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HomeRun Homes is a centralized marketplace which helps people Find or Sell a Rent to Own Home, both Nationwide and Globally to the thriving Rent to Own Market. http://www.lease2buy.com
Showing posts with label new york. Show all posts
Showing posts with label new york. Show all posts

October 29, 2013

Sandy Hits Howard Beach, and We Stand Strong

Hi Folks,
   In honor of friends and loved ones that have been severely impacted by Hurricane Sandy and continue to struggle, I am dedicating this post in their honor.

   In 2005, I was glued to the TV watching images of people on their roofs awaiting rescue. It seemed like they were stranded on Mars. I wanted to reach through my TV and pluck them off their homes myself. I had never seen anything like it, and living in New York, I foolishly thought it could never happen hear.

   Fast Forward to 2012: On this day just one year ago, I was home with my 6 year old son and joking about the possibility of losing power. He gathered all of his little flashlights and prepared them with fresh batteries. Yes, he knows the routine, because a year earlier, we faced Irene, and had no power for 3 days. We were veterans. So with the storm dumping some hit and miss rain and just winds blowing, my junior storm veteran kept asking me when the storm is going to hit. I told him I think this was it.

   About 8pm, the lights went out. We calmly got our flashlights ready and headed to the front door. There were sparks in the air and booming, with transformers blowing out on the poles (from the wind, I had thought). I turned on my portable radio and no sooner did I do that, I heard a loud twirling sound outside. It sounded like a freight train. Initial convincing thought: Tornado! No sooner did that thought cross my mind, my Emergency Alert went off on my cell phone and it warned the Howard Beach area to "take cover" for life and death conditions imminent. Yep, a tornado for sure I figured. To the basement we went! We put our Spongebob headlamps on our foreheads (silly, but I had to do whatever it took to keep him calm when the twister hit!!). I said we need to wait a little while and I was going to attempt reading to him by headlamp to keep things calm.

   Suddenly, I started hearing sounds like "Glop Glop Glop", or what you hear when a train is backed up. It turns out that we have a drain in the basement floor to drain out any seepage/leaks from big rainstorms, which never amounted to anything more than a damp floor in some spots. But this was different. I walked over with a big flashlight, and it was gushing up from the drain. I told my son that reading has to be moved back upstairs, since the water was coming fast and furious. He waited on the stairs and I grabbed anything I needed to bring up with us.

   When we got upstairs, I opened the front door, and our home became an island. Water up 2 of the 4 front steps, cars stuck in the water. Armageddon within less than 30 minutes, Images of Katrina flashed through my head. How can I get him to the roof? What is the best way? Strap him to my back? As I felt myself panic, I realized I needed to shelve the emotions, and focus on keeping him calm. I told my son that the streets were being washed by Sandy. Inside, I felt fear, but I knew that as long as that water did not hit the 3rd and 4th step, we'd be OK where we were.

   Then it hit the 3rd step, and I made a plan B in case it started coming into the main floor; we would camp out on the Dining Room table. I came down to peer at the basement with a flashlight, and it sounded like Niagara Falls. Water was shooting up from the floor! I saw the next high tide was coming at 8:20am, so I got him to take some rest, and I sat up with my radio listening to the news. There was no chance I was taking a snooze with this unprecedented catastrophe in progress and my little guy needing me to be the wall between him and the storm, both mentally and physically.

   To make a very long story short, the waters receded over night, and 12 days later, power returned !! My basement was gutted and made brand new, thanks to quick action by FEMA. I lost a lot of treasured items stored in my basement, however, I was given something in return that is more valuable than any of it: life.

   Many people lost lives in Sandy, and many people have still not recovered, even though their lives were spared. I was able to recover and move forward. I am thankful, and always pray for those who lost family and are still in dire straits.

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Have a Great Week
Regards,
Rob Eisenstein
HomeRun Homes - Rent to Own Homes, since 2002
"Located at the Corner of Technology and Real Estate"
Rent to Own Homes and Real Estate Blog for HomeRun Homes: http://blogging.lease2buy.com
HomeRun Homes Websites: http://www.lease2buy.com and http://www.homerunhomes.com


TAGS: #sandy #howardbeach #newyork #queens #hurricane #superstorm

December 12, 2011

Occupy Foreclosure Homes Hits Multiple Cities

Hi Folks,
   It's been a short while since we spoke, as I have had some unforeseen personal issues develop in my life over the past few weeks, but things are clearing up and the posts will start getting back on track for you!

   Unless you have been living under a rock for the past few months, I'm sure that when you turn on your TV, you keep hearing the same word over and over; "Occupy". Just slip a location after it, and you have Occupy Wall Street, Occupy Oakland, etc. Up to this point, the Occupy movement has been done in a Public fashion (Public Parks, etc), however, as it was recently discussed in a Newsday article from The Associated Press ("Occupy protests move to foreclosed homes"), Occupy protesters across the country are "reclaiming foreclosed homes and boarded-up properties", which they write, is "signaling a tactical shift for the movement against wealth inequality".

   These are not isolated incidents.

   Apparently, in excess of 25 cities were "occupied" by these groups who were protesting "on behalf of homeowners facing evictions". Jeff Ordower, one of the organizers of Occupy Homes, was quoted as saying that "It's pretty clear that the fight is against the banks, and the Occupy movement is about occupying spaces. So occupying a space that should belong to homeowners but belongs to the banks seems like the logical next step for the Occupy movement".

Some of the areas that the groups were protesting in were:
* Seattle: The article says that Seattle "has become a leader in the anti-foreclosure movement as protesters took over a formerly boarded-up duplex last month. They painted the bare wood sidings with green, black and red paint, and strung up a banner that says "Occupy Everything - No Banks No Landlords."

* Atlanta: At a Foreclosure Auction at a county courthouse, what was called a "boisterous rally", took place, along with "whistles and sirens to disrupt an auction of seized houses", per the story. The Occupy Atlanta spokesman, Tim Franzen, said that "We don't know how many homes we saved for one more month during the holiday season", and added that, "It was kind of a Christmas gift to the people."

* New York: Protesters marched through a residential neighborhood in Brooklyn carrying signs that read "Foreclose on banks, not people", per the Story.

* Southern California: In another familiar protest, the "protesters rallied around a family of six that reclaimed the home they lost six months ago in foreclosure".

* Portland: The home of a woman that was defiant about leaving that home, Deb Austin, was the site of a press conference. Austin, who's is facing foreclosure next March, per the AP Story, vowed to stay in her house until authorities take her out. The reason she fell behind was the result of both her cancer diagnosis, and also job loss.

   It appears that these protests will keep regenerating across the country, and perhaps the upcoming Election year will fan the flames even more. One such "desired result" could potentially be the use of abandoned foreclosed houses "that could be housing people", say the protesters.

   This will all remain to be seen, but it certainly is not a headline that will be dropping off the radar any time soon. What do you think?

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Have a Great Week, and Happy Rent-to-Owning !
Regards,
Rob Eisenstein
HomeRun Homes Blog: http://blogging.lease2buy.com
HomeRun Homes Websites: http://www.lease2buy.com and http://www.homerunhomes.com

TAGS: #OccupyWallStreet #foreclosedhomes #homeownersfacingevictions #ForeclosureAuction #residentialneighborhood #banks #Seattle #Atlanta #NewYork #Portland #Elections #California

September 8, 2011

In Memory of the September 11th Anniversary

Dear Friends,

   We would like to use today's Blog Post as a literary "Moment of Silence" out of respect for the people that suffered and lost love ones during the cowardly acts of terror, 10 years ago this Sunday 9/11.

   We hope you reflect on these events, what we have learned since then, and how we can honor the fallen and always know these families are not alone.

Thanks and I wish you a peaceful weekend with family and friends.

Regards,
Rob Eisenstein
HomeRun Homes

May 31, 2011

Foreclosures Flooding The Market And Diluting Prices

Good Morning,

   Hope you are making most of this short week (short for the lucky ones).

   The woes of the housing market surface and resurface in many different ways. The S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Indices were just released, and the numbers indicate that home prices in the Nation hit a new low in Q1 of this year. The figures showed a 4.2% drop, along with a, "new recession low" with the latest data. Additionally, home prices posted an annual decline of 5.1% when compared to Q1 of 2010. The release of these figures from Standard and Poors indicate that, "Nationally, home prices are back to their mid-2002 levels."

   "There's a three-year inventory of homes in foreclosure for sale, and that's devastating home prices.", says Les Christie, in a story titled, "Foreclosures for sale: Big supply, low prices", in a story on Yahoo Real Estate/CNN Money. The story points to data from RealtyTrac, and says that more than half of homes sold in Nevada are, "in some stage of foreclosure". California and Arizona are not far behind, with foreclosures representing 45% of sales.

   Rich Sharga of RealtyTrac was quoted very accurately as saying that this, "is very bad for the economy.".

   Homes, such as REOs (bank-owned homes), are selling dramatically lower than comparable properties, at an average of 35% less, per RealtyTrac. On the high end of this data is New York State, with a 53% discount for REOs in Q1. It is also worth mentioning short sales, which average at a 9% discount.

   Sharga says that it will take 3 years to sell the nearly 2 Million distressed properties, and about 2 years to clear out the REOs, to which he says, is, "without any new foreclosures at all coming into the system."

   This goes along with the S&P/Case-Shiller figures, where Minneapolis, for example, posted a double-digit 10.0% annual decline ("the first market to be back in this territory since March 2010 when Las Vegas was down 12.0% on an annual basis."). Always eager to end on a bright note, Washington DC was the, "only city where home prices increased on both a monthly and annual basis."

   Where do you think we'll go from here in terms of home prices and inventory?

Have a Great Week, and Happy Rent-to-Owning !
Regards,
Rob Eisenstein
HomeRun Homes Blog http://blogging.lease2buy.com
HomeRun Homes Website http://www.lease2buy.com

TAGS: #foreclosure #realestate #REO #shortsales

October 11, 2010

Revisiting the Rent vs. Buy Debate

Hi All,
   Happy Columbus Day to you. For those of you who have the day off, congratulations. For those of us working, well, we have to work today!

   Back in June, we covered the much-debated topic of "Rent vs. Buy", and Trulia has released their Rent vs. Buy Index. As Blake Ellis, a staff reporter with CNN Money notes in his article, "Where to buy and where to rent", Trulia is using the following rule to make the Rent vs. Buy determination: If the home price is 15 times higher than the annual rent for a similar property, it is better to rent.

In terms of which cities were mentioned, Ellis cites Trulia's index as follows:

Where to Buy a Home:
Miami, Detroit, Jacksonville, Arlington, Columbus (OH), and Nashville

Where to Rent a Home:
New York, Seattle, Fort Worth, Omaha, Kansas City, and San Diego.

   How do you think Rent to Own fits into the picture? The funny thing is that it could apply to any of these cities, since it is often situation-specific instead of market-specific. Do you Agree? Disagree? Please let us know.

   Do you have any additional recommendations for any other cities not mentioned here? Let us know, as there might be an buyer, renter, realtor, or investor reading this, and we all like to share and help each other.

Have a Great Day, and Happy Rent-to-Owning !!

May 17, 2010

Flipping, Homes Available, Mortgages, Tip of the Day...

Hi Everyone,

Hope everyone had a great weekend. It was a really warm weekend here in New York, and of course, that means, "Daddy, I want ice cream", and of course, my personal favorite, the resulting sugar rush !

A few business partners/investors and I went looking at some local properties this past weekend to get a better sense of the underlying market conditions, and to potentially make some offers on some of them in order to flip/rehab, and then Rent to Own them afterwards. The funny thing is that we have actually made contact with a customer who placed an Ad on our site and we are going to see their property this week. When they heard that it was members of HomeRun Homes who are actually coming to see their home, they had a good laugh, due to the irony. We had wanted to see their home this past weekend, however, they were showing the property to people who contacted them via their Ad on our site (their "Home Available" Ad).

We have been receiving a lot of E-mails from people asking us about certain properties or homes that they desire to have, so we wanted to clarify here, that you can always check out homes and contact the owners (for free !) via the "Homes Available" link on the side of our website (www.lease2buy.com). If you do not see the property you are looking for, you can let "the world" know what you need by clicking the "Find a Rent to Own" Home link on any page of our website, and following the prompts to create your own, "Home Wanted" Ad.

Tip of the Day: When we originally purchased our primary residence, our mortgage broker quoted us a specific rate. When we got to closing, there was a 1/8 point discrepancy above the quoted rate. After some yelling and screaming during the closing (of course), the broker agreed to compensate us by cutting a check to hedge the "loss" for us. All worked out well, and this kind of thing does happen from time to time, and it may not be malicious on their part - it could just be an oversight. But the tip of the day is 2 words: "In Writing". Make sure you get every single quote, whether it's a mortgage interest rate, a home price...anything...in writing, on the letterhead of the broker, seller, etc, along with the date and their signature.


We will be doing some cool structural work on our site this week, and we'll let you know.

As always, remember to "Follow" our Blog (see the left-side of the page), so you can be notified when a new post is made, and as always, we welcome your valuable comments and insights!

Have a great week, and Happy Rent-to-Owning !