Mark Wisterman's Paradise & Lake Oroville Real Estate Blog

Seaching for homes in the Oroville real estate market, the Chico real estate market, and the Paradise real estate on your mobile device just got a lot easier and more convenient with the recent release of REALTY WORLD’s Mobile Connect home search program.

 This new platform allows buyers to obtain listing information, nearly instantly, on any residential property for sale in the area in which they are currently located by simply texting  as simple two letter code. There is even a QR code available for you iPhone and Android users.   No more searching through cumbersome apps like REALTOR.com, Zillow and Trulia looking for a specific property that you are standing in front of trying to get updated information. And no more hassles when calling the phone number on a yard sign and getting hold of an agent that has no idea of what property you are asking about.

With this new system you get not only the information on the specific home you are texting for, but you also have the option of seeing the 5 other homes for sale that are closest to the home you are looking at. I have included a couple of links here that will provide further information on this awesome new system. The benefits to buyers and sellers alike are explained in the flyers.

To sign up for this program just give me a call or drop me an e-mail with your cell phone number and I will get you enrolled. As always there is NO CHARGE for this service and there is NEVER any abuse of your contact information. In fact, I will make you this promise: I will not ever call you about any home you inquire about through this system unless you ask me to.

Mobile Connect for Sellers

Mobile Connect For Buyers

Happy House Hunting!!!!!!!!!!!!

For all of you interested in the foreclosure trends in the areas that I service, which includes the real estate markets of Lake Oroville, Paradise, Chico, Yuba City, Marysville, and Tehama and Glenn counties, here are the latest stats as compiled by ForeclosureRadar.com

These one year charts show that an interesting long term trend has begun to develop that we have not heard too much about in the media.  These charts are beginning to show significant reductions in the number of foreclosures filings taking  place.  Although the charts are a little roller-coaster-like when looking at the monthly numbers, the overall trend is slowly working its way down.

To be sure, we are certainly not out of the woods by any stretch of the imagination when it comse to the impact foreclosures are having on the overall value of the home across the state.  It is encouraging to see that the long term trend is beginning to head south ever so slightly. Will it stay down? That is hard to say given the recent events with the foolishness surrounding the debt ceiling, stock market gyrations, and the fact that consumers have a general feeling of despair when it comes to the current economic climate in which we find ourselves. What I do know is that with the media so focused on the incompetence in Washington, D.C. there is a good chance that this news will not be considered important enough to share, simply because it is not “dramatic” enough.

On this blog site we take the drama out of the market and replace it with just the facts so you can decide for yourself what is happening.

I have placed links at the bottom of this posting for each area of the real estate market I service. Click on whichever area in which you are interested in seeing.

Oroville Foreclosure Report      Chico Foreclosure Report

Paradise Forclosure Report      Marysville Foreclosure Report

Yuba City Foreclosure Report     Glenn County & Tehama County Foreclosure Report

For those of you in the Lake Oroville housing market and the real estate markets of Chico, Paradise, Yuba City, Marysville, Gridley, Biggs and Durham, who did not see the Facebook posting I made on my business page yesterday at Facebook/RealtyWorld.CA, and, since I have not seen this recommendation from any other area real estate agent anywhere on the ‘net, I will repeat what I advised my Facebook readers to do:

If you are working on a loan for the purchase or refinance of a home, you need to have a SERIOUS  discussion with your lender about locking your interest rate ASAP.

As a former financial advisor with a major Wall Street firm, I have seen this type of market volatility before and I will tell you that when you get the gigantic drop that the stock market took today and the huge drop in interest rates that came with it, there is a better possibility that that stocks and interest rates will “bounce” off these lows very quickly, then there is of rates continuing to fall in a fashion that makes it worth the risk to “wait and see” what happens.

There are two events coming up that make it a good idea to consider locking your rate as soon as your loan officer is available to do this for you.

1. The monthly employment numbers will be released tomorrow. If the numbers are at all better than analysts are expecting, or even in line with expectations,  I anticipate that interest rates will tick up slightly. If, as some suspect, the number is worse than the overall consensus expectation you may see rates tick down on the news. But not by much (unless the number is some off the wall number like 10% unemployment).

2.  The weekend is here. In a volatile market like this, and with rates as low as they are now, waiting through the weekend may cost you. If there is any positive economic developments from the international markets over the weekend it most likely will cause some upward movement in rates before your feet even hit the floor Monday morning.

Obviously, there is no way to know exactly what rates are going to do in the coming days, and , as I am no longer a professional financial advisor, the above comments should not be considered financial advice. I want you to be sure and make your own decision about this based on your current financial situation in consultation with your personal finance management team.

Related articles

• How the Bond Market Relates to Your Mortgage Interest Rate (marketconsultingmortgage.wordpress.com)
• Living in a low interest rate world (financialpost.com)
• Market dive could rattle homebuyers (lansner.ocregister.com)

I just received an e-mail from the CEO of REALTY WORLD -Northern Ca/Nevada with an attached article discussing the latest foreclosure numbers for the State of California.

 Now, normally I would proclaim to all of you in the Lake Oroville real estate market that all real estate is local and that it is much more important to stay in tune with the local home sales numbers as opposed to general reports on the market. While this is still my philosophy, I do not think it is at all wise to IGNORE reports on the broader markets. After all, it is the broader markets that get the media coverage when it comes to just about anything real estate these days. Like it or not the media has a lot of influence on the consumer’s psyche that helps in creating the mindset that consumers are using when making decisions on whether to buy or sell a home.  If you are a regular reader of this blog site that serves the real estate housing markets of Oroville, Chico, Paradise, Yuba City, and Marysville California you know that I do not believe any improvement will occur in this housing market until we have two things: Employment and consumer confidence.

It is becuase of the latter of these two vital ingredients that I want to share excerpts from the article posted on DQNews.com.

The number of California homes that went into foreclosure fell to a four-year low last quarter, the result of a more stable housing market as well as policy changes in the mortgage servicing industry, a real estate information service reported.

Last quarter’s activity was the lowest for any quarter since 53,493 NoDs were recorded in the second quarter of 2007. It was well below half the record 135,431 default notices recorded in the first quarter of 2009.

A total of 56,633 Notices of Default (NoDs) were recorded at county recorders offices during the April-to-June period. That was down 17.0 percent from 68,239 for the prior quarter, and down 19.2 percent from 70,051 in second-quarter 2010, according to San Diego-based DataQuick.

Mortgages were least likely to go into default in San Francisco, Marin and San Mateo counties. The probability was highest in Kings, Sutter and Yuba counties.

Trustees Deeds recorded (TDs), or the actual loss of a home to foreclosure, totaled 42,465 during the second quarter. That was down 1.4 percent from 43,052 for the prior quarter, and down 10.9 percent from 47,669 for second-quarter 2010. The all-time peak was 79,511 in third-quarter 2008.

Last quarter’s trustees deeds total was the lowest since 35,431 were filed in fourth quarter 2010, and the second-lowest since fourth quarter 2007, when 31,676 were filed.

Now, let’s be clear here. Even with this “encouraging” news, we have a long long way to go until the real estate market is healthy again. But it is important to understand, especially for you buyers out there who are still waiting for things to go lower, that this market is so beat up right now that, if this type of news consistently continues over the next two or three quarters, it is very possible to see some firming up of prices and maybe even some very modest price increases.  Just food for thought.

Here are the latest foreclosure reports for the real estate markets of Lake Oroville, Ca, Chico CA, Paradise CA, Yuba City Ca and Marysville, CA.

These reports still show what has been true for the past couple of years- a very volatile market with not much in the way of any long term trend that could assist us all in anticipating where the market is going from here. This uncertainty, as well as rampant unemployment, is doing its best to keep many buyers on the sidelines, as they seem to be waiting to the bottoming in pricing.

If you are one of these buyers be sure that you are keeping a close eye on trends on prices and interest rates as you wait. Remember that the Federal Reserve has pulled out of the mortgage market and are no long artificially deflating interest rates. Rates are going to react much more quickly to changes in the economy than at anytime in the past 2 years without the government interference that has kept them low. Believe me when I say I understand the fence-sitting mentality as not much this economy has to offer feels very good right now. Read the rest of this entry »

I just signed up with this really cool new Newsletter service provided bt the National Association of REALTORS®. I will be using this service from time to time to bring important real estate topics to all of you in the Lake Oroville, Chico, Paradise, Yuba City, Marysville real estate markets and the real estate markets surrounding these areas. I would appreciate your feedback on this service as I always want to be bringing you the most pertinent real estate information available. Afterall, shouldn’t you have the most current information available to you as contemplate selling or buying a home?

As part of my efforts to stay on the leading edge of real estate news, in order that I can keep all of you in the Lake Oroville housing market informed, I subscribe to a number on-line real estate new organizations who regularly communicate with me through e-mail with the latest and greatest real estate info.

In an artice that just arrived in today’s communication from Inman News, I thought I was experiencing Deja Vu all over again. In fact, some of it sounded so familiar that I started to rack my brain as to where I had heard this kind of thing before. I looked high and low and still no hint. I looked inside and outside. I looked everywhere in the entire Lake Oroville real estate market area. But no luck remembering where I had heard it before.

So now my dear readers, I turn to you for help. Here, excerpted in part, (Click Here to see entire article) is what I read from the article written by Glen Roberts, Jr., entitled “ A slow-motion real estate recovery”. Maybe you  can help me remember:

Mark Dotzour, chief economist for the Texas A&M Real Estate Center, said government stimuli have delayed recovery.

“We’re not in a ‘double dip’ in my mind,” said Dotzour — referring to some economists’ talk of a second dive into downturn after some signs of an economic rebound — “we just never hit bottom in the first place.”

The market essentially “fell off a cliff,” and the government’s “lifeline” of programs it throttled at the recession, among them the homebuyer tax credit programs, “Cash for Clunkers” auto program, loan mod programs and Federal Reserve’s purchase of Treasury debt, did not have the intended benefits.

The market “would have started coming back up to a year ago or so if we hadn’t had the federal intervention in the first place.”

The federal homebuyer tax credit programs appear to have been largely ineffective, essentially “stealing” sales forward that would have occurred at a later time. “We believe pretty strongly that we paid back every bit of that stimulus,” he said, with the slumping sales that followed expiration of the tax credits.

Hmm…..now where in the world have a I heard these type ideas before?????  Wait……………..yes…………………..now I’m starting to remember………….Here is what I had read in the past. Read the rest of this entry »

Hello, once again, Lake Oroville real estate market stats fans. I can’t believe it has been nearly 3 months since I have reported week sales for the Oroville real estate market to you. Boy, how time flies when you are having fun selling Oroville homes, Paradise homes, Chico homes and homes in Yuba City and Marysville.

Lately the word is, the more things change the more they stay the same. Except for overall home values, that is. In Oroville we can’t seem to sell anymore than 7-8 homes per week and average prices of the Oroville home listings that are selling continue to trail downwardly.

Here are this week’s numbers: 

At least until July 1st, if you can. It is on this day that the sales tax rate in the State of California is reduced by 1 percentage point. In the Oroville, Paradise, and Chico areas this means that our sales tax goes from the current rate of 8.25% down to 7.25%.

The higher rate was imposed upon California by our legislature and Governor on April 1, 2009 in the hopes of helping close the budget gap caused by the out of control spending of our “state leaders.” As usual, raising taxes only made matters worse. But enough about politics.

With the expiration of the current increased tax rate only two weeks away (unless it is somehow extended) it is wise to consider putting of any non-essential purchase until the new rate takes effect. Consider the savings you will enjoy by putting off the purchase of that new car you are about to buy. By simply waiting a mere two weeks you can save yourself $200 in sales tax for a $20,000 car and $300 in taxes for a car that costs you $30,000. Heck, that is like getting a free tank of gas Speaking of cars, you can also save on registration fees if you put your purchase off until July 1st because vehicle registration fees are also being rolled back then.

The reduction in the sales tax is going to be good for the economy of a state struggling to get back on its economic feet by leaving consumers with more money in their pockets that will most likely be spent on other things. For example, the overall price on a gallon of gas will be reduced by the reduction in the sales tax. At today’s price of $3.77 per gallon at the corner AM/PM you will save almost 4cents per gallon with the new (or should I say old) rate.

If it is at all possible for you to put off that taxable purchase until July 1, then I say do it and keep more of YOUR money.

Related articles

• Calif. legislators OK online sales tax, and that means Amazon(bizjournals.com)
• California Democrats send budget to Brown(bendbulletin.com)
• California Lawmakers Pass No-Tax Budget as Deadline Looms(businessweek.com)

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In speaking with a number of lenders that serve the Oroville real estate market, there seems to be an increase in the number of prospective borrowers who aren’t listening to the instructions their loan officers are giving them during the loan process which is jeopardizing the purchase of their homes.

Today’s public service message is short and sweet to homebuyer’s everywhere:

LISTEN UP!!!

When your loan officer tells you not to buy anything using your credit card during the loan process…..Listen up!

When your loan officer tell you to be sure you have a paper trail for ANY funds you receive during the loan process….Listen up!

When your loan officer tells you that any gift funds that someone is willing to give you must not go directly into your bank accounts…Listen up!

When your loan officer tells you not to deposit those “stashed under the mattress” funds into your accounts….Listen up!

As a borrower you must understand that the loan qualification does not end when your lender pre-qualifies you for a loan.  Any changes to your financial position before your home purchase is COMPLETE will affect your ability to procure your loan. In most cases the effect is that you disqualify yourself for your loan.

Your lender will be monitoring your financial situation throughout the loan process and WILL be aware of changes to it. Be sure that you not only hear what your loan professional is telling you, but also be sure to LISTEN UP!!

If you do, you will find that the loan process is much simpler and less stressful.

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