Rancho Palos Verdes has several sub-areas, including the area known as West Palos Verdes. Sales of single family homes here have held steady for the last few years, which is pretty unusual for the South Bay. What is particularly noteworthy is that the median prices of these sales have had a surprising volatility.

Back in 2007, the median price exceeded $2,700,000, but then dropped to $2,100,000 the following year and then again to $1,200,000 this past year. It’s as though there are really two distinct markets within West Palos Verdes. On the one hand, there continue to be several sales below $1,000,000, but on the other hand there are many over $2,000,000. In 2008, more than half of all sales surpassed the $2,000,000 threshold, but less than a quarter did last year. To put this in perspective, back in 2000 the median sales price for a single family home was $645,000. (more…)

There’s treasure in them there houses, the ones that are about to be torn down! And if you look closely, you’ll see that the treasure is not just what is in the buildings, but the green business opportunities they represent.

Holding on-site auctions at houses that are about to be demolished can be a good business for enterprising individuals who enjoy treasure hunting and are passionate about preserving our natural resources. What’s more, it doesn’t require a big outlay of capital to get started. (more…)

The FNB House Price Index showed renewed year-on-year house price inflation in November, after a period of deflation starting back in December 2008. The index rose year-on-year by 2%, after a previous month’s revised figure of -0.9% decline.

On a month-on-month basis, the index has been rising solidly for some months, but due to seasonality in the numbers we place less emphasis on the 2.8% increase for November. On a cumulative basis, the index is now 195.4% higher than the July 2000 level, the point at which the FNB House Price Index started at a level of 100. The average house value for the month of November was measured at R773018.

In Real Terms, House Price Deflation Persists, But at a Diminishing Rate

Although consumer price inflation has been slowing since the 2nd half of last year, at a 5.9% year-on-year rate it is still too high for REAL house price deflation (i.e. when house prices are adjusted for consumer inflation) to yet have been wiped out.

(more…)

If you are the proud owner of a time share then it may be worth your while to find out just how much it is worth. In the past this meant hours on the phone with different realtors to get comparison quotes and prices. Now you as an owner of a timeshare can do this yourself online. These services will give you an exact price for your time share.

This is great if you decide to sell your timeshare because you are guarantee to know the value and get what you deserve for your property.

Often if you go to a realtor they will list it lower then market value to get commission faster then if you were to try to sell it at fair market value. This undermines your authority and costs you money. (more…)

If you’ve been investing in mortgage pre-foreclosure homes with little success, you may want to look into switching up your game plan and investing in houses with unpaid property taxes instead. Why? One simple reason: they rarely, if ever, are encumbered by a mortgage.

Houses with unpaid property taxes that make it all the way to tax sale have a few things in common.

First of all, they’ve had ample opportunity to be “saved” by their mortgage companies. Normally, if a house has unpaid property taxes and is in danger of being sold at tax sale, the mortgage company will come in and pay the taxes to avoid losing their stake in the property. More often than that, mortgage payments include property tax- so those houses would never end up with unpaid property taxes. (more…)

One simple way to boost your bookings is to build a simple page that focuses on your local area’s attractions and activities. Your guests will thank you because you’re providing “local knowledge” that will help them plan their vacation. You’ll also be able to expand your keyword base & SEO by ranking for keywords that are relevant to travel in your local area. You’ll be “widening your net” and positioning yourself as a resource for renters that are looking for a vacation in your area.

You’ll stand out from your competition because you’re offering guidance to them and providing local knowledge. You’re providing links to them as they plan their trip, and it’s all in one place.

As an added benefit, Google loves relevant outbound links, so you’ll rank higher because your information is deemed of value by the search engines. You can also show local businesses that you’ve listed their site on your page, and ask them if they’d like to do the same for you. (At the very least they’ll remember that you did list them and are more likely to refer renters to you in the future). (more…)

The foundation of a vacation rental property’s online success is laid with their keyword selection. By understanding how renters are looking for property to rent, they’ll be off to a much easier start and far ahead of their competition in their rental advertising efforts.

“Google Suggest” is a wonderful free tool that will provide you with some starting points for keyword identification. You’ve probably already noticed it as you type in search queries from the main Google site. It returns suggestions for search queries in list format for search terms that are similar to or expand upon what you’ve typed in. (more…)

It’s a continual source of amazement to me how many vacation rental owners do not monitor the effectiveness of their vacation rental advertising or their web site. They think having an online presence is enough. The reason this happens? I’ve found it’s a combination of two things:

1) They don’t know what else to do

2) They don’t treat property management like a true business

The good news is that the solutions here are pretty simple. From a tracking perspective, Google Analytics is a free tool that you or your web programmer can add to your web site in just a matter of minutes (it’s just a simple line of code that’s not seen). See what pages are getting the traffic, and where people enter and exit your site. This report also shows you how long people stay on your site, the number of unique visitors you get, where they are coming from, and where they live. You can sort this information daily, weekly, or monthly to look at trends. Once you learn how to use it (and it’s super simple and intuitive), you’ll be amazed at what you learn. And you may be getting traffic from places you hadn’t considered….or paying too much for property advertising that doesn’t bring you any traffic!

(more…)

Understanding the full regulations relating to purchasing real estate in Brazil is important, enabling a comprehensive knowledge of the commonly referred to ‘ease of purchasing process’. Here we attempt to provide a greater insight to potential buyers of the processes involved, providing increased clarity for personal assurance.

It has been mentioned several times that there are no restriction on foreign purchases in Brazil. While this is correct for the average investor wishing to buy a holiday home or apartment, yet some restrictions do apply on rural land.

If purchasing rural land through a company, the use of the land needs to be directly related to the company’s functions, such as agriculture or industry. Foreign individuals purchasing rural land in Brazil are required to migrate within three years of acquiring the land.

(more…)

You’ve found the ideal property you’d like to make an offer on and have to evaluate how much to offer so you get the property at your price, how do you do it?

It is said that Real Estate Investors make their money when they buy the property. For the most part, this is true. If you pay too much, you’ve just become a long term investor and potentially a landlord waiting for the market to catch up hoping you get positive cash flow on the property. If that was your strategy all along no harm, but if you wanted to resell the property quickly, you may not be able to. This article addresses the steps and items you should consider when evaluating investment properties.

First, you must have an exit strategy in mind and I recommend an alternate exit strategy in case your primary goal doesn’t work out. Typical exit strategies are to wholesale the property immediately, rehab the property and resell it, or keep the property and rent it out for cash flow. There are other strategies that incorporate several of these like lease options but the point is to decide what you will do with the property before you own it.

(more…)