There are some positive and negative news regarding home sales in the Birmingham metro area. According to the Birmingham Association of Realtors, realtors sold more homes in February 2009 than in January 2009, for a 28% increase. However, total residential home sales from February 2009 compared to February 2008 are down 26%.
The average price for a home in February 2009 was $171,062, compared to $178,600 in February 2008.
The median price in February 2009 was $130,000 compared to $152,500 in February 2008.

via nbc13.com

When Alberta's housing market abruptly switched from white hot to cold late last year, Calgary home builder Don Doolan decided the best way to keep the buyers coming was to discount prices - a lot. New single detached houses, which his company sold for $500,000 to $525,000 in 2008, are now on the market for $425,000 to $450,000. The 15-per-cent price reduction is generating sales that will enable his firm, Talisman Homes Ltd., to ride out the recession and "live to fight another day," Mr. Doolan said yesterday, adding that other Alberta builders are offering similar incentives.

via theglobeandmail.com

Las Vegas home sales edged up slightly in February, but nothing seems to stop falling prices, which have dropped 50 percent from their peak. The Greater Las Vegas Association of Realtors reported this week that the median home price fell 2.7 percent in February to $155,603. That’s down from $160,000 in January and 37 percent from February 2008. The $155,603 price marks a 50.6 percent decline from the market’s peak in June 2006 when the median price was $315,000, according to the Realtors’ group. The organization tracks only single-family homes sales on the Multiple Listing Service.

via lasvegassun.com

Freddie Mac (NYSE: FRE) today released the results of its Primary Mortgage Market Survey® (PMMS®) in which the 30-year fixed-rate mortgage (FRM) averaged 5.03 percent with an average 0.7 point for the week ending March 12, 2009, down from last week when it averaged 5.15 percent. Last year at this time, the 30-year FRM averaged 6.13 percent. The 15-year FRM this week averaged 4.64 percent with an average 0.7 point, down from last week when it averaged 4.72 percent. A year ago at this time, the 15-year FRM averaged 5.60 percent.

via msnbc.msn.com

First-time buyers' loans numbered 8,900 in January, a fall of 27 per cent from the previous month and 51 per cent lower than in January 2008. In monetary terms, January's loans to first-time buyers (FTBs) totalled £962 million, 30 per cent lower than December and 59 per cent lower than January of last year. The average FTB loan-to-value (LTV) was 76 per cent (89 per cent in January 2008) meaning the average deposit paid was 24 per cent, the highest amount on record, says the CML.

via findaproperty.com

The Vacaville Public Library-Cultural Center on Monday will host a free special program for seniors who would like to learn more about Home Equity Conversion Mortgages (HECM). The program begins at 10:30 a.m. at the library, 1020 Ulatis Drive. HECM, or reverse mortgage, counseling and information will be provided to senior citizen homeowners. Reverse mortgages may help seniors who have seen their monthly cash flow deteriorate over the past year. Reverse mortgage is a method whereby a homeowner may receive regularly scheduled payments, a lump sum, or establish a line of credit based on home equity.

via thereporter.com

CRISTINA Sipp is one of thousands of people who has been missing out on all those big interest rate cuts - but it's not because she fixed the rate on her home loan.
The Ingleburn mother is with a lender that hasn't been cutting its variable rate. GE Money gave Ms Sipp none of last month's 1 per cent cut to official interest rates.

via news.com.au

Mortgage lending activity continued to reduce in January with only 23,400 loans for house purchase completed, down from 32,400 in December and 48,600 in January 2008, according to the Council of Mortgage Lenders (CML). The decline in house purchase lending was spread evenly between first-time buyers and home movers. There were 14,500 loans to home movers, down from 20,200 in December and 30,600 in January 2008. There were 8,900 loans to first-time buyers, down from 12,200 in December and 18,000 in January 2008.

via yourmortgage.co.uk

The foreclosure picture suddenly darkened again in February. More than 74,000 homes were lost to bank repossessions during the month, up from 67,000 in January, according to a regular monthly report from RealtyTrac, the online marketer of foreclosed properties. Nearly 1.2 million have been lost since the foreclosure crisis hit in August 2007. The number of foreclosure filings rose 6% during the month after falling 10% in January. Worse, filings leaped nearly 30% compared with February 2008.

via money.cnn.com

Rising unemployment is delivering another blow to the depressed U.S. housing market. After months of declines in the number of foreclosures despite rising mortgage defaults, with a barricade of state and lender moratoriums preventing repossessions, foreclosures rose 6% in February from the month before, with 209,631 filings in all, according to Irvine, Calif.-based data firm RealtyTrac. Compared to the corresponding month a year ago, foreclosures were up 30%.

via forbes.com

As homeowners try to refinance their mortgages at lower rates, their home equity lenders are telling them, "Not so fast." Home equity lenders are throwing roadblocks in front of their clients who want to refinance their primary mortgages. In some cases, they delay refinances for a month or more. In other cases, they block homeowners from refinancing altogether -- all because of something called "resubordination." "It can completely blow a refi out of the water," says Christopher Cruise, senior loan officer for GOTeHomeLoans.com in Bethesda, Md.

via abcactionnews.com

Have a fixed-rate mortgage at 4.5 per cent or higher? Then you should be refinancing, says Steve Moffitt, senior mortgage consultant with Equimac Mortgage Centre in Vancouver. ``There's never been a better opportunity historically, never, for doing a refinancing, '' he adds.
If only it were that simple. In fact, determining whether you should refinance or not depends largely on the penalty you will pay to get out of your current mortgage, and the amount of money you could save with a new one.

via canada.com

Average residential mortgage rates declined to a near-record low, driven mainly by refinancing activity, according to survey data from the Mortgage Bankers Association. For the week ended March 6, mortgage applications were up about 11.6 percent from the previous week and up 5.7 percent from the same week a year ago. Refinancing accounted for 67.9 percent of all applications. Based on an 80 percent loan-to-value, the 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage dropped to 4.96 percent from 5.14 percent, while points increased to 1.16 from 1.05 for the week.

via bizjournals.com

The Southwest Multiple Listing Service Inc., reports that both Albuquerque and Rio Rancho showed increases in the median sales prices of homes in February. The monthly median price jumped from $175,000 to $185,000, however, overall home sales declined by more than 35 percent compared to Feb. 2008. “The increase of 25.1 percent [in the median home price] from last year for Rio Rancho is probably because we have seen a number of foreclosures eliminated from the market,” said Don Padilla, 2009 chair of the Greater Albuquerque Association of Realtors.

via bizjournals.com

AFTER looking at several houses to buy in Windhoek, we finally found “The One”, a townhouse in the Oryx Grove Complex (Olympia). We found it with the help of Glenda, a property agent of Greendoor Properties. We liked the house so much that the day after seeing it for the first time, we met at the complex and discussed our 100% interest in purchasing the unit with the owner and property agent as witness to such discussion. Two other people also witnessed such arrangement, our parents.

via informante.web.na