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(Florida Plays Host to One of the Most Desirable Places in America to “Tie the Knot”. Weddings Mean.. Romance, Paradise, Beauty, Love, Fun, & Relaxing.. It’s Interesting the Same Words To Describe Wedding, Describe Quality of Life in the Sunshine State..)

Prospects for Florida’s recovery heat up, economists say

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – May 5, 2009 – After two long years of recession, economists are beginning to see signs that the economy’s recovery is finally in sight. South Florida home sales are picking up, Wall Street has staged some solid rallies and even consumer confidence is rising.

But the road to recovery will be uneven. Economists say that an uptick in business spending will lead the way, followed by federal government stimulus projects that will create some jobs. Consumers, unfortunately, are likely to be the last to see good times return, because widespread unemployment – which is now just a notch below 10 percent – won’t start to go down until after the recovery is well under way.

It has been rough, but economists say it’s always that way for Florida.

“It performs better in good times, but during bad times, in recessions, it is one of the worst performing states in the nation,” said Moody’s Economy.com economist Chris Lafakis. “And during times of expansion it is one of the best.”

Some experts say they already see the early signs of such progress.

“The negative numbers just start getting smaller or they stop falling or they fall at a slower rate,” said SunTrust Chief Economist Gregory Miller. It’s like you tumbled out of a boat a while ago and “now we’re at the stage of swimming back to the surface.”

Other economists agree that the worst may be over as soon as this summer. Consumers surely have had enough, judging by the strong jump in Floridians’ consumer confidence this month.

Here’s how economists say the state will find its way out of the slump:

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(This Report Represents is a Nice Snapshot of Florida home sales in the Greater Ft. Launderdale Area (RAGFL = Realtor Association of Greater Fort Lauderdale). This is a Metropolitan Area of Florida that has Traditionally Established Buying Trends in the Sunshine State..)

Florida’s existing home, condo sales rise in January 2009 January existing-home sales fall, inventory down, says NAR
ORLANDO, Fla. – Feb. 25, 2009 – Florida’s existing home sales rose in January, making it the fifth month in a row that sales activity showed increases in the year-to-year comparison, according to the latest housing data released by the Florida Association of Realtors® (FAR). Existing home sales rose 24 percent last month with a total of 8,450 homes sold statewide compared to 6,810 homes sold in January 2008, according to FAR.

“Many people are looking at today’s market and seeing opportunities to find the home or business they’ve always wanted,” said 2009 FAR President Cynthia Shelton. “With a range of available housing options, historically low mortgage interest rates and affordable prices, buyers who may have been hesitant before should take a closer look at the current opportunities for homeownership. As real estate professionals who know all aspects of their local market conditions, Florida Realtors are here to help counsel consumers making sound long-term decisions for their homes and their businesses.”

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(This is a nice example of how a Homeowners Association Breaks Down its HOA fee, billed to Residents.. This Particular Development is the Collegiate Villa Condominiums, located in Manhatten, Kansas & is Very Well Maintained & One of My Favorite Communities in Manhatten.)

Condo and homeowner associations have tough time covering budgets

SOUTH FLORIDA – Feb. 24, 2009 – The pain being experienced by Florida’s condo and homeowner associations in the state’s epic foreclosure crisis worsened in the last half of 2008, forcing more to cut back services and levy special assessments to meet their budgets, according to a survey released Tuesday by the Hollywood-based Community Association Leadership Lobby.

The survey of 1,589 Florida property owners by CALL, a group formed in 2003 by Hollywood-based law firm Becker & Poliakoff, comes as Florida lawmakers begin to look for ways to address the impact of foreclosures on community associations, particularly condominiums.

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January 2009 pending sales jump almost 18 percent

In the face of national economic doom and gloom, pending sales in the Sarasota real estate market rose to 683 in January 2009 as reported by members of the Sarasota Association of Realtors®, topping the 500 level for the 13th month in a row. Pending sales last month were much higher than the 516 reported in January 2008, which indicates that local real estate has bucked the national downward to some extent.
 
Pending sales reflect contracts executed by buyers and sellers. The recent numbers demonstrate a steady, strong pattern, indicating buyers have become more active in the Sarasota market as the traditional season heats up.

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(Ben Bernanke, Federal Reserve Chairman, told that much more has to be done by the government to fight with the problem of foreclosure. Foreclosure rates remain too high, & more money may be needed for aid.. Statistically, 15-20% of homeowners are suffering from some form of Mortgage problem. 30-year fixed mortgage rates may reach lows of 4.5% sooner, than later..)  

Foreclosure aid likely to help four states most

WASHINGTON – Jan. 20, 2009 – The nation’s foreclosure crisis is centered in four states. But taxpayers across the country will feel the pain of bailing them out.

California, Florida, Nevada and Arizona generated about half of all foreclosure filings nationwide last year, according to RealtyTrac Inc., even though residents in those states hold just a quarter of U.S. mortgages. Since mid-2007, skyrocketing foreclosures in those states have been magnifying the national rate.

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(Durability is a key tenet of a good green home plan. A green home plan will strive to use eco-friendly building materials and furnishings and will incorporate leftovers wherever possible. A green home design will make use of materials that are renewable and long lasting.. This is the future of real estate construction..) 

Green home features grow in demand

WASHINGTON – Jan. 20, 2009 – Today’s home buyers are asking for more green features as a means of lowering costs, becoming more environmentally friendly, and adopting a healthier lifestyle.

“Green features are becoming one of the top three priorities, after price and location,” says Joseph Himali, Washington’s Greater Capital Area Association of Realtors Board of Directors president.

Green features focus on energy efficiency, water efficiency, resource efficiency and indoor air quality and include such elements as Energy Star appliances, low-flow shower heads, carpets and paint with low volatile organic compounds, and building materials procured from local suppliers.

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(Citizens Property Insurance Chairman, Bruce Douglas, Will be Answering Questions..)

Citizens hit with additional asset losses

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Dec. 15, 2008 – The credit market’s turmoil continues to haunt the state-run property insurer.

Citizens Property Insurance has written down an additional $119.5 million of the value of troubled mortgage-backed securities that had been included in a state-run investment pool.

The company’s general counsel disclosed at Friday’s Board of Governors meeting in Jacksonville that the state insurer has fielded questions from the Securities and Exchange Commission on the sale of auction-rate securities earlier this year. The notes were repurchased in June when there were no buyers for auction-rate notes.

A subpoena from the SEC’s Washington office was received by Citizens in June. It replied to the SEC’s inquiry in early July.

The state’s Office of Financial Regulation confirmed that it has an open investigation of Citizens. But a spokeswoman wouldn’t say why the insurer was being investigated or when the investigation started.

In 2007, Citizens had invested more than $2 billion in the Local Government Investment Pool run by the State Board of Administration. Like many cities, counties and local agencies, Citizens’ money in this fund was frozen after the news that several of its mortgage-related securities were downgraded caused a run.

As a result, the fund divided its money into two pools and restricted access to investors to prevent them from withdrawing their entire balance at one time.

Citizens has had more than $651 million sitting in the fund since last December, but will gain full access to the money Dec. 23. The insurer has $73.3 million in Fund B, which contains the most troubled securities, that it still can’t touch.

The $119.5 million write-down reflects the difference in current market price for these securities and what Citizens paid for them, Kerry McGovern, Citizens’ investment manager, told a Citizens governors board committee meeting Thursday. That’s in addition to an $88 million write-down last December.

McGovern said about 79 percent of the September write-down came from the securities in the local investment pool’s Fund B. The rest came from losses on Lehman Brothers Holdings, the Wall Street broker and investment firm that filed for bankruptcy in September.

Given continued market declines, McGovern said further markdowns might be needed at the end of the year.

Citizens did manage to skirt losses on about $8 million it had invested in the Reserve Primary money market fund, which “broke the buck” in mid-September when losses pushed its per-share price below a dollar.

McGovern said Citizens will be able to recoup its investment after Jan. 5.

At the board meeting, the financial statement presented by Sharon Binnun, Citizens’ chief financial officer, showed the insurer had a surplus of $3.3 billion at the end of the third quarter. Surplus is cash the insurer has stocked away to pay future claims.

Christine Turner, Citizens’ director of government relations, said the insurer has provided the documents and information requested by the SEC regarding its repurchase of auction-rate notes. She called it a “fact-finding inquiry.”

Citizens repurchased the notes when rates on these securities rose sharply as the credit markets deteriorated.

Both current board chairman James Malone and former chairman Bruce Douglas had been informed of the SEC inquiry. But the board hadn’t been told about it until Friday’s board meeting when the SEC request was mentioned during the general counsel’s report.

Allan Katz, a Tallahassee attorney and one of the governors, was dismayed that the board hadn’t been told earlier. Routine or not, “you don’t wait five months to tell board members.”

Copyright © 2008 The Miami Herald, Beatrice E. Garcia. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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(Mortgage Rates just plunged to 4.5% (Compare that to the Historic Real Estate Mortgage Graph Above), which will be enticing for many “Sidelining” consumers to jump into the Real Estate Market. This still won’t be enough to stabalize our Markets depreciating condition. This rate only applies to “Purchasing New Homes” & not refinancing. Only a week after the Federal Reserve unveiled a $600 billion plan to reduce mortgage rates, the Treasury Department is considering adding to the effort to lower rates even more.)

 Mortgage rates drop to lowest level since January

WASHINGTON – Dec. 5, 2008 – Rates on 30-year mortgages plunged this week to the lowest level since January after the government launched a sweeping new effort to aid the U.S. housing market.

Mortgage finance giant Freddie Mac reported Thursday that average rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages dropped to 5.53 percent in the largest one-week drop in 27 years. That was down from 5.97 percent last week, and the lowest since the week of Jan. 24, when it was at 5.48 percent.

Further drops could be on the way if the government launches an industry-backed plan to lower the rate on a 30-year mortgage to 4.5 percent by spending hundreds of billions to buy mortgage-backed securities issued by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

That would follow an effort announced last week by the Federal Reserve, which is planning to purchase up to $600 billion of mortgage-backed securities and other debt issued by Fannie and Freddie and the Federal Home Loan Banks. Those institutions don’t make loans directly to consumers, but provide money to the mortgage market by packaging loans into investments.

The Fed’s move caused rates to immediately drop by about a half-point, and many in the real estate industry hope rates will keep dropping as the government increases efforts to battle the credit crisis.

Rates “are now almost a full percentage point lower since the last week in October,” Freddie Mac Chief Economist Frank Nothaft said in a statement.

Bringing mortgage rates down is positive, but it “doesn’t help people that currently have unaffordable mortgages because it doesn’t help them refinance,” Sheila Bair, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp., said Thursday. “Low interest rates help some consumers, but the ones that really need help and can’t refinance are not helped.”

Meanwhile, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said the government can take steps to improve the functioning of the mortgage market, which would allow more people to secure home loans and help stabilize the housing market. Currently, he said, “the mortgage market is dysfunctional.”

Mortgage rates are sinking as Treasury yields, some of the most sensitive barometers of investor sentiment, have dropped to record lows this week as a torrent of bad economic news continues. But as investors send yields down, they’re also influencing the economy – driving interest rates so low that savers get punished and borrowers get a break.

Treasury buying has picked up and sent yields down because the economy is in a recession that investors believe will be long and deep.

Consumers already are taking advantage of the situation. New mortgage applications more than doubled last week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association’s weekly survey released Wednesday. Refinance volume more than tripled, and made up nearly 70 percent of all applications.

Rates on other types of mortgages also fell, according to Freddie Mac’s survey. For 15-year, fixed-rate mortgages, rates averaged 5.33 percent, down from 5.74 percent last week.

Rates on five-year, adjustable-rate mortgages dipped to 5.77 percent, compared with 5.86 percent last week. Rates on one-year, adjustable-rate mortgages dropped to 5.02 percent, from 5.18 percent last week.

The rates do not include add-on fees known as points. The nationwide fee for 30-year and 15-year mortgages averaged 0.7 point last week. The fee on five-year, adjustable-rate mortgages averaged 0.6 point, while the fee on one-year adjustable-rate mortgages averaged 0.5 point.

A year ago, the nationwide average rate on 30-year mortgages stood at 5.96 percent, 15-year mortgage rates averaged 5.65 percent, five-year adjustable-rate mortgages were at 5.75 percent, and one-year adjustable-rate mortgages stood at 5.46 percent.

The rate on Fannie Mae 30-year mortgage-backed securities fell to about 4.25 percent Thursday, said Kevin Giddis, managing director of fixed income at Morgan Keegan. That is down from about 5.5 percent in mid-November.

Fears of a protracted recession are slamming Treasury yield, which is good for borrowers with mortgage rates tied to Treasurys, but bad for people invested in money market funds that have been buying up Treasurys for safety.

Treasury prices fell again on Thursday, sending rates to new record lows, as the Dow Jones industrial average fell more than 200 points. The 10-year Treasury note yielded 2.56 percent, down from 2.67 percent late Wednesday, while the 30-year Treasury bond yielded 3.07 percent, down from 3.17 percent.

Copyright © 2008 The Associated Press, Alan Zibel (AP Real Estate Writer). All rights reserved

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Foreclosure reprieve gives hope to families

TAMPA, Fla. – Dec. 1, 2008 – Tiffany Edwards thought she was running out of time to persuade her lender to work out a new loan so her growing family could stay in their Tampa home.

She had been out of work for more than a year, and her husband’s income wasn’t enough to cover all the family’s bills. She found a job a few weeks ago, but her lender was already set to foreclose on the house – likely before Christmas.

With a 3-year old daughter and a baby on the way, Edwards panicked. Then came last week’s announcement that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – the nation’s two largest providers of mortgages – will postpone foreclosures until early January. In the meantime, they will try to work out loan modifications so more homeowners can keep their homes.

“What a stress relief,” Edwards said. “Now I have hope we’re going to be able to work something out.”

The Edwardses are one of about 16,000 families nationwide who are eligible for the help. The foreclosure suspension is exactly the kind of action some economists and industry leaders say is needed as the foreclosure crisis weighs down the entire economy. Florida Gov. Charlie Crist is contemplating a way to get lenders to agree to a moratorium on foreclosures until after the holidays.

There were cheers when Fannie and Freddie agreed to hold off on some foreclosures. But now that the dust is settling, many wonder how significant the action will really be.

That’s because after Jan. 9, the people helped by the reprieve could still lose their homes. Even if all those people work out new loans, they still represent a small percentage of the more than 2 million homes that are expected to be lost in foreclosure before late 2009.

“This is great, it really is,” said Debbi Colon, a Catholic Charities foreclosure counselor who has worked with the Edwards family. “But it’s just a first step.”

After the announcement last week, her phone rang all day and night from clients wondering if they qualified for the reprieve, Colon said. Most don’t, she said, because their loans are held by private companies.

That’s the downside of the plan, Colon said. Only homeowners with loans owned by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are eligible. Together, the two companies own only about 20 percent of the nation’s delinquent loans.

Of the loans that Fannie and Freddie own, not all of them are eligible for the reprieve. Homeowners must be still living in the home and must be at least three months behind on their payments.

For those who are lucky enough to get a second chance at a loan modification, Fannie and Freddie’s new program could be a big help. It calls for mortgage payments – including taxes and insurance – to total no more than 38 percent of homeowners’ pretax monthly income.

Officials for the Center for Responsible Lending said they are encouraged by Fannie and Freddie’s holiday reprieve, but know it’s not a solution.

“This is a solid step in the right direction,” said Ginna Green, spokeswoman for the center. “But we must also aim for solutions – like streamlined modifications – that keep families in their homes for the long term as well as the short term.”

Even so, Edwards and her family say they are thankful for the extra time in their home. No matter how long that ends up being.

Copyright © 2008 Tampa Tribune, Fla., Shannon Behnken. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services.

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(Beautiful Waterfront Real Estate Continues to Provide Sarasota with Luxury Home Sales. The Waterfront Market is a Leading Indicator of Real Estate Values in Sarasota, as the Demand for Ownership Typically Starts There..)

ORLANDO, Fla., Nov. 18, 2008 – Sales of existing single-family homes in Florida rose 5 percent in third quarter 2008 compared to the same period last year, according to the latest housing statistics from the Florida Association of Realtors® (FAR). A total of 33,203 existing homes sold statewide in 3Q 2008; during the same period last year, a total of 31,558 existing homes sold statewide.

“Coming on the heels of positive sales activity in September, Florida’s existing home sales are once again above year-ago levels in the third quarter,” says 2008 FAR President Chuck Bonfiglio. “Despite lending restrictions and the difficulties of finding affordable credit, we’re seeing buyers take advantage of homeownership opportunities in the current market – buyers who want to make a long-term investment in their future. And, more than ever, people are turning to Florida Realtors to find the professional expertise, knowledge and friendly guidance they need to make the complex process of buying or selling their home go more easily and smoothly.”

The statewide existing-home median sales price was $185,400 in the third quarter; a year ago, it was $233,200 for a decrease of 20 percent. In 2003, the third-quarter statewide median sales price was $163,700, which reflects an increase of about 13.3 percent over the five-year period. The median is a typical market price where half the homes sold for more, half for less.

Twelve of Florida’s metropolitan statistical areas (MSAs) reported increased sales of existing homes in the third quarter compared to the same three-month-period a year ago, while seven MSAs also showed gains in condo sales. A number of local markets have reported increased sales activity over the past few months, according to FAR.

Florida Realtors continued to report positive signs for the state’s housing sector in the third quarter, including an increase in pending home sales (based on contracts signed but not closed) and a slower rate of expansion of inventory levels in some areas.

To gain insight into current trends in Florida’s real estate industry, the University of Florida’s Bergstrom Center for Real Estate Studies conducts a quarterly survey of industry executives, market research economists, real estate scholars and other experts. According to the third quarter 2008 survey, the investment outlook for various types of properties remains steady. “People who have responded to our surveys have not lost their faith in Florida as a place to be and a place to invest,” said Dr. Wayne Archer, director of UF’s Bergstrom Center for Real Estate Studies. “We have 40 pages of comments from our respondents, and although the dominant theme is the disruption of financing, perhaps the second theme, as one person put it, is people being on the sidelines with full pads and helmets just waiting to jump back in.”

Over the long term, Florida stands to benefit from the migration of new residents, particularly as baby boomers age, Archer said, adding that the Sunshine State’s mild climate and outdoor amenities continue to make it an attractive retirement destination.

In the year-to-year quarterly comparison for condo sales, 9,472 units sold statewide for the quarter compared to 9,680 in 3Q 2007 for a 2 percent decrease. The statewide existing-condo median sales price was $160,000 for the three-month period; in 3Q 2007, it was $196,000 for an 18 percent decrease.

Continuing low mortgage rates remain another favorable influence on the housing sector. According to Freddie Mac, the national commitment rate for a 30-year conventional fixed-rate mortgage averaged 6.32 percent in third quarter 2008; one year earlier, it averaged 6.55 percent.

The latest industry outlook from the National Association of Realtors® (NAR) cautions the housing sector likely faces disruptions from the still-stabilizing credit market. “Inventory remains high, and price declines are pressuring owners,” said NAR Chief Economist Lawrence Yun. “Additional housing stimulus would stabilize prices more quickly, which in turn would bring faster stability to Wall Street. Removing the repayment feature on the first-time buyer tax credit and permanently raising loan limits would bring more buyers into the market and further reduce inventory.”

© 2008 FLORIDA ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS

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