10 cities with top schools: a range of real estate prices

10 cities with top schools: a range of real estate prices | Inman News@import "/files/css/b991d32ba87b8ea15796948ae043e143.css"; Join Inman News! Sign InShopping CartHomeNewsVideoConnect VideosInman TVAgent RebootPodcastsWebinarsFOREMCommunityMainMembersGroupsJob SearchOpinionColumnistsMainCategoriesBiographiesQ & ADirectoryConferencesAgent RebootReal Estate ConnectStoreReportsMediaMembershipColumnist ReportsAbout UsMainAdvertisingAd SpecsAudienceContent channelsProductsTestimonialsAdvertising InquirySyndicationExamples of Content SyndicationMeet Inman News ColumnistsPublish Our Content in PrintToolbox ReviewSyndication InquiryMembershipCareersContactNewsFree Daily HeadlinesRSS Feeds Syndication Home10 cities with top schools: a range of real estate pricesReport: Median home value runs from $148K to $1.3MBy Inman News, Tuesday, April 26, 2011.Inman News™

cwwycoff1." title="Pella, Iowa. Flickr image courtesy of cwwycoff1." />Pella, Iowa. Flickr image courtesy of cwwycoff1.

A list of the nation's top 10 cities with top-performing public schools challenges the idea that the best schools can only be found in the most expensive housing markets, announced a report from school ratings site GreatSchools and business magazine Forbes.com.

"The two biggest life stage decisions a family makes are finding a great place to live and excellent schools for their kids," said Bill Jackson, CEO and president of GreatSchools, in a statement.

"Great schools exist within every housing budget. This is good news to Realtors who want to help their clients when relocating to a new area," the report added. 

The Northeast, the West and the South each accounted for three cities in the top 10 list. The Midwest accounted for one. That city, Pella, Iowa, had the lowest median home value among the ten: $148,200. Manhattan Beach, Calif. had the highest: $1,278,980.

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Real estate buyers: protect us from ourselves

Over the last seven weeks we've taken a tour through the psyche of real estate consumers -- a group that includes each of us, really, who pays for a place to live.

We have explored how the various investor desires, motivations and values illuminated in Meir Statman's new business classic-to-be, "What Investors Really Want: Discover What Drives Investor Behavior and Make Smarter Financial Decisions," play out in our real-life real estate decisions.

We've seen that just as stock market investors want to win and not lose, want status, and exercise the highly fallible -- though sometimes useful -- form of psychological bookkeeping known as mental accounting, so do buyers, sellers, homeowners and sometimes even renters.

For the most part, we've explored the substance of what we want, rather than the process of how we want it. But there are real desires we, the human race, have when it comes to the "how" around our financial decisions, real estate and otherwise; Statman calls some of them out when he declares that investors really "want education, advice and protection."

Statman compiles meaty evidentiary proof of this declaration from facts like:

the massive investor interest in culling investment information from the Internet;the fact that financial literacy is a prerequisite for achieving the prosperity most of us crave;the cyclical ebb and flow of cravings for the government's protection of us -- largely from ourselves -- via regulation of how deeply we can leverage our own interests and how much advantage can be taken by financial predators; andthe vast desire investors have for financial advice, including the paid advice of professional advisers, but especially the free sort they trade with each other on personal finance blogs and Internet forums.

The world of real estate has not only gone through these same trends, but I submit that the pudding in which lives the proof that consumers want information and education, advice and protection is thicker when it comes to real estate than in virtually any other sector.

To wit: the evolution of real estate on the Web. Once upon a time, homebuyers had to consult an agent, who had to consult a paper book that was delivered only to agents, just to find out which homes were for sale, their prices and other details.

In response to an ever-escalating consumer clamor for this information, multiple sites now make every detail about a home -- from whether or not it's for sale; to its price; to its number of bedrooms, bathrooms and square feet; to when it was last sold and for how much; to what it's supposedly worth -- available to anyone, anytime, anywhere, all in a couple of clicks.

Anyone can see a ground-level street view of the vast majority of homes in America, what people think of the neighborhood, even whether a home's owners are behind on their mortgage or have received a foreclosure notice: click, click, click.

Wanna see pics of Nicolas Cage's house? Click here. Heard a "Real Housewife" was in foreclosure and just need to know? Click. Their gilt Rococoed, leopard-printed, McMansioned domestic world is your virtual, visual oyster (for better or for worse).

And virtually all the same sites that have made this information available in response to popular demand also feed consumer cravings for education and advice.

Most offer basic briefings on various real estate issues; virtually all of them offer education/advice hybrids by offering connections to real estate brokers and agents and discussion communities in which anyone can ask a question and get a first, second and 44th opinion from local agents not-so-covertly vying for (a) the asker's business, and/or (b) the opportunity to exhibit local knowledge and professional expertise -- not just to the asker, but to prospective clients searching for them or the subject matter on the Web in perpetuity.

(And, lest I forget, those who ask their urgent real estate questions on these communities will frequently get an answer or so from another consumer -- usually a cranky, anonymous one whose advice generally runs along one of three veins: (a) agents and mortgage brokers suck, (b) homeownership sucks, and/or (c) the government sucks. Not so nuanced, and not so helpful, but a clear case in point that some consumers not only want advice -- they also want to give it.)

Even offline, it's not at all bizarre for today's home sellers to interview three or four prospective listing agents to gather advice and opinions, and every buyer's broker has heard a client recount the real estate advice they have been given by their hairdresser, veterinarian, barista or ob-gyn.

Education, information, advice -- consumer cravings for these are clear -- but protection is a little more complicated. In "What Investors Really Want," Statman writes: "Our desire for paternalistic protection from ourselves and others increases when we experience the sad consequences of our own behavior or the behavior of others."

It is on this topic that Statman makes one of only a handful of "What Investors Really Want" references to real estate, making the hindsight observation that regulation limiting homeowners' ability to leverage their own homes might have made sense, given the woeful consequences of overleveraging (i.e., the foreclosure crisis which is currently at four years and running).

Translation: We don't want the government to limit our ability to mortgage our homes when values are skyrocketing, because we want to be able to max out the house we can buy for the money.

But when those adjustable-rate mortgages (ARMs) start adjusting, our maxed-out neighbors start walking away and the resulting foreclosures cause property values to plummet, while our craving for government protection from predatory lenders, liar's loans and confusing boilerplate loan docs takes a steep uptick.

Do real estate consumers crave information, education and advice just as much -- maybe even more -- than traded-asset investors? Absolutely. And just like stock investors, housing consumers also want government protection from lenders, mortgage brokers, agents and themselves, after their own decisions have spanked them with the consequences of a largely unregulated mortgage market. What remains to be seen is how long the desire for protection will last.

I suspect it will last as long as home values are low and rates of foreclosure and negative equity are high. But I hope that the lessons from this national tragedy -- massive losses in wealth, jobs and families' homes and health -- including the need for more intense mortgage market regulation, do not disappear when property values start to make a comeback.

Tara-Nicholle Nelson is author of "The Savvy Woman's Homebuying Handbook" and "Trillion Dollar Women: Use Your Power to Make Buying and Remodeling Decisions." Tara is also the Consumer Ambassador and Educator for real estate listings search site Trulia.com. Ask her a real estate question online or visit her website, www.rethinkrealestate.com.

Copyright 2011 Tara-Nicholle NelsonAll rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, in part or in whole, without written permission of Inman News. Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright law.

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Keller Williams top real estate franchisor in annual list

Keller Williams top real estate franchisor in annual list | Inman News@import "/files/css/b991d32ba87b8ea15796948ae043e143.css"; Join Inman News! Sign InShopping CartHomeNewsVideoConnect VideosInman TVAgent RebootPodcastsWebinarsFOREMCommunityMainMembersGroupsJob SearchOpinionColumnistsMainCategoriesBiographiesQ & ADirectoryConferencesAgent RebootReal Estate ConnectStoreReportsMediaMembershipColumnist ReportsAbout UsMainAdvertisingAd SpecsAudienceContent channelsProductsTestimonialsAdvertising InquirySyndicationExamples of Content SyndicationMeet Inman News ColumnistsPublish Our Content in PrintToolbox ReviewSyndication InquiryMembershipCareersContactNewsFree Daily HeadlinesRSS Feeds Syndication HomeKeller Williams top real estate franchisor in annual listFranchise 500 report: Coldwell Banker ranks as industry's 'fastest-growing'By Inman News, Monday, April 25, 2011.Inman News™

Austin, Texas-based Keller Williams Realty led among real estate brokerage franchises in an annual survey by Entrepreneur Magazine, and ranked 78th overall out of 500 franchises.

Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC ranked second among real estate franchises, and was also ranked as the fastest-growing real estate franchise, placing 14th overall out of 100 franchises on that list.

Keller Williams ranked 66th overall in a list of 200 top global franchises -- higher than any other real estate franchise. Keller Williams had 672 franchises in the U.S. and 15 in Canada in 2010, according to the magazine.

Overall, eight real estate franchises were chosen among the Franchise 500. Financial strength and stability, growth rate, size of the system, number of years in operation and total time franchising, startup cost, litigation, percentage of terminations, and other statistics factor into the franchiser rankings, according to Entrepreneur.com.

The rankings are based on data from July 2008 through July 2010.

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Beware when canceling real estate contract

DEAR BENNY: My husband and I signed a contract in November and put $1,000 down. The real estate agent put financing as "n/a" (not applicable) because we were preapproved by our bank. He sent us to a bank and the loan was approved, with a great interest rate and no points. Then problems started.

The underwriter said a road maintenance agreement was needed, which was not disclosed in contract. We told the other side we want out, and to give us our money back. The agent said an attorney was working on the road maintenance issue with 28 families.

We still have not gotten our deposit back, and the agent said if we pay the seller's fee of $500 for the attorney doing the road maintenance agreement, they might release us from contract.

I filed a complaint with the Department of Real Estate because of the nondisclosure of road maintenance, and they said there is no violation. Now the home inspector is calling us wanting his money, and we have told him the agent still has it. We did sign a release of contract designating where the $1,000 should go, and when we called the agent he said the owners are still thinking about it. Do we have any options left, other than paying even more money for an attorney? This has been a nightmare. --Tom

DEAR TOM: Does your state require sellers to disclose known conditions of the property? If so, and if the road condition was not disclosed, I believe you have a good case against the sellers -- not the real estate agent.

If disclosures are not required by your state, I suggest you call the attorney involved with the 28 other families. Find out the situation and ask why you have to pay the $500. That attorney is not representing you, and the seller will have to pay that fee regardless of who buys the house.

You should also discuss this with your own attorney. It may very well be that the road maintenance issue is a cloud on title, which would have prohibited you from buying in any event.

Generally, there is a provision in real estate sales contracts that the seller is conveying good and clear title. Under these circumstances, because the seller may not have had clear title to convey, you should get your money back. Furthermore, you may even have a claim for reimbursement of the home inspection fee.

There is, of course, a good lesson to be learned from your experience. Even though you had a preapproval letter from a lender, you still should have included a financing contingency in your sales contract. I know that real estate agents will object, stating that your contract was more attractive without that contingency, and I would agree with them. But I want homebuyers to be fully protected, and contingencies are consumer protections.

DEAR BENNY: I'd like to know if a deed-in-lieu of foreclosure is possible in the following situation: I am the sole mortgage holder on our house. I listed it as a short sale for a year to no avail. I am recently divorced, but my ex can reside in the house. Both of us are on the deed.

In our divorce settlement agreement, because the house mortgage is in my name only, he must allow me to try to sell it. I spoke with the bank and a deed-in-lieu is an option I would like to pursue. However, does my ex husband need to be involved with any of the official documents in the deed-in-lieu process? I guess what I am asking is although I am able to pursue selling however I choose, would a deed-in-lieu be considered the same thing? --Lisa

DEAR LISA: First, a quick explanation of a "deed-in-lieu." This is a process whereby your mortgage lender agrees to take back the house instead of (i.e., in lieu of) spending the time and money foreclosing on the property. Some lenders will agree to this, especially if there is only one mortgage on the house.

Have you discussed the situation with your ex-husband? Does he understand that he will probably have to move out, whether it is sold or the deed is given back to the lender?

Keep in mind that even if you have the absolute right to sell, your ex will have to sign any deed. Although you are the only one on the mortgage (in some states that is called a deed of trust), he still has an ownership interest in the property and will have to sign the deed along with you.

If you believe you can sell through a short sale, whereby you will not get any of the sales proceeds, I believe you would have the same right to give the deed back to the bank.

But before you proceed down either path, make sure that your ex will be on board. Talk with your divorce lawyer to confirm that you have the right to do a short sale. If so, then I think the deed-in-lieu will also fly.

DEAR BENNY: Your comments in a recent column to an elderly person seeking advice on possibly renting were unfair. Suggesting to this person that he or she watch "Pacific Heights" is like telling someone interested in country life to first see "The Amityville Horror." Painting such a gloomy picture is as wrong as saying renting leads to the road of riches.

There are pitfalls to renting, as you suggest, but there also are many benefits. A person could get help from a trusted family member, attorney or friend in screening applicants and learning the ins and outs of renting. Some older people might appreciate the companionship of a renter.

Although renting is not for everybody, someone who does his or her due diligence may find it very rewarding. I wouldn't recommend that my 80-year-old mother rent her house, but I do know seniors who have been successful landlords.

We have been landlords for years and have never had anything remotely close to a "Pacific Heights" experience. I am sure you were looking out for the best interests of the elderly, but a more balanced column would have been more helpful. --Steve

DEAR STEVE: I accept your criticism, and perhaps I was a little too harsh in my response. But as you point out, renting is not for everyone, and sometimes one has to point out the extreme risks in order to get the point across.

As always, I welcome comments and suggestions from my readers -- positive or negative.

Benny L. Kass is a practicing attorney in Washington, D.C., and Maryland. No legal relationship is created by this column. Questions for this column can be submitted to benny@inman.com.

All rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, in part or in whole, without written permission of Inman News. Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright law.

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Snag real estate bargains in post-bubble market

Book Review
Title: "Finding the Uncommon Deal: A Top New York Lawyer Explains How to Buy a Home for the Lowest Possible Price"
Author: Adam Leitman Bailey
Publisher: Wiley, 2011; 230 pages; $19.95

I'm a (recovering) attorney myself, so I feel at liberty to point out that most people think their encounters with lawyers will cost them money, and lots of it. New York real estate lawyer Adam Leitman Bailey aims to disabuse homebuyers of this belief by revealing his insider secrets for saving money on their homes.

With his new book, "Finding the Uncommon Deal: A Top New York Lawyer Explains How to Buy a Home for the Lowest Possible Price," Bailey offers a stripped-down, fluff-free set of anecdotes and action steps culled from his own daily work as a real estate attorney, homeowner and real estate investor.

In New York, where Bailey practices, attorneys are much more involved in the nitty-gritty details of effective real estate transactions than in states where the brokers and escrow providers do this work and attorneys are rarely retained for basic real estate transactions.

As a result, Bailey's advice does not focus only on legally complex deals, but rather on helping everyday homebuyers get the best price for the best home they can in "regular" old everyday real estate deals.

These days, those can include distressed sales, short sales, foreclosure auctions and bank-owned property sales.

Bailey does cover some unorthodox transaction types, like seller financing (which, by the way, should involve an attorney no matter where they take place). And, notwithstanding the book's title, Bailey is not afraid to give readers valid advice on how to get a great deal in these sorts of situations, even when "a great deal" doesn't necessarily mean getting a home dirt cheap.

For example, Bailey cautions against a "have your cake (seller financing) and eat it, too (low, low price)" approach, if you want to successfully negotiate for a seller to carry your financing. "Remember," Bailey advises, "you are asking the owner to give you the property in return for future payments, and you are attempting to obtain homeownership that you would not otherwise be able to afford. For such benefits, offer to pay at least the asking price -- if not more -- in order to seal the deal."

This is just one of numerous instances in which Bailey tells buyers what they need to know to be successful in this post-bubble real estate market, rather than telling them what they want to hear. He does a great job of this when it comes to affordability issues, as well, explaining that while homes are highly affordable now, if you do the math (which he sketches out for you) and ownership is not affordable for you, Bailey advises to keep saving until you can better handle the costs.

But for the most part, Bailey tells buyers things they both want and need to know. He provides many examples of his own personal clients who have used various money-saving strategies successfully.

He offers truly usable tips about how to manage your inspections to both get you the information you need to know about the property and the documentation to support your negotiations for repairs or price reductions with the home seller, if that's the route you're going.

Compared with writers who tout making lowball offers or buying the very worst of the worst properties as the way to get a good deal on today's market, Bailey's methods are both vastly more creative and reality-based, if very slightly overindexed around East Coast real estate standard practices and issues, like co-op boards and home engineers.

Tell the seller what your price is, and ask for a call back when the seller drops the list price into that ballpark, Bailey advises. Provide deep documentation of the comparables and the rationale underlying your counteroffer, he says, and then walk away from the negotiation for two to three days. Learn -- and remember -- details about the seller's family and their lives, and endear yourself to them.

These suggestions may sound like too much work for today's so-called buyer's market, but I am personally witnessing these exact strategies work, right now, as employed by very experienced investors and savvy homebuyers who are getting amazing deals they otherwise would not.

"Finding the Uncommon Deal" is not a super-fancy book. It doesn't have tricks and DVDs and swanky design elements (though it does have the occasional sidebar with a story about Bailey's own personal real estate dealings, or those of his clients).

There are no cute acronyms or fancy websites with downloadable doodads. What this book does have is very savvy advice from the basic (understanding the costs of homeownership and qualifying for the best rates) to the advanced (e.g., logistics of buying a home at auction) for the entire process (from the rent-vs.-buy decision to closing), which will stand homebuyers in good stead as they seek out an uncommonly good deal in this uncommonly complex, post-bubble real estate market.

Tara-Nicholle Nelson is author of "The Savvy Woman's Homebuying Handbook" and "Trillion Dollar Women: Use Your Power to Make Buying and Remodeling Decisions." Tara is also the Consumer Ambassador and Educator for real estate listings search site Trulia.com. Ask her a real estate question online or visit her website, www.rethinkrealestate.com.

Copyright 2011 Tara-Nicholle NelsonAll rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, in part or in whole, without written permission of Inman News. Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright law.

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Top issues that derail real estate closings

It can take weeks for an offer to be ratified. Buyers and sellers often counter back and forth for weeks before reaching mutual agreement on both price and terms. In this case, it's a good idea to re-evaluate the closing date in the contract before inking the final agreement.

Some buyers make offers that propose closing a certain number of days from acceptance of the contract, often 30 days. Even if you negotiate for a month, you will have 30 days, or whatever number of days agreed to in the contract, to arrange financing, complete inspections and close the transaction.

However, sometimes closing is to occur on a specific date, say June 1. If you start negotiating on May 1 and it takes a couple of weeks to arrive at agreement, you may not be able to close on time if you need a mortgage. It's best to modify the closing date in writing at the time you go into contract.

One of the main reasons transactions don't close on time is the mortgage approval process. Even though you may be preapproved by a lender, you will still need to provide additional documentation to satisfy today's underwriters who scrutinize buyers' finances zealously.

HOUSE HUNTING TIP: Be aware that you will be asked to document where the funds for the down payment and closing costs came from. It's not enough to produce a cashier's check or wire for the amount of cash necessary to close. You must verify the source of the funds in writing for the lender.

One buyer who had more than enough cash to close the sale decided to send money for closing from several different accounts, rather the one account that she said she'd draw on. This required additional documentation at the last minute from each institution that transferred money to close the sale.

Lenders not only scrutinize the buyer's financial wherewithal before they approve a mortgage, they also examine the preliminary title and appraisal reports for the property. Sellers should have a look at a preliminary title report on their property before they put their home on the market to make sure there aren't any irregularities. If there are, they can attempt to clear these up before the home goes on the market. Your real estate agent or attorney can help you with this.

Appraisals have not only delayed closings in recent years, they have caused some transactions to fail when the appraisal came in low and the buyers and sellers were unable to negotiate a satisfactory resolution. If the buyers need to switch to a different lender whose appraiser might have a different opinion of the value of the property, this will take time and can delay closing.

It's also possible that an appraisal could come in so much under the contract price that the seller might not be in a position to close the sale. For example, if the property is listed for $1.5 million and the sellers owe $1.4 million, they could have a problem if the property appraised for $1.4 million or less.

Some buyers don't want to pay more than the appraised value in this market. In this case, the sellers would have to be willing and able to bring enough cash to closing to cover their closing costs and any amount they might owe the lender. If the sellers were not in a position to do so, the sale becomes a short sale and would require lender approval.

A short sale, as defined by the National Association of Realtors, is "a sales transaction in which the seller's mortgage lender agrees to accept a payoff of less than the balance due on the loan."

THE CLOSING: Short sales take time, which might be worth the wait if you are committed to buying the home at the right price.

Dian Hymer, a real estate broker with more than 30 years' experience, is a nationally syndicated real estate columnist and author of "House Hunting: The Take-Along Workbook for Home Buyers" and "Starting Out, The Complete Home Buyer's Guide."

All rights reserved. This article may not be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever, in part or in whole, without written permission of Inman News. Use of this article without permission is a violation of federal copyright law.

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