You are currently browsing Michael Delaware’s articles.
Are you tired of Renting? Learn how to go from renting to home ownership in this new eBook!
I recently released my newest eBook on a real estate topic, it is called: ‘Going Home…Renting to Home Ownership in 10 Easy Steps.‘ The book was an inspiration from when I first became a Realtor in 2006, and I wanted to educate people who were renting on how to make that transition to becoming a home owner for the first time. The book grew from a discussion with my broker Al Morehart in 2007, and I became inspired with the idea of helping renters become home owners, and began to write this book.
Over a period of about 6 months, I drafted the original manuscript and then never took it through to publishing it. This was mainly due to the cost involved in self publishing at the time. With the release of the Kindle eBook reader in 2007 by Amazon, the ability to publish eBooks has become much easier. I recently reviewed the manuscript and updated it for 2013, and have now first the firs time been able to release this as an eBook. Going Home…Renting to Home Ownership in 10 Easy Steps bring clarity for prospective buyers on how to overcome the obstacles that they may believe to be in their way towards becoming a home owner.
In today’s economy, so many people struggle with poor credit histories, even after they have recovered their income. This book addresses how one can understand their own credit report, gain access to it, and begin the process to repair it. It also discusses how to organize ones finances, and build savings. One can also learn about the lending process, and what to expect before they even venture to look for financing so that they can take the necessary steps to make the right first impression.
Going Home…Renting to Home Ownership in 10 Easy Steps also gives insight into how to find and use a Realtor to find your dream home, as well as what other professionals one may use along the way. It does not cover every potential situation with the home buying process, but it does cover a lot of the basics so that one can understand the steps needed, and make the journey.
In my travels through the rural communities in the past few weeks, I had to go to a small township just Southeast of Coldwater. It is a small community called ‘California’ and it has a population of about 900 people, and a small town called ‘Ray’ as part of it which actually sits on the Michigan-Indiana State line. I have traveled to a lot of rural communities in the past several years, but the sign below caught my attention. I had to take a picture, just to mix up everyone’s geography,
Last week I was driving through St. Joseph County on my way to Three Rivers, and I drove into a snow storm. On my return trip back it got pretty thick, and I had my camera on the seat next to me and I snapped this photo. The weather can get pretty intense in Michigan at times, and one needs to be alert for the road suddenly turning slippery. I always try to monitor the outside temperature as a matter of routine whenever I am driving in the country at this time of year, as roads can become suddenly icy.
Today I am making my new eBook available for free on Amazon. The book is entitled: The Art of Sales Management: Lessons Learned on the Fly. It was written about the subject of sales management, and is drawn from four decades of salesmanship and management lessons learned. I originally came up with the idea for this book fifteen years ago, and finally compiled it into the present eBook for sale through my publishing company: If, And or But Publishing.
The book will be available for free download today, February 23rd through Monday February 25th, 2013. Please share this blog article with your friends, and let them know about my book.
The more downloads I receive on these three days, the higher my ranking will be for my book, and the more future sales it will get. The information on this book is designed to be both fun, and lighthearted in its lessons as you go through it.
To get your copy, all you need to do is click on this book image to the left here and it will take you straight to Amazon where you can download your copy. Thanks for reading, and I hope you will enjoy my book! Please be sure to tell others about it as well!
I recently published my 3rd book, and this one is called: The Art of Sales Management: Lessons Learned on the Fly. The book is mostly about my years as a sales manager for my own business in Roswell, Georgia in the 80′s through the late 90′s. It also draws from experiences in later years as a salesperson for several different companies, and professions, including Real Estate. It is a book I first conceived of about fifteen years ago. It contains ideas that I have never dared to share in writing until now.
Some of my approaches were different and unique, and at times quite radical. I was in a fortunate situation where I could experiment with new ideas and approaches in a microcosm of popular showroom environment in the area. I was selling high priced custom stained and beveled glass doors and windows, and people were always coming to see us. If was during this time that I built a sales staff, and tested many new sales training ideas.
I have now compiled a lot of what I have learned from this period within this book. I may write other books at a later date on this subject, as it is impossible to fully cover the subject in one entire edition. This book is the start of a great project, and one that I have wanted to do for a long time. I hope you will take time to download the book on Amazon, and read it. It has been my most favorite project to date.
The book is only available through Amazon, in Kindle format. However, I have also created a new website and blog for my publishing company called: If, And or But Publishing which you can click on the link and check out. Subscribe to the mailing list for future news letters.
I recently created a new cover design for my book: Land Contract Homes for Investors. It was released in December of 2012, and is the companion book to Understanding Land Contract Homes: In Pursuit of the American Dream. This new edition includes updated links, and revised Author and Publisher pages. Today on February 14th, you can download this eBook for free on Kindle! Just click on the image below! Happy Valentines Day!
Of all the social media applications out there in the world today, I had always been kind of disinterested in Twitter. Don’t get me wrong, I have had a Twitter account for about four years now. I have all my blogs feeding to it, as well as engaging in the occasional update on what I am doing. For some reason it has never really been something I wanted to know more about, and devoted most of my social media interests to Facebook mainly.
Follow Miichael on Twitter
However, one cannot ignore the power of Twitter in social media as a means to share information for long. If you really want to market yourself and stay connected with what is going on, Twitter is fast evolving to be the fastest news source in existence.
People who are familiar with Twitter use it all the time, and share the events of the day as they happen all over the world. It also bypasses the traditional media opinion filter, and gives you the viewpoint on exactly what is happening from multiple viewpoints as it happens.
So having realized this, one cannot help but conclude that Twitter is here to stay. Micro-blogging is addictive. To make it easier for you to understand twitter, I suggest you just jump in and watch what other people are doing at first. Then, once you have an account at Twitter, open another one with either Tweetdeck or Hootsuit.
Tweetdeck is a great website application to organize your tweets, people talking to you, and other topics you might be interested in following. Hootsuit allows you to do the same, and is a free application for iPhone, iPad and Droid, as well as some others. I use both. They also allow me to schedule tweets in advance, and work out a marketing plan for my books, etc. So my relationship with Twitter has improved in the recent months, and it has begun to slowly grow on me. So if you want to follow me, click on the bird image in this article and join me.
Geese enjoying a morning nap on the ice in Battle Creek, Michigan.
Going out on an icy pond can be dangerous for humans, but nothing would stop a goose. I was at a park a few weeks back and took the photo below of some geese napping on the ice near the edge of where the water meets the ice. There was a lot of activity with other birds going on nearby, but they appeared to be undisturbed by all the commotion. Enjoying a morning snooze.
The following article was provided by the National Association of Realtors®:
WASHINGTON (September 17, 2012) – New survey findings, combined with an analysis of historic credit scores and loan performance, show home sales could be notably higher by returning to reasonably safe and sound lending standards, which also would create new jobs, according to the National Association of Realtors®.
Lawrence Yun, NAR chief economist, said there would be enormous benefits to the U.S. economy if mortgage lending conditions return to normal. “Sensible lending standards would permit 500,000 to 700,000 additional home sales in the coming year,” he said. “The economic activity created through these additional home sales would add 250,000 to 350,000 jobs in related trades and services almost immediately, and without a cost impact.”
A monthly survey* of Realtors® shows widespread concern over unreasonably tight credit conditions for
Home sales could improve if lending restrictions were less tight, and accounted for market condition improvements.
residential mortgages. Respondents indicate that tight conditions are continuing, lenders are taking too long in approving applications, and that the information lenders require from borrowers is excessive. Some respondents expressed frustration that lenders appear to be focusing only on loans to individuals with the highest credit scores.
Even though profits in the financial industry have climbed back strongly to pre-recession levels, lending standards still remain unreasonably tight.
Yun said all it takes is a willingness to recognize that market conditions have turned in the wake of an over-correction in home prices, with all of the price measures now showing sustained gains. “There is an unnecessarily high level of risk aversion among mortgage lenders and regulators, although many are sitting on large volumes of cash which could go a long way toward speeding our economic recovery. A loosening of the overly restrictive lending standards is very much in order,” he said.
Respondents to the NAR survey report that 53 percent of loans in August went to borrowers with credit scores above 740. In comparison, only 41 percent of loans backed by Fannie Mae had FICO scores above 740 during the 2001 to 2004 time period, while 43 percent of Freddie Mac-backed loans were above 740.
In 2011, about 75 percent of total loans purchased by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are now a smaller market share, had credit scores of 740 or above.
There is a similar pattern for FHA loans. The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency has defined a prime loan as having a FICO score of 660 and above. However, the average FICO score for denied applications on FHA loans was 669 in May of this year, well above the 656 average for loans actually originated in 2001.
Interest rates remain low through the housing boom and bust cycle of the last five to six years.
Loan performance over the past decade shows the 12-month default rate averaged just under 0.4 percent of mortgages in 2002 and 2003, which is considered normal. Twelve-month default rates peaked in 2007 at 3.0 percent for Fannie Mae loans and 2.5 percent for Freddie Mac loans, clearly showing the devastating impact of risky mortgages.
Yun said home buyers in recent years have been highly successful. Since 2009, the 12-month default rates have been abnormally low. Fannie Mae default rates have averaged 0.2 percent while Freddie Mac’s averaged 0.1 percent, which are notable given higher unemployment in the time frame.
Under normal conditions, existing-home sales should be in the range of 5.0 to 5.5 million. “Sales this year are projected to rise 8 to 10 percent. Although welcoming, this still represents a sub-par performance of about 4.6 million sales,” Yun said. “These findings show we need to return to the sound underwriting standards that existed before the aberrations of the housing boom and bust cycle, and thoroughly re-examine current and impending regulatory rules that may cause excessively tight standards.”
The National Association of Realtors®, “The Voice for Real Estate,” is America’s largest trade association, representing 1 million members involved in all aspects of the residential and commercial real estate industries.
# # #
*Data derived from a monthly survey for the Realtors® Confidence Index based, on over 3,000 member responses, posted at www.Realtor.org.
Over the last six or seven years American has experienced a housing boom and bust cycle that has turned the real estate market in many areas of the country upside down. Millions of Americans now have credit problems, and many are of the younger generation who carry student loans, and credit card debt accumulated through the college experience. Qualifying for a loan in today’s market with the burden of a rocky credit history is a challenge for many.
My first published book in 2012 available on Amazon in a Kindle eBook format.
Land Contracts represent an alternative form of financing where a private seller carries the financing for a defined period of time, and allows an individual with damaged credit a time to repair and recover. It is a stop-gap measure to negotiate a Land Contract for a home, with a future date defined as to when you will refinance into a conventional loan program.
Over the years as a Realtor, I have had many requests for help in finding Land Contract homes from prospective buyers, and discovered that many did not really understand the process, the requirements nor the commitment to such an arrangement. In order to raise awareness, and also educate, I wrote and published an eBook in December of 2012 entitled: Understanding Land Contract Homes: In Pursuit of the American Dream.
It is a book that covers some of the background of home ownership in America, as well as the practical use of Land Contracts in buying a home. It is written to educate both the seller and the prospective buyer on the use of Land Contracts, and help them make it a smooth process for all concerned. It discusses the various components to such a contract, as well as ways to protect yourself from fraud, or simply omitting something that could cause problems later down the road in the arrangement.
Land Contracts area a useful tool in a struggling real estate market, but it is important that both parties understand the process on how it works. Therefore my book is available today (February 2nd, 2013) on Amazon as an eBook for free for those who are reading my blog. If you want to get your copy, simply click on the link to my eBook.
