Sunday, January 31, 2010

Venta de Casas en Chicago 2010

La venta de casas en Chicago para este 2010 , bajara y sobre todo aumentaran las casas a la venta en gran numero debido al alto numero de casas en Short sale venta cortas , por la razon que todoas esas o por lo menos el 90% se espra que seran reposeidas.

Varios barrios de Chicago los cuales se han desplomado son los sigueintes : Belmont cragin y la hermosa se llevan el gato al agua

Mientras que Albany parj e Irving park tambien bajan mantiene el tipo con valores que todavia no son ridiculos en venta de casas en Chicago

Sunday, January 25, 2009

2009 Real Estate Forecast

Troubles Spread
Wealthier neighborhoods that avoided subprime borrowing will be hurt in the new year as the downturn weakens even healthy markets
2008 was the year that subprime borrowers and speculators got hurt by the real estate crisis. 2009 could be when everyone else gets hit.
Until now, the nation's most serious home price declines have been in low-cost markets that were dominated by subprime mortgages, and in overbuilt markets such as Florida, California, and Las Vegas, where residential values are sliding fast toward pre-housing boom levels.
The Commerce Dept. reported Dec. 23 that November new-home sales in the U.S. fell to their lowest level in 17 years, down 35.3% compared with November 2007. And the outlook is even bleaker. The same day, Credit Suisse (CS) forecast that more than 8 million homes will go into foreclosure over the next four years, or approximately 16% of all U.S. households with mortgages.
That's because the big story in 2009 could be that, with the deepening recession and mounting job losses, serious housing troubles could infect wealthier communities and markets that were just beginning to stabilize this summer before the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers on Sept. 15 sparked the most serious financial turmoil in decades. In fact, according to online real estate research firm HousingPredictor.com, based in Destin, Fla., housing prices nationwide will fall 12.5% next year, compared with an estimated 11.1% this year.
Housing and mortgage problems pushed the nation into a recession that could now amplify, draw out, and expand the reach of the housing declines.
Manhattan Hit, Too
Take Manhattan, for example, where condo and co-op prices soared years after housing bubbles in most other major cities popped. New York City's real estate market was bolstered by residents who were still earning sky-high Wall Street bonuses and by a weak dollar that attracted overseas bargain hunters.
Now that the dollar has strengthened, the economic woes have spread to potential New York home buyers across the globe, and thousands of New York financial professionals are collecting severance. Manhattan apartment prices, as a result, have dropped as much as 20% since the summer, said Jonathan Miller, president and chief executive officer of real estate appraisal firm Miller Samuel Miller's analysis is based on contracts signed in recent months, rather than actual closings.
"Mid-september was a milestone," Miller said. "That's where you saw a pronounced slowdown in transaction volume."
Housing is projecting a 19.4% decline in Manhattan home prices in 2009. And Moody's Economy is predicting that condo prices in New York City, Northern New Jersey, and Westchester County will fall 29% by the fourth quarter of next year.
"Nationally, we think this recession is going to be worse than anything we've seen in 40 years," said Marisa DiNatale, senior economist for Moody's Economy.com. "If the economy gets that bad, then you will start to see foreclosures in Manhattan as well."
Smaller Declines
On the other hand, the speculative Las Vegas, Arizona, California, and Florida markets, which have already seen annual home-price declines of up to 30%, could see slightly smaller declines simply because values have already fallen so much, according to Mike Colpitts, editor of House preditor
Some Florida markets, including Naples, Orlando, and Tampa, are already seeing declines moderate a bit, but problems in other Florida markets, such as Miami, continue to get worse, Colpitts said.
Few areas across the country will likely escape the recession and the corresponding impact on the real estate market, housing experts say. Another wave of foreclosures could be triggered next year as a flood of Alt-A and option adjustable-rate mortgages, which were given to people with decent credit, begin to recast.
2009 Real Estate Forecast: Troubles Spread

Most of the option ARMs, which allow borrowers to make minimum payments that don't even cover the accrued interest, are concentrated in already battered California, Florida, and Las Vegas.
Option ARMs originating in 2006 make up about $140 billion of the $350 billion of outstanding option ARMs, and 45% to 50% of them are expected to default, according to an analysis this past summer by Lehman Brothers. The 2007 option ARMs, which were originated just as home prices began falling, were expected to perform similarly badly.
Lost Jobs
Problems in other states could have less to do with risky mortgages and more to do with job losses. The impact of unemployment on the real estate market and the larger economy are already on display in hard-hit manufacturing cities such as Gary, Ind., and Detroit. Alabama, Arkansas, Atlanta, Michigan, and Ohio could see problems next year, Colpitts said.
"We're in the middle of the game here," said Joseph Seneca, professor of economics at Rutgers University in New Jersey. "There's significant further unwinding to come…. We're in a downward spiral with job losses that is reinforcing the weakness in the consumer markets, particularly in the largest investment the consumer makes, in his home."
Seneca said the government's aggressive policies to stabilize housing by injecting liquidity in banks, lowering interest rates, tax stimulus packages, and other efforts will help. But the downward cycle will end only when prices fall far enough that they attract large numbers of buyers.
The nation's energy-producing states, such as North Dakota, South Dakota, Oklahoma, Alaska, and Montana, could be economic bright spots next year. Despite falling oil and natural gas prices, those industries remain robust.
Texas Troubles
The economy in Texas, however, is beginning to get hit as unemployment rises and consumer spending drops, Colpitts said. He added that the Houston market, which has been remarkably stable, could drop about 8.5% next year. Five of the six supermajor energy companies maintain large operating bases in Houston, including ConocoPhillips (COP), ExxonMobil (XOM), Royal Dutch Shell (RDS), and BP (BP). The overbuilt San Antonio market could see a 10.2% drop. Austin, which is a high-tech center, could also be hurt as the technology sector gets damaged by weak consumer spending, he said.
And Charlotte, N.C., a major banking center that had been one of the nation's strongest real estate markets, could have its own housing troubles. Charlotte-based Bank of America (BAC) just this month announced that it would cut up to 35,000 jobs over the next few years.
But a few places are poised for a potential recovery.
The housing market in and around Washington, D.C., which suffered greatly in the wake of the housing bust, could begin to recover, largely because the nation's capital has so many recession-proof government and defense contracting jobs, said DiNatale of Moody's Economy.com.
Other areas, such as the Boston area, San Diego, and Orange County, Calif., are getting close to affordability levels seen before the housing boom and could begin to level off, said DiNatale.
She added: "A lot of this depends on the economy over the next few months, help from the federal government, and whether buyers come back to the market."
the markets that were hurt the most by the real estate downturn in 2008.

Friday, September 19, 2008

Demand for housing

The main determinants of the demand for housing are demographic. However other factors like income, price of housing, cost and availability of credit, consumer preferences, investor preferences, price of substitutes and price of compliments all play a role.

The core demographic variables are population size and population growth: the more people in the economy, the greater the demand for housing. But this is an oversimplification. It is necessary to consider family size, the age composition of the family, the number of first and second children, net migration (immigration minus emigration), non-family household formation, the number of double family households, death rates, divorce rates, and marriages. In housing economics, the elemental unit of analysis is not the individual as it is in standard partial equilibrium models. Rather, it is households that demand housing services: typically one household per house. The size and demographic composition of households is variable and not entirely exogenous. It is endogenous to the housing market in the sense that as the price of housing services increase, household size will tend also to increase.

Income is also an important determinant. Empirical measures of the income elasticity of demand in North America range from 0.5 to 0.9 (De Leeuw, F. 1971). If permanent income elasticity is measured, the results are a little higher (Kain and Quigley 1975) because transitory income varies from year-to-year and across individuals so positive transitory income will tend to cancel out negative transitory income. Many housing economists use permanent income rather than annual income because of the high cost of purchasing real estate. For many people, real estate will be the most costly item they will ever buy.

The price of housing is also an important factor. The price elasticity of the demand for housing services in North America is estimated as negative 0.7 by Polinsky and Ellwood (1979), and as negative 0.9 by Maisel, Burnham, and Austin (1971).

An individual household’s housing demand can be modeled with standard utility/choice theory. A utility function, such as U=U(X1,X2,X3,X4,...Xn), can be constructed in which the households utility is a function of various goods and services (Xs). This will be subject to a budget constraint such as P1X1+P2X2+...PnXn=Y, where Y is the households available income and the Ps are the prices for the various goods and services. The equality indicates that the money spent on all the goods and services must be equal to the available income. Because this is unrealistic, the model must be adjusted to allow for borrowing and/or saving. A measure of wealth, lifetime income, or permanent income is required. The model must also be adjusted to account for the heterogeneousness of real estate. This can be done by deconstructing the utility function. If housing services (X4) is separated into the components that comprise it (Z1,Z2,Z3,Z4,...Zn), then the utility function can be rewritten as U=U(X1,X2,X3,(Z1,Z2,Z3,Z4,...Zn)...Xn) By varying the price of housing services (X4) and solving for points of optimal utility, that household's demand schedule for housing services can be constructed. Market demand is calculated by summing all individual household demands.

Overview of real estate markets

  • Owner/User - These people are both owners and tenants. They purchase houses or commercial property as an investment and also to live in or utilize as a business.
  • Owner - These people are pure investors. They do not consume the real estate that they purchase. Typically they rent out or lease the property to someone else.
  • Renter - These people are pure consumers.
  • Developers - These people prepare raw land for building which results in new product for the market.
  • Renovators - These people supply refurbished buildings to the market.
  • Facilitators - This includes banks, real estate brokers, lawyers, and others that facilitate the purchase and sale of real estate.

The owner/user, owner, and renter comprise the demand side of the market, while the developers and renovators comprise the supply side. In order to apply simple supply and demand analysis to real estate markets a number of modifications need to be made to standard microeconomic assumptions and procedures. In particular, the unique characteristics of the real estate market must be accommodated. These characteristics include:

  • Durability - Real estate is durable. A building can last for decades or even centuries, and the land underneath it is practically indestructible. Because of this, real estate markets are modeled as a stock/flow market. About 98% of supply consists of the stock of existing houses, while about 2% consists of the flow of new development. The stock of real estate supply in any period is determined by the existing stock in the previous period, the rate of deterioration of the existing stock, the rate of renovation of the existing stock, and the flow of new development in the current period. The effect of real estate market adjustments tend to be mitigated by the relatively large stock of existing buildings.
  • Heterogeneous - Every piece of real estate is unique, in terms of its location, in terms of the building, and in terms of its financing. This makes pricing difficult, increases search costs, creates information asymmetry and greatly restricts substitutability. To get around this problem, economists (beginning with Muth (1960)) define supply in terms of service units, that is, any physical unit can be deconstructed into the services that it provides. Olsen (1969) describes these units of housing services as an unobservable theoretical construct. Housing stock depreciates making it qualitatively different from a new building. The market equilibrating process operates across multiple quality levels. Further, the real estate market is typically divided into residential, commercial, and industrial segments. It can also be further divided into subcategories like recreational, income generating, area, historical/protected, etc.
  • High Transaction costs - Buying and/or moving into a home costs much more than most types of transactions. These costs include search costs, real estate fees, moving costs, legal fees, land transfer taxes, and deed registration fees. Transaction costs for the seller typically range between 1.5 - 6% of the purchase price. In some countries in Continental Europe, transaction costs for both buyer and seller can range between 15 - 20%.
  • Long time delays - The market adjustment process is subject to time delays due to the length of time it takes to finance, design, and construct new supply, and also due to the relatively slow rate of change of demand. Because of these lags there is a great potential for disequilibrium in the short run. Adjustment mechanisms tend to be slow, relative to more fluid markets.
  • Both an investment good and a consumption good - Real estate can be purchased with the expectation of attaining a return (an investment good), or with the intention of using it (a consumption good), or both. These functions can be separated (with market participants concentrating on one or the other function) or can be combined (in the case of the person that lives in a house that they own). This dual nature of the good means that it is not uncommon for people to over-invest in real estate, that is, to invest more money in an asset than it is worth on the open market.
  • Immobility - Real estate is locationally immobile (save for mobile homes, but the land underneath them is still immobile). Consumers come to the good rather than the good going to the consumer. Because of this, there can be no physical market-place. This spatial fixity means that market adjustment must occur by people moving to dwelling units, rather than the movement of the goods. For example, if tastes change and more people demand suburban houses, people must find housing in the suburbs, because it is impossible to bring their existing house and lot to the suburb (even a mobile home owner, who could move the house, must still find a new lot). Spatial fixity combined with the close proximity of housing units in urban areas suggest the potential for externalities inherent in a given location.

Real estate economics

Real estate economics is the application of economic techniques to real estate markets. It tries to describe, explain, and predict patterns of prices, supply, and demand. The closely related fields of housing economics is narrower in scope, concentrating on residential real estate markets as does the research of real estate trends focus on the business and structural changes impacting the industry. Both draw on partial equilibrium analysis (supply and demand), urban economics, spatial economics, extensive research, surveys and finance.

Fees

Lettings

Estate agents who handle lettings of commercial property normally charge between 7–10% of the first years rent as fees, this is in addition to taking the first month's rent in its entirety. This will be the total fee. If, say, two agents are charging 10%, they split this between them. Estate agents selling commercial property (known as investment agents) typical charge 1% of the sale price.

The fees charged by residential Letting Agents are extremely variable, depending on whether the agent manages the property or simply arranges new tenants. Charges to prospective tenants can vary from zero to £300 in non-refundable fees usually described as "Application", "Administration" or "Processing" fees (or all three). There are no guidelines for letting agents on charges except that they are forbidden by law to charge a fee for seeing a list of properties; otherwise, they are free to charge as they please.

The first month's rent in advance plus a refundable bond (usually equal to a month's rent) is also generally required. Most residential lettings in the UK are effected through a particular form of contract known as an "assured shorthold tenancy". Assured Shorthold tenancies (generally referred to simply as "Shorthold") give less statutory protection in terms of security of tenure than earlier, mostly obsolete, types of residential lettings. Shorthold Tenancy agreements are standard contracts generally available from legal stationers and the internet for around £1, the average lettings agent will charge £30 to provide such a contract.

Selling

Estate agents selling residential property generally charge between 1/2% to 4% of the sales price plus VAT, depending on the contractual arrangement and whether an individual firm has sole rights to the sale.

Other approaches

Since around 2000, online estate agents have provided an alternative to the traditional fee structure, claiming cheaper, fixed fee selling packages. These online estate agents claim to give private property sellers the ability to market their property via the major property portals (the preferred medium used by traditional high street estate agents) for a fraction of the cost of traditional estate agency.

New types of property portals based in the United Kingdom have started to encourage UK and worldwide estate agents to collaborate by showing all their properties, thus allowing site visitors to see a vast array of UK and overseas properties all on one website.

Many estate agents are using the latest technology to assist in the sale of houses, with companies enabling home buyers to receive property details while outside a house using a mobile phone.


Estate agent

Estate Agent is a British English term for a person or business that arranges the selling, renting or management of homes, land and other buildings, although an agent that specialises in renting is often called a Letting Agent. Estate agents are mainly engaged in the marketing of property available for sale and a Solicitor or Licensed Conveyancer is used to prepare the legal documents. In Scotland, however, many solicitors also act as estate agents, a practice that is rare in England and Wales.

The term originally referred to a person responsible for managing a landed estate, while those engaged in the buying and selling of homes were "house agents", and those selling land were "land agents". However, sometime during the 20th century "estate agent" started to be used as a generic term, perhaps because it was thought to sound more impressive. Estate agent is roughly synonymous in the United States with the term real estate broker.