Hot Trends 2010

Summertime Sales Suffer
The New York Post reported last week that a new study from Mark Zandi, the chief US economist for Moody’s, finds that 14.7 million households – one out of every five homeowners – owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth.

So many of you bought homes back in the spring to take advantage of the federal tax credit, that summertime home sales have suffered as a result.

THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® pending home sales index for June came in this past week at 75.7, on a scale where 100 is considered average. That represents a nearly 19 percent drop from the index for June of 2009, when the index was at 93.

What this tells us is that home sales may be pretty weak for the next couple of months. However, home prices are expected to remain relatively stable, because they have already found their basement levels in most markets, and are even back on the rise in many places.

With mortgage rates at record lows and inventory at relatively high levels for the moment, the next couple of months will give buyers plenty of incentive to shop and plenty to choose from, too. Home sales should pick up again later in the year, as long as the economy does its part to create more jobs.

With that said, we can tell you the National pending home sales index for June was down 2.6 percent from May, and more significantly , down nearly 19 percent from a year ago. What these numbers confirm is that buyers did rush in the spring to take advantage of the federal tax credit, and that created a noticeable summertime drop-off in sales. THE NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® believes home sales will pick up again later in the year, as long as the job market continues to improve.

The index took a double-digit percentage hit in all regions of the country compared to last year. Looking across the country…of all the regions the South and West had the smallest drops in pending home sales…with the Midwest next…and the biggest drop of all? The Northeast.

If there’s one bit of good news, it’s that the drop in sales should not really affect home prices very much, because they’ve already stabilized in most places, and in fact, are continuing to strengthen in several local markets, including St. Louis, San Diego, Boston, New York and Phoenix. Median prices in all of those areas are up by at least 5 percent compared to a year ago.

For the time being, this is really all great news for buyers. Mortgage rates remain in record-low territory, and are expected to stay there for the rest of the year and with more homes available over the next few months; shoppers will have plenty to choose from.

The key now is for the economy to create more jobs. Those jobs will have to be in place before we’ll see a meaningful recovery in the nation’s housing markets.

Now that was livin’ the high life!

But, let’s face it, times have changed. Mom’s out of the kitchen and in the workplace. Meals that used to take hours to prepare are now fixed in minutes. Today’s family is on the run, and with more and more two-income households, the focus has shifted from home cooking to home leisure. In fact, with the expanding popularity of the Great room, often times, the first room to be sacrificed to “greatness” is the one that’s probably used least and that’s the dining room.

But families have to eat somewhere, right? Well, as home design has evolved, so have your options. In most cases, modern kitchens today are built with family eating in mind, with plenty of space for a dining table at one end that often becomes a bridge between the kitchen and the family room, to create an atmosphere that allows families to spend time together before, during and after meals. It also allows us to watch TV while we eat. A poll taken earlier this year by CBS News shows that 60 percent of us watch TV at least sometimes during meals.

These types of floor plans have many different names. Sometimes, they’re called eat-in kitchens, but in smaller homes, that phrase is often avoided, because it infers that the feature is a necessity, not an amenity.

Terms like “country kitchen” and “transitional kitchen” are also used to describe what is essentially the same thing. In addition, or sometimes in place of a table, more and more kitchens today have breakfast bars – counter tops with stools that simulate the diner experience for people on the go.

But dining is by no means limited to the kitchen. Where the weather permits, outdoor dining has become more and more popular, especially as screened porches and sun rooms have caught on. Many families spend the entire summer eating on their decks.

In some places, outdoor dining rooms have become all the rage, with décor and design ranging from cookouts on simple picnic tables to full-blown al fresco dining under pergolas laden with grapes, leaving you to imagine yourself in a vineyard in Tuscany. The possibilities are limited only by your imagination and your pocketbook.

Of course, for many of us, it would be heresy to imagine family meals spent anywhere else, especially at holiday time.

So, with more and more homes having everything but a formal dining room have we really lost anything?

Well, think of it this way. Sure, plenty of us have wonderful memories of family dinners in the old dining room. We’ll never forget those times together.

And these days, whether you’re still getting together in a formal dining room, in a great room or a country kitchen or even outside under the stars, you’ll still be breaking bread with family and friends. And you’ll still be making memories.

No matter where you all sit down together.

Rooms are changing these days with every family. Some people want that extra bedroom to be a home office. Maybe two bedrooms becoming home offices so each grownup has a space, but a home office that can go back to bedroom so you can sell it to a young family some day. Flexibility is a trend that will never go away. If you can figure out a way to make that easier to do, you may have the next hot trend.

The easiest trends to deal with have to do with decoration. Why? Because the next owner isn’t stuck with a trend that was hot that now is not. Hot bright colors may become a hot trend, but if it goes from hot to not, a bucket of neutral color paint is all you need.

The toughest trends to start are the ones that become fixtures and can’t be undone. Theatre rooms are hot in some areas, but you might want to stick a closet in it anyway, because if that nostalgic row of theatre seats you found so cool is not too trendy to the next generation, what you’ve got is a big walk-in closet with a row of seats in the middle.

Anything trendy that needs upkeep and maintenance may go from red hot to white elephant in a jiffy. Some people built in-home gyms surrounded by mirrors that seemed like a hot trend but over the long haul in many such homes that only thing bulking up on those treadmills were cobwebs.

Steam attachments in the shower were a big trend, but some families with kids were scared of them being too easily turned on. That trend has been trending down, though the people who love it, still love it.

By the way, not to get in the way of your creativity, but a good person to ask before you try to start a new trend is your REALTOR®. Is the thing you’re about to do going to add value to your house. If so, great. It won’t add, it won’t detract. Still good.

Though the water slide from the roof seems cool, and everyone says they want one, if the advice you get is, no one wants to do the maintenance and no insurance company in the world will give you a policy maybe it’s a trend not worth starting.

In our new house, we’re putting a pit in the garage so my son and myself can do our own work on the car including oil changes with ease. Why doesn’t every garage have that? Don’t know. Will we start a trend? We’ll see. I do know all our friends who work on cars say they are jealous. So why not go all the way with a hydraulic lift. It could start a trend, but now we get into the high maintenance, big pain in the neck if I don’t want that department. That’s where trends become dead ends.

Who knows? You may start the next trend everyone is imitating. You’re probably just a You Tube video away from everyone copying you or laughing at you. Or laughing at you and then copying you. Lots of trends start that way.

So, do something different. Just remember, ask yourself and a REALTOR® how easy is it to undo and even if you can live with it, can anyone else.