Daylight Savings Time

 

Celebrate International Women’s Day

After more than 100 years, International Women’s Day draws millions to commemorate the advancements made in human rights and to discuss the challenges women continue to face in politics, education, employment, and other areas of daily life.
Here’s the full story from the Christian Science Monitor.

Pending Home Sales Give a Peek at Spring

This week’s Intero Insider has Gino bringing us a Spring forecast.

 

By Gino Blefari, President & CEO, Intero Real Estate Services, Inc.

Pending home sales – an indicator of how the market will fare in a few months – tell us today that there’s plenty of momentum going into spring this year.

In a widely distributed report from the National Association of Realtors, pending home sales rose in January, and have improved on an annual basis for 21 months.

NAR’s Pending Home Sales Index tracks contract signings, not closings – making it a fair indicator of number of sales coming down the pike. The index increased 4.5% to 105.9 in January from 101.3 in December and 9.5% from the same month a year ago when it was 96.7.

The index was the highest in January since April 2010, just before the deadline for the federal home buyer tax credit when it hit 110.9.

Also, California released a pending sales index last week, showing pending sales climbed 23% to 101.4 in January from the previous month, according to the California Association of Realtors.
It’s safe to say that the spring buying season will be hot in many markets this year.

In another bit of news, along with sales, asking prices seem to be following. This past week, asking prices of homes for sale that appear on Trulia were up in 90 of the 100 largest U.S. metros in February.

Roughly 4.5 million for-sale and for-rent properties were listed on Trulia through February 28. Asking prices for those homes were up 7% from a year ago, and grew at a seasonally adjusted rate of 1.4% from January to February – the biggest month-over-month gain since the housing downturn began.

Spring historically is one of the hottest periods of the year for home sales. In 2013, we’re gearing up to see one of the most active spring seasons since the recession hit.

This is great news for sellers. For buyers, it could mean a lot more competition in the market – especially for those markets that still struggle with low inventory. My advice is to be prepared with financing so you can move fast when the right home comes along, and be persistent.

Happy spring!

Tax Filing Reminders–the fun way

These guys, Frank & Brian, are fun. They give out some simple tax filing
advice, but the main message here is that we all have to do taxes, there are
things we need to remember if we’re doing them on our own, and we might as well
make it fun.

 

Gilroy Today Magazine – Spring Issue JUST RELEASED

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The latest issue of Gilroy Today, our uber local glossy magazine published by J. Chris Mickhartz, is out today. The Spring 2013 issue is the best ever and packed articles and information about local people, places and things. Take a look:

  

Tonight is Gilroy City Council Meeting

Big happening tonight in Gilroy. It’s the first Gilroy City Council meeting of the month. The action starts at 6 PM. Here’s the info:

The public is encouraged to participate in Gilroy City Council meeting the first and third Monday of each month at 6 p.m. in the Council Chambers, 7351 Rosanna St. If that date falls on a holiday, the meeting is rescheduled for the following Monday. Details: 846-0400 or cityofgilroy.org. Agenda: http://www.cityofgilroy.org/cityofgilroy/city_hall/meetings/default.aspx?MeetingType=2

If you can’t, or don’t want to, attend in person, you can watch the action on your computer. You can watch live-streaming of tonight’s meeting by going here: http://www.cityofgilroy.org/cityofgilroy/online_services/web_casts/council_videos/default.aspx.

Unique Property for Sale

What an amazing property! $695,000. Near San Antonio, Texas. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pearl and Amy Lorys Photography. Many more pictures and lots of information here.

 

Week-End Entertainment in Gilroy

Here’s some help for you if you’re looking for something to do this week-end. All of these events can be enjoyed rain or shine – and from what we hear it’s probably going to be rain.

Events for March 1st – 2nd
SVCT’s Big: The Musical


Pintello Comedy Theater presents, “Sylvia”




Bottle Your Own at Martin Ranch Winery
Mar 2 – 3




Kids Discover Arts
Mar 2



Out of Character, The Costume as Art
Mar 2

 

Home Values, Sales and Housing Starts on Track for Big Growth Year

By Gino Blefari, President & CEO, Intero Real Estate Services, Inc.

The housing market kicked off 2013 with an energetic bang, with January marking the 15th consecutive month of home value gains and a positive report from Fannie Mae last week that noted housing is “on a sustained growth path,” despite a potential damper on overall economic growth at the federal level.

Home values were up 0.7% in January from the previous month, and up 6.2% year-over-year, according to the latest report from Zillow. It was the largest annual gain since July 2006, when home values rose 7.5% year-over-year.

Zillow’s home value index averaged $158,100 in January. The last time home values were this high at the national level was June 2004.

The rise in values is spreading out as well. Major markets that saw the biggest annual increase in home values were Phoenix (21.9%), San Francisco (17.2%), San Jose (16.8%), Las Vegas (16.2%), and Sacramento (13.7%).

And thanks to rising home values, Zillow estimates that 2 million homeowners are no longer underwater.

In a separate report released last week, Fannie Mae made some predictions for housing this year and gave an overall conclusion that this growth will keep up.

Fannie Mae economists predict the median price of an existing home will rise 2.3% in 2013, to $181,000. They expect the median price of a new home to increase 1.6% to $248,000. And they predict a further increase of 2.8% for both types of housing in 2014.

Growth, not recovery.

Of course, not every market will be enjoying this growth – many are still in recovery mode. But Fannie Mae expects existing home sales, new home sales and single-family housing starts to see substantial increases from 2012. The mortgage financier predicts existing home sales will rise 11.5%, new home sales will climb 12.5%, and single-family housing starts will shoot up 23.7% this year from 2012.

The substantial increase in housing starts is telling of the activity expected in the market for new homes this year and in coming years. We’ve talked here before about how investors are betting bigger on home builders this year, with the first builder IPOs debuting this year in nearly 10 years. We know the demand is there in many markets that suffer from lack of supply – so this is great news to see housing starts increasing.

As anticipated, 2013 is showing signs of breaking out of a recovery pattern and growing faster and with more force. Hold on tight – the ride is getting intense!

Spinning the Oscars toward Real Estate

We watched the Oscars last night, partly because we’re interested, partly because there wasn’t anything else on. Other Realtors were interested, too. Here’s a posting from just one.


Amy Hahn, a Realtor/Broker from North Carolina, posted on Amazon.com her list of the top 10 Real Estate movies in honor of the Oscars last night. Here’s here list. (None of the movies on her list received any awards.) Let us know if she left your favorite real estate movie off the list.

Amy’s Top 10 Real Estate Movies

 

1. The Money Pit starring Tom Hanks and Shelley Long

 

2. Duplex starring Drew Barrymore and Ben Stiller

 

3. American Beauty starring Kevin Spacey and Annette Bening

 

4. Life as a House starring Kevin Kline

 

5. Poltergeist starring JoBeth Williams and Craig T. Nelson

 

6. Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House starring Cary Grant

 

7. Open House starring Adrienne Barbeau

 

8. Pacific Heights starring Michael Keaton

 

9. The Amityville Horror starring James Brolin and Margot Kidder

 

10.Neighbors starring John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd