Supposedly to be in line with recent judicial case law, the New York State Department of Taxation and Finance has reversed its previous position and now declares that the sale of Title Abstracts are subject to sales tax in New York. This new ruling will take effect September 1, 2010. The memorandum issued by the…
So Congress finally got its act together and passed a bill extending the closing deadline for claiming the federal home buyer tax credit for real estate purchases until September 30, 2010. The extension will be retroactive so that the thousands of buyers and sellers who have been mired down by short sales or the lengthy…
So I have been playing around with a new feature added to Property Shark: Deep Owner Search. You can type in a person’s name, a corporation name or an address and see what properties are associated with that information. From there, you can also search that person’s associates and so forth. Since I have practiced…
On Friday, January 15, 2010, HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan issued a press release, as part of HUD’s Neighborhood Stabilization initiative, temporarily waiving FHA’s 90 Day Seasoning Rule. Amazingly, HUD is cognizant that the seasoning guideline is having a negative impact on alleviating the problem of abandoned and blighted homes: “In today’s market, FHA research finds…
Inman columnist Bernice Ross posted an excellent article, in response to a Seller’s question, on what to do if your buyer is $5,000 short for the deal. As a New York real estate lawyer, I wanted to add my two cents as to a rather innovative way to close that gap. New York is one…
CNN recently posted a video on their website detailing the “shocking” story of a woman who paid her mortgage but whose home is being foreclosed upon, jumping on the fraud bandwagon and telling the stories of homeowners preyed upon by the real estate & banking industry. The video leaves out more than it tells, in…
I blogged last week about FHA's new plan to allow prospective purchasers to monetize the first time Home Buyer's $8,000 tax credit and use it as a down payment on the purchase of a home. The Secretary of HUD made statements at a NARS meeting about the revolutionary plan and HUD drafted a Mortgagee Letter…
