James Manning's Blog

South St Louis City Home For Sale under 100K

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 11:01:25 -0700

A Really great place to live and relax in south city...and for a wonderful price as well...for under 100K!!

For more details on the property call STL Real Estate at 314.571.9225

St Louis 'The hill' home for sale

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Tue, 04 Oct 2011 23:57:59 -0700

This home was featured in the Southwest Gardens home tour in 2010.

Check this one out!

The location is fantastic and it has so many great selling points: large kitchen with island! Big back yard with a huge deck and two great spots to barbecue and entertain! Finished lower level provides an extra bedroom to sleep, and the bathroom is up to date and in great shape! There is even a nice spot to sit on the front porch and enjoy quiet summer nights on a screened in porch.

View FULL DETAILS and additional PHOTOS

http://stlrealestatellc.com/stl-real-estate-2815-dalton

STL Real Estate
Saint Louis: 2730 S 59^th Street, St Louis, MO 63139
Kirkwood: 1031 Bernice, Kirkwood, MO 63122

stop foreclosure

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 21:13:58 -0700

If you need to stop foreclosure in saint louis and its surrounding counties then I can recommend a website for you.

The website is a great way to get a hold of foreclosure experts that truly have your best interest in mind. Click on this link and stop foreclosure.

sell house fast

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 21:09:29 -0700

Sell a house fast in Saint Louis Missouri by using STL Real Estate, LLC.

This company is a member of the Better Business Bureau and can address all your quick house sale needs. STL Real Estate, LLC is a great company that can really help you sell your house fast.

They offer free consultations for everyone, and can match their appropriate sale strategy to fit your needs.

Don't hesitate any longer and Sell your house fast.

STL Real Estate provides fast house sale solutions for homeowners in all types of situations, and it can help you too.

Some of the areas STL Real Estate serves are Saint Louis, Saint Louis County including Ballwin, Kirkwood, Creve Couer, Ladue, Chesterfield, Sunset Hills, and many other municipalities in Saint Louis county and St Charles. You will sell your house fast when you work with us.

Beautiful home in breckenridge hills misouri

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Wed, 23 Jun 2010 15:28:56 -0700

9280 East Breckenridge is a wonderful home at an unbelievable price located in Breckenridge Hills, Missouri.

Click on this link for more pictures and see a beautiful home in st ann for sale.

Not only is this property for sale at a great price, but the property has many updates including newly refinished hardwood floors.

If you are a homeowner looking to sell your home, two great websites are:

STL Real Estate

STL short sale expert

cheap saint louis property. good location great opportunity to make $$$

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 14:14:38 -0800

6113 Dupree Ave, St. Louis, MO

1BR/1BA Single Family House

offered at $12,000

Year Built	1949
Sq Footage	596
Bedrooms	1
Bathrooms	1 full, 0 partial
Floors	Unspecified
Parking	Unspecified
Lot Size	8,346 sqft
HOA/Maint	$0 per month

DESCRIPTION

Great cash flower in good area of furgeson. Visit www.cheapstlhouses.com and sign up for the list there for more great deals. contact jim@cheapstlhouses.com for showing information about this property.

see additional photos below

ADDITIONAL PHOTOS

Photo 1	Photo 2
Photo 3	Photo 4

Contact info:

For sale by agent/broker

Equal Opportunity Housing

Posted: Feb 24, 2010, 10:50am PST

Cheap Saint Louis property for sale

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Wed, 24 Feb 2010 14:10:25 -0800

James Manning | 314.571.9225

9806 Winkler, St. Louis, MO

Make an offer! Great cash flowing opportunity

2BR/1BA Single Family House

offered at $10,000

Year Built	1948
Sq Footage	1,088
Bedrooms	2
Bathrooms	1 full, 0 partial
Floors	Unspecified
Parking	Unspecified
Lot Size	10,079 sqft
HOA/Maint	$0 per month

DESCRIPTION

visit www.cheapstlhouses.com and sign up for the list there for great investment deals.

see additional photos below

Contact info:

James Manning

314.571.9225

For sale by individual owner

Equal Opportunity Housing

Posted: Feb 24, 2010, 10:43am PST

Avoid a foreclosure: you have options, and how do you choose the right person to work with?

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Mon, 15 Feb 2010 14:56:19 -0800

If you are facing a foreclosure, it is important to understand that you have options.

Some of the options that you have available are:

A short sale, deed-in-lieu, forbearance, mortgage modification, mortgage refinance, sale fo your property (for those few of us that have enough equity), are a few of your options.

Click on this page for great information on how to stop a foreclosure.

Just as important as realizing that you have options, and you don't have to just settle for letting the bank foreclose on your property, is choosing the right real estate professional.

When your house is on the line, you should be very careful with who you choose to stop your foreclosure from happening.

Make sure that

1. They don't charge any upfront fees for their services.

2. They are licensed real estate agents

3. They don't outsource the short sale mitigation process (by mitigation I am referring to the short sale negotiations with the bank)

4. They have experience with short sales. You don't want a rookie handling your short sale, or someone that simply knows how to do one because he took some sort of class. Only use experienced professionals to ensure you have the highest chance to stop your foreclosure.

If you want more foreclosure prevention information, I strongly recommend you visit this foreclosure rescue site.

For 'newbie' real estate investors in Saint Louis

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 16:59:34 -0800

In residential investment real estate, there are three basic ways to invest.

Wholesale a property to another investor.
Rehab a property and sell it to a retail buyer.
Buy and hold onto a property as a rental.

Because of where the market currently is, and the high supply of houses and low supply of qualified buyers, the 2^nd investment strategy of rehabbing and selling a house is currently not the most profitable investment strategy available to investors. It is also not the best way to maximize your long term wealth in this market.

Seasoned investors are still rehabbing properties and making money, but it is much more difficult to do this during current market conditions.

Who is making the most money in this down market?

The people making all the money in this market are the investors that have an income stream coming in from a different source other than real estate.

This cash flow alows them to safely leverage their money and use investment strategy 3: buy and hold rental properties.

Over the long term, the savy new Saint Louis real estate investors that begin their careers by exclusively buying and holding onto rental property are going to make themselves millionaires!

The key to implementing this strategy is to first have a steady cash flow coming in. This will allow you to overcome any short term hurdles that you may encounter along the way (furnace breaks etc.)

So, if you are new to investing in Saint Louis, and you are thinking about leaving your job. DON'T DO IT!

This is not the market that you want to learn how to rehab houses in.

This is the market that you want to become a landlord in. And, you can do that if you still have a job giving you a steady amount of cash flow.

The first investment option is to wholesale properties. If you are new to investing, you probably have encountered amny poeple selling you information on this.

What these people aren't telling you is that new guidelines are in place that make it more difficult to wholesale properties.

WAKE UP!

The real etate gurus are making their money selling you products, not by investing in real estate! If they were really good at wholesaling, and making the money that they claim you can make, wouldn't they be doing that instead of teaching you how to invest in real estate!

What they don't tell you is that if you are able to make it and become a successful wholesaler, it can take between 2 to 3 years to develop a marketing system that gives you enough leads to earn a decent income. Especially because when you are new you are going to mishandle many of the leads that you receive (even the good ones).

Lets review:

New St. Louis REAL ESTATE INVESTORS

If you have a job, DON'T QUIT IT.

Suck it up and think about the big picture: you are going to maximizing your long term wealth by first establishing a rental portfolio.

Then, once you do this the supply of buyers will have probably rebounded and you can now invest full time in real estate!

DON'T LISTEN TO THE REAL ESTATE GURUS

This is a hard profession, and not cut out for everyone. Try investing part time first until you have some experience and can then make an educated decision on whether or not this is what you want to do with your life.

Good luck as you begin your investment career! If this blog has helped you in any way, or if you even disagree with anything in it, please let me know with a comment on it at the original place the blog was written.

You can also reach me at one of my websites: STL Real Estate if you would like to discuss investing further.

My last blog goes into detail about the Saint Louis residential market.

Ryan Wessels: a real estate agent that specializes in short sales and foreclosure rescue

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 16:34:06 -0800

The real estate market as well all know has been down for awhile. Almost everyone that has purchased their home in the last five years has only two choices: hold on to the property until the market rebounds, sell your property short of the loan amount (the term for this is a short sale)

Click on this link for more information on Ryan Wessels, a great real estate agent who specializes in St. Louis short sales.

It is a great page to find information on Ryan Wessels, a short sale expert in Saint Louis.

Ryan is a great real estate agent who specializes in foreclosure rescue solutions for Saint Louis homeowners. Ryan Wessels also specializes in short sale solutions for St. Louis homeowners.

If you are looking for a person to help save your home from foreclosure, or do a short sale for you, Ryan Wessels is the perfect fit for your needs.

You can contact Ryan Wessels via email @ ryan@stlforeclosureexpert.com

Ryan Wessels has a wealth of knowledge and experience with short sales and foreclosure rescue, and the last article that he wrote is about short sales and Bank of America.

For more information on short sales, visit this site: St. Louis short sale experts.

Saint Louis short sale expert's take on Bank of America (I'll give you a hint...it isn't good)

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 08:40:12 -0800

STL short sale expert specializes in short sales in Saint Louis. Because we do this, we 'get' to deal with Bank of America quite a bit.

The bank was in the news for good and bad news last week.

For those of you that don't know, Bank of America is the largest lender for single family homes in the US. While one would hope that the largest company is also one of if not the most efficient companies around, our experience of negotiating Saint Louis short sales with them has lead us to the opposite conclusion.

Especially, when we are talking about negotiating Saint Louis short sales with them. This has proven to be especially challenging when we are working with people in need of a foreclosure rescue in Saint Louis.

Last week's news stories involved Bank of America and their inclusion as the first company to join the HAMP program for second lien holders. This was supposed to be the good press from last week. However, this really just shows how much Bank of America is trying to cooperate with the government because they are a company in desperate need of help. (Full article on Bank of America joining Hamp program)

Bank of America acquired Countrywide back in early 2008 in a move that solidified themselves as the largest lender in the United States. Remember the whole subprime mess? You know...That little thing that was a catalyst to the recession that we are currently in. Countrywide actually had the honor of being one of the industry leaders in subprime loans. So, when Bank of America bought Countrywide, it also bought all of the subprime loans and the foreclosures that came along with them.

Not surprisingly, Bank of America is the lender who forecloses on the most houses across the United States. As you can imagine, being a real estate agent that specializes in short sales in Saint Louis, Missouri, I have the wonderful luck of getting to negotiate short sales with them on a very consistent basis.

This brings us to the second news story about Bank of America that happened recently. Bank of America actually foreclosed on a property by mistake (click on the link for the whole story by ABC news). Many of my clients contact me for a foreclosure rescue in St. Louis. They contact me, and I am able to negotiate a Saint Louis short sale. Fortunately, I have never had to consult anyone that had their house foreclosed on by mistake!

I often will receive calls from people that aren't necessarily my clients, but are just looking for expert short sale advice. These people will ask me questions about each lender. It is important to know how the institution that holds your loan operates.

Bank of America is arguably the worst lender to deal with when facing a short sale situation. This has been true for the last four years. Hopefully with their new system and more organization they will become better at handling short sales over time. It's hard for me to believe they could get worse at handling short sales.

Know that you are not alone if you are in need of a foreclosure rescue, or a short sale in Saint Louis, and are having problems with Bank of America. Even someone such as myself, who negotiates short sales with banks for a living, and specializes in short sales in Saint Louis, has trouble dealing with Bank of America. It is not impossible to deal with them, just very time consuming. So don't expect your problems to be dealt with quickly.

Our last blog was on the topic: holding on to your house, or pursuing a short sale. If you are reading this via an RSS feed, and would like to see the article in its original place: Saint Louis short sale expert's take on Bank of America.

Great article if you find yourself asking: I'm upside down on my mortgage, can/should I do a short sale?

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 28 Jan 2010 12:10:33 -0800

There is a great article on the topic: I'm upside down on my mortgage, should I do a short sale?

This article is designed to let people know that they still have options if they are upside down on their mortgage and live in Saint Louis. A great website exists for people that need short sale help in Saint Louis, Missouri or St. Louis's surrounding counties (counties such as Affton, Shrewsberry, Florissant, Chesterifeld etc).

The site is owned by a company named STL Real Estate. The company is dedicated to first educating its clients, and then providing the best possible 'win' house sale solution.

State of St. Louis Housing Market

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Wed, 27 Jan 2010 19:23:48 -0800

Lately I have been talking to many Saint Louis real estate professionals and lenders. I respect these people and their opinions, and the general consensus is that we have entered into a stable market. Many are also hopeful for the future. I am as well.

I tend to agree with them on the future and that current Saint Louis real estate market has been stable over the past 6 to 8 months.

However, don't make mistake this current stability for a housing recovery.

The housing market (I'm writing this on January 27, 2010) in the immediate future still looks bleak. Our best case scenario is that the market remains stable and doesn't drop any further over the next couple of years. But, without government aid, it is more likely the St. Louis housing market will drop farther.

I know we are looking for a silver lining, that we want things to return back towards a boom so that we can be more comfortable with our economic future. This hope...unfortunate...is not realistic for the immediate future...

Lets get what I'm saying straight..I'm not saying that the overall outlook for our economy and housing market is bleak and going to stay bad forever.

What I AM saying is that we have yet to have our rough landing. As a result, the next couple years may be pretty tough for most families.

The housing market is currently in a situation similar to a Chinese knot tie.

For every 1 qualified buyer in the market, there are about 9 homes for sale. In 2008, 20% of homes sold were in foreclosure, and another 11% were sold via a short sale! (stat found @ CNN Money.)

To make matters worse, it is now harder than ever for a buyer to get qualified for a loan.

This recipe of a huge inventory of homes on the market, combined with new lending requirements that make it much harder to get approved for a loan, does not add up to a near future real estate boom.

Add in to the mix that unemployment still remains incredibly high, and you have for yourself a full fledged real estate recession. The current stability is merely an artificial result of the government aid and intervention that the real estate market has been receiving.

Once the economic aid is taken away, things will begin falling downward again.

Ok. I get the point. Things are bleak for the Saint Louis Real Estate market. How can I tell when the market is going to turnaround?

Supply and demand is the key indicator for recessions and booms. In real estate the supply is houses, and the demand is the amount of buyers in the marketplace. Click on this link for the most recent unemployment rate data that I could find. The chart shows data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics

So...its really that simple...the current vicious cycle will continue until the unemployment rate drops.

Sign up for my STL Real Estate RSS feed to easily see when I write new articles. My next articled is scheduled to be published in a week from today, and if you sign up for the feed it will automatically let you know when the post gets published!

The next article's topic: what is the best investment strategy is for new Saint Louis real estate investors in todays market?

If you need any solid Saint Louis real estate advice, or need to sell a Saint Louis house quickly, contact STL Real Estate!

Is there something for us to look forward to?

Absolutely. Its called the echo boom generation, and ITS BIGGER THAN THE BABY BOOMERS!

Members of the echo boom generation were born from 1981 to 2000. This means that the beginning of the echo boom generation is just entering into the work force. And, once we figure out how to give all of these members jobs, they will have money to spend and fuel the economy onward and upward to greater heights than ever before.

Is HAMP a hamper to saint louis homeowners facing foreclosure?

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 15:21:06 -0800

A great HAMP and short sales was just written by Ryan Wessels. HAMP is the abbreviation that stands for Home Affordable Modification Program.

The home affordable modification program is a government run program that was supposed to help people facing foreclosure stay in there house.

The reality is that the program has not been able to help everyone that is facing foreclosure. As of late December the program had been successful in helping roughly 760,000 loans get modified. On the surface this sounds great, but if you dig a little farther you will find that only 31,000 of these loans have passed through the approval process and been successfully been permanently modified.

No one know how many of the remaining loans will be permanently modified. However, roughly nine months since the program was introduced, it has helped merely 3,500 households a month save their homes. The cost to taxpayers has been roughly 75 billion dollars.

Here is a great article that further explains the pitfall of HAMP. From our experience with Saint Louis short sales, we have dealt with more than one client who attempted the HAMP program only to be denied. The result of their denial caused them to decide the better solution was a short sale.

One of our clients was even still in the HAMP program when we began the short sale process. This St. Louis short sale began in late August. It took the lender eight weeks to finally get the HAMP program canceled!

Do not get me wrong, loan modification is a great solution for you if you want to keep your house. HOWEVER, in many cases this is not a realistic option and you risk losing your house to foreclosure by not exploring our short sale help.

For the lucky few, HAMP is a great thing and has helped them stay in their house. But for the majority of people facing foreclosure, it has not proven to be as helpful as I hoped it would be when they first introduced it.

sell my house fast in saint louis, missouri

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Fri, 08 Jan 2010 11:07:06 -0800

5th sell my house fast tip: contact STL Real Estate!

sell your house fast saint louis homeowners

STL Real Estate's last sell my house fast tip talked about how the days of simply throwing out a for sale by owner sign in your yard, and sitting back waiting for the buyers to come to you are gone. And, they may never return do to the changing times and rise in the cost of living.

Saint Louis is no different than the rest of the country. Unemployment is in double digits and is one reason of many that we are currently in one of the strongest buyers market in history. This has made it much more difficult to sell your house in Saint Louis.

All of St. Louis and Saint Louis county has been affected, whether you live in Affton, Hazelwood, Lindbergh, Maplewood or Ballwin. There are some sell my house fast in Saint Louis statistics that show you have a a difficult task to sell your Saint Louis house. If you are looking to sell your house fast, it is even more challenging.

The real estate professionals at STL Real Estate help people just like you sell their house fast! And they can help you too!

Contacting STL Real Estate is the fastest and best way to sell your house in Saint Louis, Missouri.

Sell My House Fast, Tip #4 for Saint Louis Homeowners

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 11:08:55 -0800

STL Real Estate's 4^th tip: know where your buyers start their search. This tip is very closely related to our first sell my house fast in St. Louis tip.

sell my house fast tip 4

So the first step is to figure out who your target buyer is (explained in more depth in the first sell my house fast tip). Once you know who your buyer is, you can then figure out where they start their search.

Think about it. I realize that this point sounds far too obvious, but you would be amazed at the amount of FSBO homeowners that don't start by figuring out these two steps. To be honest, there are numerous real estate agents that don't even start with these obvious first two steps (so if you want to work with an agent make sure you choose wisely).

So, what is the where? Well, there are thousands of ways to connect yourself with homeowners. Traditional ways include listing your property on the multiple listing service with a realtor, or simply throwing a for sale by owner sign out on your front lawn.

The internet also has numerous ways. For example, if you live in an area such as dogtown in Saint Louis, Missouri. You need to realize that a large percentage of people that buy in dogtown are single people that love the idea of being close to bars and forest park.

So, you then ask yourself how does this type of person look for a house? In the pre-internet days, a young man or woman would often look for their first home by picking out neighborhoods and then driving around in them.

This is no longer the case now!

There are two major differences from when I was a child and before:

GAS is very expensive
The internet

If you don't know much about the internet, or how to find buyers that are looking on the internet. Don't worry about it. That's what we're for.

Remember, if your who is a younger (35 or below), then they most likely are looking for their house on the internet first. So you need to be on the internet broadcasting your house to your potential buyers.

Our last sell my house fast in St. Louis tip was for motivated sellers who need out NOW.

Click here for more information about STL Real Estate.

~~~This blog was reposted with the permission of stlhouseseller.com. The original posting can be found: http://stlhouseseller.com/sell-house-fast-tip-4-saint-louis-homeowners/

Great Short Sale Help Company/Article in Saint Louis, Missouri

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Thu, 31 Dec 2009 09:45:17 -0800

There is a great article on the topic: How do I sell my house if I owe more on it than what its worth in Saint Louis, Missouri?

The point of the article is to let people know that they still have options if they owe more on their house than what its worth. Click on this link for a great website exists for Saint Louis, Missouri homeowners and St. Louis's surrounding counties (counties such as St. Charles, Ballwin, Florissant, Sunset Hills, Shrewsberry just to name a few) that are in need of a short sale.

The site is owned by a company named STL Real Estate that is dedicated to first educating its clients, and then providing the best possible 'win' solutions for each and every one of its clients.

A 'win' is described here as the best possible result measuring a client's personal situation and house condition.

Sell My House Fast, Tip # 2 for Saint Louis Homeowners

James Manning (STL Real Estate) — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 12:27:20 -0800

This is the second tip for Saint Louis Homeowners on how to "sell my house fast." The first tip discussed the importance of figuring out who your buyer is going to be. Click here for the first sell my house fast tip. The second tip to sell my house fast: 2. Look at your property logically, and analyze what needs to be updated/repaired. Sometimes sellers will try to ignore or even hide house defects in hope that buyers won't notice. You should not lie to yourself and pretend a house is in great condition when its not. Buyers and their agents will notice these defects and it will cost you valuable time and money in the long run. The first 30 days that a home is on the market is very important for a house sale. If you ignore the defects of the house, you are risking losing potential buyers and it is costing you $$$ out of your pocket to pay for the holding costs. And, if your house doesn't sell right away, you will have to lower your asking price gain interest back in your property. I personally have made this mistake early in my investing career, and it cost me thousands of dollars. I rehabbed a house in Florissant, Missouri and decided to try and save some money by not replacing the windows. Three months later and $7,000 lower on my asking price, the property still hadn't sold. I finally decided that the windows were in desperate need of replacing. Guess what happened? The first person that looked at my house after I replaced the windows ended up buying the house. My property sold in one week with new windows. Incredible to think that just one improvement can make all the difference in the world. Don't make the same mistake that I did. Analyze your house and what buyers in your area are looking for. If you can afford to, make the necessary improvements and sell that house fast! Now, there are some circumstances where fixing up your home is NOT advisable: 1. The repairs needed are out of your budget and/or capability 2. You are upside down on your mortgage (own more on a home than what it is worth.) 3. You can no longer afford to hold on to the property. For a great 'AS-IS' house sale guide click on the previous link. The Guide is broken down in to twelve parts and is packed with valuable information on selling a home that needs repairs. There is also a great website for Saint Louisans who are upside down on their mortgage and need a short sale.