Scottsdale Real Estate Blog - Judy Orr

Using Your IRA or 401(k) for a Down Payment

Sometimes it seems like there is just no way you'll ever be able to afford to purchase your first property in  Scottsdale, Carefree, Cave Creek, Fountain Hills, Paradise Valley, or another Phoenix area. As prices increase, the dream of homeownership drifts farther away.

There are many different rules and ways of obtaining financing and/or funds. Here are two you might want to consider.  Please consider the date of this post and double-check with your IRA or 401K provider to make sure what the current rules are.

1. If you are a first-time home buyer you are allowed to withdraw up to $10,000 from your IRA without penalty. You will be taxed on the withdrawal, unless you have a Roth IRA, as you were already taxed on those contributions.

2. You'll…

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My Recent Press

Some of my fellow agents, friends, and clients have seen my recent press.  It started a few weeks ago with a Wall Street Journal article about how I lost the domain name for my Oak Lawn real estate website.  Many other news sources across the nation picked the WSJ article.

Please be assured that I did not forget to pay my $9.00 fee.  I relied on my web host to let me know what the problem was when my site first went off-line since I purchased the domain name through them.  They finally figured it out the 2nd time the site went down but by that time it was too late.

The story was captured by two local papers, The Southtown Star and The Chicago Sun-Times.  The Southtown Star article wasn't as bad as the Sun-Times article which made it sound like I…

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Scottsdale Real Estate Buying Trend

Over the past week or two, there has been an influx of activity with my listings and I've had 5 or 6 contracts presented in this short time period. I have noticed a real estate trend that I haven't seen in a long time. Some Scottsdale home buyers are coming in with very low offers.

I believe the lowest I received was $30,000 or more under the list price on a Scottsdale home for sale. Of course, my seller was upset and let me know that he'll hold onto the home and wait for a better offer rather than sell it at such a lowball price.  In fact, not one of these lowball buyers has been successful in getting their offers accepted.

No matter if it's a Buyer's Market or Seller's Market, there will always be potential buyers that will make lowball…

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Why Didn't I Just Leave Illinois?

I have mentioned how I wasn't happy living in the state I was born in, Illinois. I always say that I was born in the wrong state. I sometimes developed SADD during winter. It actually started in the fall season, knowing that Illinois winter was right around the corner.

One of my life regrets - a job offer based in New York

At the age of 19 I had a job offer to work with my prior boss who left the company I was employed at to work for the World Bank. I would be his Executive Secretary, traveling all over the world. However, I would have to relocate to New York. I had just gotten married and I laid awake at night contemplating such an exciting move.

I talked to my husband who was still trying to find his ideal work situation and who wasn’t…

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My First Warm Weather Love Was Florida

For as long as I can remember, every year during Easter vacation my family would jump in the aqua 1950 something Buick and drive to Sarasota, Florida. We would leave at 2-4:00 a.m. and drive until around 6:00 p.m. when we would stop at a Holiday Inn for dinner and sleep. Then we’d do it again the next day until we hit Sarasota. I remember one time we had to wait for a cow to get off the road.

When Mom would fall asleep Dad would rev it up to 100 mph. As soon as Mom woke up, we'd tell her and she'd say "Oh Bud!" and give him a hit on his arm.

We stayed in the same motel every year. It was owned by a couple who lived on-site and my parents became friends with them.

The private gated pool was across the street. There were 1-bedroom to 3-bedroom…

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More Scottsdale Home Buyers Search the Internet First

UPDATE: Please note this post date - check out that computer in the picture. The figure stated below keeps rising, it is now way above 90%. Print advertising has all but died out. Many brokerages have completely cut out all print advertising.

According to the National Association of Realtors® (NAR), Internet usage has risen among Scottsdale home buyers. In 1995, only about 2 percent of home buyers surfed the Internet. Today that figure has risen to 77%, up 3% from 2004 (see UPDATE above).

This is the reason I use multiple social media sites and invest time and money into my Scottsdale area website. These attract buyers to my site so they can see all of the Scottsdale real estate and surrounding towns (Cave Creek, Carefree, North Phoenix, Fountain…

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Don't Make These Scottsdale Home Buyer Mistakes

This is an older post that I've updated.  I received a real estate association e-mail newsletter with an interesting list from an Illinois real estate agent, Mark Nash. I'd like to quote his Top Buyer Mistakes and give my opinion after each one:

1. Bought properties to flip at top-of-market prices

I still can't figure out why buyers do this. Maybe if a buyer timed the purchase around the flipping of a Scottsdale home for sale at the beginning of a seller's market, they might have seen a substantial profit. In our local market, things are slowing and I've already seen homes purchased and quickly put back on the market at a higher price (after some renovating) sitting and not selling.

UPDATE: We are still seeing flips but I do see a lot of…

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I Finally Took My First Flight - At 45

One of my life goals was to travel to distant places like Egypt and France. Can’t do that in a car. So at the age of 45, we got a trip to Cancun as a Christmas present from my then boyfriend's parents. I couldn’t turn it down. In fact, prior to going I read some books on Mexico (more on its rich history) and was excited about the trip.  This was in the 1990's.

But I wasn't excited about my first plane ride. I had never taken a Valium but I was trolling for some. I got a couple from someone I knew. I was excited to go to Mexico but I still wasn’t looking forward to flying there.

In fact, I envisioned the scene in Airplane where a woman is going crazy and everyone goes up to her to punch her (or hit her with something) to shut her up. Even a nun hit…

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Married But Not Living Together?

I read another article yesterday that was almost unbelievable. It stated that recent census reports show that more than three million couples actually live in separate residences.

The article was about a Cave Creek couple that got married and stayed in their respective homes instead of moving in together because they already had their pet peeves about each other. One was that she was a neat freak and he was a packrat. The other was the fact that he had a music studio in his place and she needed quiet to do her work at home. They actually split up the wedding gifts between the two homes and they do spend nights with each other and have dinner together. They also conveniently live across the street from each other.

I've recently read an article about…

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My First Impressions of Arizona

My parents had been living in Mesa, Az. for many years (10-15) before I finally visited them. When my boyfriend Jimmy (now my husband) heard I had never been there he insisted on taking me. My parents were very excited to finally be able to show me their home and their new state of residence. This would have been around 1999-2000.

I was finally excited to be going. As I've mentioned in a previous post, Arizona was not calling my name.

After departing the airplane I noticed that the Phoenix Airport seemed small and more congested than our two Illinois airports. Not impressed yet.

Driving from the airport to my parent’s house didn’t instill much excitement in me, either. I did notice that things seemed cleaner from my highway view. I enjoyed…

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