When first time buyers, or any buyer for that matter, find a home they want to make an offer on in Port St.  Lucie, many find that their “highest and best” offer will not be the best in terms of financing.   On many bank owned properties, the investors have stepped into the market with cash.  This often causes a seller or lender to take a little less because they don’t have the uncertainty that the buyer’s financing will be unsuccessful.  These investors buy now at what they consider low prices, then either rent them out, or hold them until prices go up, or fix them up and put them back on the market for a quick profit.

Also the bank owned homes or foreclosed homes have fallen for 3 months in a row.  This is causing less inventory of homes to choose from.  It’s not uncommon for a Realtor to show 5-6 homes, prepare an offer, submit the offer, and  find their buyer  is in a multiple offer situation which they lose. Then the Realtor and their buyer move on to repeat the process several times before finally succeeding in obtaining an accepted offer, often times higher than the list price.

Even though interest rates are close to a historical low and FHA financing requires a low down-payment of 3.5% of the purchase price, it is  becoming more and more difficult to obtain financing due to new regulations.  FHA will most likely go through some changes sooner or later in which they raise the down paymentaccording to the CEO of CENTURY 21, Tom Kunz, who  was intervied recently on CNBC (video below).   The new appraisal rules, which aren’t new anymore, have caused many sales to fall through due to the home appraising for less than the contract price. There is currently a bill coming up for a vote to do away with HVCC, the new appraisal regulations that are causing the problem in the first place.

It’s a difficult market to be a buyer in, which is why it’s so important to choose an experienced and knowledgable Realtor to lead you through a minefield.  But with the low interest rates, the extension ofthe  $8,000 tax credit to first time homebuyers who haven’t owned a home in the last 3 years, and the $6,500 tax credit to buyers who have owned and used a home for 5 out of the last eight years, coupled with the low prices of the current inventory, it’s worth the effort to acquire a home not only to live in but to have an investment that hopefully will appreciate as the market normalizes and goes back up as it always has in the past.

We have been working with buyers and sellers of real estate in Port St. Lucie, Stuart, Jensen Beach, Traditions, and the surrounding Treasure Coast area for 38 years. We have the experience and contacts to make your first, or tenth home purchase, or sale, trouble free. If you are thinking of buying, or selling in Port St. Lucie, or Martin and St. Lucie counties, give us a call at 772-335-5400, toll free at 800-876-3535, or email us. We’ll be happy to help you.

 

 

 

 

 

 

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