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Specializing in the amazing homes of East Sacramento and surrounding neighborhoods

Monthly Payments of Home Buyers Almost at 1981 Levels?

Posted by on Oct 21, 2011 in Downtown, In the News, Sales Price | 0 comments

OK, when I saw this headline I had to read the article. Monthly Payments for Home Buyers On October 6, 2011, in Economist Commentaries, by Lawrence Yun, Chief Economist A home buyer purchasing a typical American home at the prevailing average mortgage rate today would have a mortgage payment of $698 a month. This figure is not much different from what a home buyer would have faced 30 years ago. In 1981, home prices were much lower but mortgage rates were reaching 18 percent. Today, home prices have come down by about 33 percent on average from the bubble years, but prices still remain comfortably higher than those of the 1980s. However, thanks to record low mortgage rates, the monthly payment obligations have been greatly reduced. After reading the article I still didn’t believe it and had to run the numbers for myself. I decided to take real world numbers, here in Sacramento, on a listing that I currently have in Downtown. I mean, maybe this is true for a home in Columbus GA, but it can’t be true here… The condo that I have listed at 958 Q Street is listed for $195,000. When it was first built in 1982 the units in it’s complex were selling for $55,000. Back then you had interest rates at 18%. If you did a 3.5% down loan like today’s common FHA loans, factoring in average rates for tax and insurance, your payment would have been $867 per month (not counting HOA or any possible PMI). Today you can get a FHA loan at 4% (one of my buyers just locked at 3.675 with no points!). That makes a payment of $1167 per month or about $290 more today than 30 years ago. I was feeling pretty smug for about 5 seconds until I started to think about what $867 would have bought me 30 years ago compared to today. Going back to my youth when a quarter bought you a candy bar and now I think they cost a buck, I had to go to an online inflation calculator. $867 from 1981 after adjusted for inflation is $2150 today! Well, me and my short lived smug self will just have to contemplate these numbers and the buying power of today’s interest rates over a long over due candy...

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39th & M Final Stucco

Posted by on Oct 18, 2011 in 39th and M, East Sac, Fab 40's | 0 comments

My upcoming listing at 39th and M has its final coat of stucco on and the scaffolding has been removed! It is looking like an amazing East Sac house now, not just one in the throes of construction. They are in the process of putting in the hard wood floors. The rooms are all painted, the kitchen and bathroom cabinets are in and it is getting close to being finished. The estimates are that in two or three weeks all the final finish work will be done and the listing will go live. I’m greatly looking forward to holding open houses in this amazing...

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39th and M Floor Plans

Posted by on Oct 17, 2011 in 39th and M, East Sac, Fab 40's | 0 comments

39th and M is getting very close to being completed. We expect to list if for sale in early November, the exact date dependant on getting all the finish work and landscaping completed. PJ recently asked on my blog if I had the floor plans for this property. Well, here they are! Of course as the builders went through the process there have been little changes to improve the design, so the floor plans are a little different than the finished product. It is amazing how quick this has gone up and how much the builder has paid attention to all the little details. I get regular emails for feedback on doorknob choices, the hardware for the kitchen cabinets, paint colors and everything else. I love being this involved in the building...

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QR Codes

Posted by on Oct 15, 2011 in 39th and M, Tech | 0 comments

OK, I’ve been asked what that little box of boxes is on my 39th and M Street flyer. In short, it is like a bar code, but more advanced and smart phones are often used to read them to take the user directly to a website. Here is what Wikipedia has to say about QR Codes. A QR code (abbreviated from Quick Response code) is a type of matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code) first designed for the automotive industry. More recently, the system has become popular outside of the industry due to its fast readability and comparatively large storage capacity. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded can be made up of any kind of data (e.g., binary, alphanumeric, or Kanji symbols).[1] Created by Toyota subsidiary Denso Wave in 1994 to track vehicles during the manufacturing process,[2] the QR code is one of the most popular types of two-dimensional barcodes. It was designed to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed.[3] The technology has seen frequent use in Japan; the United Kingdom is the seventh-largest national consumer of QR...

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