A New York Mortgae Planners View:

The first Time for me to do the Mortgage pro Week in Review. But who can refuse Jeff Belonger who is devoted to contribute that much information and knowledge to the group and active rain as a whole, I figured let me give it a try.

Here are the Highlights.

Did You know that you can do stuff.

• Christina Ewing  in her Post  FHA Financing on Condos-You really can do it...I Swear! 

Teaches us that you can still do a condo FHA loan even if the development as a whole is not approved with FHA. This is called Spot Approval Very informative!

• Jeff Belonger in his post Kiddie Condo" FHA loans aka Non-Occupant Co-

  Borrower Loans - What are they? In my opinion a amazing college planning tip. In adition it is a great follow up to Christina Ewing's post now that we know we can buy condos with FHA.

A word aboud Taxation.

•    Niman @TReXGlobal.com : TReXGlobal.com in his post   I'm Selling My House to Myself because of Uncle Sam!!! explains a very important Tax planning tool how to depreciate market value despite the fact that you already bought the property 30 Years ago for 30,000. this post reminds us why real estate is such a great investment at all-times.

A word about your marketing. First of all know whom you are after.  

• Steve homer in his blog Are you Missing 39% of the Real Estate Market? makes great point The NAR is doing some significant research on buyers who they are and where they come from. Read it and learn how to look at your target market.

• Misty Lackie in her post Save money, save paper and capture leads  Makes a great point, Capture the leads don't just let the flyer's fly< Know where the fly.

About the Shame Blame Game.

• Mike Mueller
  Walnut Creek, CA
   a real professional in my opinion,  in his article  titled "Lenn Harley is WRONG"in an effort to assign some blame the the real estate agents and brokers states very clearly the challenges we all had when the tide was high and many unqualified Mortgage brokers wrote in on it.
  And when the ethical hard working Loan professional couldn't prequalify a client for the amount the Realtor expected, the Realtor had a few more So called mortgage brokers that he kept in his Rolodex that he turned to, to get the deal done By hook or by crook.

• Janet Guilbault, California Mortgage Expert  in her post Why The Mortgage Ship Sank and The Realtor Ship Sailed Ondelivers a beautiful story of the smooth sailing ship and calm sea we had until late 2007. but then the storm of 2007 hit and only the though and rugged sailors and the strong ships survived,
  makes an excellent read.

New Rules coming down the pike.

Robert Ashby in his post  Federal Reserve Issues Final Rule Amending Regulation Z (Truth in Lending)Covers the few changes we expected coming down for a long time what I like is his commentary.

Have a great week evreyone it was an honor to be part of an elite group like this. I learned allot from you guys and I hope I did contribute at least a percent of what I learned.

Make it a successful one, Think good and it will be good.

Sincerely

Joel Silberstein

Certified Mortgage Planner

Business week had a segment on their video cast how much 1 dollar can buy you today versus how much one dollar was able to buy in 1948.

Back in 1948 one dollar bought you a cup of coffee hamburger ice cream and some other desert.

These days, one dollar can get you a small can of Pringles. Pretty negative huh?

Well they left out one pretty significant piece to the puzzle.

Looking at the US wages history chart on the US labor department website you can clearly see that back in 1948 the minimum wage for an hour was 0.40 cents. That means that if you spend a dollar for lunch which was more then twice the minimum hourly wage then one dollar would have gotten you all these mentioned above.

These days Minimum wage is $7.25,lets have a look on what 1 hour of earnings can buy us today.

Looking just on the McDonald's Dollar menu you can have a

McChicken sandwich $1

Double Cheese Berger $1

2 Pieces of Pie $1

Fruit and yogurt farfait $1

12 once Soft Drink $1

Side Salad, $1

And golden French fries $1 or you can get all of it for just the price of minimum wage!

Pretty similar to 1948 huh or better of?

What does that have to do with real estate?

Great question! and the answer is that people are always hearing how cheep real estate was 20 years ago, how easy it would have been if we where only around then or would have bought then. But people often neglect to look at the income you had back then, See it is relative to your income.

I can bet you that in 20 years from now prices of houses will be allot higher then it is currently and the same chant of shoulda woulda coulda will be repeated..

In Summary

Recession Inflation blah blah blah... if you can afford it now and your current income and future income will be able to support your purchase then buy now and enjoy the upside we are going to enjoy soon once again.

Get in touch with a financial professional , Real estate professional and make things happen

Rates started to level off from its volatile ups and downs we had in the recent few months since they start cutting rates.

This goes to prove a point again to the public that contrary to the popular believe that when the federal board cuts rates the so will happen to the mortgage rates.

NO THIS IS A MISTAKE

Rates go up on a scare of inflation

Rates go down when that scare tames off.

In addition to that, bonds and stocks compete for the same dollars. Therefore, when stocks goes up bonds have to go up and compete since when stocks experience growth and momentum money tends to flow out of bonds which is where money for mortgages are coming from.

Bonds however, have a strength that stocks does not have and that is security. Bonds might offer less momentum then stocks in the overall scheme of things but they offer a consistent leveled long term income for the investor. Therefore when the economy is shaky, bonds tend to pick up with the exception to inflation. inflation will kill the desire to own bonds.

Inflation is caused when the dollar loses its value

part of the value of the dollar is how much interest the fed will pay for its investors when invested in the fed bonds. since it is a global market and the euro also sells bonds and so does china. If the euro is paying 4.2% and tour fed is only paying 2% now you tell me who is more desirable?

In Summary

lower rates then our competitor the euro = weak dollar

Weak dollar= inflation

Inflation= higher mortgage rates

Higher mortgage rates= lower Real Estate market!