Orlando Real Estate News

Homebuyer Tax Credit Extended and Expanded Through April 2010

H.R. 3548 had been signed into law, extending the $8,000 homebuyer tax credit.  The bill also adds a credit for certain move-up buyers, changes income requirements, and limits a purchased home’s cost to $800,000.

While most details for first-time homebuyers mirror the rules currently in existence, the new law:

• Extends the $8,000 tax credit to homes under a sales contract by April 30, 2010;
• Expands to include a new $6,500 credit for owners of existing homes who are purchasing a new principal residence (an existing homeowner can claim the $6,500 tax credit if they lived in their principal residence for five consecutive years out of the last eight); and
• Raises income eligibility limits to claim the full credit for both groups of homebuyers to $125,000 for individuals and $225,000 for married couples (effective Dec. 1, 2009).

Orlando Real Estate Market Update November 2009

Sales by members of the Orlando Regional Realtor Association were up 79.64% in October 2009 over the same month of 2008.  Of the 2206 homes closed in Oct. 2009, 62.47% were either short sales or bank owned properties.  Year-to-date sales total 19,069, compared to 12,325 this time last year.  Pending sales at 9,050 are almost three times as many as there were in October of 2008.

The median price of all homes sold at $130,000 increased 4% from September 2009.  October 2009’s median price is a decrease of 25.99% compared to October 2008’s median price of $175,650.  Homes of all types spent an average of 98 days on the market before being sold in October 2009, and the average home sold for 94.10 percent of its listing price. In October 2008 those numbers were 110 and 93.09 percent, respectively.

2009 Seminole County High School Grades Down. What’s Up With That?

For the first time since the state of Florida starting handing out letter grades to public schools, no mainstream high school in Seminole County received an “A”.  The only exception was Crooms Academy, a technology magnet school.  How can this happen in a county known for its school superiority?  A county where all 12 twelve middle schools received an “A” for 2009?  A county where 35 out of 38 elementary schools received an “A” in 2009? 

 Is something wrong with the high schools?  The answer is no.  Something is, however, wrong with the state grading system.  The grading system docks schools a letter grade if their lowest perfoming students do not make adequate progress in reading.  This piece of the process was created to ensure the high performing schools do not ignore their weakest students.  What it does, however, is take resources away from high-perfoming students and directs them toward those that want them the least.  We are cannibalizing the education of our smartest kids.

Don’t be fooled by the “B” grades of the Seminole County high schools.  These are still some of the top-performing schools in the state.  See the 2009 school test scores ranked from top to bottom with school grades at http://www.buyerbroker.com/index.php/Schools/Orlando-Area-School-Test-Scores-Seminole-County.html.

Seminole County High Schools Make Newsweek List

Eight of Seminole County’s nine high schools made Newsweek’s 2009 list of the top 1,500 high schools in the country.  This list represents the top 5% of high schools in the U.S.  The only school not making the list was Hagerty High in Oviedo, which actually has the highest comprehensive test scores in Central Florida.  Hagerty just graduated its first senior class, so there was not enough data available to make the list.

The list is compiled using a relatively simple ratio, with the number of Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate and/or Cambridge tests taken by all students at a school in 2008 divided by the total number of students in the school.  The method has drawn much criticism arguing that basing a school’s merit on its magnitude of AP exams means little.

Orlando Real Estate Market Update April 2009

March numbers continue an upward trend, with 1,653 home sold in March 2009 compared with 1,120 in March 2008, an increase of 47.59%.  In addition,  Orlando Realtors filed 2,956 contracts pending in March 2009, an increase of 76.06% over March 2008.  There are currently twice as many total contracts pending as there were last year at this time.  Housing economists consider pending contracts to be a reliable indicator of future sales (duh!!).

The median price of all homes sold in Orlando in March was $137,000, down 37.74% from March 2008.  49% of those homes were bank-owned or “distressed” sales.  The median price for bank-owned homes was $95,000 in March, short-sales $143,000, and the median price of “normal” properties was $175,000.

Lower prices, record-low interest rates, vast selection, and the $8,000 tax credit are driving buyers back into the market.