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Article: “The Mortgage Professor: Down payment insurance: Does it make sense? (By JACK GUTTENTAG) Investment in a home is often the largest investment a consumer will ever make, so any measures to reduce the risk deserve careful attention. The big risk is that a major house price decline will wipe out the owners’ equity, leavingRead more

Real Estate News : As investors scoop up older housing properties South Beach workers feeling the squeeze by: Nicholas Nehamas, Joey Flechas “Last week’s purchase of 15 older Art Deco-era apartment buildings in South Beach has workers fearing they won’t be able to remain in the area much longer, the Miami Herald is reporting. DevelopmentRead more

By Nicholas Nehamas “Federal authorities on Wednesday announced a temporary anti-money-laundering crackdown on pricey homes bought secretly with cash in Miami-Dade County and New York City. The new policy will require title insurance companies to identify the true owners of shell companies that pay $1 million or more in cash for homes in Miami-Dade andRead more

A new report from Coldwell Banker names Doral, located in Miami-Dade, the most expensive market in Florida. “Coldwell Banker Real Estate LLC released its 2015 Home Listing Report (HLR), which ranks the affordability of the real estate markets in Florida. The Coldwell Banker® Home Listing Report named Hastings the most affordable market in Florida, with an average listing priceRead more

Little-known program gives up to $2,000 a year to people buying their first homes. By Donna Gehrke-White | Sun Sentinel “little-known state program that pays first-time homebuyers up to $2,000 a year has more than tripled its number of participants in a year.Administrators expect an even higher surge of homebuyers applying this year as theRead more

Susan Taylor Martin, Times Senior Correspondent |Friday, March 13, 2015   “TAMPA — For Doreen Rosselli, Carrollwood’s Grande Oasis condominium has provided a lushly landscaped refuge from the cacophony of urban life. For Silviya Gregory, a young nurse from Bulgaria, Grande Oasis has meant home in a country where she has no family. And forRead more

Eric Snider | Tampa Bay Business Journal | “If you ever get the creepy feeling that your neighborhood resembles a set from “The Walking Dead,” maybe it’s because greater Tampa Bay ranks way up on the list of zombie foreclosures. These are properties that have started the foreclosure process but never foreclosed and the homeowner has vacated.Read more

Mary Shanklin | Orlando Sentinel | “More than 5,200 Orlando-area houses in foreclosure sat vacant during the second quarter, making the region one of the leading “zombie” foreclosure markets in the country, a new report shows. In Orange, Seminole, Lake and Osceola counties, 22,700 houses and condos were in some stage of foreclosure during theRead more

SUSAN TAYLOR MARTIN | Tampa Bay Times | “In February, a new company in Tampa called RE-710 got a terrific deal. It paid $5,700 for a five-bedroom home valued at $311,000. The same month, RE-710 acquired control of dozens of other houses and condos throughout the Tampa Bay area for just cents on the dollar.Read more

National Mortgage Professional Magazine | “RealtyTrac released its U.S. Foreclosure Market Report for May 2014, which shows foreclosure filings — default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions — were reported on 109,824 U.S. properties in May, a five percent decrease from the previous month and a 26 percent decrease from May 2013 to the lowest monthlyRead more