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The
Offer: There's More
To It Than Just The Price
Fixating
on price in real estate may cost you the deal:
Sellers who decide that a specific dollar
figure will buy their home and won't budge from
that bottom line may sell themselves short.
Buyers who drop out of a transaction for a
property they love because the seller's
counter-offer shocks them may be quitting before
they have really started negotiating.
When a buyer makes an offer to purchase a
house, condominium unit or commercial property,
the purchase price is a prime consideration, but
it represents only part of the total value
offered to the seller. Problems may arise for
both sides
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of
the transaction when this fact is
forgotten.
The value expressed in a buyer's
offer to purchase, or in a seller's offer
to sell, involves 5 key elements -- a
financial package:
Purchase Price, the stated amount of
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Thinking of
buying or selling property in the
Northern Neck?
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Taxpayers
Seeking
Homebuyer Tax Credits, Refunds Must File Paper
Homeowners
filing for the home buyer tax credit are not allowed
to use electronic filing and must file hard copies
due to special documentation requirements.
Earlier this year, the Internal Revenue Service
(IRS) deployed new home buyer tax credit forms and
instructions requiring forms that will force
taxpayers to file on paper, rather than
electronically.
The new home buyer tax credit filing rules are
to ward off a repeat of 90,000 taxpayers who
fraudulently claimed the credit, according to the
U.S. Treasury.
Under the new and expanded home buyer tax
credit rule , the credit is worth up to $8,000 for
first-time home buyers and up to $6,500 for
qualifying existing home buyers, in both cases, who
buy a primary residence or have one built.
The tax credit is refundable. A credit
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Buyers: Why
Green is Worth It
For
new and existing home buyers alike, the options to
"green up" homes abound.
Green upgrades on homes offer two-fold
benefits. They contribute to a healthier environment,
both now and in the future, and they can save
homeowners big when it comes to energy costs.
How much impact does a green home have on the
environment, you ask? The government reports that
Energy Star qualified homes built in 2009 are the
equivalent of:
Eliminating emissions from 51,645 vehicles
Savings 312,399,672 lbs of coals
Planting 85,372 acres of trees, and
Saving in the environment 612,678,574 pounds of
CO2.
Many homebuyers shy away from green
construction and green upgrades because of the
upfront cost. But while some estimates have put
the construction cost difference at 17 percent,
recent estimates from The World Business Council for
Sustainable Development put the cost of green
construction only 5 percent higher than traditional.
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Easy Interior
Design
With
all the time you've been forced indoors during the cold
winter months you've probably found some aspects of your
interior design that you'd like to change. Well, there's
still another month of cold weather ahead of most of us, and
being stuck indoors may provide the perfect excuse for
making some much-needed changes to your interior design.
Interior design professional Emmy Spreng has a wealth
of cheap and easy tips for improving the interior design of
your home. This week she'll walk us through color and
layout, and next week she'll offer some guidance on lighting
and
Daily News and Advice
Read about the events shaping the
Real Estate market today, find current interest
rates, or browse the extensive library of advice and
how-to articles written by some of the top experts
in Real Estate. Updated each weekday.
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