Our area of expensive real estate out here in Coastal California is famous for many things, but NOT for first time buyers. Long ago these buyers were chased away by high prices into the interior of California where vast stretches of open land meant builders could build cheap houses, and cheap gas meant that buyers could commute over to their jobs in the coastal cities.
As my mother from Tennessee would say, first time buyers in our mortgage office were rarer than hen's teeth. (Do all southerners have chicken expressions? She would also say things like "running around like a chicken with its head cut off"...eeew).
But guess what? A combination of falling prices and a lending world that is determined not to let entry level buyers fall into credit crisis quicksand, has caused a renaissance of first time buyers in our area.
Thank goodness. Without that injection from the vibrant younger generation, a community becomes stuffy and boring. Bring on the first time buyers with their kids to fill the parks and schools, their innovative ideas to improve the community, and opinions that rock the boat. We need them desperately.
At the mortgage office, we still have our million dollar mortgages and our lenders hate them. They think of a thousand different reasons NOT to do them, never disclosing the REAL reason: they would be "stuck" with these loans (unable to re-sell them). So these files sit and languish, as daily new restrictions come down the pipe closing each little tiny opening that might allow one of these loans to close for the average borrower.
At the same time, first time buyers are just starting to catch on to the fact FHA has blossomed here after laying dormant for literally years. It may not be the old 100% financing that disappeared, but at 97%? CLOSE ENOUGH.
It isn't the old subprime that allowed first time buyers to sneak into home ownership with a weird loan they didn't understand and a higher rate. But a few skeletons in the old credit closet doesn't matter to FHA.
And then there is that battering of prices that has caused the $500,000 house to be a $350,000 house. Could prices drop even lower? Well, yes they could. But finally, most first time buyers have come to the conclusion the REWARDS of the opportunity outweigh the RISK of waiting around any longer.
When they ask me about the RISK, I tell them flat out: the house could lose value. Understand that you could end up owing more that the house is worth, rendering you unable to sell or the refinance.
The reward? You have bought LOW (even if house goes lower). You have bought in an area that you could have never bought in a few years ago. And your loan? Not some exotic subprime thing that will explode in 2 years.
A good old fashioned 30 year fixed at an all time low rate.
I don't know about you, but if I'm gonna be stuck? That's a good way to be stuck.
Written by Janet Guilbault, California Mortgage Expert Based Out of the San Francisco Bay Area.
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