Case-Shiller Agrees with CHR on Home Price Appreciation

Team CHR Buying, Selling

We’ve heard it several times in the last two days so maybe you’ve heard it too: The Case-Shiller Home Price Index put out by Standards & Poor/Core-Logic shows home prices are up 6.4% nationwide compared to one year ago. You may not have heard that this is the 72ndmonth in a row that the index has been positive. According to …

Off-Market Sales Detrimental to Sellers Bottom Line

Team CHR Selling

You want to sell your house. A friend or co-worker or a Nextdoor posting informs you about someone looking to buy in your area. The potential buyer looks at your place and wants to buy it. This may sound like an appealing scenario. You can avoid the time and expense of hiring an agent, prepping your house for the market, …

Protect Yourself from Rampant Wire Fraud

Team CHR Buying, Selling

Imagine this scenario: You’re buying a house. You get an email from your real estate agent telling you to wire the down payment of $91,000 to a title company right away. She tells you she’s tied up in meetings and can’t talk at the moment and will explain details later but tells you you need to get that money wired immediately …

Metro Denver Economy: Robust and Diverse

Team CHR Buying, Selling

Rapidly rising prices can create an artificial bubble if fueled by irrational exuberance. On the other hand, a strong upward price trend can be created by healthy market fundamentals. The latter is the case when it comes to home prices in metro Denver over the last six years. The robust increase in home values has not occurred in a vacuum. …

Rethinking Cost vs. Value for Home Remodeling Projects

Team CHR Buying, Selling

Hanley Wood Media Inc. publishes a study each year in Remodeling magazine on the cost of various home improvement projects and the estimated value added to a property from each project.  The study provides a wealth of information and is well worth downloading, which you can do from the website costvsvalue.com. The download is free, but you’ll have to provide them …

Millennials, Baby Boomers and Real Estate

Team CHR Buying, Selling

Millennials vs Baby Boomers A lot of ink is spilled (or these days, you might say “a lot of gigabytes are disseminated”) on the impact of the Millennial generation on residential real estate. Conventional wisdom has it that Millennials are living in their parents’ basements and are priced out of the market. On the other hand, news abounds that Millennials …

Thriving as a Seller or Buyer in a Seller’s Market

Team CHR Buying, Selling

How’s the market?” Real estate agents get asked this question all the time. Our response: Who are you? Seller? Buyer? Both seller and buyer? Owner? An agent? The market is different for each of these players. The market is close to nirvana for owners. Homes have been appreciating at a compound rate of 10% per year since 2012. The average single-family home …

Two Unchanging Truths about Lenders

Team CHR Buying, Selling

We empathize with consumers When it comes to mortgage loans for residential real estate. Claims and counterclaims are made by lenders in their ad campaigns. Breathless announcers make it sound like XYZ Lender has some special program or unique service. In reality, there are just two truths you need to know about lenders and they apply in every geographic location …

Tiny Houses – Passing Fad or Next Big Thing

Team CHR Buying, Selling

Go to Amazon. Type in “MODS 20 Foot Tiny Home”. You’ll find that you can buy a tiny house that has been created in a shipping container – the kind of container used to transport items on railroads or ships. Just $23,000 for 160 square feet. Good news is that Amazon won’t have to put it in anything to send it to …

Average House Payments Near Historic Norm

Team CHR Buying, Market Trends, Selling

There are many ways to look at housing affordability. A prior post evaluated affordability by comparing payment required to income available over a 43-year time frame. An alternative methodology is to look at monthly house payments after adjusting them for inflation. At Colorado Home Realty (CHR), we conducted an affordability analysis recently using this complementary approach. Since this analysis takes …

Housing Affordability Better Today Than During Most of the Last 43 Years

Team CHR Buying, Market Trends, Selling

Imagine it’s 1979. The average single-family home in metro Denver carries a price tag of $66,051. Don’t you wish we could go back to those days when housing was so affordable? A recent affordability study by Colorado Home Realty (CHR) came to a shocking conclusion: The average single-family home in 2016, selling at $441,172, is significantly more affordable than its 1979 counterpart! …

Proposed Tax Reforms Not Harmful for Real Estate

Team CHR Selling

Many analysts are alarmed that tax reform proposals under consideration by the U. S. House of Representatives, if adopted, will have significant negative impact on home owners and home prices. Examples include:   National Association of Realtors: The average homeowner will pay $815 more in federal income tax and house values will decline by 10%, according to a NAR study …