Brian Leavitt

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Real Estate Broker/Owner - Keller Williams Bellevue - 1505
Real estate and mortgage advice, , thoughts, wisdom (or lack thereof), opinion, humor and general real estate and mortgage commentary. Based on more than 30 years of hard won experience and remember, "experience is what you get when you don't get what you want." Blog posts are published most weekdays or so, and are provided as a service of Northstone Real Estate Inc. and Northstone Mortgage. Your comments, questions, criticism, opinions, diatribes, etc are always welcome.
RECENT BLOG POSTS
Listed here, not necessarily in the order of highest priority, are the top 10 homeowner tax breaks for 2008: 1.  Mortgage insurance:  qualified borrowers can deduct the full amount of their private or government mortgage insurance if their mortgage was originated between 2.  Forgiveness of debt t...
03/05/2009
The Obama administration today spelled out details of a plan that would pay lenders to refinance or lower monthly payments on mortgages for homeowners who qualify.  This program is designed to help up to 9 million homeowners stay in their homes.  The plan is in response to the slump in home price...
03/04/2009
Apprently so, this morning's Northstone team meeting featured Wade Pennington of Inspection Services Northwest demonstrating and discussing thermographic imaging.  Wade showed how this technology can be used to reveal otherwise hidden defects in structures including water leaks, moisture damage, ...
03/03/2009
What does $1,371,013 per month get you?  How about a 16 bedroom 35 Bath 55,000 ft.² home on a 784,000 ft.² lot?  We've all heard it said, location, location, location, how about 1600 Pennsylvania Ave?  According to Zillow today's market value of the White House would be $284,576,000 or $1,336,989...
03/02/2009
Yesterday, I did a search of the MLS for every listed property within 1/2 mile of a listing I have in order to ask the other listing agents how their level of activity has been with showings and open houses and what their opinion is of the area market.  Of the 18 agents I emailed, 16 of them resp...
02/26/2009
Ken,  If you are out there, we just want to let you know that we have the skills and experience necessary to make buying your home a pleasant and stress free experience.  Having helped many high profile people like you, we have learned that the process is an art as well as a science.  Learning to...
02/25/2009
As lenders continue to retreat from losses, many mortgage programs are being rapidly modified or eliminated altogether.  What this means is the days of easy qualification for the minimum down buyer are numbered, at least for now.  As always, the pendulum swings, and these programs will be back ev...
02/24/2009
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Showing homes this weekend I was somewhat surprised when my client asked me "what really is wrong with the market"?  After a long thought I told him, perception.  This is a difficult time for many people but people are still moving.  They are still buying and selling homes.  They are still invest...
02/23/2009
So this article appears on MSNBC about shark attacks dropping and my first reaction was "of course shark attacks have dropped, there are fewer net branches in the mortgage business."  Then I realized they are talking about real sharks, the fish kind, the ones that EAT people.  Well wait a minute....
02/20/2009
This market, more so than most, continues to be a very price sensitive market.  One of my favorite agents, Dan Edwards, of Northstone Real Estate said it best recently when he said "it is no longer adequate to the priced competitively, your price must be compelling." The most common objection I g...
02/19/2009
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Brian Leavitt

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Real estate and mortgage advice, , thoughts, wisdom (or lack thereof), opinion, humor and general real estate and mortgage commentary. Based on more than 30 years of hard won experience and over 1000 homes sold. Blog posts are published most weekdays or so, and are provided as a service of Northstone Real Estate Inc. and Northstone Mortgage. Your comments, questions, criticism, opinions, diatribes, etc are always welcome.