ochomesales.info

The housing market is a tough place for first-time buyers right now, and for many people, getting their foot on the property ladder seems like a distant dream. The cost of living is increasing all the time, and many young people are too preoccupied with paying the bills and making ends meet to think about saving for a deposit.

However, help is at hand. Believe it or not, playing online games may prove to be the solution to your cash-flow problem. A lot of people nowadays are joining online bingo websites where you can play for cheap yet potentially win jackpots worth thousands of pounds.

An example of this kind of site is cheeky bingo, which offers new players the chance to enjoy free bingo games in a total of six rooms. What’s more, cheeky bingo winners playing in these free rooms often take home prizes of £50!

An important thing to remember if you plan to play online bingo for the first time is that you are not guaranteed to win huge jackpots every time you play. You may win £10 or £20 on occasion, or maybe even £100, but remember that every penny counts when you’re saving for your deposit. Besides, it only takes one big jackpot win worth thousands to set you up in your new home!

A ten bedroom mansion in the Hollywood Hills with a history as a top-secret military base is set to be sold for $6.3 million as a residential property.

The 53,000 square foot property was built in 1941, when it was called the Lookout Mountain Air Force Station. It served as the main radar communications and air defence west coast HQ during WWII, and was also used as an Air Force film studio from 1947 until 1969.

It was said to have produced more than 20,000 movies, some of which included films of Nevada nuclear tests.

The property is now to be sold as a luxury mansion, with a swimming pool, views over the Sunset Strip and, of course, a bomb shelter.

The Harry Potter author JK Rowling has reportedly been given planning permission to knock down a house next door to her in order to give her a bigger garden.

The house is worth £1million and is located next to Rowling’s £2 million mansion in a wealthy Edinburgh suburb. The best-selling author applied to the council to have the 1970s house knocked down, and a public meeting was held to discuss the application with council members and Rowling’s neighbours, who found the request very unusual.

After no objections were raised, planning permission to demolish the house was granted. Rowling is now said to be planning to build a summer house in her new garden extension.

According to the latest statistics published by government agency HM Land Registry, house prices in England and Wales shot up by 0.8 per cent between the months of March and April.

In other data, it was shown that the average property value is currently £163,083. This is after it was calculated that in the last year, property prices have decreased by 1.3 per cent.

The total number of completed house prices recorded in February 2011 also fell by 10 per cent compared to the same time last year.

The regions of London and the North East experienced the greatest changes in property prices, with the former experiencing an increase 5 per cent whilst the latter saw an 8.1 per cent drop.

If you’ve been looking to purchase new property in Britain, yet have found that it just isn’t feasible in the current economic scenario, it may be time to look further afield.

A recent report has shown that property prices in the Bulgarian capital of Sofia are steadily starting to fall, and this will no doubt come as music to the ears of those looking to invest in property abroad.

Making Bulgaria an even more attractive choice is the news that a budget airline is planning to offer extremely cut-price flights to the country in the very near future, which will no doubt spur those in a comfortable financial position on to think seriously about investing in Bulgarian property.

It may be a little too early to start getting over-excited, but a Halifax report published today has shown that house prices crept up ever-so-slightly during the month of August.

Last month, prices rose at a rate of around 0.2%, and whilst this may seem rather insignificant to some, at such a difficult time in the property market, a small rise is far better than none at all.

Although the rise in August was down 0.5% on July, Halifax remain slightly positive that prices should hold relatively steady for the remainder of the year.

The property market still has an extremely long way to go before it even begins to recover sufficiently from the recession though.

Afghanistan is experiencing a boom in estate prices which defies the downward trend in property that many other parts of the world is seeing and has experienced for the last 2 years. Its hard to imagine why anyone wanting to live or invest in a city which has been renowned for violence and war. In some parts of Kabul, prices have risen by 75% in the past year which is partly due to the prices that international agencies are willing to pay in order to buy properties in the best locations. Alongside this wealthy Afghans which have seen there properties prices drop in Dubai are putting money back into Kabul

Estate agents are starting to smile again as the UK property market starts to rise. Last year at this time estate agents were struggling to sell one home each week, they also had to cut staff. They had people wanting to sell with no one buying – it now seems the other way round. One estate agency in London said that they registered over 300 buyers in one month. Two years the mortgage slump crippled sales and staff went to work away from the property market. As people now start to get mortgages the buyers are back. Many agents have said that parents have been the biggest contributors to the markets as it’s there help in the deposit which allows there siblings to buy a house.

Tesco has launched its own bank (Tesco Bank) but the supermarket has said it will not be doing mortgages and current accounts till 2011.

Tesco has decided that is wanted to do away with its old name of Tesco Personal Finance and rename it,

“We wanted a name that does what it says on the tin.”

Tesco bosses said.

In the meantime Tesco still plans to offer insurance products loans and credit cards, they have signed up over 300 thousand customers so far this year making a total of over 6 million and have made a profit in excess of £115 million.

Buying a home can be an emotional, time-consuming, and complex process. There are a few things that you can do to help make the process go as smooth as possible:

1. Check your credit.

Before you apply for a home loan, regardless of your credit, it’s a smart idea to obtain a copy of your credit report from the three major credit bureaus and review the information. If there are errors or things that need to be addressed, it’s easier to address them before you have found a house, than after you have found a house and are trying to close your loan.

If you know that there are a few blemishes on your credit, let your lender know what they are, why they are there, and why you are a still good credit risk. Lenders look at your credit to determine how likely you will pay back the loan. If you had extenuating circumstances – like a loss of a job or medical bills – let them know so that they understand that it is not likely to happen again in the future.

2. Get approved before you buy.

An approval means that a lender has reviewed your credit history, verified your assets and employment, and has approved your loan before you have found a home to purchase. As long as the home appraises for at least the purchase price, the loan should close.

Getting approved also gives you an advantage over other buyers. Your firm approval makes it easier for you to negotiate on the price of a home, than a person who is not approved or is pre-qualified.

While getting pre-qualified may sound official, it is really just getting an idea of what you can afford. Its having a person plug in a few numbers that you give them – your monthly income and your monthly debt – and getting an approximate payment calculated. From the payment, the calculator can approximate the house price range that you can afford. No information is verified. Because your assets, income or credit is not verified, a pre-qualification has little value when purchasing a home.

3. Find a great buyer’s agent.

Traditionally real estate agents represent the sellers in a transaction. When you are not working with a buyer’s agent, they are less likely to negotiate the best price or contingencies for you.

A buyer’s agent’s job and fiduciary responsibility (meaning legal duty) is to you, the buyer. Before working with an agent, establish if they are a buyer’s agent or a seller’s agent. After spending a lot of time with a Realtor, it’s natural to feel like you’re a team. But if they are not negotiating for you, then they are not on your team.