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Things are looking a bit better in the Third Quarter of 2011 here in the Richmon...
Monday, October 31, 2011, 3:54:30 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Things are looking a bit better in the Third Quarter of 2011 here in the Richmond area, please read the attached press release from the Richmond Association of Realtors:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 26, 2011
FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Laura Lafayette, Chief Executive Officer
[email protected]
(804) 422-5010
Third Quarter Shows Continued Home Sales Increase in Metro Richmond
Richmond, Va. – While the national economy is growing very modestly and it does not yet feel like recovery, there are some signs of improvement in the Central Virginia region’s housing market.
During the third quarter of 2011, there was a 23 percent increase in sales over the third quarter of 2010. Pending sales, a strong indicator of final sales, were up 11 percent over the third quarter of 2010.
“The fact that the housing market in 2011 has outperformed the 2010 housing market through the first nine months of the year is amazing, considering that buyers had the inducement of a tax credit to spur their decision making last year and no such inducement exists this year,” stated Cheryl Hamm, president of the Richmond Association of Realtors® and Central Virginia Regional MLS. “Of course, sales prices continue to lag, but we've known all along that sale price would be the last indicator to turn around,” she added.
The main factors dampening the resurgence of home prices are the foreclosure inventory and the economic uncertainty of buyers and sellers. “The continued presence of foreclosures in the market makes it difficult for sale prices to rebound when the region is viewed as a whole,” Cheryl explained. “We are seeing some modest price increases in certain neighborhoods; we've even seen some multiple offer situations. In many instances, whether a home is selling and for what price is dependent upon the factors that have always been most important --location, the condition of the home, and the sale price.” As major banks have resumed with processing foreclosures, an initial foreclosure uptick may be in store, but in the long run this will help promote the movement of foreclosure inventory. If positive economic indicators continue to show promise, consumer confidence should also improve. “Can I predict what the fourth quarter will look like or how 2012 will shake out? No,” Cheryl said. “The fourth quarter is typically seasonally slow, so I would not be surprised if that held true for this year as well. As for 2012, there are just too many variables abroad and here in the U.S. for me to make a prediction,” she concluded.
With more than 4,500 members, the Richmond Association of REALTORS® is the voice for real estate in the Richmond metropolitan area.
Top Ten Homes for sale in Powhatan Virginia under $400,000 http://dpollard.r...
Thursday, October 27, 2011, 9:28:23 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Top Ten Homes for sale in Powhatan Virginia under $400,000
http://dpollard.richmondexit.com/listings/areas/6242/community/Powhatan/propertytype/SINGLE/minprice/250000/maxprice/400000/pgn/1/
Powhatan Homes for Sale
dpollard.richmondexit.com
Find Homes For Sale in Powhatan. Search Powhatan real estate, recently sold properties, foreclosures, new homes, school information and much more on our site.
Things to think about when hiring the right realtor. Is your Realtor using Soci...
Thursday, October 27, 2011, 8:53:47 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Things to think about when hiring the right realtor.
Is your Realtor using Social Media to Sell Your Home?
Behind Closed Doors, Sellers Interviewing to hire a real estate agent to sell your home? With 93% of all home buyers starting their home search on-line, one of the critical questions to ask is how will your real estate utilize internet to get your home the most visibility?
Most realtors will just place your home for sale in their MLS (Multiple Listing Service) and hope that the MLS will feed information to other sites. Oh… and let’s not forget the sign on the lawn and the flyer box. Unfortunately, that’s the extent of most real estate agent’s marketing plan.
To get the top price for your home, your realtor needs to understand how to maximize all the resources available and have a comprehensive internet marketing and social media strategy.
Some of the questions to ask the realtor you’re interviewing:
1. Which internet sites will my home be listed in?
2. Will you be able to list my home on all the major brokerage websites?
3. What is syndication and how will that be used to market my home?
4. Do you know how to optimize the listing of my home to ensure that it is at the top of the search page on real estate sites like realtor.com?
5. Do you have a facebook fan page and how many followers do you have?
6. Are you active on twitter? How many followers do you have?
7. Do you have a YouTube channel and what is your strategy on posting to YouTube?
8. What is the strategy for promoting my home on classified services? (and… I don’t mean newspapers…)
9. Do you have a blog or a website? Both? How many and how is it optimized? What is the page rank? What is the traffic for your site? Can you support it by showing me Google Analytics numbers?
10. How do you use SEO? What is SEO? What does this mean for my home marketing?
11. Will your Realtor use PPC to market your home?
12. Most realtors will now offer a home listing site on your home’s individual domain. However, the question to ask is, not only will your real estate agent offer that service, but where will this site be hosted? If it’s not tied to a top rated optimized site, no one will find it.
And, of course… don’t forget to GOOGLE YOUR REALTOR! You’d be surprised as to what you might find out.
Now… internet and social media strategy should not stand alone, but be part of a comprehensive marketing strategy. However, many real estate agents are not familiar with these strategies and continue to try and sell homes with old fashioned, traditional real estate techniques. If you want top dollar for your home, make sure that the realtor you hire is on top of the changing real estate landscape and is a pioneer in social media and internet marketing.
Find Real Estate Listings, School and Neighborhood Information and More - Realtor.com®
realtor.com
Get real estate listings, school and neighborhood information, and other important facts and stats you need to know before you move. It's all at Realtor.com.
Mortgage Rates Continue Pattern of Volatility Oct 17 2011, 4:54PM Volatility...
Tuesday, October 18, 2011, 8:27:10 AM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Mortgage Rates Continue Pattern of Volatility
Oct 17 2011, 4:54PM
Volatility worked agains us on Friday, but in our favor today. After being pushed to the edge of their recent range on Friday, Mortgage Rates eased back slightly lower to begin this week. There's been a bit of ping-pong going on as Best-Execution vacillates between 4.125 and 4.25.
Today's improvement brings Best-Ex solidly down to 4.125%, but it should be noted that pricing varies quite a bit from lender to lender right now.
Today's Rates:
•BESTEXECUTION 30YR FIXED - 4.125% - lots of variation in both directions
•FHA/VA - 3.75%. Some higher.
•15 YEAR FIXED- Mostly 3.5%. + or - .125%
•5 YEAR ARMS - low 3% range, variations from lender to lender.
Ongoing Guidance At 4.25% Best-Execution Levels: you can approach the upcoming days in one of two ways: either rates will continue higher, and the general range of rates would be 4.25-4.75% in terms of Best-Execution, OR we've hit a wall of sorts, and can either bounce lower or hold steady. The more days you wait to determine this, the more money you'll lose if the first scenario plays out and the more you'd gain if the second scenario plays out. If rates don't look like they're holding steady or improving by the end of this week, we'd be locking everything (and fairly close to that sentiment already, but feel it's at least one day too soon to say for sure).
New Guidance: Today's improvements put us in roughly the same situation we were in last Thursday. And so the same guidance essentially applies: "we talked about being close to 4.25% and potentially locking at a loss if things worsened today. But now that things have improved, what do you do if you picked up an eighth of a percent improvement in rate?" There are two ways to approach this... Either you cash in your gains, lock, and move on or you float to see if you can get an extra eighth and resolve to lock if rates rise back to 4.25% Best-Execution levels. There are all sorts of caveats for this (as always), including but not limited to the fact that any mention of floating really only applies to those scenarios who are flexible enough to run the risk of paying more closing costs, a higher rate, or potentially losing a deal altogether. All others shouldn't really try to beat the market when rates are as close as they are to all time lows.
It is a great time to buy a home, interest rates are at their lowest in a long t...
Friday, September 30, 2011, 4:07:08 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
It is a great time to buy a home, interest rates are at their lowest in a long time and there are great bargins if you are willing to look.
Check out the current rates:
Today's Rates:
4.30% National Average
4.07% Bankrate.com Average
http://www.bankrate.com/funnel/mortgages/mortgage-results.aspx?market=96
http://www.bankrate.com/funnel/mortgages/mortgage-results.aspx?market=96
www.bankrate.com
Monday, October 31, 2011, 3:54:30 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Things are looking a bit better in the Third Quarter of 2011 here in the Richmond area, please read the attached press release from the Richmond Association of Realtors:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
October 26, 2011
FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT:
Laura Lafayette, Chief Executive Officer
[email protected]
(804) 422-5010
Third Quarter Shows Continued Home Sales Increase in Metro Richmond
Richmond, Va. – While the national economy is growing very modestly and it does not yet feel like recovery, there are some signs of improvement in the Central Virginia region’s housing market.
During the third quarter of 2011, there was a 23 percent increase in sales over the third quarter of 2010. Pending sales, a strong indicator of final sales, were up 11 percent over the third quarter of 2010.
“The fact that the housing market in 2011 has outperformed the 2010 housing market through the first nine months of the year is amazing, considering that buyers had the inducement of a tax credit to spur their decision making last year and no such inducement exists this year,” stated Cheryl Hamm, president of the Richmond Association of Realtors® and Central Virginia Regional MLS. “Of course, sales prices continue to lag, but we've known all along that sale price would be the last indicator to turn around,” she added.
The main factors dampening the resurgence of home prices are the foreclosure inventory and the economic uncertainty of buyers and sellers. “The continued presence of foreclosures in the market makes it difficult for sale prices to rebound when the region is viewed as a whole,” Cheryl explained. “We are seeing some modest price increases in certain neighborhoods; we've even seen some multiple offer situations. In many instances, whether a home is selling and for what price is dependent upon the factors that have always been most important --location, the condition of the home, and the sale price.” As major banks have resumed with processing foreclosures, an initial foreclosure uptick may be in store, but in the long run this will help promote the movement of foreclosure inventory. If positive economic indicators continue to show promise, consumer confidence should also improve. “Can I predict what the fourth quarter will look like or how 2012 will shake out? No,” Cheryl said. “The fourth quarter is typically seasonally slow, so I would not be surprised if that held true for this year as well. As for 2012, there are just too many variables abroad and here in the U.S. for me to make a prediction,” she concluded.
With more than 4,500 members, the Richmond Association of REALTORS® is the voice for real estate in the Richmond metropolitan area.
Top Ten Homes for sale in Powhatan Virginia under $400,000 http://dpollard.r...
Thursday, October 27, 2011, 9:28:23 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Top Ten Homes for sale in Powhatan Virginia under $400,000
http://dpollard.richmondexit.com/listings/areas/6242/community/Powhatan/propertytype/SINGLE/minprice/250000/maxprice/400000/pgn/1/
Powhatan Homes for Sale
dpollard.richmondexit.com
Find Homes For Sale in Powhatan. Search Powhatan real estate, recently sold properties, foreclosures, new homes, school information and much more on our site.
Things to think about when hiring the right realtor. Is your Realtor using Soci...
Thursday, October 27, 2011, 8:53:47 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Things to think about when hiring the right realtor.
Is your Realtor using Social Media to Sell Your Home?
Behind Closed Doors, Sellers Interviewing to hire a real estate agent to sell your home? With 93% of all home buyers starting their home search on-line, one of the critical questions to ask is how will your real estate utilize internet to get your home the most visibility?
Most realtors will just place your home for sale in their MLS (Multiple Listing Service) and hope that the MLS will feed information to other sites. Oh… and let’s not forget the sign on the lawn and the flyer box. Unfortunately, that’s the extent of most real estate agent’s marketing plan.
To get the top price for your home, your realtor needs to understand how to maximize all the resources available and have a comprehensive internet marketing and social media strategy.
Some of the questions to ask the realtor you’re interviewing:
1. Which internet sites will my home be listed in?
2. Will you be able to list my home on all the major brokerage websites?
3. What is syndication and how will that be used to market my home?
4. Do you know how to optimize the listing of my home to ensure that it is at the top of the search page on real estate sites like realtor.com?
5. Do you have a facebook fan page and how many followers do you have?
6. Are you active on twitter? How many followers do you have?
7. Do you have a YouTube channel and what is your strategy on posting to YouTube?
8. What is the strategy for promoting my home on classified services? (and… I don’t mean newspapers…)
9. Do you have a blog or a website? Both? How many and how is it optimized? What is the page rank? What is the traffic for your site? Can you support it by showing me Google Analytics numbers?
10. How do you use SEO? What is SEO? What does this mean for my home marketing?
11. Will your Realtor use PPC to market your home?
12. Most realtors will now offer a home listing site on your home’s individual domain. However, the question to ask is, not only will your real estate agent offer that service, but where will this site be hosted? If it’s not tied to a top rated optimized site, no one will find it.
And, of course… don’t forget to GOOGLE YOUR REALTOR! You’d be surprised as to what you might find out.
Now… internet and social media strategy should not stand alone, but be part of a comprehensive marketing strategy. However, many real estate agents are not familiar with these strategies and continue to try and sell homes with old fashioned, traditional real estate techniques. If you want top dollar for your home, make sure that the realtor you hire is on top of the changing real estate landscape and is a pioneer in social media and internet marketing.
Find Real Estate Listings, School and Neighborhood Information and More - Realtor.com®
realtor.com
Get real estate listings, school and neighborhood information, and other important facts and stats you need to know before you move. It's all at Realtor.com.
Mortgage Rates Continue Pattern of Volatility Oct 17 2011, 4:54PM Volatility...
Tuesday, October 18, 2011, 8:27:10 AM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
Mortgage Rates Continue Pattern of Volatility
Oct 17 2011, 4:54PM
Volatility worked agains us on Friday, but in our favor today. After being pushed to the edge of their recent range on Friday, Mortgage Rates eased back slightly lower to begin this week. There's been a bit of ping-pong going on as Best-Execution vacillates between 4.125 and 4.25.
Today's improvement brings Best-Ex solidly down to 4.125%, but it should be noted that pricing varies quite a bit from lender to lender right now.
Today's Rates:
•BESTEXECUTION 30YR FIXED - 4.125% - lots of variation in both directions
•FHA/VA - 3.75%. Some higher.
•15 YEAR FIXED- Mostly 3.5%. + or - .125%
•5 YEAR ARMS - low 3% range, variations from lender to lender.
Ongoing Guidance At 4.25% Best-Execution Levels: you can approach the upcoming days in one of two ways: either rates will continue higher, and the general range of rates would be 4.25-4.75% in terms of Best-Execution, OR we've hit a wall of sorts, and can either bounce lower or hold steady. The more days you wait to determine this, the more money you'll lose if the first scenario plays out and the more you'd gain if the second scenario plays out. If rates don't look like they're holding steady or improving by the end of this week, we'd be locking everything (and fairly close to that sentiment already, but feel it's at least one day too soon to say for sure).
New Guidance: Today's improvements put us in roughly the same situation we were in last Thursday. And so the same guidance essentially applies: "we talked about being close to 4.25% and potentially locking at a loss if things worsened today. But now that things have improved, what do you do if you picked up an eighth of a percent improvement in rate?" There are two ways to approach this... Either you cash in your gains, lock, and move on or you float to see if you can get an extra eighth and resolve to lock if rates rise back to 4.25% Best-Execution levels. There are all sorts of caveats for this (as always), including but not limited to the fact that any mention of floating really only applies to those scenarios who are flexible enough to run the risk of paying more closing costs, a higher rate, or potentially losing a deal altogether. All others shouldn't really try to beat the market when rates are as close as they are to all time lows.
It is a great time to buy a home, interest rates are at their lowest in a long t...
Friday, September 30, 2011, 4:07:08 PM | David Pollard - Exit Elite Realty
It is a great time to buy a home, interest rates are at their lowest in a long time and there are great bargins if you are willing to look.
Check out the current rates:
Today's Rates:
4.30% National Average
4.07% Bankrate.com Average
http://www.bankrate.com/funnel/mortgages/mortgage-results.aspx?market=96
http://www.bankrate.com/funnel/mortgages/mortgage-results.aspx?market=96
www.bankrate.com
