Why Choose Nicole James Real Estate Group?

Nicole James Real Estate Group is a full service Real Estate firm serving Raleigh-Durham, the Triangle, and all surrounding areas of North Carolina. Nicole James Real Estate Group is comprised of high quality associates and consultants that specialize in residential secondary and new construction markets. The firm also has extensive experience in the marketing and selling of Real Estate Owned (REO) properties. Nicole James The team consists of a broker in charge, a listing support agent, a client care manager, a closing coordinator, and a business/marketing consultant.

The BIC has been a consistent top performer with over $40 million in volume and 200 homes sold to date. The BIC has a background in public relations and marketing and is a certified REO representative licensed in North Carolina and Georgia. Professional associations include the National Association of Realtors, North Carolina Association of Realtors, Georgia Association of Realtors, Durham Association of Realtors, Triangle Multiple Listing Service, Georgia Multiple Listing Service, and First Multiple Listing Service of Atlanta.

The listing support agent has over 12 years of real estate experience and holds licenses in North and South Carolina. This agent is widely known in the area as an aggressive sale person in both the resale and new homes market. Professional associations include the National Association of Realtors, North Carolina Association of Realtors, and Triangle Multiple Listing Service.

The client care manager is a licensed North Carolina agent with broad experiences in marketing and social media. The client care manager is responsible for the day-to-day duties of the office and the direct support of clients during the entire real estate process.

The closing coordinator works with the client care manager in client support. The closing coordinator also ensures that all requirements and paperwork are in order to close transactions.

The business and marketing consultant has broad experiences in real estate, utilities, and emerging business and is a MBA from the Fuqua School of Business, Duke University.

Nicole James Real Estate Group is located on the ground floor of the historic Teermark building in downtown Durham, North Carolina. Our office suite is approximately 1,100 square feet with two separate rooms. One room is called the “war room” which is where the staff have their desks and office equipment. The other room is called the “client room” which also doubles as a conference room. The war room has the latest in touch screen all-in-one computers, color printers, phones, and a fax machine. The client room has a 46-inch plasma TV and various audio/video equipment, which is used to provide presentations to clients and during staff meetings. The entire office suite is on a secured wireless network that allows file and printer sharing. The network also has guest access points that provide internet services to clients and agents.

The team at Nicole James Real Estate Group has lived and worked in the area for over 15 years and established relationships and experience of identifying, marketing, and working with investors and clients throughout all phases of a real estate transaction. In addition to the marketing strategy outlined below, Nicole James Real Estate Group has developed a niche with first time homebuyers through their credit counseling services and first time homebuyers’ seminars. Ready and willing first time homebuyers have been identified as great potential buyers for homes at particular price points.

Nicole James Real Estate Group has created a winning marketing strategy for its clients to maximize exposure in order to sell their property as quickly as possible. Our marketing strategy has four key aspects: traditional promotions, internet and social media, networking/caravans, and viral marketing.

http://www.nicolejames.com/MarketingStrategy.pdf

Traditional Promotions

Marketing flyers

Creative and unique flyers are created and widely distributed for each property

Email broadcasts

Information of new listings are sent out through email broadcasts to local realtors

Printed media

Advertisements of the listings are submitted to local printed media

For sale signs

Quality looking ‘for sale’ signs are posted in front of listing

Internet and Social Media

Exposure is key

More than 80% of potential buyers utilize the internet

Market utilizing the latest internet tools

• MLS
• Realtor.com
• Dozens of subsidiary web services
• www.nicolejames.com – feature listings
• www.nicolejamesREO.com – Exclusive REO properties

Facebook and Twitter

Leverage social media presence through facebook and twitter

Networking/Caravans

Open Houses

If necessary open houses are set up and scheduled by the listing support agent

Property Caravans

Coordinated tours for local realtors to preview listings

Viral Marketing

Multimedia videos and slideshows

Youtube videos and slideshows are provided for each listed property

Obama signs 3-month extension of homebuyer credit

WASHINGTON | Fri Jul 2, 2010 3:11pm EDT

(Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Friday signed a law giving consumers already in the process of buying a home three extra months to close the deal and still get a popular tax credit from the government.

--------------------------\

Applicable to those who had contracts in place prior to April 30.
You now have until Sept. 30 to close out your contract.

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6614AE20100702?type=politicsNews

Luau Cookout 2010

Thank you all who attended our event.
We are blessed to have such wonderful friends, family, clients, and neighbors...

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Durham-NC/Nicole-James-Real-Estate-Group-Inc/148152617087#!/album.php?aid=175459&id=148152617087&ref=mf

Builders again buying land

Two large home builders are increasing land acquisitions in the Triangle, a bet that the region's housing market and economy is poised for a rebound.

The recent activity comes after an extended period in which large builders refrained from making purchases as they waited for the housing market to bottom out and land prices to come down. With both of those things now occurring, builders see an opportunity to grab market share in an area whose long-term growth prospects have not been clouded by the recession.

"The biggest surprise has been how quickly the pursuit has ramped back up again," said Lee Bunn, Standard Pacific Home's land acquisition manager in the Triangle. "Just in, say, a 90-day period we've kind of gone from first gear to fourth gear."

Over the last month California-based Standard Pacific Homes, among the largest builders in the country, has paid nearly $10 million for 265 single-family and townhouse lots in Wake Forest, Durham, Raleigh and Cary.

Another national builder, Toll Brothers, recently paid $23.46 million for the majority of the Hasentree luxury golf course community in northern Wake County, a purchase that included the golf course and 318 lots.

The deals reflect the confidence builders have that the Triangle will continue to draw new residents and burn off the inventory of homes left over from the boom years. They are also a sign that builders believe lot prices have fallen far enough to reflect current market conditions.

The lot typically accounts for about 20 percent of the cost of a home, meaning the less a builder pays for dirt the more affordable it can make the house on top of it.

Publicly traded builders such as Toll Brothers and Standard Pacific are in a position to buy land partly because of a change in the tax code.

In November, Congress passed a law that lets companies that are losing money go back five years and get a refund for taxes paid when they were making money. Companies were previously limited to recouping taxes paid up to two years earlier.

"They're flush with cash," said Ed Dunnavant, who tracks Triangle housing trends for the research firm Metrostudy.

Land prices down

While builders such as Standard Pacific have plenty of cash, many local builders are struggling to stay afloat and need to sell some of their inventory. Other builders have already been foreclosed on by their banks, which are now in the process of disposing the lots. This has led to steadily declining lot prices in the Triangle.

The average lot price for a single-family home in the Triangle was $48,732 in the fourth quarter of 2009, down 19 percent from the same period in 2008, according to Market Opportunity Research Enterprises, a Rocky Mount group that tracks Triangle housing trends.

Bunn said the recent buying activity should not be confused with the frenzied buying that took place during the housing bubble.

"I think people are working on a smaller footprint," he said. "They're being more selective about where they go."

The Triangle still has a glut of developed lots left over from the boom years, but a number of those lots are located in outlying subdivisions that have become less attractive as housing closer to job centers has become more affordable.

'Feeding frenzy' small

In the more attractive areas of the Triangle competition for lots has become fierce. In southwestern Wake County, which includes Cary, Apex and Morrisville, the number of vacant developed lots totaled 4,331 in the fourth quarter, down 20 percent from the same period the year before, according to Metrostudy.

Bunn said Standard Pacific is poised to make a number of other land acquisitions in addition to its recent deals, which included buying 99 lots in the Mulberry Park townhouse community in Durham and 110 lots in the Northampton subdivision in Wake Forest.

Dunnavant said he expects land purchases to slow down as builders remain wary of carrying too much land on their books -- something that led to disastrous results when the housing bubble burst.

"If they do that they're going to be right back where they were three to four years ago," he said. "While there's a little bit of feeding frenzy right now I think it's really they're replenishing their war chest because most of them let their lot supplies dwindle," he said.

The Associated Press contributed to this report

http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/03/23/402733/builders-again-buying-land.html?story_link=email_msg

Read more: http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/03/23/402733/builders-again-buying-land.html?story_link=email_msg#ixzz0jG1BQ94M

The Triangle has received more affirmation

The Triangle has received more affirmation that it is better-positioned than most regions to emerge quickly from this recession.

"Based on end-2010 economic forecasts, we think Raleigh will be the healthiest of the largest 100 markets in the country. Raleigh comes out on top because of stronger employment conditions, moderate household income growth, and continued strong household formation. The market still is expected to see minor home price declines (approximately 3 percent decline expected for 2010 over 2009), which is one factor that keeps the market from being even stronger."


http://www.newsobserver.com/2010/02/19/346681/raleigh-housing-market-ranks-first.html

Housing forecast: Expert says Triangle market not as bad as elsewhere

http://www.triangle.com/shop/realestate/story/23456.html

The good news is we’re not in Florida or California.

The numbers crunchers and statistics hounds making PowerPoint presentations and reeling off figures and comparisons at the Triangle Housing Forecast on Dec. 16 struggled to find omens of hope to offer the nearly 300 housing industry professionals who packed into the ballroom at the Brier Creek Country Club. The 3-hour seminar, jointly produced by the Home Builders Association of Raleigh-Wake County and the Home Builders Association of Durham, Orange and Chatham Counties, featured Wells Fargo senior economist Mark Vitner, a favorite on the national speakers’ circuit, though he doesn’t try to sugarcoat what he sees in economic indicators.

“Everybody wants to know am I going to put the bear back in the cage,” Vitner said.

Local speakers drilled down in the Triangle housing market. Bernard Helms of Market Opportunity Research Enterprises in Rocky Mount analyzed the recent real estate transactions in the Triangle and compared them to previous years. Stacey Anfindsen of Birch Appraisal Group in Raleigh ran through numbers on residential real estate listings and housing inventories and prices. Ed Dunnavant of Metrostudy in Cary laid out the trends in the real estate market and explained how to survive until the economic recovery kicks in.

Vitner drew a quick sketch of the economic picture overall. The economy is getting somewhat better than it was a year ago, according to indicators. The Gross Domestic Product showed some growth in the third quarter of this year, due mainly to federal stimulus programs such as Cash for Clunkers and the first-time home buyer tax credit. The recovery may be sluggish but is unlikely to double-dip, he said, meaning it won’t drop back after a short-term uptick.

Although the number of job losses — more than 9 million — is expected to exceed every post-WWII downturn, it has hit the private sector hardest. University towns and centers of government have the lowest unemployment rate. That bodes well for the Triangle, with the state capital in Raleigh and the number of colleges and universities in Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. Vitner expects the state’s unemployment rate to top out around 11 percent in fall 2010.

The one sector of the economy that is growing at a rapid pace is the mobile Internet industry, more good news for the Triangle, which has Research Triangle Park. Vitner predicts that inflation will rise faster than in the previous decade because the U.S. economy is growing slower than the global economy. Foreign suppliers are less likely to give U.S. consumers discounts, offering them instead to fast-growing economies, like China, where competition for sales is stiffer.

The worst is over for plummeting home prices, Vitner said, except for the high-end market. Mortgage rates are very low, mainly due to federal stimulus, and Vitner predicts they will remain low for the foreseeable future. “You can’t raise interest rates if unemployment rates stay high,” he said. High unemployment tamps down demand for mortgages, keeping rates low. Though the first-time home buyer tax credit was extended through April 2010, “most qualified buyers have already taken advantage of it,” he said. As for federal refinancing programs, he said, 95 percent of modified loans are delinquent again in three months.

Once mortgage rates begin to rise, in 2012 or 2013, he expects them to double to at least 8 percent. “The era of cheap and abundant credit is over,” he said.

Bernard Helm has looked at every residential real estate transaction recorded in the Triangle since 1986. And while his charts and graphs that compared market activity in 2007 with that of 2009 show a significant contraction of the market, bear in mind that 2007 was as close to a “bubble” year in residential real estate that the Triangle has had in many years.

The bright spot Helm found was that, though the total number of closings had declined, closings of resale homes made up a larger share of the market. That indicates more of the existing housing inventory is being absorbed, which will eventually lead to stronger housing prices.

The first-time home buyer credit did boost sales of moderately priced homes but had either no effect or a negative effect on the inventory of newly built homes. Those new homes tend to be high-priced because before the market collapsed, that’s where the greatest profit was for builders. Demand was strong, and the market drifted toward pricey homes. Developers bought land and prepped it for golf-course communities and other high-end subdivisions. Now that the market demand is for homes less than $150,000, developers would not be able to cover their development costs by building low-priced homes in luxury communities.

Again, there’s good news, for public builders at least. As banks grow increasingly reluctant to lend to private builders, what little land available is being snapped up by public builders who don’t have to rely on private financing.

Helm warned to expect a sag in real estate transactions in early 2010 because the federal tax credit pulled some 2010 buyers into the 2009 market.

He ended by sharing what he sees are the basics for recovery: Home sellers must capitulate on pricing. The resale home inventory must stabilize, which includes absorbing the shadow inventory of homes that sellers are deliberately keeping off the market until prices rise. Land prices must capitulate. And banks must be willing to lend and consumers able to borrow.

Stacey Anfindsen compared listings and showings and gave the heartening news that average days on the market is only a few weeks longer than in the strong 2007 market. Sales prices are dropping, he said, but as people own their homes about 4 years on average before selling, only people who bought in the past three years and sold this year probably lost money on the sale.

Ed Dunnavant closed the meeting with advice to builders on how to hold on during a slow recovery:

Refocus on building for the natural demand coming from people who marry, have a baby, get a promotion or decide to stop renting. They make up a steady supply of buyers.

Reposition your product to satisfy the demands of the 2010 buyer. Buyers are shifting their housing decisions to reflect what they need, rather than what they want. Expect them to shy away from conspicuous consumption in the early stages of recovery.

Reprice lots and homes to the expectations of your customers. Today’s buyers are concerned about debt and are risk averse. Their buying decisions will be driven by practicality, affordability and good value.

He also urged builders to exercise patience, persistence and friendly tenacity in working with customers, bankers, suppliers and other business associates. They are all in this together.

“The housing industry has always been a cyclical business,” he said. “A peak will always be followed by a downturn, which could be caused by many different local, state, national or international events.”

Nancy E. Oates is a business and real estate writer in Chapel Hill. Reach her at neoates@earthlink.net.

Out of the depths of housing's worst downturn, smaller new homes are turning into a bright spot for some home builders

Out of the depths of housing's worst downturn, smaller new homes are turning into a bright spot for some home builders.


http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/2009-12-17-smallhomes17_ST_N.htm

By Stephanie Armour, USA TODAY

Out of the depths of housing's worst downturn, smaller new homes are turning into a bright spot for some home builders.

The trend toward more compact new homes is being driven partly by the fact that more customers are first-time buyers who have less to spend.

Home builders are responding by offering smaller designs with features such as high ceilings and large windows that create a spacious feel and options that let buyers personalize the model they choose.

KB Home's smaller model helped it achieve a 62% increase in year-over-year net orders in the third quarter.

The trend cuts across the industry. The median square footage of new homes has dropped 9% from a peak of 2,300 square feet in the third quarter of 2006 to 2,100 square feet in the July-September period this year, according to data from the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB).

Housing size drops with each recession, but economists expect the current movement toward smaller homes to continue for some time in part because of the severity of the current housing market slump.

First-time buyers are driving the trend toward smaller homes because that is what they can afford, says David Crowe, chief economist at the NAHB.

As the economy improves, move-up buyers generally enter the market and begin buying larger homes. But this time, so many homeowners owe more on their homes than their properties are worth that many potential move-up buyers will be stuck even as the economy strengthens.

That means first-time home buyers will still be buying smaller homes while larger homes will find fewer buyers.

"This downsizing is more sustainable," Crowe says. "The first-time buyer will continue to be a large part of the market because the move-up buyer will not have as much equity. It's going to take them awhile to climb out."

The NAHB doesn't keep data on the percentage of new home sales that are made by first-time home buyers, but about half of all home purchasers were first-time buyers in October, according to the National Association of Realtors.

For builders, smaller, less-expensive homes mean less profit. But the industry is already facing strong competition from a high supply of foreclosed homes selling at comparatively low prices.

A welcome change

Some analysts say the downsizing trend could be good news for builders.

"The appetite for smaller homes may be a welcome change for home builders as new home sales have been challenged in the past few years," says Tom Lydon, editor of ETF Trends, which educates investors on fund choices and market trends.

Major home builders such as KB Home and Pulte Homes are responding to the shift in demand by offering more of the smaller properties.

At Pulte Homes, its most popular designs today are 100 to 200 square feet less than the most-popular plans in 2005-06.

So the lower-priced homes don't seem bare-bones to buyers, open floor plans and 9-foot ceilings provide a sense of roominess. Fireplaces are an option.

To hold down costs, Corian — a surfacing material created by DuPont— is a standard for kitchen counters instead of granite. Appliances are standard models instead of pricier stainless steel.

"It's not just making it smaller, it's maximizing the space in the home," says Caryn Klebba, a spokeswoman at Pulte Homes. "It's a 9- or 10-foot ceiling rather than a cathedral ceiling." Cathedral ceilings are 14 to 18 feet.

Getaway option

Smaller homes also are appealing as vacation homes.

Nancy Coronado, 55, a retired framer in an art gallery, has a large home in Whitehall, Mich., and bought a second Pulte home in Florence, Ariz., in March. The new home is about 1,400 square feet. "I have a big home in Michigan and didn't want another big home," she says. "I wasn't looking for that."

KB Home also has redesigned its homes to reflect the trend, because nearly 80% of its customers are first-time home buyers.

Toll Bros., which builds luxury homes, says demand is down across the board, and not just for larger homes. Company officials say they, too, see an increased interest in smaller homes but believe that home buyers will someday return to wanting larger properties.

Smaller homes, they say, reflect a down economy and tighter credit rather than an appetite for less space.

"We see the demand for smaller homes, but it's not as though there's huge demand for smaller homes but no demand for larger homes," says Kira McCarron, a spokeswoman for Toll Bros. "There is still a demand for luxury homes."