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We have been working real hard on changing things around for the better here at Sheriff Sales Online and we would like to announce the launch of our new website. After careful consideration, we have taken user feedback and worked with designers to bring you a simple and easy to use website that provides all the foreclosure information you need.

Lis Pendens Information Update

About five months ago we introduced a new and improved Daily Lis Pendens Service for those of you that don’t know. This now makes us the best value in the state of New Jersey hands down! In fact, we broke it down for you here. See the Competitive Comparison.

What a way to bring in the new year. Passaic county has listed one hundred and twenty two (122) properties for sale next week. This is the biggest list they have put out in four years! You can expect the next few weeks of Passaic sales to be big as well with all the adjournments that will follow from this list alone.

This is just the first indicator of how packed the sales will become for all the counties in the next few months. There has been a backlog of properties building up over the holidays (as always), topped off with the market the way it is… we are headed for quite a ride.

We are sorry to say that after months of trying to work things out with employees in the NYC metro area we have decided to put our New York service on hold. We are very sorry to do this and the fall in service had to do with some issues that had to be waited out with time.

We are not sure if we will be bringing New York back at this time but there are other things on the horizon here. Our New Jersey service has been going strong as always and we are looking into some other in depth services to expand our offering. Maybe more on a local level to assist investors and buyers with independent research and legwork.

We will be sending out a short survey to see what services our members will be the most interested in and we encourage your feedback. So stay tuned for that email. I will also try and post the questions here on the blog so you can also comment in a discussion environment with the other members.

Together we can come up with the most desired member services.

We are open for ideas, what would you like to see?

So the news on the street today is that the “Hope Now” alliance, headed by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson , is playing with the idea of freezing interest rates on some of the sub-prime loans in the market. In a sense this would preserve the teaser rates for a longer period of time allowing owners to avoid the jump in payments when the big reset arrives.

The congress actually has a plan as well. They are thinking of letting judges of chaper 13 bankruptcies modify the loan agreements. As if the bankruptcy process is not tricky enough. This would further delay foreclosures and allow the government to modify existing contracts! It almost seems unconstitutional…

As if we all didn’t see this coming. Discount brokers are hitting hard times in the market and Foxtons out of New Jersey has stated that it might be headed for bankruptcy. Foxton’s announced that they will be laying off approximately ALL of their staff. I wonder if I can buy one of those cool minicoopers at a good price?

Discount brokers can only thrive in a market that is hot and where the liquidity of real estate is fast paced. The problem is that real estate is NOT a liquid asset, except in a boom such as the one we just had.

The reason owners pay a 6% Realtor commission is because in traditional markets, you need a professional to help sell your house. They have an in, they know of people looking to move in to the area, this is what you are paying for.

Although I know we all have mixed feelings on Realtors, I can assure you that the value of a good Realtor is becoming more important than ever.

As if we didn’t know already, Henry Paulison stated today that the mortgage problem is not a reflection on the real economy but a problem caused by bad lending practices. I guess he is trying to shift the heat of this foreclosure news onto the lenders and as far away from him as possible.

Have we not been talking about this for weeks, even months. The data lag is finally catching up with the news in the industry, or is it. Think of it as a ripple effect, first the industry people working the streets start to feel and see whats going on. Most of the time this feeling is kept quiet, being that bad news directly effects their pockets. Then it’s rumored but never confirmed until some report with actual statistics is shown, which is actually from data 3 months ago.

So what does this mean to the investor. It means that you can stay ahead of the trend by playing the market just like the stock brokers do. Don’t buy or sell the news! Figure it out for yourself with local real estate professionals. If this news is 3 months behind, don’t you think they will be at least 3 months behind the news when it starts to go up?

The day after the market reports that housing starts are up, we see a slide in home sales. Nothing surprising since in my previous post I mentioned how the data is always a little behind the market, but who cares… What does this really mean? I don’t think anyone knows. Countless Grey haired professionals are being brought onto the news shows and questioned for their “experienced opinion”. Yet most of them seem to quote something like “follow the basics” or “fundamentals”, not really giving you a straight answer. How could they? No one has ever seen a market quite like this, and no one really knows what is going to happen. We have a credit problem which has never been this bad not to mention some of the most aloof consumers ever. Here is a great video from CNBC below.. or you can read the full story here.

The NAR talks..According to the latest home sales data from the Realtors association, median home prices fell 0.6 percent from a year ago to $228,900. Lawrence Yun (National Association of Realtors economist) stated, “In the aggregate, we don’t see the subprime market damaging the economy”. Yeah, I agree, it’s the credit crunch and tightening of lending guidelines, that’s what’s going to kill the market. Simple supply and demand…lot’s of homes for sale, very few people with good credit and 20% to put down. With the crazy loans that were in the market we made real estate a much more liquid asset than it really is, shifting back is going to be a little painful in my opinion. But remember, a lot of wealth can change hands when the market shifts, just make sure you don’t get shifted on.

So there has finally been some good news on the housing market. July housing sales are up 2.8% as reported today. The problem I have with these figures is that this information is technically old and does not really reflect the recent problems in the housing market. All these reports on TV are somewhat delayed to what is going on in the market right now. In my opinion, these recent figures are similar to what was happening in the market about 2-3 months ago.

Another thing to think about is that the “housing starts” data does not reflect canceled contracts. Example: If 100 new contracts were reported; then 2 months later 25% of those contracts were canceled or the deals fell through, the housing data would still reflect 100 new sales, a little misleading if you ask me.

Speaking of stats, if you watch CNBC you will notice that most of their foreclosure statistics are coming from Realtytrac. I find this funny since countless members of our site have said their data is far from current compared to ours. Shows you how much public relations can effect the news.

In an interview today Countrywide CEO Angelo Mozilo says that he thinks we are headed for a recession. This statement coming after the announcement of Bank of America deciding to invest 2 billion into the troubled mortgage giant. This will give Bank of America about a 16% stake in Countrywide Mortgage. Mozilo states that their sub prime exposure is in the upwards of 10% of the companies total mortgage holdings. Further explaining that he predicts that almost half of those loans will be refinanced out into fixed rates. Then why does he still think we are headed for a recession, not that he’s the only one. Not to mention that he has been dumping his stock lately which he says is totally unrelated. He claims he just wants to be doing it gradually so upon leaving in the future it is not a sudden action, but who really knows.

The problem I have with these extra efforts to bail out the mortgage industry is that it is beginning to look like the airline bailouts, but for consumers. This practice basically says its ok to go out and be reckless with credit because if enough people get in trouble, good old uncle sam will step in to bail us out. I saw an story on CNBC with a woman who was brought on for a debate saying that it is the responsibility of government to come in and help these people. This after previously admitting that when she gave her mortgage to the bank she didn’t bother to read any of the fine print herself! “It’s to confusing she argued”… are you kidding me! This is a grown woman on national television (claiming to be a professional) admitting that she doesn’t even read legal contracts she signs. It’s called being responsible, what is going on with this attitude in America?

See the CNBC interview here…