Greg Snow - Southwest Florida Real Estate Expert provides real estate services to Cape Coral, Fort Myers, Sanibel and Captiva Islands

New lender mandates have been issued by Fannie Mae for new loans or refinances after June 1, 2010 that may have new unknown consequences for real estate agents, buyers, sellers, and all vendors involved in settlement. The intent is for applicant information to be honest, accurate, fully disclosed, and in most cases, verifiable. Once the application has been submitted, and all conditions been met, prior to closing , there will be a re-check of credit and debts, that should it be different, would require a re-submission to underwriting, which would delay, and may kill the deal. Other W-2 employees, with ownership of 25% or more of the business will have additional demands for cash flow analysis, business returns and any outstanding alimony or child support. In Lee County, Florida, our banks say they want to lend to qualified buyers. Just be honest, accurate, and fully disclose everything. Isn't this a novel approach in 2010.

Today is my sister's birthday (don't worry Liz, won't tell :), and also the 36th anniversary of Richard Nixon's resignation as 37th President here. Our real estate market is trying to avoid an association with either event, and recover from a nagging case of starting and stopping to gain strength. Lee County may have been the first hit with the housing recession, since we appreciated over 50% in home values for 2005, and logically, we should be at least one of the first to emerge into a new sunshine state. The list of stop signs run the gamut from the BP oil spill (not here in Lee), end of tax credit(s), delay in implementing National Flood Insurance Program, new difficulties in obtaining conventional financing, and over 12% of our eligible workers not being employed. In the year 2005, most local families were priced out of the rising market. Today, prices have fallen about as far down as they could be, and some choice properties have multi offers when they are marketed. The banking industry claims they have money to lend, but the underwriters want to know everthing, and then want more documentation. Owning a home used to be a dream for almost all of us and now it is more like auditioning for a documentary.

Lovely August, 2010, arrives with the typical summer heat and humidity, lack of steady business for most vendors, and the promise of football very soon. In taking a view of our local real estate market, we still see a large share of short sales, foreclosures, and cash transactions as staples, with changes in any of these three being some time away.

Our southwest Florida housing market is still attractive from a pricing option, variety of choices, and quality of life mantra, so where have the buyers gone???? Could it be ability to obtain financing?? Many an expert here would say it is so, Joe :). Today, attempting to secure a loan is more difficult in most cases than it was as little as 3-6 months ago. Credit scores are under seige, and even FHA loans, traditionally more forgiving on credit, have average FICO scores around 693. One may have a sizeable down payment, however, "willingness" to pay a loan back evidenced by a mediocre credit rating will doom any application for a reasonable interest rate. A few more issues that get in the way of 2003-2006 lending practices are heavy current debt, insufficent liquidity, lack of verifable income, unemployment, self-employment, and using one's imagination in filling out the 1003 (sometimes referred to as Lying...) round out the reson most bankers just say NO!

If we as agents for buyers do not have a back-up plan for them being turned down for traditional financing, we better try somethng different, like being a Cowboy :) Eric Wohl of www.NoteFlo, has just launched this site as a FREE service to buyers to post funding requests and allow several thousand private lenders an opportunity to bid to fund them. This form of non traditional lending has been around for awhile, and Greg thinkS NOW is a wonderful time to see if this helps some people get housing.

Our nation has cast their collective eyes upon the tragedy by BP in our beautiful green waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Many beaches around the Gulf coast have the black tar on their beaches and red spoltches in their waters. Resourcefulness abounds as many of these communities are not waiting for Federal or state assistance and attempt through various berns, boons, barricades, and hours of people power have taken up the fight to protect their homes, beaches, and livelyhoods. If it is not contained for another two months, then many estimates have hunders of thousands of gallons escaping from the bottom and comprimising our quiet and unpolluted enjoyment. Here, in Lee County, Florida we may yet escape realtively unaffected in many best case scenarios, and will forever be grateful if we are that lucky. I know we would much rather have SNOW on our beaches, than oil :) :)

Lee County, Florida got some encouraging news as our local News-Press reported our Fort Myers-Cape Coral area foreclosures are down 19% from May 2009, and we STILL rank 5th nationally. Still, one in every 102 local Lee hoiuseholds received notice and May 2010 new filings stood at 3,576 or more than 100 per DAY. Repossessions nationally were almost 100,000 in May. Our Naples-Marco area increased over 10% from April 2010, with one in every 157 households getting a notice. May filings were 1,237 and this area now holds the number 16th ranking in the country. The opportunity to buy a home for investment, retirement, or just to get unwanted family members away from you has never been better with low interest rates, government assistance, and discounted properties add up to a bona-fide chance of our lifetime(s). Come on down.

I am now another year older, deeper in debt and continue to monitor what could be one of the worst disasters ever in our Gulf of Mexico. BP has caused a doomsday scenario with it's pursuit of profits in lieu of safety precautions that surely will keep many lawyers quite busy for the next ten or more years. Just having glanced at our local News-Press this morning after turning 62 yesterday (whew), and some conservative estimates of a $2.2 Billion loss if we even have a 10% reduction in tourism makes for gloom here in Lee County. Perusing the USA Today and reading best and worst case scenarios is sure to start thinking it is going to be a long, hot summer. With alot the global and national news directing toward death , destruction, anger, poverty, terrorism, and distrust, I think we may need a visit from an extraterrestial savior to buoy our spirits or at least take the oil in the Gulf to the galaxy dump out there.

"It was the Best of Times, it was the Worst of Times", is the opening in Charles Dickens, "A Tale of Two Cities" and for the past five or six or seven or eight years in Lee County, Florida, we have lived both ends of the statement. Our local industry base is made up of agriculture, tourism, and construction, and for a time in the early parts of the 21st century, we were rolling on all cylinders. Watch out for cold weather that occasionaly meanders down, and the hurricanes that pop up between June and late November, and it is a perfect equaliateral triangle with the building boom that happened. Now local unemployment sits at about 14%, and many of seasonal and census jobs have disappeared and may amke that number "soft". Some startlying statistics recently provided by the reliable Lee County Development Council show in 2005, 8550 Lee County residents were unemployed (3.25%) and in April of 2010 35,398 of working residents (13%) were unemployed in a growing workforce. Diversify into other fields would help, however time and money do not seem to be available for any immediate relief.

All the attention our Southwest Florida real estate market has created with a rocketesque rise in values to pretty much a fire sale has drawn attention from all over the globe. In late 2006, the median value of homes sold (half sold for more, half for less) was $326,000. Today we are rising in values again from median prices in low $80,000 range to a bit over $90,000 today. Our local Multiple Listing Service, www.swflrealtors.com, has been busy so far with over 11,000 closings in the first five months. With the affordability of buy versus rent now leaning heavily toward buyers, we are seeing people fly in from all over to buy property here in Lee County. Individuals that wanted to buy five years ago and were unable to because of costs, now find better deals with low and friendly interet rates, and along with some government icentives , have swung a depressing marketplace, in a recovering and soon viable investment. Lee County was once ranked less affordable than half of 225 metropolitan areas in 2005. Lee County has some of the best value in Florida with great beaches, boating, golf courses, 2 Major League Spring baseball teams, an international airport, and friendly people.

Welcome to early June in Lee County, Florida. The heat is on both outside and in our local Lee County housing market. Closed residential single family homes to date read: 3883 under $100k, 2904 from $100k to one million dollars and 40 sold above 1 milllion with top sale being a 5 bedroom, 8 bath on 7.5 acres of riverfront proerty in January for $3.7 million. Zip code of 33908 if one is tracking those particulars. Closed condo sales of 1280 up to $100k, 1322 between $100k and 1 million$ and even five sold for over $one million dollars. Our multi-family sales read:360 sold less than $100k, and 45 sold for more. Raw or undeveloped land closed sales of 1191 for under $100k and 132 over $100k (also boat sips and/or docks included here. That total of 11,217 closed sales in our www.swflrealtors.com,  is impressive versus same time period last year here and rivals same period in booming 2005. In order to comprehend where we are at and where we may be going this June 7th, 2010, one needs to review prices, loans, employment, and government assistance. Follow next few articles to follow us.

As the magic number for the return of the National Football League, possibly for a while, falls to below 100 days, our local residents in Lee County, Florida have many concerns. Our local unemployment is near 14%, the merry-go-round of foreclosures and short sales continues, weather is warming up for a really HOT summer and hurricane season, and the BP oil spill sure seems to be getting larger and closer. Toss in the failure of many banks here, the most recent being the Bank of Florida, and one begins to imagine this could spiral in either an up or down direction. Resiliency appears to our best asset to once again begin dealing with trials and tribulations that our Lee County rsidents and visitors encounter by living here in paradise. We be keeping our fingers and other appendages crossed that the projections for a Super active hurricane season are inaccurate.