Marsh Creek is a subdivision in southern Chesapeake that has about 200 homes. There are currently 2 homes for sale in this neighborhood. One is a 3400 square foot home that is listed at $335,000 and is a short sale. The other is a 3000 square foot home listed for $404,000. In the past 6 months one home has sold in the neighborhood. It was a 2600 square foot home and it’s sale price was $339,900. Market time for that home was 36 days. Homes vary in size from 2400 square feet to over 4500 square feet. They are frame construction, built on a crawl space and exterior coverings are brick and vinyl.

Marsh Creek has it’s own elementary school in the back of the neighborhood. Grassfield Elementary was built around 2005 and all Marsh Creek children will attend this school. Hugo Owens Middle and Grassfield High School are the other schools that are zoned for this neighborhood.

Marsh Creek is surrounded by a marsh and horse stables and also has its own park. There is only one entrance to this neighborhood which is located on Cedar Rd. For more information on this neighborhood, call me today.

I have a Virginia Beach Foreclosure listing and have been holding Open Houses quite regularly. One question I always get is “are the floors hardwood, laminate or engineered hardwood”? I have had many different opinions on what they were, but without tearing up a piece to to inspect it, I was not sure myself. So today I went to the local home improvement store and I found it. There it was – Scraped Maple Engineered Hardwood. Beautiful! So you might be asking “What is the difference between these floors”? Here are the definitions:

Laminate Flooring: It is a surface layer of two thin sheets of paper impregnated with melamine. The surface layer is a photograph of wood grain, not real wood, and is covered by a hard transparent layer which is impervious to most things. Underneath the top layers is about a 1/2 inch of wood composite materials. This type of floor can’t be sanded.

Hardwood Flooring: As the name implies, this type of flooring is solid wood all the way through. It is similar to any other piece of lumber that is cut from the log. This type of floor comes either finished or unfinished and has to be nailed to the sub-floor. Hardwood flooring can be sanded and refinished numerous times to extend it’s life for decades.

Engineered Hardwood: Engineered Hardwood is basically a sandwich between real wood and and plywood and is a great alternative to hardwood flooring. The plywood underneath is about 80-90% of the floor. This type of floor stands up well to areas with light moisture – basements and bathrooms. It can be either nailed down to the sub-floor or it can be installed as a floating floor which expands the range of uses for this type of floor. Since the top layer is only 1/16″ to 1/8″ it can only be sanded once or twice.

I have recently talked with a few buyers and they stated that they think there will be a new “Stimulus Plan” coming out soon that will have another home buyers tax credit. Well I said “It is like rolling the dice, do you want to take a chance on interest rates going back up above 5%”? You can wait and get your $8000 tax credit now, or whatever it may end up being -OR- You can get a 30 year loan at an interest rate of approximately 4.5%.

On a $225,000 loan at 4.5% your monthly payment will be $1140 principal and interest. If rates go up, you get the same loan at 5.5% and your principal and interest payment will be $1277. At 4.5% you will be saving $137 per month.

If you keep the home for 10 years that will be a savings of $16,440!! Lets say you stay in the home for the whole 30 years. That 1% difference in your interest rate will save you about $59,000.

Well lets say you will only stay in your home for 5 years max. You can get a 5/1 ARM for a interest rate of 3.34% with a monthly payment of $990. That is a $287 savings per month over the 5.5% rate. Over 5 years that would be a savings of $17,220.

In my opinion we already have a “Stimulus Plan” in place. It is called LOW INTEREST RATES!

The seemingly endless run of bad housing news is discouraging some potential home buyers from considering a purchase. But the truth is that the advantages of homeownership have very little to do with investment gains. The best things about owning a home have a lot more to do with personal comfort and satisfaction.

Here are five of them:

· Be your own landlord. The bank can only kick you out if you don’t pay; a landlord can be much less dependable – deciding to sell the property or choosing to live there themselves.

· Paying the principal is forced savings. Yes, it’s possible that home prices will fall further. It is also possible that your 401(k) will lose value. But over the long haul, both are likely to enjoy modest gains in value.

· Fixed-rate mortgages never rise – and eventually you pay them off. With mortgage rates at record lows, people who buy now are locking in real bargains.

· Good schools. Family-sized rentals are harder to come by in areas with excellent public schools.

· Spacious properties in pleasant neighborhoods. Sizable homes in attractive communities are almost always owned – not rented.

Source: The New York Times, Ron Lieber (08/27/2010)

Since the Hampton Roads area is in a transition zone between warm season and cool season grasses the struggle to keep a lawn green year round can be challenging. The grass of choice in this area is tall fescue. It will stay green most of the year but since it is a cool season grass, you definitely need to water it a lot during the hot summer months. Some people say your lawn needs about 1 inch of water per week. If you have a sandy soil I would go for about 2 inches per week. The first step I would take for a healthy lawn is to have your soil tested for proper pH. If you do not want to get it tested, I have had good luck applying about 50 pounds of lime per 1000 square feet every 2 years. Lime can be applied anytime during the year. The following is the treatment schedule that I use.

Feb. 15 – Apply Crabgrass pre-emergent with fertilizer.

April 1 – Apply Crabgrass pre-emergent with fertilizer.

June 15- Low Nitrogen Fertilizer with iron.

Aug. 15 – High Nitrogen Fertilizer

Sep. 1 – Spray any weeds in lawn with Round Up or any other selective herbicide.

Sep. 15 – Aerate entire lawn, seed with premium seed and apply starter fertilizer.

Nov. 1 – Apply Winterizer fertilizer and weed herbicide.

Repeat this every year and you will have a beautiful green and healthy lawn!