By April 3rd, you will need to appeal your property tax if you do not agree with the assessment that was sent to you by the Pima County Assessor’s Office.  You should have received your notice of value for 2010 within the last few months. Remember that if you appealed last year, and as a result, your property tax went down, you will need to appeal again this year,  since last year’s lowering of taxes is frozen for another year.  If your assessment was lowered last year, appeal again since there is no doubt that the values went down all over Pima County. The telephone number for the Office of the Pima County Assessor’s office is 740-8630 – call if you misplaced your assessment and need the appeal form; you can mail or fax your appeal to 792-9825.  I have successfully appealed my taxes three times, and, unfortunately, will have to do it again since values have declined.  It is important to note that Arizona law calls for any lowering of assessment as a result of appeal will freeze the assessment for the following year and therefore be ready to appeal again next year, since the values have declined. The comparables they use for the tax year are a year or two behind so there should be declining values for tax year 2011. Keep in mind I am not an appraiser and I am only going by my personal experience and also informing my readers of what I have learned through phone calls with the Pima County Property Assessor’s office.

It truly is not difficult to appeal. You look on the internet at the Pima County Assessor’s site for neighbor’s homes assessed values that are homes similar to your’s and if they are assessed less, you site this in your appeal; also if your assessment was lowered last year you should also site this is a reason for your appeal, since the Assessor’s office is more than aware that the law works against you when you appeal and then in a following year  the values decline, and will keep this in mind when relooking at the 2010 value they sent you. When the not too foward-thinking law- makers made this law they never foresaw that values would decline. They should have known that in any real estate market that has a rapid ascend in values, there will later be a descend.

This Sunday from 1-4, I will be holding open my beautiful Sabino Mountain listing that is located at 4128 N Sunset Cliff Place. This beautiful almost 3,000 square foot home with heated pebble-tec pool is listed at 500K. Go to my website at www.DonnaAnderson.com for more details. This home is one of the prettiest ones in this price range. Sabino Mountain is a premier gated community minutes from Sabino Canyon.

Congratulations go to the Obama Administration  since they are working tirelessly to counter the challenging housing market! Pima County’s FHA limits are back up to $316,250! This translates into–one can buy a house for up to $327,000 with as little as 3.5% downpayment.  This will definitely assist the recovery and will bring out a lot more buyers! There are plenty of nice homes that will appeal to empty-nesters and first-time home buyers in this price range in the beautiful Tucson Foothills. Give me a call at 520-615-2598 if you would like to check out the housing market in beautiful Tucson.

Tucson luxury hotels will be be packed this week when many spectators will be coming to watch Tiger play at the Ritz-Carlton Golf Club on Dove Mountain, 20 minutes outside of Tucson. The winner will receive $1.35 million. Practice rounds start Monday-Feb 23rd and Match Play begins Wednesday-Feb 25th, with the championship match commencing on Sunday-March 1st. Although the Ritz-Carlton Hotel does not open until October there are plenty of ritzy hotels nearby–The Omni, the Westin LaPaloma, the Hilton El Conquistador, Ventana Canyon Resort, the Marriott Resort, to mention a few.

Some will be looking for Winter Residences. Prices have come down in the houses in adjacent Dove Mountain communities and start in the low $200,000s and go all the way up into the millions.

Welcome back Tiger!

In a sign of the times, the Tucson Board of Realtors, has an 18.2% drop in members from this year over last year. This is good for the industry since Buyers and Sellers will more likely have representation from full-time, experienced and more passionate real estate agents than ever before.

Since January 1, 2009 (the last 47 days) in the prime Foothills zip codes of 85718 and 85750 only 2 homes have sold (meaning closed escrow) between $500,000 – $600,000; 3 homes have sold between $600,000 – $700,000 and no homes have sold between $700,000 – $800,000; 2 have sold between $800,000 and $900,000 and 5 have sold for 1 million to 1.4 million. It should be noted that many more homes are under contract now, but we are experiencing a large number of fall -throughs, so it is best not to study those figures too closely now, except to say that there are no homes under contract between $796,000 and $994,000 .

 The main reason for this rapid slow down is it is a very challenging time to obtain jumbo loans (over 417K).  Interest rates are quite a bit higher than rates are for conforming loans; just a few years ago one could obtain a jumbo loan  for the same or almost the same interest rate as one could obtain on a mortgage of 417K or less. Many lenders are looking for 30% down or more, very high credit scores and very good work histories. The lenders are taking no risks. So the pendulum swings!  Lenders were much too lenient for years and now they are only accepting the “creme-de-la-creme”.

Obviously this is killing the move-up Foothills market. It is easier to sell a home priced a little over a million than one that is priced between $700,000 and 1 million! This is amazing and has never happened before! Of course, this is because those buying a home for over a million will either pay cash or put enough cash down to obtain a low mortgage.

Could this last? Unless Jumbo financing loosens up we will see a big glut of homes priced between $700,000 and 1 million. And it is no picnic for Sellers with homes priced from $500,000 to $700,000, either.  Great opportunities will be knocking for those move-up buyers or second-home buyers who can come up with a big downpayment, especially if they can get the mortgage amount down to $417,000.

Until early next week we will not know the total and factual details of the section of the Stimulus bill  pertaining to first-time home buyers’ tax credit.  This should be signed by President Obama on Monday. However, rumor has it that it will be a true 8K tax credit that will not have to be paid back (if you qualify) unless you sell the house within 3 years. Other rumor details include: It is not retroactive to 2008 and will only affect homes purchased this year (as a primary residence) until the end of November 2009. Also you must be a true “first time home buyer” and not be one who has just not owned a home in 3 years (unlike the present $7,500 tax credit that has to be paid back interest-free). Income limits are probably the same – 75K for single filers and 150K for married filers with some reduced credit for those with incomes up to 95K (single) and 170K (joint). If you do not owe 8K tax, you will get a check from the IRS for the difference.  Please remember these may not be the facts, but this is what is rumored to be in the new tax stimulus bill that was passed by Congress on Friday night.  I will update you with the factual details next week. This credit will stimulate the economy and bring out many first- time home buyers who will want to take advantage of the 8K tax credit.

I was watching an excerpt of the CEOS of the major financial institutions being interviewed by the Congress and one CEO said, “We need to embrace the new reality”.

 This reminded me that Sellers and Real Estate agents need to also embrace the new reality. What this means is that Sellers have to aggressively price their homes; bring them to as model-perfect condition as possible and pick an excellent realtor to represent them in their selling journey. As real estate agents we need to refuse to take listings that are not priced as well as, or optimally better priced than all the competition.  We need to keep abreast of the current market conditions which includes previewing all homes that come on the market that are in competition with the Sellers’ home and recommend price reductions based on the new information; call back all agents that show the house for feedback and  recommend changes if needed based on the agents comments; let all agents who have showed the home know when a price has been reduced or a minor improvement is made; encourage the Sellers to make the home as accessible as possible–all homes should be on keysafe; the home should be able to be shown with little notice; and the listing agent should not be required to accompany the buyer’s agent — are just a few of the ways to make access easy; and  all offers should be encouraged–even a low offer–it makes the buyers more interested in the house and perhaps even if the first offer is way too low, in time the buyers will come up to a more reasonable price.  The list of things a good agent should do for the Seller is extensive, but these recommendations are a few highlights that a real estate agent should do in the present market that is very much a Buyers’ Market. It is time we all embrace the “New Reality”.

Although there are 90 homes under contract in the prime Tucson Foothills zip codes of 85750 and 85718, only 52 of them have a list price of $379,000 and over.  Many of the lower- priced homes (under 379K) are condos.  Every price range is represented except the $800K – 1 million price range which only reveals one sale; this is quite unusual and maybe just an anomaly. This demands a close watch in the months to come and could mean that the typical  Foothills move-up market is pretty dead at the present time. There are 10 homes that are priced over 1 million that are under contract and 14 homes that are priced from 379K – 450K that have also joined the  successful sales ranks. Apparently the high-end buyers and the first-time home buyers are still very attracted to the Foothills.  First time home buyers usually find the number one attraction is the top-ranked schools, and the high-end buyers find the Foothills has a magnetic charm with remarkable beauty, fresh air, and fantastic climate that is affordable compared to Scottsdale, San Diego,  and Naples, etc. 

There were six homes that sold for over a million last month. One was a foreclosure located in The Gallery of Dove Mountain and had a final sales price of $1,111,125 for a 4,649 square foot house that was built in 2006. The other five included a 5,521 square foot home located in Sin Vacas that was built in 1983 and sold for $1,170,000; another one is a 2002 built Alta Vista 4,343 square foot home that sold for $1,175,000; I sold a 2003 built Sabino Mountain 3,923 square foot home for $1,250,000; a home sold for $1,382,000 that had 5,309 square feet and is new at La Reserve; and the most expensive January sale–$1,400,000– was located in the Catalina Foothills at 4341 E Paloma Drive that has 3,915 square feet and was built in 1993.