Lethbridge Mortgage and Real Estate Blog: 2009

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

Lethbridge mortgage and real estate

Robert May is the broker/owner of Rainbow Realty of Lethbridge Alberta. He is also a licensed lethbridge mortgage broker associate and financing expert with Canada First Mortgage of Calgary Alberta. He has been in the lethbridge real estate industry since 1993 and offers full MLS real estate services to Lethbridge and surrounding area, as well as Lethbridge mortgage financing, refinancing renewals, preapprovals, and home equity loans to Lethbridge and Southern Alberta. He can be found online at www.LethbridgeLoans.com

Lethbridge real estate, mortgage and financing is available through Robert May of Rainbow Realty, a real estate brokerage located in Lethbridge Alberta. Robert is also a mortgage associate with Canada First Mortgage. (Real estate loans, mortgages, heloc, equity loans, self employed products, consolidations, refinancing, and mortgage renewals, are our specialties. With offices in Edmonton, Calgary, and Lethbridge we are Alberta's largest Verico mortgage franchise and a leader in service and performance.)

Reading that first paragraph should make any ordinary reader scratch their head and way "what the heck?", but it has a very specific purpose for being there. That purpose is search engine targeting. Search engines such as the mighty Google like to scan for keywords, but also like to scan for keyword in relation and location to other keywords in the article and page content.

I will come back and edit this blog and amend to it the results 30 days from today. This will provide some sort of data that others can use to estimate how effective this strategy is.

Originally, I wrote a few articles about Lethbridge, about Lethbridge Real Estate, Lethbridge foreclosures, etc. I figured that it was important to have a mix of business, personal, and community content on the blog. My main website, apart from being a great tool for accepting online mortgage applications, is an online business card.

Recently, I started an outside blog, LethbridgeRealEstateBlog.com, to which I post most of my active rain content, especially the content that is relevant to Lethbridge Real Estate and Lethbridge mortgage. I post a little about Lethbridge mortgage rates, Lethbridge real estate listings, and a few other related topics.

Robert May

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I apologise for the scattered and disorganized content of this blog post, but I am just doing a bit of a test regarding SEO of my AR blog vs my outside blog as it relates to these posts. Please stand by for the results.

Friday, February 6, 2009

Do you have an EXCEED, GE Money, Accredited, or Home Trust mortgage?

If you currently have an Exceed, GE Money, Accredited, or Home Trust mortgage in place you should call me or another professional Mortgage associate ASAP and discuss your future plans for this mortgage product. Recent fluctuations and changes to the mortgage and credit granting market in Canada has left many mortgage holders at risk, and only those who are proactive and prepare for this situation will not be inconvenienced by this.

In the past few months, several of the 'high risk' mortgage lenders have withdrawn from the lending market or have altered their lending practices to no longer offer mortgages which fall into the 'high risk' category. Among the first products to disappear was mortgages for non-owneroccupied properties (rentals, second homes, vacation properties, etc), followed by conventional low document and no document products which were designed for self employed individuals. Several insured products of this type are still available however.

The problem arises when a client who holds one of these high risk loans (similar to a US subprime mortgage) comes up for renewal. Your current lender is under no obligation ro renew your mortgage when the term expires. In the case of these high risk lenders, there will be many mortgages not renewed in the next few years, as the lender has left the industry or changed their lending practices. Simply put, when your mortgage term expires, you will receive a letter asking for the full payment of the entire value of the outstanding mortgage or else face the foreclosure process. This will happen to you regardless of how strong your credit is, regardless of your repayment history, and regardless of how prepared you are for it.

If you have one of these mortgage, even if it does not come up for renewal for a couple years, you should prepare for that scenario NOW! If the mortgage associate who sold you that product has not yet contacted you, you should contact our office ASAP so that we can help you prepare. It is your responsibility to be proactive on this. Let us help you before a problem arises. Do not wait until the last minute or it will cost you thousands of dollars.

Here are a few of my favorite past articles from my Lethbridge real estate and mortgage blog you might have missed or wish to recommend them to a friend.

Common Financial Problems - Avoid these financial mistakes
Get Your Credit Score UP - Invaluable insight into your credit score
Mortgage Guidelines Get Tighter - Harder and harder to borrow money
Is Your Mortgage Company Out of Business in 2009? - What to do when your bank goes broke
What is wrong with MLS - Is your info being abused?
Survivor - Real Estate Edition - Let's vote a few more off the island

Robert May is a Realtor, as well as the broker and owner of Rainbow Realty of Lethbridge Alberta. He is also a licensed mortgage associate and financing expert with Canada First Mortgage of Calgary Alberta. He has been in the real estate industry since 1993 and offers full MLS real estate services to Lethbridge and surrounding area, as well as mortgage financing, refinancing/renewals, preapprovals, and home equity financing to Lethbridge and Southern Alberta. He can be found online at www.LethbridgeLoans.com

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

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Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

What is Wrong with MLS?

I am the broker and owner of an independant real estate brokerage in Lethbridge Alberta. I have been a member of the Lethbridge Real Estate Board, the Alberta Real Estate Association, and the Canadian Real Estate Association, for approximately 15 years now. I have watched the organized real estate industry make several changes and evolve for all these years. Some of the changes have been progressive while others have seemed to be misdirected.

I have experienced the change from corporate owned offices to franchises, the rise of independant contractor status, the introduction of the 100% commission split, the introduction of new technologies, the alteration of the terminology, at least half a dozen revisions of the standard purchase contract from a simple 1 page form to a 2 page form to a 3 page form, into an even longer 'plain english' form, then back to a 3 page form, into whatever it is today. I have watched commissions fluctuate, but almost always downward. I remember back in the day when we used to fill in the commission rate we were charging (7%, which we commonly split 50/50) before we even left the office with the contract. Today as I browse my local MLS listings I see less then a half dozen listings offering anything other then 2% of the selling price as commission. Perhaps the trained and skilled agents working our streets back then were worth 3 times more then all the recent licensees, or perhaps someone forgot to train new licensees to negotiate their brokerage fee, or perhaps we have given away so much of our expertise, data, and value that we are getting paid exactly what we are worth? At any rate, that is not my biggest beef with the current situation.

What has really bothered me in recent years has been the direction that organized real estate has gone concerning client data and information. It is obvious that in this day and age of identity theft, organized crime through electronic means, and spam marketing, that consumers are more concerned then ever about their personal information. Even legislators at the municipal, provincial, and federal level have enacted laws in an attempt to control and protect consumers identities and information. Despite this, the amount of information required to submit a listing to MLS is at an all time high. You currently have to provide more information then ever before to submit a listing to MLS. What happens to that information afterwards seems to be a bit of an unknown, and definitely varies in different juristictions.

Some of the information is unquestionably made public, some is shared with various levels of Government, and some is stored in dirty old filing cabinets and hard drives some place apparently forever. The fact that every new listing seems to receive various marketing materials mysteriously in the mail points to the fact that the information reaches the hands of various other commercial interests as well. Who owns this information and what level of privacy and disclosure is the consumer entitled to? Obviously if you were to ask a consumer if they wished their data to be shared or held forever to be potentially shared at a later date, most would opt out of that idea. Many of my own friends and clients specifically choose to avoid MLS listing their property to avoid the potential of their information falling into the hands of others or being shared publicly.

I belive in the spirit of the MLS system, but not with its practices. As the information age progresses, it will be interesting to see if this data collection by the MLS system will be its saviour or its downfall. Until then, I will leave my personal data withheld.

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

Enjoyed this article? Please leave a comment, subscribe, add me, OR click the little red flag and feature it!

Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

The Only Reason Every American Doesnt Own an Elephant

"The only reason every American doesn't own an elephant is because they haven't been offered one for no money down and easy monthly payments"

The horrible truth behind that statement is reflected in the purchasing decisions many people have been making for much of the past few years. Everything from vacations, furniture, and elctronics has been sold using the sales gimmick of "no payments until....". I have a friend who sells vacuums for prices in excess of $2,000 and while I am pretty sure they are nice vacuums, unless you can drive them to church on Sunday the price seems a little steep to me. What the change in marketing strategies of recent years has meant for the consumer has been a total shift in the way they think.

I remember in the early 1980's my parents saved up money to go to the furniture store and buy a new sofa set. We loaded up the station wagon and drove to town and they picked one out. It was a beauty, rusty orange with wishing wells or waterwheels or some other browny orange pattern with wood accents on the arms. I believe 'the good couch', as it would forever be known in our household, cost about $1200 for the entire set and was paid for with cash money that my parents had saved up and earmarked for this purchase. Compare this to the modern furniture shopper experience. According to my friend who manages a large box furniture retailer, the majority of their purchasers have $0 when they walk in the front door. The furniture is sold primarily on a 'do not pay for xx months' basis, and on a less common basis charged onto a purchasers credit card. It is an absolute rarity for a customer to actually pay for their furniture.

The customer mindset has changed from shopping for 'how much can i afford' to 'how much can i afford to finance'.

A recent automobile sale that I visited made this extremely evident. It wasnt held at a car lot, but rather in a rented hall and was staffed by travelling hired-gun car salesmen who help lots clear used inventory all across the country. As none of the vehicles had prices displayed in the window, I was forced to communicate with an aggressive little guy who when I asked what the price was of a certain van was told it was $199/month. I told the salesman that I did not need to finance and just wanted to know what the price was, again he told me the price could be as low as $49/week. After much prodding and reiterating that I would simply be writing a check for the vehicle, he divulged that the salesmen at the event did not know the actual prices of any of the vehicles only financing numbers, and to find out any more specific information the financing manager would need to be asked. At first I thought the guy was joking, but he was not. Their entire sales technique was based upon selling a vehicle based upon the payment amount and not the actual price, interest rate, etc. Amazing to me.

I have always held the theory that any item which you are being sold that requires that you make a decision within 5 minutes, that you have to attend a presentation with your spouse, that they offer you a free gift over the phone, that they wont tell you the purchase price until the end of the demonstration, or that sounds too good to be true..... IS. So when you get offered that elephant, and inevitably the day is coming, just make sure you get your spouses consent and sleep on the decision, otherwise you may need a big shovel to clean up the mess you will be getting yourself into.

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

Enjoyed this article? Please leave a comment, subscribe, add me, OR click the little red flag and feature it!

Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

Common Financial Problems

Common Financial Problems:

How Financially Healthy Are You? Financial problems, like many medical problems are best detected early. Here is the list of some widespread and most common personal financial problems:

Not Planning. Human beings were born to put off things. And that is why we have deadlines – and deadline extensions. Unfortunately, you may have no precise deadline with your overall finances. You can allow your credit card debt to accumulate, or you can leave your savings sitting in lousy investments for years. You can pay high taxes, leave gaps in your retirement and insurance coverage, and overpay for financial products. Certainly, planning your finances is not as much fun as planning a vacation, but doing the former can help you take more of the latter.

Overspending. The average Canadian saves less than 5 percent of his or her after-tax income. Simple arithmetic helps you determine that savings is the difference between what you earn and what you spend. To increase your saving, you either should spend less, work more, or know some wealthy people who want to leave everything to you (the last alternative is the least realistic).

Buying with consumer credit. Even with the benefit of today’s lower interest rates, carrying a balance month–to-month on your credit card or buying a car on credit means that even more of your future earnings are going to be earmarked for debt repayment. Buying on credit encourages you to spend more than you can really afford.

Delaying saving for retirement. Most people say that they want to retire by the mid-60s or sooner. But in order to accomplish this goal, most people need to save a reasonable chunk (roughly 10 percent) of their income, starting sooner rather than later. The longer you wait to start saving for retirement, the harder it will be to reach your goal. And you will pay much more in taxes to boot if you don’t take advantage of the tax benefits of investing through particular retirement plans.

Falling prey to financial sales pitches. Great deals that can’t wait for a little reflection or a second opinion are often disasters waiting to happen. A sucker may be born every minute, but a slick salesperson is born every second! Steer clear of those who pressure you to make decisions, promise you high investment returns, and lack of proper training and experience to help you.

Making decisions based on emotions. You are most vulnerable to making the wrong financial moves after a major life change such as: a family loss, divorce, or when you feel under pressure. Maybe a recent divorce has you fearing that you won’t be able to afford to retire when you planned, so you pour thousands of dollars in some newfangled financial product. Take your time and put your emotions aside.

Exposing yourself to catastrophic risk. You’re vulnerable if you and your family don’t have insurance to pay for financially devastating losses. People without a savings reserve and support network can end up homeless. Many people lack sufficient insurance coverage to replace their income. Don’t wait for a tragedy to strike to find out whether you have the right insurance coverage.

Focusing too much on money. Placing too much emphasis on making and saving money can warp your perspective on what’s important in life. Money is not the first or even the second priority in happy people’s lives. Your health, relationships with family and friends, career satisfaction and fulfilling interests should be more important.

Most financial problems can be fixed over time with changes in your behavior.

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

Enjoyed this article? Please leave a comment, subscribe, add me, OR click the little red flag and feature it!

Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

Tips for Selling in a Slow Market

Price it right! Thinking that you can start high and lower the price if it fails to sell in the first couple of days or weeks is a mentality held by ignorant homeowners. That may sound strong, but recognize that you have one chance to introduce your house to a potential buyer. Maybe that buyer seen and ad, stopped at an open house, or even seen the lawn sign go up. The potential buyer is interested and excited about your home, until they call and discover that you are optimistically overpriced. That buyer will not likely ever revisit the property, phone on it again, watch to see if the price moves down to a realistic level, etc. You have one chance, don't mess it up.

Position yourself in the right price range. Buyers search by price range, such as between $200,000 and $225,000. Make sure your property is properly positioned so that it is the best value within a standard price range. For example, pricing it at $230,000 could miss the people looking for a bargain on a home in the $200,000 to $225,000 range. Look at homes in the price range, is your home the largest, the most upgraded, have the most inclusions? If you cannot name concrete and specific reasons why your home is better than similarly priced homes, neither can a buyer. (and I am not talking about anything that personalizes the home!!!)

You also need to be prepared. Delay on the seller's part is one reason that deals often fall apart. Before you list your home, have information readily available about your schools, taxes, utilities, condo documents, homeowners association info, any neighborhood covenants and information about liens that have to be released prior to closing. Be ready to hear an offer immediately and to deal with it at a moments notice.

Market to people who are likely buyers, not everyone who reads the paper. In addition to placing an ad in the newspaper and using the multiple listing service, you should advertise to people who are already in the market for a house. For example, have your real estate agent pull a list of people who have just listed their own house within a five mile radius of your home. People are likely to want to stay within the same school district if they have kids.

Any schmuck can plant a sign in the yard and put an ad in the paper. If that is what your agent is doing to sell your house, start looking for a new one now because you might find a wiser one after your listing expires for the first or second time.

In 2009, buyers want traditional values and modern techniques. They are more sophisticated and educated then half the industry members and so called 'professionals'. Hire an agent who has some skill!!!!!

If possible, offer terms. Cash buyers are becoming harder to find in a market where financing is tougher to get. Offer creative financing terms to attract more buyers. Sometimes a skilled agent can overcome many buyer objections by utilizing financing terms. If your real estate agent has no idea why TERMS beat PRICE, get ready to watch your house not sell.

Stay tuned, in my next blog I plan to give Jeff Foxworthy a run for his red-neck job, lol.

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

Enjoyed this article? Please leave a comment, subscribe, add me, OR click the little red flag and feature it!

Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

Is Honesty ALWAYS The Best Policy?

Today I received an email from a colleague that contained the following picture, which is hilarious.

Let me share my 15 years experience in the local Lethbridge real estate and financing market with you! It is the first step towards making a profitable real estate decision.

Enjoyed this article? Please leave a comment, subscribe, add me, OR click the little red flag and feature it!

Lethbridge mortgage real estate financing alberta mortgages blog

Tuesday, April 7, 2009