Not every short sale ends up at the closing table.  Many homes instead end up in foreclosure.  Often the reason is simple – the homeowner did not use the right professional to represent them.   Whether buying or selling a home, the best results come when you use the right people.  This is critically important for short sales.

The attorney or real estate agent who did a great job for you when you purchased your home are not necessarily the best choices if you are upside down in your house and need to do a short sale.  Skills needed for short sales are very different.

Short sales are arduous transactions requiring a tremendous amount of work and/or patience on the part of everyone involved.  The individual who negotiates with the bank is the person who achieves or loses the opportunity get the home sold.  It really is as basic as that.

If you are buying a home that’s a short sale, you also need a professional in short sale transactions.  There are special protections you must have that don’t exist in conventional transactions.

Sometimes a short sale is not the best idea for you whether you’re a buyer or a seller.  Without an expert’s advice, how can you analyze what’s best for you?  I have done several short sales successfully.  What I can tell you is that without the help of short sale professionals, I could not have achieved the success I did.  If you need the name of a short sale professional, just let me know.

STEVE HOCKSTEIN/SPECIAL TO THE RECORD

Did you ever believe you would live so close to one of the greatest cities in the world and see headlines like this:

Bear Just “Playing Through” NJ Suburbs

Well, this is what happened here in Tenafly this week, and in the surrounding towns. It doesn’t happen often, but it does happen occasionally that we see wild animals in this beautiful area we live in. The bear is a very unusual visitor, but in Tenafly, it is not uncommon to see deer, and many beautiful birds. You will even see wild turkey strolling through our green neighborhoods on occasion.

We don’t see the big fellows like that young bear very often for the simple fact that we are a community, and wild animals don’t like to get too close to people. But we do live in a place where we can connect with nature, and yet have the benefit of the city close by.

One of the truly great places to learn about all the natural beauty in our community is the Tenafly Nature Center. Stroll the paths, go birdwatching, or visit when they have family hikes organized. It is a great place to relax, and to really appreciate the beautiful world we live in.

By the way, the best thing you can do if you encounter a bear or any wild animal unexpectedly, is to remain calm, don’t run, don’t play dead, and don’t try to feed it.

It seems the bear was lost in Tenafly.   He should know that neighboring Bergenfield High School is the home of the bears!

The real estate market in Bergen County outperformed the national market.  According to the report released this morning by the National Association of Realtors (and which is making headlines throughout the news media), June pending contracts are down by 2.6% from where they were in May.  This is not true for Bergen County.

New Jersey MLS data shows that we had 844 homes going under contract in May and 848 in June.  Where you will see declines are in July and August but this is typical of what happens every summer.  The real estate market is still geared towards the school schedule.  If parents don’t register their children by mid August, their children will miss the first day of school in September.  As a result, parents can’t wait until July to find a home - it’s just too late.  For example, if you bought a home in Tenafly, you would need a minimum of 2 weeks to get your child registered today and 3 weeks is preferred.

Last year July had 139 fewer pendings but this year July is down by 101 so here too we’re doing better.  The bottom line is that real estate is always extremely local.  Despite today’s report from the NAR, the truth is that we’re doing all right.

Senior citizens get a lot of breaks in New Jersey; sometimes you don’t even have to be that senior.  Imagine my surprise when I went into the Englewood International House of Pancakes and learned that because I’d crossed the 50 year line I could get pancakes at a discount.  Frankly, being told I get a senior rate at the age of 50 was more than disconcerting!

Property taxes are a major reason why senior citizens sell their Bergen County homes.  The cost of ownership for people who are on a retirement income often becomes a burden they cannot handle.  When they bought their family home many years ago, they had a working income but without that now, it’s just too expensive even when the mortgage is paid off.

Property taxes are a big part of the problem because they often go up every year making it increasingly more dificult for senior homeowners to afford their home.  To help out, the State of New Jersey has a property tax freeze program for those seniors who qualify and the deadline to apply for this has been extended until August 2nd.

Just go to the State of New Jersey’s Property Tax Reimbursement website where you’ll find all the information.  This program, known as the Senior Freeze, stops property tax increases for those who qualify.  As in all things relating to your finances and taxes, I suggest that you contact your accountant for guidance.  You can also call your local Tax Assessor.  But one thing’s for sure – if you’re a senior citizen, you want to check this out before August!

Proximity to NYC,  great schools and a wonderful suburban lifestyle make buying a home in Bergen County, to quote Martha Stewart, a “good thing.”  Because Bergen County homes offer these advantages, buyers come here no matter the economy or housing market.  The Bergen County real estate market regularly outperforms all other counties in New Jersey and this is true today.

Taking a look at the market through May, we are significantly ahead of where we were last year.  In 2009 there were 2,011 sales and this year 2,536 for a gain of 525 units and a 26% improvement.  The average sales price decreased by 3% because more of the homes sold this year were less expensive than in 2009 but they sold quicker (5% fewer days on the market) and that’s positive.

These figures are from the New Jersey Multiple Listing Service and I have their graph here for you.

When June numbers are in, I expect this trend to continue.  The question is how much of this is due to the tax credit and to the demanding terms of jumbo loans.  With formidable down payment requirements, the jumbo loan has really put a damper on the market for more expensive houses along with the negative economy.  Very recently these demands have been relaxed and so we’ve seen a real pick up in such places as Englewood Cliffs, Franklin Lakes, Saddle River and Tenafly.   Based on both the NJMLS data and the activity we’re seeing in all of our offices, there is a significant improvement in the demand for Bergen County real estate so far this year.  I’ll continue to keep you updated throughout the year.

Does this look familiar? 

If it does, then you”re like many people who’ve bought an older, charming colonial home in Bergen County.  Along with the home (and especially if you bought it in towns with large inventories of charming colonial homes like Tenafly or Teaneck or Ridgewood) you got a red brick fireplace in the living room that you figured you’d fix in the future.  An article I read in Lowes “Creative Ideas” magazine recently showed how you can transform that old red brick quickly and affordably.   

Lowes has a special program for real estate agents which I’ve found to be a great help for my clients and myself.  Recently there was an article in “Creative Ideas” that solved this problem.  By resurfacing the existing red brick with a combination of tile and slate you create an amazing, beautiful effect immediately. 

This fireplace was an old, stained, red brick unit and then the Lowes team went to work  with a combination of tile and slate.  You can, of course, use other tile and stone materials but the change is certainly remarkable.  No structural renovations were needed to make this fireplace a modern showpiece.

If you’d like to get “Creative Ideas” you can go to http://www.Lowes.com or you can get in touch with me for the full real estate agent benefits program.  Lowes has many simple and affordable solutions to design problems for homeowners and they also have a lot of good tips for you too.

You don’t have to own a home in Tenafly to know what’s happening there – all you have to do is to go to the Borough of Tenafly website where you’ll discover that Tenafly is doing a revaluation right now.

Let’s say you’re thinking of buying a home in Englewood.  You see that many of the homes there are from the early 20th century so you’d like to know about the city’s history.  Just go to the City of Englewood website where you’ll find the Our History page that takes you from Englewood’s earliest days to the present.

The River Vale website is the place to go for local events – it’s always on their home page.   Park Ridge and Westwood does this too along with many other local communities.  You may find important changes on a town’s home page – this year Westwood began registering it’s various Recreation Department activities online; the announcement is on it’s home page right now.

Town websites are also a great help when you need a form.  For example, if you want to put up a fence on your property and you live in Cresskill, the fence permit form can be downloaded from the Cresskill Boro website Some towns like Tenafly actually have a step by step guide for you when it comes to getting a permit

Many community sites have portions of their building codes right on their websites.  Old Tappan has their entire borough code on line.

You may be amazed at how much information can be found on a town website.  If you’re thinking of buying a home or if you’re a Bergen County resident now, check out the borough website.  You’ll be glad you did.

While the real estate market in Bergen County has been recovering nicely since late last year, sales of high end homes had been one of the less robust parts of the market.  This was due in large part to mortgage financing which all but disappeared in 2008 and then was burdened with simply objectionable terms.

Jumbo loans and super jumbo loans were not only hard to get but their down payment requirements went through the roof.  If you wanted to purchase a $2 million house you had to come up with as much as a 50% down payment.  Requirements of 40-45% were standard for up to $2 million purchases.  This has now changed.

Today I can report to you that only a 20% down payment is required for $1-2 million homes and just a 25% down payment for a $2-3 million purchase.  Of course this assumes the buyer is qualified as to credit, assets, etc. 

This change bodes well for affluent buyers and the luxury home market.  With more liberal jumbo loan financing the market for high end luxury homes is now becoming more active.  According to the New Jersey MLS data, we have an 18% increase in the number of homes sold at $2 million or above for the first 4 months of this year.  Better mortgage loan terms for luxury home buyers is indeed positive for the Bergen County real estate market.

  Two towns in the Pascack Valley have come together as a team to offer their residents all options for summer day camp.  If you have a Hillsdale home or a River Vale home, you now have the choice of full or half day summer camp for your children.  Each town will accept the other’s children on an equal footing with their own residents which serves to share both town’s resources and fully answer’s homeowner needs.

  River Vale has a half day summer program and Hillsdale has a full day summer camp.  This is truly innovative because most homeowners are stuck with only one choice – whatever their town has to offer.  By sharing their resources, both Hillsdale and River Vale have given their families with children an unbeatable situation.  This is just another example of why our suburban lifestyle keeps  Bergen County homes  in high demand.  

  If you have a school aged child and need a summer camp placement, go to the Hillsdale website for full day and the River Vale website for half day placements.  Whether you’re looking at Hillsdale homes or River Vale homes you know you’ve got summer camp covered!

If you own a Bergen County home or anywhere else in the New York City area, the past few months were a challenge indeed.  Winter weather in Bergen County was very unusual this year.  We had multiple storms that wreaked havoc throughout the NYC area and Bergen County was right in the middle of things.     

One snow storm after another for weeks on end with even a full blown blizzard gave us over 30 inches of snow.  Once that melted then we had a series of rain storms culminating in a vicious nor’easter that came with winds at hurricane force toppling tree limbs and entire trees  knocking out power with such drenching rain that many local towns resembled lakes or raging rivers.  We had 7 inches of rain within 24 hours.  It was so bad that Berten County and 11 other counties in New Jersey were declared Federal Disaster Areas. 

Bergen County homes suffered with days of power outages, flooded basements, cars smashed by trees, 100 year old trees strewn across lawns like  toothpicks or thrown across a roof ripping it to shreds and impassable streets everywhere.  Because of this mess, the IRS has delayed tax day to May 11th from the traditional April 15th date.  So if you own a Bergen County home, you’re getting additional time to file your taxes from both the IRS and the State of New Jersey.  Of course you should consult with your tax preparer to make sure of things but tax day for Bergen County homes this year is May 11th.