The dog days of summer

It was so hot this weekend, not just the temperature, although 95 degrees was pretty darn hot. The real estate market was hot too. These are the dog days of summer and in real estate, this is when people who have been thinking about buying or selling usually decide to act. I'm busier now than I've been all year. A lot of my clients have decided they want to make a move so things have been hopping. Fortunately for them all, there's more out there to choose from so they have greater selection now. There's no way to tell how the market will be in the coming months, I certainly don't have a crystal ball. But if you're still on the fence about buying or selling, now's the time to do it. Sure things will slow some in the coming months, prices may even go down slightly. If you wait, however, you lose the benefit of having a house now and all the advantages that come from that and with interest rates edging up still, you'll basically pay more even if prices go down. Now's the time to strike.

The real estate section of Saturday's Washington Post the past two Saturday's had two excellent articles. One was on how deals can fall apart at the settlement table. I have three settlements in the coming weeks and I always worry about what can go wrong. So much so that I often don't get much sleep the week of a settlement. I had one last week and for several days prior to the closing, I was waking up at 3 a.m. and I couldn't go back to sleep. Here's the Post article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/16/AR2006061600749.html

The other article was on loans. When choosing the type of loan to finance your home purchase, be careful. http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/09/AR2006060900027.html

There's a lot involved when buying or selling a house so keep me in mind if you have questions or need the services I can provide. Enjoy the rest of your day and remember you can rest when you die.