Bedford NY Real Estate | Robert Paul Talks Life in Bedford NY

A week after unexpectedly jumping 10.3% last week , mortgage applications returned to their declining trend despite near year-low interest rates. Applications dropped 9.2% from one week earlier, according to data from the Mortgage Bankers Association’s Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending June 13, 2014. The Market Composite Index, a measure of mortgage loan application volume, decreased 9.2% on a seasonally adjusted basis from one week earlier. The Refinance Index decreased 13% from the previous week. The seasonally adjusted Purchase Index decreased 5% from one week earlier. “Interest rates increased relative to the previous week, as incoming economic data continues to suggest a pickup in the pace of growth,” said Mike Fratantoni, MBA’s Chief Economist. “Although the average rate for the week was up only a few basis points, the increase was matched by a large drop in refinance volume, and purchase application volume also declined. Some lenders continue...

34 images <div class="gallery loaded"><a href="http://curbed.com/archives/2014/05/19/socals-historic-villa-rockledge-roars-back-for-30m.php"><img src="http://cdn.cstatic.net/images/gridfs/53798e77f92ea13865027394/timthumb.jpg" width="500" height="338"></a><br /><a href="http://curbed.com/archives/2014/05/19/socals-historic-villa-rockledge-roars-back-for-30m.php" style="font-size: 9px; text-align: center;">Click here to view the full photogallery.</a></div> Location: Laguna Beach, Calif. Price: $30,000,000 The Skinny: Finding a sprawling, Mediterranean Revival clifftop villa with a private beach, amazing views and a National Registry of Historic Places pedigree is no small order, but Laguna Beach's Villa Rockledge ticks all the boxes and then some to make for a trophy property of the highest order. Built by Riverside's Mission Inn developer Frank Mille...

The Bedford Police Department is reminding residents that April is Distracted Driving Awareness Month. Police sent out a community message Tuesday, April 15, reminding residents that "one text or call could wreck it all." The department is spreading the word on the national Distracted Driving Awareness campaign that aims to stop drivers from using a cell phone or texting while driving. Residents looking to learn more about the initiative are asked to visit the national Distracted Driving Awareness website. http://bedford.dailyvoice.com/police-fire/bedford-police-raise-awareness-distracted-driving

While national trends for troubled properties are improving, there are 19 states where newly started foreclosures are heading higher, according to data released Thursday. In March, there were foreclosure filings on about 117,000 properties throughout the country, up 4% from February, but down 23% from a year earlier, online foreclosure marketplace RealtyTrac said. Such filings include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions. In addition, trends show national improvement: For the first quarter, there were about 342,000 properties with foreclosure filings, also down 23% from a year earlier. Looking nationally, the pipeline of foreclosures has narrowed since the housing bubble burst. The past year in particular has seen a rebound for the U.S. housing market, with rapidly rising price s enabling many troubled borrowers to gain equity. But at the state level, the foreclosure news is somewhat darker, with 19 states posting annual growth in foreclosure starts for the firs...

At the height of Seattle's real estate market in 2003, when Leah and Chad Steen bought their first home, the property was far from picture perfect. "There was no landscaping; the previous owners even left us a note about the sad-looking Charlie Brown tree in the front yard," says Leah, who owns Revival Home & Garden ( revivalhomeandgarden.com ), a shop in Capitol Hill. "But the house had tons of character, and there weren't holes in the ceiling, like other places we'd seen." Inexpensive mingles with high-end Mix high and low Inexpensive furniture mingles with high-end touches in the living room: Ikea curtains hang on plumbing pipe behind a $1,200 chandelier from Leah's shop; custom pillows sit atop a bargain (at $579) settee from Urban Outfitters; a hand-painted chinoi­serie coffee table rests on an old Pakistani rug ($85 on eBay). How to decorate in a global style High class with a couple of coats of paint Update secondhand furnishings ...

Changes expected to result in more realistic housing market | Bedford Hills NY Homes | Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor

After losing his third battle for a Dallas-area home, Johnny Tseng offered the winner $10,000 to walk away. The buyer declined, and Tseng understands why. “If I were under contract right now and somebody came along and offered me money, I would be hesitant,” says Tseng, a 31-year-old financial analyst for a Dallas-based commercial bank. “There just aren’t that many options out there.” Known for its open spaces and cheap land, Texas is experiencing the real estate bidding frenzies more common in tightly built markets such as New York and San Francisco. Prices of existing homes in Dallas and Houston are up more than at any time since the oil boom of the 1980s. Homebuilders, caught off guard by the ferocity of demand, are struggling to recruit workers to complete houses. The number of residential sales across the Lone Star State reached a record in the second quarter. The inventory of existing homes on the market in Houston and Dallas sank to about three months of supply in August...

Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Sneak a Glimpse Inside a $500M London Mega-Mansion | Bedford Hills NY Real Estate

Location:  Vinalhaven, Maine Price:  $3,600,000 The Skinny:  Built in 1904 as one in a long line of Maine “cottages,”  Stonecrop boasts 11 bedrooms and 4.4-acre property that spills downhill to a dock on the edge of the Fox Island Thoroughfare, the channel that separates Vinalhaven from neighboring North Haven. Joined on the property by a pair of historic boathouses, the main shingle-style cottage includes plenty of historic charm, with a stone fireplace, ceiling beams, and “one-of-a-kind beautiful Japanese-style wall panels.” Worryingly, the listing includes no photos of the kitchen or bathrooms, suggesting that after the buyers are done  forking over   $3.6M  for the property, they should be ready to spend thousands more to bring it up to date. Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Classic Harborfront ‘Cottage’ on Vinalhaven Listed for $3.6M | Bedford Hills Real Estate

Bedford   Hills NY Weekly Real Estate Report 9/5/2013 Homes for sale 34 Median Ask Price $1,357,500.00 Low Price $289,000.00 High Price $30,000,000.00 Average Size 4501 Average Price/foot $569.00 Average DOM 154 Average Ask Price $3,201,112.00 Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Bedford Hills NY Weekly Real Estate Report | RobReportBlob

Bedford   Hills NY Weekly Real Estate Report 8/12/2013 Homes for sale 32 Median Ask Price $1,590,000.00 Low Price $289,000.00 High Price $30,000,000.00 Average Size 4841 Average Price/foot $588.00 Average DOM 138 Average Ask Price $3,388,869.00 Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Bedford Hills Weekly Real Estate Report | RobReportBlog

Real estate ranks second as America’s favorite long term investment despite the three trillion dollars in equity homeowners lost during the housing depression, according to a new survey by Bankrate.com. More than one in four Americans (26 percent) favor cash, edging out real estate (23 percent). One in six (16 percent) favor gold or other precious metals, even though those investments have been pummeled in 2013, while only 14 percent say stocks would be their choice. Just eight percent of Americans chose bonds. For money not needed for more than 10 years, 26 percent of Americans favor cash, 23 percent real estate, 16 percent gold/other precious metals, 14 percent stocks and 8 percent bonds. “Americans not saving enough is well-documented, but hunkering down in cash investments and settling for low returns will only magnify the problem of not having a sufficient nest egg to meet longer-range financial goals such as retirement,” said Greg McBride, CFA, Bankrate.com’s senior financia...

The board of directors of Jupiter, Fla.-based Regional Multiple Listing Service Inc. has voted to dissolve the 11,000-member MLS following the settlement of a lawsuit filed by one of its shareholder associations. Regional MLS members are now receiving all MLS services directly through their respective associations: the Realtors Association of the Palm Beaches, the Jupiter-Tequesta-Hobe Sound Association of Realtors, and the Realtors Association of St. Lucie. The dissolution of Regional MLS, which was formed in 1987, is expected to be finalized sometime this summer. In April, the Jupiter-Tequesta-Hobe Sound Association of Realtors filed a complaint against Regional MLS and its other two shareholder associations, alleging false and deceptive advertising, unfair competition, and interference with business relationships. The origins of the suit lie in a change in billing structure made by Regional MLS’ board around November 2012. Whereas previously Regional MLS had provide...

When it comes to distressed properties, Florida is still in trouble, Naples News writes. Florida has jumped to No. 1 from the second spot on the list of states with the highest foreclosure activity. Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » The Sunshine State leads in foreclosures | Bedford Hills Real Estate

With painfully few homes on the market and the “sweet” Medford Colonial the perfect place to raise the baby they are expecting, Elizabeth Deutsch and Brian Rosen were determined to vanquish the competing bidders. Not only did they offer $11,000 above the asking price, but they wrote the couple who owned the home a personal note. “Dear Caleb and Autumn,” it began. Small problem: Lisa, not Autumn, is the name of Caleb’s wife. Autumn is their dog, a boxer-terrier mix : beloved, but not a decision-maker in real estate matters. “They got the place anyway,” said their broker, Ed Greable of Keller Williams Realty. “The owners got a laugh out of it.” Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » In a hot real-estate market, buyers make their pitches personal | Bedford Hills Real Estate

A hedge fund manager who made a killing betting against the U.S. housing market is now publicly fretting about Canadian real estate. Steven Eisman’s comments on Canada are arguably more important than those of other observers given that he put his money where his mouth was in the run-up to the U.S. meltdown, gaining renown and, eventually, becoming one of the players noted in  The Big Short , the book by Michael Lewis. Most observers believe that Canada’s housing market, while cooling rapidly, is in a soft landing, with the exception of Vancouver. Canada’s finance minister has moved several times to prevent a burst bubble and tame the mortgage market amid record levels of consumer debt. At a conference in New York yesterday, Mr. Eisman, who founded Emrys Partners, noted the exceptional run-up in prices for Canada homes, deemed by the Economist as the most overvalued in the world. He pointed specifically to Canada Mortgage and Housing Corp., according to published reports,...

Bedford New York Real Estate | Bedford NY Homes by Robert Paul Realtor » Blog Archive » Positive Equity is Driving Down Defaults | Bedford Hills Real Estate

Monday Morning Cup of Coffee is a quick look at the news coming across the HousingWire weekend desk, with more coverage to come on bigger issues. A test prototype of the single-securitization  platform for the secondary mortgage market is expected as early as next year, regulators said while speaking at the  Mortgage Bankers Association’s Secondary Market Conference  on Sunday. This goal set forth by the  Federal Housing Finance Agency and the government-sponsored enterprises is to incorporate mortgage participants’ feedback into the prototype development, which will hopefully result into a platform creation that suits the industry’s needs, explained Tim Yanoti, senior vice president of securitization at  Fannie Mae . HousingWire Reporter Christina Mylinski  has more on the securitization platform  and will be covering the MBA Secondary Conference online Monday and Tuesday. You can follow Christina on Twitter:  https://twitter.com/@Chri...

Risks to  Switzerland ’s housing market increased further in the first three months of the year, raising the question as to whether authorities have taken sufficient steps to prevent the bursting of a bubble. The UBS Swiss Real Estate Bubble Index rose to 1.17 points in the first quarter from 1.11 points in the three months to December, according to a statement from  UBS AG (UBSN)  today. A reading above 2 would indicate a bubble. “The risks in the real estate market have continued to rise,” Matthias Holzhey and Claudio Saputelli at UBS said in the statement. With the central bank easing policy to take pressure off the franc, Switzerland is in the throes of the biggest rise in real estate prices in twenty years. The SNB has held its benchmark  interest rate  at zero since August 2011 and in September of that year capped the franc at 1.20 per euro to shield the economy from the crisis in the neighboring euro region. High immigration, particularly of ski...

Any homebuyer on the market right now will tell you the crowd of buyers and multiple offers are creating a challenge. Those in search of distressed homes owned by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development are not immune to this supply-and-demand situation. In fact, recently one HUD home in San Diego attracted 100 offers within 10 days.   "In this market, because it's so competitive we're seeing buyers just happy to get a house.  They are being less selective on location and condition," said Whissel, broker/owner of Whissel Realty.   But in its latest news report, RealtyTrac reported that an uptick in homes owned by HUD may create opportunities for patient buyers. Experts project that over the next two years, as lenders steadily work through a backlog of foreclosures delayed by foreclosure-processing reviews, the supply of these HUD homes will increase significantly.   via housingwire.com