New York Real Estate Institute Offers Online Licensing Course to the Real Estate Salespersons

Monday, December 8th, 2008

New York, December 4, 2008: The top educational institution for certified real estate experts in the New York Region, New York Real Estate Institute has launched two online courses. One course is a real estate salesperson course with a duration of 75 hours and the second one is a remedial course with a duration of 30 hours. Both courses are being offered in association with Hondros Learning. The all-inclusive online courses would assist the students get ready for their new profession through concentrating on the basics of a career in real estate. Both the courses are interactive in nature and contain video clippings and other facilities to emphasize and highlight key ideas. These first-rate and engrossing courses offer the students in New York the training they require to get their real estate salesperson certification. These courses have been sanctioned by the Association of Real Estate License Law Officials (ARELLO) and the Division of Licensing Services, New York State.

The President of New York Real Estate Institute, Richard Levine stated that the courses are to the point, up-to-date and designed particularly for the real estate examination in New York. The emphasis of these online courses is on what is necessary to clear the examination. Distinct from other online courses, interaction has been utilized to enable the students learn and remember the subject matter. The courses have been especially planned for online education, hence they are more interactive in nature and not simply online books.

The Vice President for Hondros Learning., Dave Evangelisti remarked that they are really taking pride to assist New York Real Estate Institute to offer simple and helpful online courses to the students. They are hoping to go on supplying educational solutions which would help their clients develop their business in an almost natural way.

About Hondros Learning

Hondros Learning designs and sells highly emphasized learning tools necessary to thrive in a wide variety of professions in the mortgage lending, home inspection, appraisal and real estate industries. Reputed education providers of continuing education credits and licensure including Holloway’s Real Estate Institute, Inc., Chicago Association for Realtors ® and Hondros College provide online courses of Hondros Learning to their students.

About New York Real Estate Institute

Since 1987, New York Real Estate Institute is considered as a paragon of excellence in the real estate industry. Over 50,000 graduates have passed out from this institute and some among them are the most accomplished real estate professionals in the New York state. It is ranked as the top educational institution for accredited real estate experts and those people who want to become real estate investors.

Real Estate Recovery Not Expected Till 2011

Tuesday, November 25th, 2008

People should not anticipate the countrywide real estate scenario to better in the near future. The Seattle Urban Land Institute expressed this key opinion in the Emerging Trends in Real Estate breakfast held on Thursday, 20th November, 2008.

According to Jonathan Miller, lead author of the yearly Emerging Trends report and an advisor of PricewaterhouseCoopers, the year 2009 would be more disappointing and the year 2010 would not show signs of significant improvement. He further commented that there are expectations of a slow recovery in the real estate market in the year 2011.

Jonathan Miller mentioned that the extent of slump in the real estate prices is dependent on the broader economy and would differ according to the locality.

As a whole, apartments are more potent in comparison to other categories of real estate. In addition, the urban properties in 24×7 metropolitan cities are showing more sustainability as compared to secondary market properties and suburban properties.

The real estate market in Seattle, Washington has been rated by the Emerging Trends report as the top among the principal metropolitan localities in the U.S. in terms of potential investment. On a scale of 0 to 8, it was rated 6.2 on the basis of reviews conducted by over 600 real estate experts.

Still, no optimism was voiced by Jonathan Miller because he thinks in spite of the ranking, it is not really a time for a good feeling since chances of improvement in the real estate sector for 2009 are quite limited. Only affluent people would have the capacity to locate profitable deals.

Miller said that the house prices all over the country have to go back to that level where they had been from 2003 to 2004 and this might happen in 2009. The S&P/Case-Shiller 20-city home price composite index of Standard & Poor demonstrates prices in 2008 were simply lower than where they had been in the month of June 2004. The broader economy also has a significant role to play in real estate sales. There should be more jobs for people so that it becomes convenient for them to purchase homes.

The regional executive vice president of Centex Homes, Doug Barnes stated at the time of a panel discussion following Miller’s speech that the U.S. Federal Government was not functioning adequately to cause a recovery in the real estate market. He appealed to the government for subsidizing a step-down in the mortgage rates for the borrowers, eliminating the repayment necessity for a first time homebuyer tax credit of 7500 dollars and providing for availability of credit for every buyer.

Lisa Stewart, who is working as a principal with Urbis Partners, a commercial real estate broker, stated that ownership of office premises is not getting transferred due to the downturn in the real estate market. The sellers are asking for prices that are higher than what the buyers can pay, and yet while they consent, they do not find financing.

The president, chairman and chief executive officer of Washington Federal Savings, Roy Whitehead stated that his bank is lending selectively despite having good volumes of cash.

The executive vice president of Kennedy Associates Real Estate Counsel based in Seattle, Preston Sargent mentioned that 30 properties were placed by his firm in the market, they were anticipating to sell 10, however would land up selling six in case they are fortunate.

He provided an instance of a building which was priced at over 100 million dollars by the company executives and an offer was consented for a value of slightly over 90 million dollars. However, following due diligence, the buyer reduced the offer to 80 million dollars. Kennedy Associates refused to sell for that price.

Wall Street Turmoil can go in favor of the homebuyers

Monday, September 15, 2008

Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc., the fourth largest investment bank of USA today filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy and Bank of America declared that they are going to acquire Merrill Lynch, another famous investment bank in a deal of $50 billion. This news naturally resulted in turmoil on Wall Street. But, experts opine that the home buyers can benefit from this turmoil.

As the news of bankruptcy filing by Lehman Brothers created disturbance in the stock market, the investors will now concentrate on safer investments instead of investing in stocks. This will push down the interest rates of long term investments. So, the interest rates of fixed term mortgages are likely to fall.

In that case with cheaper mortgage loans homes will become more affordable. Given the takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac by the federal government, it is being expected that the availability of mortgage loans will also rise. But, according to some economists, the benefit of lower interest rates may be outweighed if the high level of unemployment and the economic recession due to credit crunch continue to prevail.

Sources: inmannews.com

Fannie Mae’s mortgage portfolio drops again

Mortgage backer says its gross portfolio fell over $10 billion to $722 billion in November.

December 21 2007: 11:49 AM EST

NEW YORK (Dow Jones/AP) — Fannie Mae said Friday that its gross mortgage portfolio fell in November to $722 billion from $732.3 billion in October.

Shares of Fannie Mae (FNM) climbed 3 percent in midday trade Friday.

The Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight no longer requires Fannie Mae to report the numbers, which exclude expenses, for its mortgage portfolio assets. For investors, the adjusted mortgage portfolio assets were approximately $719 billion as of Nov. 30, the agency said.

Fannie said its net retained commitments fell to $4.5 billion in November, and that its book of business grew at an annualized compound rate of 15.4 percent.

Fannie’s duration gap, a measure of the portfolio’s sensitivity to interest rates, averaged one month in November.

The conventional single-family delinquency rate rose to 0.83 percent in October from 0.78 percent in September.

The multifamily serious delinquency rate fell to 0.07 percent in October from 0.08 percent in September.

Total residential mortgage debt outstanding grew at a compound annualized rate of 7.6 percent to $11.8 trillion during the third quarter of 2007, compared with a rate of 10.2 percent in the third quarter of 2006.

Realestate Rates Fall Overnight

Wednesday, December 19, 2007

On Tuesday Long-term mortgage interest rates were lower and the benchmark 10-year Treasury bond yield has been dropped to 4.12 percent. The 30-year fixed-rate mortgage average sank to 5.84 percent, and the 15-year fixed rate mortgage dipped to 5.4 percent.

The 1-year adjustable rate held at 5.59 percent. The 30-year Treasury bond yield edged down to 4.54 percent. Rates and bonds are current as of 7:15 p.m.

Eastern Standard Time. Mortgage rate figures are according to Bankrate.com, which publishes nightly averages based on its survey of 4,000 banks in 50 states. Points on these mortgages range from zero to 3.5.

In other economic news, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 65.27 points, or 0.5 percent, finishing at 13,232.47. The Nasdaq gained 21.57 points, or 0.84 percent, closing at 2,596.03.Stock figures are current as of 7:30 p.m. Eastern Standard Time.

Sources: inman.com

Overnight real estate rates continue climb

Tuesday, December 11, 2007

Recently the mortgage rates have been increased. According to the Bankrate.com, 30-year FRM rates have been increased to 5.8%; and 10-year Treasury yield at 4.16%. The Long-term mortgage interest rates have also been increased on Monday, and the benchmark 10-year Treasury bond yield moved up to 4.16 percent.

Even the 30-year fixed-rate average rose to 5.8 %, and the 15-year fixed rate edged up to 5.38 %. The 1-year ARM has been increased to 5.54 %.

The 30-year Treasury bond yield was also up at 4.62 %. In another economic news, the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 101.45 points, or 0.74 percent, finishing at 13,727.03. The Nasdaq gained 12.79 points, or 0.47 %, closing at 2,718.95.

Sources: inman.com