Home buying thread

Blazin_sl said:

Zillow and Trulia make their revenues FROM realtors wth are you smoking

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Inform yourself, idiot.

NAR and realtor.com operator Move Inc. file suit against Zillow, Errol Samuelson
Redfin study: Trulia and Zillow lack listings and show out-of-date information
Realtors Push Back Against Zillow and MLS Listing Syndicators

Most of Zillow's revenue comes from consumer advertising. They make some via realtor/broker advertising, but I doubt that it's enough to offset the litigation/payments made to get super out of date MLS information.

My brother in law and his girlfriend, yes.. girlfriend, just closed on a house today. They make about 50-75% of what me and my wife make, live very lavishly, and bought a house that was over $300k. It's dated inside (very 70's, wood panelling walls, 90's style kitchen, carpet everywhere, MORE wood panelling), but has a humongous yard.

I am just sitting back and waiting for the complaints come in when they can't pay their bills. It makes absolutely zero sense to me. I tried telling them multiple times it was a bad idea, but everyone else was just egging them on and supporting them. Fuuuuck that.

What the hell happens to a house when a couple splits up too? I mean they aren't even engaged, how does that work?

Noodlemod_sl said:

What the hell happens to a house when a couple splits up too? I mean they aren't even engaged, how does that work?

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I don't know what the common law rule is. Under the civil law either owner in indivision can force a partition by licitation, which is a judicial sale of the property by the parish sheriff.

I think it's in both their names. I was just curious for myself.. let's say I have little faith in the two of them right now.

The image you posted doesn't backup what you're asserting. It does not delineate between revenue from consumers and from brokers.

Zillow's listings are still very out of date with limited sale data. So my original point stands: brokers still have a stranglehold on MLS information. And you act like zillow and brokers are just a big happy family now, but that's incorrect. Zillow had to sue the shit out of them to even get the business arrangement they have now.

Edit: I think you're confused because you don't realize just how much information is on the local MLS systems. Every sale, the moment it gets placed on market, as well as years, sometimes decades, of sale data. How long a property has been on the market, how many times it's been listed and at what price, etc. Of course the broker and appraiser lobby is fighting tooth and nail to keep that from consumers.

Zillow is completely full of shit when it comes to price estimates. To start with, their "data" said that my house had been sold for $200,000 less than the purchase amount on a date smack in the middle of my eight-year occupancy (never happened). I contacted them to correct it, and after 5 attempts at pointing them to the publicly-available tax commissioner's records they removed the sale point but didn't update their evaluation. When we ended up putting my house on the market we got all kinds of crap from prospective buyers because, "Zillow says your house is worth XX (30% less than any comp in my area) and you're listed at YY (priced favorably to comps)." Since then, their evaluation has oscillated all over the place. In the space of three months it went from 30% under my list price to 50% OVER my list price, back down, and back up again. From week to week it would jump by 15% in whatever direction. I have no idea what they're smoking over there.

tl;dr - Fuck Zillow in the ear

I'm not a big fan of "comps". I guess that works in areas where all the houses are built at the same exact time in a neighborhood and whoever you are selling to needs a 100% loan. I sold a house and the first people who wanted to buy it offered $40k less because their agent said the comps didn't support it. They didn't want to value the 40'x80' shop I had at all. I wound up selling it for more than my asking price and the person paid cash and gave it to a relative. The woman who bought it paid with a personal/small business check and she owned a small company that made sex toys. Her logo on it was a dildo. We drove down to the bank and they said it was good. Then off to the title company. Maybe 1 hour total.

I wonder if that woman is using the lock, stock and two smoking barrels method of basically stealing money with those checks.

Hell, look at his picture, he probably doesn't even have banks out there. He just meant his mattress.

Cad_sl said:

So escrow is a foreign and silly concept to you then?

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I was in a hurry to finish up and close. Offers were coming in multiple times a day. This was post Katrina and people were getting insurance payoffs and were buying houses left and right. She wanted to pay with a check and it was drawn on the same bank I use 5 minutes away.

Noodlemod_sl said:

My brother in law and his girlfriend, yes.. girlfriend, just closed on a house today. They make about 50-75% of what me and my wife make, live very lavishly, and bought a house that was over $300k. It's dated inside (very 70's, wood panelling walls, 90's style kitchen, carpet everywhere, MORE wood panelling), but has a humongous yard.

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If you are right about their income, it will bite them.

If you are not right about their income, it could be a smart move. Acreage gives the property value independent of the structure, and in a desirable developing area, the land could become valuable very fast.

Then again, if the house needs lots of renovation that they can't execute and there is less of a market for big lots requiring upkeep, they could be all sorts of fucked =p

I'm most definitely right about their income, in fact I probably make more than the two of them alone. But I have been silenced on this regard by their family, so I'm just sitting back and enjoying the ride.

Noodlemod_sl said:

I'm most definitely right about their income, in fact I probably make more than the two of them alone. But I have been silenced on this regard by their family, so I'm just sitting back and enjoying the ride.

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Do you know their downpayment? The guy could have had massive help from his parents and/or co-sign.

koljec_sl said:

If you are right about their income, it will bite them.

If you are not right about their income, it could be a smart move. Acreage gives the property value independent of the structure, and in a desirable developing area, the land could become valuable very fast.

Then again, if the house needs lots of renovation that they can't execute and there is less of a market for big lots requiring upkeep, they could be all sorts of fucked =p

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I've mentioned it in other threads, but a good friend of mine moves nearly every time he gets a promotion/raise. He says "I can qualify for more house now" and then always bitches he's broke all the time and I know he makes pretty well. He has a masters in nursing and is now in administration over the nurses at his hospital and his wife is a nurse practioner. But they can't scrape up $100 cash between them at times.

Borzak_sl said:

I've mentioned it in other threads, but a good friend of mine moves nearly every time he gets a promotion/raise. He says "I can qualify for more house now" and then always bitches he's broke all the time and I know he makes pretty well. He has a masters in nursing and is now in administration over the nurses at his hospital and his wife is a nurse practioner. But they can't scrape up $100 cash between them at times.

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This is just how the majority of Americans live. I have friends who make more than 90% of America and always complain about how they are just scraping by. When they make more they spend more, I used to be like that too, though never to the point where I felt strapped for cash.

Khane_sl said:

This is just how the majority of Americans live. I have friends who make more than 90% of America and always complain about how they are just scraping by. When they make more they spend more, I used to be like that too, though never to the point where I felt strapped for cash.

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If you asked my close friends what I make you would get answers probably close to 3-4x what I actually make because I don't spend it like they do. Plus I don' thave kids which of course is a big money saver, but the friend mentioned above took out a loan weeks after signing on his new house at the country club for $16k to put in a invisible dog fence that took them less than a day to put in.

Friends think I am odd because I mention 20% down is a good thing in case the economy goes to total crap you can at least sell it even if you take a loss. The early 80's petrochemical downturn which took a decade to really get up and running again stuck with me hard even tho I was only a teenager at the time.

Since I get off on Fridays at 11 now I had some appointments to see houses this afternoon and two of them called after the appointment time to tell me they weren't coming with no other explanation.

I guess things are going very well housing wise here so they really don't have to work that hard. The town had 750 people in it 10 years ago and now has 12k according to the paperwork the chamber of commerce gave me which was close to the census data,and the adjoining communities are similar. The city limits also butt up against a metro area of the 7th largest city population wise.