Continuing Education - CE requirements will increase from 12 to 18 hours. Licensees will need to complete 9 hours of core education and 9 hours of general education / electives to renew a license effective January 1, 2010.
If your license expires in January 2010, you may renew your license in December 2009 and instead complete the current 12 hours of Continuing Education.
Sales Agent Pre-licensing - Pre-licensing education will increase to 120 hours on January 1, 2010.
Utah Mortgage Licensees ...
Mortgage Loan Originator Pre-licensing - license applicants are required to complete a 60 hour pre-licensing course, effective January 1, 2010. If the licensee applicant completes the licensing process on or before December 31, 2009, current criteria will be acceptable.
S.A.F.E. Requirements and Testing - Mortgage licensees in Utah must create an account on the NMLS website by May 31, 2010. All licensees must pass the S.A.F.E. exam by December 31, 2010.
RESPA ...
New Good Faith Estimate and Settlement Statement forms are required on all applications taken on or after January 1, 2010.
From My Porch ...
Prof Mike • Class Star®
ClassStar offers two, 3-hour core courses and several live courses. www.ClassStar.com Your business and referrals are appreciated.
This is a series of ideas and articles and quotations about business.
My profession and my training is in business, and of late we are reading about the worst of the bunch of us - those "business" folks that take billions from taxpayers in bailout … and reward themselves with bonuses for sub-par and failing work product.
Enron execs go to jail after manipulation of energy markets … taking more money than they earned… and further misstating it so they could personally profit further - aided by a certified public accounting company.
Financiers rip off their friends and family and ruin lives.
Geeezzz ...
As real estate practitioners we are doing business, too. I believe most of us are honest and work hard to make a good living and so then, based upon my own training plus a book by a couple of guys I work with by the same title ("Foundations of Business Thought" by Cal Boardman and Alan Sandomir) and who have nothing to do with this blog...I'm going to sort of pinch the title of their text because I can -- and it rightly indicates the subject matter ahead -- let's talk about this stuff. Surely business is not built on dishonesty.
How do we … how ought we do … business? And so, here I go to explain why and hopefully how … and please note this is not a big bunch of theory or pontification or an altruistic scolding. It will help you understand your profits and make them even bigger. Commissions are good.
"Commissions Are Good …" or "Foundations of Business Thought"
To get started, please read the following selections from "The Business Guide," J.L Nichols self-published it in Naperville, Ill in 1883…
Business, in every age of the world, has been the chief pioneer in the march of man's civilization. Blessings everywhere follow its advancing footsteps. It travels over no bloodstained fields to secure its noble ends, but everywhere brings man into friendly and harmonious intercourse. It removes local prejudices, breaks down personal antipathies, and binds the whole family of man together by strong ties of association and of mutual and independent interests.
It brings men together, and towns and cities are built; it makes men venture upon the seas in ships, and traverse continents on iron pathways, and wherever we go, whether abroad or at home, it is business that controls the great interests of the world, and makes the affairs of men mighty.
Practical Rules for Success
1. Keep your health good by adopting regular and study habits.
2. Never be afraid to say no. Every successful man must have the backbone to assert his rights.
3. Remember that steady, earnest effort alone leads to wealth and high position.
4. Be not ashamed to work, for it is one of the conditions of our existence. There is not a criminal who does not owe his crime to some idle hour.
5. Never covet what is not your own.
6. Remember that time is gold.
7. To industry and economy add self-reliance. Do not take too much advice, think for yourself. Independence will add vigor and inspiration to your labors.
8. Don't be selfish. Selfishness is the meanest of vices, and the parent of a dozen more. Selfishness keeps a penny so close to the eye that it can't see a dollar beyond.
9. Never forget a favor, for ingratitude is the basest trait of a man's mean character.
10. Never taste or touch that which befogs the mind or dethrones the reason. A drunken man is always at the mercy of his enemies.
This is a good place to stop and think about it all, I think.
I like the "do not take too much advice" in no. 7. If the truth be known, I think there's an overabundance of advice in any particular office on any given day.
We will continue.
From My Porch
Prof. Mike • Class Star®
ClassStar offers two, 3-hour core courses. Your business and referrals are appreciated.
This is a primer on real estate math. For many of you this is quite familiar and basic and for others it can be a good refresher.
This primer is on how to calculate appreciation, equity, and the difference between the two metrics.I’ve also included some HP financial calculator keystrokes.Please note Hewlett-Packard Co. has no idea who I am.It just makes the best calculators.For Texas Instruments fans, I will soon develop the corresponding keystrokes for TI financial calculators.
How to calculate appreciation
Values in real estate are caused by appreciation.Real estate value tends to go up over time - which is called appreciation.It doesn't just happen, and it is a result of various market factors such as other homes on the property and the number of buyers in the market.It can also be based upon current economic conditions which as we all know right now is causing perhaps flat values or reduced values, and some loss of value in some cases.We've lost some appreciation from prior years which the experts are telling us perhaps were not real anyway, but nonetheless we have still experienced a positive average increase in value over time.
When more buyers into the market and start competing for the available properties, which is a market force, and as those buyers purchase available inventory, causing the supply of those homes to reduce -- prices will tend to rise. Basically this is simple demand and supply macroeconomics.
The U.S. Census Bureau says the median value of a home in the US from years 2002 to 2005 averaged a compound annual increase of 7%.In other areas of the United States, for example California -- the median home value increased at a compound rate of 20.1% during that same period.
Let's say in Utah right now we have, in lieu our current flattened economy, over the last five years have recorded an average of 7% appreciation.Let's also say we bought a home for $225,000 three years ago.
So what is the home worth -- starting at $225,000, three years ago, at 7% appreciation annually?
Here is one equation to do it;
$225,000 X (1.07)X(1.07)X(1.07)= $ 275,634.68. This is the correct amount.
Why can't we just multiply $ 225,000 by 21%?21% would be three years of 7%, wouldn't it? Here's an incorrect equation:
$ 225,000 X(1.21) =$ 272,250.That's less than the first answer, isn't it?
So, no: just using 21% won’t work. It’s not the correct equation because it doesn't compound the first or second year's appreciation in its calculation.It just calculates 21% of $225,000 and doesn't include the value achieved after year one and year two.
------- Fast Calculator Maneuvers Instead -----
But let's just use our trusty HP financial calculators and calculate this quickly and quite screwing around with equations.Here are your calculator keystrokes to do the foregoing problem quickly…
PressCCCCC[ PV ]... outflow of $225,000 is our present value - the amount spent on the house.
Press7CCCCthen press [ i ]...The appreciation rate for one year from the example above.
Press3CCCCthen press [ n ]... which is the numbers of years since we bought the house.
Press CCCCC[ FV ] ... the FV keystroke will calculate the future value of the house = 275,634.68
* Hewlett-Packard and most financial calculators use the minus symbol to indicate the value (money) left us -- we spent it -- we placed it outside of our wallets so to speak.Notice after pressing the Future Value key, your answer is positive -- meaning that's what your value is now -- to you -- your asset - your good.
So, if we bought a house for $225,000 three years ago and it appreciated at an average rate of 7% each year, it is now worth $275,635.
How much appreciation is ours in dollar terms?
The dollar amount of appreciation is the ending value less the beginning value:
275,635CCCCCEnding / market value
225,000CCCCCBeginning / Purchase price of the property
50,635 CCCCCAppreciation. Nice.
But...$ 50,635 is not equity.
How to calculate equity…
Equity = Market value - Debt (the mortgage)
$ 275,635= Market value after the appreciation is added in. Let’s say the borrowers put a 10% down payment on the purchase and mortgaged the rest:
