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Prices for Real Estate are at 2002 levels in some areas of Celebration Town and mortgage rates started to go back up this week – don’t wait any longer! If you’ve been sitting on that fence waiting for the right time, now is your time to act and put in your offer. Many low priced bargains are now getting multiple offers and selling for more than Listing price!
Give us a call and find out your home Value and how much you would get in this market.
Do you know how many Seminole County residents are now homeless due to the current housing crisis? I was just reading the OrlandoSentinel.com when I ran across an article entitled, “Number of homeless families grows amid foreclosure crisis“, when I saw that an estimated 600 school -aged children will be spending part of the next school year living in “tents, shelters or even in the woods,”. Additionally, there are expected to be 450 homeless children in Seminole County under the age of five. Most folks know that the national real estate scene is in a state of depression, but I was not aware of the number of families, and children, who are homeless due to foreclosures.
The main reason that some homeless folks will have to live in tents and makeshift shelters is that Seminole County does not have any homeless shelters. People like Annette Eagan, for example, have had to split up their families in order to keep them together. Eagan came to Florida looking for work and has since spent all of her savings.
Now everyday after school, Eagan drops her two sons off at a Boys Town Shelter and she herself stays at a rooming house in Sanford. When one considers that salaries in Seminole County were among the highest in the state just a few years ago, the number of those who are homeless is shocking.
Beth Davalos, a Seminole County social worker, recently spoke at a meeting of social service agencies in hopes of addressing the “housing crisis in our own back yard”. With help from The Children’s Cabinet, a volunteer group, speakers called on the entire community including government, police, nonprofit groups, churches and private businesses to help address this important issue.
While reading the Orlando Sentinel online today I saw an article that got me thinking about priorities. According to this article entitled, “Schools on a shoestring: Specialized programs cut to the core” some popular programs that deal with gifted and troubled students are set to see some significant budget cutbacks. Orange County’s Advanced Placement Program and AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) will see some major cutbacks in funding this year and the CEP (Community Education Partners) program has already been cancelled. For example, Bill Gordon, Winter park High School Principal stated that his school alone could lose up to $500,000 in Advanced Placement funding in the coming year.
This article made me think about priorities. Is a great school system not one of the highest priorities for any community? Is education not the one place where we would want to avoid budget cutbacks? While core subjects such as mathematics, reading and science will continue to receive their allotted budgets, is it not important to have programs for the best and brightest as well as those who need special attention? I wonder if schools have considered cutting back on their sports programs in order to try to maintain these programs for gifted and troubled students.
According to this article, those students who can afford to are paying for their own textbooks and tests in order to maintain the competitive edge that the Advanced Placement classes offer. This is great for those who can afford to pay for their own materials, but what about those students who do not come from well-to-do families and are at risk of dropping out? If these students do not have programs to help them, what is to stop them from joining a gang, robbing and selling drugs and eventually becoming a burden on taxpayers sitting in a prison? I agree that this is an extreme case example, but in my opinion, schools are the one place where we have to do our best to make sure there is enough of a budget to function as well as possible. It is in every community across the country’s best interest to have excellent school systems and I can only wonder if leaders and decision makers thought of every possibility before deciding to cut back on our school’s budgets.
Please click if you would like to read this article in its entirety.
I was just perusing Forbes.com when I ran across an article that offers some predictions of how low real estate prices will go this year. This article entitled, “How low will real estate go?” is based on a report that was prepared for Forbes.com by Moody’sEconomy.com. This report considers inventory of homes, job growth or loss and the availability and cost of credit based on current mortgage rates and the Federal Reserve’s Senior Loan Officer Survey. Another factor that is considered is homebuyer expectation in different markets that is based on an 18-month moving average of home values.
So, how did the Orlando fare? Between 2000 and 2006, Median home values in Orlando rose from $111,290 to $267,920. This rise in prices outpaced average rise in income making home prices unaffordable for many. According to this article, the expected year-end median price of a home will be 19% lower at $210,730. However, this is still more than approximately five times the average household income in Orlando. If you consider that in between the 802 and 90s home prices were only about 2.7 times median salaries, it is obvious we still have some way to go before we balance out to historic levels.
One thing this article does not mention is Real Estate Owned (REO) homes or more simply, foreclosure homes. Just in central Florida alone there are some 22,000 foreclosure homes for prospective homebuyers to choose. These homes can be had for up to 40% less than the cost of a regular home. For those who have been waiting for home prices to drop before buying a home, this may be a viable way to buy a home for less than current values. REO or foreclosure homes can be a great way to save money in an overvalued market.
If you are thinking of purchasing a home in the central Florida communities of Celebration, Champion’s Gate, Reunion, Windmere, Dr. Phillips, Hunter’s Creek or Orlando, please contact me. I can help you find REO and foreclosure homes in these and other areas of central Florida.
Okay, so it is not Leonardo Da Vinci’s famous masterpiece I am talking about, but rather the newest option in luxury hotels from WORLDHOTELS. I was just reading The Earth Times online when I saw a press release from WORLDHOTELS about their newest hotel in Central Florida. Those coming to central Florida on vacation or business now have another world-class option in hotels here in the Celebration area. Located just two miles from the Disney World theme park complex, the Mona Lisa Suite Hotel is the newest of the company’s Deluxe Collection of hotels. The Mona Lisa is WORLDHOTELS’ eighth property in Central Florida and the 19th in the state of Florida.
The Mona Lisa offers guests 240 one and two bedroom luxury suites complete with full kitchens, ample balconies overlooking the infinity pool and tropical landscaping. The Galerie Restaurant and Bar run by Executive Chef, Leon Teow, offers seating for 150 guests on two floors. Each floor has an outdoor terrace where guests can dine under the central Florida sky. Chef Leon Teow will introduce the Mona Lisa’s guests to Eden Cuisine, “a blending of traditional cooking methods, fresh ingredients and infused flavors”.
The Mona Lisa Suite Hotel’s other amenities include access to Celebration Day Spa and Celebration Golf Club as well as park tickets, complimentary shuttle service to the Walt Disney World theme parks, a 360-degree infinity pool, valet parking, car rental, grocery shopping services and high-speed internet access throughout the hotel.
If you are going to be staying in the Celebration, Florida area, I recommend you peruse this press release yourself to find out more about the Mona Lisa Suite Hotel. You can make reservation at http://www.worldhotels.com/.
I have just read an article in the Orlando Sentinel online entitled, “Orlando-area mortgage-crisis misery has silver lining for buyers” that highlights the positives in this negative that is our nationwide mortgage crisis. According to this article, the nation’s number one home lender, Countrywide Financial Corporation is slated to market 1,600 homes in Florida, more than 200 of which are in central Florida neighborhoods.
These homes are Real Estate Owned (REO), which means that they are owned by the banks that issued the credit to buy them. Countrywide is also in the process of selling out to Bank of America in hopes of avoiding collapse. In order to help avoid this collapse and reduce their losses, Countrywide will be offering these houses at 40% less than the original owners paid for the homes. This fact makes it obvious that home prices in most parts of Florida have been artificially inflated for some time and that there were banks that approved inflated and unrealistic loans for these overpriced offerings. Countrywide however, is not alone in having issued loans for homes that were artificially priced higher than their actual value. More than 22,000 mortgage holders defaulted on their loans in 2007, and that is just in central Florida. The fact that between 2004 and 2006, there were 200,000 sub-prime loans issued in this area, speaks to what is still ahead for Orlando real estate. It should be some time still before the market corrects itself completely.
Sure, this is all bad news if you were one of the unfortunate ones who signed onto a loan for an overpriced home, but for homebuyers, this is a welcome adjustment. Buyers today are seeing some great prices on the REO homes and many are starting to buy them up, providing a boost of sales that is helping our depressed local markets.
Where sellers are reluctant to reduce the asking prices on their offers, banks are not. Banks are basing their prices on facts and current market conditions as opposed to emotion. This is turning out be a positive for those who have been waiting for home prices to adjust to historic levels before buying.
If you are thinking of buying a home in the Seminole County, Florida communities of Champions gate, Reunion, Windermere, Dr. Phillips, Hunters Creek and Orlando, please contact me, Tony Davids, I can help you find and view these REO homes as well as help you with every aspect of the home buying process.
I was just reading the Orlando Sentinel online when I ran across an interesting article entitled, “Parched grass yields yard debates“. This article brings to light an interesting Catch-22 that some central Florida homeowners are facing. Peter Cervone is one of these homeowners. The homeowner’s association where Cervone lives has just fined him $25 for some dead patches of grass in his lawn and is threatening to resod his lawn and bill him for the labor and materials. The downside to this, it would take more water to irrigate newly planted sod than his current lawn.
The interesting thing is that by law, Peter Cervone, like all central Florida homeowners, can only water his lawn twice a week and with this dry hot spell we are experiencing this just is not enough to keep his lawn lush and green like his homeowner’s association would like. Peter is not the only homeowner in his neighborhood whose lawn has some brown patches, but he is the only one who has been fined and threatened by the association.
The St. John’s River Water Management District’s limits state that homeowners can water their lawns twice a week between the hours of 4 p.m. and 10 a.m. That is a law and the homeowners association’s law is that lawns must be lush, so which law would you break if faced with this dilemma? According to this article, homeowner’s associations have some power, so residents should not ignore them. Take for instance the case of a homeowner in Tampa named Ed Simmons. Ed was initially charged $2,200 by his homeowner’s association for fixing his yard, after association fees and legal fees; Ed’s debt with his association now stands at an incredible $119,000.
This article also mentions that The St. John’s River Water Management District plans restrict lawn irrigation even more next year. So what is a homeowner to do? Should homeowners have to choose which law it would be cheaper to break?
If you are a central Florida resident, I recommend you read this article in its entirety at OrlandoSentinel.com.
Summer is almost here again, and with it comes the scorching central Florida sun. What can you do to help reduce cooling costs during the summer months?
I was just reading some articles on MSN Money when I ran across a good article with some great tips to help reduce your home cooling costs. This article entitled, “25 ways to keep your house cooler” offers some simple and inexpensive ideas to help you beat the heat in the coming summer months while still saving some of your hard-earned money.
Some of these tips are common sense such as opening windows and using fans to help cool your home, using fans to distribute the cool air from your air conditioner throughout your house and placing some shade over your outside air conditioning compressor (without blocking air flow) and changing filters regularly. Programmable thermostats can help you regulate the temperature of your home at night or when you are not home. Installing white or heat reflecting curtains on your windows and closing curtains on windows that face south and west and installing awnings on southern facing windows also help to maintain your home cooler. You can also plant trees and shrubs around your condenser or in from of south-facing windows, they will help to keep the sun out of your house and keep your condenser cooler as well. Proper insulation can also help take a load off your cooling costs.
I thought this article would be helpful for those who will be spending their first summer(s) here in central Florida and are not aware of things they can do to help reduce their energy bills. With the price of energy rising, we should do all that we can in order to stay comfortable and not spend too much in the process.
I was just browsing through the OrlandoSentinel.com when I ran across a new feature they have added to their site, Orlando-area High School ratings. This new feature is a rating system for High Schools in central Florida including, Orange County, Seminole County, Lake County, Osceola County and Volusia County schools. I thought this would be a good resource for those who are thinking of relocating to the central Florida area and want to research the local High Schools.
These ratings are based on grades given to High Schools by the Florida Department of Education. The grades range from A to F and are based on FCAT scores. These ratings are directly proportional to how much money a particular school will receive as well as local area real estate values.
You can research scores in reading, mathematics and science as well as number of students in Advanced Placement classes, average SAT scores, number of graduates, number of students suspended, absentees, dropouts and much more. This is an excellent tool to get a good overview of different schools in the different central Florida Counties. You can search by school name, specific scores, search all schools in a particular county or search all High Schools in Orange, Seminole, Lake, Osceola and Volusia Counties.
If you are thinking or relocating to central Florida and have teens in High School, I recommend checking out this new feature on the Orlando Sentinel online. It is a good place to begin researching these local area schools.
For more information about High Schools in central Florida, refer to the links below.
The above links will redirect you to greatschools.net. The Great Schools web site features information about class sizes, Great Schools ranking, parent reviews, Schools environment, district overview, test scores and an option to compare different schools. GreatSchools.nethttp://www.greatschools.net/ also offer information about all public, private and charter schools including elementary, middle and High Schools.
I would like to introduce you all to my son Luke Davids.Luke is a very talented singer and songwriter who was born in England.He moved to Orlando, Florida in 2001 and that is where and when he started his career as a musician.Luke has been playing piano since he was five and started playing guitar when he was fifteen.His musical influences range from legendary jazz musicians such as Oscar Peterson to modern artists like Aqualung, Billy Joel, Coldplay, Damien Rice, Dave Brubeck, Keane, Goo Goo Dolls, Jamie Cullum, Jack Johnson, Jason Mraz, John Mayer and Muse.His unique blend of blues, jazz, rock and pop is appealing to a variety of musical tastes and preferences.
Luke made his first album, Claustrophobic, in 2007 and is currently working on his second album as well as doing live shows in the Orlando area to promote his music.Claustrophobic consists of four songs that can be heard on his recently redesigned MySpace page at http://www.myspace.com/lukedavids.If you enjoy the album, you can purchase Claustrophobic on iTunes.
Here is a video of Luke performing the song “The Rope of Life” with his band live at Chrissy V’s Rock for Iraq Battle of the Bands at the Haven Lounge in Winter Springs, Florida on January 14, 2008.
There are many more videos of Luke playing live. If you would like to see of Luke’s live performances in and around the Orlando, Florida area on YouTube click here or simply search the term “Luke Davids” in YouTube. If you would like to stay abreast of upcoming shows in the Orlando area, go to Luke’s MySpace page.
I am very proud of Luke and all the hard work he has put into his chosen profession.I enjoy his music because it has a sense of soul seldom seen in today’s music. I wish him all the best in his current and future endeavors.
Below is a CD review from Connections magazine’s Sara Wilsey.
“By looking at the inner cover art, I expected an acoustic guitar with vocals and nothing more. What I heard was a full band and I have to say I was impressed with the four tracks to be found here. With a pop-rock/light-rock/folk-rock sound, the songs are well-crafted and catchy, and the record is well-recorded, mixed and mastered. I don’t know if Luke Davids plays solo or with a full band live, but I’d be willing to wager his songs would also stand strong solo acoustically. At any rate, this CD is a solid effort that is presented in a professional manner, and worth checking out.”- Sara Wilsey
