Home inspectors and home repairs, underwater mortgages

Real Estate Tip:
 

Make clear to your home inspector that you’d never hire him to do repair work on your property.  Otherwise, he may try to inflate or invent problems with your property in his inspection report and then try to get you to hire him to do the repair work.

Real Estate Insights:
 

Nearly 10 Million Mortgaged Homes are Still Underwater [View Article]: One of the main reasons real estate prices throughout much of the US have risen so precipitously recently is because of the lack of supply of houses to buy.  That shortage of supply is due in large measure to the millions of homeowners whose mortgages are still underwater and are unable to sell.  The ‘technical’ end to the recession occurred a long time ago but the mortgage crisis still looms large in many places particularly in working class and lower-income neighborhoods.