Happy St. Patrick;s Day!! The February numbers just came out today. What does a quick snapshot show for Montgomery County? Hotness ratio stays level. Monthly Single Family Residence Unit sales tick upward. Average and Median prices tick upward. The number of Active Listings rise. Days on the market drop. Months Inventory rise slightly. These are all county wide numbers. I will add that it appears that MLS area 15 (The Woodlands and west to the county line) did take a beating. A big beating unfortunately. I will have more information after I digest the full fifty page report. I may also have some comments after I check my crystal ball. Thanks and have a great day!! And please do not forget if you are looking for Lake Conroe real estate please call me!! Ron 03/17/2009

Do not forget about the First-time Home Buyer Tax Credit Take advantage of it today!!! Who: ••       First-time home buyers or anyone who has not owned a principal residence in 3 years previous to purchase Amount:  ••       $8,000 Tax Credit ••       Can be claimed on buyer's 2008 federal tax return using Form 5405 Purpose: ••       To encourage first-time home buyers to purchase; to reduce larger-than-normal inventories of homes for sale Provisions: ••       Must be a primary residence ••       Does not have to repay unless home is sold within three years of purchase ••       To earn full tax credit, income (adjusted gross) cannot exceed $75,000 single or $150,000 joint ••       Eligible Homes:  ••       All single family residences/condos/co-ops/townhomes Effective Date: ••       Jan.... 03/16/2009

We have a fair number of condos in my market area. Consequently I think about them often. If you are thinking about buy on here are some things put together by the National Association of Realtors that you should keep in mind. Storage. Some condos have storage lockers, but usually there are no attics or basements to store belongings. Outdoor space. Yards and outdoor areas are usually smaller in condos, so if you like to garden or entertain outdoors, this may not be a good fit. However, if you hate yard work, this may be the perfect option for you. Amenities. Many condo properties have swimming pools, fitness centers, and other facilities that would be very expensive in a single-family home. Maintenance. Many condos have on-site maintenance personnel to care for common areas, do repairs ... 03/10/2009

521 S Rivershire is a Great Family home in the family friendly neighborhood of Rivershire. This home features a large living area, Great Kitchen and Breakfast Room. Huge backyard, with nice landscaping, detached two car garage, 1/2 bath downstairs, and Formal Dining Room. Nice masterbedroom features huge walk-in closet and light and bright masterbath. Bedroom 2 and 3 are nice sized with great closets. 4th Bedroom is currently being used as office/playroom. Entire home is light and bright. Neighborhood is close to everything. This listing has recently been reduced to $135,900.  Please click on Address/Picture or contact Brenda King for more Information! Conroe Homes for Sale   03/09/2009

209 Lakeside Hills Dr. Look no further, this American Tradition Custom Home offers an open plan, formal dining, formal study, covered back porch, 3-car garage, wooded homesite, high ceilings, extensive millwork, all bedrooms are large, granite kitchen w/ oversized island, jennair appliances, wood floors, sprinkler system and so much more!  Low tax and HOA rate and no mud tax! This listing has recently been reduced to $379,000.  Please click on Address/Picture or contact Marion Franke for more Information! Conroe Homes for Sale 03/09/2009

We are all too painfully aware of the woes of the economy.  You cannot escape the ever-present topic every time you turn on the television, listen to the radio or surf the Net.  The reality of the economy however, is that we are all affected by what is happening.  Therefore, do you stick your head in the sand or do you engage in a different tactic like being creative? Of course real estate is not immune to the economic challenges out there.  We have seen lending tighten, appraisals tighten along with job losses and stock market crashes.  All of these factors have touched us in real estate in a very real way. When doing business with our Seller's, we have had to educate ourselves as REALTORS® and have really had to become local economists.  Knowing what is going on in your neck of the wo... 03/09/2009

Spring is here! The weather is fantastic! Taken together those two things mean it is time for spring cleanup work. What are some things that you can do cheaply that will enhance the value and look of your home? Consider these ten easy and worthwhile ideas. 1- Look at your front door. Does it need painting or possibly replacing? This one simple thing can make a huge difference in the look of your home. 2- Have you looked at your garage lately? Why not paint the walls, organize the clutter or paint the floor. Remember it is not a big storage room room but rather an addition to your home designed to garage your valuable vehicles. 3- Plant some seed or grass sprigs and add some color by planting some cheap annual flowers. This combined with a refurbished front door will make your home seem ... 03/06/2009

This Sunday, March 8th, I will be hosting an open house at 2505 Amy Lee Dr. in Conroe. This wonderful home is located in the Canyon Creek subdivision located off Longmire Rd. between North Loop 336 and FM 3083.  MLS number 39913947 at www.har.com This home features unrivaled versatility with the retreat area and floor plan this home offers. With high ceilings, an open floorplan, tile, carpet, metal accented travertine backsplash this home offers elegance in a family friendly home. The island kitchen will serve as the center piece for this entertainment friendly abode. The retreat area would serve a couple working from home couple great. This truly is the perfect home for all! So please when your are out and about this Sunday stop buy and say "HI". Have a great day!! Ron 03/06/2009

7468 Enchanted Stream is an amazing Acadian style home. This home is immaculate! Features designer finishes throughout. From the antique heart pine flooring to the Karastan carpeting, the 'Ann at Home' finishes, to the unique chandeliers.This home features Mahogany wood cabinetry in the formal living and keeping room. Granite countertops in the kitchen with a copper vegetable sink in the island. Screened back porch overlooks the 8 person spa and pool.The master bathroom features his and her seperate areas! This listing has recently been reduced to $699,900.  Please click on Address/Picture or contact Brenda King for more Information! Lake Conroe Luxury Homes 03/04/2009

The business of residential real estate is different every single day.  As an agent for over 30 years, I have experienced the cycle of a down market and of a market flooded with short sales and foreclosures.  I get calls everyday asking me what a short sale is and what an REO is!  I thought I would do a quick lesson on the two and why this is important to know for all future sellers and buyers. First of all a short sale occurs when a home owner finds themselves getting behind on their mortgage payments and don't know how they will catch up.  Rather than having their property go into foreclosure, another option is to see if your lender will consider doing a short sale.  Basically this means that the lender agrees to accept less than the total amount due on the mortgage note through a "sh... 03/04/2009

Guys seem to have lots of time for bonding with each other; golf, fishing, watching sports.  Sometimes it seems I have too little time for bonding with my sister friends. Well that changed this week-end - 5 of my sister friends and I went to see "Menopause, The Musical." The musical was a real hoot.  I highly recommend it if it ever comes to your area.  I believe they have several traveling companies. The jest of the show is 4 average women who are in menopause.  Their songs are oldies with the words changed to reflect symptoms of the dreaded change; My Guy became My Thighs, Tropical Heat Wave became Tropical Hot Flash and so on. I really felt bad for the men in the audience, I'm sure they thought at any moment there might be a riot.  I have never been to a play or musical where the aud... 03/03/2009

For these next four blogs I am going to show you data for each of the four MLS areas that make up Montgomery County. The data will cover 2007 and 2008. It will let you see the progression of the market over the last to years. I think you will find it interesting. Please note that the hotness ratio is pending sales as a percentage of active listings at the end of the month. It may be viewed as a perdicter of sales to come. SFR is single family residence. If you have any questions please send me an email. The numbers below are for MLS area 15 from the Houston Association of Realtors MLS system. It basically covers The Woodlands and its' environs west to the county line. A map of this MLS area may be viewed at www.har.com. Here's the data. 2007 Data Hotness Month SFR Average Median Active ... 03/02/2009

Myself and three other team members, Marion, Jacob and Christian all attended the recent KW Family Reunion in Orlando, Florida!  It was cold there!  The convention however was very warm and inviting!  Despite the economic struggles and bad news we hear constantly in the news, it was refreshing meeting other agents from all over the country who were there and had great attitudes. Even agents from Florida, California and Nevada where we have heard they are starving were saying they have found creative ways to keep their businesses going.  Goes to show you that it is attitude more than anything that allows each of us to either reach our potential or bury our heads in the sand. The keynote speaker was Clint Swindall who gave us a powerful lesson on being positive.  His catch phrase of, "Te... 03/02/2009

Normally I try and keep my blog posts restricted to real estate and credit related subjects. However today I just cannot do that. I believe we as a society have some of our leisure time priorities wrong. I am talking about sports. Now do not get me wrong I like sports. I have coached soccer, basketball and baseball. Golf and scuba diving are my two favorite sports and leisure time activities. Watching football and baseball are at times enjoying to me. However this year I think I am going to stop watching professional sports and attending some games. Why you ask. Well let me recite some numbers. 400+ million 100 million 200 million 45 million 54 million And the list goes on and on and on..... What are these numbers? Well first of all they are all dollars; U.S. dollars. They are not the T... 02/27/2009

"Go west young man" "Ask not what your country can do for you - ask what you can do for your country" "Walk softly but carry a big stick" These phrases have all been famous at some point in our country's history. Now we have a new famous catch phrase that may with us for a while. What is the new phrase you ask. 620 or BUST! That is correect. 620 or bust. 620 is now the lowest credit score that will be accepted for FHA loans. That is what we have been told. No more 580 and up. Those days are apparently gone. The new threshold is now 620. And remember if you want the best interest rate you had better be at 721 or above. Is it now worth it to spend between $995 and $1,495 in order to get your credit cleaned up and get the lowest interest rate and if you qualify as a first time home buyer g... 02/19/2009

Everyday is a new day with the economic stimulus package.  I think most of us are fairly confused by the whole thing are just sitting tight to see what really comes of it.  I am personally interested in the bill that is specific towards homebuyers with down payment assistance. On Jan. 15, the House Democratic leadership outlined an economic stimulus package ranging from health care issues to home buyer credits.  A credit for home buying could bring a relief to the lending markets and the real estate markets which would ultimately boost the national home sales woes. Looking closely at the stimulus package tucked away in the tax section was a significant improvement to July's congressional effort to stimulate home sales. This program offers a credit of up to $7,500 to purchasers who had n... 02/19/2009

Wahoo!!! I am so excited!! I am finally getting a wish that I have had for many years, something to cross off my Bucket List. We are going to Hawaii for a cruise of the Hawaiian Islands.  I know, poor us, what a problem to have.  Here's why I need your help.  If you have traveled to Hawaii and have favorite places to visit, I would love to hear about them.  There are so many things to see and do it would be nice to have some input from someone who has been there recently. We were there 20 years ago and I am sure things may have changed just a wee bit since then. This is our first big trip since the moose at the campsite fun in Yellowstone.  Diesel got so high we parked the RV for a while.  I almost feel guilty taking a trip with the economy in such a sad state, but if people didn't trav... 02/19/2009

Did you see the article in the business section of the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday entitled More Credit, but not for all? The author of the article was interviewing Nariman Behravesh, the chief economist of IHS Global Insight. IHS is a Lexington, Ma. based research firm. When asked if the current tight credit conditions would be easing Mr. Behravesh said yes he thought they would. However Mr. Behravesh was quick to point while that he felt mortgages, auto loans and other loans would become easier to get it would only be for those whose credit score is good. If your credit score is not good he was quick to say that credit will probably still not be available. What is a good credit score? I wish I could get a definitive answer to that question. We know that to get the best conventional... 02/12/2009

That title came from youtube, not from me! I would never assume that these drivers were women solely based on what happens... Yeah, I should stop talking. That's just been circulating around the office today and though I've seen some of these clips before, I still laugh pretty hard every time. I mean... why won't they just left off the gas! By "they" I mean the drivers... not women in general. Ok stopping again. Have a good weekend! Article by: Jacob Hebert 02/06/2009

Yesterday our Leadership Montgomery Class attended sessions all day long with directors from several Economic Councils in our county.  It was great to hear about the process of how our area attracts new businesses to Montgomery County.   Of course we all know this is a great place to live and work but to actually understand the entire process was very enlightening. J.R. Moore our county Tax Assessor shared a lot of interesting facts about tax abatements for companies and how they really work.  Many people misunderstand these tax incentives as our county government simply giving away money to bring companies here.  Upon learning more however, these tax abatements help these companies offset relocation costs but in the long run with the employees that they bring in along with housing nee... 02/06/2009