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Sonoma County info

Jul 22
0

Latest Short Sale News for California residents

By | Buyers, Sellers, Short Sale, Sonoma County info | One Comment

LATEST NEWS : A lot of home owners have 2 mortgages against their property, we call that a senior and a junior loan. These second loans may be a home equity line of credit or a regular loan. This second loan was always nasty to deal with, it survives a foreclosure and usually you still owe on it after closing. UNTIL NOW…

Earlier this week Governor Brown signed into law Senate Bill 458, prohibiting a deficiency after a short sale for one-to-four residential units, regardless of whether the lender is a senior or junior lienholder.  Effective immediately for transactions closing escrow from this day forward, both senior and junior lienholders cannot require a borrower to owe or pay for a deficiency in a short sale.  This law also prohibits any deficiency judgment to be requested or rendered for senior or junior liens after a short sale of one-to-four residential units.  Any purported waiver of this rule shall be void and against public policy.
Although a lender cannot require a borrower to pay any additional compensation in exchange for a short sale approval, the new law does not prohibit a borrower from voluntarily offering a monetary contribution to a lender in hopes of obtaining a short sale.  A lender is also permitted under the new law to negotiate for a contribution from someone other than the borrower, such as other lenders, agents, relatives, and the like.

This means that there still is quite a bit to negotiate with lenders involved in a short sale. The good news is: when all is said and done and the deal closes, it’s DONE!

Great news I wanted to share with you, please spread the news to your friends and family. A short sale is a dignified solution for a difficult situation.

Mirjam

Jul 10
0

Short Sales… and how about Tax Liens?

By | Foreclosure, Sellers, Short Sale, Sonoma County info | No Comments

When a person/business does not pay taxes the IRS can put a lien on a house. A contractor can do the same by the way, it’s called a mechanic lien. When a homeowner wants to avoid a foreclosure and do a short sale, there is no money to pay for these put of the proceeds of the sale. The IRS understands this predicament and has a form one can request a release of a lien, this is form 14135. The form is not hard to fill out, it asks for an appraisal report and there needs to be anfvsshortsalesquare.gif offer on the property. There is also a news article on the CA Franchise Tax Board about the same subject: Partial Release of Lien for Short Sales.

So don’t let a tax lien against your property stop you from doing a short sale to avoid foreclosure. Apparently also banks are not unwilling to accommodate the release of the liens. If you need

On a general note: in unincorporated Sonoma County, the sales tax is 9%, this seems high but that’s all perspective, in Netherlands the sales tax is in general 19% and 6% for food, medication and plants/seeds. This is the sanederland-1-euro-170.gifme for all of Netherlands, there is no difference between cities/provinces AND it is part of the price displayed in the store. When we were traveling from Canada to USA years ago, I thought I was cheated on my change when I bought something…

You will smile when you read this but pretty much in all of Europe and also Canada, sales tax is part of the displayed price. Travel tip to keep in mind by the way 😉

When I have visitors coming from Europe who have never been here before, this is something I explain to them so they don’t have to feel ‘cheated’ on their change. And that the exception is gas, the price of gas includes the sales tax.

Have a most wonderful day.

Mirjam

Jul 04
0

House For Sale – Your Privacy and Safety

By | Buyers, Dutch stuff, Privacy and Safety, Sellers, Sonoma County info | No Comments

Some time ago I posted a blog about Google and your Privacy.

Selling a home means that a property becomes a showcase, strangers walk through and see how a person lives. Where I come from (northern part of 449_klein.jpgNetherlands), privacy is important. People don’t open up their homes that easy, homes used to have a room to visit with visitors (voorkamer or parlour). A front door opens into a hallway with a door towards the family room: someone at the front door cannot see inside the house. Funda.nl is a great website to check real estate in Netherlands by the way.

When selling a property, safety and privacy become more and more important. Reason for this blog posting:

Last week my dear friend Diana had a nightmare: the house she is currently renting is being sold. She was worried that some ‘weird’ Realtor would use the lockbox to come in at night. This is a valid concern. If you do not know about the  Lockbox system we use in Sonibox.jpgoma County, a reason to worry. What Diane did not know: the Supra Lockboxes that are used to give Realtors access can be programmed to have timed access. This means that Realtors showing a property only have access to the key in the Lockbox when they are within the times that are programmed in the Lockbox: usually between 9 am and 7 pm.I am not the listing agent for that property and when Diane told me about her nightmare, I realized that the Realtor hired by the owner (she rents the place) had not shared with her this valuable information. Now Diane can sleep again at night: the lockbox on her front door has a timed access, no ‘weird’ real estate agent can come in a odd hours.  Other interesting tidbit: the moment an agent shows one of my listings, within a few minutes I receive an email showing the time and the name of the agent showing the property.

Lesson learned: the next time I do share my extensive marketing plan with a person who wants to sell his/her house, I will put even more emphasis on this small but oh so important feature of the lockbox system we use here in Sonoma County.

Your safety and your privacy is important, especially when selling a property.

Mirjam

Jun 22
0

Real Estate On Sale!

By | Buyers, Economy, Investing in Real Estate, Sonoma County info | No Comments

Always love a good sale, especially when the value is there. Buying just because it’s cheap doesn’t make sense. However, when something I like is on sale… Buying season! Sonoma County is a great place to live and right now Real Estate is on sale. Owning a home or even investing in this beautiful part of California is not just a dream right now, it is doable. In fact, it is cheaper to buy than to rent right now.

Darren Seliga from Seliga Financial Funding and Investment  gave a presentation at our weekly networking group recently and did the math for us using an example of a medium priced home.

bni-power-feb-new.jpg

Buying a home right now is a smart thing to do, with a 30 year fixed mortgage you will know for the coming time how much you will spend on your home. Rents go up every year, a 30 year fixed mortgage is fixed… for 30 years…and paid of in 30 years.

Mirjam


Jun 12
0

Green Living, what does that mean for you?

By | Buyers, Economy, Investing in Real Estate, Sellers, Sonoma County info | One Comment

220px-flesinname.jpgOne of the funny stories when we moved to CA had to do with recycling. In Netherlands you pay deposit money for a lot of the glass and plastic bottles. The gorcery store has a recycling station: you bring your bottles and crates back and receive the refund. For some of the bottles this might be a high as an Euro. Great reason to recycle… Also in most towns, the glass bottles you don’t pay deposit money for, have to be brought to recycling containers, separated according to color… In the first month after we moved to CA, I walked through twice through the local grocery store to find the recycle station… and then I finally asked…

In Sonoma County we have Curbside recycling for glass, paper etc, there is a recycling guide for all the items that need recycling. We might not realize it but we have more ‘toxic waste’ products in our homes than we think.

Recycling is just one part of Green Living. A lot of the buyers I work with like to live in a spot where they can bike to work, walk to the farmers market, walk to the store. The numbers show a trend that is becoming more important. Popular neighborhoods in Santa Rosa for this reason: JC area, Burbank Gardens, Proctor Terrace, Sherwood Forest, Montgomery Village, the West End district. It will be interesting to see how this is going to impact for instance the homes in Fountain Grove, right now the same SqFt home in Fountain Grove is less expensive than in the areas mentioned before.

santa-rosa-charlie-brown.jpg Think about this: if you pay $600 a month to fill up your car to get to work while you could save this money by biking to work or walking to the stores… with current mortgage interest rates, that is about $100,000 in mortgage payment…

Just some thoughts I wanted to share, not only when buying a property to live in but also when investing in real estate. Properties in areas closer to good schools, shopping, parks, public transportation are just easier to rent.

Green living saves money!

Mirjam