Category: Real Estate

Benefits of an AC Tune-Up | Home Matters | AHS

With warmer temperatures soon to come, don’t be caught off guard with a broken AC. An AC tune up can extend your system’s life and efficiency, keeping you cool and comfortable.

With the holidays over, we’re looking forward to spring – and with it, annual AC tune-ups! It’s important to get your air-conditioning unit tuned up by a professional before the summer season hits, so your home can stay cool and comfortable during the hottest months.

Many American Home Shield® customers may not know that AC tune-ups are an added benefit of their home warranty plan.  So, before you schedule an AC tune-up with another company, call American Home Shield. Customers can begin scheduling their AC tune-ups in March. An AC tune-up can help ease the worry and expenses that can result from a faulty air conditioner.

What Problems Can a Faulty Air Conditioner Cause?

A faulty AC unit can cause all kinds of problems, ranging from tripped circuit breakers to leaky ducts, low air flow, and even environmental pollution from refrigerant leaks. Faulty wiring in an air conditioning unit can create a potential fire hazard, as well as tripping the circuit breaker. Refrigerant leaks not only present an environmental hazard, but can harm your AC’s efficiency and degrade its performance.

Of course, the most obvious problem with a faulty AC is that it fails to cool your house. In some climates, things can get very uncomfortable indeed while you wait for a repairman. Failing to maintain your unit properly increases the chances that your AC will quit working during the hottest weeks of the year, and can cause it to sustain irreparable damage.

How Can an AC Tune-Up Help?

Getting an AC tune-up this spring can catch small problems before they become big ones, potentially lowering your AC repair and maintenance costs. Small problems tend to become bigger, more expensive problems if they’re not dealt with right away. With new AC units costing an average of $5,414 nationally, it pays to make sure your unit lasts as long as possible. Tune-ups can extend the life of your air-conditioning unit while lowering your maintenance costs.

A spring tune-up is a sensible and smart thing to do. AC tune-ups help you keep your home comfortable, allowing your AC to cool your home with efficiency. They can help reduce your utility bill and help provide more control over the temperature inside your home.

When Is the Best Time to Get an Air Conditioning Tune-Up?

The best time to get an AC tune up is in the early spring, before temperatures climb and you need to start cooling your home for the summer. If you can’t get your AC tuned up in the spring, try to have it done as early in the summer season as possible.

Why Should You Leave AC Tune-Up to the Professionals?

It takes a properly trained professional to perform these tasks competently and correctly:

• · Check and calibrate thermostats
• · Test temperature split
• · Check refrigerant levels and system pressures
• · Perform amp draw on condenser motor, evaporator motor, and compressor
• · Rinse condenser coils
• · Check contactors and condensate lines
• · Clean or replace (owner supplied) filters
• · Clean and tighten electrical connections
• · Test capacitors and check A/C operations
• · Test safety switches and limit switches

Because air conditioners contain environmentally hazardous refrigerants and have delicate components, it can save you time, money, and headaches to have a professional evaluate your AC for potential problems and perform regular maintenance. With AC tune-ups being an added benefit of your American Home Shield home warranty plan, there’s no reason to risk doing it yourself. Professional service is completed in a timely manner, so you spend your free time doing something you want to do, and you won’t have to worry about accidentally breaking your AC while you’re trying to service it.

With spring almost upon us, it’s time to think about scheduling your 2019 AC tune-up. Tuning up your AC unit in the spring, before hot weather sets in, can help prevent future problems with the unit later, so you can stay cool all summer long. If you’re an AHS customer, make sure you’ve created a MyAccount profile so that when the time comes for a tune-up, it’ll be a simpler way to request service. 

Equity Rich Properties Surge to Record High | Realtor Magazine

Homeowners should have felt richer in 2018. Equity rich properties comprised 25.6 percent of U.S. properties with a mortgage in 2018, according to a newly released report from ATTOM Data Solutions, a real estate research firm.

 

© Glow Images – Getty Images

 

In the fourth quarter, more than 14.5 million U.S. properties were considered equity rich, where the combined estimated amount of loans secured by the property was 50 percent or less of the property’s estimated market value. That represents a new high in ATTOM Data’s records dating back to the fourth quarter of 2013.

The metro areas with the highest share of equity rich properties in the fourth quarter of 2018 were San Jose, Calif. (72 percent); San Francisco (60.7 percent); Los Angeles (48.5 percent); Honolulu (40.2 percent); and Oxnard, Calif. (39.2 percent).

“With homeowners staying put longer, homeownership equity will most likely continue to strengthen,” says Todd Teta, chief product officer with ATTOM Data Solutions. “Those that are seriously underwater may find themselves coming up for air as they continue to pay off excessive legacy mortgages or sell. This report helps to showcase a story of West Coast markets having the highest share of equity rich homeowners versus the South and Midwest markets, who continue to have stubbornly high rates of seriously underwater homeowners.”

The report showed that more than 5 million—or 8.8 percent—of U.S. properties with a mortgage remained seriously underwater in 2018. “Seriously underwater” is when the combined estimated balance of loans secured by the property is at least 25 percent higher than the property’s estimated market value. The metro areas with the highest share of mortgages seriously underwater included Baton Rouge, La. (20.7 percent); Youngstown, Ohio (19 percent); New Orleans (10 percent); Toledo, Ohio (18 percent); and Scranton, Pa. (17.7 percent).

Has Spring Sprung Early for the Housing Market? | Realtor Magazine

Demand for housing is picking up and housing analysts are pointing to lower mortgage rates as the main reason. The spring buying season may be coming early.

In Coppell, Texas, a suburb of Dallas, real estate pros reported a traffic jam of buyers lined up on the front stairway to get into an open house.

 

MarcoMaru – Morguefile

 

“It kind of caught us a little bit off-guard,” Laura Barnett, a real estate professional with RE/MAX DFW Associates in the Dallas area, told CNBC about the sudden uptick in buyer demand. “We actually did get a surge of buyers coming in. And, matter of fact, I worked with two this weekend, one of which is under contract; another is about to be.”

The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage increased for most of 2018 and neared 5 percent, prompting home sales to decrease. However, rates have been moderating in recent weeks, and potential home shoppers are taking advantage. The 30-year fixed rate mortgage averaged 4.46 percent last week, Freddie Mac reports.

Mixed with the lower rates, home prices are slowing too. Home prices in December were up 4.7 percent annually, the smallest gain in more than six years, according to CoreLogic, a real estate data firm.

“When you see those numbers coming down, you want to go, ‘OK, this is the time to buy,’” Celena Vittorio, a home shopper in the Dallas area, told CNBC. “You certainly don’t want to buy at the top of the market.”

Also in buyers’ favor recently, the share of homes with price cuts increased in January. The share of price reductions increased in 39 of the 50 largest markets, an analysis from realtor.com® found. The most expensive markets saw the largest price cuts.

The cities with some of the largest reductions in list prices were in Las Vegas (up 16 percent); San Jose, Calif. (up 9 percent); Seattle (up 8 percent); Orlando, Fla. (up 6 percent); and Phoenix (up 5 percent).

Real estate pros are responding to the increase in traffic by trying to get the homes that were going to wait to list until the spring ready to go to the market earlier.

Buyers are taking advantage of the price reductions and lower mortgage rates. “We don’t want to miss that opportunity, so we’re trying to get busy with our listings and start getting our listings on the market early,” Barnett told CNBC.

4 Things to Be on Alert for When Buying an Older Home | Realtor Magazine

Older homes often come with plenty of character and possibly even a lower price. But buying a home that has been around for a while can also mean dealing with age-related problems.

 

© deberarr/Getty Images

 

RISMedia’s HouseCall has tips during the home inspection process for home shoppers to watch for before purchasing an older home, including:

Watch for electrical issues.

Older homes could have dated wiring and electrical panels that may not be able to keep up with today’s needs, so be sure to check that that the house is up to code. Also, insulation on old wiring can pose a safety hazard, RISMedia’s HouseCall warns. Have an electrician look over the home to be sure everything is in order.

Carefully inspect the roof.

In general, roofs often need to be replaced every 10 to 20 years. Learn the last time the roof was replaced and how it was done. Some homeowners may just add new shingles on top of the old roof, which is not viewed by housing experts as the best way to replace an entire roof. Also, check for loose shingles, leaks, and the type of materials used on the roof. “A composite shingle roof will cost less to replace than a clay tile or slate roof,” RISMedia notes. “The pitch of the roof can also drive up costs—a roof that is particularly steep may be challenging to replace and repair.”

Check the foundation.

Address any potential foundation issues immediately. Older homes could have foundations that are cracked, sunken, uneven, or otherwise in need of repair. A structural engineer can closely inspect a foundation and alert you to potentially costly problems.

Check for lead paint.

Older homes may have lead paint, which can lead to serious health problems. It was banned in the U.S. in 1978, but homes built before then may still have it. In fact, about 87 percent of homes built before 1940 contain lead-based paint, according to RISMedia. Make sure that it is professionally removed.

You Don’t Always Need a High Credit Score to Get a Great Rate | Realtor Magazine

Buyers don’t necessarily need an 800-plus FICO credit score to get the best rate on a mortgage. Depending on the market, some buyers with a 700 FICO score could get nearly as attractive a mortgage rate as an applicant with an 800-plus score, according to a new analysis for the Washington Post completed by LendingTree. The analysis was based on more than 1 million actual loan offers during 2018.

Lenders turn to FICO scores—which range from 300 to 850—to assess a borrower’s risk. The general rule of thumb has always been that the higher the applicant’s score, the less the risk of default, and therefore, the lower the interest rate the lender would charge.

 

© krisanapong detraphiphat/Getty Images

 

For example, as of last week, a score of at least 760 on a $300,000 fixed-rate 30-year mortgage could get an average mortgage quote of 4.14 percent. But a borrower with a credit score of 620 would get a 5.73 percent rate quote for the same amount..

However, the differences are getting less pronounced. According to the analysis, borrowers last year making a 5 percent down payment with a credit score in the 670–679 range received mortgage rate offers averaging 5.2 percent. However, borrowers with scores above 800 making the same 5 percent down payment received offers averaging 4.78 percent—a much smaller spread than in the past. The analysis found similar smaller gaps between high and low credit scorers who had down payments of 20 and 25 percent as well.

“Although scores and down payments are indeed crucial risk components that factor into a lender’s offer, market conditions and competition also can affect the size of rate benefits to lower-FICO borrowers compared with high-FICO borrowers,” writes Ken Harney, a national real estate syndicated columnist for The Washington Post. “In actual application situations, lenders who want to increase their loan business to home buyers may dig deeper into the credit pool and offer relatively more attractive rate deals to people whose scores are not pristine.”

Indeed, Tendayi Kapfidze, LendingTree’s chief economist, told The Washington Post that this was likely due to a more challenging market for lenders in 2018 as demand for refinancings shrunk. They looked to be more competitive to attract more home purchase applications.

Fed Puts Brakes on Rate Increases | Realtor Magazine

The Federal Reserve voted to leave interest rates unchanged Wednesday and signaled that it’s not in any hurry to resume raising rates in 2019. Fed Chairman Jerome Powell used words like “patient” to describe the Fed’s latest approach to increases. His change in tone follows four rate hikes last year. The Fed’s benchmark rate is not directly tied to mortgage rates but does often influence them.

 

© Kameleon007 – iStock/Getty Images Plus

 

Since the Fed has indicated a more cautious tone about the future of rate hikes, mortgage financing giant Freddie Mac has revised its mortgage rate forecasts to a lower average for 2019.

After climbing for several months, the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage rates began to let up at the end of the year, averaging 4.6 percent in 2018 and falling to a nine-month low of 4.45 percent in early January.

Freddie Mac predicts that 30-year fixed-rate mortgages will now average 4.7 percent this year and 4.9 percent in 2020. Freddie Mac’s Economic Research Group says in its January forecast that it expects the moderation in mortgage rates to offer some relief to the previously strained housing market. “Home buyers are very sensitive to changing interest rates and will likely respond positively if mortgage rates remain below 5 percent,” says Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist.

The Fed’s rate hike in December was its ninth quarter-point increase in the past three years since the Fed began to gradually raise rates from record lows in December 2014. After Wednesday’s meeting, the Fed will keep its key short-term rate in a range of 2.25 percent to 2.5 percent.

“In light of global economic and financial developments and muted inflation pressures, the committee will be patient as it determines what future adjustments to the target range for the federal funds rate may be appropriate,” a statement from the Federal Reserve read. The Fed said that economic activity has been “rising at a solid rate” and it does expect continued growth, but noted several political uncertainties—such as fallout from the government shutdown—and a slowdown in foreign economies as reason for a more cautionary approach.

Mortgage Rates Inch Up, But Don’t Be Worried | Realtor Magazine

© REALTOR® Magazine

 

After weeks of moderating, mortgage rates moved up slightly this week. But aspiring home buyers may be able to breathe a sigh of relief: Freddie Mac economists revised their forecasts this week to predict 30-year fixed-rate mortgages to average below the 5 percent threshold for at least the next two years.

Fed Puts Brakes on Rate Increases

That will bode well for the housing market, which has become very rate sensitive. With mortgage rates slightly up this week, purchase applications for mortgages fell this week after soaring early this year, notes Sam Khater, Freddie Mac’s chief economist.

“However, softening house price appreciation along with increasing inventory of homes on the market—and historically low mortgage rates—should give a boost to the spring homebuying season,” Khater says.

The following are the national averages with mortgage rates for the week ending Jan. 31:

• 30-year fixed-rate mortgages: averaged 4.46 percent, with an average 0.5 point, rising from last week’s 4.45 percent average. Last year at this time, 30-year rates averaged 4.22 percent.
• 15-year fixed-rate mortgages: averaged 3.89 percent, with an average 0.4 point, increasing from last week’s 3.88 percent average. A year ago, 15-year rates averaged 3.68 percent.
• 5-year hybrid adjustable-rate mortgages: averaged 3.96 percent, with an average 0.3 point, rising from last week’s 3.90 percent average. A year ago, the 5-year ARM averaged 3.53 percent.

‘2018 Was Most Profitable Time to Sell in 12 Years’ | Realtor Magazine

Median home sale prices zoomed to an all-time high last year,  helping home sellers net higher profits.

The average home price gain since purchase was $61,000 in 2018, up from $50,000 last year, according to ATTOM Data Solutions’ Year-End 2018 U.S. Home Sales Report. That marks the highest gains for sellers since 2006. In 2018, sellers averaged a 32.6 percent return on investment compared to their original purchase price.

 

Rawpixel – Unsplash

 

The U.S. median home price in 2018 was $248,000, up 5.5 percent from 2017 to a new record high.

“While 2018 was the most profitable time to sell a home in more than 12 years, those along the coasts, reaped the most gains,” says Todd Teta, chief product officer at ATTOM Data Solutions. “However, those are the same areas where homeowners are staying put longer. The economy is still going strong and home loan rates remain historically low. But there are potential clouds on the horizon. The effects of last year’s tax cuts are wearing off as limits on homeowner tax deductions are in place.”

ATTOM researchers analyzed 217 metro areas with populations greater than 200,000 to find the highest returns on investment. The cities were predominantly located in the west.

The highest average returns on investment for home sellers last year were in San Jose, Calif. (108 percent); San Francisco (78.6 percent); Seattle (70.7 percent); Merced, Calif. (66.4 percent); and Santa Rosa, Calif. (66.1 percent).

More Buyers Reach for ARMs in High-Priced Markets | Realtor Magazine

Fixed-rate mortgages have been inching lower in recent weeks, but the percentage of borrowers being tempted by the even lower rates of adjustable-rate mortgages is rising. ARMs posted the highest share of originations in December since Ellie Mae, a maker of software used to process mortgage applications, began tracking them in 2011.

 

© Witthaya Prasongsin/Getty Images

 

The share of ARMs reached 9.2 percent in December 2018, up from a 5.6 percent share a year prior, according to the firm’s December Origination Insight Report, Mortgage News Daily reports. With an ARM, an interest rate is usually locked in for a set period, such as five to seven years, and then will change based on market conditions.

Last week, five-year ARMs averaged 3.90 percent, Freddie Mac reports.

“With the strong demand for housing and rapid increase in property value appreciation, more consumers are turning to adjustable-rate mortgages in order to gain additional flexibility when competing for a home,” Jonathan Corr, president and CEO of Ellie Mae, told Mortgage News Daily. “This is another key indication of how demand has outpaced supply in the housing market as consumers pursue their dream of homeownership.”

Overall, mortgages for home purchases comprised 70 percent of mortgage originations in December, according to Ellie Mae’s report. Closings moved faster, too. The time to close on a purchase loan fell to 47 days in December.

When a Pair of Cats Are Your Renters | Realtor Magazine

Two cats in Silicon Valley are the pampered renters and sole occupiers of a $1,500 per month studio.

The landlord says the cats haven’t made much fuss, keep to themselves, lounge around in a cat tree most of the day, and always pay their rent on time—the prrrrfect tenants, you might say.

© Cyndi Monaghan/Getty Images

 

“It’s quirky isn’t it?” landlord David Callisch told CBS San Francisco (KPIX). “People love their pets, they’re part of their family.”

The father of Victoria Amith, a freshman at Azusa Pacific University in Southern California is paying for his daughter’s cats to have their own pad because she coundn’t take the cats, Louise and Tina, to her dorm with her when she started school. The man’s fiance’s dog and the cats weren’t getting along at his home in the Bay Area, so he approached Callisch and offered to rent the studio, located behind a single-family home in Willow Glen, Calif., for the pets.

Studios in Willow Glen typically rent for just under $2,000 per month, KPIX reports, so the cats are getting a bargain at $1,500. Callisch feeds the cats every day. Amith visits them on breaks from school.

Amith emphasizes that the cats are using space in someone’s backyard and that the arrangement is temporary “There’s obviously a huge housing issue in the area, and I don’t want people to be like, ‘Oh, this is taking away the housing,’” Amith told KPIX.