Home Buying Blogs - Page 3

I just got off the air with Talk of the Nation on NPR. We were talking about whether now is a good time to buy.

Dean Baker, an economist based in Washington, took the view that prices are coming down and will fall a lot farther. He thinks maybe buying a house in a year is a good idea.

I think it…

I'm in Los Angeles, attending the Society of American Business Editors and Writers (www.sabew.org, SABEW) annual conference. Since we're staying at the Disneyland Hotel, in Anaheim, Walt Disney Company President Bob Iger came to speak to us this morning about where Disney is headed and how he sees…

Over the past few years, the green buzz has been growing. More home buyers are concerned with how builders are putting up homes, and how "green" they are.

Building a "green" house means focusing on sustainable design and construction. In other words, being as energy self-sufficient as possible while…

Tim called the show this morning asking if he should put sod down in his front yard to make it shine for the Internet. Then, he offered this gem for buying a home.

Tim is moving to the Indianapolis metro area, and once he found the town he wanted to live in, he ran an ad in a local newspaper offering…

I wrote a story last week about some things you should ask your listing agent before you hire them. Here's the link to the story, in case you missed it: www.thinkglink.com/Nine_Thing_You_Should_Ask_Your_Agent.htm

The story has generated a fair amount of email from brokers, some of which I'll include…

This morning, Zillow (www.zillow.com) announced it would allow homeowners and agents to upload photos and information about homes that are for sale.

"To date Zillow has created a Web page for almost every home in the country - close to 70 million - on which we've placed public records data and our…

Forgive a few days without a post. I've been in Miami since Saturday, and weather-wise, it's been a most welcome respite from the freezing cold a/k/a the earliest snowfall Chicago has EVER seen -- and that's in more than 120 years of reporting the weather, according to my friend and WGN-TV…

It seems as though everybody is thinking about the next house they're going to buy. Ellen is thinking about trading her condo for a brick single family house. Matt is thinking about moving from a townhouse to a condo.

Even having just gone through the pain and hassle of moving into a new house…

I guess it's official: The Census Bureau has weighed in and found that Americans are, by and large, spending a lot more money for their homes than before.

Homeowners in every state except Alaska are spending a larger percentage of their income on housing costs than they were at the start of the…

Last week, I got an email from a home buyer who had been told by a builder's representative that because she was unagented when she first saw the property, the builder would refuse to pay an agent's fee if she later returned with an agent in tow.

You can read the article here…

The National Association of Realtors announced this morning that existing home sales slowed 4.1 percent. There are now enough homes for sale on the market that if there weren't one more home put up for sale it would take 7.3 months to clear out the industry. That's the worst record since 1993 -- 13…

If you're buying or selling a home -- or, if you're an agent representing a buyer or seller -- take some time to figure out Microsoft's VirtualEarth tool (www.virtualearth.com).

Virtual Earth allows you to build "collections" of information. Steve Lombardi, who works with Virtual Earth, showed me his…

According to a company called LeadQual, 69 percent of home buyers who shopped for a home online selected the first agent they interview compared with only 9 percent of traditional buyers.

Another interesting fact I learned is that for every 10 times a home buyer or seller requests more information…

I went to see a $15.5 million house for sale last night in a fancy San Francisco neighborhood. The owner had taken a very nice house, bumped up the third floor roof, and redid the home in a very nice style. There is a wine cellar (natch!), and a lovely master bathroom with a closet to die for. The…

Customer service -- make that customer "no" service -- generally stinks. As I fill in for Clark Howard today, I'll give some examples of great customer service (and the regular customer no-service) and talk about ways you can get what you want and what you need.

I'll also talk about how to turn a…

Hey, Folks. I'm back from London. And, a little late in posting for the show this morning. But, here's a look at what talked about today:

I talked about how the BEST deal you can get on your money when traveling abroad is from an ATM machine. In London last week, I used an ATM machine, and got a…

On today's show, we'll take a look at some of the new scams that popped up this week, and follow up on some issues relating to Identity Theft. I'm continually amazed that Congress is fighting patient privacy (www.patientprivacyrights.org).

I'm getting ready to leave for London and Cambridge to give a…

I spent a frustrating morning yesterday at the Learning Annex's Real Estate Wealth Expo in Atlanta, where I was broadcasting live from the Georgia World Congress Center. There seemed to be about 10,000 to 15,000 people in attendance -- most of those got up awfully early in a really horrific…

One of my part-time/full-time jobs is being a radio talk show host for the top News/Talk station in Atlanta, Newstalk 750 WSB. I've been filling in for nationally-syndicated radio talk show host Clark Howard for 7 years or so. I'm Clark's "Kent," so to speak. I sit in for Clark somewhere between 20…