Real Estate Search

Making the decision to refinance a home equity loan is an important choice which should involve a great deal of consideration. The following are ten key points for homeowners to consider when making this important decision of securing a second mortgage loan:

1. The purpose for which the liquid funds will be used should be considered. The loan could be used for debt consolidation, investments, college tuition, buying a vacation home, home repairs or additional home construction to the current home.

2. The method which will be used to refinance the home equity loan should also be considered. Will it be a fixed interest rate equity loan or a variable rate credit line?

3. The next consideration should be the length of term over which the loan will be paid off. The length of the loan agreement combined with the interest rate dictates the amount the homeowner will be paying in interest over the course of the loan. Most home equity mortgages will have terms ranging from 15 to 30 years. Longer terms will have lower payments, but over the life of the loan you will pay alot more interest with longer terms.

4. The next consideration should be to compare the higher closing cost of fixed rate mortgages to the savings on lower or no closing cost with variable rate credit. If you keep the loan for a few years, typically fixed rates with fees will cost you a lot less than a free revolving credit line that has a high interest rate.

5. Pre-payment penalties should also be considered. Fixed rate second mortgages usually do not carry a pre-payment penalty beyond 3 years. Variable rates with little or no closing cost can carry a substantial early closure fee or penalty if the line is closed out in the first few years.

6. The type of loan is another important consideration. Total mortgage refinancing or just refinancing the home equity loan are two of the options available. Monthly payments should also be considered with particular interest to whether a second mortgage on the home at a fixed rate will provide less monthly cost than a line of credit at a variable rate. In a line of equity credit the amount borrowed is available but no debt is incurred until the proceeds are used. The home equity line of credit can save money if the funds are to be released periodically.

7. Another consideration is whether the homeowner wants the loan to be repaid interest and principal or interest only. The homeowner’s current financial situation as well as his future financial goals will dictate this decision.

8. Another consideration would be a hybrid 2nd mortgage that offers a fixed rate for 3 or 5 years.

9. A secured mortgage is one in which collateral is used to secure the loan. The loan is limited to 75% of the collateral used to secure the loan. There are no closing cost or pre payment penalties involved.

10. Lastly, the main consideration is how much am I saving monthly? Homeowners should evaluate whether the monthly savings are sufficient to justify refinancing.

Taking out an additional lien on your property should always be taken seriously. These are secure loans, and repayment of the loan will be essential for maintaing ownership of your home. Home equity loans can be very beneficial, but always consider looking at loan from several perspectives.

Mary has been writing mortgage loan related articles for homeowners for many years. She is a respected free-lance writer who had countless finance articles published. You can read more of her residential lending articles online at

The mortgage industry is very different today than it was just a few short years ago. If you are a Loan officer you’re probably frustrated with the fact that many of the lenders that you were able to rely on ‘back in the day’ are no longer around today. Many mortgage brokers and loan officers are starting to use sites such as the mortgage net branch sites to do their research on searching for a net or satellite branching company. It’s a very good idea to utilize the internet and to do your homework in advance when making any type of business or career move.

The Mortgage Observer is a site that reports mortgage industry news and offers insight on many of the mortgage net branch companies last month. They said that they seem to get a lot of hits on their site from people who are already loan officers and since their primary business is to report the latest industry news they wanted to provide these people with the information that they were looking for.

More and more industry insiders started to keep track of many of the mortgage net branch offices initially as a side project to document in a journal-type format all of the crazy changes and company closings in the industry. The industry got so out of hand, that it seemed every day another big player was going down and people seemed to come here to kind of find out who was going to be next.

Many people in the industry are not familiar with mortgage net branch type of companies. A mortgage net branch is a new concept that came about around five or six years ago where a loan officer would no longer need to go to work at your traditional mom and pop office or big lender. It allows a mortgage professional to kind of live the American dream where they can be in business for themselves. Most of the clients that have been using new technology tools and they seem to know what they want and what questions to ask. They seem to all be very good communicators which is very important in this day and age.

Most of the regular visitors to the site seem to have one thing on there mind that is top priority and that is when do they get paid and how fast. There are many mortgage net branch companies out there who don’t pay on time and because of that they have a bad taste in their mouth with the entire mortgage industry. The site tries to seek those companies out separate the good ones from the bad ones. What we want to do is find out who the poor performing companies are and make sure that you know what their weaknesses are so you don’t invest too much time in the wrong opportunity.

The mortgage net branch part of the industry is constantly changing so it’s always a good ideal to do your homework and your research and always take your time when deciding on a mortgage net branch.

Rich Hadermann is a Mortgage industry observer and studies the patterns and the trends of the mortgage business. He has been brought on to help and contribute to the brand new site MortgagenetBranch.tv MortgagenetBranch.tv He also contributes regularly to mortgageobserver.net mortgageobserver.net

A jumbo loan is a loan that is higher than the conforming loan limit. In California, the conforming loan limit in 2006 is $417,000. However, because the price of homes in California has been skyrocketing over the last decade, some members of Congress are trying to raise California’s conforming loan limit. Because of the high cost of homes in the state of California, jumbo loans are not so uncommon. This article explains what you need to know when obtaining a California jumbo mortgage loan:

Location Matters

If you live in an area of California where the average price of a home is above the conforming loan limit, chances are many more lenders will offer jumbo mortgage loans. These high-cost cities will have a higher number of lenders that offer jumbo mortgage loans. However, if you live in a part of California where the average home price does not exceed the conforming loan limit, you may have to shop outside of your local area in order to find a lender willing to finance your jumbo loan.

Expect a Higher Interest Rate

Conventional loans are funded by government sponsored entities, such as Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Jumbo loans, however, are not sponsored by these government agencies. Therefore, when you apply for a jumbo loan, you will receive a higher interest rate than you would have on a conforming loan because a jumbo loan represents more risk to your lender.

Refinancing Will Be Difficult
The conforming loan limit on a refinance mortgage in California in 2006 is $208,500. This means that you’ll have to pay your mortgage more than halfway off before you can refinance into a conventional loan. Borrowers should keep this in mind when deciding whether or not a jumbo loan is right for their needs.

Visit

The business environment is getting more competitive every day. New companies and new concepts are being born daily. There is always someone trying to do it better and cheaper than what has been done previously.

There is more competition in today’s global economy than every before. Do you remember when the US Postal Service was the only way to send documents? Now that age-old institution has to compete with delivery services such as Fed-EX, Airborne, UPS, as well as fax machines and the Internet with e-mail. Competition is everywhere and in every business segment.

The real estate business is no different. The new companies and the remaking of the old ones challenge us. There are two key questions that must be answered if we are going to thrive, not just survive, in the future.

1. How do we make our business (ourselves) the obvious choice for the consumer?

2. How can we be different than the other competitive choices, so we can better attract customers?

These two questions are at the center of success in attracting new prospects and clients to your business.

Many companies and Agents have taken the discount route to answer these questions. Still others are adopting a fee-for-service model. Both of these philosophies are trying to attract consumers solely based on the cost of the service. I believe that this tactic is a losing proposition for the Agent, the company, the real estate community at large, as well as the consumer. Cheaper is not always better…better is better. For some reason, we are fixated on the commission we charge. We often have tunnel vision as to how to compete. Because we lost a listing to a lower fee broker, we assume that we must lower our fee to compete.

We have been working diligently with all our coaching clients specifically on their sales skills, presentation skills, qualifying skills, and objection handling. We have scripted, rehearsed, practiced, and role-played with them to increase their levels of skills. Here is what we found, after studying their commission structure and fees. Most have actually raised their fees because of their confidence and delivery in their sales and objection handling skills. They have consistently received the highest commissions in their respective marketplaces. Many have even added a processing fee, between $295 and $495, to all their transactions. This processing fee has further increased their profit on each transaction.

The key in all this is the skills that you possess – the ability to handle the commission objection or the statement that another Agent will do it for less. Your sales skills will make you the obvious choice for the consumer. We all should have reasons that the consumer should select us. However, you must stop and ask yourself these three questions:

• Are your reasons well thought out?
• Are they well laid out in scripts that you know cold?
• Are you able to convey them with power and conviction?

If you can’t answer “yes” to all these questions, you have work to do!

Step 1: List all your competitive advantages. They could be your company, your service commitment, or your statistics (listings to sales, days on market, or average list to sale price). Write down as much as possible.

Step 2: Look at the list from the customer’s perspective. What do they really care about, besides lower commission? What would really set you apart in their eyes? Pick the five key services you think they want. If you are struggling, go back to a dozen past clients. Call them, and ask them why they selected you over the other Agents. You now have the consumer’s perspective.

Step 3: Select five competitive advantages and script a response to them. Your ability to drive these five points home can mean the difference between a powerful listing presentation and a weak one, and could well determine if you get the contract signed that night or have to wait a week. Be prepared to say to the customer what is most important.

We then need to analyze the next question: How can we be different to attract new customers? First, you must know your business and spend your time there. We often do activities at work that don’t bring a large return. I coached a lady who did thirty-five open houses in one year and made $9,000 from all that work. Once she redistributed her time to calling her past clients, her production skyrocketed. She added over $50,000 to her gross commissions earned, in less than six months. It was a matter of understanding where her revenue was coming from and investing her time there. Why invest your time in activities that generate little income?

Another technique to attract more customers is expansion of your leads by using call capture, or IVR systems, to expand the number of leads you receive. You can expand the number of leads you get daily and weekly by 50 to 100%, by using call capture technology. There are numerous companies out there that provide this service. In my opinion, the most user friendly, with the best marketing minds behind the system, is Pro-quest Technology. They have mastered the use and implementation of this product and made it easy. As Agents, the ability to generate more leads allows us to be highly selective with the people we work with. Being selective leads to more revenue. Take the time to implement your call capture system today.

Take some time this week to reflect upon (and answer) these key questions. You are running a multi-million dollar sales company. Make sure you invest the time in planning your own course to a successful career.

Dirk Zeller is an Agent, an Investor, and the President & CEO of Real Estate Champions. His company trains more than 250,000 Agents worldwide each year through live events, online training, self-study programs, and newsletters. He’s the widely published author of Your First Year in Real Estate, Success as a Real Estate Agent for Dummies®, The Champion Real Estate Agent, and over 300 articles in print.

You can get more information by visiting realestatechampions.com/realestatetraining_articles/sba.asp Realtors-Build Your Skills, realestatechampions.com/direct/products.asp Real Estate Training, realestatechampions.com/realestatetrainingresources.asp Free Resources For Realtors

With today’s boom in the UK land prices, one could think it’s a sure-fire way to make a lot of money. Think again! You need to use care and beware when buying land in the UK.

If you are astute in your research, and find the correct situation, you can make a great profit.

Many people have found the opposite to be true and have been stuck with massive losses.

The reasons for the losses are classic of any scam, so use care and beware.

What the land promotion companies will tell you is that you buy land that is scheduled for planning permission (but not yet granted), and you can buy before the great price appreciation happens. Sounds logical, but…

Is the word of a land sales company enough for you to make an investment? Certainly not!

A salesman will obviously say anything to make his sale, and that includes misleading the customer as to the real state of affairs. In land planning and permission, nothing any salesman says should be taken for face value.

Think about it.

If a land sales company knew some property was about to be granted, they would be buyers themselves, and not promoting it to you.

The land sales company will sell you unplanned and non-granted land at prices above the market for such property.

If the permission and granting does come, you have done well, but if not, you are stuck with an expensive asset that will never realize even its own value.

Regardless of the fact that land sales companies are reputable or not, you must take care and beware when buying land in Britain.

Here are some reminders and tips to follow:

• Planning permission can be discovered on your own. Make an investigation aside from the information you are given by the land sales agents.

• Do your own survey on prices for similar tracts of land in the area.

• Demand from the land sales agent to see records of their previous success stories. If there are none, go elsewhere.

There are reputable land sales companies in the UK, and they will be very glad to prove to you their good intentions and previous track records.

Alternative Investments?

If you have in mind to invest in land, there are other locations offering similar advantages to the UK market.

These are all within the UK, but if you are cautious in the UK, you must be more than careful in the new EU states. These are the areas of Bulgaria, Romania and the Baltic States.

For pure investment prposes the countries of central america such as Costa Rica and Panama are excellent and offer many investors triple digit gains

One could envision large annual gains in areas where planning permission is easier to obtain and where the markets are still in their growth period (easy sell and buy scenarios) and big profits can be made by selecting the right location.

Wherever you plan to buy, use care and beware, do your own research, and as the old saying advises, “measure the cloth many times before you cut” and always visit the area before you buy and make your own mind up.

MORE FREE INFO

On great locations to net-planet.org/costarica.php invest inland visit our website for a huge resource of articles, features and downloads and at net-planet.org/index.html net-planet.org/index.html.