[Happy renter]

My friend bought 2 houses around 1989 to flip for profit with her sister who was an agent. Houses went up 10% in few months, but they wanted at least 20%. So, they did not sell. Around 1990, houses started to fall and they could not even sell for break even. They rented out for loss a few years and tired of it. They sold with big loss in 1997. After that lesson, they never flipped or invested in real estate any more, except their primary residents.

I think it’s not nice and a kind of insane to flip houses since houses are basic living requirements for everybody, but not luxury! I do believe in karma.

[Happy renter]

Alex_angel,

For my knowledge, 3% co-op is not for a loan. It means the builder will pay 3% commission to the real estate agent who brings the client in the First Time. Then, builder will pay the agent 3% after the escrow is being closed. Usually, the builder does not offer the co-op. The purposes for the builder to offer the co-op are:
1. The builder is very desperate and it ranges from 1-3%.
2. Attract the agents to bring in potential buyers.

However, if you visit the model home without an agent, the builder does not need to honor the co-op offer. Usually, if the builder offers the co-op, your agent must bring you in for the 1st visit. Must have your agent to sign in for you! Your agent has to represent you in order to get the 3%.

[Happy renter]

Yes, most flippers & sellers are very stubborn to the prices in SD, OC & LA. Some even ask for 20% more from peak. They don’t accept reality of housing slow down and still dream about the old mania. Greed, greed, greed! After the market crashes very hard, they will deeply regard.

[Happy renter]

I think the 0.7% unexpected rise is only an illusion. It ignores 2 major factors:

1. The pending sales can’t guarantee that all houses will be closed. The fell out subprime and the sentiment of buyers (changing their mind) may affect the percentage of houses being closed.

2. The pending sale is up 0.7%, but it is still 8.5% Down from last year.

The stock is up because the 0.7% rise beats the estimation and the oil is down. It does not mean the real estate is stronger. We will have a bigger picture in summer for both housing and stock markets.

[Happy renter]

kewp
Yes, I wish the mess will be corrected by itself with price adjustment also!

Fed will be very likely to lower interest rate if the housing market crashes. However, the Fed can only lower 1/4 or 1/2 the most at a time. Also, it can only change the Fed rate during to the meeting schedule.

Hopefully, the market will crash hard and fast to correct itself. Even the Fed lowers the rate, it won’t stop the correction.

[Happy renter]

Well, the down payment was only $3K, even max 5% was only about $150. May be they have already added $150 to the price on the ad. since the dealer let you to pay up to $3K only? You still needed to finance for the rest right!

Also, the dealer took the $3K, c/c dep. to make sure you would buy the car in that night. They spent a lot of time to negotiate with you, so they did not want you to walk away and never went back.

That’s good that it seemed like both parties were happy!

[Happy renter]

recordsclerk,

I use my cash rebate c/c a lot, but I pay off everything month. I tried to buy a car using c/c and planed to pay off right way. But the dealer said NO! It’s what I could imagine. If I used c/c, the c/c company would charge the dealer 3-5%. That’s why the c/c company could give us 2% rebate!

If the dealer let you to use c/c to pay, they had to make sure they needed to charge you 3-5% more in order to cover the c/c company’s charge. So, you were the one who actually paid the 3-5%. Even after the max 2% rebate, you still over paid 1-3%. Unless, the dealer was willing to pay the 3-5% additional cost.

The dealer told me if they let me to use c/c, they had to charge me 5% more since they quoted me the cash price! They have already gave me good deal, there was no room for them to eat the 5% cost! I totally agreed with them since they needed to make their living.

Everything has a cost!

I have very high credit score, but my score was not a lot lower before I sold & paid of my 2 houses. The loan of my 2 houses was much more than a car loan. Credit score needs time and payment history to build up.

[Happy renter]

Option 1:
I suggest you to pay off the car loan that is with 6% interest rate:
Unless you can use the money to invest something else like, stock that can generate more than 6% return. If your return is 10%, you make 4% profit. The 10% is taxable, but you still make profit. However, the future stock market will be very volatile. If you are not sophisticated investor, you better don’t touch it. If you put money to CD, the max is about 5.5%. So, you lose 0.5% to carry the loan, plus the 5.5% CD profit is taxable. So, you actually losing 0.5% + tax.

Option 2:
I don’t suggest you to use the reward credit card to pay off your car loan:
You did not mention the interest rate and reward % of your rewards credit card. So, it’s hard to compare. But I know the max reward % is about 2%. Sometimes, credit card offers very low introductory rate, but it will go up tremendously, like over 20%!

[Happy renter]

I know most houses on that side of street have very good ocean view, but also very loud freeway noise. This house has freeway noise, but NO nice view. No wonder it’s so hard to sell.

I bought my 1st house in 1993 and that house was pre-foreclosed. Back then, homeowners cut prices a lot and very quick to avoid being foreclosed since most had 20% down plus good credit to buy houses. During this housing bubble, flippers & buyers bought houses with zero down and bad credits. So, they are not willing to cut prices. Some even ask for 20% more from the peak since they have NO money or No credit to lose. They enjoy free rents, kick back, relax and wait for lenders to foreclose. Also, most of them think they are genius since they flipped houses for insane huge profits.

I feel the quality of homeownership has been highly deteriorated by this housing bubble and corrupted lending system. Eventually, we as good honest citizens have to share the loss of the crash!

[Happy renter]

The Affect Of A Short Sale On Your Credit in 3 different situations:

1. If the lender chooses to sue the borrower for the difference of short sale, and the homeowner cannot pay, a deficiency judgment would appear on the homeowner’s credit report, negatively affecting the homeowner’s credit.

2. Often, the bank chooses not to sue. Even when the bank chooses not to sue, the foreclosure can end up showing up in credit checks because it is a public record.

3. If the property owner needs to take a new loan from a bank in order to make up the difference from the short sale, most likely the new credit score will not be drastically different than the property owner’s credit score before the short sale.

My friend took a new loan after the short sale during the last housing down time market. It did not impact his credit at all.

http://www.mortgagenewsdaily.com/wiki/Short_Sale_Credit.asp

[Happy renter]

This Scam is specious:

1. I still feel Cunningham might get some cash from the lender. Otherwise, what did she sign for?

2. The article did not mention if she got any money, but it does not mean she did not. Or the reporter did not check if she got any money from the lender.

3. Nobody knows what did the lender say! Everyghing is accoding to Cunningham.

If she really sign off her house’s title to a “Stranger” knocked at your door without getting any money and without looking the document. I would say this is more like a Joke, but not a scam.

[Happy renter]

no_such_reality,

So, it’s really a scam and she signed her house away without getting any moeny.

[Happy renter]

It is my Guess! I think may be she borrowed $89k in 2000. 9 months ago, she refinanced with higher loan or got the equity loan. But the reporter did not mentioned it and “How Much Money did she Cash Out?”.

The reporter made it like the lender robbed Cunningham $145K and also her house. It sounds stupid, but I think a lot of Ignorant Americans blieve it and give Poor Cunningham mercy & bail out.

Once again, she should be responsible for what she signed!!

[Happy renter]

no_such_reality,

I hear your! Our society is sad and ironic:

Yes, $1M (net worth) is no big deal now. It’s not enough to have nice house and good life.

However, how many middle class Americans can save $1M in their whole life.

[Happy renter]

The Gov’t (Rep or Dem) does not determine the interest rate. The short-term rate is determined by Fed. The long-term rate is affected by a lot of factors like bonds, inflation, US economy, Gov’t & Fed’s policy, banks & lenders, and even global economy as well.

It is my own opinion, if the housing market crashes, it will take a few years to recover. So, Fed will likely to keep the rate low. Look at the history of last housing downtime. The rate was kept realtively low for a few years. Especially, there are so many terrible mortgage problems now. If Fed rasies the rate a lot, it will cause serious recession. Right now, the Fed hands on and tries to bal. If it sees any market at risk, it will adjust the rate to bal the economy.

Nobody can make sure, only prediction! Any uncertain factor can affect the rate. However, interest rate is not like stock. It does not fluctuate a lot at a time. You should monitor the rate all the time if you are concerned.

Good Luck!

[Author]

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