Have You Lived in Your Home For Five Years? 6,500 Reasons to Upgrade

Have you lived in your current home for atleast 5 Years? Have you thought about upgrading or downgrading into a different residence?

If so, right now is an awesome time to upgrade. There are tax credits available for home buyers, there are screamin deals on many Utah Homes for Sale, and mortgage interest rates are incredibly cheap.

$6,500 Stimulus Tax Credit Incentive

Until the end of April, you may be eligible for a $6,500 tax credit. This Credit is available for all buyers making less than $220,000 per year, who have lived in their current home for five out of the last eight years.

Lots of Selection and Sales on Northern Utah Homes
There is an oversupply of large homes in Northern Utah. In Cache Valley, there are 220 properties for sale larger than 3,000 square feet. This is 11.58 months of inventory. There are 93 Box Elder county homes for sale bigger than 3,000 square feet, or 18.6 months of active inventory. Weber County has 511 properties for sale, or 11.93 months of inventory, and Davis County Utah has 700 properties larger than 3,000 square feet for sale, 8.52 months of inventory based on the last six months of home sales.

Mortgage Interest rates are dirt cheap.

Mortgage Rates for conventional mortgages are currently less than 5%, for 30 year fixed mortgages right now. 15 year fixed, and 5-year ARM's are even less expensive. At a 5% interest rate, a $250,000 loan has the same monthly payment as 2 $200,000 loan at a 7% interest rate. If you have a mortgage, you're going to get a lot more home for your payment with the current rates.

Moderate Homes are actually selling.

If you do own a home, you probably need to sell before you can buy. The good news is that starter and more moderate homes in Northern Utah are actually selling. Prices of these homes aren't as high as they were a couple years ago, but sellers of these types of homes are usually getting close to what they are asking. For homes less than 2,000 square feet, Davis County has just 4.86 months of inventory, Weber County 7, Box Elder County 7.18 months, and Cache County just 6.15 months of real estate inventory.

Selling your current home in this market is possible. With this new tax credit, you actually have until June to buy, you just need to get your new property under contract by the end of April.

If upgrading is something you have thought about, call a Cornerstone Real Estate Agent today to discuss your options.

October Home Sales Up for Cache Valley

October was actually a pretty good month for home sales in Cache Valley. There were nearly a hundred homes sold (99 so far, but there are always some Realtors who are slow to report their end of month sales).

Cache County Home Sales were up 10% from September, and up 6% compared with October of last year. October will be the third best month of the year for Logan Ut Real Estate.

One of the primary reasons that home sales have improved has to be the expiration of the first time home buyer tax credit, which was scheduled to expire this month. It has since been extended through April of next year, but the expiration of it did spur many first time buyers into taking the steps too purchase now.

Some statistical evidence that supports this is the fact that during October, we had the lowest average monthly home sales price since May of 2006, and the smallest average square footage of homes sold since March of 2003!

While home sales were up, the amount of inventory on the market is also down. At October's home sales pace, Cache County now has seven and a half months of active inventory.

It's still a good time to buy homes in Cache Valley Utah

Cache County Home Sales for Third Quarter

Home sales in Cache County during the third quarter were down by about 5% compared with the third quarter of last year. They were up compared with last quarter, but that's a poor indication as to what is happening with the real estate market because Cache County real estate is so seasonal. The third quarter is traditionally the strongest period for Home Sales in Cache Valley. Home sales during the third quarter have continually dropped for the last four years.

Even though home sales were down during the third quarter, the trend does show improvement. They are considerably, "less down" than they were during the first half of the year. During the first two quarters of 2009, Cache County home sales were down by double digits.

Prices of homes sold in Cache County during the third quarter is also down. The median Q3 sold price of $166,727 is less than the median sold price of 2007. This doesn't necessarily mean that home values are less than they were in 2007, but it does show that a large percentage of the Homes in Logan Utah that are selling are of the more affordable variety.

Overall the recovery of the Logan Utah Real Estate market appears to be slower than in other parts of Utah. Areas like Utah County, and Davis County Real Estate have seen third quarter improvements compared with last year.

Cornerstone Real Estate sees increase in sales while other Brokerages see Decrease

One of the owners of Cornerstone Real Estate Professionals, Robert Brown, ran some stats comparing the top Logan Utah Real Estate Brokerages.

These numbers show home sales stats so far through this year, compared to the entire year for 2008. So far, Cornerstone Real Estate already has more homes sold than it did all of last year. Most of the other Cache Valley brokerages appear like their sales totals will be significantly down.

Over the last year, Cornerstone is the leading brokerage for home buyers. Cornerstone has already closed more than 100 buyer transactions this year.

Foreclosure Rate Increasing Cache Valley

• Foreclosure rate inching upward in Cache Valley

  The number of short sales and the rate of foreclosures are increasing in Cache Valley. The Herald Journal interviews Ty Haguewood of Cornerstone Real Estate Professionals.

  tags: foreclosures, short, sales

  • Foreclosure rate inching upward in Cache Valley
  • With the economy still struggling and layoffs on the rise, the risk of foreclosures is rising.
  • According to figures from First American CoreLogic, a company that collects real estate statistics, the foreclosure rate in the Logan area rose from 0.42 percent to 0.84 percent during the past year.
    
  • This is still well below the national rate of 2.86 percent, but experts believe the trend isn’t likely to reverse for some time.
  • Kim Datwyler, executive director of Logan-based Neighborhood Nonprofit Housing Corporation, also says that the region “hasn’t topped out” when it comes to foreclosures.

One advantage we have in Cache Valley is that the price of homes hasn't declined much since the peak of the housing boom. People that have owned their homes for a few years nearly always have the option of selling, and can afford to sell. In other portions of Utah, Short Sales are a much larger percentage of the overall real estate market.

Cache Valley has more than 40 Short Sale Homes

The number of homes requiring short sales continues to rise for Cache Valley. There are now more than 40 listed properties that require bank approval. Prices are dropping on these properties, especially the more expensive ones. Currently the most expensive Short Sale Home in Cache Valley is priced at $475,000. A few months back there were a half dozen homes more than half a million.

Overall the number of real estate listings in Cache Valley is dropping. An increased number of short sales tells us that prices are declining and more borrowers are seeing hard times.

September Home Sales and Prices Down for Logan

After the best month in the year, Cache County home sales were down a little in September. Just 88 homes have been reported sold compared with 116 in August, and down from 100 of September of last year.



The average price of homes sold during September was also much lower than it has been in recent times. The median sold price of Cache County Homes was just $154,000. This means that half of the 88 properties sold were less than $154,000.

Cache County currently has 755 homes for sale. This includes homes for sale in Logan Utah, North Logan Homes, Providence Utah Homes, Smithfield Utah Homes, Hyrum Utah Homes, Nibley Utah Homes, and the more rural areas of Cache Valley. At Septembers Sales pace, Cache County has nearly 9 months of active inventory.

Winter is approaching and home sales are typically much slower during the colder months of the year. October and November should still be pretty good months for home sales with the expiration of the first time buyer tax credit.