SCORE – Counselors to America’s Small Business

I’m in Oakland, California today for a presentation to the East Bay chapter of SCORE. Score is an organization of active and retired business executives and small business owners from a wide range of businesses.

SCORE is over 40 years old and has over 10,500 counselors nationwide who provide personalized, confidential counseling. Areas of expertise in the East Bay include:

• Business Planning
• Marketing
• Retail
• Finance
• Strategic Planning
• Succession Planning
• Manufacturing
• Export & Import
• Operations

Regularly scheduled workshops include:

• Starting & Managing Your Small Business
• Export/Import Workshops
• Writing an Effective Business Plan
• The Financial Plan
• The Marketing Plan
• Legal & Insurance Aspects
• Opening a Restaurant
• Retail Basics
• Home Based Business
• Secrets to Buying a Franchise

This mornings meeting was attended by 25 SCORE counselors from around the East Bay. My presentation was on Internet marketing for small businesses.

East Bay Real Estate Market in 3 Easy Pictures

For those more visually oriented, we offer this quick assessment of the real estate market in California's East Bay.

It's a great time to buy real estate in the East Bay! Contact Craig (925) 984-4910

Thanks to Transparent Real Estate for the inspiration.

Home ownership in the East Bay is sky-rocketing as renters become owners.

Of course, every taxpayer in America is now a home owner - so to speak. With the bail-out of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Come April 15, 2009 – maybe all of us will get property deeds along with our tax bills for bailing out the all the financial institutions that were willing to ignore common sense and basic business and financial principles to make a buck.

Part of the costs American taxpayers will be bearing will be the legal bills for some of the big boys facing litigation – and – don’t forget the golden parachutes of some of those same big boys that created this mess.

AMERICA – where else can you lie, cheat and steal, stick the taxpayers with the bill, and ride off into the sunset with a personal fortune??

Is there anyone, besides me, wondering about the Sanity Index in Washington, D.C.???

Affordable Housing for First-time Buyers

Now is the time for parents to help their children buy their first East Bay home. The meltdown on Wall Street coupled with foreclosures, dropping home values and tightened credit are creating a “perfect storm” of opportunity for parents with solid credit.

Who the heck knows what will happen next week, but right now with mortgage rates plummeting, great home deals at an all-time high, and banks desperate for cash and rock-solid loans – it’s time to strike!

The challenges for first-time buyers in the Bay Area are considerable. Many turn to their parents for help in buying their first home. There has not been a better time for parents to help their children buy their first home in the East Bay.

The media is doing a great job in scaring the hell out of people and that is helping to create this window of opportunity. The general public sees the Wall Street meltdown as one more reason to wait, but the havoc on Wall Street is what is causing mortgage rates to drop.

The foreclosure rate actually dropped in August. We could very well be seeing the greatest opportunity to steal a home deal for a long, long time.

Not everyone is in a panic. Investors are flocking back into real estate. Contact Paul (925) 963–4246 f you want to buy a home in the East Bay.

East Bay Russian Roulette Home Sales

East Bay home owners continue to gamble and lose more money on the sale of their homes than many U.S. citizens earn in a year.

Sellers refusing to face the reality of a housing market that is continuing to settle and a lending and mortgage industry that is experiencing weekly kaleidoscopic change are losing tens of thousands of dollars chasing the market down.

Without a doubt, our biggest challenge these days is trying to get sellers to face the reality of their local real estate market. Over 90% of the sellers we talk to want to over price their home for existing market conditions.

Sellers are holding on to their wishful thinking that there is that one “magic buyer” that will appear, fall in love with their home and pay more than market value to own the seller’s dream home. In most life situations 2 out of 3 isn’t bad, but with  dreaming sellers – it’s 3 out of 3 or hit the road Jack.

Mortgage Industry Continues to Change

WASHINGTON — U.S. federal regulators, in a dramatic move highlighting the
tenuous state of global credit markets, outlined a takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac on Sunday morning, including giving control of the firms to their regulator and allowing the Treasury Department to purchase billions of dollars of the firms' senior preferred stock.

What’s this mean to YOU the local home buyer/seller? According to Dan Green of The Mortgage Reports – As of today, mortgage debt is government debt and by the transitive property of risk premiums, mortgage debt is now risk-free.  Therefore, conforming mortgage rates are down.

Wall Street Journal – The government takeover of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac likely will help ease mortgage rates for home buyers, say economists, home builders and housing experts. But it won't cure the housing markets biggest ailments: falling home prices and rising foreclosures.

Are there any glimmers of hope? The National Association of Realtors said on Tuesday that pending home sales dropped again in July, dashing expectations of a continuing rebound after positive results in June. And prices of existing homes fell 7.1% in July.