Rates,
Well after a wild week last week, rates for Idaho took a breather and settled pretty much at PAR for the week. We still see a pretty defined trading channel, where rates have been in since August 19th.
Let’s take a look at some numbers:
- August Existing Home Sales 5.31M vs est. of 5.50M, slightly lower, but not bad.
- Government sold $26B in 2 year notes and $35B of 5 year notes (i.e. US Debt) kind of blah is the reaction.
- Weekly Jobless claims 267,000 vs est. 271,000, still a VERY low number.
- Durable Good Orders 0.0% vs est. of 0.1%, little low, starting to concern some people.
- August New Home sales 552,000 vs est. 515,000, VERY nice number.
Overall, good numbers for jobs and Real Estate, not so good for Durable Goods.
Janet Yellen did come out yesterday and said she will raise rates this year, so stock market came back a little yesterday. This is starting to take some of the guess work out of when rates will start to go up, because now we only have 3 more months left in the year, and indications are Fed Funds Rate is going to be .40%
In a locking mode, there is really nothing being said or anticipated to cause rates to drop below where they are currently, technically we have been at these rates for over 3+ months with very little movement. And with the Federal Reserve now specifically defining when their rates will start to go up, we can anticipate the potential rise of Mortgage Rates.
Idaho Home Owner’s Exemption
State tax commission came out last week and said the Idaho Home Owner’s Exemption for 2015 taxes will be $94,745.
If you have a home in Boise, and say Ada County Assessors assessed it at $189,000, they you will take 50% of that away for exemption.
But if you have a home in Boise, and Ada County assessed it at $200,000 then you will subtract $94,745.
Loan Estimator and Closing Disclosure, or TRID
Well it is time to come to terms with the new TRID law, starting Next Saturday, all loans in Idaho will fall under the new TRID guidelines, except for:
-Mobile Homes
-Reverse Mortgage
-No interest mortgages, say from Boise City Grant Department or Nampa Neighborhood Housing.
I encourage you, if you have not done so, to take a class, watch Title One and Idaho Real Estate School’s web site for classes, looks like I will probably be teaching atleast 1 more.
And you should familiarize yourself with the Idaho ALTA closing document from your favorite title company, don’t know what that is, look at my previous Blog, I have a link to a sample of it.
Red lining still a problem?
Red lining is the process of not lending or selling/buying homes in a specific geographical area because of the type or race of people in that area…i.e. discrimination.
You would think in this day and age, we would not hear of this, but yet a large bank, Hudson City, just got their pants fined off by the CFPB and DOJ, read more here and learn from their fines. Link Here
Could this happen, say in Caldwell, Idaho, you bet it could.
Quick Run down of Changes to Lending:
9/15/2015, ALL NEW FHA guidelines and appraisal rules.
October 1st, Rural Development increased fees on Up Front MI
October 3rd, All new Disclosures being released, i.e. TRID
October 1st, IHA is requiring ALL home buyers to take Home Buying Class, $50
And some issues in Lending that have come up this week:
-If a pool has been installed either above ground or worse in ground, and the pool owner did get proper permits, or worse installed it over easements, i.e. water or electrical, lenders won’t loan on it.
-Built in Hot Tubs have to be functional, along with Built in Pools, or lenders won’t loan on them.
-Realtors ARE NOT allowed to take water samples, I wrote about this about a year ago.
Lead Generator
Well my Lead Generator for the week is really about time management. Select 2 hours per week, on a specific day, to manage marketing. So each Monday from 2:00 to 4:00 you shut off your cell phone, and do nothing but:
Research marketing ideas
Analysis of past marketing ideas
Blog
Have a corporate meeting with yourself and evaluate your marketing and lead generating efforts, and for some of you, you might recognize the “Start, Stop, Continue” strategic
What should you start doing? Why?
What should you Stop doing? Why?
What should you Continue do do? Why?