Again, Zillow hits it out of the park.

Big hats off to Zillow for producing this information.

There is no doubt that Zillow does the best job producing housing reports that are useful for Realtors. Every agent should have this information at the ready.

The Q3 Survey, fielded October 7-9, 2008 (the worst week in stock market history, by the way), asked homeowners their perception of their home’s value over the past year, and what they think will happen to their home’s value in the coming months.

The results are kind of baffling. While the perception gap did narrow, still half of U.S. homeowners do not think their home’s value has declined over the past year. Specifically:

* 32% think their home’s value increased in the past 12 months
* 17% think their home’s value held steady
* 51% think their home’s value declined

In reality, three-quarters (74%) of U.S. homes lost value in the past 12 months, according to Zillow’s Q3 data.

As long as sellers are on denial about the value of their homes…inventory will continue to build, values will continue to plummet, the rate of foreclosures will rise….and the housing crash will last for years and year. Realtors, give this information to all of your sellers. Remember, you are the only true “Hope For Homeowners”….help your real estate market one seller at a time.

The following chart breaks down responses by region, and you can see that homeowners in different areas of the country hold a more (or less) realistic view. In the West, where the most homes are losing value (85% of homes in the West declined over the past year), homeowners are more realistic — with 65% of homeowners saying the value of their own homes has declined. In the Northeast, the perception gap is widest.

Meanwhile, optimism continues into the future for a good chunk of homeowners:

* 21% believe their home’s value will increase in the coming 6 months
* 40% believe their home’s value will stay the same
* 40% believe their home’s value will decrease

(Click graphic to see larger view)

What does all of this mean for Realtors?

You better sharpen your pricing skills and get used to telling home owners things they don’t want to hear. Lets be clear, being a Realtor is an honor. You are being trusted to help someone with one of the most significant decisions of their lives. Be 100% honest with your sellers…100% of the time. The only way out of this epic real estate mess is fellow Realtors accepting the fact that we are the only true solution. Its up to us to work with our sellers…one seller at a time…to understand the reality of this market.

As predicted, expect to see more foreclosure moratoriums…typically for 90 days. California tried this and..it didn’t have any sort of significant effect. Expect to see a massive number of foreclosures hit the market after this artificial reprise….

Mortgage finance companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are suspending foreclosures for about 16,000 households during the holiday season.

The two companies said Thursday that they will halt foreclosure sales between Nov. 26 and Jan. 9, while they evaluate whether borrowers qualify for a new loan modification program announced last week.

As you may recall when the government seized Indymac back the FDIC implemented their own “Mortgage Loan Modification” program. Overall, very few loans were actually modified as a percent of the whole.  Now we are seeing that even after the homeowners have had their mortgages modified they are still missing payments. Loan Mods are a great solution in theory. But, the newest research about what happens post loan modification isn’t encouraging. Clearly, simply massive numbers of homes will become REO listings. Learn now how to become a REO, Bank Owned Homes Listing Agent. Instant Free Agent REO Secrets book.

Fannie Mae said about 10,000 households would be affected, while Freddie Mac said the changes would affect about 6,000 borrowers who are facing foreclosure. The change does not apply to vacant homes.

Realtors, read that again….only 16,000 borrowers would be ‘affected’….that’s assuming they want to do a loan modification. Remember, a loan modification temporarily makes the payment lower….rarely, are there any principle reductions. In other words, they are still upside down in their homes. If they want to sell..and they don’t want a foreclosure on their credit one of their best options is doing a short sale. Realtors, learn how to offer these extremely motivated Sellers the option Short Selling their homes. Download the Free Agent Short Sale Secrets book now.

OK, you will love this next part…..in order to qualify for this new initiative a borrower has to miss 3 mortgage payment….

Fannie and Freddie’s loan modification plan aims to help abate the foreclosure crisis by aiding homeowners who have fallen at least three months behind on their payments, but only if their loans are held by the two companies.

More fun facts….when I first read this next point a week or so ago I thought it was a misprint. Can we all agree that one of the (many) reasons we are in this immense real estate mess is because lenders gave mortgages to people who didn’t qualify? Assuming we are in agreement…then WHY the heck is it that the FHA is now allowing people to have mortgages with a 38% housing ratio? Get this, the actual housing debt to income ratio that the FHA uses is………..28%. So, the FHA is now becoming the worlds largest….SUB-PRIME lender!

Under the program, the new primary mortgage payments — including taxes and insurance _shouldn’t total more than 38 percent of homeowners’ pretax monthly income.

It very important that you read and clearly understand the next point…THIS year…2008…the NAR is estimating that there will be around 5 million home sales….the FDIC is expecting that by the end of THIS year…2008 there will be 4.4 MILLION borrowers who are deliquent on their mortgages. If you are a HREU Coaching Student you know that the best opportunities for helping the millions (and millions) of homeowners is still ahead of us. Start now by learning how to become a REO (bank owned homes) listing agent. If the government predictions are correct nearly 50% of ALL sales in 2009 will be REOs and Shortsales.

Download the Free Agent REO Secrets guide book Now. Instant Free Download.

Fannie and Freddie are the dominant players in the U.S. mortgage market but hold only 20 percent of delinquent loans. Ultimately about 400,000 households are likely to qualify for the loan modification program, according to Priya Misra, a mortgage analyst with Barclays Capital.

By contrast, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. estimates that more than 4.4 million borrowers will become delinquent by the end of next year, not including loans backed by Fannie and Freddie.

You will want to read this…

The *F-R-E-E* Agent REO Secrets call is TODAY November 19th
at 12:00nn PST, 1:00pm MTN, 2:00pm CNT, 3:00pm EST.

This will be a completely full call. On the Last Agent REO Secrets
call many agents were shut out because they called in late…

I don’t want to see that happen to you….

You must call in at least 10 minutes early to be guaranteed your
spot.

Now, go to this link for all the call info:
Important Link—> http://instantTeleseminar.com/?eventid=4958508

This call will last 90 minutes. Be ready to take pages of great
notes.

The is not a fluff call. We are holding nothing back on this call.

You will have the information you need to jump start your
REO listing business.

Be ready to take pages of great notes because we will be giving
out the exact secrets you must know now to become a REO Listing agent..

You will learn directly from 3 fellow Realtors who are absolutely
cleaning up listing and selling REOs. One of the agents we will
interview is listing 27 REOs  THIS MONTH!

Again here is that link..go there now..
Important Link—> http://instantTeleseminar.com/?eventid=4958508

Have you ever read something that made you……speechless?

This is a link to a BusinesWeek Story that you must read to believe…nothing more to say…here is the link:

BUSINESSWEEK ARTICLE: Sex, Lies, and Subprime Mortgages.

Hello,

Tim Harris here…

So, a couple weeks ago we held the *F-R-E-E* Agent REO Secrets
teleconference….

That call was completely full.

On that call we announced that we were closing the doors for Agent
REO Secrets…and would consider re-opening some time next year.

Here is what happened…we received over 200 emails from agents
who missed that REO call. They were asking (make that demanding)
that we provided another call.

So, thats what we are going to do.

But, this will be the last one we do this year. In other words,
you will have to wait at least a few months before we open the doors
for Agent REO Secrets again.

We are setting aside 350 spots for this weeks Agent REO Secrets
teleconference (or webinar). I suspect that (like the call before)
all of these spots will be taken immediately….

Here is the information for the call..

THIS WEDNESDAY Nov 19th, 2008 you are invited to attend Agent REO
Secrets Teleseminar.

Go here now for all the call in info:

Important Link—>
http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=EDFtS&m=1g44EHgCRqdGm9&b=NRvTxbCCikzbkoG0cL
Du5w

This is going to be another fantastic call.

We are interviewing 2 fellow agents who have become REO listing
machines…

1)  An agent from LA who just started listing REOs 6 months ago …
and he is now taking 4-6 new listings directly from REOs per week.
He is making more money and its taking 50% less time and effort.

2) You won’t believe our next agent expert’s REO experience…he is
listing dozens of homes directly from ONE REO source this month. That is
not a typo…20+ listings. You will learn exactly how he is doing
it…we are holding nothing back!

Your spot on this Wednesdays Nov 19th Agent REO Secrets
teleconference has been reserved. Remember, this teleconference is
no cost to you.

Go to this link now for important call-in information:

Click This Link—>
http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=EDFtS&m=1g44EHgCRqdGm9&b=NRvTxbCCikzbkoG0cL
Du5w

We only have 350 spots available for this teleconference. Once those
’seats’ are taken..they are gone.

To guarantee your seat here is what you need to do…

You will want to call in (or log in using the webinar) at least 10
minutes early to be guaranteed your spot.

When you attend the event this Wednesday here are a few of the
things you will learn:

1)  How to contact the lenders…YES…we are giving out names and
numbers of the largest REO companies.
2) We will tell you exactly how to ‘present’ to the REO companies
so they will want to list their homes with you.
3) You will learn the 3 biggest mistakes you must avoid at all costs.
4) How to make money now from BPOs.

On this 90 minute call you will learn our proven step-by-step
process to becoming a REO listing agent. We aren’t holding anything
back on this call. Get ready to take pages of great notes.

Here is the best part about these 2 agents…neither had any REO
listings 90 days ago. They applied what they learned from Agent REO
Secrets and are now having their best years ever.

Here is that link again:
Last Chance—–>
http://clicks.aweber.com/y/ct/?l=EDFtS&m=1g44EHgCRqdGm9&b=NRvTxbCCikzbkoG0cL
Du5w

One more thing….I know this sounds crazy. Please don’t share the
info about this call with other agents. We expect the call to be
completely full.

Speak with you soon!

Tim and Julie Harris

P.S. This is not a ‘fluff call’. We respect your time and will be
giving you the information you must have to cash in on the REO
listings explosion that is taking place now.

P.P.S. This call is taking place at 12:00 pm PST, 1:00 pm MTN, 2:00
pm CTR, 3 pm EST.

First a confession…..we were late to the Twittering world.

We had certainly heard about twitter but, frankly…had no idea how it worked…or why we should bother with yet another online social media/ blogging/ on-line time suck.

Well, after much consternation we signed on with Twitter and after a few months of ‘Twittering’..I can no report back that we ‘get it’

What is www.Twitter.com and why should Realtors consider using this free service?

Simply, twitter is basically what is called a micro-blog. Its a way for you to keep in constant contact with your twitter followers in nearly real time. Think of it as your daily online journal. For example, you friends will become your ‘followers’ and the read your twitter updates as you go through the day doing your updates.

Many agents haven’t gotten on the blog band wagon because they didn’t want to learn how to create blog posts. Hey, lets all be honest here..writing fresh, interesting and ‘blog worthy’ blog posts IS very time consuming. Its easy to spend (waste) hours of your life creating new blog posts. Not with Twitter…

You see, Twitter only allows you to enter a sentence or 3 as your twitter updates.

For example, in the morning you might twitter…” Listening to the Harris Real Estate University daily message..today’s topic was Gratitude”. That’s it…that is your entire post. Sure, you can also use Twitter to market your listings, your real estate services. Maybe you post a twit about a new listing and you include a link to your website.

Bottom line, Twitter is blogging made easy.

Get started now..go here and get signed up with Twitter. Its free and takes second to set up. Then tell Twitter you want to follow us. Here is out twitter page. www.Twitter.com/TimandJulie