In today’s lending climate, it’s tougher and tougher to find ways to borrow the money for renovation of a home, but contrary to popular belief, the programs are still out there.

The FHA 203(k) program is one such option. For more information on how you can buy and renovate a house, just get in touch with us and we’ll be happy to help you.

The Party’s Almost Over! I’ve been telling would-be home buyers for several weeks that if they want to take advantage of the home buyer tax credit, NOW is the time to pull the trigger, or they’re in danger of missing the November 30th closing deadline.

As a result of this looming deadline, we’re seeing a spike the number of multiple-offer bidding wars in the Edmond/OKC market. Realtor Magazine just reported similar situations in many other areas of the country, for the same reason.

Word of advice, quit trying to time your interest rate and get locked in on a house now. It’d be silly to miss out on an $8K tax credit while trying to time a simple 1/8% reduction in interest rate.

According to a recent article published by Business Week, Oklahoma City and Tulsa are tops when it comes to housing market strength; of course, we already knew that

OKC, comes in at #10 of the Top 30 with a positive annual change in home values of 4.94% and a quarterly increase of 1.85%

Ask anyone what home values across the country are doing and you’ll get mixed responses, based solely on what locale each person is familiar with. Seems pretty obvious, right?

Truth is, it’s obvious to everyone except those enforcing broad-sweeping change to appraisal guidelines (HVCC), and Richard Mize has pointed out – in grand fashion – the biggest problem created by this broad-brush approach; the resulting home depreciation.

It’s pushing down appraisals, which is good if they were inflated, which they were not everywhere, and it’s pushing down values, which can’t be good here, since there was no bubble-induced price inflation here.

If there’s a problem with the Home Valuation Code of Conduct, that’s surely it: It was put in place everywhere to fix problems that had cropped up only in certain locales.

Here’s the next question; What would our home values be doing in Central Oklahoma if there weren’t legislated policies in place that are unquestionably holding them down?

Many Oklahomans (or Okies) may think to themselves ‘What Recession?’ when they watch the nightly news, and that sentiment is being noticed more every day as the national press continues to report how strong our local economy is here in the Sooner State.

Only a couple of weeks ago, USA Today reported on the strength of OKC’s economy and the list of these types of accolades continues to grow.

This city is perhaps the most surprising. Construction cranes are busy here. New medical buildings are underway. Buildings are being renovated in the historical Bricktown neighborhood. Oklahoma City’s June unemployment rate of 6% was the second-lowest in the nation for metropolitan areas with 1 million or people, says the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Its per-capita income grew 6.9% in 2008 to $40,942, compared with a year earlier, the Commerce Department reported last week. That growth made the city No. 1 in the USA for large metro areas.

What about your corner of the US? How are things there?

Having lived in Cedar Pointe up until a year and a half ago, I have a lot of great things I could tell you about this small, close-knit Edmond community, but if you found this, you’ve probably already chosen Cedar Pointe as your next home.

Now it’s time to find the right home, right? Here’s a great one I just listed yesterday:

4 Beds, 2.5 baths, 3-car garage and so much more. The thing you’ll notice from the pictures is the wonderful decor and the perfect condition of this open, inviting home at 1920 Cedar Pointe Ln. Click here to let us know when you’d like to see it in person.

The closing of TBW was sure to affect plenty aspects of the real estate business, but today I was witness to one aspect I hadn’t considered.

My client bought their first home and we closed today. It turns out that the seller’s mortgage was through Taylor Bean & Whitaker and the title company was unable to obtain a payoff from TBW, since they’ve basically ceased all operations. With no way to validate payoff, the seller didn’t get their proceeds check. Instead, all of that money will sit, unclaimed, until somebody, somewhere can manage to get a correct payoff figure.

How’d you like to have all of your equity tied up indefinitely? Yep, the TBW closing is affecting plenty of people.

Ah, yet another list for Oklahoma City to add to it’s quickly-growing stack of bragging rights.. One of the Top 5 places to sell a home, according to ABC. Anyone out there noticing a trend yet?

This question gets the award for the most asked question of August 2009. I’d assume it’s because the clock is ticking on those who haven’t found a house yet and they’re worried that they’re going to miss out.

Well, I can’t tell you if the tax credit will get extended or not, but what I can tell you is that as the program stands today, you better find a house and get under contract with the next 40-45 days or you’re gambling with $8,000!

Here’s another feather in the cap of the Oklahoma City metro and it’s ever-growing list of economic kudos.. according to a report recently released by the Bureau of Economic Analysis at the US Department of Commerce, “Five of the six fastest-growing large MSAs were in Texas and Oklahoma.”