| Chappaqua NY Real Estate Report | RobReportBlog | ||
| 2013 | 6 months ending 7/8 | 2012 | |
| 85 | Sales | 47 | |
| $950,000.00 | median sold price | $939,000.00 | |
| $335,000.00 | low sold price | $225,000.00 | |
| $3,100,000.00 | high sold price | $2,575,000.00 | |
| 3607 | average size | 3593 | |
| $286.00 | ave. price per foot | $288.00 | |
| 166 | ave days on market | 169 | |
| $1,025,487.00 | average sold price | $1,222,460.00 | |
| 96% | ave. sold to ask | 96% |
Chappaqua sales up 80% – Prices p 1% | RobReportBlog | Chappaqua Homes.
Money and workers are pouring into Williston, the capital of North Dakota’s oil boom, but the only department store in town is a JCPenney, with a facade straight out of the 1950s.
“We desperately need some kind of shopping center or mall here in Williston,” said Rev. Jay Reinke, a 20-year resident and pastor of Concordia Lutheran Church. “You have to drive hours to find decent shopping.”
That drive is not getting shorter anytime soon. Real estate developers are finding loans and investments hard to come by from Wells Fargo, private equity firm Carlyle Group and other major American financial powerhouses for new department stores and other commercial property, as well as residential developments.
While billions of dollars in oil money may be rushing into North Dakota, big money has resisted financing large real estate deals there, barring some projects entirely and leading other developers to self-finance.
Many would-be financiers say the North Dakota oil patch real estate market is too hot to handle right now, with demand for housing outstripping supply, fueling high prices. The average two-bedroom apartment in the oil patch rents for more than $2,500 per month, helping drive land prices sky-high and sparking concern about a bubble.
National homebuilders such as Pulte Group, D.R. Horton and Hovnanian Enterprises have yet to enter North Dakota. Pulte said it was focused on improving its market share on the East and West Coasts, as well as some Midwest states. The other two declined to comment.
Part of the hesitancy stems from the reluctance of energy-field workers to move their families full-time to North Dakota, a step that would cause them to spend more money locally. The state’s biting winter weather and remoteness have discouraged all but a few families, realtors say.
Data about home-building permits suggests workers are still keen to rent apartments rather than invest in housing and settle down. Only 20 permits were granted in Williston during the first five months of this year, compared to permits to build 482 apartment units, according to the city’s building department. As recently as 2010 the number of homebuilding permits in Williston, a city of about 16,000, far outpaced apartment permits.
“At first we thought we really had to run fast to get position in the homebuilding market, and now we see a landscape that frankly isn’t running away from us,” said Terry Olin, a North Dakota native now exploring real estate projects in the state with Switzerland-based investment company Stropiq LLP.
HISTORY IS A GUIDE
Many banks remain wary of the past repeating itself. North Dakota saw a surge of oil activity in the 1950s and 1980s, only to have the flare-ups burn out, leaving many residents, municipalities and banks in debt after funding large projects. Williston alone had millions in debt from the 1980s oil boom as recently as 2005.
“What we don’t want to do is go into a community like Williston and engage in speculative lending and not have an exit strategy,” said Dan Murphy, Wells Fargo’s regional president for North Dakota, South Dakota and western Minnesota. “We’re happy to make loans. We want to be repaid.”
The hesitancy comes even as Marathon Oil, Exxon Mobil, Statoil and dozens of other energy companies spend billions of dollars to extract North Dakota’s oil and natural gas.
Oil may be booming in North Dakota, but real estate is slow to follow – CSMonitor.com.
For the first time since the Institute for Luxury Home Marketing began tracking upper tier market trends in 2008, its Market Action Index hit the threshold that separates buyer’s and seller’s markets earlier this month.
The highest tier of homes for sale, homes priced over $500,000, has been the last part of the market to feel the effects of the housing recovery. On June 2, the ILHM reported its Market Action Index had reached 30 for the first time and in subsequent weekly reports the index has maintained its position.
“The ILHM National market is currently slightly in the Seller’s Market zone (greater than 30).The Market Action Index stands at 30 which indicates that luxury demand is relatively strong but the available supply of new listings doesn’t get acquired immediately,” the ILHM noted in its June 23 report.
The ILHM Luxury Composite Price for the week ending June 23 was $1,273,414 and the asking price per square foot was $324. Homes have been on the market for an average of 151 days.
“I believe that it was in the first week of June that we first saw the Market Action Index hit the 30 threshold which defines the entry point into a “Seller’s Market.” All month it is has been trending along right around that 30 mark,” said Waco Moore, the Institute’s president. ILHM staff could not identify a time when institute’s market index crossed over into seller’s territory in the past five years.
Hot markets in the ILHM report where luxury properties on selling on average faster than the national average last week were Atlanta, Boston, Dallas, Washington, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle and Silicon
Luxury Homes Officially Enter Seller’s Market | RealEstateEconomyWatch.com.
This 1890 carriage house has a lot of historic charm, but unlike many old houses, it has large, spacious rooms. Features include coffered ceilings,wide-plank floors, a fabulous granite kitchen with pro appliances, and a sunny porch. There are five bedrooms and three and a half baths in 3556sf. We like the soothing, summery neutral palette warmed up with antiques, too. Outside, specimen trees and formal gardens are on a lot of 1.3 acres. The setting is very private, with a long gated driveway, but Main Street shopping is a short walk away. There’s room for a pool and pool house.
· 478 Main St [Elliman]
After years of experiencing the lows of the real estate market, many industry professionals expressed hope that better days are on the horizon.
“The market continues to improve,” said Joel Sarmiento, senior vice president of community outreach regional manager for Wells Fargo. “There continues to be new legislation that is coming. It’s going to be a while before we are through this whole entire thing, but there’s light at the end of the tunnel.”
More than 100 gathered for the State of the Housing Market event hosted by the Reno chapter of the National Association of Hispanic Real Estate Professionals on Friday at the Atlantis Casino Resort Spa. Sarmiento was one of the speakers.
Even though Nevada continues to top distressed property lists and hundreds of thousands of people have sought help to stay in their homes, it was much worse two to three years ago, experts said. The state seems to hit bottom, and the Reno-Sparks region is recovering, they said.
“The state in Reno is better than what we see nationally and also better than what we are seeing in the entire state of Nevada,” Sarmiento said. “It is one of those markets that is performing at a much higher level than the state of Nevada and, say, Las Vegas, for example.”
About 95 percent of Wells Fargo’s home loan customers are current on their mortgages in the area, he said during the presentation.
Northern Nevada is doing better because homeowner legislation has slowed down the foreclosure process more in Southern Nevada in comparison, he said.
Wells Fargo, the national’s largest home lender and a sponsor of Friday’s event, has invested in technology and hired more people to handle increased activity and are seeing improvements in the time it takes to process short sales and foreclosures, he said.
Meanwhile, home prices still are well below the peak of the market in the mid-2000s and more people are entering the home-buying market. The low existing homes for sale inventory is driving bids higher and moving others to sell their homes.
Reno market better than rest of Nevada | Reno Gazette-Journal | rgj.com.
Do you have what it takes to be the agent who represents the most luxurious properties in your marketplace? While taking classes can help you be better prepared to represent luxury clients, the real key to your success results from your ability to build personal connection.
Recently, I was at a party where a top-producing agent who specializes in luxury properties asked whether agents should be “certified” to sell luxury properties. She went on to answer her own question by saying, “I don’t know a single agent who specializes in the million-dollar-plus price range who needs a certification.” I spent 20 years selling in that price range and I had to agree. None of the luxury agents who worked with me in Los Angeles ever attended a luxury certification class.
When I first moved to Austin, Texas, a local title company asked me to put together a course on how to market luxury properties. Since I had been an active agent in Southern California (Brentwood, Bel Air and Beverly Hills) for almost 20 years and had run the training program for the 4,000-agent Beverly Hills-based Jon Douglas Co., this was second nature for me.
One of the biggest surprises came as I chatted with the agents during the break. Most of them were terrified at the thought of representing a buyer or seller in the $700,000-$800,000 range. A million-dollar listing was absolutely out of the question. Nevertheless, they were hopeful that this class or a certification program would provide the magic bullet that would somehow transform them into luxury agents. Sadly, this underlying lack of confidence would probably be the biggest stumbling block to their success.
In a different class, we had about 50 agents in attendance. One agent arrived in shorts, a Hawaiian shirt and strapless sandals. Nevertheless, I remembering thinking, I’ll bet he’s a luxury agent. When I surveyed the class, he was the only one who had actually sold a property priced at more than $1 million. In fact, he had owned commercial offices both in Beverly Hills and Austin.
– See more at: http://www.inman.com/2013/06/17/be-the-go-to-luxury-specialist-in-your-market/#sthash.VPy7tX2H.dpuf
The NAHB housing market index for June jumped to 52. This is the highest level since April 2006.
This beat expectations for a rise to 45, from 44 in May.
The eight point increase from May to June is the biggest one month gain since August and September of 2002.
A reading over 50 shows that more builders think sales conditions are good rather than poor.
What’s more? All three sub-indices gained in June.
The index gauging current sales conditions climbed eight points to 56. The index measuring future sales expectations climbed from 52 in May to 61 in June — the highest level since March 2006. Finally, the index of prospective buyers traffic increased seven points to 40.
Investors track this index because it is a leading indicator for housing starts. “Today’s report is consistent with our forecast for a 29 percent increase in total housing starts this year, which would mark the first time since 2007 that starts have topped the 1 million mark,” NAHB Chief Economist David Crowe said in a press release.
In recent months it was reported that affordable mortgage rates were helping buyers. But mortgage rates have been rising and while these haven’t impacted purchase applications, they have weighed on refinance applications. Today’s report shows that homebuilders aren’t fazed by the rise in mortgage rates.
The NAHB housing market index is a sentiment index in which respondents rate not just the housing market but also the economy in general.
The index draws on builder perceptions of current single-family home sales and sales expectations for the next six months. It also includes builders’ expectations of traffic of prospective buyers.
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/june-nahb-homebuilder-confidence-2013-6#ixzz2WUdofU2t
June NAHB Homebuilder Confidence Rises To 52 – Business Insider.
They were talking about an affordable housing “report card” sent by Maurice Jones, secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, last month.
Astorino said the affordable housing allocations given in the report cards are based on a Rutgers study released in 2004 that was never approved by the county. He said the allocations exceed the benchmarks set forth for the county during its affordable housing settlement in 2009 and that the new numbers are an attempt by HUD to force localities to change their zoning.
“The 2004 study, for all intents and purposes, should be thrown out,” Astorino said. “It has nothing to do with the settlement. Nothing. Seven hundred and fifty is the only number that anyone should be talking about.”
In 2006, the Anti-Discrimination Center of Metro New York brought a federal lawsuit that claimed the county failed to live up to its obligation to provide affordable housing and address issues of racial segregation in its housing markets.
That suit eventually led to a $63 million settlement in 2009 that requires the county to see to it that 750 units of affordable housing are built in 31 of the county’s predominantly white communities and to market those units to the nine counties surrounding Westchester.
But Astorino said HUD’s plan in the report cards would require the county to build 5,097 additional affordable housing units. The two largest allocations were 975 affordable housing units for Mount Pleasant and 756 units for Harrison, meaning each town’s individual report card allocation surpasses the settlement’s total, according to Astorino.
Jones wrote another letter to Ken Jenkins, chairman of the Westchester county Board of Legislators, last month refuting Astorino’s claims that HUD is requiring the county to build additional affordable housing units.
“Under paragraph 7 of the Settlement, the County is obligated to ensure the development of “at least” 750 new affordable housing units that affirmatively further fair housing,” Jones wrote. “By its terms, this is a floor, not a ceiling.”
Jones said the Rutgers study, which estimates that the county would need to build nearly 11,000 affordable housing units to meet the regions needs, was used as a starting point
“In any event, HUD is not requiring the County to build this number of units, but to use this study as a tool to examine how the eligible municipalities are contributing to meet the regional needs,” Jones wrote to Jenkins. “Such an examination does not equate to a new funding mandate.”
Joan Maybury, supervisor of the Town of Mount Pleasant, said she wanted to know why HUD sent out the report cards using the Rutgers figures if they really didn’t mean anything.
“The idea that the federal monitor would send a report card beforehand and have it with flaws—in the Town of Mount Pleasant it said we didn’t have any affordable accessory apartment, which is absolutely not true…I think the public deserves a little bit better in regards to communication,” Maybury said.
Astorino said that this was another example of how HUD has continued to ‘move the goalposts’ when it comes to Westchester and is attempting to see how far it can push.
He said the county had 386 units with financing so far, which is well past the goal of 300 units that was set for 2013.
“When I say we’re done, are they going to say no your not, this is going on forever?” Astorino said. “I think this is what we’d like to know. When we get to 750 units, is it game over? Or do we have ongoing obligations to build more?”
Welcome to our weekly edition of what’s hot in social media news. To help you stay up to date with social media, here are some of the news items that caught our attention.
Facebook Streamlines Ad Offering: Facebook says they plan to “streamline the number of ad units from 27 to fewer than half of that” while mapping all of their ads to “the business objectives marketers care about—be it in-store sales, online conversions, app installs, etc.”
Facebook will eliminate redundant ads. “This includes removing the Questions product for Pages because marketers can simply ask a question in a post and get answers in comments.”
LinkedIn Lets You Enrich Your Updates: After recently giving you the ability toadd rich media to your profile, LinkedIn now also lets you “directly upload images, documents and presentations to the updates you share from the LinkedIn Homepage.”
LinkedIn’s new feature allows you to “add a richer and more visual component to your professional discussions.”
Discussion From Our Networking Clubs: Thousands of social media marketers and small business owners are asking questions and helping others in our free Networking Clubs. Here are a few interesting discussions worth highlighting:
LinkedIn Gives You a New Look at Who’s Viewed Your Profile: LinkedIn has rolled out “a new, simplified look and feel for Who’s Viewed Your Profile to make it easier for you to get a snapshot of who, what and how you are being discovered on LinkedIn.”
“Who’s Viewed Your Profile can also give you insights on how often your profile has been viewed and what connections or groups you have in common with them.” Premium members get additional filters.
SlideShare Announces Richer RSS Feeds: “SlideShare’s RSS feeds just got richer, with each content item now including a full image of the first slide. For developers building upon SlideShare, this enables them to create even more visual apps than before.”
Facebook Reduces Ad Options: This Week in Social Media | Social Media Examiner.
On the current path, home prices, sales and construction should continue upward, said economist Jed Kolko of Trulia. Meanwhile, vacancies, delinquencies and foreclosures will be dropping. “Inventories may be down too as a necessary part of the housing recovery.”
Homes are still undervalued relative to rent, Kolko said, and a full housing recovery is a few years away.
Currently there are no signs of over-building and little sign of over-borrowing, he said. “Prices would have to rise at current rate for several years to return to bubble territory.”