Jeff Rickard

     Universal Lending has had a program for 8 years called Housesmart that is in the business of making mortgages and real estate an employee benefit.  It is even listed on the State of Colorado employee site as an available benefit so it does have traction.  It is very interesting how the program ebbs and flows with time and market conditions.  In other words, when real estate is hot or we are in a refinance boom the program creeps near extinction.  When things are bad the program generates enormous interest.

     It generates interest not necessarily involvement.  It amazes me how few loan officers at Universal Lending take part in a program that works and how few Realtors will continue to stay interested in what many real estate trainers are calling the future of selling real estate.  The programs most successful Realtor, who has done 16 Housesmart transactions over the last few years, doesn’t even call me and I am now the coordinator of the program.  Last year the National Association of Realtors introduced a program called Home From Work that mirrors our program and as far as I can tell has no real presence in Colorado.  Why is that? Continue Reading »

Market events in the coming weeks will have significant impact on the prospects for any new legislation.  If there is more bad news, the odds of legislation increase.  On the FHA front, it appears to be more a question of when and not if. 

     FHA bill should be enacted around December 1st to raise the mortgage limit in “high cost” areas to $417,000.  It could be raised higher to possibly $500,000 or more if problems persist for jumbo loans.

     Mortgage insurance tax deductibility looks like it will be extended for another 7 years until 2013.

     Risk based pricing for mortgage insurance will be enacted. 

     The termination of seller funded down payment assistance was effective October 1st.  The only exception was for Nehemiah that did get a 6 month extension because of  an agreement they reached with HUD over litigation in 1999.

There is a 50/50 chance that we could see GSE conforming mortgage limits increase from $417,000 to $600,000 or $650,000.   

     Yes it does!  I had a past client tell me yesterday that “that’s the American way”.  I do not know if that is the true but I will tell you that this year I have personally pulled over fifty 400 FICO score credit reports.  The scale runs from 300-850.  300 sucks, 850 is awesome.  To give you a point of reference, when we were the preferred lender to Oakwood Homes we would pull credit on 600-700 people per year and in 2001 if we saw one 400 score that was amazing.

     What’s happened??????????    Who cares!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 

     What we do care about is getting your score repaired.  You must improve your credit score if you are going to get a mortgage today.  All the bad credit score programs are gone.  What is the first step? Continue Reading »

Should I be Blogging?

The last time we talked, it was about one of the most commonly asked questions I get: What is a blog? Now, we’re going to talk a little bit about the second most common question people ask me: Should I be blogging?

Well, that depends.

A lot of people are out there blogging right now. Technorati says it’s something like 71 million. With 71 million blogs out there, there has to be someone reading those blogs, right?
Continue Reading »

We have been inspired to change our blog site name. The inspiration came from a Rocky Mountain News article written by James Paton on September 15, 2007. If you read the article you will see that 5280 Magazine is beginning to sue companies using 5280 in their name. They say they don’t want to be “jerks” but that before their magazine no one knew that there was 5280 feet in a mile or associated 5280 with Denver. So in my attempt to follow in the footsteps of 5280 Magazine’s education of the Colorado public I am going to change the name to www.1760mortgageguide.com. 1760 is how many yards are in a mile. Thank God for this website or none of us in Colorado would know that.

Does anyone know how many inches are in a mile?

     I had one of my Realtor partners call me yesterday and ask why her buyers, who were using another loan officer and closing on Friday were getting all new loan conditions and why they went from approved to not approved three days before closing. 

     We all know the answer to that, programs are being changed or dropped at a moments notice.  That is true and a great excuse but not the real truth on this deal.  The truth is there are still bad loan officers saying yes before they do their job.  In the past they could get away with it more because we had so many funky programs they could usually get them to fit into something.  The rate was way higher or closing costs had to be raised but although the buyer was unhappy with the loan they still closed.  

     Today if you are bad at your job, people will not close no matter what you do with rates or fees.  Many bad lenders are leaving the business but their are some who are desperately trying to hang in there and they are holding their clients hostage until they can land somewhere.  I have interviewed many brokers who say I have 10 deals please hire me so I can take them FHA.  The truth is they do not know FHA and 9 of the 10 deals are not deals, they are dead.  Instead of saying “okay I will call my clients”, they say “I will interview somewhere else”.  Good luck, the deal is still dead and you have never done an FHA deal in your 3 year career but I’m sure you know better. 

The biggest question if you are a borrower or a Realtor out there is; is this your loan officer? 

If you have stories or frustrations let me know.   

I just read a blog on the U. S. House voting to eliminate the “Phantom Tax”. I did not know what the “Phantom Tax” was until this post. Did you know that if you go into foreclosure and the mortgage company agrees to a short payoff that the IRS considered the amount you short paid to be taxable income? Are you kidding me? Your life is destroyed, you have your home foreclosed on and the IRS thinks you had a windfall. To read the complete article from Renae Bombardiere of HomTur Video Realty click on the following link: http://blog.renaesellscolorado.com/2007/10/08/tax-reflief-for-foreclosures/

The number one issue impacting values today in Denver are foreclosures. There are certain subdivisions in the metro area with over 40% of the sales being from bank owned sellers. That is a staggering statistic.

What can we do about it?

As leaders in the real estate industry we must effectively communicate in order to stop the downward spiral. Here are 5 important (easy to do) tips: Continue Reading »

G B Fish and Chips located at 1311 S. Broadway has awesome fish and chips. I guess that is important if you name your restaurant that. I have not been to London but as far as Denver goes this is a MUST visit. I have only had the Cod, so I can not comment on other fare but the place always seems to have a happy crowd. The inside is stools and picnic tables so no need to dress up. I was turned on to the place from a review in Avid Golfer. If you have a restaurant that you think is great let me know, I love trying new places.