Real Estate Directory

MyHouseDeals.com Grants Free Access to All Property Listings

In a bold move, MyHouseDeals.com makes its property listings available for free to all real estate investors; previously, listings were only available for a monthly fee

HOUSTON, Jan. 13, 2010 -- MyHouseDeals.com went live with a radically different website and business model in early January. There were dozens of changes, but visitors will most likely notice that the listings are now free to view instead of $39.80 per month as they had been.

When asked why MyHouseDeals.com moved from a paid access to a free access model, Doug Smith, president of MyHouseDeals.com, responded, "Our primary goal is to maximize the number of investors who view - and profit from
- our listings."

Mr. Smith continued, "While hundreds of investors have profited from our site in the past, thousands have missed out. The main reason is that they were unwilling to submit their billing information to an unfamiliar website. This huge barrier has been removed, and we now gladly welcome the skeptics.

"We also think now is the perfect time to remove that barrier. 2010 provides an ideal buying opportunity for real estate investors. Homes are highly undervalued and interest rates are at historical lows. So we want to equip as many investors as possible with the listings they need to buy now."

But Mr. Smith doesn't see investors as the only ones who benefit from this change. "Most of the sellers on our site are motivated to sell quickly due to financial problems caused by the recession. Serious buyers are harder to come by these days, so they need all the exposure they can get.
Making the listings free should double or even triple that exposure."

If things go as planned, MyHouseDeals.com also stands to gain. "We believe that the free listings will generate an enormous buzz amongst real estate investors. And this buzz should dramatically increase traffic." And according to Mr.
Smith, that increased traffic can lead to substantial revenues.

"Once investors are involved on the site and profiting from our free listings, we're confident that a substantial number will upgrade to our Premium service, which gives them unrestricted access to all deals. Plus, they'll gain access to the deals fourteen days early, which gives them a huge leg up."

Just a few days after going live with the free listings, MyHouseDeals.com is already seeing a positive impact. Prior to the change, their data showed that only 36% of visitors remained on the site for an extended period of time. Based on data from the new site, an average of 65% of visitors are staying, an 81% improvement over prior performance. These figures bode well for visitors returning to the new site on a regular basis and generating the desired buzz.

When asked if he had any concerns about granting free access to the listings, Mr. Smith responded, "I think it's normal to have concerns or to second-guess oneself. But at the end of the day, it can't hurt to be in alignment with the mantra of Internet pioneers: 'Information wants to be free.'"

To gain free access to the listings, just go to MyHouseDeals.com, click into your city, and create a free account.

About MyHouseDeals.com:

MyHouseDeals.com provides a listing of discounted investment property in fifteen of the nation's largest metro areas.
Residential real estate investors use the site to purchase properties at up to 50% off fair market value. Since its inception in 2005, MyHouseDeals.com has provided information on 42,700 bargain-priced properties containing $2.7 billion in total equity.

Contact:

Alex Soares, business manager
MyHouseDeals.com
(713) 942-0703
http://www.myhousedeals.com

How the Daily News Stole the Empire State Building

In one of the biggest heists in American history, the Daily News "stole" the $2 billion Empire State Building. And it wasn't that hard. The News swiped the 102-story Art Deco skyscraper by drawing up a batch of bogus documents, making a fake notary stamp and filing paperwork with the city to transfer the deed to the property. more

Now is a Great Time to Buy!

DO you think property will ever go up?

If you do then now is a great time to buy as bargains are everywhere:

Almost one-third of U.S. homeowners who bought in the last five years now owe more on their mortgages than their properties are worth, according to Zillow.com, an Internet provider of home valuations.

Do You Remember Your Childhood Dreams?

Randy Pausch Last Lecture: Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

Randy Pausch past away today of complications from pancreatic cancer at age 47. Randy recently became famous for his "Last Lecture" when he talked to his students at Carnegie-Mellon after he learned that he only had months to live.He was diagnosed with incurable pancreatic cancer in September 2006. He gained world wide fame thru this Last Lecture. He appeared on Oprah and this video spread across the web as a lesson to achieve your dreams and enable the dreams of others.

Tony Robbins has asked that at the end of your days will you look back on a life well lived or a life of regret? Mr. Pausch does not look for sympathy here but he looks to inspire us to take action on our lives. To live.

Watch this and be inspired.

Forbes’ best-places-to-buy real estate

10 cities that topped Forbes’ best-places-to-buy real estate list:

1. Houston
2. Austin, Texas
3. St. Louis
4. Philadelphia
5. San Antonio, Texas
6. Dallas
7. Charlotte, N.C.
8. San Francisco
9. Jacksonville, Fla.
10. Atlanta

Trump Breaks Mansion Record

Trump sells his mansion and breaks the record.

"I love breaking records," Trump said Wednesday, "and this is a record."

It's believed to be the most expensive single-family home ever sold in the United States.In true the Donald fashion he said: "At the same time, I believe the buyer made an absolutely fantastic deal, and time will prove this right," 

The mansion, at 515 N. County Road, was sold to an entity known as County Road Property LLC.  Apparently the dung business is good. Russian fertilizer billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev acknowledged last month that he is the buyer.

Best Housing Deals Since 2004

Homes are biggest bargain since 2004

(CNNMoney.com) -- With prices crashing around the nation, home price affordability has improved dramatically in many U.S. cities.

As a result, 53.8% of all new and existing homes sold nationwide during the first three months of 2008 were affordable to families earning the median household income of $61,500, according to the latest Housing Opportunity Index released Tuesday by Wells Fargo and the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).

That's up from 44% during the first three months of 2007 with home prices the most affordable they've been since the three month period that ended June 30, 2004.

"Three factors combined to substantially increase housing affordability," said NAHB president, Sandy Dunn, in a press release accompanying the report. "Mortgage rates returning to near the record low levels of a few years ago, a $2,500 rise in family income nationwide (from 2007 to 2008) and lower house prices."

California has been particularly hard hit by a liquidity squeeze in jumbo loan markets. These mortgages of greater than the $417,000 cap limit that Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae imposed (now temporarily raised to $729,250) are especially important to high-priced markets.

"Jumbo markets had essentially shut down, " said Seiders, "and many California markets depend on jumbo loans." These are getting a little easier to find but they still cost a full 1 to 1.5 percentage points higher than other loans.

That has helped make Los Angeles, the least affordable metro area in the United States, more affordable than last year. But still, despite much lower home prices, to a median $412,000 from $525,000, only a little more than 10% of homes sold during the first quarter of 2008 were priced low enough so that households earning the median income of $59,800 in the area could buy.

That, however, is a change from a year ago when only 3% of Los Angeles area homes sold were affordable to the average Joe.

The affordability improvement was even greater for Santa Ana in Orange County, Calif. Helped by a median price drop to $470,000 from $610,000 a year ago there, 17.4% of homes sold were affordable, up from 4.4% during the first three months of 2007.

In San Diego, home affordability rose to 25.2% from 9.4% as prices dropped to $368,000 from $460,000; in Riverside Calif. affordability went to 26.9% from 9.7% as prices fell to $288,000 from $380,000; and in Stockton, Calif., it soared to 35.5% from 9.7% as prices cratered to $262,000 from 390,000.

The least affordable big city outside California was the New York metro area. There, nearly flat prices - $490,000 this year compared with $500,000 last, led to an increase in affordability to 12.5% this year. Still, that's better than a year ago, when only 6% of homes sold were affordable. New York is the second least affordable area according to this survey..

HawaiiLife.com Welcomes New Broker

HawaiiLife.com opened it's first office in Kapaa, Hawaii at the end of May. . The office will serve the entire island of Kauai.

We welcome aboard our new broker, Matt Beall (R),(formerly of Century21), along with some new agents. The move brings multiple millions of dollars of listings to HawaiiLIfe.com and will allow us to leverage Hawaii's #1 real estate website to market our new inventory.Plans to open up offices on the island of the Big Island, Maui and Oahu are in the works.

Don't Bury The Economy Just Yet

The economy grew 0.6 percent last quarter. Technically meaning we are not in recession. Like the engine that could, this economy is not giving up without a fight, despite raising food and gas prices. Not to mention housing and credit.

"The economy is weak but not collapsing," said Lynn Reaser, chief economist at Bank of America's Investment Strategies Group. "A recession can't be ruled out, although the stars are not lined up at this point to definitively say one way or the other."

Taxing the Internet

NY City approved a new Internet tax for reatailers that could have sweeping ramification across the Internet. The justification was for brick and mortar businesses who argued that many people will shop "live" and then go online and buy it cheaper without tax.

Taxes tend to spread virally. Until now a taboo subject, most municiplaities were afraid to be the first to break with the "free" internet. However, with a dragging exonomy the net will no doubt be in the scope of many States and Cities.