The Typical Realtor Spin Of Buying A Home In Today’s Market

The Typical Realtor Spin Of Buying A Home In Today’s Market

While just about every well known economist, with the exception of NAR’s own Baghdad Bob, Lawrence Yun, is telling people to hold off in buying a house right now…Realtors are still screaming the mantra that it’s a great time to buy a house and that we’ve reached bottom. (I’m Starting To Feel Sorry For Lawrence Yun )

Realtors hate the fact that I challenge them and they’re always asking me for back up…maybe this will help? But I doubt it. Instead we’ll hear the usual rhetoric about real estate being local and why am I treating things with such a wide brush and blah..blah..blah…

C’mon people. Aren’t you tired of hearing people at the National Association Of Realtors saying the same thing over and over again? Hey even a broken clock they say is right twice a day but the people at the NAR aren’t even as effective as a broken clock. It’s absurd!

Today I received an email from Realtor.org (yes..I do get their emails and my do they probably wish that I don’t) and in the email they try to summarize a recent article from the New York Times.

In their newsletter, they espouse the virtues of buying a home by saying that there are basically 5 good reasons to jump in. Most of the reasons they state have nothing to do with economic sensibility, they are basically ridiculously positioned anecdotes.

I’m not making this stuff up. Here are the 5 reasons they say it’s a good time to buy a house.

1. Be your own landlord. The bank can only kick you out if you don’t pay; a landlord can be much less dependable – deciding to sell the property or choosing to live there themselves.

I’m guessing that the people over at the National Association of Realtors have never heard of a legal document called a lease. If you are smart and negotiate a well written lease their argument is baseless as you will be more than protected. And oh yeah…you can download one yourself or ask an attorney to draw one up and not even involve a Realtor if you or the Landlord / property owner choose not to.

One down…four more to go…let’s see what’s next.

2. Paying the principal is forced savings. Yes, it’s possible that home prices will fall further. It is also possible that your 401(k) will lose value. But over the long haul, both are likely to enjoy modest gains in value.

Possible?? Again, with millions of homes slated for foreclosure and with over 11 Million homes upside down, meaning the owners owe more than they are worth coupled with high unemployment, the odds aren’t looking all that promising for the appreciation of property values. By the way…what does the NAR consider the “long haul” to be?

3. Fixed-rate mortgages never rise – and eventually you pay them off. With mortgage rates at record lows, people who buy now are locking in real bargains.

So when that $300,000.00 mortgage I’m locked into is on a house that is worth $250,000.00 next year because there are a ton of foreclosures and short sales closing am I still looking at that great bargain?

Also…I’m pretty sure that banks have gotten pretty stringent on their lending criteria and I’m thinking that you have to have pretty darn good credit and a decent downstroke or they don’t want to talk to you right now.

Hmmm…again, with rising unemployment, and a volatile workplace with layoffs looming, how many people can actually qualify for those so-called “bargain rates”.

4. Good schools. Family-sized rentals are harder to come by in areas with excellent public schools.

Really? So you’re saying that people who rent don’t have access to good schools..seriously? Where do these nut jobs live? I’m not even going to dignify this statement. You know the neighborhood that you live in and you already know what kind of schools are nearby.

5. Spacious properties in pleasant neighborhoods. Sizable homes in attractive communities are almost always owned – not rented.

I find this to be a very odd statement for a couple of reasons. First, go ahead and ask a Realtor what is or isn’t an “attractive community” or a “pleasant neighborhood”. I challenge you to do so.

You see it’s funny as we have heard for years that they can’t talk about neighborhoods for fear of violating some mythical Fair Housing BS…yet they want YOU to now believe that neighborhoods that have renters in them are less than “attractive” or “pleasant”. Can’t have it both ways people.

Another aspect of this statement that is comical is the predisposition of knowing what YOU as a prospect considers “attractive” and “pleasant”. Hmmm…how does one do that?

In any event, Realtors are continuing to grasp at straws to get people to buy a product that is getting stale.

Why not come out and give a prospect great financial information. Above they compare a home to a 401K. And while they are correct in one regard…that a 401K can indeed go down, One has a lot more pertinent info at their disposal in investing in a 401K than they do in buying a home.

And the liquidity of the comparison makes the statement baseless on the surface.

Bottom line is this. If you want to buy a home in today’s economy, do your homework. Ask the Realtor involved some very pointed questions. If you don’t get satisfactory answers, then simply move on. You’re dealing with an incompetent.

This is your livelihood and the livelihood of your family. Don’t entrust your financial future to someone who has a week’s worth of education and hasn’t sold a house in a year.

There are some very…very competent, experienced and knowledgeable Realtors out there. All you have to do is find them.

And if someone emails you something like the NAR emailed me this morning, you’d better run.