Home sales are up and interest rates are down!

I hope you are all doing well. I feel like I open these always apologizing because I haven't written in a while. The reason, as always, is we are swamped! That's a good thing of course!

In March and April we had two of the biggest months we have had since we opened our doors in 2005. We helped 58 customers in March and 46 in April. Our record prior to this was 44 customers in a month. Not to shabby! Was the tax credit the reason for the increased sales? I'm not sure. I do know however, that our marketing has produced a ton of new buyers coming into the area. Even though May, which is usually a slow month for us, is slower, we are seeing a lot more buyers come out who are looking for higher priced homes. The inventory of the low end homes continues to evaporate and prices have definitely leveled for quite some time.

So, with all that said, there is a lot of excitement in the market right now. Our bookings (people coming in to view homes) for June and July are extremely high. That should mean very busy months for our office and our Agents. Luckily we have some of the best Agents in the area working for Tropical Realty. The always put their customers first before their commission. We always talk about how important it is to help our customers. I'm blessed to have 20 + Agents that have the same moral fiber I do when it comes to this business. We love helping our customers!

As of today, interest rates were down under 5%. According to the news, the problems over in Europe are actually helping to keep our rates lower. Foreigners are buying our bonds which keep our rates low. This really is the perfect situation for buyers. Prices are at their 8 year low and interest rates are at their 50 year low according to the news today. What are you waiting for?!

As always, we are here to help you. If you are seriously thinking about buying, this IS the time. If you have been thinking about it, then this IS the time to make your move. It won't be long before this perfect time becomes the past time.

If you have any questions. Always feel free to call or email me.

Have a fun night!

Mitch

Brevard County July Stats

Hi Everyone!

It certainly appears that home sales are holding steady. Our inventory is at a new low with 6860 single family homes on the market. Currently there are only 2454 townhomes and condos on the market and 3445 lots for sale.

July Sales were:

Single Family Homes - 439 sales

Condos and Townhomes - 97 sales

Land - 36 sales

June Sales were:

Single Family Homes - 456 sales

Condos and Townhomes - 117 sales

Land - 41 sales

As you can see, sales remain steady and based on the number of people contacting us daily, it appears the market should remain steady in the near future. Prices seem to be stable and homes that are priced correctly are selling in quick fashion. We have had many listings selling within 30-45 days as long as they are willing to listen to us on our pricing to sell. We tell all sellers you can either be in the market or on the market. We are not interested in listings homes for the sake of listings homes. We will only list homes that are "in" the market! Last month only 439 homes were in the market.

The foreclosure market has definitely affected the resales of non foreclosures. With so many foreclosures (494) and short sales (1513) on the market, sellers are going to either not sell their homes or sell them competitively with these bank related properties.

Short sales remain a pain in the neck to deal with and time frames have not increased to get answers from the banks. Many times we are waiting 3 or more months for an answer and still less than 35% of these homes are actually going forward to closing. Our advice is still to stay clear of short sales. You are better off going after foreclosures or other resales. Of course if you have plenty of time to kill and are not in any hurry, short sales can be a good deal. Remember though, the listing price of a short sale is not necessarily the price the bank will take on the property. We still receive many banks countering our offers much higher than the asking price.

Interest rates are remaining stable also. It's just a matter of time until the rates start to go up, but for now, it still remains a great time to buy a home. As I have said many times, the only thing we know for sure right now are the prices and the interest rates. Even if prices stay the same or go down a little, interest rates have no where to go but up. Buy now and don't wait for the unknown. Keep in mind, we won't know that we are really at the bottom until the prices start going up again.

Hopefully you can see a snapshot of Brevard County Florida. If you have any questions or would like to see any properties, don't hesitate to contact us. Have a great night and good luck in your home search!

Mitch

Tropical Realty's Marketing Stats

Hi Everyone!

Now that we have decided to actually start taking listings again, I thought I would share with you some of the stats that help us to sell homes. Firstly though, it is important to know that there are really only two things that will help sell a home in a slow market....price and exposure.

Price

We have been very selective about the homes we choose to list. Unlike most Real Estate companies, we will not take every listing that presents itself to us. Don't get me wrong, I used to do that like everyone else. It was then, while sitting on 50 listings or so, getting yelled at by every owner, that I realized I need to change our philosophy on Listings.

As most of you know, we do things quite differently at Tropical Realty. Over the past few years we have spent all our efforts on helping buyers buy homes. Because of the scenario above, it just wasn't worth it to carry listings. Besides that, it just wasn't fun. I'm a firm believer that if my customer and I are not having fun, I really don't want to be involved!

I heard a saying a few months ago that I truly love. "Do you want to be IN the market or ON the market". With less than 250 homes selling out of 7200 homes on the market in January, you can see that only a few sellers choose to be IN the market. Since our goal is always to help our customer, we will only take listings of customers who want to be IN the market. So how do you become IN the market?

In this market, it's really all about price. We have been testing our marketing and have found that if a home is priced at 5% below everyone else in their market, the home should sell within 90 days or less. We have seen that a few of the homes we listed in January are now under contract using this rule. The others are getting showings and it's just a matter of time before we should get offers. It's actually very exciting and our customers love us!

One problem with our Industry is that many Realtors will tell you what you want to hear. Fortunately we don't fit into that mold. We are going to be upfront and honest every time. Unfortunately most sellers do not want to hear what we have say! We are not going to list a home for $250k when we know that it is going to get $200k at the most. In fact most Agents will tell you that you should be able to get $250k and they are the first ones to call you in 30 days or less letting you know that you have to lower the price. They are not doing any type of service for their customers. Price your home right and it will sell...it really is that simple!

Exposure

Most Agents will put your home in a magazine and list your home in the MLS...and then what....they just sit back and wait for another Agent to sell the home or for someone to call off the sign in the front yard of the home.

Tropical Realty of Suntree owns and operates two websites currently with two more in the works. The stats I am going to give are a combination of both sites.

Tropical Realty of Suntree – Quick Facts

Did you know that over 80% of homebuyers start their search on the Internet?

Tropical Realty of Suntree is the leader in Brevard County for Internet Traffic and Buyers.

Currently Tropical Realty websites receive approximately 55,000 visitors each month.

www.MitchRealty.com is ranked 14th in the nation for Real Estate websites according to Ranking.com.

Tropical Realty of Suntree was the Number 1 office in Brevard County in closed transactions with buyers in 2007.

There are over 500 registered Real Estate companies in Brevard County

Tropical Realty currently has over 25,000 people in our database with approximately 10,000 buyers actively looking to buy within the next year.

Tropical Realty spends more money on Internet Advertising than most companies spend on print Advertising.

All our listings are found on Google, Yahoo, Homegain, Craigslist, Trulia, Lycos, AOL, Zillow and many more sites with a total of over

Our goal is to have 100,000 visits per month by the end of 2008 with an additional 20,000 new customers in our database.

As you can see there is a lot of great stuff here ! I have more stats but don't want to put to much writing on here as I try to keep these blogs to a reasonable length. As always, let me know if there is anything I can do to help.

Have a great night!

Mitch