Vince Hoehn of CENTURY 21 Pierce Realty LLC, Manitowish Waters, WI

According to Freddie Mac, the national average commitment rate for 30 year fixed rate mortgages fell in November to another new low -- 3.99%.   See monthly average rates back to 1971 at the Freddie Mac website.  Remember the days of 18% back in 1981?

A wise man probably wouldn't be so quick to point out his own errors of analysis, but then I have never been saddled with the sobriquet of "Wise Man." One year ago I wrote a piece about the relationship between interest rates, sale price, and affordability and it would have been just fine if I had stopped after making my ...

In August I posted information on how the recent passage of the Secure and Fair Enforcement for Mortgage Lending Act (SAFE Act) can make it difficult for sellers to offer seller financing, including land contracts, to buyers of residential properties, including vacant lots upon which a 1-4 family residence is ...

Due to the passage of the Secure and Fair Enforcement for Mortgage Lending Act (SAFE Act), it has become a whole lot more complicated for sellers to offer, and buyers to obtain, seller financing for residential properties, including vacant lots upon which a 1-4 family residence is intended to be built.  This applies to land contracts, as ...

"Freddie Sees Mortgage Rates Hitting 6 Percent in 2010" Washington Post (12/26/09) P. A12; ElBoghdady, Dina As reported in the Washington Post, mortgage rates could increase to six percent by the end of 2010, or even sooner, according to Freddie Mac.  (Freddie Mac is a GSE, or government sposored enterprise, that purchases ...

For those sitting on the fence about whether to make the "buy" decison or not, or for those afflicted with "paralysis by analysis" and are looking at every property on the market and thus cannot make a decision, consider this:If interest rates rise from today's lows to an entirely plausible 7.5%, sale prices would have ...

Day 2 of the GRI Course 3 in Green Bay, WI. A lot of good stuff to digest. First we discussed the benefits of using one’s retirement account to invest in real estate. If you sell your investment property, unless you do a delayed exchange (one type of a 1031 exchange), your gain on the sale is taxable. If your retirement account owns the ...

Day One at GRI Course 3 (see my previous post) has proven to be most interesting. The subject today and tomorrow is “Investment Real Estate and Exchanging”, and our instructor assures us that if we master what he is illustrating for us, we will be able to do something 99% of other real estate agents can’t -- properly and ...

I commented on the new Real Estate Settlement Procedures Act (RESPA) rules on a previous blog post. I now read that two lawsuits have been filed seeking to reverse or eliminate several rule changes contained in the re-written rules. The lawsuits have been brought by the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) and the National Association of ...

More fall-out from the sub-prime mortgage mess: HUD has issued new Real Estate Settlement Procedure Act (RESPA) rules. In recognition of the fact that at times consumers didn't understand the consequences or just simply didn't realize that their mortgages could result in large payment increases after just two or three years, or that other ...