Video Summary

How do I know if the property I’m going to buy is in a deed restricted community? If you’re dealing with a realtor, you need to ask your realtor is the property in a deed restricted community. And if so, I need to receive a copy of the deed restrictions. The newer subdivisions, I would say in the last 30 years, usually set up homeowner’s associations. And so your contract, if it isn’t a deed, restricted community should reflect how much the monthly or the annual assessments are to the homeowners association. The deed restriction will also indicate what the responsibilities are of the homeowner’s association. If there is one, now the older subdivisions may have deed restrictions and those must be enforced by your neighbors or the other people in the subdivision rather than by the homeowner’s association. Whenever you close on the transaction or before closing, you can ask your title agent for a copy of the deed restrictions so that you can review them beforehand. If you do not want to be in a deed restricted community or have deed restrictions on your property, you should insert that in the contract and say, this contract is contingent upon there being no deed restrictions on the, uh, on the property or that they must be approved by the buyer. If you have any questions about deed restrictions and purchasing property with, or without deed restrictions, give me a call at (727) 847-2288.

Video Summary

Do I need flood insurance to get a mortgage? Yes, you will need to have flood insurance. If the property that you are purchasing is in a flood zone that requires flood insurance, your lender’s required by the federal government to make you have flood insurance on the property. If they have a mortgage and it’s a federally insured lender. Flood insurances, the flood zones are determined by FEMA and the U S Corps of army engineers. And not all property is in a flood zone that requires flood insurance, flood insurance is available in this area and that this community participates the national flood insurance program. The surveyor your insurance agent should be able to tell you whether or not the property is in a flood zone that requires flood insurance. Then a survey role also, would determine the finished floor elevation of the property and compare that with what the requirements are or what the flood elevation is for a hundred year flood plain. And depending on how high your property is, will determine what your flood insurance rate is. If you have any other questions about flood insurance, you can give me a call at (727) 847-2288.

Video Summary

What advice would you give a first-time homebuyer? Well, it’s certainly the largest investment you’ll probably be making in this time in your life, so I would suggest that you probably talk to an attorney who handles any number of real estate transactions and can give you some guidance as far as the process of buying a home and what all you need to do.

Certainly, you need to check on your school districts as far as location. I would also suggest that you have a home inspection for the, a home inspector to come out and verify that there’s nothing physically wrong with the property. Be sure that you always get title insurance as far as ensuring that you have marketable title and not just buy property and take a deed or something that someone is giving to you.

Sometimes I run into folks where they, this is something that they’ve done and they didn’t go through an attorney or obtain title insurance. There’s always problems there wherever you have a seller who says, “Oh, we don’t need an attorney,” or “We don’t need to get title insurance.” Be wary of that. I suggest if you’re going to make that kind of investment, even if it is seller financing, that you go ahead and go through a formal closing, see that your deed is recorded, and so that is some advice I’ve given to you.

Some of the other things you need to do is see whether or not it’s in a flood zone, so that’s going to impact you as far as your flood insurance is concerned. There are any number of mortgage programs involved, so if you’re going to finance it through a financial institution, need to ask them if they have a first-time homebuyers program, so that you may be able to get some favorable rates as far as being a first-time homebuyer.

So, buy and large, you need to talk to somebody that’s been there and seen what can happen. Particularly in this area, there’s any number of problems with sink holes, so if you’re going to be buying a repaired sink hole home, you need to be sure to get the engineering that goes along with it.

These are some of the things that you need to be concerned about, and certainly if you talk to an attorney who represents buyers or handle any number of real estate transaction, he can give you some guidance as far as helping you as far as your purchase is concerned, as well as your mortgage banker or your lender who has program for first-time homebuyers. If you would like to talk to me about that, give me a call at 727-847-2288. Thank you.

Video Summary

How many days does a real estate broker have to return the escrow after a deal falls through? Well, the practice or what transpires is there’s no particular time line. If a deal collapses, then the broker routinely obtains a escrow release. Many brokers don’t even hold the deposit but they ask both the buyer and the seller to sign a release that says who receives the deposit. So if the deal falls through because of financing and you’re within the time period for the buyer to get financing and they give notice that t hey did not obtain financing and they want their deposit back, they routinely make a demand upon whoever’s holding the escrow to return it.

The real estate brokerage would then prepare a form that authorizes the escrow money to be released to the buyer borrower, and ask that the seller sign it and the buyer sign it and the realtor sign it, all releasing any rights they have to the deposit. Until that is done, well the escrow does not get released. If you have a seller that won’t sign it, well it creates a problem. If they make a demand upon the deposit, well the deposit doesn’t get released and certainly the buyer gets frustrated as far as that’s concerned.

My suggestion is if you believe that a seller is not releasing your deposit after you have a good reason to cancel the contract, I advise the folks to file an action in Small Claims Court if the deposit’s less than $5,000, and ask the court to reward them their money back under the terms of the contract. There’s no set time period. The escrow agent and the broker are going to ask the parties to sign a release and if that doesn’t happen on a timely fashion, then I believe that a broker does have a time period, which I can’t give you, to submit this to the Florida Real Estate Commission as far as to whom they should release the money when there is a dispute.

I don’t have an answer as far as that’s concerned on how many days they have before they send it to the Florida Real Estate Commission and ask them to make a determination as to who they should release the money to. If you have any questions, you can give me a call at 727-847-2288.

Video Summary

How do I add my spouse to the deed on my property? Well, it’s fairly easy in that you simply sign a new deed and you can bay the property to you and your spouse. Which brings us to, what does that accomplish legally? It creates what they call a tenancy by the entireties which is a biblical concept that’s been carried over from the English common law into the Florida law and it is Florida specific as to how it’s treated, although there are seven other states I think that recognize tenancy by the entireties. The bible says that when you become married, when you’re married you become as one and that’s the concept of tenancy by the entireties. That gives you the right of survivorship. In Florida in particular, it also is a simple way to have some asset protection so that if anyone would get a judgment just against one spouse, they cannot attach the property that is held as tenancy by the entireties.

Most property that is held by husband and wife, that creates a tenancy by the entireties whenever you show you’re married as husband and wife. That protects a real property held that way. What a lot of folks don’t know about is that you can also set your bank accounts up in that same manner, but you need to ask the bank on the signature card do they offer tenants by the entireties accounts? If they do you need to be sure to check that box rather than joint tenants with right of survivorship.

Joint tenants with right of survivorship means that each of you own a one half interest in the property and it can be attached. By going back to the simple question is how do I add my spouse to the deed to my property is you simply sign a new deed. One pitfall, or an unattended consequence of doing that is if you have a mortgage on the property, unfortunately the Department of Revenue at this point requires you to pay documentary stamps at $7 per thousand based upon one half of the mortgage amount. There is going to be some proposed legislation which allows you to waive that, but right now that’s not what the law is and so whenever you do that, the cost of the deed is relatively a few hundred dollars. However, if there’s a mortgage on it that can cost you a substantial amount depending on the amount of your mortgage.

If you’d like to add your spouse to the title of the property and put it in your name as husband and wife, which I would recommend, give me a call at 727-847-2288.