By the STATS Monday's

Real Estate by the STATS
County	Available Homes	Homes sold	Expired listings	Month's Supply
Utah	4977	234	801	21.26
Salt Lake	8635	536	1657	16.11
Davis	2601	182	418	14.29
Weber	2659	154	367	17.26

Update on FHA

The President signed H.R. 5140 February 13th, 2008. This is the $168 billion Economic Stimulus Plan which was rushed through Congress. The mortgage conforming loan limits have been adjusted as part of the bill. The conforming loan limits have been raised to 125% of the median home price, the limit is not to exceed $729,750. This bill also increases the loan limit on FHA guaranteed mortgage loans.

The calls and email are already coming in asking what the new loan limits along the Wasatch front, as well as other areas. I don't know. The reason is the HUD has 30 days from February 13 to provide their official loan limits for every area. They will be computing the median home price for each area and then publish an official conforming loam limit list.

Check out our new site

We are constantly looking for cutting edge products to offer to the Utah Real Estate market. Check out our new site at http://www.allfor299.com and let us know what you think. We are excited about the launch of these exciting product. Leave us some comments and let me know what you think.

BZ

Mortgage Rumors

Rumors are flying about loan products that are available and those that are disappearing...

Now we have a loan product that is very likely to be changing; FHA, and the rumors are saying that it will happen sooner than later. When (if) it does happen, it will mean more potential homes are to be sold.

Change normally comes from pain, and we have been experiencing some pain nationally in the Real Estate Market... thankfully we have not felt the full impact that other parts of the nation have.

Change can be good!

Zig Ziglar said "You can get anything you want out of life if you help enough people get what they want"

The sad truth illustrated by the following article is that in the last few years you have needed very little if any skill or professionalism to succeed in the surging Real Estate market. I think it is a good thing to see the market correction that is occurring in the Real Estate profession right now. There were a good many people out there who had absolutely no business representing the public they did more of a disservice the anything else. Of course this does not apply to 100% of everybody exiting the profession but the vast majority. The good news is we at UAR help a lot of people get what they want and as a result we are currently looking for additional office space and have our pick of the top agents in the industry as we grow while our competitors are closing their doors.

BZ

Real-estate agents bail out

As the housing market slumps, thousands of agents across the country are being forced to go back to their former careers or start looking for new ones.

By Patrik Jonsson, The Christian Science Monitor

After three years showing houses in Atlanta's hilly suburbs, Dee McMahon is finished with real estate.

Yanking up her custom-made "For Sale" signs in her North Lake neighborhood rattled her ego, she admits. But when McMahon closed her final sale, a house in Snellville, Ga., in late November, the mother of two felt a swell of relief.

"Now I can finally get my own house back together," she says. "I'm nervous about the future, but I feel happy."

McMahon is one of thousands of real-estate agents across the U.S. wandering with mixed emotions and uncertain prospects through the debris of a real-estate gold rush.

As many train for new careers, return to old ones or wait tables until prices rebound, the plight of the real-estate agent -- average age, 51 -- reveals the human dimension of how loose lending, raw opportunity and self-determination produced a housing bust that has stunned the U.S. economy.

"They've tasted success and big money, and now their standard of living has been rocked and reality has set in," says John Baen, a real-estate professor at the University of North Texas in Denton. "The whole (economy) has been built on real estate. When the music stops, what is left?"

Americans are still drawn to working in real estate, according to the National Association of Realtors, which says its membership was more than 1.3 million at the end of 2007. That growth in the ranks may be attributed to unaffiliated agents scrambling for clout in a tough market rather than an indication that the total number of agents is rising, the NAR acknowledges.

Evidence is growing that agents, especially in hard-hit markets such as Florida, California and Georgia, are closing up shop in large numbers, experts say.

In Atlanta, the number of agents letting their licenses lapse is growing at a faster pace than the number of overall licenses held. Nationally, an average agent's income dropped from $49,300 to $47,900 between 2004 and 2006. Not helping that trend is the cold fact that, according to Standard & Poor's house price index, home prices dropped precipitously in 2007, breaking the record 6.1% annual decline in 1991.

In Cape Coral, Fla., where only 30% of agents sold even a single home last year, real-estate agents are "dropping out" daily, says local agent Ginette Young. The Oregon Association of Realtors reports an 11.5% decline in licensed agents statewide in the past year.

Many of those who leave quietly shelve their signs. Others go out big: In Gilbert, Ariz., the fastest-growing city in the fastest-growing state, RE/MAX 2000 closed 13 offices throughout the Valley of the Sun, laying off at least 20 employees and scores of contract agents right before Christmas. The company couldn't meet its expenses.

Real estate is a line of work filled with mothers returning to the work force, older workers squeezed out of lifetime careers and young opportunists looking to trade sweat equity for potentially big cash-outs. Indeed, the industry norm is that only 4% of agents choose real-estate sales as a first career.

In Georgia, realty ranks had swelled to 48,000 at the peak of the market. In the end, many say, there were too many inexperienced agents hawking houses.

"There's a lot of money being spent (on real-estate classes) teaching agents how to waste a year of their life," says Atlanta agent Sandy Koza. "Then you get a downturn and a bunch of people get bumped. To (experienced agents like) us, it cleans out the business a little bit."

Florida's Cape Coral, a canal-sliced beach community, saw 800 building permits a month fall to 25 to 30 in the past year. The rapid slowdown left real-estate agents, investors and brokers holding the bag on big-money deals.

"It's a gold-rush mentality," says Michael Davis, an economist at Southern Methodist University's Cox School of Business in Dallas. He has been struck by how many agents, brokers and investors, acting against conventional wisdom of portfolio management, converted large percentages of cash holdings into only a single and somewhat risky investment: property. "I don't know whether they're ignorant or optimistic; perhaps a little of both," says Davis. Many others became the foot soldiers in the housing boom, second- or third-careerists drawn to the self-determination, relatively low entrance costs and perhaps even the allure of the trade as embodied by novelist Richard Ford's legendary character Frank Bascombe, an angst-driven agent who wanders the Jersey Shore for deals and revelations.

Thomas Banecke, of Sandy Springs, Ga., a former computer developer, spent most of the summer baby-sitting a new condo development -- usually a plum assignment. But when the Atlanta condo market tanked, foot traffic dwindled to almost zero.

Banecke is now back in the computer business and is putting his real-estate career on hold. In some ways, he says, the cold housing market forced real-estate agents, especially rookies, to confront their own abilities, schemes and dreams. Upfront costs, marketing, association fees and the crucial contacts are either more costly or harder to procure than an aspiring real-estate agent usually expects, Banecke says.

"This kind of thing will wipe up a whole bunch of people who thought they could do this to make a living," he says.

As for McMahon, the Atlanta agent, she still had a nice listing book and plenty of leads when she called it quits. In the end, unreliable buyers, surly sellers and a lack of office camaraderie contributed to a decision that solidified when home sales and prices dipped. "I was waiting for a time to kind of swing out," she says. She's planning to become a high-school science teacher.

One problem for out-of-work agents is that their skills may not transfer easily to other careers. California is waiting to hear on a $9 million federal retraining grant after 6,000 people lost their jobs in the housing industry since September.

But Baen of the University of North Texas is optimistic about their futures. "These people are hustlers, hard workers. They're used to getting on the phone," he says. "They'll end up in insurance, in mutual funds, in retirement planning and commodities."

State names new real estate division leader

By Brianna Lange

The Salt Lake Tribune

The state Department of Commerce said Friday that Mark B. Steinagel has been appointed director of the Division of Real Estate. Since 2001, Steinagel has worked for the Office of Legislative Research and General Counsel as a policy analyst. He will start the new role in early January. Steinagel said addressing the problem of mortgage fraud in Utah will be one of his top priorities. "Since we license the mortgage lenders in the state, we have an enormous role to make sure they have ethical standards and follow the law," he said. Steinagel said he will be working with the existing mortgage fraud task force to address the issue. "I am confident that he will be able to hit the ground running once he takes over the position," Francine Giani, executive director of the Utah Department of Commerce, said in a news release. Steinagel says his experience with the Legislature has prepared him for his new role. "The issues I hear [the task force] discussing are things I've dealt with before," he said. Steinagel has a master's in public administration, and a bachelor's degree in geography from Brigham Young University. Derek Miller, the former director of the Division of Real Estate, will take over as managing director of business recruitment for the Governor's Office.

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Bailout!!! Glad to see the government is helping out!

!!Warning you may find the following article very disturbing!!

For those of you worried that troubled homeowners would get some sort of bailout from the Federal government, you don't have to worry any more. It's now clear the bailouts are going to those who need it the least and deserve it the least. Bank of America completed it's purchase of Countrywide Home Loans today in a $4 billion dollar stock deal, effectively doubling down the $2 billion convertible deal it brokered in August. Countrywide gets to continue operations and its stock (CFC) will converted to Bank of America (BAC) stock - Shareholders of Countrywide will receive 0.1822 of a share of Bank of America stock in exchange for each share of Countrywide. The deal is expected to close in the third quarter and to be neutral to Bank of America earnings per share in 2008 and lift earnings per share in 2009, excluding buyout and restructuring costs. Now here's where the bailout takes place and there's not a damn thing that can be done about it. Bank of America is a solvent and profitable company. Countrywide is not. Now B of A gets to write off Countrywide's existing and pending losses, robbing the Treasury coffers of $270 million dollars per year over the next half decade. After that, it could be more. The Countrywide tax break isn't in that league, but it would still be worth a lot of money. Willens estimates that Bank of America will be able to deduct $270 million of Countrywide's losses annually for the first five years it owns the firm.

Here's where the real disconnect takes place. Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo gets paid $115 million to walk away from a company he already unloaded $100 million from in the last year. Adding insult to injury, Mozilo gets to use the corporate jet and B of A will pay his country club dues for a few more years. Remember the public relations campaign Countrywide launched last year? It was a two pronged affair called "Protect Your House" for consumers and "Protect Our House" for employees. What Mozilo meant to say was he interpreted it as "Protect My Ass" and he'll take his hundreds of millions and leave everyone else to pick up the pieces. Countrywide is so huge, it's involved in almost every bad deal out there. Failed flipper Casey Serin had loans with Countrywide. River bottoms scandal? Countrywide. They've been notoriously difficult to work with as foreclosures rise. Countrywide is even on the short list of subprime lenders the city of Cleveland is suing for blighting their city. Instead of a prison sentence, or accountability, Angelo Mozilo is getting a golden parachute of $115 million and American taxpayers are given the bill both for his bonus and to care for the foreclosed families left in his wake. Unsurprisingly, BofA chief Ken Lewis told investors Friday that he doesn’t expect Mozilo to stick around for long: “I would want him to stay until the deal gets done,” Lewis said on a conference call, Reuters reports, “and then probably I would guess that he would then want to go have some fun.”

This article was reprinted from slcrealestate.blogspot.com

6 Not Guilty Pleas In Utah Mortgage Fraud Case

The following defendants charged in a federal indictment for their roles in a mortgage fraud scheme have all pled not guilty:
Bradley Grant Kitchen, 39, Provo;
David R. Bolick, 50, Sandy;
Steve Wells Cloward, 38, Orem;
Ron K. Clarke, 38, Provo;
Jeffery David Garrett, 42, Provo; and
Rebecca Ann Hadlock, 30, Saratoga Springs, all of Utah.

Trial is set for March 10, 2008.

As previously reported by Mortgage Fraud Blog, A federal grand jury returned a 15-count indictment charging above-referenced defendants with wire and mail fraud in connection with a mortgage fraud scheme involving the purchase and resale of upscale residential properties, including five in the Utah Provo River Bottoms area. The case is the first federal indictment sought by members of the Utah Mortgage Fraud Task Force, announced earlier this fall. The Utah Mortgage Fraud Task Force includes local, state, and federal law enforcement officers, state and federal prosecutors, and representatives of regulatory agencies. (A copy of the press release announcing the task force issued earlier this year is attached for background information.)

The indictment alleges the defendants, functioning in various roles (mortgage brokers, investors, real estate agent, appraiser, straw buyers, and escrow agents), formed a network to engage in transactions to obtain a series of loans secured by real estate worth less than the loans through fraudulent pretenses and representations.

The indictment charges that Kitchen reached an agreement with Bolick to conduct real property purchases through Bolick‘s company, Home Owners Group (H.O.G.), backed up by another Bolick entity known as Paragon Investment Group (P.I.G.). Shortly thereafter, Kitchen and others began to purchase residential properties and, through false statements on loan applications and false appraisals, to falsely and deceptively inflate the apparent value of these properties to induce lenders to grant loans for amounts in excess of their fair market value, according to the indictment.

According to the indictment, the plan worked in several phases:

First, Kitchen and others caused H.O.G. to execute paperwork to purchase homes in the Provo River Bottoms area.

Second, the indictment alleges Kitchen and Bolick recruited straw buyers to make false and deceptive statements to lenders while acting as borrowers on resales of the residential properties on which H.O.G. had contracts of purchase. The indictment alleges these false statements included significant overstatements of income, claims of non-existent assets of between several hundred thousand and several million dollars, false principal occupancy declarations, non-disclosure of the payment of fees to the straw buyers for signing papers, the falsification of down payments when in fact there were no down payments being made to obtain the loans, the over-valuation of River Bottoms properties, and non-disclosure that the straw buyers had been assured that they need not make loan payments—that they would be handled by Kitchen through H.O.G. or P.I.G. These false statements were included in loan applications and loan packages to divisions of Countrywide Home Mortgage and American Broker’s Conduit in California and New York, respectively.

Third, Kitchen, Clark or others caused properties to be entered into the Multiple Listing Service reflecting a sale on River Bottoms properties which had either not occurred or sales that had occurred at deceptively inflated prices. These exaggerated MLS listings were then used as fodder to support overstated appraisals. These inflated appraisals also gave Countrywide Home Mortgage and American Broker’s Conduit false assurance that the value of the River Bottoms properties was sufficient to protect their loan investments in the properties in the event the loans went into default, according to the indictment.

The indictment alleges that Kitchen and Cloward caused the River Bottoms properties to be reappraised at a value more than twice the original sales contract price to H.O.G. Kitchen and Bolick, according to the indictment, recruited straw buyers with good credit ratings to contract to purchase the River Bottom properties from H.O.G. at a price well in excess of the H.O.G. contract price. The indictment alleges Kitchen told or caused the straw buyers to be told one or more of the following: that they would not have to invest any money of their own to buy the home; they would be paid a substantial fee for signing the loan papers; they should claim in loan documentation that their income and assets vastly exceeded what the straw buyers then made or owned; they should claim an intent to occupy the home and to make a down payment even though they did not intend to do so; that they would have no risk, including no obligation to make loan payments on the home; that they need not move into the home purchased; H.O.G. or another entity would make the home loan payments; and the home would be resold in short order, thus relieving them of any worries about liability for the loan.

Fourth, the indictment alleges that on several occasions, Kitchen, with the cooperation of title insurance and escrow agents, Garrett and Hadlock, manipulated the closing documentation to reflect non-existent down payments of several hundred thousand dollars. On several occasions these same closing agents also manipulated the closings to conceal the true substance of the closings: that the original H.O.G. purchase of the property was not yet completed, that the flip purchases by the straw buyers were being closed first and that the loan proceeds of the second transaction were being used to close both transactions. The lender and straw buyers were never aware that they had participated in the purchase of a property from H.O.G. that H.O.G. did not yet own.

The indictment charges that these flip transactions yielded several millions of dollars in inflated loan proceeds, which were diverted to the benefit of the participants in the scheme, and used for, among other things, to make loan payments on the River Bottoms homes to create the appearance that the loans were performing.

The indictment also includes a notice of intent to seek millions of dollars in criminal forfeiture from the defendants involved in the alleged offenses.

I now have a blog.

I have been meaning to do this for a long time and finally here it is.

This blog is going to be focused on the Utah Real Estate market and will also be filled with my very valuable opinions and commentary.

I have been at this game for 8 years and at a time when others are running for the hills I have decided to expand. After all they say fortunes are made in the bust not the boom.

BZ