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New Home Essential features

Paul Cardis, CEO of AVID Ratings Co., which conducts an annual survey of home-buyer preferences, recently said that there are 10 “must have” features in new homes:

1. Large kitchens, with an island. “If you’re going to spend design dollars, spend them where people want them — spend them in the kitchen,” McCune said. Granite countertops are a must for move-up buyers and buyers of custom homes, but for others “they are on the bubble,” Cardis said.
2. Energy-efficient appliances, high-efficiency insulation and high window efficiency. Among the “green” features touted in homes, these are the ones buyers value most, he said. While large windows had been a major draw, energy concerns are giving customers pause on those, he said. The use of recycled or synthetic materials is only borderline desirable.
3. Home office/study. People would much rather have this space rather than, say, a formal dining room. “People are feeling like they can dine out again and so the dining room has become tradable,” Cardis said. And the home theater may also be headed for the scrap heap, a casualty of the “shift from boom to correction,” Cardis said.
4. Main-floor master suite. This is a must feature for empty-nesters and certain other buyers, and appears to be getting more popular in general, he said. That could help explain why demand for upstairs laundries is declining after several years of popularity gains.
5. Outdoor living room. The popularity of outdoor spaces continues to grow, even in Canada, Cardis said. And the idea of an outdoor room is even more popular than an outdoor cooking area, meaning people are willing to spend more time outside.
6. Ceiling fans.
7. Master suite soaker tubs. Whirlpools are still desirable for many home buyers, Cardis said, but “they clearly went down a notch,” in the latest survey. Oversize showers with seating areas are also moving up in popularity.
8. Stone and brick exteriors. Stucco and vinyl don’t make the cut.
9. Community landscaping, with walking paths and playgrounds. Forget about golf courses, swimming pools and clubhouses. Buyers in large planned developments prefer hiking among lush greenery.
10. Two-car garages. A given at all levels; three-car garages, in which the third bay is more often than not used for additional storage and not automobiles, is desirable in the move-up and custom categories.

Housing prices will moderate – Canadian real estate Association

Housing market will cool down, real estate industry says

OTTAWA — House price increases will moderate as the resale market becomes more balanced, says the president of the Canadian Real Estate Association.

“The resale housing market is becoming more balanced in a number of provinces,” Dale Ripplinger said Wednesday after the association released January sales statistics that revealed another big year-over-year price increase.
“A more balanced market is likely to result in smaller price increases going forward, with buyers in less of a rush due to an increase in supply.”

While Canadian home resale volumes slipped in January compared with December, they came in far higher than in January 2009, when sales fell to the lowest levels in a decade as the country suffered through the global credit crunch and recession.
The association said 25,671 homes were sold across the country in January, up 58 per cent from the same month a year

earlier when consumer confidence hit an ebb, drying up buying and lending activity.

The national average price for homes listed on the association’s Multiple Listing Service was $328,537, up 19.6 per cent from a year ago.

The Kitchener-Waterloo Real Estate Board recorded 416 sales in January, 64 per cent more than a year ago. The Real Estate Board of Cambridge registered 140 sales, an increase of 32 per cent.

The average price in Kitchener rose 12.3 per cent to $278,825 on a year-over-year basis. In Cambridge, the average price jumped 16.3 per cent to $278,527.

The association’s report was issued a day after Finance Minister Jim Flaherty announced that tighter rules for mortgage borrowers will be introduced in April. He described it as a measure to prevent a bubble in the housing market.
Under the new rules, effective April 19, borrowers will have to meet the standards for a five-year fixed-rate mortgage even if the interest they will pay initially is lower.

Compared month-over-month, seasonally adjusted home sales were down 2.8 per cent from the strong levels reported in December, giving a sign that the housing market could be already starting to cool in some regions.

Nearly half of the drop was linked to a slowdown in housing sales in Ontario.

“One car doesn’t make a parade, so a few more months of results showing a cooling trend will be required before talk of a Canadian housing bubble begins to fade,” said association chief economist Gregory Klump.

Klump suggested that Flaherty’s new plan and the harmonized sales tax, which replaces provincial sales taxes in Ontario and British Columbia on July 1, could encourage more Canadians to enter the market in the first half of the year.

“It could take until the second half of the year before a cooling trend becomes evident,” he said.

Resale homes were still drawing a stronger demand for January, with 170,199 listed homes on the Multiple Listing Service in Canada, a decline of 18 per cent over the same time last year, the report said.

The full story can be found online here.

Little changed with US Mortgages

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Improve Your Home’s Marketability

Taking care of necessary repairs before putting your house on the market is important for yielding a top price and ensuring a quick, hassle-free sale.

The most common areas of concern are the roof, gutters and downspouts. Repair of missing or peeling exterior paint will also improve the general appearance of your home.

The following are some simple repairs that make a huge difference in marketability and sale price:

• Replace washers in leaking faucets
• Fix handrails and repair steps
• Replace light bulbs and fixtures where necessary
• Make sure windows open and close
• Eliminate wood to ground contact around the house
• Replace loose or damaged tile or vinyl

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