the wasserblawg

Your House As Seen By: Yourself... Your Buyer... Your Lender... Your Appraiser... Your County Tax Assessor...

This just in from the Wasserlaw Department of Meaningless Statistics: J.D. Power & Associates has published its first ever evaluation of customer satisfaction for Real Estate Brokerages . The inaugural study measures customer satisfaction of home buyers and sellers with the largest national real estate firms. Overall satisfaction is determined by examining three factors for the home-buying experience: agent (65%); office (21%); and services (13%). Four factors are examined for the home-selling experience: agent (43%); marketing (38%); office (12%); and services (7%). I'll not waste your time (here) citing the winners or losers. Let them brag on themselves if they want to, and you can satisfy your own curiosity by following those links in the paragraph above. Suffice it to say that I am just not all that impressed with the study or the finding. I know a whole slew of really able and talented (nice) agents working at the "winning" firms and just as many who work

Zillow reports that: 29.1% of homeowners who purchased in the past five years are currently underwater on their mortgages (i.e., owe more on the mortgage than the house is worth). We also reported that almost half (45%) of those that bought at the national market peak of 2006 currently have negative equity. Nearly 14% of all single-family homes in the U.S., regardless of when they were bought, are currently in negative equity. Read more (if you dare) here .

The Governor has amendatorily vetoed Senate Bill 546 (requiring that notaries take thumbprints of grantors signing deeds for Cook County property transfers, to delay its effective date for one year (making it July 1, 2009) and also delay the sunset repeal for two years (making it July 1, 2013). It will be on the General Assembly's this fall for acceptance of the amendatory veto or override. NOVEMBER UPDATE: The Senate and House both approved the Governor's changes. The new law becomes effective June 1, 2009.

The Illinois Association of Realtors is due to release its July sales statistics next week. I'm staring at the computer waiting, with my hands over my eyes but peeking through my fingers. Can anyone say train wreck? Its getting hard to post on a real estate blog like this one this summer without whimpering or whining or bemoaning the state of the market. Instead, I've been spending a bit time on the bike lately and reading the occasional blog. Sure I like my work and all, but hey - there are worse things than actually taking time to enjoy the really terrific weather we have been blessed with. Riding the bike is terrific on many different levels. Having your bike stolen is not. So as a public service, I would like to refer you to an important reference point: The Chicago Stolen Bike Registry ; and a couple of irreverent ones: Bike Snob NYC and a wacky U-Tube vid . In the words of its creators, the bike registry exists: To provide a public forum for the distribution of i