Archive for the 'Pensacola Real Estate News' Category
FBI Shifting More Resources To Mortgage Fraud
June 12th, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Real Estate News
I have reported in several articles about the rise in real estate mortgage fraud. A news story was published from Inman news today that indicated the FBI is shifting even more resources to investigations of mortgage fraud. This shift is occuring in 26 field offices in areas hit hardest by mortgage fraud.
Agents in these field offices have actually been ordered to temporarily stop opening new investigations on other crimes, such as wire fraud, mail fraud, price fixing and environmental crimes.
While Florida is one of the top 10 states for mortgage fraud cases, most of these cases are in the central and southern part of the state. Pensacola has not seen the level of fraud that other areas of Florida have. This is due mainly to the fact that Pensacola was not as speculative of a market as other areas of Florida were. Read more in the related articles below about mortgage fraud in Florida, and a case we saw right here in Gulf Breeze Florida.
Related Articles On Pensacola Real Estate News
Mortgage Fraud On The Rise
Did Speculators Accelerate The Florida Housing Downturn
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Pensacola Real Estate News: Mortgage Fraud on the Rise
May 14th, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Real Estate News
In recent days, reports have been coming out that indicate the FBI has increased their real estate mortgage fraud caseload. That is not a big surprise, as a down real estate market provides an ideal climate for mortgage fraud perpetrators.
Examples of real estate mortgage fraud include builder bailouts, seller assistance, foreclosure rescue and identity theft in exploiting home equity lines of credit. An example of a builder bailout scheme would be a builder providing undisclosed incentives to buyers, such as returning the down payment.
Remember, to stay out of trouble, make sure everything is openly disclosed to all parties, including the lender. As a real estate buyer, don’t let a seller try to provide you any incentives to buy that are not fully disclosed in writing.
The FBI had more than 1,200 mortgage fraud investigations open at the end of fiscal year 2007. This is a 47 percent increase from the previous year but still is estimated to be a small fraction of suspected cases. The number of suspicious activity reports (SARs) filed by banks detailing suspected mortgage fraud grew 31 percent during this same period, to 46,717. Although federally chartered banks are required to file SARs with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN), many other mortgage lenders are exempt, suggesting that the FBI is investigating only a small fraction of mortgage fraud cases.
The FBI said the top 10 worst states for mortgage fraud were Florida, Georgia, Michigan, California, Illinois, Ohio, Texas, New York, Colorado and Minnesota.
A Pensacola real estate attorney spoke recently at a Pensacola Real Estate Navigators meeting. She told the audience about a local case of mortgage fraud that she handled. A man had bought a house and lived in it for only a few years. He then forged a Satisfaction of Mortgage and recorded it in the public records. Thus it appeared that he owned the home free and clear. He then applied for a home equity loan. In doing the title work, the attorney became suspicious, as it is rare that someone pays off a home in a few years. She checked with the bank and found that they still held the mortgage and it had not been paid off.
The attorney went ahead with the closing on the home equity loan. The man came into her office and signed the necessary paperwork. On his way out, the police were waiting for him. He was arrested and taken away.
It is not worth it. Disclose everything to your lender and to your buyers if you are the seller. In the long run, this ensures that everything is legal and no one ends up ruining their life over simple and plain greed.
Fortunately, there is relatively little mortgage fraud in the Pensacola Florida area. Most of the real estate fraud in Florida will be in the southern part of the state. See related articles below.
Related Articles on Pensacola Real Estate News
Did Speculators Accelerate the Florida Housing Downturn
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An Evening With Chris Jones, Escambia County Property Appraiser
April 1st, 2008 Categories: Local Stories, Pensacola Real Estate News
In the March 2008 monthly meeting of Pensacola Real Estate Navigators, our local Escambia County property appraiser Chris Jones was the guest speaker. I have never met Chris, although I have been friends with other members of his family for many years. And Chris, like the rest of his family, is a warm and friendly person and truly cares about his Pensacola community.
I have also had to work through real estate related issues with the Escambia County Property Appraisers office, and they are a pleasure to deal with. (I’m not kidding. No sarcasm intended.) Maybe you’ve dealt with our local county or city government and were left wondering how anything ever really gets done in our county. That is not Chris Jones’ office. They are extremely customer service oriented and just as helpful and friendly as they can be.
The main topic of the speech was Property Tax Exemptions: Limitations on Property Tax Assessments, also known as Amendment 1. If you are not familiar with Amendment 1, follow the links on the Escambia County Property Appraisers home page for more information.
The first topic Chris covered was the doubling of the $25,000 homestead exemption. Chris made the point that this was not a “true doubling”. The homestead exemption was increased to $25,000 in 1980. At that time, it should have been indexed to increase at a rate to keep pace with inflation. However, it was not. It was kept at $25,000 for the next 27 years. If the homested exemption had been indexed to keep pace with inflation, the exemption would now be $65,000, not $50,000. Hence, not a true doubling. This exemption does not apply to school taxes.
Why did we end up with Amendment 1? The taxable value of Escambia County real estate doubled over the last 7 years. The taxing authorities refused to lower tax rates, and just raked in all the extra money. Citizens of Florida said enough is enough. Hence, Amendment 1 was the Florida citizens’ way of stopping the government from taking advantage of rising property values while not providing any better service to the people. 
Another feature of Amendment 1 is portability. Portability refers to being able to move your “Save Our Homes” benefit from one home to another if you buy and sell your home in Florida. Without this portability, it can be cost prohibitive for many citizens to move in Florida. Chris gave the example of a gentlemen in his 80s who had lived on waterfront property on Bayou Texar for many years. His current property value is well over a million dollars. However, to downsize and move to a more modest $250,000 home would result in an increase in property taxes paid by this man. Portability will help with these types of issues. Chris believes that the portability feature will help absorb much of our current glut of inventory in the Pensacola real estate market. You can follow my Pensacola real estate market reports to keep track of local inventory.
The next feature of Amendment 1 discussed was the Tangible Personal Property Tax Exemption. This exemption pertains to Florida businesses. It basically helps the property appraiser’s office focus their efforts on larger businesses that have more assets, versus wasting valuable resources on smaller businesses.
The last feature of Amendment 1 discussed was the 10% per year cap on non-homestead property. Thus if you own land, a second home, or other investment properties, your property taxes cannot increase more than 10% per year. This does not apply to school taxes.
After Amendment 1 was discussed, Chris went on to give his assessments of what he felt was the state of the Pensacola real estate market. He felt one of the big positives for the area was commercial property. We are seeing commercial property selling well, and holding its value. In addition, homes under $200,000 are holding their value fairly well. This should be a call to action for first time home buyers. There is bond money available at low interest rates, down payment assistance, and other programs to help first time Pensacola home buyers.
Of course we also have our negatives in Escambia County. Chris saw our big negatives being sales of waterfront properties and condos. These properties are not selling well in the current Pensacola real estate market. However, the prices are coming down on waterfront. See my article on Cheap Pensacola Waterfront Properties. Unfortunately, insurance rates are a big factor in preventing sale of these properties.
Chris also sees that people are leaving Escambia County faster than they are coming in. We need new business to attract people to our area. Santa Rosa county is rated as the 5th fastest growing County in Florida. Mobile Alabama is booming, along with Baldwin County and Orange Beach. And here sits Escambia County, sandwiched between 2 of the fastest growing areas in the nation. Our economy is stagnating and we are losing residents, while our neighbors are creating new business and have positive growing economies. Something is wrong. My feeling is that our local government leaders are not proactive in bringing new business to our area. Chris did not go so far as to say this, but I did hear several people in attendance mention poor leadership as our biggest problem.
I would like to extend a big thank you to Chris Jones for sharing his time and his knowledge with our local real estate investment group. It was a great educational experience for all who attended.
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Real Estate Short Sales, Is It Worth It?
March 28th, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Real Estate News, Working With Realtors
A few years ago, very few people, including real estate agents, had heard the term “short sale”. With the growing foreclosure rate, short sale is now a well known term to both real estate professionals and many consumers. A search of the Pensacola MLS shows that of 6693 residential properties for sale on the Pensacola real estate market, 417 are short sales or foreclosures. That amounts to 6.2% of the properties on the market.
For those not familiar with the term “short sale”, think of a short sale as a pre-foreclosure sale. You are purchasing from a very motivated seller who needs to sell to avoid foreclosure. And you are negotiating with a motivated lender who wants to get their money, but doesn’t want to own a home.
For the lender, foreclosure can be an expensive proposition, due to the fact that many buyers owe more on their home than the home is worth. The lender has to pay all the legal fees process the foreclosure through the legal system, and then turn around and pay all the fees related to selling the home. For these reasons, banks are often willing to accept less than is owed on the home just to avoid losing more money on a foreclosure.
But how good of a deal can you really get buying a short sale? And if you are a seller, what are the chances of getting your bank to accept a short sale? Are the banks really motivated to sell at a discount?
The answer to these questions is that “it depends”. Every bank is different, and every situation is unique.
I read a post on the real estate site Active Rain regarding experiences that many agents were having with short sales. I wanted to share assorted quotes from this post with my readers so everyone could see the reality behind short sales, which are often advertised as the way to get properties dirt cheap in this market. These quotes are from the author of the article and from agents who left comments. The bank names have been removed. 
- “I realize that many agents are struggling with short sales right now. Because the system is screwed up, and some banks in particular are almost impossible to work with. Bank staff are overworked, probably underpaid and buried in paperwork. I tell my buyers to throw out the short sale listings they get from me, because they’re not worth the effort. Buyers can purchase a home that comes with warranties, where sellers will pay buyer’s closing costs and the price is comparable to a short sale, so why bother pursuing what is guaranteed to become a headache without resolution?”
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“ I have worked with some great asset managers, some of whom I actually have a real, on the phone conversation with once a week. They all say the same thing — handling 750+/- files, buried in the paper, and depressed when they look at their voicemail because they know they can’t possibly get back to everyone on everything. ”
- “I have a short sale with BANK since last October. They finally approved the primary loan 2 weeks ago…the second loan is still pending. This has been six month’s…my buyer is ready to forget it. ”
- “Here in Florida many of us agents have been throwing cash and buyers at the short sales to no avail. There are not enough processors. What I am being told is that they cannot find enough “qualified” people to make decisions and that the board of director’s only meets once or twice a month to make these decisions.
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“I know an agent here who had a great offer on a short sale - it was almost full price, or “retail” as she said. The servicer for the lenders took 90 days to respond and by then the value of the property had fallen 10% and the buyers did not want to buy at that price any more. The delay cost the lenders $50,000. ”
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BANK ”refused an offer at $462k with the seller coming in with an additional $2000 and willing to do a promissory note only to foreclose and have the bank’s real estate agent list it at $454k. That really baffled me.”
- “I recommend anyone considering getting into short sales contact their attorney first to see what they could be held liable for. And please, inform your sellers to first contact an attorney and try to work out a deed in lieu of foreclosure before agreeing to take a short sale listing. Short sales should be the last effort before foreclosure…not the first step.”
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“I suggest you take your ready and willing buyers to very motivated listings that are ready to close NOW…My time is too valuable to work with a known 80% failure rate….The only ones making any money in the actual short sales end of the business are the seminars and books & CD sellers on EBAY. ”
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“I currently have an bank owned property here in Florida. I have two offers sitting on the table for it and the bank still has yet to respond. I call the asset manager 3 times a day and he tells me the same thing, “still waiting to hear if the bank approves it”.
This is Karl writing again. The previous paragraphs were quotes from the other thread. So what is my point in sharing these messages? Think twice before going after that super deal on a short sale. It may end up being an unproductive and stressful waste of your time and energy. I’m sure there are a short sale success stories where buyers ended up with a great deal on a property, but just beware that it may not always be that easy to get a property below market value through a short sale.
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Cheap Waterfront Real Estate In Pensacola Florida
March 22nd, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Buyers, Pensacola Real Estate News
“Cheap Waterfront” are two words that have not been used in to describe waterfront real estate in Northwest Florida for a very long time. However, we may now be seeing our beautiful bayfront and intracoastal waterfront homes and lots fall to prices not seen since the late 1990’s.
Below you can see one of the best waterfront lot values on Perdido Key, 100 feet of waterfront on a .30 acre lot for under $325,000.
From Navarre to Perdido Key, prices continue to respond to the downward pressure on the market caused by the slow but certain deflation of the real estate bubble, the sagging national economy, and the abysmal state of the local economy. Most of the properties have been completely repaired, restored and updated to better than ever condition, with their owners expecting to be able to recoup the investments by relying on the traditional high resale value of waterfront. However, these property owners have not seen the appreciation they hoped for, with many canal, bay, and sound front homes languishing on the market for months. It seems the time has come for a certain percentage of owners to cut their losses and negotiate prices that they never dreamed they would sell their little pieces of paradise for.
This beautiful 2 story waterfront home below on Santa Rosa Sound is one of 2 homes for sale on the same lot. With both the homes, you can get a total of 6 bedrooms and 4 baths for under $600,000. That is only $300,000 asking price for each home. You could live in one home and rent the other out, or have family living close together on pristine Santa Rosa waterfront. Or, for people who love to entertain out of town family or guests, the 2nd home could be used as an exclusive luxurious guest house. How impressive would that be???!!! If you are interested in this beautiful waterfront property, call me to see it, at 850-512-2587
It is becoming common to find 2000+ square foot homes on 50-100 ft lots for less than $500,000, and waterfront lots, some with panoramic views of pristine barrier islands, beautiful sunsets, and deep water access for $300,000 or less. It is becoming more and more common for older homes to be torn down and replaced with state of the art hurricane hardened homes.
The question on everyone’s mind has now become “how low can it go”. We must surely be approaching a price level for these types of properties that compares favorably with the entire nation, especially given the natural beauty of the area. The only reason some of these properties have not sold may be that the areas they are in have been well kept secrets, hidden away from the main east to west highway 98 corridor by the big, moss covered oaks that cover the peninsula of land that forms the Gulf Breeze and west Navarre communities.
It is certain that within the next several months these properties will become too much of a value to resist, and will be snapped up by people who had dreamed of living on the water all their lives but never thought they could afford it. Additionally, foreign investors are now taking advantage of the falling dollar and searching out these hidden gems for future returns.
For more information on great deals on Pensacola waterfront properties, Contact Me and let me show you all the great deals on Pensacola waterfront homes and land.
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Boeing Files Protest Over USAF Tanker Contract
March 11th, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Real Estate News
As my readers know, I’ve been following the developments in the U.S. Air Force contract which was awarded to Northrop Grummon Corp and its partner Europeean Aeronautic Defense and Space Co (EADS). My interest mainly concerns the effect this contract could have on not only Mobile Alabama, but also Pensacola Florida and other areas of the Gulf Coast. Los Angeles-based Northrop and its bidding partner, EADS North America, won the 179-plane contract on Feb. 29. The companies plan to assemble their tankers in a pair of new plants at the Brookley Field Industrial Complex, creating 1,500 jobs. For more on this contract award, read my previous article on Pensacola Real Estate News.
And the saga continues. Boeing today officially filed a protest over the award of the contract. “Our team has taken a very close look at the tanker decision and found serious flaws in the process that we believe warrant appeal,” Jim McNerney, chairman and chief executive officer of Boeing said yesterday.
This contract award has already caused a lot of bitterness among lawmakers whose represented areas stand to gain jobs from this contract award. Some lawmakers have even threatened to block funding for the contract awarded Feb. 29 to Northrop and EADS, the parent of Boeing rival Airbus because the partners plan to do about 40 percent of their work in Europe on the 179-plane order. The Boeing protest will trigger a 100-day suspension of the contract during the review.
“I don’t think their chances are good” in getting the award overturned”, Jon Kutler, head of Los Angeles-based investment firm Admiralty Partners Inc., said in an interview. According to Kutler, the Air Force dotted every “i” and crossed every `t’ because they knew how politically charged the whole thing would be.” The Air Force is not commenting.
Boeing estimates its plan would support 44,000 U.S. jobs. Northrop today almost doubled its projection for U.S. employment to 48,000, saying it revised the formula that had produced the earlier “conservative” estimate of 25,000.
EADS and Northrop plan to ship the components to Mobile, Alabama, where they’ll construct an assembly plant for both the military and commercial-freighter versions. Boeing planned to do the main tanker work at its facilities in Everett, Washington, and Wichita, Kansas.
Lawmakers including Representative John Murtha, a Pennsylvania Democrat and head of the House Appropriations Committee’s defense panel, threatened to cancel funding if the Air Force didn’t explain why much of the work was given to a foreign company.
Alabama political leaders said they were disappointed by Boeing’s decision to protest but said the company had the right to an independent review. “This was one of the most open, fair, and transparent competitions in the Pentagon’s history,” said U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Mobile.
How this will play out remains to be seen. From everything I’ve read, I expect the contract award to be upheld. For the sake of our economy, I hope so.
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Pensacola Real Estate Weekly Market Report for Week Ending March 1, 2008
March 5th, 2008 Categories: Pensacola Real Estate News
Pensacola Real Estate Market Data
Weekly Update For Residential Listings
In Escambia and Santa Rosa Counties
Welcome to this week’s Pensacola real estate market report. Pensacola home sales are starting to come up. The table shows 50 more homes sold than the previous week, and total homes for sale has dropped a little also. Watch for more weekly updates to see if this trend continues.
- The table shows the weekly market data for Pensacola residential property.
- These numbers include only residential homes and condominiums in Escambia and Santa Rosa Counties that are listed in the Pensacola MLS.
- They do not include vacant land or lots, mobile homes or manufactured homes or Pensacola FSBOs.
- The numbers above are created using data from the Pensacola MLS and are deemed reliable but not guaranteed
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