Blogging Tulsa Real Estate: December 2010

Higher Mortgage Rates Spurred an Increase in Home Sales

Does this just blow your mind?

How is it that we have had historically low rates and have not been able to get buyers off the fence and yet now that they are creeping back up they are beginning to come out of the wood work?

Is it that spring is on the way?

Is it that people are snowed in and looking for something to do?  So let's just go online to look for a new house?

Is it because they think housing has hit the bottom?

Do people purchase more when they think that prices are going up?

Check out this information from CNN Money.

Higher Mortgage Rates Spurred an Increase in Home Sales

Dec 24, 2010 (www.cnnmoney.com)

The recent surge in mortgage rates, by all rational calculations, should have made America's already troubled housing market worse off. Instead, higher borrowing costs modestly boosted homes sales in November.  Before slipping down slightly this week, mortgage rates had risen for several weeks in a row as yields on 10-year Treasury bills, which largely influence the cost of mortgages, rose.  The rate increases were some of the highest seen since June of this year.

Intuitively, it would make sense that higher borrowing costs would discourage potential homebuyers. And vice versa. But quite the opposite has happened.  Before the recent surge, mortgage rates had fallen to historic lows but failed to spur much refinancing or home purchases as virtually all major banks tightened lending standards. When mortgage rates started rising recently, potential homebuyers waiting in the sidelines took notice.

In November, the share of home purchases by first-time buyers surged to 37.2% from 34.4% the previous month, according to a monthly survey by Campbell/Inside Mortgage Finance, which tracks mortgage and housing industry trends.  "That's extremely significant," says Tom Popik, the survey's research director. Since the survey launched in 2009, there's typically only been a one-percentage point change, if any at all, among first-time homebuyers.

The higher rates seem to have served as a warning shot, drawing in buyers eager to lock in historically low rates before they edge any higher. In a sense, they were waiting for an uptick to prove that rates had gone as far down as possible, before deciding to buy. Unlike current homeowners, first timers are positioned well to respond quickly to fluctuations in mortgage rates.

Popik says it's unlikely the rise in rates will spur many more home purchases. After a while, potential homebuyers will again think mortgages are becoming too expensive. For now though, rising rates have brought a boost, however small, to the struggling housing market. November sales of new homes rose 5.5% to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 290,000 units, the Commerce Department reported December 15.

Naturally, in response to the uptick in home sales and increase in demand for lending, mortgage rates have most recently . . . fallen again.  Somewhere, that makes perfect sense.

Twenty years ago after the Oil Bust in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when a homeowner could not sell his home for enough money to pay the bank off and pay all the expenses from the proceeds of the sale, the homeowner took his checkbook to the bank and wrote a check at closing in order to get rid of his house.  Often the seller wrote a bigger check at closing than the buyer.

Things have changed.  Many homeowners lack the ability to cover the equity shortfall in their home.  They cannot write a check at closing to get the bank paid off and get on down the road.

To help homeowners in hardship situations, many homeowners are resorting to listing their homes with REALTORS® who understand how to do short sales. 

It is a complicated process and it is not fast, nor are there any guarantees.

I have successfully represented both Buyers and Sellers through the short sale process.

The following is a description of how a homeowner qualifies for a HAFA Short Sale -- a particular subset of the short sale family of transactions.

If you have questions, please call me at 918-712-4473 or send me an email at dsolano@cbtulsa.com

Christmas Gift Traditions Remind Us of How Much We Are Loved

Yesterday was a special day for me.  I came home to two packages on the front porch.  I knew immediately what they were because of the familiar shape of the boxes.

One contained Mother's Macaroons from my sister Kathy.  Yum yum.  I was restrained.  I only ate two last night.  She's been sending them for at least 10 years.

The other package contained Pittman & Davis grapefruit from my sister-in-law Anita.  She's been sending the box of grapefruit for the past couple of years now because my brother used to send it before he died of cancer three years ago. Actulally, in 2007 I received two boxes of grapefruit -- because my brother David didn't know Anita was sending it and David figured he was the next son in line to carry on the tradition that my parents had started years ago.  Anita won out.  She has the highly privileged job of sending the family grapefruit.

Pittman & Davis grapefruit reminds me of the love of my parents.

Both of my parents are dead now.  Every year they used to send a huge box of grapefruit and we could never find enough refrigerator space to keep it.  My ex-husband whined for whatever reasons.  I loved the delicious ruby red grapefruit from South Texas. 

I took the boxes of grapefruit for granted -- until after my Daddy died.

Mom had died in March 2004 and Daddy died at Thanksgiving time in 2006.  We spent two weeks clearing out his apartment at the Hampton in Houston.

I was working in the living room when I heard my sister exclaim from Dad's office, "The receipt for the onions! You found the receipt for the onions!  I can't believe you found the receipt for the onions."  I went in to see what all the commotion was about and Kathy was holding an old paper receipt from Pittman & Davis dated sometime in 1937.  Daddy had saved it for all those years and had neatly placed it in his desk drawer with other important mementos.

I had never heard the story of how my parents met. ( I was the last of five kids and I never paid any attention.  Now I wish I had been more "present.")

I guess it was the year 1937 and my mother was the college roomate of my father's sister Gerrie at Mary Hardin Baylor College in Belton, Texas.  Daddy had seen my mother's photograph and wanted to meet my mother.  So he drove up from the Valley to visit his sister.

Evidently the girls were washing their hair in the river -- no kidding, that's what I heard.  Daddy drove to the river and met my mother.

He was driving a truckload of Pittman & Davis sweet onions. He had saved that receipt for that truckload of onions for 67 years!

My parents, Cleo and Burt Matteson, were married for more than 65 years when Mommy died.  I never had a clue how much they loved each other until we went through their stuff.

I just put an entire ruby red grapefuit in my Vita-Mix and am drinking my grapefruit juice as I write this blog. Yum!

Pipe and Cable Horse Fencing Installation

Here's a new pipe and cable horse fencing installation at Fleur de Lis Farm in Nowata, Oklahoma.

It was professionally installed and so I thought these photos may be helpful for someone who wants to weld their own fencing.  This installation is particularly well done.

In this case, the owner saved about $2 per foot by using lightly used pipe.  Overall, this installation was economical and provides safe and sturdy fencing for horses.

This is a new installation by a company in Tulsa, Oklahoma. 

This fence was recently installed behind the house.  Eventually there will be a small barn and a horse here.

What I like especially about this fencing is that it does not disrupt the sight lines when looking out across the pastures.

Here is a 12-foot gate.

Heavy plastic sheathing covers the point at which the cable is attached to the post.  This is to protect the horses' manes.  The owner calls them Mane Protectors.

This is the walk-through people gate.  The owner wishes it were just a bit wider because they did not leave quite enough width to drive the ZTR lawn mower through.  Notice the strong posts to either side of the gate and the mane protectors on the cable. 

In the distance you can see a corner post across the pasture where the pipe and cable meets a corner of barbed wire.

Eventually the barbed wire will be replaced when there is another chunk of change to put in another section of pipe and cable fencing.  This will be done before a horse is put in the pasture.  A barn is yet to be built before Pegasus comes to his new home.

This corner post is where  the pipe and cable fencing meets a barbed wire fence.  There is a gate to the right and so the fencing had to be very sturdy.