Las Vegas does get hot, but it is a very cool city. I have been to Vegas 22 times but I never went beyond the Strip or downtown until my in-laws relocated there. My father in law works for Bechtel- the humongous contstruction company that bids on large, public works projects. He got transferred to Vegas a few years back and he went shopping for homes for sale in Summerlin.
Summerlin is a tidy subdivision out near Red Rocks National Park. It's away from the bright lights of the strip and unlike the Las Vegas high rise condos you'd find there, its more of a conventional neighborhood. When people think about Las Vegas real estate, they picture glitz and glitter, not neat, single family homes.
The fact is, Las Vegas is a very liveable city. Everything is new and it's easy to get around. It is also a very clean city. If not for the slot machines in the grocery store, you wouldn't know you were in Las Vegas!
I keep telling Mrs. HDM that we should move out there when the kids get out of school, but we both have reservations because we like the shore. My mother in law mentioned up Lake Las Vegas as a solution to our conundrum. This place is set on a 320 acre, man-made lake. There are golf courses, a marina, restaurants, and a quaint, old world village with shops and boutiques. It might not be set on the ocean, but as long as we got a pool, Mrs. HDM would be happy. Who knows, maybe we'll live there some day.
Check out the video on Real Estate Las Vegas.
Las Vegas is HOT
Sell Your House
Real Estate is all over the news lately. Unfortunately it's mostly bad news. In the early 2000's real estate was HOT. Property values were escalating at a breakneck pace and new homes were being sold as fast as they could be built. Mortgage money was fast and easy-I used to joke that all you needed was a job and a pulse and you could qualify for a mortgage. Many people bought homes for the first time and probably borrowed more money than they could afford.
Now, as the popular lingo goes, the real estate "bubble" has burst. Homes have generally gone down in value and many new homeowners owe more money on their homes than they are worth. Couple that fact with many adjustable rate mortgages going up in their interest rates and you have a lot of people looking to sell property.
Houses don't sell in three hours like they did a few years ago. High priced homes are languishing on the market for months and lower priced homes are listing for less than what they were purchased for. It's a real nightmare for folks looking to sell property.
WeBuyHouses.com offers an alternative to people who need to sell their house. They'll come in and buy your house for cash. If you're having trouble making the mortgage and you need to get out of your home, they can be true saviors. In some instances selling property to them actually works out better since you don't pay any brokerage commissions. Time is money too and selling quick rather than waiting around for a buyer in a slow market can have its advantages.
Any way you slice it, it's always good to have options and knowing there is a company like WeBuyHouses.com out there can ease the minds of many a worried seller.
DROdio Real Estate
I began my life in the greater Washington D.C. area. I was born in Bethesda Naval Hospital in Maryland and I lived in Arlington, Virginia until I was two.
I had a sales territory down that way in the late 1990's and I got to travel down there a bit. I liked it. I saw quite a bit of Virginia and it's a beautiful state. The people are super nice and the pace is a little slower down there too.
The wife and I have talked about heading South once the kids get out of high school and Virginia is certainly on our list. Every once in a while we look at real estate in other parts of the country and we recently found out DROdio lists Virginia Real Estate.
DROdio Real Estate has a unique approach to selling real estate. They actually want buyers and sellers to have as much information about the process as they can. They don't restrict access to the MLS listings like many other brokers and they have developed and adapted technology to make the purchase process as easy and informative as possible. Heck, they'll even give out property addresses so you can check out a house yourself. They believe if they give you the information you want and actually let you make some of your own decisions, you'll come see them when you're ready to buy.
That wasn't my experience in dealing with brokers when I was in the mortgage business. Brokers usually want to steer clients to specific homes and they want to have their fingers in every piece of the purchase process. The folks at DROdio Real Estate believe their approach is a better way of doing business and they're willing to put a lot of tools in the hands of potential buyers for free. They may not get every buyer who takes advantage of their free services, but they apparently get enough to be very successful.
My sales approach has always been to provide the customer with as much information as possible and give them great service. I found that if I did that, I didn't have to sell them, I simply had to let them buy from me. The people at DROdio Real Estate have a similar philosophy.
Remember, when you're looking for a home, DROdio lists Virginia Real Estate.
Florida Vacation Homes
Where does the MVP of the Super Bowl go to every year? DISNEYWORLD! Every kid, heck every adult, LOVES DISNEYWORLD. I'll be heading there in a few more years with my youngest. For a while there, we were heading there every year for vacation. The kids love it.
There's lots of other cool stuff in Orlando too. It's a schlocky vacation paradise. I wish we'd purchased a condo or villa in Orlando ten years ago. The appreciation on the home and any rental income we realized would have paid for all those vacations. As we get on in years, we're getting more concerned with investments and my wife wants to invest in Real Estate.
Orlando is a vibrant community with lots of economic opportunities for Real Estate investors. The folks at Bardell Real Estate in Orlando specialize in Florida villa sales. They can hook us up with a Florida vacation home that would be a solid investment.
Orlando continues to grow at a rapid pace, so investing in Real Estate there is a fairly safe bet.
That Toddlin' Town
I had a cup of coffee with AT&T back in the internet boom. I was hired and flown to Chicago for a week of training. I'll never forget the trip, it was in March and it was sunny and sixty degrees all week in Chicago and Boston got 3 feet of snow! Alas, six weeks after the training was complete, AT&T killed the program my group was being hired for and I was out of work!
I had a nice time in Chicago though. A group of us went out to dinner every night and we did some carousing in the city. Every day I'd take a few walks around the State Street area where our hotel was located.
Whenever I'm in a new city, I check out the real estate for sale and apartments for rent. Since we usually had a few hours to kill, I picked up a Chicago apartment finders "freebie" magazine in the hotel lobby and looked for apartments in Chicago, IL. I even went into a Chicago Property Management Company office in a nearby high rise and got a quick tour of some swanky lake view apartments.
On another tour through the neighborhood, I stopped at a Chicago Condo Management office and posed as a would-be condo buyer. I got a tour of a few really cool condos. A few of us from the training class ended up partying with the real estate sales lady and some of her friends one night. We kept up the ruse of me wanting to buy a condo through the whole night. She called and emailed me for about six months after that with new listings!
Beach Property
I like the beach and the warm weather. The wife and I have dreams of packing up the old Hot Dog Truck and heading south some day. Living in a beach community year-round would be ideal. Florida is nice, we've been there many times.
Unfortunately, there is not much unspoiled beach front property left in Florida. We've never been to the Florida panhandle. Destin seems like a lovely beach community in that part of the state-its about midway between Tallahassee and Mobile, Alabama. This part of the Florida coast (on the Gulf of Mexico) is called the Emerald Coast and the communities of Destin, Fort Walton Beach and Okaloosa Island are home to some of the best beaches in the world. Sounds like a place I'd like to live someday.
We were looking at Destin real estate sales & rentals the other night and came across the folks at East Pass Realty. They have tons of Destin real estate sales & rentals from modestly priced land and condos to mega million dollar waterfront palaces!
Next winter when we're in Florida, we're going to take a drive up and see them.
Wanna Buy in Cali?
If you want to move to Northern California, you can find tons of California Bank Owned Property & REOs for purchase. Bargains are everywhere in the depressed Real Estate market and Northern California is no exception.
All you need is a good resource for finding California Bank Owned Property & REOs like MLS-2. Just about every property for sale in Northern California is listed on this site. You can find California Bank Owned Property & REOs, motivated sellers and short sales as well as regular listings.
If you're considering buying property in this area and you're looking for a bargain,MLS-2 is a great starting point.
