You saw it here first.  Maybe.

It's off to President Obama.  "It" being the extension and expansion of the First Time Buyers' Tax Credit.

Here is the House of Representatives vote

If nothing else, that should get the closing attornies a hectic December 2009, and June 2010.

Gratuitous Graphic

I forsee a lot of 70 day closings coming up in April 2010, as folks try to hit the contract deadline and max out the closing time period.

As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, the Senate voted 98-0 to pass the extension and expansion of the First Time Homebuyers Tax Credit.

As expected, $8,000 will be given to first timers, with an increase in income levels to define eligibility.  And the move up buyer may also qualify for $6500 in credit.

Expected to pass in the House and quickly to be signed into law by President Obama?

Whoopee.

Wait until the moaning and groaning and gnashing of teeth starts in April, 2010, when it becomes clear that some folks have missed the boat.

Is this a new organic staging approach that didn't get enough publicity?  Is it a local Cary, NC, thing, or is it featured on "Divine Design?"  Or some other HGTV show?  "The Stagers," maybe?

Showed a home with multiple challenges today, and at the side of the front stoop was a skin shed from about a 30" snake.

Buyer pointed it out and laughed.  A lot harder than Mrs. Buyer did, by the way.

We had a nice chat about copperheads, vs. rattlers, vs. water moccasins. What fun!

The things you remember from a day on the roadshow...

We get the calls routinely, "Can you help us find foreclosure listings?"

More often than not, the questioner means they would like to hear about homes upon which the lender has foreclosed, that are entered into the Triangle MLS when the bank is ready to sell them.  They often are looking for foreclosures in hopes that they can gain more affordable housing around Cary, NC.  Whether foreclosures make for more affordable homes is debatable, but one thing at a time........

I always want to say, "Yes," and I always catch myself and say, "Well, kinda...  Sorta..."

See, there is no provision in our Triangle MLS rules that require a listing agent to identify a home as in the foreclosure process, or as a bank-owned foreclosure, "REO."

Some try.  Some don't try.  Some try to obscure the status so they can semi-pocket the listing and get the Buy side commission, I think.

Triangle MLS has taken a recent measure towards gaining clarity.  A "Special Conditions" field will go live on the MLS on November 3, 2009.  And in that "Special Conditions" field, it will be required to indicate if a home is a short sale.   The field also offers listing agents the option to indicate if a home is in the foreclosure process, or if it is already bank-owned. 

Frankly, I don't get it.  I understand the Short Sale requirement.  If the list price is inadequate to cover outstanding liens and pay costs of the transactions.  That is a material fact that will impact the Seller's ability to convey title.

What I don't understand is:  Who is served by providing confusion regarding "In Foreclosure Process," or that fact that a property is an "REO?"  With these two options being, well Optional, we will be in the same circumstance.  Unable to build a search for one of our hottest commodities currently: REO's.

The intrinsic value in an MLS is the data, and the integrity of the data.  Providing opportunity to obscure data, and to corrupt the integrity of the data diminishes the value of the Listing Service.  It makes that data unreliable.

I'm hoping that this is an incremental change that foreshadows a move by the Triangle MLS directors to at some point make these fields mandatory, so we can search by In Foreclosure Process and REO statuses and gain reliable information.

I'm not reporting a "Done Deal," a la some to whom Lenn refers.  I'm only striving to comprehend...

 

So...  What will be the impermanent panacea of the moment in May, 2010?  I mean, we are looking at a proposed, Senate-Approved, credit that ends in April.  What's next?

These meddlers are fixin' to aggravate any normally functioning person.  Thanks, WRAL-TV.

And, I think the politicos have tortured the nerves of a lot of people who are not real estate professionals.  The tax credit cacaphony rattles around forever, it seems.

I think the last two credits have been bad policy, for what that is worth.

Regardless, the workings of our government vividly portray one of the weakest links in the USA:  Short-term thinking without stability or predictability.  Government by Twitter.

See you in May, 2010!

 

Cary, NC, is well known as a town with expensive housing and some lack of affordable homes. This results from a very desirable location and a very high economic demographic. Advanced degrees are a common denominator in Cary.

Cary has an Affordable Housing Initiative in place to encourage offering of affordable homes to Cary residents.

It is noteworthy that many town employees and other service industry employees are commonly unable to afford a home in Cary.

On October 31, 2009, Cary residents are invited to sit in on a Wake County Affordable Housing Project design workshop, which will be held at the Page-Walker Arts and History Center, 119 Ambassador Loop, Cary, NC 27513.

It should be interesting, with graduate students from NC State's School of Architecture holding forth. Arguably, Town of Cary policies help to inflate the cost of residential construction in Cary. Can professional design overcome artificial pricing effects of policy?

Of course, being Wordless Wordless Wednesday, and all, I couldn't offer Susie Blackmon an explanation about the fact that my photo this morning was 2 years old.

So, I went out and shot one today, and uploaded it to WW Wednesday:  Silverlake Today.  And, no worries, Susie.  It didn't hurt when I fell off the guardrail.  Dang bushes have grown a couple of feet in the last two years, and I had to ELEVATE!

Then I got on a roll and shot about 113 photos of the fall season around Cary.

What fun!

Uploaded over 272 MB to Flickr, and listened to the internet grunt...

See, Susie, we DO have color changes in Cary!

A few free samples: