Fresh off the press! The incentives keep getting better for first time homebuyers throughout the country. Shaun Donovan, secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, said that the Federal Housing Administration is going to permit lenders to allow homeowners to use the $8,000 tax credit as a downpayment.

The best part is the $8,000 does not have to be paid back. Secretary Donovan said that important changes, which the National Association of Realtors® has been calling for, will help consumers purchase a home. “We all want to enable FHA consumers to access the home buyer tax credit funds when they close on their home loans so that the cash can be used as a downpayment,” Donovan said. According to Donovan, the FHA’s approved lenders…

For those of you that call expired listings and for sale by owners the most common objections this time of the year from a homeowner is "I want to wait until after the holidays" or "Nobody buys homes during the holidays." We all know this is NOT true. In fact if you look at your MLS statistics homes still sell in November and December, so the homeowners that are on the market actually have a distinct advantage over those that are "sleeping" until spring time. Here is the most compelling reasons if I was a homeowner I would be excited about having my home on the market during the holiday season.

A recent article in the Detroit Free Press, written by Greta Guest talks about how the number of Michigan Real Estate agents dropped by 16.7%, and many big name franchises like Real Estate One and Century 21 closed many of their offices because business was so bad. Experts predict this will spread throughout the entire country soon as times get tough.

The article then goes on to talk about how because so many agents have left the business, the agents that have made it through these times are some of the most aggressive agents in the industry. In fact there is one agent in particular the article spotlights, and his name is MARK Z., a Top Real Estate Agent in Northville Michigan who works for Coldwell Banker who is having his best year ever selling a little…

I'm very excited about the real estate market that is spreading across the country. While most Realtors think this is the worst possible thing that could ever happen to our industry, I'm looking at all the positive things that will come out of this market. Lets face it, there are a lot of Realtors who are having their best year ever, not to brag but me included. There are a lot of Realtors who have sold more houses than they have ever sold before. There are a lot of Realtors who have done positive things that they have never done during the "great markets."

For all the agents that have figured out ways to still get homes SOLD, they will finally earn the respect they deserve from the general public. Let’s face it, for a long time anybody could sell a home.…

ATTENTION ALL REAL ESTATE AGENTS...

ALL Seller funded Down Payment Assistant Programs such as Nehemiah, HART and AmeriDream or funds from any other interested party (Yes, this includes the seller) to the transaction will be prohibited on all loans where final credit approval has not been established by September 30, 2008. 

This means call all your buyer leads that have been sitting on the fence and tell them the urgency of finding a home within the next two weeks. I say the next two weeks, because we all know it is going to take 30 days to fund the loan, so if you don't have a house picked out and negotiated a signed purchase agreement to have in your lenders hands by September 1, 2008 you are going to be chasing your tail to close by September 30,…

Donald Trump has even decided to jump into the real estate bank foreclosure market. Donald Trump will be soon be Ed McMahon's Landlord. Trump has agreed to buy Ed McMahon's house for an undisclosed price and rent the house back to him.

The Beverly Hills mansion boasts six-bedrooms, five-bathrooms and had been on the market for about two years. At one point, it was listed at more than $7 million but dropped in increments, winding up this weekend at $4.6 million. McMahon purchased the house in 1990 for $2.6 million, according to public records.

Trump said he stepped in because helping McMahon "would be an honor."  According to an exclusive interview with the Times, Trump said "I don't know the man, but I grew up watching him on TV."

McMahon, 85, was about…

Divorce Attorneys are a great source for Real Estate leads and most Realtors never even think to take advantage of the opportunity. Why not try to network with divorce attorneys in your market. It was never brought to my attention until I was dealing with a divorce couple in the Novi Real Estate Market, who had me contact their attorney to get a better handle on what we needed to do, to get their home sold. The couple wanted to sell their home so they could split the proceeds and move on with their life. After I listed their home I then realized that a divorce attorney could be a great source for leads. I have a great Michigan Divorce Lawyer who often calls me when she is handling a divorce and the couple needs to have their home sold.

Here are the top 4…

Northville Home For Sale On 2.8 Acres

   JUST LISTED $425,000

• SEV $379,450 (city value over $758,000)
• Seller paid $555,000 in 1996

AFTER BEING ON THE MARKET FOR OVER 5 YEARS WITH 4 DIFFERENT REALTORS, THIS REALTOR MARK Z. SOLD THE HOME IN LESS THAN 120 DAYS!!!

This home will be coming on the market and available for sale here very shortly.  The home is currently being professionally staged by a company called Staging Places, to impress a buyer with the most discriminating taste. The sellers insist on putting a new $20,000 tear-off roof and touching up some interior and exterior paint before we list it for sale. The home is located in the city of Novi with Northville schools and a Northville mailing address.

The SEV on the property…