No EHLP Foreclosure Prevention Help for Floridians

In danger of foreclosure? You have until July 22 to apply for the federal government's Emergency Homeowners' Loan Program.

By Emily Glazer, WSJ

[Unfortunately, Florida is not included in the participating states, but Puerto Rico is included. Interesting!

EHLP will be available in the following states: Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Hawaii, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Wyoming. EHLP is also offered in Puerto Rico. ]

Eligible homeowners can qualify for an interest-free loan to pay a portion of their monthly mortgage for up to two years, or up to $50,000, whichever comes first. The money also can be used to pay missed mortgage payments and past-due charges including principal, interest, taxes, insurance and attorney's fees.

Requirements include household income no greater than $75,000 or 120% of the area median income. Homeowners also must be at least three months delinquent on mortgage payments and have received notification of their lender/servicer's intention to foreclose.

Loans will be given out to as many as 30,000 borrowers, with an average loan amount of about $35,000, according to the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The program is available in 27 states, including Massachusetts, New York and Texas. In most states, you must apply through a participating credit-counseling agency, such as CredAbility or Money Management International. Connecticut, Delaware, Idaho, Maryland and Pennsylvania operate and administer the program directly.

Go to http://FindEHLP.org or call 855-346-3345 for more information.

Written by Emily Glazer, Wall Street Journal

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304569504576408220945889118.html?link=SM_spn_re_res

  

2 Major Banks Offer Cash Incentives to Homeowners to Short Sell

‘Secret’ short sale reward in Florida?

FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – June 29, 2011 – Two lending giants are reportedly offering homeowners who are behind on their mortgage a cash reward to agree to a short sale in Florida.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co. aren’t releasing many details about the short-sale incentives, but defaulting homeowners in Florida have confirmed that they’ve received anywhere from $10,000 to $20,000 from the banks in order to agree to a short sale.

To help homeowners avoid foreclosure, banks have offered a “cash for keys” program, offering money in exchange for surrendering the home, but banks offering incentives for a short sale would be new, industry insiders say. Usually the perception is that banks agree to do a short-sale transaction as almost a favor for homeowners, experts note.

The banks won’t say why only some homeowners are being chosen to receive the cash incentives, nor its criteria for choosing who gets the reward, only saying it’s determined by “individual circumstances,” according to the Florida Sun-Sentinel.

The short-sale incentives are a way for the two banks to write off the bad loans as soon as possible and avoid the lengthy process of foreclosure, experts say.

Wells Fargo says it offers the cash incentives to homeowners in Florida and other states "where the foreclosure process is lengthening," spokesman Tom Goyda told the Florida Sun-Sentinel.

In the first three months of 2011, the average foreclosure in Florida took 619 days, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Source: “Chase Borrowers Getting Cash to Complete Short Sales,” South Florida Sun-Sentinel (June 27, 2011)

© Copyright 2011 INFORMATION, INC. Bethesda, MD http://www.floridarealtors.org/NewsAndEvents/article.cfm?p=1&id=261702
   

Fort Myers High-Rise Finally Draws Crowd

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS 

Published: April 29, 2011

FORT MYERS — For two years, Victor Vangelakos was the only resident of a 32-story riverfront tower in Fort Myers.

Now, he has dozens of new neighbors at the Oasis, thanks to new ownership and a new push to sell homes at the high-rise condominium development.

Vangelakos has been out of town, but says he can't wait to see the neighbors. Meanwhile, the Weehawken, N.J., firefighter and the developer remain locked in a bitter legal dispute.

"I'm coming there at the end of the month for just two days" on the way back to New Jersey from Miami, where he's giving a deposition in the lawsuit, Vangelakos said.

"I have yet to see it. I'm looking forward when I get down there to asking all the neighbors how things are going," he said.

The sales push, started with an auction Nov. 20, by new owner Oasis Associates LLC of 40 units to get sales going. Those units were sold at absolute auction, meaning the high bid took the unit with no minimum price by the seller.

Five months later, units have been selling steadily, said Wendy Payton-Enriquez, spokeswoman for The Related Group, which is still managing the project and handling sales.

According to Lee County Clerk of Court records, 12 units at Oasis have been sold in the past two months. The price varied from $155,000 for a one-bedroom condo on the 15th floor to $284,000 for three bedrooms on the 23rd floor.

In Tower 1, where Vangelakos lives, 82 of 200 units are sold or under contract. With a bulk sale of 224 units in Tower 2 in February, that means "the project's about 70 percent sold," Payton-Enriquez said.

The riverfront condominiums are selling briskly, Payton-Enriquez said - and most buyers are paying cash.

It has been a turbulent year for Oasis.

Bank of America, which financed the two towers' construction, filed for foreclosure a year ago on its $154 million loan to Oasis' developer, Miami-based Related. Four months later, the bank assigned the mortgage to a company with connections to Related.

Most of the buyers are using the condos as second homes, although a few are living there full time, Payton-Enriquez said.

Jeff and Carol Turcotte bought a three-bedroom unit on the 14th floor for $165,000 at the auction and now split their time between there and Bristol, N.H., Jeff Turcotte said.

"I think we ended up doing pretty well," he said. "We originally looked at Oasis when this was pre-construction. We liked the plans but thought the price was too high. We ended up buying a villa home at Moody River Estates" in North Fort Myers.

Also, Turcotte said, they moved because of the spectacular views and the project's location.

"We liked the way it was close to downtown Fort Myers," he said. "We like the restaurants, we like the proximity to the city."

Fort Myers Mayor Randy Henderson said he's glad to hear that, and that he's working to make the downtown even more of a magnet for the riverfront towers. They sprung up after the city hired Miami-based architect Andres Duany to draw up a plan to reinvigorate that part of the city.

Sales at the towers fell sharply, however, after the housing market imploded starting in early 2006. Units at Oasis, for example, now go for less than half their pre-construction prices.

"I'm a little guarded," Henderson said. "I don't want to get too optimistic, because things are going to taper off" after this winter's tourist season ends.

But he said all the signs are encouraging. City officials are in discussions to get a Columbia Restaurant downtown - the Tampa landmark dates back a century and has an enthusiastic following in Florida.

Fort Myers-based commercial real estate broker Steve Luta said he sees a general improvement in downtown real estate. "Things are selling," Luta said.

Payton-Enriquez said a lot of the buyers are Midwesterners, although Oasis is also getting interest from the West Coast and some European countries - notably Germany, Austria and Switzerland.

The buyers tend to like the contemporary design of the building and also the assurance that the auction brought to pricing, she said.

"The effect was to jump start the sales process, which was the goal."

With so many cash buyers, Payton-Enriquez said, Oasis' stability is more assured. "There's no foreclosures or short sales in there," she said.

Meanwhile, Vangelakos wants the company to return his deposit and let him out of his purchase of the unit he bought in December 2008. All the other buyers either accepted a swap for a Tower 2 unit or simply walked away from their deposits.

He and his family have vacationed at the condo, where they're usually the only people in the building.

Vangelakos attended the auction but hasn't been in town since then. He said he's certain he'll like the place more than in the years when he was the only resident and Related provided minimal upkeep.

He may not know his new neighbors yet, but they know him because of media coverage, Vangelakos said with a chuckle. "At the auction, they all knew me," he said.

Originally Published: http://www2.tbo.com/business/breaking-news/2011/apr/29/fort-myers-high-rise-finally-draws-crowd-ar-203784
    

How to Assess the Real Cost of a Fixer-Upper House

By: G. M. Filisko

When you buy a fixer-upper house, you can save a ton of money, or get yourself in a financial fix.

Make sure you have the time, skills, and desire to embark on home improvement projects before buying a fixer-upper house. Image: Somos/Veer/Getty Images

Trying to decide whether to buy a fixer-upper house? Follow these seven steps, and you’ll know how much you can afford, how much to offer, and whether a fixer-upper house is right for you.

1. Decide what you can do yourself

TV remodeling shows make home improvement work look like a snap. In the real world, attempting a difficult remodeling job that you don’t know how to do will take longer than you think and can lead to less-than-professional results that won’t increase the value of your fixer-upper house. 

• 
  
• Do you really have the skills to do it? Some tasks, like stripping wallpaper and painting, are relatively easy. Others, like electrical work, can be dangerous when done by amateurs.

• 
  
• Do you really have the time and desire to do it? Can you take time off work to renovate your fixer-upper house? If not, will you be stressed out by living in a work zone for months while you complete projects on the weekends?

2. Price the cost of repairs and remodeling before you make an offer

• Get your contractor into the house to do a walk-through, so he can give you a written cost estimate on the tasks he’s going to do.

• 
  
• If you’re doing the work yourself, price the supplies.

• 
  
• Either way, tack on 10% to 20% to cover unforeseen problems that often arise with a fixer-upper house.

3. Check permit costs

• Ask local officials if the work you’re going to do requires a permit and how much that permit costs. Doing work without a permit may save money, but it’ll cause problems when you resell your home.

• 
  
• Decide if you want to get the permits yourself or have the contractor arrange for them. Getting permits can be time-consuming and frustrating. Inspectors may force you to do additional work, or change the way you want to do a project, before they give you the permit.

• 
  
• Factor the time and aggravation of permits into your plans.

4. Doublecheck pricing on structural work

If your fixer-upper home needs major structural work, hire a structural engineer for $500 to $700 to inspect the home before you put in an offer so you can be confident you’ve uncovered and conservatively budgeted for the full extent of the problems.

Get written estimates for repairs before you commit to buying a home with structural issues.

Don’t purchase a home that needs major structural work unless:

• You’re getting it at a steep discount

• You’re sure you’ve uncovered the extent of the problem

• You know the problem can be fixed

• You have a binding written estimate for the repairs

5. Check the cost of financing

Be sure you have enough money for a downpayment, closing costs, and repairs without draining your savings.

If you’re planning to fund the repairs with a home equity or home improvement loan:

• 
  
• Get yourself pre-approved for both loans before you make an offer.

• 
  
• Make the deal contingent on getting both the purchase money loan and the renovation money loan, so you’re not forced to close the sale when you have no loan to fix the house.

• 
  
• Consider the Federal Housing Administration’s Section 203(k) program, which lets qualified purchasers wrap up to $35,000 into their mortgages to upgrade their home before they move in.

6. Calculate your fair purchase offer

Take the fair market value of the property (what it would be worth if it were in good condition and remodeled to current tastes) and subtract the upgrade and repair costs.

For example: Your target fixer-upper house has a 1960s kitchen, metallic wallpaper, shag carpet, and high levels of radon in the basement.

Your comparison house, in the same subdivision, sold last month for $200,000. That house had a newer kitchen, no wallpaper, was recently recarpeted, and has a radon mitigation system in its basement.

The cost to remodel the kitchen, remove the wallpaper, carpet the house, and put in a radon mitigation system is $40,000. Your bid for the house should be $160,000.

Ask your real estate agent if it’s a good idea to share your cost estimates with the sellers, to prove your offer is fair. 

7. Include inspection contingencies in your offer

Don’t rely on your friends or your contractor to eyeball your fixer-upper house. Hire pros to do common inspections like:

• Home inspection. This is key in a fixer-upper assessment. The home inspector will uncover hidden issues in need of replacement or repair. You may know you want to replace those 1970s kitchen cabinets, but the home inspector has a meter that will detect the water leak behind them.

• 
  
• Radon, mold, lead-based paint

• Septic and well

• Pest

Most home inspection contingencies let you go back to the sellers and ask them to do the repairs, or give you cash at closing to pay for the repairs. The seller can also opt to simply back out of the deal, as can you, if the inspection turns up something you don’t want to deal with.

If that happens, this isn’t the right fixer-upper house for you. Go back to the top of this list and start again.

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Foreclosure wheels begin to turn again for Bank of America, GMAC

NEW YORK – Oct. 19, 2010 – Bank of America and Ally Financial’s GMAC Mortgage have begun to lift their freezes on more than 100,000 foreclosure cases in Florida and other states, saying they’re not finding flaws in their paperwork.

Late Monday, Bank of America issued a statement saying that it expects to begin going back next week to courts in the 23 states where foreclosures are a judicial process, including Florida. A statement from spokesman Dan Frahm said the lender is preparing to re-submit documents in 102,000 foreclosure cases already underway.

Also Monday, Ally Financial spokesman James Olecki confirmed that GMAC is re-submitting documents in some foreclosure cases including at least one in Florida “as each of those files is reviewed and remediated when needed.”

Among major lenders, Bank of America had called a halt to all foreclosure sales nationwide. It also, along with GMAC, JPMorgan Chase and PNC Financial Services, initiated reviews in the 23 judicial foreclosure states. Bank of America later extended its review nationwide. Wells Fargo did not undertake a review of its procedures.

Major lenders in September began announcing halts to all or parts of their foreclosure processes, after revelations – in sworn statements submitted in lawsuits in which homeowners are fighting foreclosures – showing that employees or representatives failed to verify mortgage paperwork before submitting foreclosure cases to courts.

The so-called “robo-signers” said, under oath, that they handled thousands of documents each month without knowing whether they were accurate, as required by court procedure.

The GMAC and Chase documents surfaced in Palm Beach County cases that are still going through the courts.

On Monday, Bank of America said its “initial assessment findings” have shown “the basis for our foreclosure decisions is accurate.”

GMAC’s Olecki wrote in an e-mail, “Again, we have been in the midst of a review for approximately two months and have found no evidence of any inappropriate foreclosures to date.”

A spokesman for PNC Financial said the lender hasn’t changed its position on reviewing foreclosure documents. A spokesman for JPMorgan Chase repeated the bank’s intention to review about 115,000 foreclosure files and delay foreclosure sales.

Monday’s developments won’t speed the foreclosure process in Florida’s overburdened courts, said Alexander Fernandez, director of homeownership preservation for Neighborhood Housing Services of South Florida. He noted there are more than 50,000 cases in Broward County alone that are still pending. And renewed cases, he said, would probably go to the back of the line.

Foreclosure defense attorneys questioned how the process can be re-started. “Do they simply get to resubmit the document and go on like nothing happened?” said Matthew Weidner, a St. Petersburg foreclosure defense attorney.

Beyond Florida, Bank of America said it would continue its halt of foreclosure sales in the 27 states that do not handle foreclosures through the judicial system.


Reprinted courtesy of the Florida Sun-Sentinel and Florida Realtors: http://www.floridarealtors.org/NewsAndEvents/article.cfm?id=248980
Foreclosures in Florida: Remedies, Defenses, and Lender LiabilityThe mortgage foreclosure crisis in Florida: a 21st century solution.: An article from: Florida Bar Journal