During the last few weeks the media wrote few interesting stories about the growing power that the lenders have in regard to home appraisals and how the appraisals are becoming pricier. However, let's look into the issue deeper. What really house appraisal involves. Ravisankar Poduval reports.

Down here in Florida, real estate sales have been up for the last 4 months. Existing sale prices have moved up 0.2%, and unsold home inventories have declined from a high of 16 months to a low of 10 months. So why are real estate agents seeing emotions ranging from amazement to anger among buyers when sellers refuse to yield much of a discount on their selling price in lower priced homes?

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the real estate investment market in South Florida, commercial property foreclosures jump out of the news and bite owners right in their wallets. Of course, the ill fortune of former investors becomes the very good fortune for new investors waiting on the sidelines with pockets full of cash.

Of the hundreds of thousands of reverse mortgages currently insured by FHA, to pull this one out as his shining example of danger in the product is a travesty to seniors who will now be frightened because of his lack of factual reporting

Commercial real estate is currently in the tank. While residential sales are slowly creeping upward, commercial real estate sales are lagging. Cities all over the country are reporting larger than ever vacancy rates, with the national average standing at close to 16%. It is interesting to note that in Beijing, the vacancy rate is hovering around 23%.

Sales of new homes rose in July for the fourth consecutive month, rising 9.6 percent to an annualized rate of 433,000 units. There is so much excitement that Commerce Undersecretary Rebecca Blank said "these new numbers are another sign that we have put the brakes on the worst economic downturn in generations. Increased distribution of Recovery Act dollars at the end of the year should continue to encourage economic growth and support the gains that we are just beginning to see."

Several columns ago, I noted that while home sales were up, home sellers were holding onto their asking prices much more tightly than they had been. The typical concession, from what I saw, was around seven percent. Currently, nationwide sales figures are showing that homes are selling at 94% of average asking price. Home prices are trending up.

During the last few weeks, I’ve received a large volume of calls asking about real estate investment down here in Florida. Many of these people think that real estate prices may be close to their bottom and I agree with them. However, they still see a chance to buy a property at a reasonable rate and perhaps make a profit on it.

Foreclosures are on the rise all over the country. As people are losing jobs and as wealth vanishes, even mortgages that are not subprime are going into default. Yet, as more people abandon their homes because they cannot pay their monthly mortgage costs, hungry investors with cash are scrambling to purchase those homes at bargain rates.

Existing home sales leaped in the month of July, as first-time buyers rushed to take advantage of a tax credit that expires this fall. The 7.2% increase from June to July was the largest in at least 10 years.

It's been almost five years since housing has looked this hopeful, but for the last three months, existing home sales have risen. While this doesn’t yet signal an end to foreclosures or short sales, it does indicate that housing is no longer languishing in the doldrums. In short: Housing is pointing upward as mortgage rates are low.

Charlotte is the second largest banking city in the US and people move here for those types of jobs, despite the fact that banks are having issues in today’s marketplace. Although the Queen City is not considered a “Big City”, it certainly has its perks. Coming from Detroit myself over 8 years ago, I found the metro area to be a nice balance of city life as well as peaceful small towns.