Which Cities have the Greenest Homes?

In this day and age people all over the country are looking to green sustainable building to help, save on energy costs, protect our environment and cut down on city pollution. In some parts of the country it is easier to find these energy efficient and Eco-friendly homes than others. Recently the real estate brokerage Redfin ranked cities that have the greenest homes, basing its rankings on the number of homes for sale that boast green features—such as solar panels, LEED certification, and Energy Star appliances—as well as taking into account each city’s carbon-dioxide emissions ranking.

"The residents of these cities are reducing their environmental footprint and saving money at the same time" by lowering their monthly utility bills, says Julie Jacobson, a real estate agent with Redfin.

The following cities emerged on the top of the brokerage’s list for greenest cities for homes:

1. San Francisco,  California
2. Washington, D.C.
3. Sacramento, California
4. Boston, Massachusetts
5. Portland, Oregon
6. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
7. Phoenix, Arizona
8. Los Angles, California
9. Seattle, Washington
10. Austin, Texas

Source: “10 Cities With the Greenest Homes,” AOL Real Estate (April 19, 2013)

iDeal Realty & Managment

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

Phoenix Property Management

Phoenix Real Estate 

Save Money with CFL's and LED's

Have you ever wondered how much money you could actually save by using those CFL's or LED lights in your home? I mean can the slightly extra cost really pay for its self in the long run and how long do you really have to wait before you start to see the savings?

Well I am going to do a little bit of math for you to show you that CFL's and some LED lights are worth the switch and even the extra upfront cost in the long run but even in the short run they can be worth it. At the end I will explain my experience since switching from incandescent bulbs to LED's and CFL's.

First the math:

Lets say you have 15 light bulbs in you home that get used on average 6 hours per day. Lets also say that the current bulb uses 60 watts of electricity

15x60=900     900x6=5400

So in this example those 15 bulbs are using an average of 5400 watts of electricity per day or 5.4 kilowatt hours of electricity per day.

Now lets look at those same bulbs if they were CFL's most 60 watt equivalent CFL's use only 13watts

15x13=195     195x6=1170

So these new bulbs are using an average of 1170 watts of electricity per day or only 1.2 kilowatt hours of electricity per day.

Although the savings may not seem significant enough to be worth your trouble in switching lets look at how much that savings adds up to during a normal month. we will base it on a 30 day month.

5.4x30=162     1.2x30=36

Now you can start to see the savings in one month the incandescent bulbs are using 162 kilowatt hours of electricity, where as the CFL bulbs are only using 36 kilowatt hours of electricity. So you can see that regular bulbs use about 4.5 times as much electricity as CFL's

Now lets look at those same bulbs if they were LED's the newest and most energy efficient bulbs that are on the market today. LED's that are equivalent to a 60 watt bulb only use about 7 watts of electricity.

15x7=105     105x6=630     .6x30=18

So an LED bulb will only use about .6 kilowatt hours of electricity per day and for a month only use about 18 kilowatt hours of electricity which is about 10 times less than a standard bulb uses.

Now my experience:

I made the switch to all CFL's and LED's about a year and a half ago in my house I have a total of 45 light bulbs (I don't necessarily use all 45 in any given day but I switched them out all the same.) Since the switch I have managed to cut my electric bill down to an average of around 450 kilowatt hours/month during the the last 12 months. Before the switch I was averaging around 800 kilowatt hours per month during the same 12 month span. So just switching out light bulbs really can save you about 50% on your electric bill.

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

Phoenix Property Management

Housing Investors Buying Up Florida Real Estate

Florida is the next stop for investors that are looking to buy homes on the cheap, fix them up and rent them for some short term cash flow and hopefully net a pretty penny on resale in the next 5-7 years.

Created last year by private equity titan Blackstone Group, Invitation Homes has spent about $3.5 billion buying 20,000 houses in nine U.S. markets, including Southern California. It's a new business model emerging from the misery of the mortgage meltdown.

Blackstone and a handful of other firms believe prices fell too far in the hardest-hit markets. So they're racing to buy up the bargains, rent them for short-term profit and hold them for long-term price appreciation. These firms say they've invented a new investment strategy that also serves the public good by fueling the housing recovery and sprucing up homes.

The investors have played a major role in recent home-price surges in markets that are recovering. Southern California's median home price has jumped 21% over the last year, and Arizona's Phoenix Market has jumped up about 30%. In the process, financial firms — including Oaktree Capital Management, Colony Capital and the Alaska Permanent Fund (which manages that state's investments) — are rapidly staking claims as the new landlords of the suburbs.

On paper, the buy-and-hold calculus makes sense. The foreclosure crisis destroyed home values — but drove up rents, as repossessions created a new wave of rental demand from would-be owners with ruined credit. Fresh demand from young workers, a short supply of newly built rental units, and stricter mortgage requirements have also made the rental market competitive.

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

Phoenix Property Management

Home Builder Confidence Drops

Home builder confidence unexpectedly fell for a second month in March. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo index of builder confidence dropped 2 points to 44 this month. In a Bloomberg survey, the median forecast called for a gain to 47. Anything below 50 means many of the respondents said the conditions were poor. According to the report by the NAHB, the drop is due a decrease in the measure of current sales.

“In addition to tight credit and below-price appraisals, home building is beginning to suffer growth pains as the infrastructure that supports it tries to re-establish itself,” David Crowe, chief economist at the builders association, said in a statement.

The builders’ index compares with a reading of 28 in March 2012.

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

Phoenix Property Management

2013 List of the Most Expensive Rentals

The real estate website Trulia recently compiled a list of the most expensive rental properties currently available on the market. Surprisingly, only one property has enough square footage to qualify as a mansion. One of the biggest factors determining a few of the astronomical rents was simply location.

Top 10 Most Expensive Rental Properties

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

Phoenix Property Management

Most Young Consumers Want to Buy a Home, Survey Finds

Today, the vast majority of consumers between the ages of 25 and 44, comprising both millennials and those in Generation X, say that home ownership is at least somewhat important to them, according to a new survey from Prudential Real Estate. In all, 96 percent of all consumers feel this way. But 77 percent of those aged 25 to 34, and 78 percent of people between 35 and 44, say it's "very important." Further, 74 percent say that the current levels of affordability lent by historically low interest rates mean that now is a great time for them to buy a home.


In addition, 63 percent of those polled say they currently have a favorable view of the real estate market in general, and those in the younger generations were typically more enthusiastic about it than their older counterparts, the report said. Further, the number of people who contemplated getting into the market but did not buy or sell a property in the previous year was up 10 percent in the last six months of 2012 when compared with the end of the second quarter.

However, many consumers are still understandably cautious about wading into real estate even with all the improvements and good sentiments, the report said. In all, 62 percent say they're having more trouble getting financing from lenders than they would have faced prior to the downturn, and 72 percent want to have a trusted partner in their lender. It's believed that more buyers will continue entering the market in the next year at least, driven largely by interest rates and prices that have remained extremely low when compared with historical norms.

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

www.idealrealtyaz.com

Why You Might Want to Add More Photos to Your Listing

Selling a home is a lot of work, you have to find the right realtor, find the best marketing strategy, and make sure you listing gets published to the internet in as many places as possible. But do you take the time to make sure you have enough good pictures of your home?

Studies have shown that you could increase the sale price of you home by 3.9 percent simply by adding one picture. A new study of 4,000 homes evaluated by researchers Justin D. Benefield, Christopher L. Cain and Ken H. Johnson, shows that the more photos you add to you listing the more you stand to gain. Each photo could net the seller about $150 to $200, not bad for a little bit of extra work.

A good working ratio Johnson told The Wall Street Journal is to have a ratio of four to five interior shots of a home to every one exterior shot. Interior shots were found to have a bigger effect in increasing the sales price than exterior photos. Interior shots were found to increase the value 4 percent vs 1.9 percent increase from exterior shots.

Although the study shows that adding photos could increase the sale price of you home there is a bit of a catch 22 for some people. The same study found that adding photos to a listing increased the time that it takes to sell a home by 16.5 extra days. The reason Johnson suggests is that photos provide buyers with more information to consider and can slow the decision process.

iDeal Realty & Management

9051 W Kelton Lane, Suite 10

Peoria, Arizona 85382

(623) 201-3544

www.idealrealtyaz.com