Golf Course Homes in Carmel

Golf Course Homes in Fishers

Golf Course Homes in Indianapolis 

Golf Course Homes in Westfield

Golf Course Homes in Zionsville

Carmel-Bank Owned Homes

Fishers-Bank Owned Homes

Noblesville-Bank Owned Homes

Westfield-Bank Owned Homes

Zionsville-Bank Owned Homes

Downtown Indianapolis

• Under $250,000
• $250,000 - $500,000
• Over $500,000

Carmel

• Under $250,000
• $250,000 - $500,000
• Over $500,000

Fishers

• Under $250,000
• Over   $250,000

Washington Township 

• Under $250,000
• $250,000 - $500,000
• Over $500,000

Westfield

• Under $250,000
• Over   $250,000

Zionsville

• Under $250,000
• Over   $250,000

2011 REGULAR SEASON 
Radio Broadcast on Vectren Radio Network / 97.1 Hank FM / 1070 AM The Fan 

1. Curb appeal is key to selling your home

If it looks rundown from the outside, then it probably is on the inside too. Curb appeal is all about first impressions. Buyers want to feel like they could live in a home from the moment they pull up in front of it. Basic improvements such as exterior painting, cutting the grass and planting some flowers improve the look of a home from the outside tremendously.

2. Deodorize

Every home has a unique odor, especially if pets are present. Be sure to professionally clean the carpet and the furniture and replace carpets if necessary. Keep pets clean and the home free from dander. Consider taking pets and pet cages if present in the home with you when you leave for showings.

3. Really want to sell your home? Repair and repaint

A little putty and paint can make all the difference. Repair damaged dry wall, gouges in wood surfaces and paint the walls. Bright colors such as those in children’s rooms should be repainted with a neutral color.

4. Put away your personal collections

Here, the old saying that one man’s treasure is another man’s junk rings true. De-clutter your home by packing up knick-knacks, heirlooms, personal collections, and even family photos. After all, they are special only to you and your goal is to make the home presentable to the widest number of people possible. Expensive collections should be packed away as well to keep them safe.

5. No guns, drugs or valuables

If you own a gun, be sure it’s unloaded and lock it away. Don’t leave it accessible to anyone viewing your home, especially anyone with children. The same is true for prescription drugs, fine jewelry, valuable art work, money and anything else you want to keep safe.

Very Impressive Real Estate Story.  Clyde Hill, Washington Home Generates 34 Written Offers in 6 Days!  Property listed at $1,217,000 Sold well over list price.  The real story is that there were 33 qualified buyers for the property.  Great sign for things to come!

Click Here to read the full story.

Congratulations to Brazen Sotheby's International Realty!  Job Well Done.

We are officially in a rising interest rate environment.  The action the FED is taking to purchase Mortgage Backed Securities is not working as expected. There is too much supply out there for them to buy, and consequently, the rates are rising. 

At the moment, a conventional 30 year fixed with 0 points is now 4.5% (according to Regions Bank).  This is still historically low, but buyers have grown accustomed to hearing 4.25%.  This has the potential to cause a lot of questions, and misunderstanding.  Please contact the mortgage professional you are working with to inquire about the current rates if your rate is not locked. 

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Thank you!

Over the last day I have been belabored with calls and emails about the magnitude of the effect on local home sellers and homeowners. Is the problem as big as the mansion? 24,786 square feet. Or bigger? The house sits on 40 acres, an acre of land in west Carmel sells for at least $100,000. This is clearly one of the best deals on real estate in the country.

Does this sale set the bar?

I say no.

The sale of 1143 W 116^th Street is unique. The property was unique and it does need money put into it. Frankly, some people do not even want that big of a home. That said, it is still a bargain.

Is it an isolated incident?

I say no.

How is that possible when I just said the sale was unique! It is not isolated because this is the textbook example of over pricing a property and chasing the market down. Here is the price history of the property:

6/13/2005                  $20,000,000

1/30/2009                  $15,000,000

9/1/2009                  $9,900,000

10/6/2010                  $3,000,000 – SOLD

I have it on good authority that there was at least one and probably a second offer in the $12,000,000 range a sometime after the property was listed for sale. Terms were never reached on this offer. Furthermore, it typically costs 1% of a property’s value to keep it up on a monthly basis with that much square footage and land I am sure it cost over $300,000 per year to maintain the property.

Even if they sold the property for $3M in 2005 they would have saved $1.5M in up keep.

What if they priced it $15M in 2005 (the peak of the hottest real estate boom in history)? Could have they gotten close to $10M? They still would have saved countless hours and a lot of money.

In short, the sale is isolated because of its scope and size but the pricing philosophy is the same whether it’s $100,000 home or a $20,000,000 one. You need to price the property where the buyers are; otherwise you’re fishing with your bait out of the water.

Jason O’Neil

Continuing the market's trend: Hamilton County reports 62 homes that went under contract last week while Marion County saw 173 homes pend. 

The numbers for July are in and according to MIBOR here are the Highlights:

• During May to July 2010, average sale price increased 5.7% when compared to the same period in 2009. 
• Average Sale Price increased 8.9% during July 2010 when compared to July 2009.
• Closed Sales decreased 4.1% during the three month comparison and decreased 30.4% during July 2010 when compared to July 2009.
• Pended sales during May to July 2010 decreased 30.7% when compared to the same three month period in 2009. The one-month comparison recorded a 27.2% decrease during July 2010 from the same month in 2009.

The Verizon Wireless Music Center is one of the best places in the Midwest to see a concert, it is no surprise that the 2010 schedule is packed with top performers. Indianapolis is lucky to have such a venue! 

5/7/2010                      Pearl Jam

5/15/2010                    Jimmy Buffett

5/22/2010                    Nickelback

5/23/2010                    Country Throwdown 2010

5/29/2010                    X103 MayDay with Three Days Grace

6/5/2010                      Brad Paisley

6/18-19/2010                Dave Matthews Band

6/27/2010                     Lynyrd Skynrd

7/6/2010                      Vans Warped Tour

7/7/2010                      Steve Winwood/Santana

7/10/2010                     Tom Petty & The Hearbreakers

7/16/2010                     Brooks & Dunn with Gary Allan

7/20/2010                     Lilith

7/22/2010                     Chicago and The Doobie Brothers

7/23/2010                     Jack Johnson

7/31/2010                     The Rockstar Energy Mayham Festival

8/3/2010                       Rihanna

8/12-13/2010                 Phish

8/15/2010                     John Mayer

9/3/2010                       Kings of Leon

Last week, 4/16-4/23, Hamilton County had 125 homes go under contract and Marion County saw 304 homes go under contract. Our reporting does not count this past weekend, which unless extended, will have been the last home shopping weekend to take advantage of the Home Buyer Tax Credit. By all accounts the tax credit worked. We have been saying for about a year now that with interest rates so low, free money available, and prices down from their 2007 highs this has been an amazing time to buy a home. 

The remaining question is how will the housing market fare when standing on it's own? Our prediction is that in that the summer months will be down as many of the would be summer and early fall first time homebuyers purchased homes earlier than expected to take advantage of the tax credit. Fall and Winter should be in line with previous averages and we should begin to see a normally increasing numbers by next March.

Financier Warren Buffett on the state of the housing market:

"Within a year or so, residential housing problems should largely be behind us," Buffett wrote Saturday in his annual letter to the shareholders of his Berkshire Hathaway. "Prices will remain far below 'bubble' levels, of course, but for every seller or lender hurt by this there will be a buyer who benefits. Indeed, many families that couldn't afford to buy an appropriate home a few years ago now find it well within their means."

Families in the market for a house are shopping at the right time: Nationally, homes are near the most affordable they've been in 18 years. In the fourth quarter of 2009 housing was 62.4% more affordable than the same time a year earlier, according to the Housing Opportunity Index, published quarterly by the National Association of Home Builders and Wells Fargo.

In Depth: America's Best Housing Markets
The best place to buy right now: Pittsburgh. For a housing market to be attractive it should have appreciating prices that show homeowners are making wise investments; an affordability rating that gives middle-class families with good credit entry into the market; and a relatively low number of foreclosures, which keeps prices stable and indicates there isn't an excess of inventory.

Pittsburgh has all three. In the metro area, 85% of homes are affordable to those making the median family income of $62,500. At the same time, foreclosures are low: Only one home is in foreclosure for every 120 housing units--the second-best record of all the cities we ranked; and home prices are expected to increase 2.67% by the end of the year.

Yes, the city has suffered greatly since the decline of its manufacturing-dependent economy. But that slump helped its real estate market dodge the rapid run-up in prices that doomed so many markets after the housing boom.

"Manufacturing cities like Pittsburgh have suffered so much for the last two, three, four years that there's still a population base in that region, and now those areas are sort of attractive," says James P. Gaines, research economist at the Real Estate Center at Texas A&M University. "Home prices are so low, some service-level jobs can be created, so it's not surprising perhaps that there's been a revitalization of some of those communities."

Behind the Numbers

To find the country's best housing markets, we used the Housing Opportunity Index, a metric created by the National Association of Home Builders and Wells Fargo that determines affordability by measuring median home prices against median incomes. Using the 40 largest housing Metropolitan Statistical Areas that the HOI ranks, we then factored in Moody's Economy.com's one-year forecast for the S&P/Case-Shiller Home Price Index, a measure of sales prices in major markets, to find out where home prices were expected to rise. Finally we included the 2009 Foreclosure report from RealtyTrac, ranking cities by their percentage of foreclosures. We averaged the rankings for all these measures to arrive at an overall score.

The reason for taking all these factors into account is that alone each doesn't say much about a housing market's health. An area could be affordable because prices were dragged down by a glut of foreclosures. Similarly, a low foreclosure rate doesn't guarantee that home-buying is a good investment, as values could be flat or falling. Even looking at home-price forecasts in a vacuum won't tell you everything about a market, since some areas have dramatic price increases ahead due to severe drops back when the bubble burst.

Like Pittsburgh, Columbus, Ohio, might not jump to mind as one of the country's best cities for housing, but job-rich suburbs surround the city and 87% of middle-income families can afford a home. That combination creates significant pull for homebuyers.

Also looking strong is Louisville, Ky., a city whose low foreclosure rate--only 1.15% of homes are in foreclosure, half the national average--illuminates it as one of the cities least affected by this aspect of the dramatic housing market collapse of the past three years. Louisville had less of a market boom than coastal cities and vacation destinations, so it didn't have as far to fall.

Jobs Stability Equals Housing Stability

Strong industries have bolstered some of the cities on our list: The energy sector has kept jobs flowing into Texas oil town Houston, and that effect trickles into Dallas and Austin (which is also buoyed by technology jobs). A good job market means the housing outlook will stay strong. Houston home prices are expected to rise 1.2% by next year; it's one of only four of the markets we ranked where prices won't continue to slide, according to Moody's Economy.com.

Midwestern cities Indianapolis, Minneapolis and St. Louis make our list in spite of middling home-price forecasts because housing in these places is eminently affordable. Indianapolis has the highest HOI in the country, with decent housing accessible to 96% of families making the median income. In places like this the recession has weighed down home prices, but mortgage rates are still at historic lows, giving families a chance to get in on the ground floor.

Some markets are accessible to buyers because of a price slide now, yet still offer wise investment choices. In Minneapolis-St. Paul, which is ranked seventh in HOI, prices will continue to slide this year by three-quarters of a percent; but by 2012 they will have risen 2.82%.

Most real estate markets are struggling, some quite severely, so discussing the best ones is relative. But between the even-keeled housing climate of some Midwestern cities and the job opportunities in Texas, real estate in these areas is worth keeping an eye on.

America's Top 5 Housing Markets

1. Pittsburgh, Pa.
1-year Home Price Forecast: 0.03
Housing Opportunity Index: 85.1
% of Housing Units in Foreclosure: 0.83

2. Louisville-Jefferson County, Ky.-Ind.
One-year Home Price Forecast: -0.01
Housing Opportunity Index: 84.3
% of Housing Units in Foreclosure: 1.15

3. Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, Texas
One-year Home Price Forecast: 0.01
Housing Opportunity Index: 73.2
% of Housing Units in Foreclosure: 1.3

4. Minneapolis-St. Paul-Bloomington, Minn.-Wis.
One-year Home Price Forecast: -0.01
Housing Opportunity Index: 84.9
% of Housing Units in Foreclosure: 2.2

5. Indianapolis-Carmel, Ind.
One-year Home Price Forecast: -0.02
Housing Opportunity Index: 95.7
% of Housing Units in Foreclosure: 2.47

Click here to see the full list of America's Best Housing Markets

By: Francesca Levy, Forbes.com

Home Sales in Hamilton and Marion Counties were up 19% in the fourth quarter 2009 compared with the fourth quarter 2008. In fact, the fourth quarter of 2009 was the strongest since 2006! The brightest spot was Carmel, where sales were up 41% during that time period. 

Though we are Realtors with Sotheby's Realty in Indianapolis we have contacts with top producing realtors across the country. If we don't personally know someone, we will search every major real estate brokerage on your behalf to find the most qualified agent to meet your buying or selling needs. The agents will be interviewed and evaluated based on:

• Production 
• Education/Certifications 
• Marketing 
• Agent and Client References  

We offer this service free of charge, if you have a friend or family member who is in need of the best real estate service in their area, email us HERE or reply to this note. We can generally track down the right person within 24 hours.

Know of someone buying or selling a home ANYWHERE? Click Here and we will help!

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As of January 4, 2010 we have joined Encore Sotheby’s International Realty as Founding Members. This change, while substantial, requires no action on your part other than understanding the benefits to you while buying and selling real estate on the Northside of Indianapolis.

Founded in the mid 1700’s, Sotheby’s has a long-standing reputation of outstanding knowledge, service and the ability to sell hard to sell items. It is exciting to be a part of such a grand opening as it unfolds in our city.

Sotheby’s perspective compliments the ideals our business was built on. They understand that uniting people with properties is more of an art than a science and are committed to discovering the distinction in all homes. Their commitment to providing unrivaled service and a refined experience matches our own and will allow us to help you achieve your dreams while remaining a connoisseur of life

We are certain our association with Sotheby’s will be mutually beneficial. As always, if there is anything we can do for you, your family or your friends, please call our email.