Entries Tagged as 'Education'

Are you a Responsible Dog Owner? This is a MUST Read.

As a Massachusetts resident who has registered a dog with the American Kennel Club over the past five years, the AKC would like to notify you of Massachusetts House Bill 5092. Opposed by both the American Kennel Club and its Massachusetts federation, the Massachusetts Federation of Dog Clubs, HB 5092 is a conglomeration of many anti-dog, anti-responsible dog owner, and anti-responsible dog breeder proposals.
For specific information on HB 5092, please click here to view AKC’s post.
WHAT YOU CAN DO:
The AKC encourages all Massachusetts residents to contact their state representative and express their opposition to the draconian provisions of HB 5092. Furthermore, Massachusetts residents are encouraged to urge their representative to contact Representative Donato, Chairman of the House Steering, Policy, and Scheduling Committee, and respectfully request that he “send HB 5092 to study.”
For more information, contact AKC’s Government Relations Department at (919) 816-3720, […]
Read the full post here.

Where Do Mortgage Rates Come From?

I saw a good post today on boston.massachusettsblogpage.com.
Here’s a summary….

Where do mortgage rates come from? Not the 10 year nor 30 year Treasury as many think.
Why and how mortgage rates change in the marketplace is often misunderstood – even by the news media. They often report mortgage rates will go down when the Federal Reserve announces a rate cut when sometimes the opposite can happen.
How do Federal Reserve rate changes affect mortgages?
Fed rate changes don’t directly affect mortgage rates. Instead, they affect the inflation expectations of investors. The role of the Federal Reserve in our economy is to control inflation so we have long-term economic growth and prosperity. If the economy grows too fast, we get inflation. If the economy shrinks, we have recession. The Fed’s main tool in managing the economy is to change short-term interest rates. They can directly change the rate banks charge each other for loans and the rate the Fed charges banks. Banks eventually […]
Read the full store here.

Bye Bye Newspaper Advertising For Real Estate

martin kalisker did an interesting post today on boston.massachusettsblogpage.com.

As further evidence of the shift to online advertising, the Los Angeles Times has announced it will no longer publish its weekly real estate section. Click here for the entire news story.
Is Boston next? As a Realtor®, I am often asked by Sellers and Agents alike, why I am reluctant to use the newspaper for marketing and listing of properties for sale. Besides the high cost and low return on the advertising dollar spent, over 80% of homes are sold because somebody saw the listing on the Internet.. What could be more convincing?
I understand that it used to be fun to sit down with a cup of coffee on a Sunday morning, circling open house ads, but that was literally, yesterday’s news. Today’s buyers are more motivated to simply drive around an area of town that they like to look for open house […]
For all the details click here.

FAQs about HOPE For Homeowners Legislation

I read an interesting post today on boston.massachusettsblogpage.com.
Here’s a snippet:

This is hot off the press news. President Bush just signed into law the HOPE For Homeowners legislation on July 30, 2008.
When does the program start?
The legislation is effective upon enactment; the HOPE for Homeowners program goes into effect on October 1, 2008. The Oversight Board will write more detailed program rules.
What agency is administering it? Will people be calling state offices or federal? Or will people just contact their lenders directly?
The Federal Housing Administration (FHA) will administer the program. The process begins when a homeowner or servicer of an existing eligible loan contacts an FHA-approved lender. Homeowners can contact lenders or servicers directly or through counselors (for which the bill provides another $150 million). It is important to note that this is a voluntary program.
Do borrowers have to use their current lender, or can they switch to another?
Borrowers may use any FHA-approved lender, as long as their current […]
Check out the rest of this story here.

Weichert Forecasts Housing Market on the Rise

Real estate pioneer calls the bottom of the market and expects home sales to begin showing modest, steady increases
As president and founder of Weichert, Realtors, one of the nation’s largest privately-held real estate companies, James M. Weichert has seen his share of market shifts. In fact, Weichert has become quite efficient at predicting changes by regularly studying the factors that shape the housing sector. Yet, this well-respected industry pioneer has never felt so strongly about a market shift that he would come out and declare so publicly – until now.
In a message to the company’s nearly 18,000 sales associates as well as approximately 2,000 employees, Weichert announced that “we have reached the bottom of the housing market and will soon begin to see improvements.”
“We saw an extraordinarily hot market at the start of the decade like we may never see again. I knew in May 2005 that we had reached […]
View the rest of it here…