The Renton Wa Realtor Blog !: April 2009

This is from my friend and partner at KW in Renton.  Robby hits it right on the nose about buying a Renton Home.

It is time for you to get off the fence.    There will NEVER be a better time to buy a Renton Highlands Home or buy a  Kennydale Townhome.   NEVER EVER!!!

Call me, or tweet me @RentonHomeFinde even send me and old fashioned email at Gary@GaryMcNinch.com  or  search every listing on a map at www.RentonHomeFinder.com

But Please ACT NOW.    Wow my typing fingers are out of breath on this one.

Don't Lump Your Renton Real Estate Research With The 128,203,000 Other Homes In America

National real estate data helps economists identify trends in the housing market. It shapes policy and influences markets.

For active home buyers and home sellers, though, national real estate data is irrevelant. This is because national data says nothing for the factors determining home prices in any given zip code.

See, national real estate news is mash-up of data. It's 128,203,000 homes from all 50 states. Each of these states has its own economy and there are different factors that drive home values in each

Most Americans understand this.

But, if we dig deeper, we see that within those states, there are more than 19,000 incorporated cities -- plus thousands of unincorporated ones. And like the 50 states, city-to-city home values vary by economy, too.

Furthermore, each city is comprised of areas, and those areas can be broken down into neighborhoods and then sub-divided again into streets, with blocks.

It's apparent that a random home in Alabama can't be compared to a random home in California. Yet, that comparison is exactly what you're getting with national real estate data and why we can't rely on it to say "values are up" or "values are down".

Values depend on what's happening locally.

For buyers and sellers, the underlying goal is to meet at "the right price". To reach that sort of price discovery, you have to look local.

It's not as easy as it sounds.

Local real estate trends is a topic that's too narrow to be covered by the national press. It's even too narrow for local papers. Therefore, buyers and sellers have two places to turn:

1. A general Renton real estate website (RentonHomefinder.com)
2. A practicing Renton real estate agent (The Gary McNinch Team)

Using both sources for local data is common among today's buyers and sellers.

National real estate news offers little value with respect to home price negotiation. Because all real estate is local, your real estate data should be, too. Give the Gary McNinch Team a call or use our map search of Renton Homes and Townhomes for Sale to start your search. There are huge differences between communities and neighborhoods and we have been inside homes and condos in most all of them.

SUPPORT OUR MILITARY, TELL THEM THANKS AND GIVE THEM OUR APPRECIATION.

This is a reblog of a post by my friend Todd Clark, who is a great Realtor in Oregon.   Click on his blog and read the comments.  I am disgusted and appalled by the behavior of the idiot in this story. 

Here is my comment:

Todd,

I guess I know in my logical brain (after spending 26 years in law enforcement) that Rene is right.  The spitter was just ignorant.

But my emotional brain would like to reach out with a quick forward thrust (punch, blow, jab) through the spitters solar plexis and knock the air right out of him, and crumple him to his knees.  Makes it hard for an idiot to spit on someone when they are gasping for air!

Then my logical brain realizes you can't educate an idiot.

But my emotional brain says ... but the idiot has been neutralized and it is even kinda comical looking at him gasping away.

List and Sell (and remember to honor every citizen in our country who ever protected our freedoms by serving in the military)     Gary @ RentonHomeFinder.com

If you are a Veteran or their family and looking to buy a home in Renton or South King County please give me a call.  You will get the best service and tremendous respect.

Home Safety : An Easier, Better, Cheaper Fire Extinguisher

Sure, you've got a fire extinguisher at your home in Renton, but if you ever had a fire, would you know what to do with it?

Like any tool, reading the directions can only get you so far. If you've never "pulled the pin" and discharged a fire extinguisher before, fighting an actual fire can be a frightening intiation. Having spent years running up and down the highways with the Washington State Patrol, I got pretty good at using a fire extinguisher. And you usually can't get a car fire out with one extinguisher, just to put an old wife's tale to rest.

For non-firefighters, there's an alternative. It's an aerosol spray from the First Alert company called the Tundra Fire Extinguishing Spray and it's billed as an intuitive fire safety product.

According to a First Alert product fact sheet, aside from its ease-of-use, the Tundra product boasts several advantages over traditional fire extinguishers:

1. Tundra sprays for 32 seconds -- double a traditional fire extinguisher
2. Tundra spray covers 3 times more surface area than a traditional extinguisher
3. Tundra cleans up with a damp sponge

The Tundra Fire Extinguishing Spray is recommended for cooking fires, electrical fires and household fires involving wood, paper and fabrics. You can buy it at most hardware stores such as McLendons in Renton or Home Depot or Lowe's in Tukwila or for cheap at Amazon.com.

One of my great clients Leandra Hoyne and her husband Jeff have sold a house in Lake Tapps and
bought a house in Enumclaw.  Then her mom and dad bought a home and a rental property in Enumclaw.

I have seen their family go from no kids to 3 kids.  All healthy and full blast.  We've shared meals and stories about kids.  Plus Jeff is a Police Officer and Leandra was a police dispatcher so we have that craziness in common as well from my 26 years in the State Patrol.

So this morning I'm on facebook and this is what I see from Leandra.

COFFEE OUT MY NOSE!!!!!!!     LMAO!!!!!!!   I raised 2 little boys and nothing surprises me.

Life is good.  If you are interested in buying or selling a home and want to know about the Satisfaction Guaranteed Service of the Gary McNinch Team, then you can call Leandra and get a good recommendation for real estate service.   If she has time to answer the phone or get on the computer, because she has 3 little kids and is a really busy mommy.  Or MAYBE SHE JUST WON'T HAVE TIME TO ANSWER.

A Few Reasons Why Now May Be The Least Expensive And Easiest Time To "Go FHA" when you buy a Renton townhome or Kennydale house.

Shopping for low mortgage rates is a game of luck.

Some days, mortgage rates are favorable. Other days, they're not. And while you can sometimes make an educated guess about where rates might be headed, you're not always going to guess right. Plus they change several times a day. That is why the Gary McNinch Team can refer you to a couple of tremendous loan officers for your home purchase.

Even the experts get it wrong more often than they'd like.

But some parts of the rate shopping process can be predicted and one of them is the future of mortgage guidelines.

In general, the more often homeowners default on their respective mortgages, the harder it is for future mortgage applicants to be approved.

This is why "now" may be the best time to apply for a FHA mortgage. Defaults are climbing, suggesting that FHA underwriting guidelines are about to tighten.

Indeed, the FHA has implemented two major changes since last summer:

1. The minimum downpayment requirement was raised by a half-percent to 3.5%.
2. Cash out refinances are now limited to 85 percent, down from 95 percent.

These changes create barriers to entry for potential FHA borrowers, improving the overall quality of the FHA loan pool.

For a taxpayer-funded agency like FHA, loan performance is an important goal. Therefore, as the number of defaults grows, expect FHA guideline to get tighter.

The problem is, though, we can't predict just where the FHA will tighten. Maybe the FHA raises its minimum FICO score requirement, or maybe it gets tough on seller-paid closing costs. A hike in loan fees isn't out of the question, either -- that's the path Fannie Mae took, after all.

Whatever the FHA does, fewer people will qualify for FHA mortgages once it's done. So, if you're planning to buy a home and your downpayment is limited, or your credit scores are suspect, or there's some other "red flag" in your profile, consider moving up your timeframe to act.

In fact three of my current home sales contracts, an Ashburn townhome, a preforeclosure sale, and a Kent single family home, have buyers utilizing FHA financing. And for them it is a great program.

Mortgage rates may rise or mortgage rates may fall, but neither is going to matter if you can't get qualified for a home loan. And, for FHA mortgage applicants, tougher mortgage guidelines are only a matter of time. Get going now, get off the fence and buy a Fairwood or Renton Highlands home while there is great inventory and the lowest interest rates in nearly 50 years. And of course, call, email or tweet the Gary McNinch Team Renton Wa Realtors Keller Williams Realty Renton.

(Image courtesy: The Wall Street Journal Online)

10 Strange Things For Which You Can Claim A Tax Deduction, Mortgage Interest on Your Renton Home is Just Normal

It's Tax Day today and who among us doesn't love a legitimate tax deduction?

The IRS expects to process 138 million tax returns this year and accompanying those returns will be a melange of tax deduction requests.

Most will be run-of-the-mill including such staples as mortgage interest when you own a Renton home or Kennydale townhome, vehicle mileage, and child care deductions. Others, however, will be less ordinary.

On its website, TurboTax pays homage to some of the most off-the-wall, offbeat tax deductions through the years permitted by the IRS.

Among the "weirdest deductions allowed":

• A bodybuilder's body oil so his muscles would glisten in competition
• A private airplane for owners of investment properties
• Landscaping for a sole proprietor that meets clients at home
• A swimming pool for a man with emphysema

Tax deductions are prized by U.S. taxpayers. Hopefully, your 2008 tax returns included some good ones, too. Call the Gary McNinch Team Renton Wa Real Estate if you want to learn the tax advantages of Renton home ownership. Mortgage interest deduction is the still one of the best reasons to own a home. And if you need great tax advice we will be glad to give you a referral to a veteran local CPA.

Good luck on your taxes for this year, we pay the business taxes on our Limited Liability Corporation (our real estate business) a quarterly basis, so ours are in the mail. And we hope you enjoyed this crazy look at our "interesting tax deductions."

 This amazing story and photo are courtesy of the Associated Press and was on the Seattle Post Intelligencer.

STOCKHOLM -- Parishioners at a church in Sweden celebrated Easter on Sunday by unveiling a 6-foot-tall (1.8-meter-tall) statue of Jesus that they had built out of 30,000 Lego blocks.

It took the 40 volunteers about 18 months to put all the tiny plastic blocks together, and their creation shows a standing Jesus facing forward with his arms outstretched.

The Protestant church was filled to capacity with about 400 worshippers on Sunday when the statue went on display behind the altar, and some of the children in the congregation couldn't help but touch the white art work.

Church spokesman Per Wilder said the statue at the Onsta Gryta church in the central Swedish city of Vasteras is a copy of Danish sculptor Bertel Thorvaldsen's "Christus" statue on display in Copenhagen.

He also said that even though the statue is all white on the outside, many of the donated Legos that the church received were of other colors and were placed inside.

This is a year and a half labor of love.  Creating this must have been exciting for everyone and also given them time for great introspection.   What a way to teach your kids, spend time with the Lord and build an work of art that will thrill genertions.  Amazing.   We had a great easter at Renton Christian Center in Fairwood, wonderful worship, standing room only, lots of kids and a solid and uplifting message.  Hope you did too.