Best Place to Raise Kids in Utah: Smithfield

via The Best Places to Raise Your Kids 2012: Best Place to Raise Kids in Utah: Smithfield – BusinessWeek.

If you want to raise your kids in one of the best places, use this link to search homes for sale in Smithfield Utah.

A few years ago I showed a vacant house in Providence; it was really cold, and we could actually see our breath inside the house. As we walked into the bathroom, we realized that the water in the toilet was FROZEN!  I called the listing agent, and notified them that their listing had a frozen toilet. I’m not sure if the heat was supposed to be on in the house, or if the place was improperly winterized or what went wrong. Because the toilet was frozen, I’m sure the pipes were as well. When water in pipes freeze they expand, and usually break. I am uncertain of what damage was actually done, but am sure glad I didn’t have to deal with it.

Winterization for Vacant Homes

If you own a house that is vacant you want to make sure that the utilities are still on, or that the house is properly and professionally winterized.

To help create a more inviting atmosphere for potential buyers, I recommend keeping your utilities on. A potential buyer wants to have that “warm feeling” about a home. It’s really hard to feel warm, when your teeth are chattering. In addition, if a potential buyer likes your house enough to make an offer on it, they will want to complete home inspections where they will need the water, gas, and electricity to be on so they can make sure the house works properly. You don’t have to have your heater on at comfortable temperatures, but you do need to make sure it is warm enough to prevent pipes from freezing.

If you want your house to sell during the winter you absolutely must keep the electricity on. Think about it, when our potential buyers going to look at homes? Usually after work, during the evenings. What time does it get dark during the winter months…..? It’s really hard to sufficiently look at homes for sale with a flashlight.

via Winter is Approaching: Be Prepared, Winterize It « Logan Real Estate Blog.

With a “Lease Option”, or “Rent to Own home,” sellers rent their home out giving the renter the option to buy the home at a future date. Lease option contracts usually require a substantial down payment. The down payment will be subtracted from the purchase price in the event that the renter buys the house. Lease options also generally have a portion of the rent that goes towards the option as well.

Why is there an increase in Cache Valley Lease Option Homes?

There are too many homes for sale. Cache Valley has record high numbers of real estate listings right now. Because there are so many homes for sale, some homes will just plain not sell. For many sellers who need to move out of the valley, its better to have a renter pay to cover the mortgage payment than it is to have a vacant house. Offering a house as a lease option, opens the door to the number of potential buyers.

Here are a few reasons why right now might be a good time to offer your home as a lease option:

Cover your mortgage payment. Because your house may not be able to sell right now at the amount owed, a lease option gives you one way to pay the mortgage while you wait for the real estate market to improve. Lease options can net more monthly income than just “renting” your home out. In addition, someone who has ownership interest in your property is more likely to take better care of it.

It’s harder for buyers to get financing. Mortgage loan underwriting standards are still very strict. While some potential buyers may have large savings, good credit, and excellent income, they may be unable to buy a house just because they switched careers or are self employed. These people can make excellent renters, and don’t have an option to buy.

Home ownership isn’t as appealing as it once was. Some qualified buyers just don’t want to buy right now. They fear that home prices will go down further, or just don’t want to commit to a certain house. Some people moving to Logan from other areas want to get a better feel for the area before committing where they want to actually buy. For people like this, a lease option is an ideal solution.

Higher Purchase Price. Offering your house as a lease option, may help you to net a higher purchase price. Only 22 out of more than 900 Cache Valley real estate listings are offered as lease options. This is a small percentage of the total inventory. People that want to buy, but cant get mortgage financing have no other option. In addition, if prices do continue to drop over the next few years, your contract lease purchase price has already been set. You may be able to get today’s market value for the sell of your property when the future market value is actually lower.

via Number of “Lease Option” Homes in Logan Up « Logan Real Estate Blog.

via Housing Is Very Affordable Right Now | Real Estate News.

Well that blog was posted before I actually visited any of the houses on this years parade…

Homes on Past Years Cache Valley Parade of Homes

Homes on This Years Parade of Homes

So far my wife and me have seen all of the Parade Homes in Logan, Nibley, Millville and River Heights. None of these homes are what I would call “Dream Homes.” Sure, these homes are nice. They are well built, well staged, and professionally decorated, but the size of the homes Cache Valley builders are showing off is probably a good indicator of how the Logan Real Estate market has changed. Cache Valley Builders are clearly targeting the “starter home” and more moderate home buying market. The largest finished area of these homes was actually the Kartchner Model home which is just over 2,600 square feet. There was one slightly larger rambler in Millville, but its basement wasn’t even finished. It had only about 1,600 square feet, and the “great room” in it is not what I would call great. It was so small there wasn’t even enough space for all of the staged furniture.

There are a few bigger Parade Homes I will view this weekend, but from the homes I’ve visited thus far, there has been a major shift in builders focus. For the realities of the Cache Valley Real Estate market this is a good thing. There just isn’t demand for luxury houses right now, and unless a builder can build a custom home for a client that they can show at the parade, there really is no point of throwing money away on a fancy spec home that nobody will buy.

via Parade of Homes: Signs That The Real Estate Market Has Changed « Logan Real Estate Blog.

The “Parade” is an event where builders can show off some of their most impressively built fancy homes. These homes usually have the finest materials, and are professionally staged and decorated. Lookers can fantasize and imagine their dream homes. It’s a great way to get ordinary people to wish they had extra-ordinary homes. The Parade indulges the average Cache Valley resident, and opens their eyes to potential living arrangements that they would otherwise probably never imagine.

With the struggling economy, and the huge surplus of high end homes for sale in Logan, it will be interesting to see if the builders toned down on things a little more this year.

Overall the Parade of Homes is a fun experience and makes a great date activity. The Parade ends Saturday, and there are 14 homes available this year. If you still want to participate in the parade of homes you need to act quickly. Tickets for the Cache Valley Parade of Homes cost $10 per person age 8 or older, and can be purchased online at http://www.cvhba.com/parade09ticket.html

via Parade of Homes Time in Cache Valley « Logan Real Estate Blog.

From a marketing standpoint, this is actually a pretty good idea. Harness the power of the MLS and IDX feeds with fake homes for sale to get potential buyers to ask about a particular builder, and think about building.

From a statistics and market condition standpoint, this is downright dishonest and misleading. Having a dozen phantom high end “North Logan Homes for Sale” has a significant impact on the average price of homes for sale, and on the months of real estate inventory our market appears to have.

At the beginning of the month when I ran my monthly home sales statistics, there were 794 homes for sale in Cache County with an average list price at $237,173. Right now there are 820 listings with and average list price of $246,118.

So Cache County home prices went up $9,000 in the last 20 days! This is the first time in 15 months that home prices have gone up. This means our real estate market downturn is finally turning around right?

No. Not really, there just happen to be a dozen fake listings that make the average list price of Cache Valley homes look higher than it really is.

via Real Estate Blog – Phantom Home Listings in North Logan.

Even more impressive is the huge advantage Cornerstone has for the number of buyer transactions among the major Cache Valley Real Estate brokerages. For the second quarter, Cornerstone had nearly three times more buyers transactions than Parker Real Estate, Youngblood Real Estate, and ERA Advantage Realty. It also had nearly twice as many transactions as Century 21, @Home Realty Network, and Coldwell Banker.

Buyers are choosing to use Logan real estate brokerages that know how to use technology and that are on top of things.

During President Obama’s State of the Union Speech tonight, he didn’t talk long about the housing market.But, what he did say speaks volumes about his policy intentions and the questionable philosophy of his economic advisers.

Obama: Now, the price of college tuition is just one of the burdens facing the middle-class. That’s why last year I asked Vice President Biden to chair a task force on Middle-Class Families. That’s why we’re nearly doubling the child care tax credit, and making it easier to save for retirement by giving every worker access to a retirement account and expanding the tax credit for those who start a nest egg. That’s why we’re working to lift the value of a family’s single largest investment – their home. The steps we took last year to shore up the housing market have allowed millions of Americans to take out new loans and save an average of $1,500 on mortgage payments. This year, we will step up re-financing so that homeowners can move into more affordable mortgages. And it is precisely to relieve the burden on middle-class families that we still need health insurance reform.

Barney Frank had already semi-officially declared high home prices to be government policy. But this is different…this is from the President.They are working to “lift home values, allowing “millions of Americans to take out new loans“…do they not remember how we got in this mess in the first place?

via Why Obama Wants High Home Prices | Danville Real Estate Trends.

It’s really ridiculous. The federal government really lacks economic understanding. They are trying to propel house values to artificial levels they were during the boom, simply so Americans will spend more, and feel like they have more net worth? The federal government really needs more competence in terms of economics.

In Utah, houses are even bigger. The average Utah houses sold year was closer to 2,500 square feet. Cache County Homes are a little more moderate than homes  in Salt Lake and Utah Counties, and the average size home Cache County homes sold was right around the national average.

This is still double what the average house size was fifty years ago, but, atleast we are headed in the right direction. Taking a step in the right direction towards living within our means.

via US Homes are Getting Smaller : Utah Real Estate and Home Sales Numbers.