The real estate market is taking a little break too – but don’t get too comfortable!  There is going to be another shift here very soon.  How so, you might ask?  Well, remember all those loan modifications that occurred about 4 years ago?  Many of them were only for 5 years…..and they are beginning to adjust.  Those adjustments are putting a financial burden back on the homeowners because their wages have not kept up with the new adjusted interest rate.  They will, most likely, have more equity in their home but not enough to be able to refinance to stay.

How will this affect real estate pricing?  I don’t expect banks to take a big hit here and negotiate as much as they have in the past – now that they are coming out of the financial crisis – because pricing has gone up.  A property might be sold ‘short’ to cover closing costs only –

Look in the $900,000 price point and above for great deals coming soon!

The post Have we settled down yet? appeared first on Santoro and Sons Real Estate Group.

In October we reported our third straight month of median home prices across the Southland staying essentially flat, at $382,000. The September data confirmed expert predictions that waning demand would throw a wet blanket over the white-hot market. The stall is owed to multiple factors: buyer fatigue over skyrocketing prices, higher mortgage rates, an expanding supply of homes and a pullback by investors who had swarmed the market.

One thing I can say about the housing market is that there is never a dull moment!   Most areas have seen big gains and a clear recovery from the ‘bubble’ and now we are seeing a pullback of sorts – Is this the correction that everyone has been talking about?  What is the prediction for 2014?  What  about all the short sales we should be seeing…this ‘shadow’ inventory everyone has been reporting?  Where is it????

I think we can safely assume that the Burbank, Glendale, Pasadena, La Crescenta, Sun Valley, Sunland, Shadow Hills, North Hollywood and surrounding areas have processed most of their short sales and REO’s.  We might see a slight uptick in those coming in the next few months – people who were holding out to see if they could get back up to a price that would get them out or help them refi are going to see the market has leveled out.  But for the most part that ship has sailed.  All this talk about ‘shadow’ inventory has been a bunch of malarkey!  I was pretty sure, all along, that there wasn’t a whole bunch of inventory sitting on any bank ledger just waiting to get released as the media was reporting for a time.

So what can we expect for 2014?  I predict a ‘normal’ market – like we had many years ago, prices went up gradually, leveled off, then went up a little more – rates held steady, small uptick, then leveled off slightly.  I think we have come to terms with the Feds decision to start tapering and realize that, with tapering, comes  higher interest rates on home loans, but tapering is necessary for the economy to fully recover.

One thing I am watching closely is our single largest deduction for home owners, our mortgage interest deduction.  We still get dollar for dollar, up to $100,000, there has been no major overhaul of this legislation for many years.  Those fat cats in congress have had their eyes on that deduction for a long time and every year, us Realtors, fight hard to keep it in place.  This past year was one of the toughest fights and many of our representatives came back a little less confident in the future of that deduction.  I pray that congress doesn’t get their hands into that cookie jar!

When you decide the time is right to sell, let me know, I would love to help you through the process!  www.SantoroAndSons.com

The post The housing market is changing – again appeared first on Santoro and Sons Real Estate Group.