Thursday, April 15, 2010

Albuquerque Real Estate News!

Albuquerque Real Estate Sales are on the rise!
In March the local area housing market saw significant increases in home sales! There were 634 residential inits in March 2010 which represented a 36% increase over the same month in 2009! Additionally there were 1,077 sales placed under contract in March 2010 which represented an incredible increase of 44% over March of 2009! This was the highest number of pending sales since June 2007!
The median price dropped about 5% from $184,500 in March of 2009 to $175,000 for March of this year. The average price dropped slightly to $211,049.
The number of homes cureently on the market is down 4.7% from this time last year!
The market is brisk! Buyers are in the marketplace and sellers are selling. With today's interest rates this is nothing but good news for all involved!
Did you know that The Albuquerque Real Estate Group can place your home in the Coldwell Banker Legacy Welcome Home Magazine every month until it sells? Well, we can and we will!

Visit us at TheAlbuquerqueRealEstateGroup.com and search the Albuquerque MLS!

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Albuquerque Homes May Be Saved By Reductions in Mortgage Balances


In the newest attempt to stem foreclosures in Albuquerque and elsewhere in the country, Bank of America has announced that it will reduce the balance on some mortgages that owe more than the current market value.

In example some homes that sold for $200,000 during the housing boom may now be worth more like $150,000, encouraging homeowners to toss in their lost down payments and walk away in disgust. Bank of America says it will "forgive" some principal balances up to a maximum of $30,000, providing the homeowner is underwater at least 120%, or owes 20% more than the home is worth.

Since Bank of America bought Countrywide Home Loans in 2008, this has the potential to help a large number of Americans to keep their homes and hopefully prevent another flood of foreclosures as more of the negative-amortization and adjustable rate mortgages with baloons become due.

Here is how the program will work for an eligble mortgagee:

The bank will create a separate, interest-free "forebearance" account that covers a five year period. The $50,000 overage goes into this temporary account, and your new mortgage is based on $150,000 instead of $200,000. In some cases the interest rate can be reduced as well, resulting in much lower payments.

During the first year, if the homeowner makes the new, reduced payments on time, the bank will "forgive" $10,000 of the overage.

The second year, providing the house is still in an underwater condition, another $10,000 will be dropped.

The third year brings the same, providing the homeowner is continuing to make timely payments and the house is still over-mortgaged. This brings the amount "forgiven" to $30,000.00.

During the fourth and fifth years, your situation would be re-evaluated, and if you still benefitted from the reduced payments, they could remain the same. However, if the house has appreciated, or your principal balance is now under 100%, no more would be forgiven for that year. If home prices have not gone up and your mortgage is still more than the market value, they may elect to forgive $10,000 more these final two years until the total overage of $50,000 is met.

On certain negative-amortization mortgages, the bank may forgive the principal amount down to a 95% loan to value level as well.

Wells Fargo has also announced similar plans to reduce negative equity balances, and the Obama Administration has announced measures aimed at getting lenders to reduce underwater borrowers' principal balances and refinance their mortgages into government-sponsored loans. Government programs could affect loan modifications offered by many other banks and mortgage companies.

With these programs coming into effect, the prices of Albuquerque homes for sale will hopefully stabilize and our real estate market will bounce back sooner instead of later.

If you are a homeowner currently facing this situation, be sure to contact your mortgage company and find out your options before you decide to walk away from the home that you love.

If you are a buyer looking for a home in Albuquerque, there is no better time to buy than right now. Use our website to search the Albuquerque MLS and find just the one for you. 


Share

Monday, April 5, 2010

Free WIFI on Albuquerque's Rail Runner Express



One of fun things about making your home in Albuquerque is the Rail Runner Express shuttle bus. Getting to the Albuquerque Airport is a snap with the Rail Runner, whether you take Route 350 from north of downtown, Route 222 from south of downtown, or the single Saturday Route 50.

Ride to the Santa Fe Depot, the Kewa Pueblo for a little casino action, downtown Bernalillo, or several other destinations in New Mexico's attempt to go green and eliminate a few cars on the road.. And now you can work (or play) while you ride with the free WIFI on the train. For the last several months, only a 50 chosen participants had been given access to test the system. As of April 5, 2010, the final test phase is being opened to all passengers for the next 90-days to work out any remaining bugs in the system.

Quite the "Google-esque" thing to do, don't you agree?

Check the schedules and full information about times and stops from their website at www.nmrailrunner.com. Our city offers more reasons every day to own real estate in Albuquerque, NM. Downtown Albuquerque condos offer more and more in lifestyle amenities and conveniences and there's always plenty of land for new homes in Albquerque too. Let us show you around town and convince you we've got the best city in the west!

The website offers the following instructions for connecting on the shuttles:
How to connect on the NM Rail Runner Express:
  1. Turn on your device
  2. Check for a list of available Wi-Fi networks
  3. Select or connect to NMRX (SSID or Service Set Identifier that will appear in list of available networks)
  4. Open your browser and you will be redirected to the NM Rail Runner portal page.
  5. Click on “accept” to accept the terms of using the service and you will be allowed into the free internet.
 Remember this is a free service and is not password protected. Never perform any data-sensitive transactions such as banking while accessing the internet on an unprotected network.