Knowledgebase
All of Think Realty's extensive content archive is at your fingertips. Filter by media type and keyword to hone in on exactly what you need.
Knowledgebase
All of Think Realty's extensive content archive is at your fingertips. Filter by media type and keyword to hone in on exactly what you need.
How Recent Tax Proposals May Affect Marketplace Investors Part 1 of 2 Part Series
The commercial real estate industry, in which many online marketplace investors participate, remained largely unscathed by the recent House proposal of changes to the Internal Revenue Code. Investors may actually benefit from some of the proposals, and changes to the individual mortgage interest deduction and other changes may end up ...
Homeownership Rates Rise Slightly in Mid-2017
Homeownership rates are slowly crawling upward. But fewer than two-thirds of the nation’s households owned their own homes at the end of Q3 2017 according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Rates climbed slightly between the second and third quarters of this year, from 63.7 percent at the end of June ...
MIT’s First “Smart” Country Test
A small country in Europe has become a living laboratory for MIT researchers working on what they call “urban innovation.” They are collaborating with city planners, residents, and local companies to interactively test the effects of urban planning decisions and new technologies like driverless cars and ultra-lightweight, three-wheeled autonomous vehicles ...
This Paint Color Could Add Thousands to Your Selling Price
If you’re feeling a little blue this holiday season, that could be great news for your home values. According to Zillow’s 2017 Paint Color Analysis the right shade of blue in your bathroom could add more than $5,000 to your sales price, while light blue kitchens and bedrooms net sellers ...
5 Fastest-Growing Cities in America
Two Texas cities dominated WalletHub’s most recent list of “fastest-growing cities in America,” and cities in Florida, Idaho, and Washington state made the list as well. Before you pack up your bags, your bandit signs, and your investment capital and head south or west, take a moment to read the ...
HOA Liens Create Huge Stumbling Blocks
Homeowners Associations (HOA) can be a great thing for a neighborhood. These associations charge monthly or annual fees and, in return, perform certain maintenance-related duties. To include caring for neighborhood amenities, and work with the homeowners in the neighborhood to keep all properties looking well-kept and, to varying degrees, consistent ...
Distressed Sales Share Drops to 10-Year Low
ATTOM Data Solutions released its Q3 2017 U.S. Home Sales Report shows that distressed home sales — including bank-owned (REO) sales, third-party foreclosure auction sales, and short sales which accounted for 12.5 percent of all home sales in Q3 2017, down from 13.5 percent in the previous quarter and down ...
Top 3 Lighting Preferences for Homeowners in 2017
As the year winds to a close and lighting begins to take on a bit of a holiday tone, lighting manufacturer Legrand has released its annual lighting product survey. Legrand asked more than 2,200 U.S. adults about their lighting preferences and noted that 1,563 of those surveyed were homeowners. Real ...
Scorching Seattle Housing Market Draws Tech Population
Savvy real estate investors know that broken-down buildings can hide diamonds in the rough. This has never been truer than in a “hot” market like Seattle, Washington. A 1901 home with no bedrooms in Seattle’s Ballard neighborhood was recently listed at $595,000, and local real estate professionals predict that the ...
Think Realty Welcomes Linda Liberatore to Resident Expert Team
Linda Liberatore, challenge-seeker, mother, teacher, and founder and president of Secure Pay One Inc., is the newest addition to the Resident Experts at Think Realty. “I’m so passionate about helping other people and when I realized that I could combine real estate with that passion, I really felt like I ...
Think Realty Magazine November 2017
+ WHAT'S INSIDE Think Realty | Where We’re Thinking Realty • Think Realty Honors Finalists Coaches Corner | Fostering Entrepreneurial Spirit and Community • Think Realty Course Reviews • Please Help Me! I’m Stuck Cover Feature | Real Estate, Not Rocket Science Up Close & Personal | One-on-One with the ...
Serial Squatters are a Nightmare for Landlords
A couple who appeared to be the perfect potential tenants have turned out to be nightmare renters. They’ve taken more than one North Texas landlord for a ride. In their most recent escapade, they moved into a home, bounced their first rent check, and then proceeded to drag the eviction ...
How to Become an Accredited Investor
Summary: Understanding the purpose of the accredited investor designation is important for you and your investing business. This article walks through how to determine if you’re an accredited investor, your net worth’s contribution to investor accreditation, and how you can still invest in private placements if you are not yet ...
Wildfire Devastation: How Tiny Houses Could Help
When multiple wildfires swept across California, burning hundreds of thousands of acres and destroying thousands of homes in the process, California’s housing crisis became immediately worse. While homeowners are still sorting through the wreckage and real estate investors are taking to the streets in hopes of helping homeowners who wish ...
Vacant “Zombie” Pre-Foreclosures Down
ATTOM Data Solutions released its 2017 U.S. Residential Vacant Property and Zombie Foreclosure Report, which shows nearly 1.4 million (1,367,793) U.S. residential properties (1 to 4 units) were vacant as of the end of the third quarter of 2017 — representing 1.58 percent of all U.S. residential properties. The 1.58 ...
3 Tough Truths About Real Estate Asset Protection
Ask any real estate investor what asset class is the safest for their capital investments, and the odds are pretty good that you’re going to hear the same answer time and again: Real estate, of course! Unfortunately, even the most dedicated and diligent real estate investors tend to make a ...
Pop-Up Shops: A Vital Commercial Tenant
Derelict and distressed properties can lead to the downward spiral in property value for residential neighborhoods. When it comes to the commercial side of real estate investing, empty retail space can easily detract from the location or the buildings’ allure to businesses seeking a commercial location. Pop-up shops can make ...
3 Actions to Start Self-Directing Your Retirement
“Most financial advisors will tell you that you simply cannot have a better lifestyle in retirement than you did while you were working full time. Most financial advisors are wrong.” So began Edwin Kelly, CEO of Specialized IRA Services, in his 60-minute training session at the 2017 Think Realty National ...
Tools for Property Management Mean Profit Growth
“We are an instant society,” Linda Liberatore, founder and president of SecurePayOne, started out in her presentation on saving hundreds of dollars each month by making simple adjustments to your property management strategies. “Did you ever see [the way people act] when they do not have internet?” she continued; “They ...
The Importance of Transparency in Passive Investing
When it comes to transparency in real estate, it seems like everyone boasts how they offer it, but few people are able to fully deliver on their promises. After all, just as chefs have their “secret sauces” and search engines have their “proprietary algorithms,” real estate investors who provide investment ...
California Settles with Mortgage Servicer Over Alleged Misconduct
After a long and drawn-out battle with the state of California, Ocwen Financial Corporation has finally reached a settlement with California’s Department of Business Oversight (DBO). Ocwen agreed to pay nearly $25 million to the state as well as providing nearly $200 million in debt forgiveness through loan modifications made ...
Rent Control Breeds Crime – MIT Research Study
MIT researchers are adding to the debate on rent control with a new paper on the relationship between rent control and crime. While many people feel rent control keeps people off the streets and away from a life of crime, this study found that by eliminating rent control, the city of ...
Future of REI: Google Designing a Private Utopia
If you could own a home inside a metropolis boasting floating parks, perfect weather, and the option to work from home every day with the simple touch of a button, would you? Google thinks you probably would and, furthermore, that you would be a happier, healthier person as a result ...
California Wildfire Damages to Exceed $1 Billion, Exacerbates Housing Crisis
California wildfires have killed nearly four dozen people, destroyed nearly 7,000 homes and other buildings, and caused at least $1 billion in damages, so far, said northern California officials late last week. State insurance commissioner Dave Jones reported that his office had arrived at the preliminary dollar amount of losses ...
Top 5 Most Expensive States for Property Taxes
According to WalletHub’s “2017 Property Taxes by State Report,” the average American household spends more than $2,000 on property taxes each year. Perhaps of even greater interest to real estate investors, nearly $12 billion of those property taxes go unpaid each year according to the same study. Interestingly enough, the ...
