Apparently in Lee County Florida, they are starting to investigate Chinese Drywall as causing failure of air conditioning systems and potential health problems. I have no idea if this problem exists out here in Oregon, but for folks with newer construction homes, watch for air conditioning problems and a quick call to the builder may…
In June of 1845, settlers from Missouri arrived in what was to be called Independence. One of the settlers, John Thorp settled north of Ash Creek and that area was called Thorps’ town. In 1861, a large flood occurred that left the town devastated. A new city, south of the old town, was platted on…
Hailing originally from Illinois, I have to say the one thing I sometimes miss about the Midwest is snow. Oregon has mountains so I can get my snow fix every year, but I do have very fond memories of playing in the snow…including the Midwest blizzard of ’79… Now that was snow…but I digress… We…
Thesa Chambers, a Central Oregon real estate agent, wrote on her blog today about a scam that is happening out there. In her post she wrote… Today, I discovered that there is a group of people posing as asset managers and stripping homes in Central Oregon listed as short sales. They are removing everything they…
Just today the Fed met and lowered interest rates to historic lows, and they also announced plans to discuss purchasing bad securitized loans and potentially treasury bonds. As a result there was a rally on the stock market with this news. Why is the fed taking such bold moves? This… That seriously huge green peak…
Sometimes I am surprised that people are surprised. According to a December 8th article by Market Watch, a high number of modifed mortgages are re-defaulting. They were surprised?? Really?? According to the OCC statistics, which looked at loans modified in the first quarter and second quarter of 2008, 36% of borrowers had re-defaulted by being…
It’s been no big secret that many people don’t feel too fondly for their real estate agents. Gallup does a survey every year about professionals, integrity, respect…you get the idea. Essentially, what professions are the most respected and what are the least. They released their annual study at the end of November. Agents are not…
I hope you all like my new blog format! I was waiting to do my market reports until my blog was finished. So… For residential real estate in Salem Oregon… The 90 day trend: Average sold price: $208,679 Average original list price: $225,461 (ie what the agent originally listed the price). % of listing price…
Any real estate agent that has worked with a buyer doing a VA (Veteran’s Administration) loan can tell you that they are not always the smoothest of transactions. I won’t go into details… Oregon is fortunate that we have the ODVA loan program. The Oregon Department of Veteran’s Affairs has an amazing loan program for…
My husband is directionally challenged. In fact he is so bad that whatever his instincts tell him to do, he does the opposite. He says he has a 95% hit rate of heading the right direction that way. Me…I have pretty good directional instincts. He tells me which way to go and I ignore him.…