Main home Morris Ranch with stone foot bridge

The locally famous Morris Ranch, one of Vista, California’s premier real estate properties, has just been listed for sale by Equity 1 Lenders Network.

Since I live just down the road from this beautiful property, I wanted to take a few moments to highlight the Morris Ranch to see if this unique home is just right for you.

If you drive on Gopher Canyon Road with any regularity you will have seen the sign for Morris Ranch over and over. But perhaps like almost everyone who drives by, the property seems like just a name since the trees and streams that made Vista such a beautiful place to live obscure the homes and property of Morris Ranch from view.

Take a few moments to look over some of the pictures and information on Morris Ranch. An appointment is needed to preview the property, and I would love to have you consider this unique home, barns, fenced almost 9 acres of land, streams and trees for your next home.

Oh, there’s four homes on this property, all unique, and totalling 4341 square feet with an additional 1890 square feet in the pool house! Horses – Yes! Pasture – Yes! Barns and fencing – Yes! Pool – Yes!

Contact me at 760-802-9713 right now to schedule an appointment to see this home and possibly make this Vista, CA landmark your next home, retreat, bed and breakfast or horse property.

Real Estate Market Information

April 15, 2010

More people can now afford to buy a home at mortgage rates that remain lower than a year ago. Inventory of homes for sale were reduced, and partially because of that home sale prices increased, while home sale volumes decreased.

This is perhaps the best time to buy a home in San Diego in the past twenty years. If you are buying a home to live in, and want information on how your current rents would compare with the costs and benefits of owning a home, then please contact me for a review of how you can buy the house you always wanted.

It’s nice to be a straight A student, get a full ride to Harvard, and get that fabulous college education without bankrupting the parents. But it doesn’t happen, does it? No, instead most college students borrow from the Feds, seek out scholarships, work part-time, and occasionally get a fairly hefty handout from mom and dad as well. It’s a team effort from the start, and practically the ONLY way to make it happen.

Do you know any college wrestlers? It’s a sport for the individual, and not a communal sport like basketball, football, soccer or baseball. Because we seem to operate best in a group setting like a team, the majority of sports we play are team sports. (Golf being the notable exception). Team athletics allow average players to perform above average feats, all the while teaching skills that carry over to all other aspects of life.

Why not home ownership then? Why do we have a built in resistance to corporate (group) ownership of a home when in so many other areas of our life groups make such good sense?

The Buy Half A House name signifies a change in the way we ought to think about home ownership. It says “think about the power of the group”. It says “think about whether all or nothing is the sensible way to proceed.” It says “share”, don’ hoard. It says “think”, don’t react.

Hopefully as Buy Half A House with its vision of equity sharing ownership takes flight, many of you will become advocates for this way of owning and prospering in the buying and selling of homes. Hopefully Buy Half A House will create traction with all of us who understand the power of cooperation, the spirit of sharing, and the lessons of team play.

There’s a lot in this name.

Solving the Real Estate Puzzle

San Diego, CA – April 7, 2010

Today we’re going to look at the effect of the Bond Market on Mortgage interest rates.  What you pay for the cost of money to buy your home actually impacts you more than the asking price of the home.

This week’s economic calendar may seem slow after the wave of economic news last week. But there are still some big items on tap, starting off right away Monday morning when the Pending Home Sales report gives us a look at the health of the housing industry.

Tuesday brings us the Meeting Minutes from the latest Fed Meeting. Although we already know what the Fed’s policy announcement was, the markets will be looking at the discussion contained in the Meeting Minutes as an indication of what Fed members are thinking and what they may do in the future.

On Thursday we’ll get another look at Initial Jobless Claims. Last week, Initial Jobless Claims were reported basically in line with expectations and down from the previous week’s number, and Continuing Jobless Claims declined as well. With those numbers and last week’s official Jobs Report in mind, the market will be watching to see if the labor market can continue to make positive strides.

Finally, in addition to those reports, the Treasury Department will auction off $82 Billion in Treasuries. And since most of those will be longer maturities that compete with Mortgage Backed Securities, the auctions could add volatility to the markets depending on how they are received.

Remember: Weak economic news normally causes money to flow out of Stocks and into Bonds, helping Bonds and home loan rates improve, while strong economic news normally has the opposite result. As you can see in the chart below, Mortgage Bond prices plunged last week and rates increased .25%.

Mortgage Rates and Bonds

You see, then, that when investors can put money into bonds and get a better yield, they begin to stop wanting to take on the increased risk of loaning money to people to buy a home.  Home loans, as we all know, are riskier for banks and investors, and the way they overcome that risk is by raising rates.  If they get a higher return, they are willing to take the higher risk.

With the bond market increasingly showing signs of following the improving economy, it is likely that this will put pressure on the banks to RAISE interest rates for home buyers.

Advice:  If you’re in the market to buy, then now is absolutely the right time to begin to take advantage of the historically low interest rates.  And if you’re a homeowner thinking to sell, please call me to talk about how selling now probably is the best decision you can make.