Article: Look At That Pig In Lipstick

No, I haven't gone mad - that really is the title of an article on south Florida property...

The Broward/Palm Beach version of the New Times, a local south Florida newspaper, gives more details on inventive approaches from realtors - and vendors themselves - to help shift property.

The article starts by mentioning a lady who's selling her rather plush home in Ocala (in northern Florida) - a house with a couple of 50-foot terraces and two acres of land that's worth $1.25 million. Or rather, she's not selling it - she's giving it away. That's right. Giving it away. This lady will give her home away to the winner of a contest that she's running, in which entrants must write a 100 to 300 word essay on a pet. Sounds crazy? Not really. All entries much be accompanied by a $200 fee, and if the contest doesn't draw 6,250 entries then the lady reserves the right to cancel the whole thing, refunding $180 to each person. And yes, $200 multiplied by 6,250 equals $1.25 million, the value of the house. If she gets more than that number of entries, it will be pure profit to her. Sounds pretty clever to me!

Real estate agents and developers are also offering extras in order to help sell their properties, from designer furniture to one year leases on cars (fancy a new Mercedes?) to spa memberships at up-market hotels. Some developers offer these extras because if they've already sold a number of units at a development, they don't want to lower the value of remaining flats. Instead of lowering prices, they offer purchasers additional benefits.

The article also mentions in particular how one agent, Zach Finn, is coping with the market downturn - he's marketing overseas, particularly in London and Paris. Finn states "the dollar is down and prices are down... Europeans are coming over to America on real estate spending sprees."

So put it this way - buy a property in Florida, and you could enjoy lots of additional goodies on the side!

Article: Look at That Pig in Lipstick (New Times, 8th May 2008)

Article: Floridians Feel Heat...

A recent Sun Sentinel article reveals that the number of foreclosure homes in the U.S. continuing to rise - double the number of homes foreclosed in the first quarter of this year than for the same quarter last year. The most affected states are California, Nevada and yes, Florida.

The article states that alleviating the foreclose problem would need people to start buying again. Many respectable buyers can't do so, however, because of the unavailability of suitable loans.

If you're raising financing from the UK or, even better, don't need to acquire a loan, you'll be in a much better position than many Florida purchasers and, as such, be a much stronger buyer.

The article also has an interesting map for Broward and Palm Beach counties showing subprime loan and foreclosure areas.

Article: Floridians feel heat as homes facing foreclosure nationwide more than double (Sun Sentinel, 29th April 2008)

Opening A US Dollars Account

Whilst setting up my various utility and maintenance accounts for my new flat in Florida, it seemed quite clear that almost all of them would only accept payment from a US bank account or payment by US dollars cheque (check). Here in the UK, it's possible to pay for some utility accounts by credit card (even paying online) or by transferring funds from your bank account. This doesn't seem possible in the U.S.

I therefore needed to set up a US bank account. Whilst I believe this would be simple enough to do if you're actually out in Florida, it's not so straightfoward how to do it from the UK!

So what's the solution? I'd advise checking with your local bank in your home country to see if they can help - they may have branches in the U.S. I bank with HSBC in the UK, and they have a pretty large presence in the U.S.

As such, my local HSBC branch were able to help me set up a US bank account. I was sent various forms that I had to fill in and then submit to my branch...and then simply wait for the account to be set up. In fact, the whole process was much simpler than I was expecting.

A few things to note, however:

• I believe you can specify a US branch - this hopefully means you can specify a branch close to your property! If not, you may a general branch (e.g. based in New York state, as mine is) which can be reached by telephone banking, 24 hours a day. If you have Internet banking, a local branch may also not be that important.
• You may have to pay a fee to your bank for setting up a US bank account.
• You will definitely have to pay to get a cheque (check) book on the US account. I didn't know this (I don't pay for this in the UK!) and waited a good few weeks for my cheque book to come through, not realising they weren't sending it to me because I didn't have any money in my account (and therefore couldn't pay for the book). Except I didn't have any money in my account because I was waiting for the cheque book to reach me first!
• The easiest account to set up is the most basic - a current account. You'll probably be able to get a debit card for this type of account, though, which might be useful!

If your home bank can't help, I'd advise to set up an account the next time you're in the U.S. Other banks in the UK may be able to set up an account for you, but are likely to have restrictions - e.g. Citibank in the UK can open up a US current account for you, but you'll either need to be an existing customer, or maintain a monthly balance of £2,000 in the account - otherwise you'll have to pay monthly fees.