According to a recent article by Barron’s, the real estate slump may be over sooner then we think. Despite the record number of foreclosures and homes on the market, and widely ignored in the media, was the news that home prices actually rose, (slightly) between March and April, in eight of the 20 markets covered by the S&P/Case-Shiller Index (Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Cleveland, Dallas, Denver, Portland, Ore., and Seattle). Prices of Las Vegas homes and Henderson NV real estate in several areas of both cities have also gone up slightly.
I think part of the reason for the stabilization is a flood of overseas investors and second home buyers. The weak dollar combined with the fire sale of US real estate has drawn foreign investors in large numbers. Homes that were selling for over half a million dollars are now selling for just over $300,000. Builders are giving away upgrades and providing super low interest fixed rate loans just to move their inventory.
The other part of the equation are areas that didn’t experience a boom. Those markets remained fairly stable, experiencing neither an up or downward trend in inventory and pricing. There have been some experts recommending buying now. Time magazine ran an article in February urging buyers not to wait. MSN real estate ran a similar piece recently, stating five reasons to buy now.
With interest rates at historic low and an oversupply of homes on the market, there hasn’t been a better time in recent history to purchase a home.
Manhattan Developer takes umbrage at media coverage
Alex has two projects in Las Vegas that his company, Gemstone has developed. The Manhattan was the first, offering mid-rise Las Vegas condos and lofts just off of Las Vegas Boulevard South. It was completed in 2007. His second project, Manhattan West is under construction offering similar properties to the original project with some unheard of guarantees and incentives.
It’s inevitable when you live in Las Vegas. Your out of state friends, relatives or even perfect strangers what to know what else there is to do, where the best deals are for food, rooms, etc. My response has been how would I know? I rarely go to the strip and am mostly a home body.
Of course a search of the web lists dozens of sites that will answer those questions. Most of them are big corporate run sites which I am NOT a fan of. Big business wants to run the web like they run the other media networks. I like privately owned and run sites, they always go the extra mile and have more up to date information. For example, if you are looking for things to do on the cheap, try SaveLV.com. The site is a blog that lists fun things to do, who is having a special or offering a discount and what concerts are coming up. The site is run by Randi and there are new posts almost every day. There are even a few things listed there that I didn’t know about.
If you are a frequent visitor of the Bloodhound blog or Active Rain, you’ve probably read about the ongoing saga of ePerks suing a blogger because they are unhappy with his posts. Having read several posts about the company as well as feedback by some of their customers, I have to wonder exactly what the hell they are thinking.
Do yourself and your company a favor. Drop the lawsuit, issue a statement that you overreacted and then hire a PR firm that specializes in reputation management to clean up the toxic waste dump that was your reputation. Trying to sue someone because you don’t agree with their opinion is not going to help your business, especially when you are suing the exact demographic that you target for your business. The damage done may be irreversible by this point.
Think about it from a Realtor’s point of view. You have a company that has some negative feedback (almost all do, regardless of the service they provide). Most companies would shrug it off, or if they are forward thinking, try to fix it and make the company better. Then there are those that try to squash any criticism, earned or otherwise, using schoolyard bullying tactics to intimidate the problem away. Here is the clue you apparently don’t have, NO ONE LIKES A BULLY. David wins against Goliath.
Dave over at Real Estate blog lab put up a post about using Lightbox to speed up your page loads. If you aren’t familiar with Lightbox, it’s a free plugin that handles the way photos are displayed on your website. For an example, you can see it in action on this page about high rise condos in Las Vegas. That site is being powered by Drupal, another free CMS. Dave’s site is using WordPress, but he is having to use an older version as the latest WP version doesn’t support it (yet). Not only does it help speed up page loads, it also lets users browse photos easier and you can control the exact size you want your user to see without sacrificing page space either.
Channel One posted an interesting clip of the different things going on around the Las Vegas area. News about the huge Union Park project plus an interesting tidbit about the MGM Signature condos.
I was cruising around some of my favorite real estate social networking sites when I stumbled across a very interesting post about foreclosures on bigger pockets. Check out this video:
A judge in Ohio may have changed the foreclosure game forever. If this becomes precedent, the housing market just got even more complicated and the implications will reach out beyond the United States. The impact it would have on the Nevada market would be huge, especially since Las Vegas is one of the leading cities in foreclosures in the US.
I highly recommend checking out Josh’s Bigger Pockets blog if you are interesting in real estate information. You won’t be disappointed.
FIRST QUARTER 2008 HIGHLIGHTS:
– Generated approximately $80M positive cash flow from operations
– Paid down debt by $80M, nearly eliminating outstanding bank debt
– 47% net debt-to-capital ratio; $377M available borrowing capacity at quarter-end
– Reduced inventory of unsold homes by 31% to 768 at quarter-end
– Reduced total lot supply to 24,591 lots, or 3.4 years supply, with 60% optioned
– Backlog increased 13% to 2,594 contracts, from 2,288 at year-end 2007
Despite a slowly recovering market, its not doom and gloom for some home builders despite the reported losses. This is a quote from the press release:
“We made significant progress on our objectives again this quarter, strengthening our balance sheet and improving our liquidity,” said Steven J. Hilton, chairman and CEO of Meritage Homes. “We generated significant positive cash flow, paid off nearly all of our bank debt, reduced our inventory of unsold homes, kept lot purchases below home starts and further reduced our total lot supply. We maintained compliance with all of our debt covenants, and believe we’ve demonstrated disciplined financial management with the tremendous strides we’ve made over the last nine months.”
Clearly Meritage Homes in the market for the long haul. They have several communities in Nevada, the most notable are located in the master planned community of Mountain’s Edge in Las Vegas and Inspirada in Henderson. The Yellowstone community with five neighborhoods and the smaller Summer Trail are still under construction in some areas. However, Meritage Homes credits the Texas market for their numbers.
In addition to lowering their inventory across the country, Meritage Homes completed an offering of common stock on April 25th of approximately 4.3 million shares. The offering raised an additional $83 million (net commissions). It seems that potential new home buyers could do a lot worse than buying a new home from Meritage homes. They look like they are planning on being around for a long, long time.
Del Webb is having a Spring Sales Event, offering up huge incentives PLUS free landscaping on new home purchases at The Club at Madeira Canyon. It is one of Del Webb’s community for all ages in Henderson, Nevada adjacent to Anthem Country Club.
The sale started yesterday and continues until Wednesday, April 30th. Henderson homebuyers will find huge incentives on the homes at The Club, not to mention free landscaping on some of the most luxurious Henderson real estate available.
The Club at Madeira Canyon offers 11 beautiful home designs that range in size from 2,096 to 4,817 square feet with the community amenities you would expect in a luxury community. To schedule a tour of the models, call 702-493-8033 or email. To qualify for the additional offers, you must have a sales voucher with you.
For the past six years, one company has continued to be the globally recognized brand name for commercial real estate, CB Richard Ellis. So it was no surprise that out of the more than 20,000 surveyed real estate professionals one name came out on top again—CB Richard Ellis. The company has continued to dominate the commercial market in name recognition despite increased competition in that sector.
CB Richard Ellis has over 300 offices in 50 countries which has made them a leader in global commercial real estate.
