Real Estate the American Dream? or Nightmare?: Creative Solutions and Secrets for Buying, Selling and Saving Your Home!

By Megan Zucaro

This book will truly teach you 30 years of combined experience from Megan and Zeke! if you want to BUY, SELL or SAVE your home this is the book for you! After going through a financial crisis in 2007-2009 Megan realized there was no one out there to help that does not have a biased opinion;so Megan decided to take all the nasty and good things she had learned and truly help people across the country! Megan has seen the worst financially, bounced checks, tax liens, Bankruptcy, pawning jewlery..... everything as a financial planner she cringed at she now had experienced and overcome By the Grace of GOD. Megan and Zeke did overcome the worst financial crisis they could have imagined so Megan decided to help the rest of the world by teaching all the ways to get in and out of homes along with other fantastic financial secrets no one in the financial world wants you to know about! This book will not only help you buy, sell or save your home but after reading it you will have more knowledge than 90% of people out there on Real Estate! It will give you the basic tools to help yourself and be able to make the best decision for you! Megan and Zeke believe in Prosperity through charity therefore 50% of book profits go to help people in financial crisis.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Feb 6, 2012
• ISBN: 9781467041775

Megan Zucaro

Megan grew up on a Hobby Farm in Minnesota and went to the U of M for Journalism Broadcasting! After College she become an Assignment Editor, Reporter and News Anchor for an ABC Affiliate in Minnesota. She married Zeke at 26 who was an Officer/Pilot in the Army! Hooah! Since then; Megan and Zeke have been Financial Planners, Owned a Mortgage Company, Real Estate Investors, Authors and National Speakers. Megan is known as a real estate Strategist! She can help you no matter what your situation! Megan is loved by everyone who meets her; she was Mrs.. Texas in 2007-2008 and her mission was, "What can I do to Help You". After overcoming a major personal financial crisis in 2008 Megan decided to take everything she learned from her horrible financial nightmare and help other people! Megan and Zeke started a Radio Talk Show giving financial advice which led to a goal of National TV Show to help the Nation out of Crisis and Give America HOPE!

Book preview

CHAPTER 2: The American Dream Overview—We Are Supposed To Achieve Our Dreams in America 

Living the American Dream

The American dream is alive and well but you must show up, take action and work hard. You see 85% of life is showing up the other 15 is making a decision and taking action and the last 5% is just good old hard work! America is the land of opportunities, and achieving your dreams is possible here. This is the place where your dreams can come true if you really believe in them.

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Having a home in America is a very important part of the American dream. In fact, having one’s own home was so important that saving up for the down payment of your house was considered a commendable goal. The tax structure of the country also offered incentives to people who wanted to take a mortgage and buy a house. It was conventional wisdom that buying a house was better than renting one, because real estate prices could head only in one direction—upwards. Buying a home was considered a part of the settling down process; a resting place for retirement and a security against financial troubles.

In simple words, to own a home was American dream, and to rent was something lesser. Over the years, every generation came up with its own reasons, all of which claim that home ownership was part of national pride and the nation’s saving grace. So much so, that buying a home almost became synonymous with a character building exercise.

Till the early 20th century, having a mortgage was considered a problem. It was a stigma as bad as gambling or drinking addiction. Young middle class Americans were told to buy only what they could afford, and thus, most of them lived in rented spaces. It was only during the Great Depression when the government stepped into the housing market, that tenancy declined and home ownership went up. The government programs made millions believe that the virtue of homeownership was a result of hard work and determination. In fact, in the 1950s the census bureau started collecting data on new housing-, which was considered an indicator of the economic vitality of the country. By the 1970s over 60% of the people had their own homes. In the 1990s, sub—prime lending and mortgages made average Americans believe, that it was possible to make their dreams come true.

Today, more than third Americans live in their own homes. Buying a home in America is the single greatest investment that most people make. They put their entire life’s savings and sometimes those of their family and friends into a home, believing they are making the biggest investment of their lives.

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However, this is one of the biggest half truths fed to Americans over the years. This advice, like many others, is true in certain situations and cases, but definitely not true for everyone out there.

Whoever thought of this piece of advice, obviously did not take into account the housing market meltdown of the 2000s. Unfortunately, many people who took this advice either have now lost their entire life’s savings, or are on the brink of bankruptcy or in the process of foreclosing their homes and egos. Lives have been destroyed as the Great American Dream turned into Nightmare on Main Street.

However, not all is lost and there’s still some hope. We are here to save the American Dream and help out the Main Street of America. Our aim is to save people and their homes and to revive the American dream of home ownership. It’s time for Banks and Corporate Giants to watch out because people don’t need to wait for economic stimulus to come. We are here to help people and to help the American Dream make a comeback!

CHAPTER 3: The American Nightmare—Americans Are Losing Their Homes Every Month 

We saw in 2009, 140 Bank Failures the highest since 1992 during the savings and loan crisis. In 2008, we saw 25 banks failures and in 2007 we saw three bank failures. The number of banks on the FDIC’s confidential Problem list is 702. Bank Failures in 2010 have been 16 so far and analysts expect 200 or more banks to fail this year. (Douglas A. McIntyre) The crash of real estate market in America is the cause of massive home foreclosures. This has led to a massive fall in the prices of housing estates all over North America. The housing bubble attained its zenith in the year 2005 and broke down in 2006. Today, it is on the verge of bursting, and a collapse in the housing market all over the nation has ensued with a sharp decent in its prices.

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Banks and various other financial institutions used to invest in real estate, as it was one of the main profit arenas, which continued for decades. The safest method to protect people’s money was to invest in a house. Keeping this in mind, people continued to invest in the housing market between the late 1990s and 2005, in spite of their high reaching prices. Now in 2010 and 2011 it is not getting better as per RealtyTrac, Inc. RealtyTrac Inc. is an Irvine, California based firm that provides research information on foreclosure information throughout the United States. Rick Sharga is a senior vice president for RealtyTrac and he believes that according to their data, the country is on pace to experience more than one million bank repossessions this year. He said that We’re finally seeing the banks start to process the inventory that has been in foreclosure, but delayed in processing. We expect the pace to accelerate as the year goes on. The number of homes that were lost in foreclosure to banks in the first quarter of this year was up thirty five percent over the first quarter of last year. This is with no end in sight because the number of homeowners that were in a position to be facing foreclosure also increased by sixteen percent in the same period of time. Posted by Rancho Cucamonga Realtor on November 16th, 2010 President Obama’s administration has spent seventy five billion on a program to prevent mortgage foreclosures but has only really been able to offer assistance to a very few troubled homeowners. The process of a obtaining a loan modification is extremely difficult even with the assistance of the government program. About 1.2 million borrowers began the program during the previous year but of them only 231,000 loan modifications have been completed with the assistance of the administration’s flagship foreclosure prevention program. It seems that the problem for many is deeper than something that can be solved with the level of assistance that this kind of program can provide. In some situations loans that were issued with special short time interest rates have reached the point where the rates have reset and the payments have skyrocketed causing the homeowner insurmountable difficulty in continuing making their payments.

When these loans were originally issued, these homeowners felt that when the time came they could just re-finance their mortgages but now many no longer have sufficient equity in their homes to be able to do that.

Add to this problem the homeowners that have suffered a job loss in their household and you can see why the administration’s program showed marginal success. Other factors that made it appear that mortgage foreclosures were on the decline were that foreclosure moratoriums were enacted by some states, with the hope of giving homeowners a chance to catch up with their past due payments. These moratoriums have ended and many are even further behind in their payments now than they were before.

The administration put pressure on banks last year to do more to modify home loans and as we previously discussed it has had limited success because it did not fix the underlying problem. And it also took some time for banks to be able to begin to cope with the rising pool of problem loans.

With the sinking of financial institutions and banks, the scenario of the real estate market has become more volatile. The American housing estate collapse was not an overnight matter. Following are some of the reasons that contributed to the crash:

REAL LIFE EXAMPLE: A FRIEND OF MINE WHO’S HUBAND IS AN ATTORNEY CALLED ME AND SAID I JUST LOST MY HOME! I SAID HOW IS THAT POSSILBE? SHE SAID, WE WERE TRYING TO DO A MODIFICATION THEY TOLD US NOT TO MAKE PAYMENTS, WE GOT BEHIND AND THEY PUT A FORECLOSURE DATE UP, THEY SAID SINCE WE WERE IN THE MODIFICAITON PROCESS THAT WOULD DELAY THE FORECLOSURE… . SHE NEVER FOLLOWED UP AND THE MORTGAGE COMPANY FORGOT TO TELL THE ATTORNEY TO DELAY THE FORECLOSURE THEY LOST THEIR HOME, JUST LIKE THAT… . THESE ARE SMART INTELLIGENT PEOPLE.

PEOPLE ARE LOSING THEIR HOMES BECAUSE THEY DO NOT KNOW WHAT TO DO NOT BECAUSE THEY CAN NOT AFFORD THEM

FOLLOW UP IS KEY PEOPLE DO NOT DO WHAT THEY SAY THEY ARE GOING TO DO UNLESS YOU FOLLOW UP FAST AND OFTEN. All the government programs in the world cannot help the unemployed and or people that missed payments in the last 6 months. That is the problem people do not have income. If you can prove you can make the payment with your income the bank will give you a modification.

The financial institutions and banks were giving mortgages that are 5 to 10 times higher than the yearly incomes of the people. This was much above the safety rate of 3 to 4 times. These financial establishments, while providing mortgages to the people, did not scrutinize them properly. In addition, the powerhouses implemented aggressive conditions and terms. These resulted in an easy flow of cash in the market that fueled the real estate prices in the market. This was ok as long as your income never changed! We have learned the best in life can change unexpectedly and unemployment is causing the loans to fail. Lenders had good intentions who would ever have thought it would be such a massive amount of the population.

2.   The meltdown of US economy played a vital role in the crash of the housing market all over the world. When people started losing their jobs and income changed there was no turning back because people did not have the income they had before.

Aftermath of the crash:

1.   Today, the real estate market is facing a number of challenges. The recovery from this downfall is a very long drawn and tedious process. This is because of the growing rates of unemployment, the plunging prices of the houses, and the bleak economic scenario. All these factors are leading to an unsettled future. It is possible that a considerable amount of time may be required to reinstate the values of property and recover the real estate market to normality.

2.   The foreign investors went bankrupt due to massive loss, as they had invested in the housing market in US.

3.   The banking organizations suffered a whooping loss of $2 trillion dollars because of this housing economic meltdown.

4.   Unemployment: With the highest levels of unemployment still occurring, it make’s modification’s unavailable to homeowner’s because they need to qualify for a mortgage and with out income no one can qualify.

CHAPTER 4: Homeowners Tax Credit—The Government Is Giving You Money 

What Are Housing Tax Credits?

IT’S OVER AS OF SEPTEMBER 30TH 2010 BUMMER!

HOWEVER!

EACH STATE HAS SPECIAL PROGAMS GOOGLE IT YOU WILL FIND IT!

YOUR STATE AND HOME BUYER INCENTIVES TO BUY HOMES AND DOWNYPAYMENT ASSISTANT PROGRAMS

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CHAPTER 5: Buying a Home—It Is Not That Hard 

GET OFF THE COUCH AND BUY A HOUSE!

NOW IS THE TIME TO BUY A HOME IF YOU DO NOT OWN ONE! Do not kid yourself; the market is at an all time low, the mortgage rates are at an all time low! Jump In Right Now do not hesitate if you have a credit score of 600 or above and you can prove your income and you do not buy a home you are missing the BOAT people!

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REAL LIFE EXAMPLE:

We are a real life example of just recently buying a home on contract for deed $199,000-2400 Square feet 5 acres fenced in a gated secure community 80 miles north of LA, CA with $5000.00 down and 30 year financing with a 10 year balloon note (which means if we do not pay it off in 10 years we will need to do a refinance after the property is deeded to us in 3 years). No qualifying it is just a matter of finding the right person who understands the situation and paperwork. I tell you this because it CAN BE DONE, don’t listen to people who tell you people that it cannot be done. Why rent for $2000.00 a month when you can buy for $2000.00 now if you don’t have any cash for a down payment you must do a lease option which I will talk about later.

Advantages of Buying a Home

Buying a house can be a very rewarding experience. It gives you the joy of settling down and owning your own home. The process of buying a home may initially seem scary and tedious to you but the feeling of owning your own home is totally worth the effort.

If you don’t have the required funds to buy a house,