The Mortgage Man
Get more out of your mortgage experience!Archive for May, 2008
Selling Your Home In A Difficult Market – 1
How do you sell when competition is high and equity is low?
If you are a home owner and you need to sell, you are no doubt aware that the competition is fierce. Your reasons for selling will likely dictate the level of aggression that you put into marketing it, but here are some things you need to know to separate yourself from the pack.
Get ready to sell
Getting ready to sell your home can come in many forms. You need to have your home clean and tidy for buyers to view it. You need to make sure that the front yard is presentable and inviting. This is called curb appeal, and if buyers don’t even want to get out of the car, it will be hard to sell them your home.
Getting ready to sell is also a state of mind. You have to think like a seller, and picture your home the way that a buyer would. This can mean several things but here are the most important ones:
De-personalize your home
De-personalizing means to make your home look more like a model home and less like someone is currently living there. If you have lots of pictures on the mantle and knickknacks everywhere, go ahead and box them up (consider this as part of preparing to move since you will have to box it up anyway). The more clutter you have, the smaller the house will feel, and buyers are looking for space.
The cheer leading trophies and spelling bee awards are a tremendous source of pride to you and your family, but buyers don’t care. As a matter of fact, it may be a turn off.
Make Minor Fixes
If you have a hole in the drywall where the door knob hits it, take a little time to get some drywall patch at Lowes or Home Depot. It is not a big job, and depending on the size of the hole, it is a relatively easy fix.
Make sure all light bulbs work, and fix the ones that don’t. Make sure that there are no leaky faucets, and fix them if there are.
Check back on the next post for additional tips, and how to choose the right Realtor.
Thursday May 22, 2008
Today’s Mortgage Market Is Battered Again By Oil Prices And Threats Of Inflation!
With oil prices hitting another record high at over $135 per barrel, inflation fears are stirring the mortgage bond market to run for the hills. Mortgage bonds have fallen through 3 major levels of support at the 25 day, 50 day and 100 day moving averages. For the market to bust through 3 different levels of support is significant, and if you have a mortgage loan working that is not locked…I highly recommend locking today to protect from continued losses.
The jobless claims report came out a little better than expected at 365,000 vs. the projection of 372,000. Even though this report was better than expected, it still shows significant weakness in the jobs sector, and therefore did not pose any immediate help to the financial markets.
In other financial news, UBS AG reported an additional write off of $19 Billion in subprime mortgage losses. This is not good news for the sector in general as it indicates that we are not out of the water yet with the credit crisis.
Tuesday May 20, 2008
Producer Price Index (PPI) Puts Pressure On Mortgage Bonds
Mortgage bonds are feeling pressure today from the Core Producer Price Index, a leading inflationary indicator, which came in at twice what was forecast. The PPI for April came in at 0.2% which is half of the 0.4% projected, and significantly less than the 1.1% reported in March. This is putting pressure on mortgage bonds in spite of the stock market remaining sluggish today.
Crude Oil prices set another all time high, AGAIN, last night at $127 per barrel. This increase was likely “fueled” by OPEC’s refusal to increase oil production to meet increasing demands. No more significant economic news is expected out today, so if the stock market continues to be sluggish, bonds will likely reap the benefits later in the trading day.
The Mortgage Man 
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