As you’ve probably heard by now, President Bush on Wednesday signed into law a new housing bill designed to boost the struggling housing market.  The Senate voted in favor of the bill last Saturday, after the House passed it three days earlier.

Here’s what’s in it for you:

1. For many homeowners stuck paying bigger and bigger adjustable mortgage payments, help is on the way.  My next blog post will have all of the details you need to know to get out of trouble.

2. Limits on “conforming” loans - those mortgages that are easily traded on the securities market - are permanently raised to $625,500.  (This will be especially helpful to the Myrtle Beach real estate market, and especially to higher-end properties.)

3. First-time home buyers would be eligible for a $7,500.00 tax credit. But, there’s a catch. I’ll explain in my next post.

4. For the next 18 months, the government entities that guarantee the purchase and trade of mortgages (called Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac) have been given an unlimited line of credit backed by the United States treasury. This is BIG!

I was speaking with a friend yesterday who is pretty high up in the banking/finance world in New York.  He said, “I like your blog, but you have to stop talking about price as your primary focus, and start explaining to your clients the true cost of owning property over the long term.”

Here’s a good example of what he meant.

If you were to purchase a single family home in the Myrtle Beach real estate market right now, you might pay $180,000 for that house. And you might qualify for a rate of 6.75% (according to two lenders this morning). Your principal and interest payment would be $1,116 per month.

But what if you wait until things settle down, and you’re absolutely positive that the market has hit bottom?  Let’s say that you were able to purchase that same house for $170,000 six months from now, but changes in the mortgage market and inflation have pushed rates up half a percent (which, by the way, we fully expect to happen).

Now your principal and interest payment would be $1,112 per month.

Wow. Big savings, huh?

Plus… let’s not forget that in those six months, you’ve either (a) paid six more months of rent (money flushed away forever) or interest on your existing mortgage (mostly money flushed away forever), and (b) not living in the house you really wanted.

And, of course, in those six months you would have also built up approximately $900.00 in equity you still don’t have.

If you really want to buy real estate, stop worrying about price.  Go get pre-approved and lock in your rate now, while rates are still at historic lows.

You can thank me later.

Most journalists use the S&P/Case-Shiller Index as their benchmark statisitical tool to keep reminding us what everyone who doesn’t live under a rock already knows - that real estate prices have dropped.

The index was developed by an economist from Welleley College, Karl Case, and an economist from Yale College, Robert Shiller. Their method of taking recent sale prices of homes and comparing them to previous sales prices has become the “go-to” source for media reporting the real estate “story”.

What you probably haven’t seen, read or heard is that one of the Index’s creators, Karl Case, believes home prices might be near bottom. In an outstanding piece on Smartmoney.com, Case notes that the decline of new housing starts has been extremely dramatic — only 975,000 in April of this year (compared to 2.27 million in the peak of January, 2006).  So inventory is dropping — drastically. Case commented:

“Every time this has happened before, housing market activity has rebounded within a quarter and caught experts by surprise. In many areas, particularly outside the overbuilt markets of Arizona, Florida and Nevada and the huge bubble market of California, home prices may well stabilize and begin to recover before the end of this year.”

Wait a second. Did you get that?

The go-to guy for real estate doom-and-gloom is now saying that things are looking up!

But did you read that anywhere (besides here)? Probably not.

Did you read that the Case-Shiller Index, which in March reported price declines in 18 of the 20 major markets that it tracks, showed price INCREASES in eight of the 20 markets in its recently released April report? Probably not.

Did you read that the Index is also showing a slowing down of price declines? Or that the sheer volume of homes that fall into the subprime housing category — which makes up only 10 percent of the total U.S. housing stock — is skewing down home prices? Probably not.

Why didn’t you read those things?  Because the media are not reporting those things. Bad news sells.

There is a great quote in the Smartmoney story by S&P/Case Shiller Index Committee Chairman David Blitzer, who seems to explain why you’ve never heard any of the good news:

“Other than Larry Kudlow of CNBC, none of the journalists who interviewed me after the latest release seemed at all interested in any of the positive developments.”

So don’t wait for the evening news or the daily newspaper or MSN.com to tell you things are getting better. Pay attention to your local market. Study the statistics. Watch the trends. Take advantage of our expertise.

Because if you want GOOD news, you’re going to have to find it yourself.

You’ve heard it before.  We are in a full-on Buyer’s Market.  Why are people so apprehensive about buying anything?  So many are just sitting on the fence, waiting for some “sign”….

Here are your signs:

1. Sellers are offering concessions and incentives to buyers in order to make their homes more attractive.

2. There are lots of homes to choose from - in every price range.

3. Interest rates are as low than they have been in years. In fact, we received a rate sheet from a major national bank just this morning and their FHA loan rate dropped .375%  (that’s a 6% drop, folks!) today!

4. If you wait for the Myrtle Beach real estate market to “get better”, you’re going to pay more by way of fewer incentives, higher interest rates and less inventory to choose from.

Savvy investors like Donald Trump and Warren Buffett love this kind of market.  This is what they wait for!  They wait for these types of conditions and then acquire as much real estate as they can get their hands on.  It’s the golden rule of finance and real estate alike - BUY LOW, SELL HIGH.

Get off the fence!  You’ll be in great company!

My seller client and I have been negotiating with an outside agent and her buyer client over a great single family home. The agent said something to me yesterday that struck me. She said, “It’s been such a pleasure working with you… your attitude is so positive!”

What struck me is that her perception of my attitude must have been different enough from what she’s used to dealing with, that she just had to comment on it.

We live in an incredible age of abundance, and I happen to work in an industry that, day in and day out, changes people’s lives. Take this particular transaction, for example. For these buyers, this will be their first home. The American Dream is alive and well, and I am extraordinarily proud to be a part of it.

I hear complaints every day about our real estate market. During the first half of 2008, 3,584 properties changed hands in the Myrtle Beach real estate market. This market is not 2005, but reports of its death have been greatly exaggerated.

And now, even the national media are starting to publish reports of a silver lining around the cloud they’ve created. Things are looking up.

I’m positive.