real estate prices in

Pondering Real Estate Pondering Real Estate Adam Hamilton August 23, 2002 2913 Most Americans' largest asset is their home. With chaotic and turbulent economic times upon us, how will residential real estate perform in the coming years. Some thoughts... One of the greatest blessings of writing publicly is the continual stream of feedback I am offered from folks around the world. They let me know when I am wrong, help shape my worldviews and opinions, and offer dazzling new ideas that are often absolutely brilliant. Without everyone who graciously writes in to help deepen my own understanding, my own thought processes would rapidly stagnate. I am always grateful for feedback, positive, neutral, or negative. The people who take the time to write really augment the crucial foundational base off which my thoughts articulated in these essays are formed and polished. One of the most common questions people have, especially those writing from the States, regards real estate. For Americans, real estate, in the form of their primary family home, is often the largest asset they command. The value of real estate, especially the price trend, is very important to countless folks across our great nation. Many Americans I hear from, especially those with a contrarian investor mindset, wonder what will happen to residential real estate prices in the United States. The question is a very complex and difficult one, for a whole myriad of reasons. I have been pondering this matter since the US equity bubbles burst and am finally ready to commit some tentative thoughts to paper on this vexing issue. A massive caveat is in order however. I am approaching this question about real estate price trends from the perspective of a speculator. Not having a background in real estate, these ideas may be completely worthless, so please dont act on anything in this essay without at least first discussing these concepts with a real estate professional you personally trust with decades of experience. I hope this essay will simply spur further thoughts and discussions. The primary issue that I have been wrestling with in my mind regarding residential real estate price trends in the coming years concerns inflation and deflation. Inflation and deflation are simply opposing monetary phenomena, but both seem to be attacking our fragile post-bust economy in the US with great fury from opposite sides. For some background on these two titanic forces, please see my Inflation or Deflation? essay published last December. Inflation is spawned by the hooligans at the Federal Reserve printing too much paper (or electronic) money, which they have been doing in spades in recent years in a vain and fruitless attempt to stop the normal post-bubble bust process from running its full course. In the last 12 months, the various US money supply measures have exploded up with astounding violence. The absolute year-over-year M1 inflation is 5.2%, MZM 12.7%, M2 7.9%, and M3 7.4%. These numbers are downright frightening in light of historical inflationary precedent! In an inflationary environment, relatively more money chases after relatively fewer goods, services, and real estate. If the amount of money in circulation is rising faster than available real estate in the areas in which people want to live, residential real estate prices should rise. Realtors use this inflation idea to convince their customers that land prices should perpetually rise because land is scarce. Unfortunately, thats not the whole story. While real estate professionals constantly bombard us with marketing propaganda claiming that land is scarce and no more is being made, that is a myth. One example why is evident in multi-story buildings. A 10-story structure, for example, has about 10x the usable space as a single story structure, but has the same footprint in raw land terms. Land itself is not scarce, just land in locations where people want to live. For example, the sparsely-populated state of Montana has about 147,000 square miles of area, or roughly 94m acres. Assuming that only 2/3 of Montanas land is useable (the rest might be mountains or lakes, or streets in cities), that leaves 63m acres. If the entire US population is 287m people, they could all move to Montana and each live in modest estates of almost 1/4 acre, or 9,500 square feet. If their houses took up 1/3 of their plots, and each had a basement and two aboveground stories, every American could live in Montana in individual 9,500 square feet mini-mansions! Land is not scarce in general. I have seen land sell in the North Dakota Badlands for $25 per acre. I have heard of deals involving vast tracts of land in northern Australia going for under $1 per acre. Land is relatively scarce in small areas in which lots of people want or need to live however, such as New York Citys Manhattan Island. Monetary inflation should indeed bode well for real estate prices, but where will it strike? If US monetary inflation bids on barren lands in the Western states for example, residential real estate in the big Eastern cities might not benefit. Just because the general economic environment in the US is highly inflationary thanks to the Feds obnoxious and practically criminal monetary growth, that doesnt necessarily mean real estate in a given small corner of the US will do well. And then we must consider deflation! Deflation is caused by relatively less money chasing relatively more goods, services, and real estate. In deflationary environments money supplies shrink and prices drop. As long as the American people allow the private Federal Reserve bank to continue its tyranny of inflationary theft, there will never be less money in the US economy than there is today. But, muddying the waters even further, the historical line between money and credit is now exceedingly blurry. Because Americans love going into debt, they insist on buying their houses on time, with borrowed money at high interest rates, rather than working hard, saving the funds themselves, and paying cash when they can afford to buy a house outright. While deflation in the US money supplies is probably impossible with the Fed around, deflation in debt, or credit, is already happening. With Americans not actually buying houses outright but really in effect borrowing them from banks, any contraction in available debt will leave less credit available to chase houses. With less credit chasing residential real estate, prices will be forced to fall. But, just as with inflation, it is difficult or impossible to predict how the contraction in general credit available to buy houses will affect real estate in any given small area of the United States. Confused yet? Me too. There are both titanic inflationary and monstrous deflationary forces barreling down on the United States. But, residential real estate markets are all local and many will be affected differently. Deflationary forces could win out in New York City for instance, causing home values to plummet while at the same time inflationary forces win out in Wyoming causing house prices to rise. Real estate is all local. In the stock markets, it is meaningless whether you buy a share of a publicly-traded company in New York or California. In real estate where you buy your house is everything! Location, location, location. Since all real estate markets are really local, perhaps there are some warning signs that you can watch for in your little corner of America to warn of impending real estate price drops. While national generalizations about monetary inflation or debt/credit deflation regarding real estate are tough to make, zooming in to the local level for analysis has a much higher probability of success. Stock speculators throughout history have learned to carefully monitor equity markets for danger signs of maturing bubbles. All markets, including real estate, move in great cycles throughout history, marked by rampant euphoria at the tops and popular indifference at the bottoms. Perhaps applying some common bubble warning signs in equity markets to your local real estate market will yield some interesting fruit. Three common warning signs for equity bubbles are parabolic price rises, excessive valuations, and overwhelming euphoria. In real estate, parabolic price rises happen when a local market witnesses prices rocketing up by 15%+ per year, for years in a row. If you go to your local library and look at old newspaper classified ads, or else secure local data from your hometown real estate professional, you can easily graph it in Excel. If prices of comparable homes across time are shooting up on a long-term zeroed-chart like a ballistic missile, like the bubbles in the NASDAQ 2000 and DJIA 1929, you are most likely in the belly of the beast, a local unsustainable real estate bubble. Check out bubble growth graphed, it sticks out like a central banker at a rock concert! This graph shows values indexed to 100, but you can just as easily think of them in terms of dollars, starting out at $100k. Imagine you bought a house 25 years ago for $100k, a lot of money back then. If your house price appreciated by 5% per year compounded annually, it would now be worth $339k, which is totally plausible and makes sense. On the other hand, if your house had appreciated by 15% each year, it would now be worth $3,292k, or $3.3m! This is a massive increase in price, and it ought to throw up big red warning flags all across your cranium. Does it make sense for a $100k house to become a $3.3m house in only 25 years? Absolutely not, that is just silly! As the graph above shows, abnormally high growth rates make for parabolic charts, bubbles that look just like the stock market variety. If your local real estate market is ascending parabolically like the NASDAQ of 1997-2000, you are in a bubble. History unambiguously shows that no financial trend continues in the same direction forever and all bubbles ultimately pop. Unrealistic annual growth rates are a key bubble warning sign. For a deeper discussion of unrealistic growth rates over the long-term, please see my essay The Elusive Long-Term from last August. Another warning sign of equity bubbles is excessive valuations. In the stock markets, valuations are most commonly measured by the formidable yet often scorned price-to-earnings ratio. The historical average P/E ratio for US equity markets is 13.5x earnings. We can also apply this concept to real estate holdings. While most people buy a house simply to live in, it is also possible to buy a house to use as a rental property. In a residential house used as a single-family rental, there is a price, the cash paid for the house, and an earnings stream, the rent the family pays to the owner. With a real estate P and E, we can compute a rough real estate valuation multiple. If a rental property costs $100k to buy, and rents for $1000 per month, or $12k per year, its P/E ratio is 8.3. Even though most families dont own a separate rental property, with a little legwork you can check your local newspapers and calculate some rough P/E proxies for your area. Find houses for sale similar to yours to get price data points. Find houses for rent similar to yours to get earnings data points. Divide the P by the E, and you have a rough valuation estimate. I dont know what a reasonable average long-term residential real-estate P/E is. I suspect it is probably in the 10-20 range though, as that implies a 5% to 10% return on the owners capital, which is in line with historical returns available across a broad market spectrum. If you find that houses in your area are renting for implied P/Es of under 20 or so, that is a good sign that house prices may be fair. Conversely, if you find houses in your area renting for implied P/Es of over 20, valuations are probably too high and you should be wary of a potential real estate bubble. Another common warning sign of equity bubbles is rampant and unbridled widespread euphoria. Remember the NASDAQ in 1999 and early 2000? It was unreal! All anyone ever talked about was the NASDAQ, how boring. As a hard-traveling consulting road warrior at the time, I remember even the shoeshine boys at airports were talking about their tech stock investments as they polished shoes. It was just crazy, just as brilliant historians like Charles Mackay of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds fame (written in 1841) warned us it would be. It is difficult to empirically quantify euphoria, but there is no mistaking it if you keep your ears open and pay attention to what folks are talking about in your social circles. If you find yourself in a local situation where the preferred topic of conversation at every social get-together is always residential real estate and the great wealth to be made in home ownership, chances are euphoria is setting in and you should proceed with great caution. Just as parabolic price rises, excessive valuations, and overwhelming euphoria are danger signs of bubble tops in the stock markets, they are also equally valid danger signs in local real estate markets. It is probably a wise idea to periodically monitor these three fronts. In addition to stock market-like traits, there are also other factors that affect local real estate prices. These include net local migration patterns, income trends, and interest rates. One of the most important local factors in house prices is migration. If you live in or near a community that is growing as more people move in each year, that increases the pool of potential bidders competing for local houses. Prices are far more likely to rise in an environment of net in-migration. On the other hand, if your community is shrinking, both the number of people and amount of capital available to throw at residential real estate dwindles. This is a bad omen for future real estate prices in your area. Typically cities grow and rural areas shrink as people seek the jobs available in cities. This is not always the case though. As the Information Age continues to evolve, a new population of workers is growing, the information worker. Info workers deal purely in information, like a software programmer. It is often not important where they live, as they rely on the Internet to work remotely with their colleagues and clients. Info workers often earn high salaries and have the means to bid up home prices. Zeal LLC , my company, is an example of an Information Age venture. My partners and I can research, consult, trade, and write from anywhere on Earth. It makes absolutely no difference to you whether I penned this essay in Alaska, Australia, Argentina, or the Azores. Info workers, whose ranks will grow dramatically in the coming decade, are very blessed to be able to live and work from anywhere. So, if you live in an area of exceptional natural beauty and very high quality of life, prime rural areas, an influx of urban information refugees from the decaying carcasses of the megalopoli will probably help support real estate prices in your location even through tough economic times. It may make sense to buy real estate in elite communities like the Colorado or California mountain resort towns even if the US economy faces very turbulent times ahead. The Information Age will probably totally alter the dynamics of rural real estate in prized areas. Another factor to consider is income trends in your area. Ultimately, real estate prices in a given location can never increase faster than income over the long-term. Even for the vast majority who choose to go into debt to live in a house, the level of debt service they can afford is totally dependent on their income. If general income trends in your community are rising, that is a great sign and is bullish for real estate prices. On the other hand, if general income is falling, for any reason, that suggests real estate prices will have to correct downward to adjust for the loss of debt-servicing ability necessary for folks to borrow money and buy residential real estate. Interest rate levels are also intimately tied into this whole debt service capability. As all those burdened with a mortgage know, for many years most of the monthly payments are almost totally interest. It takes a long time and a huge amount of money dumped down the mortgage black hole, into bankers pockets, before the amortization starts taking good-sized bites out of principal each month. Amazingly, in the first 2/3 of a typical 30-year mortgages lifespan, the interest portion of each monthly payment exceeds the principal portion. So, if interest rates are heading higher due to Greenspans promiscuous inflation as I have discussed in past essays including Bond Anomalies Abound , it will severely retard debt-financed residential real estate purchases nationwide. Although interest rates havent turned north yet, history suggests they will be forced higher sooner or later as the bubble excesses are painfully squeezed out of the US economy. In summary, attempting to divine real estate price trends is very difficult in a macro sense. There are a great deal of diverse variables that affect real estate prices. In addition, unlike the stock market, there is no national real estate market. All real estate is local, so national trends must be examined for your particular situation in light of the local realities in your community. Nevertheless, if you do your own due diligence and integrate local real estate data you uncover into national post-bubble trends, you should be able to emerge with a fairly good idea of where your local residential real estate prices might be heading. Adam Hamilton, CPA August 23, 2002 Do you enjoy these essays? Please subscribe to our acclaimed private Zeal Intelligence newsletter today to see the good stuff each month, including our specific stock and options trades based on our research! For more information ... Zeal Intelligence For a FREE sample ... FREE Samples! To subscribe ... 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Denver Real Estate! PorchLight

Denver Real Estate and Denver Homes For sale by PorchLight Real Estate Group - Search Denver MLS email password forgot password sign up Price range min max Rooms 0+ 1+ 2+ 3+ 4+ 5+ bed 0+ 1+ 2+ 3+ bath Select city All ARVADA AURORA BOULDER BRIGHTON BROOMFIELD CASTLE PINES CENTENNIAL CHERRY HILLS VILLAGE COMMERCE CITY DENVER EDGEWATER ENGLEWOOD EVERGREEN FEDERAL HEIGHTS FIRESTONE FREDERICK GLENDALE GOLDEN GREENWOOD VILLAGE HENDERSON HIGHLANDS RANCH LAFAYETTE LAKEWOOD LITTLETON LOUISVILLE MORRISON NORTHGLENN PARKER SHERIDAN SUPERIOR THORNTON WESTMINSTER WHEAT RIDGE hold ctrl key for multiple selections email me listings that match this search Advanced search Your Guide to Denver Real Estate! PorchLight Real Estate Group has the most stellar real estate professionals in Denver! Our website is full service and user friendly for all of your Denver real estate needs! Whether you are relocating or just need information on the Denver real estate market this is the site for you! Find my New Denver Home (Fill out this form and we'll find your home) Denver Real Estate Buyers Guide (A handy guide to the home buying process) Denver Neighborhoods (Profiles of Denver Neighborhoods) Denver Relocation Guide (A Guide to Relocating in Denver) Sell my Denver Home (Fill out this form and we’ll contact you) Buyers can Tour Your Home (When buyers search, they will see a 360° tour of your home) Denver Home Sales Guide (A handy guide for preparing to sell) The PorchLight Difference (Here are a few reasons to choose PorchLight Real Estate Group) Would you like to receive an email every time a new listing comes on the market that fits the criteria of the home you are looking for? With our DENVER REAL ESTATE PROPERTY WATCH you can! Just sign up, enter your search criteria, and you will automatically be emailed the day new Denver homes are listed for you! PorchLight is the only Denver Real Estate Company to have comprehensive market statistics for over 52 Denver Neighborhoods ! For each neighborhood we have median & average home sale price, price per square foot, days on market, and the rate of increase in sale price back to 1996! If you would like statistical information on a particular neighborhood or just want to know how they stack up against each other, email us and we would be happy to share our Denver Real Estate market knowledge with you! Would you like in depth information on the different neighborhoods Denver has to offer? Browse Denver Neighborhoods and learn about the different areas of Denver. If you are looking for a specific amenity email us and we would be happy to tell you where you can find it! Our goal is to help you find the best home for you while giving you the information you need to make an educated decision! We serve the entire Denver real estate market and can assist you in finding the perfect homes for sale in Denver including the following neighborhoods: Belcaro , Bonnie Brae , Lowry , Cherry Creek / Polo Club , Capitol Hill , Cheesman Park , Congress Park , Denver Country Club , Highlands Sloan Lake , Hilltop /Crestmoor , Lower Downtown , Park Hill , Southern Hills , Stapleton , Washington Park , and many more... ...and, suburban Denver real estate in these areas: Arvada , Aurora , Bow Mar , Broomfield , Boulder , Cherry Hills Village , Englewood , Greenwood Village , Golden , Highlands Ranch , Ken Caryl Ranch , Lakewood , Littleton , Northglen , Parker , Thornton , Westminister , and many more... About PorchLight Group Real Estate/Our Agents Contact Us About Denver Colorado Denver Real Estate Market Statistics Find Denver Homes For Sale Search Denver MLS Denver Homes For Sale Buying Denver Real Estate Mortgage Calculator Denver Neighborhoods Sell my Denver Home Denver Home Sellers Guide Site Map [2] [3] [4] Links Resources Add URL Denver Neighborhoods Denver Relocation Services The PorchLight Difference Internet Marketing Print Marketing Denver Real Estate 201 Fillmore Street, Denver, CO 80206 303.733.5335 info@PorchLightGroup.com ©2004 PorchLight Real Estate Group. All Rights Reserved.

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Arizona Real Estate Agent : Phoenix Real Estate Broker : Scottsdale Listing Home Sitemap Real Estate Agent Arizona Find your qualified Arizona real estate agent here. Whether you are trying to purchase a new house in Phoenix or trying to sell an existing home in Scottsdale, we can help. We have agents that specialize in commercial Arizona property as well. Many investors have a great interest in the Phoenix, AZ real estate market. Pros and Cons of Owning A Phoenix Single-Family Home Hottest Areas to Purchase Property in Arizona Arizona Real Estate In Phoenix With over 48,000 new home permits planned for 2004, Phoenix will become the largest housing market in the US. In fact, the population will double in the next 20 years. The highway system (ADOT)will complete over 233 additional miles of freeway by 2007 and the Phoenix airport is the fastest growing airport in the US. "The growth of the Arizona population will be the largest single contributor to this strong forecast performance." Interesting Phoenix facts: Population: 3,396,875 and Rising Median Age: 32.9 and Going Down Labor Force: 1,712,300 and Rising Unemployement: 4.9% and Going Down AZ Inflation Rate: 1.3% and Going Down Median Income: $45,776 and Rising Single-Family Permits: 46,000 and Rising Phoenix, AZ Housing Market Outlook The Phoenix housing market will be the beneficiary of favorable mortgage interest rates. There will continue to be plentifulsupply of mortgage money. The supply of land for development will remain plentiful. Overall, the next several years appear to be headed toward the best of the best times for the home building industry in the Arizona region. Specific Phoenix Real Estate Growth Areas: Laveen-Buckeye South of I-10 Loop 303 West of 99th Ave Bell Road / Sun Valley Pkwy North Sun Valley Pkwy South I-17 Happy Valley to Anthem Maricopa To Casa Grande Hunt Highway To Florence Florence, Coolidge, Eloy To Casa Grande Phoenix Arizona Real Estate Highlights The infrastructure in Phoenix is modern and extensive. The water supply is sufficient to meet the growth needs for over a hundred years. Due to the open land, Phoenixhas the largest amount of affordable real estate west of the Rockies. Phoenix is also 2nd in job growth for the 9th consecutive year. Phoenixwill become the #1 home building market in the United States. Arizona Economy Boosting Job Growth Arizona ranks 3rd among all states in the rate of new health care jobs. It also ranks #1 fastest growing in transportation, utilities,government, business services, construction, trade, and hospitality. Looking for an Arizona Real Estate Agent? Whether you're planning on buying or selling a home, choosing the right Real Estate Agent is one of the most important decisions you’ll make. Let Real Estate Agent Arizona help. Please enter your contact information below and a live Arizona real estateagent will contact you within 24 hours or sooner. Special Offer: FREE $300.00 Home Depot gift card upon close of escrow. Just fill out the contact form below to begin. Residential or Commercial. No Obligation, and it's FREE! *First Name: *Last Name: *Email Address: *Phone Number: Tell us what your needs are: First Time Home Buyer - Arizona Land For Sale - First Time Home Buyer - Southwest Architect - ARMLS Listing Service 2005 © Blue Gumbo LLC. All rights reserved.

Home equity for the

MSN Money - Home equity for the holidays MSN Home Hotmail My MSN Sign In Money S earch MSN Money: Help Home News Banking Investing Planning Taxes My Money Portfolio Loans Insurance Banking Home My Accounts Bill Pay Mortgages/Loans Services Credit Reports Financial Tools Track your bills Resources Decision Centers Home Buying Guide Home Financing Your Credit Rating Financial Privacy Better Banking Credit Card Smarts Bankruptcy Guide Commentary Index Related Links Manage Debt More on Budgeting Print-friendly version Send this to a friend See where rates stand Calculate your debt burden here Find a home-equity loan Find books on home buying Find It! Article Index Finance Q&A Tools Index Site Map Recent articles by Bankrate.com: • Mortgage rates hit 18-month high , 11/2/2005 • Best deal? Go to the source , 10/27/2005 • When it pays to stay single , 10/24/2005 More... The Basics Home equity for the holidays advertisement Borrowing from a home-equity loan for holiday spending is tempting because of the lower rates and tax-deductible payments. But theres a huge risk involved. By Bankrate.com This season, many consumers will charge against the home for the holidays. They will use home-equity debt to pay for gifts and travel. Some will do it directly, paying for presents and airline tickets with charge cards tied to home-equity lines of credit. More will do it indirectly, by using equity to pay off credit-card balances that end up as bloated as a turkey-sated family. Home-equity debt traditionally has been spent on investments that bring some kind of return -- renovating houses, paying for college, starting small businesses. More recently, as consumers have become more clever about using debt, equity loans are seen as a cheaper, smarter way to consolidate debt and pay for such items as cars and furniture. But gifts and airline tickets to visit family? Believe it or not, bankers and consumer advocates agree that there are times when it's appropriate to pay for something so fleeting by charging it against the roof over your head. It's not exactly wise to go into debt to pay for presents, but if you're going to do it, you might as well do so as inexpensively as possible. Find a loan that's right for you at the Loan Center Debt for gifts "Don't let these things be excuses to be in debt. That's the issue," says Anthony Hsieh, president of Home Loan Center, an online lender based in Orange County, Calif. If you listen long enough to AM radio, you are likely to hear a holiday-themed sales pitch for these loans, which allow you to borrow money and use the accumulated equity in your home as collateral. Generally, it takes two to four weeks to get access to the money after you apply. Home-equity loans, also known as second mortgages, come in a lump sum. You repay them with equal monthly payments at a fixed rate for a specified period. Related news and commentary on MSN Money • Gift cards are not gifts • 15 worst holiday gift ideas • The fine art of holiday tipping: why, who and how much • The 13 worst holiday spending blunders • 12 rules for regifting without fear • 10 low-cost gifts from the heart Home equity lines of credit, or HELOCs, on the other hand, work like credit cards. Instead of getting a lump sum, you start out with a credit line and can draw up to the credit line's limit. During the first years of the account, the minimum monthly payment covers only the interest on the balance. The rate is variable and usually is tied to the prime rate. The tax deduction On both kinds of equity debt, the interest you pay is deductible from your federal income taxes in most cases. That's the key, Hsieh says. If you decide to take some time to pay off your holiday debt, why not do it with tax-deductible interest? "Is it irresponsible to dig into equity (to pay for gifts?)" Hsieh asks. "Yes. But if you're going to get into debt and you're disciplined enough to pay it off in a predetermined time, there is an advantage to using a HELOC because the interest is deductible." Rudy Cavazos of Money Management International , a national, nonprofit credit-counseling agency based in Houston, agrees that buying things with low-rate home equity debt "beats using that credit card" with higher rates and no tax-deduction. But he's not sure every consumer understands all the differences between regular credit cards and cards tied to HELOCs, including the biggie: "You're placing your home on the line as security, as collateral, for these funds." No walking away from equity debt Sure, the HELOC has a lower rate and the interest is tax-deductible. But the regular credit card is unsecured, meaning that the balance is not backed by collateral -- so the debt can be wiped clean in some bankruptcies. Not so with a card tied to a HELOC. If you buy your godson a Christmas gift with your HELOC, you are pledging your house as collateral. You can't walk away from the debt, even in bankruptcy. This important point might not be stressed at the time of the loan application. That's why Cavazos recommends that consumers get some kind of loan counseling before they take out home-equity loans or get HELOCs. Consumer credit counseling agencies, such as MMI, often hold workshops or do one-on-one education for people who get home loans of all kinds. Cavazos hears radio advertisements all the time that urge listeners to use home equity as a way to consolidate debt "or improve their lifestyle in some way. That's all good, but you have to remember to educate yourself before you enter into these types of financial tools." When it comes to gifts and holiday travel, the best financial tool is to stay away from debt in the first place. Instead, use the financial tool that can't be beat: a savings account. Editors' choice Don't get scammed by your mover Safeguard your Social Security number 5 ways to tap into the onshore drilling boom Your checkbook just became obsolete Turn $1 a day into $67,815 Readers' choice Ratings Top 5 Articles 9.30 Zombie debt collectors dig up your old mistakes 9.24 Keep thieves out of your bank account 9.22 Credit reports now free for entire U.S. 9.19 10 ways to avoid outrageous hospital overcharges 9.17 Tax breaks for Katrina victims -- and all of us View all top rated articles More Resources · E-mail us your comments on this article · Post on the Your Money message board · Get a daily dose of market news S earch MSN Money tips advertisement MSN Money's editorial goal is to provide a forum for personal finance and investment ideas. Our articles, columns, message board posts and other features should not be construed as investment advice, nor does their appearance imply an endorsement by Microsoft of any specific security or trading strategy. 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Las Vegas Real Estate

Homepage of the California Department of Real Estate (DRE) California Home DRE Home Contact Us What's new About DRE Careers at DRE DRE Records Consumers Escrow Violations eLicensing Examinees Licensees Subdivisions Real Estate Law Regulations Publications Forms FAQs Links Index Department of Real Estate START Examinees and Licensees: Use eLicensing for expedited processing of: Examination services Mailing address changes License renewals Salesperson additions/changes of employing broker Broker certification of salesperson employment Broker discontinuation of salesperson employment Duplicate license requests Additional services Learn to use eLicensing It's easy, paperless and interactive! Resources Key Announcements Brokers Must Report Commission Payments on 1099s Real estate brokers are required to report commission payments of $600 or more to brokers and salespersons on Form 1099-MISC, Box 7 - Nonemployee Compensation. For more information, see 1099 Reporting for Real Estate Brokers published by the Franchise Tax Board. Combination examination and license applications are now available: Broker Examination/License Sales Examination/License Expanded Services: Use eLicensing to apply for the salesperson exam Important Information About: Application Processing Timeframes Satellite Exam Sites for Salespersons and Brokers Can't find what you're looking for? Try the Index Featured Items Topics of Interest: Gulf Coast Hurricanes CalHFA First Time Homeownership Program Instructions to License Applicants Help Avoid DENIAL of Your License Application Guides for First Time Home Buyers and Renters Information for Homebuyers Apply Online for a CalVet Home Loan Predatory Lending Prevention Investigate Before You Invest Small Business and DVBE Opportunities Workers' Compensation Coverage Flex Your Power - Be Energy Efficient! Find out how you can save money, save energy, and save natural resources.   more My CA Customer Survey Course & Instructor Evaluation Back to Top of Page Conditions of Use | Privacy Policy | Tech Problems 2003 State of California This page last modified on Wednesday, December 28, 2005