Real Estate References

The several thousand or even millions of foreclosed properties allover the US are prime pickings for investors or first-time home buyers, if they know what they’re doing. Foreclosed properties are some of the best buys and worst around. Most lenders simply have so much to dispose of they may not have maintained them properly. The may look fresh and sparkling on the outside but what about the guts of the property or home? These can easily be checked for defects by licensed home inspectors who can point out major problems should they exist out of sight of us normal people.

Having a good real estate agent is also one of the most important aspects of the realty business. For one, your real estate agent should be knowledgeable about real estate law, and can answer your questions about mortgage payments and home insurance premiums accurately. You should also get a Realtor who’s straight to the point and doesn’t try to win you over with smooth talk and too much technical terms. A good Realtor will be upfront with all the prices and terms and is willing to negotiate up to a certain point. He should also not be afraid to give you advice regarding properties you’re looking at. You should also have a Realtor with dedication, because combined with his knowledge and confidence, he or she will be able to give you the best deal that benefits the both of you.

Environmentalism and real estate may be strange bedfellows, but current advances in technology are now starting to promote green building. Green building is the practice of creating structures and using practices that are environmentally friendly and resource efficient. There are a number of green building standards that builders and developers can use to certify whether a particular structure is a green building. These standards include the Leadership in Energy Efficiency and Design (LEED) rating system, which is a nationally accepted standard developed and administered by the U.S. Green Building Council. Many of these standards use a system that assigns points for a variety of practices and certify a building at various levels of “green“ depending on the number of points acquired. Energy conservation, water conservation, sustainable site selection, building material conservation, and enhanced occupant health is an integral part of green building. Green building practices tend to increase up-front construction costs but often provide long-term benefits that may offset these increases.

Image source: www.propertyforeclosureprofits.com
Here’s a simple method of getting to know your real estate investing market, which is VITALLY IMPORTANT before you can know if a property/price is worthy of calling a ‘deal’ or not…

This ‘LAZY’ method of market research reveals some amazing facts about the real estate investing market in your area and it works for any area there is….

Take a local newspaper (you can get many of them online, for free, nowadays) and simply count the number of ‘For Sale’ and ‘For Rent’ ads, keeping track of them for later reference.

Usually, Sunday and Wednesday papers are the ‘biggest real estate investing days’, so, for now, just watch these.

Keep track of the number of ads for a few weeks and watch what is happening to your market (hold on, now, we’re coming to the part about you turning all this research into a really great real estate investment).

Keeping more detailed records (what price for a 3/2/2 in the SW part of town is being offered for sale and rent wise, etc.) will yield tremendous knowledge, but, for now, just to get started in your real estate investing, stick with the basic ‘total ads’ research.

After a few weeks, you’ll start to see ‘trends’ in the real estate investing potential of your area – maybe the number of For Sale is going way up and the number of For Rent is going way down…