Cuyahoga County Bank Owned Property Sales: Some are Now Upgraded by the Banks

The National news is abuzz with the 2006 figures for foreclosures which are out now. This is not news to us in NE Ohio since our figures have been public and discussed for some time. I wrote about it several times, for example, here.

The end result is that I wind up showing many more bank owned homes to buyers than ever before. With so many homes in almost every market in Northeast Ohio for sale, there is a lot to pick from. Yes, it's a buyer's market. As it turns out, banks are realizing they have to be competitive in the same way private owners who put their homes for sale are being competitive. This means it's now possible to find bank owned homes that have been upgraded.

An example: I have a client with a contract on a home in Cleveland. We had looked at about six homes, and one of them was owned by Fannie Mae (which means the foreclosure occurred on a government loan. After Fannie Mae took it over, they made significant improvements to the home: upgraded the kitchen with new everything including appliances. Stuccoed the garage; replaced the roof on both the home and the garage. They also upgraded the bathroom. This is not your stereotypical bank owned behavior. I guess some banks are realizing there are so many foreclosed properties for sale and in order to get theirs sold they are going to have to put money into it. This is a savvy move on their part. And it also means, if you are looking to buy a home you might not want to pass over the bank owned properties because they may be in better shape than you expect. So ask your Realtor® to add them to your search for a home. The benefit to you is easily seen. The benefit to the community is they sell. Win-win? Peace Out - 3C

June 21st is National 'Dump the Pump' Day

We have another grassroots effort to protest the use and cost of fossil fuel coming up. It is sponsored by the American Public Transportation Society (APTA). Their figures show people in this Country took 10.1 billion trips on public transportation in 2006.

How about NE Ohio? RTA stats show that for the fourth straight year, ridership was up. This past year, .03%. Might not sound like much but that meant an additional 150k plus trips for a grand total in 2006 of 57.2 million rides. They also said that the blue and green lines servicing Shaker/Cleveland increased ridership by 5.1%.

A good time to try it out yourself? Next Thursday for Dump the Pump Day. Good time to start planning the trip now. It's really a good way to show your support for the reduction in reliance on foreign oil. It's really a good way to show the value in energy conservation no matter where the oil comes from, when you get right down to it. Some other facts from the press release on Dump The Pump Day:

• 
  Each year, public transportation use saves the equivalent of 140,769 service station tanker truck trips clogging our streets


• Each year, public transportation use saves the equivalent of 34 supertankers of oil, or a supertanker leaving the Middle East every 11 days


• Each year public transportation households save over $1,399 worth of gas


• Transit availability can reduce the need for an additional car, a yearly expense of $6,251 in a household budget

It's a good idea! I realize everyone doesn't live near transit access (which is a shame, it's a great reason to move). If you have the opportunity and the accessibility, why not participate in this. Who knows, you might find out it's a great way to get to work and wind up doing it more often. Peace Out - 3C

More NE Ohio Job Info: Hot Jobs for 2007

Browsing through my daily dose of Crain's Cleveland I discovered an article on three 'fields' of expertise that are supposed to be 'hot' in NE Ohio. This according to the staffing firm Robert Half. The three jobs are:

• Accounting
• Finance
• Help Desk/IT Support (DUH!)

You can read the Crain's article here. You can read the Robert Half press release here.

Then I decided to do some more research. According to Careerbuilder.com (a thriving and expanding local company I might add), these are top ten jobs:

1. Radiation Therapist

2. Nurse Paralegals (like tax attorneys only different lol)

3. Genetic Counselor (assisting families with family members who have birth defects)

4. Legal Nurse Consultant

5. Art Therapist

6. Computer Forensic Expert

7. Medical Illustrator

8. Veterinary Physical Therapist

9. Animal Defense Lawyer

10. Animal Assistant Therapist

To find out more you can read the article. Peace Out - 3C

June is National Home Ownership Month

Bonnie Erickson is a fabulous blogger, so reading her blog is always a treat. I wanted to feature her latest post because she talks about June being National Home Ownership Month. The National goal is to increase minority home ownership. It's a good read! While you are there you just might want to check out her other informative and well-written posts.

June is also a good time to do some of those pesky chores like cleaning gutters, washing windows, repairing screens. I'm still working on weeding all my flower beds but that is another story! Peace Out - 3C

New Approach to Community Activism: Blogging

Many of already know this, but there is an interesting article in the Washington Post about how you can advocate for your community by establishing a blog. There are already community blogs per se, where organizations can all join on one blog and residents can go there and find out information. But this gets to the heart of grassroots efforts which a lot of us are well, advocating! Christian Antoniades is the author. Remember my post about reporting pot holes to the City in Lorain? Well she brings up a good point! You can set up a blog that basically allows you to do that about potholes, or any other issue of importance on your street or block or neighborhood.

She interviewed bloggers who have set up community blogs in Maryland neighborhoods and they had some tips.

1. Take a camera! (absolutely!) if there is a recently vandalized home on your street, take a photo, blog about it, and email the blog to your Council person I say).

2. Get other bloggers involved. (Or get other neighbors involved, in my opinion. Have them come to you and tell you what they are concerned about. It's rare to have a lot of activists in one spot. It does happen. For example there is a Yahoo! Group for Ohio City that pretty much acts as a neighborhood watch group and it does an excellent job. But in reality one or more bloggers can get the job done for a small area.

3. Get a few people to have different areas of interest. (For example, the Business people on the Euclid Avenue Corridor could have used a blog to get help before that one poor woman wound up arrested because patrons could not get out of her establishment.)

We have fine bloggers in NE Ohio but I'm not aware of a series of neighborhood blogs. Could be I am just not seeing them it's a big blog world out there!

And by the way, it doesn't have to be a 'complaint' blog! Maybe you want to get the neighborhood teens involved in a project for the summer. Maybe an elderly resident needs help with home repairs. Teens working to help neighbors could get started on a blog. You get my drift.

Anyway, the more people who get involved in each of our neighborhoods, the better off we are and just maybe we can make a difference? Peace Out - 3C

A Day In the Life of a Realtor®

Normally I don't blog about my daily experiences but something happened Thursday evening that has stayed on my mind. I wrote a post a few days ago without having personal experience with it but now it hit home. Well, it happened when I trekked out to show a home.

My client had gotten really excited about this one home. New enough to still have tax abatement. Very affordable. And the on line photos gave it great curb appeal and interior updates. I made the appointment with the listing agent, and set out to show it. Arriving a few minutes before the scheduled time, I decided to go ahead and open the door. That should have been my first clue. It was jammed. My clients arrived and with the help of one of them, we got the back door open, although that was not easy either. Once inside, the home looked nothing, anymore, like the on line photos. Dry wall smashed out of every room, particles all over the floor. Every piece of wiring was gone. The copper pipes were gone.

This home featured an updated bath with jetted tub and really nice fixtures. Well the bath was no longer nice, believe me. It was surreal. The three of us kept wandering around. My clients were a young married couple and the gentleman wandered into the basement first. He announced a flood. I checked it out, half of the basement had standing water because even though the vacant home had been winterized (which means water turned off so pipes don't burst in below freezing weather), the pipes had water in them and as they were ripped out a flood appeared. Now the home is not only vandalized but in this weather, in danger of becoming a festering haven of mold before you know it.

I of course called and left a message for the listing agent (who oddly has never called me back nor responded to my emails) to make sure she knew what was going on. My clients and I secured the windows and doors and left.

So you have a home, built in a neighborhood in need of revitalization. And less than five years after it is built, it's now trashed. There is something very sad about that. Peace Out - 3C

Manufactured Homes Go Green and Upscale?

Housingzone.com did an interesting piece on pre-fab housing. For those of us who take a snooty approach to pre-fab (and yes, I like the old historic homes better aesthetically), the article points out some reasons why the market for pre-fab is increasing.

1. Fresh designs. To me that means more than just the look of the exterior. Think about how people use extra bedrooms for offices, dens, game rooms. Think about how a Great Room or Family Room off the kitchen has turned into a practical and desirable floor plan for families or those who love to entertain. The small parlour/living room combination has been transplanted with this style. Pre-fab homes are offering ways to meet these new needs and apparently the public is buying it.

2. Designs that appeal to more upscale consumers. The old standard of a manufactured home only being a low to moderate income home design of lower quality does not hold true anymore. As one builder said in this article "....[perceptions] that are rooted in past decades when the industry kept costs low at the expense of good design...." are gone.

3. Environmental and energy concerns. Environmentally friendly construction materials and green housing standards are being met now with many pre-fab builders. As a side note, you can look at homes made of steel instead of wood framing, which is a big plus in areas that experience a lot of nature's wrath. Steel also gives you more square footage to play with inside the home since there are less 'interior room' structural supports needed.

They claim their biggest market is baby boomers, not that this is surprising since there are so many of us lol. Anyway, to read the entire article, go here. Peace Out - 3C