Pat Starnes' Snippets

Last week I wrote the premiere edition of Foreclosure Friday, a series of blog posts designed to discuss buying foreclosures. As a reminder, the tips in last week's issue were:

1. Arrange financing before beginning your search for a home.
2. Find a qualified agent to help you in your search for a foreclosure.
3. Foreclosures are usually sold "as is - where is" without any warranty or repair allowance.

Following is the process for buying a HUD foreclosure:

• When a property is first listed for sale through HUD, only owner-occupants can submit offers to purchase during  the initial "10 day bid period". An owner-occupant, quite simply, is someone buying the home with the INTENTION OF LIVING in the property as their primary residence.
• If no-one purchases the property during the initial 10-day bid process, the status for bids will be changed to "All Bidders". Once the initial bid period has expired, investors are then able to sumit offers to purchase.
• All bids must be in writing and submitted through a real estate brokerage approved to sell HUD homes. Individuals are not allowed to submit a bid on their own behalf.
• Earnest money must be presented at the time of submitting an offer to purchase. In HUD's case, the dollar amount is either $500 or 1% of the purchase price, whichever is greater. If your offer is not accepted, the earnest money IS RETURNED TO YOU.
• Closing typically takes between 30-45 days.

CURRENT MISSISSIPPI FORECLOSURES

Currently, there are 35 HUD homes within the city of Jackson for sale. The city of Brandon has four available HUD homes priced between $66,600 to $96,000, and Pearl has four homes ranging in price from $63,000 to $116,000.

A new listing in Ridgeland, at 613 Harvest Road, is in the 10-day bid period and available to owner-occupants only. It is priced at $131,000.

One home is listed in Florence, MS at 573 Eaglewood Drive. It is priced at $121,000 and is open to ALL bidders.

See all available HUD properties in MS by referring to the weekly Foreclosure Friday report.

Search MS VA Foreclosures

Search all Fannie Mae Foreclosures

Search Freddie Mac Foreclosures

If the prospect of searching through all the foreclosures on a daily or weekly basis seems overwhelming, let me do the searching for you. Send an e-mail or contact me by phone, TELL ME WHAT YOU ARE LOOKING FOR, and I'll do the searching for you. Or subscribe to my blog, Pat Starnes Snippets, where you will receive an e-mail each time a new blog post is written.

Until next time...

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Pat Starnes, a Realtor since 1988, specializes in Mississippi Residential Real Estate and can assist you with buying or selling in the Jackson MS Metro area.

Search all homes for sale in Brandon, Pearl, Flowood, Madison, Ridgeland, Florence, Bryam, or Jackson, MS.

Written and Published by Pat Starnes REALTOR

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The Jackson Association of Realtors released their new MLS system a couple of weeks ago. The program, List-It, is provided by Solid Earth, a real estate technology company based in Huntsville, Alabama.

Realtors have been experimenting with the new site since it went "live" on February 5th. As expected, the transition has been challenging, but the new MLS appears to be superior to the previous system and has some quality enhancements that should prove more user-friendly to Realtors and consumers alike.

For the consumer who wishes to search homes in the Metro Jackson area, the prospect can run MLS searches, save searches, set up automatic searches, etc.

A major improvement of our new system is that we no longer rely on zones or numbered areas to search for properties, Now we have the capability of searching by county or zip code. In the past, listings were occasionally entered in an incorrect area which made them harder to locate. Hopefully the search by zip code will be more efficient.

Another vast improvement is the new geo-mapping system. The previous MLS system had a map program that had not been revised in years.

My personal website provides access to the MLS. The address, PatStarnes.com, is easy to remember. Bookmark the site and keep it handy whenever you want to find homes in Brandon, Pearl, Madison, Ridgeland, or Flowood, MS. If you would rather have me search for you, contact me here.

After the learning curve is conquered, both JAR Realtors and consumers should be pleased with the new site.

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Pat Starnes, licensed since 1988, specializes in Residential Real Estate and can assist you with buying or selling in the Metro Jackson area. 

Search homes for sale in Brandon, Pearl, Flowood, Madison, Ridgeland, Florence, Bryam, or Jackson, MS.

Written and Published by Pat Starnes REALTOR