Archives for July, 2008

Home Sales At 10-Year Low

As if a gift from God himself to real estate investors, home prices continue to drop leaving a large supply of property on the market. This is a "negative" announcement to be sure. The National Association of Realtors reported that sales fell by 2.6 percent last month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 4.86 million units. It hasn't Read full article »

A Sad Day For The Real Estate Market

President Bush has dropped his threat to veto the massive Housing Rescue Plan, and it will likely be passed into law in the coming days. As a result, many financially irresponsible homeowners will be given more affordable mortgages and will not learn the lessons that will make the immediate and long-term future of our housing market more solid. That's not Read full article »

Interest Rates Up, Mortgage Applications Down – What Does It Mean?

30-year mortgage rates hit their highest level in a year last week, pushing mortgage applications (both purchase money and refi's) downward, breaking a 3-week uptrend for mortgage applications. Let's be clear: This is a negative occurrence, as fewer mortgage applications invariably means fewer mortgages granted and fewer properties sold. However, its merely a "blip" on the radar screen since a Read full article »

Real Estate Investing Internet Joint Ventures – Opportunity Knocks!

Do you have an email list of your own? Are the subscribers on that email list interested in the real estate market in general or real estate investing in particular? If so, contact me right away by filling in the information below. I'll keep it 100% confidential, and this could be a very high-impact move for your business. Read full article »

Oil Prices – An Emotional Trigger For Real Estate

Oil prices have been falling hard in the past week. Barely more than a week ago, a barrel of oil was priced at over $145. This morning it was trading around $127 - a drop of 12.4%. That's a huge decline in a short time. But this is a real estate website, right? So here's the connection: The Read full article »

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The Politics of Real Estate

Few industries are as profoundly impacted by the political machinations in Washington as the real estate industry. Whether it's old legislation like Jimmy Carter's Community Reinvestment Act or Barack Obama's massive mortgage bailouts, the U.S. political machine has a huge impact (usually bad) on the business of real estate.

Ideally, we could ignore politics. But here at the Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter, we insist on seeing the world with clarity - including the reality of Washington's aggressive involvement in every facet of our business, from mortgage lending to real estate sales license; from loan modification regulations to appraisal requirements... every piece of our business is profoundly impacted by politics. So rather than stick our heads in the sand and ignore reality, readers of the Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter choose to be informed and prepared.

About Bryan Ellis

Bryan Ellis is an Atlanta-based real estate analyst and publisher of the widely read newsletter "The Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter". With over 200,000 subscribers - including real estate investors, agents, brokers, appraisers and other real estate professionals - the Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter is among America's largest sources of unbiased coverage of politics and public policy for the real estate industry.

Bryan Ellis serves as editor in chief for the Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter and is assisted by an extraordinary staff of writers, researchers and editors who are each real estate experts in their own right and who assure that the news we report is well researched, factual, and highly relevant to today's real estate industry.

Bryan is very happily married and has two wonderful daughters. He makes his home in the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. You can contact the team at the Bryan Ellis Real Estate Letter here.