1) How bad will foreclosures hurt your credit? – What I find most interesting about this is how things effect your FICO score different based on where your FICO score starts.
2) Carpeting – It’s time to add it as a disclosure topic to the AAR seller property disclosure statement – Lorti makes a great case on why carpet and other flooring should be added as something the seller discloses to the buyer.
3) The move-up buyer’s gameplan – So much attention has been given to the first-time homebuyer market because of the $8000 tax credit. With the addition of the $6500 move-up buyer credit we could see more people looking to get a bigger house with today’s deflated prices.
4) Climategate posts – With the news this week that climate scientist were fudging the numbers to make the data say what they want on climate change, here are two posts on the effects of the climate change debate and real estate. Climategate & you: The real estate edition and a video Will fraudulent climate changed revelations effect housing?
5) How to safely text and email while driving – What does this have to do with real estate? Nothing, unless you are a real estate agent who spends as much time as me a day in the car and finds yourself wandering daily because of texting and emailing.
6) 640 is the new 580 – 580, 620 now 640, minimum FICO scores continue to rise for a mortgage.
7) President Obama Calling Lenders to the Carpet Today – Obama is expected to try to shame banks into moving faster on saving houses from foreclosure (they are talking about you Bank of America). My take is just stop giving them my money (TARP) and if they don’t want to approve loan mods or short sales and would rather make the poor economic choice of foreclosure let them sink.
8) A question that needs to be asked more often… – When deciding how long you are going to live in your home are you considering the variable of what interest rates may be then?
9) Should we put our home on the market during the holidays or wait until spring? – One thing is for sure, anyone looking at your house during the holiday season is very likely a serious buyer.
10) Evaluating professionals: Imperfect solution for an imperfect world – Agent ratings, always a fun and popular topic.
Dean, you have a knack for finding the good stuff on the web. Thanks.