SE Minnesota Real Estate News

The housing slump seems to have had little impact on consumer confidence, as 81% of adults believe buying a home is the best long-term investment a person can make. According to a report by Pew Research, this figure is only down 3% from 1991. Pew cites a CBS News/New York Times survey completed in 1991. Of those 81% of the adult sample, 37% "strongly agree" that a home is the ultimate long-term investment, while 44% only moderately agree. Both figures indicate less adamant view than the 1991 survey. Pew finds the overwhelmingly positive results notable in light of the fact that 47% of survey respondents said their home value depreciated since the beginning of the recession. About one-third of those surveyed claimed their home value has stayed the same, while 17% said their homes are now worth more than before the recession. Almost half (44%) of individuals whose homes lost value said they expect to recoup their equity losses in three to five years. Homeowners aren’t the only people who consider a house the best long-term investment one can make. Approximately 81% of current renters surveyed by Pew reported they would like to buy a house at some point. One-quarter said they would continue to rent. Source: HousingWire

The rise in gas prices is influencing buyer decisions as they shop for a new home, causing more buyers to make short commutes and home offices a top priority, according to a new real estate survey of more than 1,000 of its real estate professionals about buyer trends. Seventy-five percent of the real estate professionals surveyed say the spike in gas prices is influencing their clients’ decisions on where to live. What’s more, if gas prices continue to increase, 93 percent predict that even more buyers will choose to live somewhere closer to their work. Gas prices recently topped $4 a gallon and higher, and are up about 30 percent over last year, which is starting to put a dent in many Americans’ pocketbook. More real estate professionals also report that the rise in gas prices is prompting more buyers to look for homes that will allow them to work-from-home. Indeed, 77 percent of those surveyed say that more of their buyers are showing an interest in having a home office compared to five years ago. Gas prices also seem to be spiking a renewed interest in urban living. More than half of real estate professionals surveyed say they are seeing more buyers wanting to target homes in urban areas compared to five years ago, citing shorter commute times, being able to walk to more places, and being near public transportation as the most likely reasons for the urban-area migration. Source: MarketWatch

Those who are buying real estate as a gift to a family member need to report such real estate gifts to the Internal Revenue Service. The IRS is increasingly scrutinizing these gifts using state land-transfer records to prove the omissions, The Wall Street Journal reports. Any gift–including property–to a person that is valued at more than $13,000 requires the giver to let the IRS know by filing a gift-tax return (Form 709), even if the transfer falls within the $5 million lifetime exemption amount. In a court document from December, the agency said that in the last two years 323 taxpayers had been examined for failing to report possible real estate gifts, another 217 were being examined, and 250 were being considered for review, The Wall Street Journal reports. The states that have handed over information on gift-like transactions are Florida, Connecticut, New Hampshire, Hawaii, Nebraska, Tennessee, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Texas, Virginia, Washington, and Wisconsin, according to court documents. Through its investigation, the IRS so far has uncovered a high "failure-to-report rate" in these states–with noncompliance rates reaching even 100 percent in Ohio based on case reviews as well as 90 percent in Florida and Virginia, 80 percent in Washington, 60 percent in Connecticut and Nebraska, and 50 percent in Wisconsin. Source: The Wall Street Journal

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