Category

Around the house

Dec 13
0

House on Fire!

By | Around the house, Buyers, Sonoma County info | No Comments

House on FireAs mentioned before, in Sonoma County, it is cheaper to buy than to rent. BUT there is a major difference between being the tenant vs being the OWNER… When renting, the landlord is ultimately responsible/liable for the house/asset. In the rush of buying, home owners insurance is often the forgotten stepchild. And after the home is bought and nothing happens, it’s something you pay for and never think about. See also a previous posting…

Home Owners insurance is quite often called fire insurance – insurance to rebuilt your house when there is a fire. I have written about this before. Important is for instance the type of roof. There is a surcharge for wood shake roofs vs composition shingle. Side note: many insurance companies are refusing to insure homes in a high fire hazard area.

Home owners insurance is also liability insurance: for instance when someone trips on your property and hurts himself, that is covered under your home owners insurance. Or the puppy that looks sooooo cute. Certain breeds can make you ineligible for Home Owners Insurance coverage. Others are acceptable only if the owners have taken the dog to a ‘Canine Good Citizen’ test through the AKC.

In our area  Animal RN (Robyn Kesnow) provides this service for a nominal fee.

Having a good insurance agent is crucial, for questions about Home Owners Insurance, I can highly recommend Erin Temple of Vantreo Insurance, she is my preferred insurance agent, she is extremely knowledgeable.

So when you decide to buy that cute puppy, call your insurance agent do this to when you are still renting, just to be safe.

Mirjam

Oct 23
0

Banks not supporting Energy Independence Program

By | Around the house, Buyers, Disclosures, Sellers, Sonoma County info | No Comments

As Kermit in Sesame street sang: ‘It’s not easy being green’

new_kermit.pngSonoma County in general has been promoting lowering our dependence on fossil fuels for a while now. Not only in big things but also in small things like using the old fashioned clothes line for drying clothes. That’s how I grew up in the Netherlands.

A great program that was developed a few years ago is the Sonoma County Energy Independence program (SCEIP

With SCEIP, a home owner can apply for a loan against the property for energy efficient upgrades: Windows, water heater, furnace, solar panels etc. It is a loan against the property, to be paid back in 15 years via property taxes. The current interest rate is 7%. The idea was to encourage home owners to make older homes more energy efficient. And that when a home owner does the upgrades, sells the home that the next home owner can not only benefit from the savings but also help paying for it. Great idea…

However, lenders do not see the loan as part of  assessments on the property taxes. With property taxes generally one also pays for the school, fire department, road bonds… For instance the road bond used to build Fountain Grove Park way is being paid for by home owners as part of the property taxes. Some homeowners have paid it of. When a home is for sale in Fountain Grove it is part of the seller disclosures and a prospective buyer will also see it when he received a copy of the property tax bill.

Now we see homes coming on the market that have the energy efficient upgrades. When the first home went into escrow, it was interesting to see that the lender who was chosen to provide the mortgage for the buyer, did not accept the SCEIP assessment on the property and required that is was paid of before close of escrow. Reason: they see it as an other loan against the property, thus the SCEIP lien will become senior to theirs when they new loan gets recorded. This means that in case of default, they are not in first position and thus responsible for the SCEIP lien in case they foreclose on the property. Also the government loan programs FAFH – Fannie Freddie, do not recognize the program and require the SCEIP assessment to be paid of before they will put a loan on the property…

Extra note, the above is also the case when a home owner wants to refinance his/her property to take advantage of the current historic low interest rates…

Sonoma County is protesting this and has taken FHFA to court.The latest update is on the website.

While the above should not stop a home owner from taking advantage of this program, it is good to be aware of the above developments. AND when you buy a home ALWAYS read the preliminary title report as well as the copy of the tax bill.

Have a most wonderful day!

Mirjam

Sep 11
0

Insurance and Real Estate on Sale

By | Around the house, Buyers, Sellers | 3 Comments

Right now it is common in Sonoma County to buy a property below the value of what it would cost to rebuild… OK let’s read this again: it is more expensive to build a home than to buy one that is already there…

This not only means that building new developments is not interesting for home builders. This also means that a buyer has to make sure that the home owners insurance chosen at time of purchase will cover the cost to rebuild. Quite often, buyers will go with the cheapest bidder. In the blur of the buying process: the inspections, the financing, the reports etc, Home Owners insurance is quite often an overlooked item. Any lender requires insurance coverage, however they may not always look at whether  the coverage is enough. Recently I worked with a buyer who thought he had a great quote for his insurance policy. It was so cheap that luckily the lender he worked with realized this and strongly ‘encouraged’ him to change this. That is by the way that I am very happy with the team of professionals I love to work with : Erin Temple (Vantreo Insurance – phone 303-2574) and Darren Seliga (Seliga Financial – phone 577-8737). But that is beside the point;)

Reason for this blog posting is not only the national disaster that happened in New York 10 years ago but also a recent experience as well as an article I came across in the Huffinton Post. This article is about insurance coverage and disasters.  Usually it is not a national disaster when your house burns down, but one needs coverage in both situations…

sale-left-red.pngI might as well confess: the insurance coverage we have on our house is not on my list of priorities, it was when we choose the insurance we have right now, but then I forget about it in the hurry of every day living. My insurance agent, the aforementioned Erin Temple, reviews each insurance policy every year, to not only see if we are eligible for new discounts but also asks whether we had any changes in our life that might affect our insurance program. If you do not have a pro active insurance agent, it might make sense to have a yearly reminder on your calendar to initiate that call yourself… Or call Erin…

Moral of the story: with the current historic low interest rates as well as homes being ON SALE it is a great time to buy. Do not let insurance coverage be the forgotten stepchild…

And the cheapest is not always the best… quite often it turns out to be the most expensive. Even people with a Dutch heritage realize this;)

Have a most wonderful rest of the day

Mirjam

Jun 26
0

It’s the Law!!!

By | Around the house, Buyers, Disclosures, Sellers | No Comments

When moving to a new country the first thing to deal with is the difference in the laws. Traffic law is usually the first one: when you rent a car and drive of the airport parking lot. Yours truly has come to find out that usually police officers don’t respond when you tell them you were not aware of the law that you didn’t adhere to. The response: it’s the law… its-the-law.jpg

Funny story: my  husband was pardoned the first time he visited CA: when he drove from SF Airport to Cupertino and a police officer stopped him and found out he came straight from Netherlands he was warned that speed limits in CA are lower than in  Netherlands and he could not drive that fast ;))) he got of with a warning, promising he would drive slower ;))… When we finally moved to CA we both had to get used to the speed limits here…

With that said: There is a new law that affects everyone who lives in a home in California. Per July 2011 every home in California needs to be equipped with a Carbon Monoxide detector. This is next to the smoke detector every house needs to have. carbon-monoxide-detector.jpg

Reason: The Carbon Monoxide Poisoning Prevention Act of 2010 signed into law last year. Locally in Sonoma County, not having one could result in a $200,00 fine. Here is a link to the article in our local new paper the PressDemocrat this week.

There are more and more laws to comply with when you buy and sell Real Estate. They are part of the many disclosures your receive. Both sellers and buyers are always advised to read all the paperwork carefully.

The local hardware store is a great source for these new Carbon Monoxide filters. Home Depot has instructions on their website on how to choose and instal one that is right for your home.

Have a great week,

Mirjam

May 01
0

Keep the Gutters Clean

By | Around the house, Sellers | No Comments

Earlier this week we did a pest inspection on a cute older house, built in the early 1920’s. The family had lived there for a very long time. A couple raised 4 daughters in that house, he passed away when he was in his early 70’s and she passed away when she was in her 90’s. But she lived in the house until she died. Now after she died, the daughters are selling the house. There is clearly some deferred maintenance which was clear in the pest inspection performed by Bugbusters in Santa Rosa.

One huge problem was that water had leaked inside one of the walls, the damage on the inside showed clearly that it came from the roof and had intruded the wall all the way from the second story. Guess what the main cause was??? Yes you guessed right: by not cleaning the gutters for over 10 years, the debris that accumulated in the gutters had caused the rain to to flow over into the wall.

When the inspector mentioned the problem they realized that dad had always cleaned the gutters but after he had died, no one had ever thought about doing this.

So next when my dear hubby says that we have to clean our gutters I will help out with more fervor.