Brian Sodoma
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Recent Articles
Economy
Not Even Easing Will Be Easy
September 6th, 2012
The media has been speculating that the Federal Reserve may soon undertake a third round of quantitative easing—or QE3, in economist-speak. The Fed would buy about $500 billion worth of 10-year treasury bonds—with freshly printed money—from banks and other financial businesses. The hope is that after selling off these bonds to the government, the banks will turn around and lend more money for business expansion and consumer credit purchases at historically low interest rates.
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Real Estate’s Voice of Reason
August 30th, 2012
Nasser Daneshvary wasn’t one to raise his voice. But he’d happily stick out his neck from time to time, smiling as he did it. Maybe there was hyperbole that needed to be pushed aside in order to get to the facts. Or perhaps the facts needed a more patient, reasoned explanation. He was great at that, too. If there was passion and anger in the worlds of economics and real estate, Daneshvary was there, smiling, calmly presenting his findings, then getting back to work.
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Real Estate
A Matter of Life and Debt?
August 23rd, 2012
You may have seen it in your mailbox over the past six months: that notice from your friendly neighborhood Realtor urging you to short-sale your home now before it’s too late! Too late for what?
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Real Estate
How Hot Is It Out There?
August 9th, 2012
Summer heat has never deterred house hunters in the Valley. In fact, prior to the previous five summers, we went through several decades of appreciation, anchored by hot summer buying seasons. Even if it was oven-like outside, buyers still bought into our perpetually hot market.
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Taking Stock
Real Estate 2012—So Far, So Strange
July 26th, 2012
This is the year we’ve learned to use the terms “foreclosure glut” and “bidding war” in the same sentence. What gives? We review the, uh, bidding in this zaniest of markets.
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Reopening the Foreclosure Pipeline?
July 19th, 2012
Trustee sales and NODs are the heart and soul of the foreclosure pipeline. Under Nevada’s foreclosure-process law, a bank must file an NOD with the county recorder’s office, then a trustee sale (or public auction) notice 90 days later. At that point, the property goes up for auction. If there are no buyers, the bank then gets to foreclose on the home. AB 284 has created more paperwork and costs in this process, real estate experts say, keeping banks from starting it in the first place.
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Are Appraisers Still Too Conservative?
July 12th, 2012
The good news is home prices are climbing again. The bad news is home prices are climbing again. No one knows this more than a Las Vegas appraiser.
With prices sliding for years, appraisers took an image hit for being too conservative, putting the brakes on real estate deals with appraisal figures often coming in lower than what was agreed upon between a buyer and seller. Banks will only lend up to a percentage of the appraisal figure, which could stall or kill a transaction. For a while, it was common for the seller to cut the price of a home to move a transaction along.
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Real Estate
A Win for the Buyers?
July 5th, 2012
While more buyers may be a good thing on the surface, they come at a time when the supply/demand equation is off kilter. Available homes without offers on the resale market have dipped below 3,000 units, far from the 10,000 or so on any given day last year. Bidding wars are in full swing again, with more than 50 percent of buyers purchasing with cash.
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Real Estate
Foreclosure Flux
June 28th, 2012
Foreclosure figures have their layers. Many reports highlight foreclosure “activity” as being anything from a notice of default for a first missed payment to a foreclosure auction-sale listing. Some statistics include the number of actual formal bank repossessions, while others leave that figure out. RealtyTrac identifies new foreclosure activity using all three of these elements. Whether one publication uses all three or only one or two can create headlines using the most sensitive words in journalism today —“increase” and “decrease”—words that sway public views and confidence.
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Treasure or Stolen Juhl?
May 10th, 2012
The happy story will come in time—the one in which 300 more rental units come to downtown, bringing critical mass, businesses and more to the area. But a hill of condo deposits stands in the way.
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