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Offered at $739,000
Waterfront contemporary home with deeded beach and boating rights. Private 3 boat dock with electric, water and retaining wall. Professionally landscaped. Secluded front courtyard with garden. Backyard with large wood deck and heated in-ground pool surrounded with pavers, Large country kitchen with new stainless steel appliances, granite countertops, glazed cabinets, porcelain tile floors and crown moldings. Additional features include hardwood floors, Florida room with slate floors and partially finished basement.
Listed by Kevin Loiacono and Ken Bowman, you can find out more information and view additional photographs here: 39 Pine Edge Drive
Offered at $328,000
This beautiful upper unit, with views of the pond, offers a kitchen with tile floor and raised oak cabinets, living room with vaulted ceilings, custom fireplace mantel, Bose stereo system and a lovely terrace overlooking the pond. A must see! The Greens at Hampton Vistas development offers community Tennis, Pool and Playground.
Listed by Kevin Loiacono you can find out information and view additional photographs here: 15 Lakeview Drive
Offered at $599,000
This immaculate detached Patio House is located in the Harts Cove waterfront community. This home offers a custom kitchen with beautiful tiled floors, granite countertops and stainless steel appliances. Additional features include skylights, crown molding, recessed lighting, hardwood floors and a wood burning fireplace. Community amenities include pool, tennis courts and a boat slip. The attached patio is accessible through glass sliding doors. Backyard overlooks a corral.
Listed by Kevin Loiacono, you can find out more information and view additional photographs by clicking here: One Thoroughbred Court
The New York Times
By BOB TEDESCHI
Published: June 5, 2009
THE subprime mortgage crisis has had at least one positive outcome: many unscrupulous professionals who steered unsophisticated borrowers into risky loans went out of business.
Some of those people have since returned to the industry, lenders and mortgage brokers say, only this time they are involved in loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration, which are also often sought by less sophisticated borrowers.
Now the F.H.A. is tightening its review of mortgage professionals who are permitted to originate its loans. Some longtime F.H.A. mortgage brokers say the efforts will help spare borrowers some of the abuses of the subprime era.
Among other things, brokers who help originate F.H.A. mortgages will be required to obtain approval in advance from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, of which F.H.A. is a division. In the past, nonapproved brokers could refer applicants to approved lenders and charge the borrower a fee.
Additionally, people convicted of making fraudulent loans cannot take part in the F.H.A. program. Previously, though companies were penalized by the F.H.A. for such behavior, the individuals responsible could simply switch employers.
William Apgar, the senior adviser to the secretary for mortgage finance at HUD, said that some of these individuals were probably among the roughly 1,500 new mortgage professionals who have obtained licenses to make F.H.A. loans in the last two years. (There are 13,500 in all, according to Mr. Apgar.)
“These folks know how to scam people,” he said, “and they’re now trying to scam people in a new way. But these guys haven’t just invaded F.H.A. They’re in every corner of the world.”
The new requirements for F.H.A. lenders, as well as more than $400 million in additional financing, partly for mortgage-fraud investigations, Mr. Apgar said, will help mitigate fraud among F.H.A. lenders.
F.H.A. loans are similar to subprime loans, because they are typically made to borrowers who have difficulty qualifying for prime loans — people with less money for down payments and those with damaged credit.
A frequent choice for first-time home buyers, F.H.A. loans carry competitive interest rates — late last week, for instance, the rate on a 30-year fixed-rate loan was 5.5 percent — but borrowers must pay a monthly insurance premium. (On a $400,000 loan, the insurance is $183 a month.)
Borrowers with low credit scores or low cash reserves rarely considered F.H.A. loans over the past decade, partly because of the insurance fees, but also because they could easily get other subprime mortgages with no or low down payments and with interest rates initially much lower than for F.H.A. mortgages.
The problem was that many of those loans were adjustable-rate mortgages, or ARMs, whose interest rates often spiked in the first few years. Now that these “exploding ARMs,” as they were known, have vanished, subprime borrowers are again flocking to F.H.A. loans.
Of the mortgages made in the past 12 months, about 20 percent have been F.H.A. loans, compared with about 2 percent in 2006, according to HUD.
Richard L. Tracy Jr., a board member of the Connecticut Society of Mortgage Brokers and an F.H.A.-approved lender, said the agency’s recent measures “will go a long way toward getting out the marginal players.”
Still, Mr. Tracy said, borrowers who seek F.H.A. mortgages should ask lenders how long they have been approved to offer such loans. “And they should go to the Web site of their state banking departments to verify the lenders’ licenses,” he said.
The federal government, he added, also maintains two online lists of lenders who can no longer participate in the F.H.A. program. The “Limited Denial of Participation and Debarments” lists are available on HUD’s Web site, at www.hud.gov/offices/hsg/sfh/lender/ldp_abou.cfm.
Mr. Apgar of the F.H.A. said prospective borrowers might also try “Neighborhood Watch,” a another Web site set up by HUD that, among other things, lists sanctions and other enforcement actions taken against lenders. That address is https://entp.hud.gov/sfnw/public/.
Offered at $335,000 ~ SALE PENDING
Great location for this well built 1964 Ranch home. Located on a quiet cul-de-sac, features include a full, partially finished basement, living room with fireplace, one car attached garage and roof that was redone last year.
Listed by Steven Monzeglio, you can find out more information and view additional photographs by clicking here: 14 Canal View Drive, Center Moriches
Gordon M. Grant for The New York Times
‘A DREAM’ Donna Santoro’s Center Moriches home, which she bought in a short sale.
MARCELLE S. FISCHLER Published: June 5, 2009
TWO years ago, when Donna Santoro first noticed the listing for the two-bedroom carriage house in Center Moriches on a canal with a view of Moriches Bay, the price was above $600,000.
“That was a dream,” said Ms. Santoro, a Teamster official. She couldn’t afford it, and eventually the house was taken off the market.
But last October, she noticed that it was back. At $429,900, it was extremely tempting.
It was now a short sale — which ended up meaning the deal took a very long time, a fact that Ms. Santoro described as “the epitome of an oxymoron.” Yet that is the tendency, when houses are worth less than what their owners owe the bank.
She was able to put more than 20 percent down, was prequalified for a mortgage and had a good credit score. But she still had to wait for the seller’s two mortgage holders to approve the offer and let her close, a process that took until April.
“I hung in there,” she said, drawn by an “absolute great buy” and daunted by the idea that if the deal didn’t go through, the home could be boarded up and go into foreclosure.
“It’s a great opportunity to afford something that you otherwise may not have ventured into” was her summation. Beyond getting a house she loved, she was “taking it off the seller’s hands and giving them the opportunity to repair their credit more quickly and giving something to the bank other than zero.”
Across the Island, short sales are up. Brokers say that banks are increasingly amenable to approving them, though expediting the paperwork is not always a cinch.
From January to April, there were 2,520 lis pendens — or notifications of foreclosure — in Suffolk County and 1,888 in Nassau, according to propertyshark.com. Some carry mortgages as high as $2.8 million, in Southampton, and $1.94 million, in Old Westbury.
Nationwide last month, 45 percent of transactions were distress sales — whether short sales or foreclosures, according to the National Association of Realtors.
Michael Morris, owner of Coldwell Banker M&D Goodlife, whose Moriches-based firm handled Ms. Santoro’s purchase, says short sales represent 11 percent of its transactions. Among its 343 listings, 36 are short sales. Of 120 transactions in contract, 17 are short sales.
Phil Tesoriero, owner of Dynamic Real Estate Services in Garden City, primarily deals with distress sales on properties ranging from $180,000 to $750,000; he sees tremendous growth in the short-sale market.
“A lot of people are over their head and underwater,” Mr. Tesoriero said.
It used to be that short sales became possible only after a mortgage payment had been missed and after the bank had filed a lis pendens. Lately, however, the bar has lowered: homeowners need only prove hardship, or a looming deficit, to proceed with a short sale, Mr. Tesoriero said.
Mr. Morris said hardships include divorce, job loss and family illness. In such situations, he said, owners “have to sell it and they are talking to the bank to try to work it out.” He added: “Nobody wants to foreclose. Foreclosure hits your credit score pretty hard.”
Rick Simon, a spokesman for Bank of America Home Loans, said that even though the bank’s first priority was to help owners keep their homes through loan modifications, short sales had soared in the last year and a half. The bank is now looking to speed up the approval process, which can take up to 90 days, he added.
One pilot program, to be rolled out nationwide in a few months, would preapprove a short-sale price at the start of the process rather than at the time an offer is made. This would knock 30 days off the wait.
The bank assesses whether “the loss to the investor is mitigated by doing the short sale more than it would be mitigated” by foreclosure.
Then the home must be appraised, as a basis for ascertaining that any offers reflect market value. “Low-ball offers are not being accepted,” Mr. Simon said.
Short sales face competition in a market glutted with regular sales and foreclosed homes owned by banks, Mr. Morris said. Yet they tend to find takers more quickly, because their sellers “are more apt to price it at market value and not be in denial.” The difficulty comes later — with the heightened risk that the bank may not approve the sale and the buyer will have lost time.
Wendy Funk, a Merrick-based real estate lawyer, says banks “are so inundated with foreclosures they are agreeing to settle for less money” to avoid the full foreclosure process, which in New York can take years.
But, she said, “the bank may not make a deal if a homeowner was totally irresponsible.”
In March, after a year spent looking at homes upstate, in New Jersey and in Levittown, Sandy Acosta, a bank comptroller, found a short sale in East Meadow, a three-bedroom for $488,000, through Janie Davis, an associate broker with Re/Max Hearthstone in Bellmore.
“I was looking for the house that I liked, not a short sale,” Mr. Acosta said. Still, he figured that the home’s status would ensure a good price, and decided it was worth the three months’ wait for bank approval to close. Besides, his wife, Clara Canio, loved the house.
“If this is the style of the house that you want,” Mr. Acosta said, “you can wait.”
Offered at $299,000
Hi-Ranch style home in Holiday Beach with deeded beach and boating rights. This home is located on a private street within walking distance to the water. Features include an eat-in kitchen, beautiful wood floors in the living room, and a full walk-out basement with sliders. The fourth bedroom would make a great office! 4 bedrooms and 2 full baths. Large, fenced backyard with deck and enclosed hot tub.
Listed by Kevin Loiacono, for more information and to view additional photographs, click here: 7 Carriage Lane
Federal and NY regulators moving to weed out scam operations with tighter rules
- BY RANDI F. MARSHALL | randi.marshall@newsday.com
- 9:37 AM EDT, June 2, 2009
Federal and state regulators say the loan modification industry, which came from nowhere fast to offer help to troubled home owners fearful of losing their homes, needs regulation and oversight to prevent people from losing even more money and ending up without the help they need.
In April, the Federal Trade Commission painted the industry with a broad brush, saying the “proliferation of these mortgage relief scams” should be stopped by increased law enforcement efforts because they “target” vulnerable homeowners desperate for help.
Sign in front of pending sale
In New York State, Gov. David A. Paterson is preparing a new bill that would require loan modification firms to register with the state and tighten guidelines on the upfront fees some charge, which can approach 1 percent of the total mortgage — easily $3,000 or more, according to the governor’s counsel, Gurav Visisht. And the state Banking Department and the attorney general have also raised red flags about the industry.
“The fees I’ve heard quoted I would say would be better served being placed toward the loan that is in distress,” said Banking Department deputy superintendent Rholda Ricketts.
Many want money back
That they will cut through the red tape, negotiate lower mortgage interest and monthly payments and thus help owners keep their homes. The companies say what they do is perfectly reputable. Many experts point out that homeowners, already strapped for cash, do not need to pay for something they can get free help for or even do themselves.
Some loan modification executives said they wouldn’t mind more oversight, but that the whole industry should not be cast in a negative light.
‘Banks don’t make it easy’
There’s plenty of good business out there and there’s plenty of people who legitimately need help and the banks don’t make it easy,” said Steve Richards, who heads ABM Mitigation in Ronkonkoma. ABM charges $2,995 per modification.
Still, experts say there’s more to be done. While there are laws against deceptive advertising practices, for instance, some say some modification companies’ marketing techniques deserve more scrutiny. For example, several firms send out letters that look like they’ve come directly from the borrower’s bank. Others call lists of people in foreclosure, whose names are in the public record.
“Scammers are taking advantage of people in a difficult situation . . .” FTC chairman Jon Leibowitz said in his April announcement.
Nonprofit housing advocates note that state and federal laws also don’t regulate how much companies can charge.
“There’s no reason on earth that you would pay for a loan modification when there are free services,” said Meghan Faux, who heads foreclosure prevention at South Brooklyn Legal Services, which provides free legal assistance to individuals across the region.
After months of trying to get mortgage relief using American Modification Agency, Brooklyn resident Rolett Brown is now working with South Brooklyn Legal Services to try to get back the $5,600 she paid AMA, based in Hauppauge and founded by executive Salvatore Pane. He also owns Amerimod, a separate Uniondale company that’s Long Island‘s largest modification firm.
Brown, who needed help after the monthly payment for her adjustable rate mortgage rose to $3,700 last July, said she paid AMA last summer, using two credit cards and a loan from her retirement fund. Her loan modification application was denied – twice.
AMA wanted to try a third time. Brown said no. Then, she said, she connected with city officials and her bank’s representatives and was able to get the changes she needed on her own.
AMA hasn’t refunded her money, she said. “I feel betrayed,” Brown added.
Pane said Brown may have obtained her modification because of the work AMA had already done. If he finds it’s not, Pane said, “If I didn’t do my job or I can’t prove that we did our job, she’ll get her money back.” He said that the company always makes three attempts before giving a refund, adding that the firm’s successful loan modifications number in the “multiple thousands,”
“The success in this office is superior to most,” he said.
A satisfied customer
Pane points to homeowners like New Jersey resident Jacinta Lopez, who fell behind on her mortgage when her salary was cut and who called Amerimod after hearing a radio advertisement in December. The firm charged her $4,000, which she is borrowing from family members. This month, Lopez got a loan-term change that she said cut her monthly payment in half.
“I feel relieved,” said Lopez. “The way it was going I was going to lose the house.”
But Lopez said she never knew she could do a loan modification herself or get free help. And that, said U.S. Housing and Urban Development spokesman Adam Glantz, is part of the problem. “They’re beating us in this publicity war,” he said.
Many in the for-profit industry, including Pane, said they welcome more regulation or licensing.
“If they pass a law that says I have to go get registered, I’m going to go and get registered,” said Dan Harris, who heads the Manhattan-based Home Retention Group. “I just try to do the right thing.”
Harris, who is working on 160 files right now, charges $995 upfront for a “forensic audit,” to check for fraud in the homeowner’s mortgage, and then charges one month’s mortgage payment after the mortgage relief goes through.
Executives like Harris and Pane said the industry may not survive in the long run, in part because it’s tougher to get banks to reduce loan payments and also because there’s a growing negativity surrounding the business.
“It’s not that everybody in the industry is bad, because they’re not,” said Garden City attorney Adam Kitzen of National Modification Group, a for-profit company that charges up to $4,000 per file, $500 of which is required upfront. “But I don’t think this is the type of industry that’s long-lasting.”
