Articles – Real Estate Deeds Made Easy Since 1997
For every 15 people banks approve for mortgage loans, one applicant gets turned away. That one person is likely to be a member of a minority group. And the barrier could be a credit score.
But at least some good news is on the horizon: a credit scoring system designed to recognize the real-life financial activities of regular people.
Continue reading “Light at the End of the Tunnel? New Credit Score Models Are Coming”
New York Attorney General Letitia James has announced a new package of legislation to create the specific crime of “deed theft.”
Deed theft occurs when someone conveys a property deed to another party without the informed consent of the rightful owner. The new law against it is meant to bolster the remedies available under New York’s real estate deed protection measures, and to make prosecution easier whenever New York state residents fall victim to shady deed shifting.
Continue reading “New York’s Attorney General Gets Tougher on Deed Thieves”
In April 2023, in a U.S. first for cryptocurrency, Coinbase enabled bitcoin purchases of Texas real estate.
In June 2023, real estate in other “select states” will be available.
The company behind the integration is a startup named MyEListing. Based in Cedar Park near Austin, Texas, it’s a free-to-use marketplace for investors. MyEListing displays both listings and data, along the lines of the Zillow or Redfin websites.
Both residential and commercial properties are listed on its website, and its new tool on the U.S. cryptocurrency exchange Coinbase will enable people to buy real estate with bitcoin.
Continue reading “Coinbase Plans to Enable Bitcoin Real Estate Buys. Will It Succeed?”
“I am meeting young people who make $78,000 and they cannot find a home. They cannot bid (against investors). They don’t have the money…Who wants to pay $3,000 a month for their first home? Nobody. It’s unsustainable.”
—Dina Neal, a state senator in Nevada, quoted in the Nevada Current.
We all know the stories of investors elbowing out ordinary home buyers. Corporate buyers really revved up after Covid took hold and real estate prices soared. Especially in Nevada. The nonprofit Stateline, examining statistics from CoreLogic, found that investor-buyers snapped up about one in four Nevada listings by 2021. Only Georgia and Arizona beat out Nevada on the score of how much real estate is going into the portfolios of corporate real estate investors.
Now, it looks like policy makers are ready to push back. State Senator Dina Neal of North Las Vegas is sponsoring Senate Bill 395 to rein in the large, corporate buyers.
Continue reading “Legislate Corporate Landlords Out of Town? Nevada Might Just Try.”
It’s legal to buy a house at the age of majority. That special number is 18 years old — with a few exceptions. People reach legal adulthood at 19 in Alabama and Nebraska. And Mississippi residents are late bloomers—they stop being minors at age 21.
Legal majority means you’re old enough to apply for mortgages, sign (or even co-sign) binding contracts, and close real estate deals.
But it usually takes quite a few years after the age of majority to build the credit profile that works for a mortgage.
Continue reading “At What Age Is It Time to Buy a Home?”
Perfectionists are a giant step closer to finding their perfect homes. This month, two internet-savvy real estate giants launched ChatGPT plugins.
It’s an intriguing new development, connecting real estate and the artificial intelligence (AI) company OpenAI.
And it’s part of a technological milestone: OpenAI only recently linked ChatGPT to the internet.
Continue reading “Zillow and Redfin Just Launched ChatGPT Plugins for the Perfect Search.”
The red-hot real estate market might have cooled somewhat. But with housing in relatively short supply, affordability is hard to come by. The major hurdles for buyers right now? Down payments, mortgage payments, and interest.
There are no simple hacks to work around these hurdles. But there are a few indicators worth watching closely.
Continue reading “Will the Cost of Borrowing a 30-Year Mortgage Ever Come Back Down? Are There Better Alternatives?”
Setting up an LLC for an investment property is simple, and not terribly time-consuming. Doing it well does take research, attention, and professional support. But it may be worthwhile.
Here are some basic considerations to have on your radar if you wonder whether forming an LLC could be a worthwhile goal. This is not legal or financial advice — just a checklist to help guide your own due diligence.
Continue reading “When Owning Real Estate in the Name of an LLC Makes Sense”
Last year, Fidelity launched its Metaverse exchange-traded fund — the ETF with the ticker symbol FMET.
The Fidelity Metaverse Index tracks the current development of a future internet. According to Fidelity’s website, the metaverse will blend “augmented reality and virtual worlds” and enable many people to be work, play, and invest in these settings, “persistently and in a shared environment.”
It sounds like a projection of our current lives. But in the metaverse, we’ll enjoy experiences remotely, whenever we’re ready. As Andrew Kiguel, CEO of metaverse property investment firm known as Tokens.com, told CNBC: “You can go to a carnival, you can go to a music concert, you can go to a museum.”
Fidelity believes in the metaverse.
Continue reading “Fidelity Looks Ahead – To the Metaverse”
Occasionally, the parties to a home sale make side deals, and do not write them down. This can lead to later questions, regarding just how meaningful a side agreement is.
To know whether a side agreement is binding after closing, it helps to be familiar with the impact a deed transfer has on that agreement.
Let’s take a look and side agreements, and what it means when they either “merge with” or “survive” the deed.
Continue reading ““Merging With the Deed”: Are Side Agreements Binding After Closing?”