NEWS ABOUT YOUR CREDIT
Check your credit reports for free.
One of the best ways to protect yourself from identity theft is to monitor your credit history. You can get one free credit report every year from each of the three national credit bureaus. Request all three reports at once, or order from a different bureau every four months. More comprehensive monitoring services from the credit bureaus cost from $44 to $100 per year. Order your free anual credit reports by phone, or online at www.annualcreditreport.com.
Sources: The Federal Trade Comission, the Office of Privacy Protection in the California Department of Consumer Affairs and the Hawaii Assoc. of Realtors.
NEWS ABOUT US
Sotheby's International Realty
Sotheby's International Realty has negotiated the sale of franchise rights in Japan to Urban Corporation, a leading development firm. Japan Sotheby's Internaitonal Realty plans to open their office in Tokyo in early April. In a recent survey conducted by Urban, 70% of their clients polled want to purchase in Hawaii. The currency exchange rate will make purchasing real estate here exceptionally attractive. We look forward to our new affiliate office providing us with the ability to market our property listings to a qualified audience of buyers from Japan. (As an exclusive affiliate of Sotheby's International Realty, we represent a network of offices spanning six continents, comprised of more than 400 of the world's most respected real estate brokerages.)
LuxuryRealEstate.com
We are proud to announce that we were recently selected for membership in LuxuryRealEstate.com. This highly publicized and trafficked website features luxury real estate offerings from around the world. The network consists of 1,621 members, comprising more than 6,000 offices, and 122,000 sales associates in 65 countries spanning the globe. The website captures more than 60 million hits each month, making it the most-viewed luxury website in the world. It has been named "Best of the Web" by Forbes magazine for seven consecutive years and is highly ranked by popular search engines.
NEWS ABOUT LOANS
Daily Real Estate News I February 27, 2008
Refits Drop, Interest Rates Rise
Applications to refinance existing mortgages dropped last week, lowering overall mortgage volume 19.2% to 665.1 compared to the 822.8 the previous week on an adjusted basis, according to the Mortage Bankers Association weekly survey.
The refinance share of mortgage activity decreased to 52% of total applications compared to 61.7% the previous week. The percentage of applicaions for new purchases remained essentially the same, increasing just 02% to 358.2 from 357.6 the previous week.
Mortgage rates rose:
-30-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 6.27% from
6.09%
-15-year fixed-rate mortgages increased to 5.77% from
5.55%
-1-year ARMs increased to 5.84% from 5.72%
Stimulus to Benefit Jumbo Borrowers
The biggest winners in the economic rescue plan that passed the U.S. Congress on Thursday and awaits President Bush's signature are middle- to upper-income Americans who can refinance their jumbo home loans at cheaper rates.
The stimulus package temporarily raises the maximum size of mortgages that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac can purchase and market as securities from $417,000 to as high as $729,750 in expensive parts of the country like New York City and California.
It makes a similar change for loans backed by the Federal Housing Administration, which insures loans to borrowers with weak credit.
Right now, borrowers in expensive areas are "really stuck between a rock and a hard place," says Mark Vitner, senior economist with Wachovia Corp. Raising the caps, he says, will result in a refinancing boom for those properties.
"We're more likely to see an immediate improvement at the upper end than we are at the lower end" of the housing market, he says.
Source: The Associated Press, Alan Zibel (02/08/2008)
NEWS ABOUT THE MARKET
The 2008 Top 25
Real Estate Market Forecast
An amazing dozen states' real estate markets are represented on the 2008 Housing Predictor Top 25 Market List.
The Top 25 with the highest forecast appreciation have the greatest probability of reaching their forecast of the more han 250 local housing markets Housing Predictor forecasts. In 2007 Housing Predictor's forecasts were 86% correct within a 1 to 2 percent margin.
Yakima, Washington in eastern Washington State won the #1 position with forecast appreciation of 7.1% after appreciating strongly in the past year. Yakima still has a fairly active market, despite mortgage woes.
However, Hawaii is the strongest single state in the nation for real estate sales, and Honolulu was seleed for the second spot in the Top 25, followed by Salem, Oregon.
Six states each placed 3 communities on the list.
Interestingly, the top markets for 2008 are scattered throughout all parts of the U.S., from the we to the east and into the southern states. No particular area was more dominate than another as more and more smaller communities based on population made the forecast. The forecast shows a strong trend that is developing in the U.S. More people are moving to smaller, less urban cities seeking a better quality of life.
KEEP INFORMED
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