A Primer on New Construction Finance

This week alone, I spoke with 7 families about how to finance their brand new home.  That’s a sharp tick up in the number of people who have determined that their next home will be a new one.  With the Fall Parade of Homes about to kick into high gear, I thought it might be important to cover some of the basics of construction lending, since it is often a requirement today for the buyer to obtain the interim construction financing in addition to approval for the permanent mortgage.  I know you may have heard otherwise but construction financing is once again readily available to qualified buyers. Read the rest of this entry »

I have this ritual every morning.  I get up, pour myself a cup of coffee, throw on my sandals and walk down to the mailbox to get the paper.  It’s a long winding driveway and gives me a chance to survey the scenery.  The sky was jigsaw puzzle blue today and the cool nights have made the grass a lush vital green.

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Just after midnight last night, I was startled out of my sleep by the sounds of chairs flying across my deck and tree branches cracking.  Our windows were rattling and creaking under the strain of howling winds and pelting rain. At any moment, I expected the house to implode with the strain. The lights stuttered for a minute and then everything went black.   With each flash of lightning, I could see trees bending to the ground and debris flying in all directions.  Coward that I am, I made a beeline for the basement and camped out until the wind died down.  With the dawn’s light, I threw on my flip flops and went out to survey the damage.  One of my hanging baskets Read the rest of this entry »

On Tuesday of this week, my mother called. It was 6:35AM. In a voice as soft as a whisper, she told me she wanted me to call Hospice.  She was prepared, she said, to bring the final chapter of her life to a conclusion.  I was talking to a friend of mine about her and he told me that when we are very little we count our birthdays in half years. A four year old will tell you, for instance, that they are 4 and a half wanting you to understand how important it is that they have moved past being just 4. Once we hit 60, we start to do it again. My mother is 85 and almost a half.  She caught pneumonia after suffering a compression fracture in her L2 vertebrae. The rest of her life is being measured in hours and minutes.

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Winston Churchill once said that “a pessimist sees the difficulties associated with every opportunity and that an optimist sees the opportunities associated with every difficulty.” 

 Just for fun I decided to do a little math problem this week.  Rates actually hit 4.375% on a 30 year fixed rate.  Can you believe it?!  There are people who are on the sidelines waiting for prices to fall further before they make the leap of faith that we have finally hit bottom. Read the rest of this entry »

Rome wasn’t built in a day

Toss a coin over your shoulder into the Trevi  Fountain and the superstition is that your wish to return to Rome will be granted. We couldn’t resist. It was blazing hot while we were there last week. I wanted to dive in and cool off but thought they might take me for a fountain bandit. Rumor has it that over 3,000 Euro per day are tossed into the fountain and collected to feed and care for the poor in Rome. The water in the fountain comes from a Roman aqueduct, Aque Vergine built in 18BC, Read the rest of this entry »

All too quickly, we have arrived at Half Time. With the tax credit now behind us, and 6 more months before us, it seemed like a good time to take a couple of weeks off and get in some R & R. We’re off to the City of Eternal Love, Rome. Have you ever noticed the clarity of purpose that occurs right before a vacation? I don’t know about you but checklists sprouted everywhere…on my desk, my kitchen counter, in my purse. One by one, everything got done. It’s 11PM now and pretty soon, I’m going to need to take my own advice and get a good night’s sleep. Read the rest of this entry »

Fanniemae takes a hard line on Strategic Defaults

On Wednesday, Fanniemae announced a Major Policy change with regard to borrowers who can afford to pay but simply walk away. Underwater, but able to pay, this group tends to be well educated with higher than average credit scores. Read the rest of this entry »

Washington, DC/Rochester, NY – Word that the US Senate passed an amendment to extend the closing deadline for home buyers who qualified for the tax credit pleases realtors.

The original deadline date of June 30 has now been extended to September 30.  Read the rest of this entry »

“In the land of the blind, the one eyed man is king!”  -Erasmus.  With an oil spill in the Gulf, an economic meltdown in Europe, and a Volcano in Iceland making recent headlines and sending the stock market on a roller coaster ride, it would be difficult to predict exactly what might impact the markets next.  In real estate, those who know half of what is going on will be in a better position to help their clients succeed than those who don’t understand what direction the market is headed. Read the rest of this entry »

My granddaughter Delaney called me this morning to report that her Daddy will be returning from his tour of duty in Afghanistan in the next couple of weeks and could we please build her bike. Her Christmas gift from Grandpa and I was her first bicycle. That wintry day, with tears in her eyes, she asked us if we could ‘save it’ until her Dad got back to teach her how to ride it. Their twins, Sully and Ryan, will be 2 on Monday. While he was gone, they learned Read the rest of this entry »

There is simply nothing in the world that I am more passionate about than stalking the elusive Walleye.  If you see me sporting a tan, you can bet I got it on the water with a rod and reel in my hand.  I always Read the rest of this entry »

The story of Mtera

Traveling with a volunteer group in 2002, I landed in a rural school in Tanzania. Mtera Secondary School is located half way between the towns of Dodoma and Iringa.  In 2002, the school was just beginning to get started. Read the rest of this entry »

April 30, 2010-time’s up but we’re not done yet.

With no extension of the homebuyer tax credits in sight, today will be the last frenzied day of deal making for home buyers and sellers intent on taking advantage of this bonanza.  The next deadline is June 30^th.  There is still one qualification to be met and that is that all of these purchases must close no later than June 30^th in order to meet the final IRS test for deduction on tax returns and they require a copy of your HUD 1 Settlement Statement to prove that the transaction was consummated on time. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s 6:30AM.  I woke up this morning at 4:14AM, my circadian rhythm interrupted by this constant humming noise that comes every spring.    My neighbors are out in full force, fertilizing, plowing and seeding their fields.  Read the rest of this entry »

It’s that time of year when we pull out the extension ladder, take down the Christmas lights, and if you’re anything like me,  create an ambitious  to-do list of warm weather projects.  Last weekend, I pulled out the belt sander and wore a hole through my knee sanding down all of the cedar boards on our one and a half year old deck.  The winter ice storms were unkind to my solid stain to say the least and I was apparently not thinking clearly when I decided that cedar was the ‘Greener’ choice.  Having completed a tear down and rebuild just a year and a half ago, my husband finds it difficult to comprehend how I can find so many additional projects to do and pulls out the Advil in anticipation of my next suggestion.  After completing 17 whole house renovation projects with me, he’s ready to retire his tool belt. Read the rest of this entry »

– Attention shoppers: You have barely a month left before the homebuyer tax credit expires. But depending on where you live, you might not want to rush out to buy.

First-time homebuyers may qualify for up to $8,000, while those who are trading up could get as much as $6,500. But either way, buyers have to ink sales contracts by the end of April and close before July 1 to see the refund. Read the rest of this entry »

The sun is just about to come up and there is a pale glow of morning off to the east. Though it is 22 degrees outside right now, I know that with the sunrise, the temperature will also rise and by afternoon, we Minnesotans will shrug off the chill, dump our jackets in the back seat and be out walking around in our shirt sleeves.   I have been known to nonchalantly brag to my California friends, about the below zero degree days in winter here, where, if you spit, it freezes before it hits the ground. We are a tough bunch of people with a diehard gene uncommon to most of the nation’s population. Read the rest of this entry »

One of the wisest of men in the world once said, “There is a time for everything , and a season for everything under heaven…”

A dominant theme kept cropping up in coaching sessions this week. Most people feel overwhelmed with too many things to do and too little time to do them.  For some, there just isn’t enough money to pay all of the bills so they feel the need to work harder than ever. Others said that there was so much to Read the rest of this entry »

by Matt Elerding for The Columbian