Refinance Free Credit

Obviously the value of your home is very important. It is important because you can use equity you have built up in the home. How does the value of your home change? There are some factors that can affect the value of your home for both the good and the bad. The following are some of those factors. The best part about them is that they are all very controllable.

Factors That Increase a Home’s Value

• Landscaping – If the surroundings of the house are clean, then it can really help. The appearance of a house is important because people like to look at a clean home. It also shows that you truly care about the property you have.
• The materials you use for your floors are important as well. These are called natural materials. People love wood floors and exotic looking stone. It shows that you enjoy the changing times. Certain materials also give the house a very historic feel, or warm feel as well.
• The Kitchen – This is so important. A bad kitchen can really be a downer. Money you put into updating your kitchen will really be worth it. The kitchen is supposed to be a very clean area. Make it clean looking by always keeping it updated.
• Bathrooms – This is also suppose to be a very clean area. If you notice the shower is getting old and beat down, then update it. Maybe the faucet heads are rusty. Fancy looking shower heads or faucet heads give the bathrooms a whole different feel.
• A great first is impression is so important. If someone is visiting your house they generally decided whether they like the house within 2 minutes. So clean it up. Make sure the clutter is cleared and that the house has a very clean feel.

Factors That Decrease a Home’s Value

• Location, location, location – People want to live in a part of the city that is growing. If you live in a part of the city that has not seen growth for a few years then you could be in trouble. Obviously this is a factor that is out of your control. Unfortunately it still does affect your home’s value.
• Bad roofing – This is such a deterrent. Nobody likes to fix a roof, it is such a distraction. So people may be turned off if they see a house that has a poor roof. Roofing offers comfort to the entire house.
• No garage – The days of the carport are over. People like to see a garage. They want to know that their belonging and cars will be safe. A garage is a very safe place to store your automobiles.
• Bad maintenance – This has been an overwhelming theme for this blog. You need to maintain your house, because your value will be greatly affected by poor or no maintenance.

Additional Resources:

• Buying a Home
• Selling Your Home

Required reading:

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119798901839036859.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

The staff proposal would also “generally” ban lenders from “directly or indirectly paying mortgage brokers in connection with consumer credit transactions secured by a consumer’s principal dwelling, unless the mortgage broker enters into a written agreement with the consumer” and provides certain disclosures. Creditors wouldn’t be banned from paying brokers if the compensation isn’t determined by the borrower’s interest rate (YSP).

Fed staff also are proposing to ban lenders from structuring traditionally “closed-end” mortgage products as “open-ended.” Fed staff believes this is necessary to prevent lenders from trying to evade the new protections.

The new proposal would apply to loans secured by the consumer’s principal dwelling where the annual percentage rate exceeds the yield on comparable Treasury securities (30-year now at 4.53%, 5-yr now at 3.50%) by at least three percentage points on first-lien loans, or five percentage points for second-lien loans.

So the axe is gonna fall, one way or another.  What are we going to do about it?

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This article on Bloomberg talks about Paulson and Bernanke wanting to increase the Fannie and Freddie market from $417,000 to $1,000,000.   I’ve got a couple of reactions to that:

1. If Fannie and Freddie are currently bleeding money and we don’t really know how bad things are in their current portfolios and they don’t have enough capital (or it appears that they don’t) to handle the current loan pipeline and what do we want to do?  Give them a larger portion of the mortgage market?   Are we asking for trouble?

 2. I’d love to see Fannie and Freddie start buying jumbos because I think it would unfreeze the jumbo market a bit.

So, what do you think?

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The National Association of HomeBuilders reported that their index of home builder sentiment stayed at the same level this past month and that marks a three month level pattern.   Does that mean we’re seeing the first sign of a “bottom” in the new home market?   Or is it a temporary?

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