The good news is that home sales numbers for Cache County Utah during August were substantially improved compared with last month. The bad news is that although the 68 homes sold is an improvement, it is still down nearly 40% compared with last August of last year. This graph shows the comparison of home sales numbers during 2010, compared with the average monthly home sales over the previous five years.
The other good news is that it looks like September home sales will be even better than August home sales. There are more Cache County Homes under contract than there have been in the last two months. We currently have 107 homes under contract compared with just 98 at this time last month.
One interesting thing about the Logan Utah Homes that sold during August is that they were bigger than homes that have sold over the previous four months. The average home that sold was 2,489 square feet, and had an average original list price of $221.767. During April, the average original list price of homes sold was just $176,975, and the average square footage was 2,093 square feet. I think this statistic shows that a much larger percentage of August home sales were made by non first time buyers, whereas, during April the large majority of Cache Valley homes were purchased by first time buyers.
via Logan Utah Real Estate Market Conditions: Cache County August Home Sales Numbers Improved.
Tags: home sales, under contract
Cache County is proposing some changes in the current zoning laws in the rural areas. Right now, an A10 Zone means that lots have to be a minimum of 10 acres to have a home built. So, if there is a 40 Acre lot, it can be subdivided into a development that has four, 10 acre lots.
Cache County is proposing a zoning change where 4 houses can be built on smaller lots but still only 4 per every 40 acres. The 40 acre parcel would be divided so that 70% of the land would be used for Greenbelt, and 30% for Residential. As incentive for rural land owners subdividing using this method, they are talking about allowing 5 property’s in the residential portion, as long as 70% remains the greenbelt, agricultural lot. The 70% agricultural percentage will have no rights for building homes. They are also talking about reducing the greenbelt back taxes currently required when agricultural land is converted to residential.
This appears to be a good way to preserve some of the rural Cache Valley Farm land, while also allowing the farmers to get more money from their land. Most people who want to live in rural areas, don’t necessarily want to take care of a full 10 acres of land. Two or three acres is usually enough land for the large gardens, and pasture areas they want. People that want to live in the country, usually want to for the open space and rural feel. This is a possible solution that can better the situation while helping Cache Valley land to maintain its rural identity.
Tags: A10, agricultural, cache county, rural land, zoning, zoning laws
After months and months of complaining that the time required for short sales is too long, it looks like change has actually happened. According to the Campbell study, the average time short sales are on the market during July was 15.8 weeks. this is down nearly 5 weeks compared with February when the average short sale was on the market for 20.5 weeks.
The number of offers submitted before a short sale was actually completed was also down. The average short sale sold during June had 2.7 offers compared with 3.2 offers in June.
Still, major banks like Bank of America take about four months for a short sale to be approved. But, this is much improved from last year when it took nearly a year before bank of America would approve a short sale.
via Good News, The Average Time for Short Sale Approval Is Down | Short Sales.
Tags: Short Sales
Well, the mortgage interest news is the same as it’s been every week for the last few months. Interest rates are down, again. According to the latest Primary Mortgage Market Survey the averaged 30 year fixed mortgage rate dropped .06% to just 4.34%. The 15 year fixed mortgage hit a new low with an average of 3.86%, down .04% from last week.
The downward mortgage rates won’t last forever, but the question is when will they start going up? For people like me who are unable to refinance right now, but who will be able to next year, will interest rates still be this low in 2011? No one knows for sure, but here is what the experts are predicting. Take it with a grain of salt, because we all know their past predictions haven’t exactly been accurate.
In March, the Mortgage Bankers Association projected that rates on 30-year fixed-rate mortgages would rise to 5.8 percent during the final quarter of 2010, and average 6.2 percent in 2011 and 6.4 percent in 2012.
The MBA’s most recent mortgage finance forecast, issued on Aug. 17, projects that 30-year fixed-rate loans will rise to an average of 4.8 percent during the fourth quarter of this year, and stay around 5 percent most of next year.
MBA economists don’t foresee mortgage rates ticking up at a more rapid pace until 2012, when they expect 30-year fixed-rate mortgages to climb to an average of 5.8 percent during the final three months of the year.
So in short, now is probably the best time EVER to refinance, but it looks like Utah Real Estate interest rates will still be incredibly low for the next few years.
via Utah Real Estate Mortgage Information » Mortgage Rates Down, Again – But When Are They Going Up?.
Tags: refinance
Not only are there way too many big homes on the market, but there is now far less desire for people to ever own a Logan Luxury Home. A recent survey conducted by Trulia recently shows that American’s attitudes towards home ownership, and the size of homes they desire to own has drastically changed over the past few years.
Consider this:
In the survey, just 9% of Americans adults desire a home bigger than 3,200 square feet. Currently 24% of the homes for sale in Cache Valley are bigger than 3,200 square feet.
Just 13% of adults want a home between 2,601 and 3,200 square feet. 16.8% of Homes for Sale in Logan are of this size.
27% wanted a house between 2,001 and 2,600 square feet. We’re about right on in this size range as 23.4% of Cache Valley Homes for Sale are this size.
28% of American adults desire homes between 1,401 square feet and 2,000 square feet. 20% of Cache Valley Homes for Sale are of this size.
9% want homes less than 1,400 sqaure feet. 16% of the current Logan Homes for sale are in this size range.
There might be a little bit more demand for larger sized homes in Cache Valley due to different demographics. Cache Valley’s population is much younger than national averages and we also have larger average family sizes. The actual desire for different sized homes is probably different than the national averages. Even then, there are still way too many larger homes for sale in Northern Utah. We are likely going to see significant drops in the values of large Cache Valley Homes.
The average U.S. home size has increased each decade since the 50′s, but it appears that that trend is now coming to an end.
Tags: Big Homes, High End Homes
The standard news for Mortage Interest Rates, they’re down again. Because they keep going down every week, are people waiting to refinance until they drop further? Will we possibly see an increase in refinances the moment interest rates start going up?
Probably not. Most people who can refinance right now and would benefit by it likely have already done it. The good news for anybody who plans to buy a Utah home in the next little bit is that mortgage financing is at all time lows.
via Utah Real Estate Mortgage Information » Mortgage Interest Rates Go Down, Again.
Tags: interest rates
The Logan Utah Real Estate market saw a huge drop in home sales activity following the expiration of the tax credit. Now we are starting to see things improve a little bit. The number of homes for sale, has gone down, and the number of homes under contract has gone up. Two weeks ago there were 908 Cache Valley Homes for sale, now that number is down to 891. At the beginning of the month there were just 97 homes under contract, now there are 107.
While these improvements are minimal, the good news is that they are improved and the real estate recovery is headed back in the right direction again.
The number of homes listed as short sales has risen in Logan over the past month. While the total number of Cache County real estate listings is nearly identical to a month ago, the percentage of these homes requiring bank approval has increased. 4.75 percent of the listed homes in Cache Valley are short sales.
via Logan Utah Real Estate Market Conditions: Short Sale Numbers Up in Logan.
The increased number of short sales could be partially attributed to homes that were under contract, that now are not. The long term effect of more short sales is result of lower home prices and a poorer economy.
Tags: Short Sales
So the latest results from the weekly Freddy Mac Survey show that mortgage interest rates are at new all time lows again. The only difference is that now demand for these record low interest rates is even less.
The good news is that less demand means that these lower than ever mortgage rates will probably stay low for a while. There’s still hope that interest rates will remain incredibly low for those borrowers who may not be able to qualify for home loans until next year.
The bad news, is that this is a pretty good indicator that the real estate market has not recovered the way the experts thought it was going to. It looks like it will be a while before we will start seeing more demand for home buying, and real estate price appreciation.
via Utah Real Estate Mortgage Information » Mortgage Rates at New Record Lows – Demand for Loans Down.
Tags: interest rates
