UPDATE: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have slashed the asking price on their Big Easy home by $850,000, bringing it to $5.65 million. The couple’s new movie, “By the Sea,” has led to a spate of interviews that plumb everything from how many kids they initially wanted (12) to their parenting style (Brad is a disciplinarian with the boys), but no word on why they’ve cut the price in NOLA - or why there are no interior listing photos.
ORIGINAL POST 5/21/15: Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have listed their French Quarter mansion for $6.5 million, but a rep tells US Weekly they aren’t walking away from New Orleans. They will look for “something off the beaten path down the road.”
The star couple bought the renovated 1830s home in late 2006 for Pitt’s filming of “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button,” and they let Jonah Hill crash there when he was filming “21 Jump Street.”
It has 5 bedrooms, 5 baths and all the grandeur you’d expect from a Big Easy mansion: Venetian plastered walls, marble mantles and fireplaces, crown moldings, a grand spiral staircase and - bringing it into the modern era - an elevator. There’s also a two-story guesthouse.
Hill, a months-long guest, called Pitt “the nicest guy” for letting him stay there but said it came with some fan baggage.
“I would go home every day from work, and there’d be a tour outside and they’d be freaking out,” he told Jon Stewart on “The Daily Show.” “I’d get out of the car, and you could hear a collective audible sigh of annoyance when it wasn’t Brad Pitt.”
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/brad-and-angelina-new-orleans-176581/
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When you’re preoccupied with important relocation-related tasks, it’s easy to forget about informing relevant people and institutions of your upcoming residential move and subsequent change of address.
But notifying specific organizations and individuals of your relocation is essential for ensuring a smooth moving process and preventing various hassles and troubles with your mail and accounts.
Here’s a checklist of the people and institutions you need to contact when moving.
Family and friends
Naturally, your relatives and close friends should be the first to know that you are about to move house. Informing them of your imminent relocation as early as possible will not only give you the chance to ask them help you move, but, if you’re moving far away, will also provide you with enough time to say a proper goodbye and plan for different ways to stay in touch despite the distance between you.
Current employer
Unless you’re relocating to a different branch of your current company, you should inform your employer about your decision to move and leave your job as early as a month in advance.
This way, the company will have time to find a new person for your position, and you will be able to put all the relevant paperwork in order without any hassle.
Remember that your old boss will need your new address to send you tax documents and insurance information at the end of the year.
Landlord
If you live in a rental home, you should carefully review your tenant rights and responsibilities contained in the lease agreement. You will probably be required to notify your landlord of your intentions to move out at least 30 days in advance.
You need to prepare a written notice that clearly states your move-out date and your future address. It is also a good idea to include a brief statement about the excellent condition of the rented property and to request your security deposit back.
Postal services
Changing your address with the United States Postal Service should be among your top priorities when moving to a new house, as it will help you avoid many troubles and inconveniences.
To have your mail forwarded to your new place before you’ve updated your address with individual organizations and companies, you only need to fill out a change of address request at your local post office or at the USPS official website.
Utilities
To prevent service lapses and past-due bills you need to inform your service providers about your relocation plans. Arrange for the utilities at your old home to be disconnected on moving day, and have them reconnected at your new residence by the time you move in.
The utility companies you should contact when moving include electricity, gas, water, telephone, cable, Internet, domestic waste collection and other municipal services you may need.
DMV
When you move out of state, you'll have to transfer your driver's license and update your vehicle's registration and insurance within quite a short time frame (10 to 30 days, depending on your new state).
It's a good idea to visit the local office of the Department of Motor Vehicles at the earliest opportunity, inform them of your new address, and request all the relevant information about putting the required paperwork in order.
Government agencies
A number of government agencies should be notified when you're moving to another state. Be sure to update your address with the local office of the Social Security Administration, the electoral register, and other relevant institutions.
The IRS
The Internal Revenue Service will need your actual home address to mail your tax return, fiscal notes, and other documents. All you need to do is print out and mail in the IRS' Change of Address form soon after your relocation.
Financial institutions
To keep your finances in order, you must update your bank accounts and inform credit card companies, stockbrokers, and other relevant financial institutions of your new address either shortly prior to or immediately after your move.
Insurance companies
The insurance agencies that provide your life, health, and homeowners insurance policies should have your current address on file, as should any other organizations and individuals (such as your family attorney) who have dealings with you and your family.
Medical and educational facilities
When moving to a new state, you will have to enroll your children in a new school, find a new family physician, and transfer all your academic records, medical records, and prescription medicines. To successfully complete these important tasks you need to tell your doctors, dentists, vets and other healthcare providers, as well as the educational facilities your kids are attending, about your relocation and your new address.
Subscription services and clubs
Last but not least, you need to update your address with any sports, professional, or social clubs you are involved with. You should also notify the subscriber services department of any magazines or newspapers you want to receive at your new home.
You may have to personally visit some companies or institutions to notify them of your relocation, but in most cases you will be able to change your mailing address online or with a simple phone call. Postcards, e-mails, text messages, and social network announcements are also viable methods to inform people of your new address.
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/who-to-notify-when-moving-187286/
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For the past decade, housing in Las Vegas has been a scene straight out of the Wild West.
Rules have been bent, and lives ruined — a consequence of a housing crisis that caused such catastrophic and widespread declines in home values that much of the city remains on its knees.
At one point in 2012, more than 70 percent of Las Vegas homeowners with mortgages were underwater, many of them owing more than twice what their homes were worth.
The negative equity rate has fallen to 25 percent but remains higher than any other major market. In normal markets and times, that rate is closer to 3 percent.
Among those affected is Terrie Brooks, a bingo agent for 30 years who never dreamt she’d resort to giving blood to pay her mortgage.
With income of $60,000 a year and money in savings, she paid her mortgage for four years after the recession hit and her employer cut her hours.
She fell behind after her college-age son, who rode a mo-ped between classes and work to save on gas money, was in a terrible accident. A traumatic brain injury left him incapacitated for two years before he died.
“I thought I had put away for a rainy day and was keeping up. Once my son was in the hospital, I didn’t care,” said Brooks, who often stayed home, even when work called, to feed her son and otherwise care for him.
“I gained weight, my health went to hell. You don’t care anymore … Then you say, ‘Look what a mess I’ve gotten into because I didn’t care.'”
Brooks tried to make up for the lost hours by selling blood and participating in focus groups.
She also tried to get a mortgage loan modification but became stuck in a bureaucratic cycle — a process so common it was the subject of one of the focus groups she was paid to attend.
Squatters and their tenants
Getting a loan modification when people all over town — and many across the country — want one, too, is no simple thing.
Some people give up and stop paying.
Tim Kelly Kiernan
“I closed a deal in August where a guy hadn’t made a payment in 88 months,” said Tim Kelly Kiernan, a real estate agent with Re/Max Benchmark Realty.
“It wasn’t illegal. He was just playing the system.”
He also wasn’t alone, by a long shot.
Many people in Las Vegas stopped paying their mortgages for months and years at a time with little consequence.
Some filed for bankruptcy and walked away, assuming lenders would take ownership, only to return years later to find the homes still in their names.
Sometimes, their homes had been taken over by squatters or, more absurdly, by renters making monthly payments to someone who’d swooped in and pretended to be the owner of an empty house.
Kiernan had one such client who ended up doing a short sale — negotiating with his lender to sell the house for less than he owed — and walking away with cash to relocate (and leave the house in good condition).
There were even cases of homeowners being sued by squatters who were injured while squatting, Kiernan said.
“I can’t make this stuff up,” he said. “There are all these crazy stories, and [that] story is very common — people filing bankruptcy and leaving their property thinking they were done.”
Tangled in red tape
Getting lenders’ attention is the hard part.
For a while after the housing bubble burst, lenders rubber-stamped foreclosures so fast — in Las Vegas, foreclosures reached six times the national rate — that they got in trouble and were forced to slow down.
Now they often approve short sales and loan modifications, if a borrower keeps the same lender long enough to negotiate such a deal and to exchange the proper paperwork.
“It can be very frustrating,” said Christine Miller, a lawyer at the Legal Aid Center of Southern Nevada.
“Even though you sent a packet, and the fax transmittal shows 54 pages went through, they [the lender] will say they don’t have it, or to send it again.”
It’s against mortgage servicing regulations to draw out the process, but fighting that means filing a complaint with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, “and that’s a process” as well, Miller said.
Judah Zakalik
Tangled in financial red tape, some homeowners turn to experts like Judah Zakalik, an attorney who for two years defended banks against predatory lending lawsuits, then was laid off and switched to the consumer side.
People have to be careful where they turn for help, Zakalik said.
“When we started in 2009, there were probably over 250 loan modification specialists and attorneys in this city doing this work,” he said. “A lot of them were taking advantage of people’s desperation.”
Some charged upfront fees, then skipped town. Others filed bankruptcy papers but didn’t take clients’ names off homes — and squatters often beat lenders to those properties.
Even now, people are renting abandoned homes from landlords who are not the rightful owners. “I see it at least once every two weeks. I saw it this morning,” Zakalik said.
A morality shift
Despite their dire situations, many people balk at filing for bankruptcy or not making mortgage payments.
“They’ve been told, ‘You’re a bad person if you do that,'” Zakalik said.
During the recession, he said, “I’d sit down with people and have discussions about their morality. [I’d tell them] you have to look out for your family’s future. If you throw $700,000 at this loan, you’re taking away money you could invest in your future, your retirement, your children’s future.”
The need for those discussions has waned.
“People understand that now. They understand that corporations are looking out for their own best interests, and they have to look out for themselves.”
There’s been a shift in moral consciousness, he said, “at least in this city.”
Military retiree Robert Lujano stopped making payments just to get his lender’s attention.
“They said, ‘You’re not making payments.’ And I said, ‘That’s right. Didn’t I try for five years to get you to refinance?'” Lujano recalled.
He negotiated a short sale that included $2,500 in relocation fees. It only marginally hurt his credit score, and he plans to buy another house next spring.
“This would be a great time for many, many people to buy a house,” he said.
With help from the legal aid center, Brooks also renegotiated her mortgage — but the relief is temporary.
Her monthly payment has dropped from $1,300 to $760. After 22 years, however, she will owe the full balance of her original loan — $100,000 — and she doubts her house will be worth that by then.
“They said, in a couple years I can do a short sale,” Brooks related hopefully.
If not, there’s bound to be another way.
Already, a passel of homeowners are pioneering another mortgage frontier: re-defaults.
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/las-vegas-negative-equity-184888/
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from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/favorite-2015-real-estate-stories-187278/
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Did you miss the pre-holiday sales? The Black Friday bargains? Not to worry - there are plenty of great deals to be found in December, from toys, books, laptops, and tablets to various big ticket items like these.
Cars
As the year comes to an end, car dealerships start dropping prices and rolling out big incentives, such as cash back or low interest rates. After all, they've got to clear out their inventory and meet their annual sales goals. It's their last chance!
Selection may be limited this time of year, so if you're fixated on a specific make/model/color/features, the deals may not interest you, but if saving money is a priority, you're in the driver's seat.
Homes
Just like car dealerships, sellers of homes have it tough at this time of year. Many simply take their homes off the market to ride out the long winter months.
So if houses are on the market, this means that sellers are serious. They're motivated. This puts you, the buyer, in a strong position to negotiate and ultimately cut a deal, particularly if you've done your homework.
Home prices, historically, are lower in December than any other month. Cities where listings have the greatest percentage of price cuts include Albuquerque (where 24 percent of listings have a price cut), Omaha (24 percent), Baltimore (23 percent), Milwaukee (23 percent), Jacksonville (22 percent), Phoenix (22 percent), Houston (21 percent), Minneapolis (21 percent), Mesa (20 percent), and Indianapolis (20 percent), according to Zillow analysis.
Take advantage of resources like Zillow to find inventory you usually can't find alongside for-sale homes, like new construction, pre-market inventory, for sale by owner and, soon, foreclosures.
Wedding dresses
Since so many couples get engaged over the holidays, bridal shops receive major shipments of gowns in late December. In order to make room for these new gowns, they have to clear out the older inventory, and that means you’ll see big markdowns in early December.
Beach vacations
How does a beach vacation sound right about now? Prices to destinations such as the Caribbean drop between Thanksgiving to right before Christmas (about December 20) because demand is minimal. Welcome drinks and resort credits may also be included in special package deals. Pack your bags!
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/big-ticket-items-december-187207/
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It was 60 years ago today that Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, AL — a spark for the civil rights movement that led to sweeping changes nationwide, from ending segregation to ending a racist banking practice called redlining.
Lenders stopped literally drawing red lines around minority neighborhoods on maps, marking them as too risky for mortgages and harming the economic prospects of people of color while contributing to urban decay.
However, the recent housing crisis pointed to a different way in which minority borrowers have been hurt by the mortgage process.
“It’s pretty evident that people of color were being targeted” for risky mortgage loans during the housing bubble, according to Rolf Pendall, director of the Metropolitan Housing and Communities Policy Center at the Urban Institute.
When housing values declined, black and Hispanic communities were harder hit and sustained more foreclosures, according to Zillow Research.
It was a double-whammy for minorities when lenders tightened their lending standards as the recession took hold.
“We have completely overcorrected with fear of those borrowers who have pretty good but not perfect credit, and those tend to be disproportionately minorities, so this overcorrection disproportionately hurts them,” said Sheryl Pardo, the spokesperson for Urban's Housing Finance Policy Center.
The good news is that denial rates for conventional mortgages fell in 2014, particularly for black and Hispanic applicants, according to data recently released under the Home Mortgage Disclosure Act (HMDA).
That means it was easier for everyone to get a conventional home loan last year than it was in 2013, and black and Hispanic applicants bounced back stronger than others.
But they were coming from a place of far higher denial rates and still have a long way to go.
Last year, 23.5 percent of black applicants were turned down for conventional mortgages, compared to 18.8 percent of Hispanics, 12.2 percent of Asians and 9.4 percent of whites.
A host of factors, including the high denial rates, have led blacks to have a far lower rate of homeownership (41.2 percent) than whites (71 percent), Asians (57.5 percent) and Hispanics (45 percent).
Blacks’ wages have suffered since the dot-com bust, putting black homeowners in a particularly precarious position in the runup to the most recent recession, Pendall said.
“Black Americans had been uniquely hard hit among racial groups by the post-9/11 crash, so they were already financially struggling, and that’s part of why the mortgage crisis could hit them so hard,” Pendall said.
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/lending-rosa-parks-anniversary-187480/
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After a year of recovery, Zillow’s experts say 2016 will be all about housing affordability, with a lack of affordable homes near city centers pushing young and first-time buyers out to the suburbs.
“In 2016, we’ll start to see more people in hot coastal markets forced to move farther from the core of the city to find housing,” said Zillow Chief Economist Svenja Gudell. “When they get there, they’ll be looking for amenity-rich suburbs - mini-cities, with walkable cores and an urban feel.”
Zillow’s 2016 Housing Market Predictions
The median age of first-time home buyers will set a new record in 2016. Buyers are already about three years older, on average, than they were in the 1980s.
More low-income Americans will be priced out of homeownership. Home values are rising faster than incomes, so in 2016, the poorest Americans will be unable to afford even the least expensive homes.
Rents will soar in 2016, bringing the highest median rents ever.
People will move outside cities to find affordable homes, and that will change the suburbs. Hot spots for 2016 will be dense, walkable suburbs with urban amenities.
More than 100 economic and housing experts in the latest Zillow Home Price Expectations Survey pinned home value growth at about 3.5 percent in 2016.
from Zillow Blog - Real Estate Market Stats, Celebrity Real Estate, and Zillow News http://www.zillow.com/blog/zillow-2016-forecast-187561/
via Reveeo
It was 60 years ago today that Rosa Parks was arrested for refusing to give up her seat to a white passenger on a bus in Montgomery, AL — a spark for the civil rights movement that led to sweeping changes nationwide, from ending segregation to ending a racist banking practice called redlining.