the wasserblawg

I have not heard of this from friends or colleagues, have you? Hard to argue with the general advice though: Addicts Snatch Drugs From Homes for Sale Addicts are posing as home buyers and cleaning out medicine cabinets in homes for sale, according to recent police reports. "It's commonplace – more common than you think," Detective Dennis Luken, vice president for the Ohio chapter of the National Association of Drug Diversion Investigators, told the Cleveland Plain Dealer. "It's everywhere." In one recent case, a man showed up to an open house and while the real estate agent was distracted with other customers he went through the home owner’s medicine cabinet. The agent overheard the man going through the drawers, and he was later questioned by police officers. He admitted that he went to the house looking for pain pills and that he learned the trick from peers at a drug treatment program. Authorities say some criminals also copy information off the home own...

With the new year upon us, the  “Good Funds” section of the Title Insurance Act is now one full year old.  Illinois home buyers (and the professionals that represent them) are the beneficiaries of a bit of a "birthday present" from our friends down in Springfield - an amendment that addresses the three biggest issues that were complicating closings over the last 12 months. The good funds rule regulates the way anyone bringing money to a closing can deliver it to the closing agent. Basically, funds in excess of $50,000 must be sent by wire transfer. Funds less than $50,000 can be delivered by wire or cashiers, certified, or (approved) title company check.  As amended,  •         Earnest money held by a real estate broker or attorney is no longer aggregated with the buyer’s bottom line. As long as those funds are less than $50,000, title companies can now accept a realtor's or attorney's check drawn on a trust account. Note: this is no...

I am a real estate lawyer. I help buyers buy and sellers sell their homes, their condos, their apartment buildings. One at a time.  Each deal I work on is the most important contract in the local real estate market. To my clients and the parties on sitting accross the table they are. And because each individual transaction is to each individual client, that specific deal is also the most important case I am working on too.  But in a wholly other sense, each transaction is part of a larger real estate marketplace. Each transaction adds another data point that economists and sociologists can pick over and analyze. The collective information gleaned from all transactions informs us all about the larger trends and patterns in our communities. The collective body of information gathered in real estate conveyancing and from census data, all helps paint a very different picture. It is real estate pointillism. Think of Georges-Pierre  Serat or Chuck Close .   ...

Homeowners - think back a moment to your last re-finance or purchase transaction.... How did you chose your lender? According to a just released study by Lending Tree & Harris Interactive , chances are you probably signed on with the first lender you spoke with. True?  Lending Tree reports that roughly 40% of homeowners surveyed went with the first loan officer they spoke to. As restated in a Forbes article on the report, 2 out of 5  buyers take the very first home loan deal presented to them, regardless of whether a better one could be had. Curiously,  96% of the survey participants said they compared prices when shopping for anything else besides mortgages.  Heck, the average consumer compared at least three home computers before buying. And special question for all the Realtors: How many houses did that buyer look at before picking "the one" to make an offer on?  The end result? Only   28% surveyed felt confident that they got the best possible...

A brief experiment with Google AdWords produces at least most unintended (but pleasant) result:    http://www.youtube.com/adwords10?x=459beb1a5a3a4028a1d562c03c60cc34

Buyers and Sellers (and the knowledgeable lawyers, Realtors, and mortgage originators that represent them) should all brace themselves as title charges are going up again as of January 1st. When an amendment to the State's Title Insurance laws  kicks in. Buyers should expect to pay at least $25 more on each transaction. Sellers will be shelling out at least $50 more. Those are minimum fees folks. Be on the alert for title agents who may charge more. Make no mistake about it either, the new requirements for Closing Protection Letter s are important. We will address the specific reasons why in a future post, but on the bottom line, they afford some  parties to a closing a additional title insurance coverage against losses caused by errors or infidelity of closing agents in the handling of the transaction. Important? A sk anyone who lost money when a mortgage loan was never actually paid off from the proceeds of a sale or loan re-finance, or who's ...

Cook County Homeowners - be prepared to put some of that gift-giving money aside.... those property tax bills that were supposed  to be mailed out back on August 1st are heading towards your mailbox on Wednesday and   will be and payble by December 13th.  http://cookcountytreasurer.com/default.aspx