Ramesh Nyberg's Real Estate Blog

Yes, it's been pretty wet lately, and the humidity is freakish. But--we've all heard this phrase-- "we need it" and, if you're house-hunting, rain can be your friend. I like showing homes in a rainstorm; we can check for leaks, and look for areas on the patio where water is pooling, indicating uneven surfaces which will eventually lead to discoloration and mold growth.

The market continues to adjust to the growing presence of short sales and foreclosures. Short sales slow the market down, because the banks take so long to process and approve them, but they also close less often, because there are more problems with the sellers.

I recently had some buyers lose a nice house on a short sale on the day of closing, because the seller, it turned out, falsified several documents. The resulting title defects could not be cured in time, and poof!-- There goes the transaction. That's always a risk with short sales, because the sellers are in dire straits and desperate to unload the house before the foreclosure process is finalized.

Foreclosures are actually faster and more predictable, and at least you know you have a bank which owns the property free and clear.

SALES STATS
Small signs of recovery are everywhere. I had seven people at my last open house (that's pretty good!) and the June statistics are out: Miami-Dade overall posted 1551 new sales in June, 1580 in May. Consider that against January through March, when it never got above 1291. The unsold numbers are still edging up, but not at the sharp rate they have done for the last 16 months. From April '07 to November, unsold properties ballooned from 36,364 to 41,578 (that's an increase of 14% in 7 months). The next seven month period--November to the present, shows an increase of just under 4%, to 43,188. That's a result of increased sales, and that's a good sign.

On top of this, at a recent Florida Association of Realtors Conference I attended, FAR President Chuck Bonifiglio said that, statewide, the sales statistics show that "we have hit bottom" and a recovery is on the way.

This could be the last window of opportunity for conventional financing buyers to get out there and make the deal of the century. All-cash investors will still have a bounty of foreclosures to choose from for some time.