Citi Mortgage Short Sale Success!

One of my favorite banks to work with on Short Sales has to be Citi Mortgage.  Fast, responsive, and realistic.  

Too often we get counter offers from banks that are 2006 prices – knowing the house will never appraise at such a blown out price, we have to go through the lengthy value dispute.  Citi hasn’t done this as much, and they seem to be realistic on values.  

This particular short sale was another fast sale.  The home was on the market for just a few weeks and the 3rd showing went to contract.  Buyers were very fast with all addendum request and the Sellers were super fast with all updated documents as requested by the bank.  

We received the approval letter and full release from the deficiency balance!

Do you need to short sale your Citi Mortgaged Real Estate?  Contact a Short Sale Specialist today.

WHOA we are in business!  The floodgates have re-opened and the buyers have finally gotten off the fence.  I’m sure the low interest rates combined with the fact that homes are priced lower than what they should be (cheaper to own than rent) has this market on fire.  

The biggest problem right now is inventory.  Homes are still worth less than most people owe ….. about 40+% of Jacksonville home owners with mortgages are in this position, however there aren’t enough homes on the market.  Buyers are in the market, but the homes are not.  

WE NEED LISTINGS!!!

Latest chart showing the Jacksonville Real Estate Market:

Check out the Waterfront Homes For Sale.

We are seeing some signs of progress for rising prices.  Albeit a few percentage points increase from the drastically depressed values – but hey – positive is better than flat and a whole lot better than declines in value!

News is everywhere of the housing pick up.  Here’s a good video:

Odd trend in the market.  The inventory of homes available to purchase in Jacksonville has plummeted.  I’m talking full on nose dive and it hasn’t started pulling up to level off yet.  BUT – the average number of days on market has actually increased.

My theory:  Lower priced homes are being snatched up by investors in record numbers.  I have several very large, institutionally large, investment firms that I market properties directly to.  They are buying site unseen and cash closings.  As fast as we can get them on the market……within their pre-set parameters.  That handles the lower priced market.  HOWEVER, the middle priced and up are still sitting.  $400,000 + seems to be sitting and waiting just like a few years ago.  I’d like to see this trend end!  Less lower priced homes to choose from and more middle to upper priced homes and I believe this is causing this increase of days on market.

In my expert opinion, this leads me to believe it is a great time to shop for Waterfront Homes in Jacksonville FL and the surrounding areas!  As the Sellers are sitting with homes on the market for longer than desired, you just might be able to pick up a home under market value……..and those days are fleeting!

I believe we are well into the Optimism side of this chart here in Jacksonville!

A new study just came out on how home buyers shop for a home.  This study was a collaboration between Google and the National Association of Realtors.  A couple of interesting statistics were found.  (interesting to me).

As anyone who is currently alive can tell you, home buyers shop for homes on line.  Actually only 9 out of 10 use the internet as their primary shopping tool, and that’s mind boggling to me.  I just can’t understand what the other 1 out of 10 does.  ???

Another interesting stat from the study:  Days of research on the web before a potential home buyer “takes action on the site”.  That would lead me to believe before they request information about homes they’ve found or sign up to keep up with their favorites, etc.  The stat finds 40% will shop online for 120 days+ before taking that action!  That’s 4 months of pre-shopping!

And lastly, is the % of shoppers who used the web to search for “categories” of homes for sale.  To me, this would be waterfront homes, condos, golf communities, etc.  93% of vacation home buyers search by category!  This is awesome news and confirms the number of out of state home shoppers who contact our office on a very regular basis.  

In the end, the results of the study just confirm what we’ve known for 10 years.  The real estate industry has changed from the old school of having to contact an agent who holds the book of homes for sale in an area to now being able to shop for all homes for sale on line.  

ONE LAST KEY POINT:  Even with all the great information on the web that exists, home buyers are using agents to help find and purchase property as much or more than ever.  88% of buyers used an agent.  By the way, even the guy who owns one of the largest national for sale by owner companies used an agent to list his property.