Website of the Week

Okay, she's my sister-in-law, but she's got a cool website for her photography business. Definitely worth checking out! KelliHodgesPhotography.com

Mortgage Modification

Here's a good article from the LA Times about mortgage modification for people with adjustable rate mortgages who are having trouble with the payments. While it talks about the California market, it can really be applied anywhere. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-cover22-2009mar22,0,7096135.story

Signs of life in Gig Harbor real estate

The market ratio is at 11.51%!!!! What does that mean? You take the number of active listings vs. the number of pending listings and the market ratio is the percentage of pendings to actives. Does that make sense? Today there are 669 active listings in Gig Harbor & Fox Island. There are 77 pending listings, homes with an accepted offer on them. 77 is 11.51% of 669.

For the last 2 years Gig Harbor has had a market ratio under 10%. That is a horrible ratio if you are trying to sell a home. In the summer of 2007 the market ratio was about 6% and there were hardly any homes with offers on them. Too much inventory for the number of buyers out there. This jump in market ratio means two things: a. The inventory has dropped. b. Sellers are finally pricing their homes competitively for the current market. We still have a long way to go but we are heading in the right direction. I'd love to see that market ratio around 30%.

Twitter... Tweet? Twit? Twat?

All of a sudden the world is atwitter! Okay, I signed up on Twitter yesterday. I officially have 2 followers. The big question I have been grappling with is, "What the heck do I do with it?" I'm still trying to get the blog thing down. There is a very helpful article on biznik.com that explains the Twitter basics. Click here to take a look. It explains how to send private messages, how to forward and reply, etc. Next I need to figure out how use it for networking and marketing. And, how to use it on my phone...

Modify Your Mortgage

With so many people struggling to pay their mortgages right now (and most of them are real estate agents!), the federal government has created a new program for either refinancing or loan modification. It just launched today and here is the website: http://www.makinghomeaffordable.gov/

This isn't going to help everyone who is having trouble making their payments. For example, many real estate agents won't qualify because we don't have a steady enough income. Rats!! Still, if you are having trouble, please check the website out. There may be hope.

Website of the Week

If you are new to the area or just looking to meet new people with similar interests, check out MeetUp.com. I have found a couple of interesting groups and have really enjoyed meeting the people.

Why I love Gig Harbor

I currently have a listing on Warren Dr. in Gig Harbor. When I have an open house there I always stop and put a sign at the corner of 70th Ave and 32nd St. This is a fairly busy intersection with stop signs and yield signs so the traffic can still really move quickly. I park my car on the side of the road and put my blinkers on. The cool part is that someone usually sees my blinkers and slows down to make sure I'm okay and my car isn't broken. I find that so great! Having moved up here from LA, I find it almost unbelievable, too. People really check on their neighbors here, even if they are total strangers. Now THAT is a community.