters, the bank said.

“As agreed in today’s settlement, the institutional investors have committed to support the settlement and have requested that the trustees accept the settlement offer,” the company said.

The announcement continued, “The offer, which the trustees may seek court approval for, would resolve all representation and warranty claims as well as servicing claims on all trusts issued by JPMorgan Chase and Bear Stearns between 2005 and 2008.”

The offer will remain open until Jan. 15, 2014, but may be extended pursuant to its terms for an additional 60 days.

The offer includes six key terms, including payment by the bank of $4.5 billion in cash to settle all representation and warranty claims as well as servicing claims that were asserted by the RMBS trusts.

Additionally, it provides for the implementation of certain servicing changes to mortgages serviced by Chase in the RMBS trusts, as well as continuation of a previously agreed tolling and forbearance agreement among the bank and the trustees while the proposed settlement is evaluated.

 

 

http://www.housingwire.com/articles/27997-jpmorgan-reaches-45b-settlement-over-mortgage-bond-claims