August issue of Smoke Signals

The August 2008 issue of my bi-monthly newsletter for Firelight residents is available as a PDF here: Smoke Signals - August 2008.

June issue of Smoke Signals

The June 2008 issue of my bi-monthly newsletter for Firelight residents is available as a PDF here: Smoke Signals - June 2008

April issue of Smoke Signals

The April 2008 issue of my bi-monthly newsletter for Firelight residents is being delivered to your door right now but if you would like an advanced or digital copy, here it is:
Smoke Signals - April 2008

20 Firelight Homes Sold YTD

Firelight is lagging compared to last years figures but not much. As of today there have been 20 reported sold homes according the MetroList, Inc. (The Denver area MLS system). At this point last year there were 26 homes sold.

And while average appreciation is still down 5.8 percent for the year, the days on market is down as well to just 61 days.

The summer months are coming and we tend to see improvement that time of year but the old mantra still rings true...you must price your home accordingly for the market if you want it to sell.

Job growth is good!

There's a statistic floating around somewhere out there that says that on average, when a company relocates workers to a new city, half of those people buy homes. I don't know where the other half end up living, but this announcement today could mean a potential of at least 250 new buyers to the south side of Denver, including Highlands Ranch and Fightlight!

Schwab to bring 500 jobs

February issue of Smoke Signals

The February issue of my bi-monthly newsletter for Firelight residents is being delivered to your door right now but if you would like an advanced or digital copy, here it is:
Smoke Signals - February 2008

This issue includes graphs of Firelight's real estate market activity over the past three years. I'm setting up an email list if you would like to receive this newsletter every other month as well. Just send me your email address and you'll be added to the distribution.

Beware the Certified Deed Scam

There is a new scam going around that I wanted to alert you to. It's called the "Certified Deed Scam," and here's how it works:

You receive an official looking letter in the mail from the "U.S. Government Federal Citizen Information Center," recommending that you have a certified deed on record, then pointing out that what you receive at closing (when you bought your home) is only a copy of the deed and not a certified copy. The company offers to provide you with a certified copy of your deed if you mail them a check for $69.50.

Fact is you don't need a certified copy of the deed unless an attorney tells you to get one for some reason, and if that happens you can get one at your county office for around $7.

This isn't an entirely new scam as I've run across reports of it going back almost three years, but I read about it in the newspaper last week and then actually received one of the letters in the mail on Friday. It's not illegal what they are doing, but a certified copy simply isn't necessary.
(more information at http://www.newsome.org/2005/10/ridiculous-offer.shtml)

I suspect there are people who fall for the scam, but hopefully now you'll know not to.

10575 Wildhurst Circle

STEAL OF THE YEAR!


This home was one of Berkeley's original award-winning Larkspur model homes in Firelight. It was sold fully furnished in February,2006 for a net price of $368,600. Great custom colors and upgrades throughout like granite coutertops, built-in shelves and desk, 42" maple cabinets, tile bathrooms, a professionally built deck overlooking outstanding mountain views and more.

The owners listed the home (without furnishings) a year later for $375,000 and made multiple price reductions all the way to $335,000 and eventually withdrew the listing in May, 2007.

But now it's back on the market for just $279,900!

I'm not sure if it's bank owned, but it's advertised that it's been "winterized" and the buyer would have to pay for utilities to be turned back on then off again after inspection. (Then back on again after purchasing). It was also previously listed as "subject to short payoff".

The only possible negative issue with the home that I know of is it backs to Poston Parkway, which might cause some unwanted street noise, but it's not as bad as backing to a street like Wildcat Reserve Pkwy and you get the mountain views!

The home is 2,121 square feet, 3 bedrooms upstairs, 2 full bathrooms upstairs and a half-bath on the main floor.

It's listed by Westfall & Company Marketing but if you are interested in this home, I certainly would be happy to arrange a showing for you. Give me a call at 303-887-4275 and take advantage of this outstanding opportunity!

Can you believe it?!

Firelight is still positive!
With 11 months of data, Firelight on average is doing very well compared to the overall Denver housing market.

2007
Total homes sold YTD = 91
Total appreciation YTD = 2.7%
Average sales price = $324,888
Average days on market = 67 days

We are on target to equal last years total sales (101 homes) and do it with a slightly higher average sales price and in a slightly lower average number of days on market!

Don't believe the media hype that the housing market is in free fall. Firelight continues to sell and while it might not be as good as in 2005, if you price your home correctly for the current market, you can sell too!

Banks have no one to blame but themselves

Foreclosures aplenty and who is to blame? My answer is without question, it's the banks fault.

Banks (i.e. lenders) gave people money to buy homes without regard to the buyers true ability to repay. They looked the other way just for the opportunity to get some money from the buyer without considering they may never get paid back.

But now, with so many bank-owned properties on the market, banks are doing it to themselves again by not working very hard to sell a home before it goes to foreclosure.

Here's teh scenario. Buyer likes a home that's about to go into foreclosure. Buyer makes a reasonable offer to buy the home. Buyer submits a contract with all the proper legal jargon around it, including dates for closing and a reply to the offer.

Next step? The banks need to review the offer and make a reply! Seems simple does it not? But I keep hearing and have experienced banks taking up to 40 days just to reply to the offer! 40 days!!! The banks usually claim that they are so backlogged that they can't reply very quickly. It takes about 2 minutes to review an offer, and another 1 minute to compose an email reply. That's 3 minutes. Therefore, a bank employee should be able to process 20 offers per hour if it were their only job. But few banks have a dedicated person who does this and instead, they make that person handle the foreclosure process.

They sure could prevent a great many more foreclosures if they would just get off their asses and take what they can get. It saves time AND money in the long run as well as in the short term.

Where are we today?

The average days-on-market for sold homes in Firelight over the past two months is 41 and the average price per finished square foot of those homes is $150.24 on a total of 15 homes sold in that time period.

To compare that to the same two month time period in 2006, there were 18 homes sold with an average days-on-market of 55 days and at an average price per finished square foot of $148.57.

Looking at the total year-to-date comparisons, at this point in 2006 the average days-on-market was 62 days with 86 homes sold. In 2007 the average days-on-market is 67 days with 78 homes sold and average appreciation for those 78 homes is just 1.7 percent whereas the total average appreciation for all of 2006 was 4 percent.

Signs of a Real Estate Recovery?

Compared to August 2006, we actually had an increase in the number of properties sold in Highlands Ranch, Lone Tree, Parker, Castle Rock and the rest of Douglas County! The Highlands Ranch / Lone Tree area saw a year-to-year increase of 4.3 percent and the Parker area increased a whopping 12.4 percent!

Year-to-date, the Highlands Ranch / Lone tree area is only down 2 transactions from 2006 with 258 total transactions through the month of August.

It's hard to belive with all the negative news regarding mortgages and foreclosures but perhaps...just perhaps...we've hit bottom and are seeing the first signs of a true recovery for 2008.

Get your complimentary 2007 football magnet

Football season is nearly upon us and there's no better way to keep on top of the action then by having a 2007 magnetic football schedule featuring the game schedules of the Denver Broncos, CU Buffaloes, and CSU Rams!

Get yours now by sending me an email with your name and address and I'll mail one out to you right away!

Firelight Sales Stats through July

As of August 8, 2007 there have been 64 reported real estate sales in Firelight for an average sales price of $319,265...a 1.1% appreciation over the 2006 average! Curious how your model of home is selling? Check out my exclusive report.