Right now there is a lot going on in the real estate market. Home buyer tax credits, low prices and low interest rates have many first time home buyers ready to take the ownership plunge. With all the excitement and incentives, don’t forget the basics when it comes to closing on your Key West home.

The first and most important thing to remember as you prepare for closing is don’t change anything about your financial profile! The excitement of buying your home may have you running out to the local home improvement store and opening a credit account to buy new appliances or other necessities for your new home. STOP! Any changes to your to your credit picture can mean you no longer qualify for your financing.

Avoid buying a new car, new furniture or anything else on credit, even 90 days same as cash. There have been home buyers who walked into a closing and walked out again without becoming a homeowner. If you are working with a real estate agent they will have probably already told you to make no changes to any of your debts. Just be patient and go shopping after the paperwork is done!

Another important thing to do before closing day is asking for a final walk through inspection. Check for the condition of the home and that everything negotiated has been completed. This is your chance to make sure everything is as it should be.The best way to make sure everything goes smoothly at closing is to work with a good real estate agent. They will let you know what to expect at your closing meeting and if there are any special requirements in your state (some states even require a real estate attorney be involved in the closing). Closing doesn’t have to be scary! Your real estate agent will walk you through the process and you will walk away with the keys to your new home!

If you are ready to buy in Key West, call Margarita Villoch! She is your local real estate resource! It won’t be long until you find yourself enjoying the island life and relaxing on the beach!

There are many reasons why living in Key West is such an amazing experience, but one of the most spectacular things you will find in the Florida Keys is our coral reef. The Florida Reef is the ONLY living coral reef in the continental United States. It is home to some of the Keys most colorful residents! One of the best ways to explore the reef and all its’ inhabitants is by going snorkeling!

Approximately 6,000 coral reefs are found between Key Biscayne and the Dry Tortugas. There are many charters that are available to those wanting to snorkel. Sailboat charters, catamarans, and glass bottom boats are some of the favorite ways to go snorkeling in the Keys. However you decide to get to the reefs- just do it! It is one of the most amazing experiences you may have!

There are a few things to remember when snorkeling. Coral is a living organism, so when diving or snorkeling, look, but do not touch! Avoid grabbing, standing or sitting on the coral. Not only can you damage the coral, but you may hurt yourself in the process. Most important: all coral is protected, it is against the law to collect, harvest or sell Florida corals.

If you are wondering what you may see when you go snorkeling, the answer is a lot! The reefs are full of tropical fish, hard and soft corals, sponges, snails, jellyfish, anemones, crabs, lobsters, rays, sea turtles, nurse sharks, and other sea life. There are around 110 species of corals and over 500 species of tropical fish living in perfect harmony on the reefs! So come on down to Key West, where the water is alive!

After a day of snorkeling, come back to shore and relax watching the sunset over the water, then enjoy some of the amazing cuisine Key West has to offer. If this sounds like the life for you, call Margarita Villoch and start packing! There is nothing quite like the island life!

The goal of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act was to help save jobs and benefit the local communities. Here in Key West and throughout the Florida Keys we have seen the benefits from the program. In the Keys a total of 15.5 million dollars is being used to do things such as pay teachers, hire law enforcement officers and fix roads. As a result, it is estimated 87,000 jobs were saved or created.

In Key West, you will see improvements throughout the island. One of the biggest projects is $8.6 million in federal stimulus money being used for sidewalk improvements, storm water gravity wells and upgrades to waste water treatment. Several of the intersections in Key West were not wheelchair-accessible. The city can now bring these sidewalks into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The stimulus money will allow Key West to install 24 new gravity wells to accommodate storm runoff. This will make a big difference in alleviating flooding that has been an issue in some neighborhoods. Indigenous Park on White Street is receiving parking lot repairs and will have a new storm water pump station installed as part of the stimulus package.

Other smaller projects receiving grants are the Key West Police Department and street repairs. The police department will be able to hire four new officers and pay them for three years with a grant of $812,000. $418,000 of federal money has also been set aside for the repaving of portions of United Street.

These projects will enhance the quality of life here in Key West! It is always nice to see your tax dollars at work in your community! When you are ready to move to the island, call Margarita Villoch! There is no life like the island life in Key West!

If you haven’t found anything to do this weekend, head down to Key West for the Old Island Days Art Festival! This annual art festival brings in over 100 artists to the area. It is a two day event starting February 27^th. Exhibitors will include painters, photographers, sculptors and more!

The exhibits will be set up along Whitehead Street and Caroline Street. They will go through the Presidential Gates and into Truman Annex. The historical setting gives visitors even more reason to come to the show! At the festival you can enjoy both traditional and contemporary art. Don’t forget to bring your wallet, you may just find a piece you can’t live without!

This is the festival’s 45^th year and is sponsored by the Key West Art Center. The first show was held on the sidewalk on Front Street and featured local artists. The artists had to use clothespins to display their artwork on the fence in front of the Old Custom’s House. The festival has now grown to include artists from all over the country and even some from Canada!

Of course, one of the most beautiful things you will see when you come to the festival is Key West itself! A city with ocean views and warm winds! A city filled with rich history and colorful diversity! If you think you may want to live the island life, call Margarita Villoch. She is your real estate resource for Key West and the Lower Keys!

There are many great reasons to buy a home in Key West! Beautiful surroundings, ocean views, and the island life are just a few that come to mind. The home buyer’s tax credit ($8,000 for first time buyers or $6,500 for repeat buyers) is another reason why now is a great time to buy or sell your home. But there are more changes on the horizon as the FHA announces its new lending guidelines.

January 20th, the FHA made an announcement outlining their new lending quidelines. These changes may make it harder for some to realize their American dream of homeownership. For years, FHA has helped countless people who had less money for a down payment or had a credit score that was lower than what the banks liked. There are many homeowners who would still be renters if it weren’t for FHA loans.

Always a popular program, in the last few years FHA has written almost 30% of mortgage loans. As the number of loans they held increased, they began to feel the impact of rising delinquencies. The new rules are an attempt to reduce the number of defaults. While some of the rules will apply to lenders, there are some big changes for buyers as well.

So what is the FHA’s new plan? Basically to lessen defaults on FHA loans, guidelines are being tightened. While there is not a specific date set for the buyer guidelines to go into effect, they will definitely impact who can buy a home. Here are the basics of the changes:

• Lower FICO scores (below 580) will now require a 10% down payment…that is up from 3.5%
• Mortgage Insurance Payment (MIP) is being raised from 1.75% to 2.25%.
• The allowable seller’s concession has been slashed from 6% to 3%. This means sellers will contribute less to the buyers closing costs.

All three changes are expected to go into effective by late spring-early summer except for the MIP increase which starts April 5, 2010. So if you have been trying to decide if it is time for you to buy or not, it is! You can still take advantage of home buyer tax credit, low interest rates and the current FHA loan guidelines to make the dream of owning a home come true.

If you are ready to embrace the island life and relocate to beautiful Key West, call Margarita Villoch! Her team will be glad to answer any questions you have about the changes coming for first time home buyers! If you are wanting to sell your home, we can help with a free market analysis of your home!

About 70 miles west of Key West lies a beautiful set of islands that are often overlooked by many tourists:  the Dry Tortugas. A US National Park, this group of seven islands was once the known as the Guardian of the Gulf. Famous for its pirate stories, military past, and rumors of gold, this is one island group you don’t want to miss!

The Dry Tortugas National Park protects the southwest tip of South Florida’s coral reef tract.  The only living coral reef in North America, the Florida Barrier Reef is also the third largest reef system in the world! Divers and snorkelers are drawn to the area by the clear waters, ship wrecks, loggerhead turtles and amazing coral formations. Nature lovers flock to the area to experience the wonder of migratory birds and marine life.

Accessible by ferry, you need to plan an all day trip when headed to the islands. It will take a little over two hours to travel to the island and then after 4-5 hours of exploring Ft. Jefferson and the surrounding beaches, it will be another two hour boat trip back. You will want to make sure and pack some sun protection and a few beach towels, other than that the ferry will have what you need.

The ferry trip includes a simple continental breakfast and a picnic lunch at Ft. Jefferson. It will have all you need to enjoy snorkeling around the island. There will also be a guided tour available. If one day isn’t enough, you can also camp on the island overnight. Definitely a once in a lifetime experience to sleep under the stars in the Dry Tortugas!

This is a unique destination and tours have limited availability. You will want to book your trip in advance! Of course, if you live in Key West, you aren’t rushed by time schedules and could work around the trip’s availability. When you are ready to change your lifestyle, call Margarita Villoch! Her team will answer any questions you may have about island living!

Raising the score in Key West doesn’t mean rooting for the Miami Heat in an upcoming NBA game! It is referring to getting the most out of your credit score. As we discussed recently, credit scores determine not only if you get a loan, but also how much you will be paying in interest over the life of your loan. Very few people have picture perfect credit; we have all experienced bumps in the road along the way! But don’t despair if your score isn’t where you want it, there are things you can do to raise your score now, and long term goals you can set to continue the upward trend!

Once you get the copy of your credit report, the very first thing you should do is look for errors! Errors on your credit report can lower your score. These are easily corrected and will quickly raise your credit score to where it should be. Make sure all accounts listed are yours! This is one of the most common errors on credit reports. Any late payments, charge offs and collections noted on these accounts have a negative effect on your score. Let the reporting agency know about these errors as soon as possible!

Next, check notations on your accounts. If there are late payments showing, make sure the information is accurate. If any of the derogatory notations aren’t correct, call the reporting agency to dispute the information. Inactive accounts should fall off after seven years, if they haven’t and there are negative notations on the account; ask for them to be removed. One of the most common errors is an account being flagged as “charged off” when you actually paid in full.  By correcting these errors you may see an increase in your credit score.

There are long term goals you can make that raise your score as well. Paying down the balance on your credit cards as much as you can is a big one! It used to be that as soon as you paid your balance down, you would lower your credit limit- DON’T DO THAT! Most lenders like to see your balance be about 30% of your credit limit. If you lower your credit limit, all that hard work is less effective. It still lowers your debt to income liability, but lenders also look at how much you owe on the card versus your credit line.

Of course the best way to raise your credit score is to pay your bills in a timely manner as much as possible. If you think you are going to be late, call the company. You may even be offered an extension! Either way, let them know what is going on. By doing that, you are letting them know you care about your credit rating.

Buying a home is one of the best investments you can make! Even with all the recent changes to the market, real estate outperformed the stock market in the long term! If you have questions or if you are ready to “score” that Key West bungalow you have been looking for, call Margarita Villoch or fill out the Dream Home finder! Her team is ready to help.

There are many unique and beautiful things in Key West. From breath taking sunsets to sparkling blue waters, everywhere you turn you can see the wonder of nature around you. One of the most unique places to experience this is the Key West Butterfly & Nature Conservatory. Voted the #1 attraction in Key West by People Choice Awards, walking with the butterflies in Key West is amazing!

In the conservatory, you will journey through a display of flowering plants, trees and waterfalls all setting the stage for the main attraction! Literally hundreds of butterflies fill the air, dancing in a silent aerial display. The conservatory averages 50-60 species of butterfly at any given time. You can observe butterflies and birds in a tropical setting, enjoying the diversity nature has to offer.

The residents of the conservatory are not wild butterflies. They come from butterfly farming operations around the world. Over the course of a year, there will have been about 75 different species that have been on display. You can check out the humble origins of a few of these flying wonders in the Learning Center. Observe live caterpillars as they feed and develop, each on their own specific host plant.

In the Gallery you can see how artist Sam Trophia has interpreted the butterfly world into wonderful artwork. Sam’s creations have been displayed on corporate and residential walls. His art has been showcased at such places as Butterfly World, the Audubon House, the Design Center of the Americas, and numerous art galleries. From the various pieces of art, you can begin to understand why butterflies are called the “flowers of the sky.”

Whether you spend the day, or just a few hours, you will always remember the day in Key West when you go to walk with butterflies! If you are ready to do more than just visit Key West, give Margarita Villoch a call. Her team can help you step make island living a year round event!

There is no way around it; lending practices are getting stricter when it comes to home mortgages. Recently, even the FHA (Federal Housing Administration) announced new stricter guidelines for first time home buyers that should take effect in late spring or early summer. These changes in lending mean Key West homebuyers may have to do a little more planning than in years past. One of the first things you want to do is make sure your credit score is in order.

It wasn’t that long ago a few blemishes on your credit report didn’t affect you very much. That is no longer the case today. Your credit score determines not only your ability to get a loan, but your interest rate as well. So the first step on the road to home ownership is:  find out your credit score!

A free copy of your credit report is available to you once a year. You can go to AnnualCreditReport.com, which is the official site for consumers to access their free annual credit report online. There are numerous other sites you can use as well. These often require enrolling in a free trial period in a credit report protection plan of some sort.

So now that you know your number, let’s talk about what it means. Credit Scores range from 300-850. The higher your score, the better! To give you an idea of where you might stand, let’s look at the average scores needed for most lenders.

 Fannie Mae (Federal National Mortgage Association) recently raised their minimum credit score requirement to 580.. As we discussed in a previous post, FHA just announced their new guidelines. If you have a credit score lower than 580 you will have to come up with a 10% down payment instead of 3.5% for those with a higher score. Lastly, most financial institutions want to see above 700 and for the best interest rates, some lenders are looking for scores of 760 or higher. Just to put that in perspective, three years ago a 630 credit score could have gotten you a mortgage loan with minimal road blocks and a slightly higher interest rate.

Don’t despair if your credit score isn’t where you want it to be. The FHA guidelines have not yet gone into effect! So you still have time to buy a home before these changes impact you. Also, the home buyer tax credit is still available through April 30, 2010. The credit of $8,000 for first time buyers or $6,500 for repeat buyers can also help with your down payment.

If you are not ready to buy right now, that is OK too! It means you have time to improve your score and to save up for your down payment! All the changes taking place can seem a bit intimidating, but don’t let that stop you from pursuing your dream of owning a home! When you are ready to enjoy the island life, call Margarita Villoch! Her team can help you navigate through all the changes and help you find a place to call home in Key West!