Real Estate – Tips for Buying Water-Front Real Estate

Thinking about investing in some real estate on the water? Now is a great time to buy a home or vacation house at the lake or on the ocean. However, you have to do some homework before laying down the cash to determine if buying waterfront real estate is right for you. 

Here are some things to keep in mind while you are looking for property and doing your research:

It is usually a good idea to hire a real estate agent to help you with a purchase, but it is especially true for waterfront property. But, you don’t want to hire just any agent, but one that specializes in the waterfront area. This agent is familiar with the land and the water. He can tell you what the fishing is like from your dock, when the seaweed gets bad and if there are any unseen obstructions to keep you from using a boat.

Every year insurance costs are making it more and more expensive to own a piece of real estate by the water. The record damage sustained in recent years from hurricanes, floods and wind damage have caused rates to skyrocket in popular water-front areas. So, you have to decide if the cost is worth it as well as the risk of future weather situations.

Related Posts :

Tips for buying a house in buyers market .

Tips for buying investment properties

Real Estate investment properties

Find your dream property through real estate

Tags: Waterfront real estate property, dream house,tips for buying real estate property, Consult a real estate agent, Cosmic Projects, Cosmic Structures.

Read More

All about Apartment Associations

Increasing urban migration and scarcity of land in the cities has led to a rise in Apartment culture – where rows of independent houses are now replaced by high-rise structures that offer all amenities essential for urban living.

Cosmic India

When an apartment is completed and starts getting occupied, there can be many initial issues with the developer. Common problems would include handover issues, maintenance problems or any pending documentation problem. At this time a committed group of individuals has come together to coordinate on behalf of the residents and form an apartment owners association. This association is formed then works as an authoritative body that protects the rights of the apartment owners, maintains the amenities within the apartment complex and works for the welfare of the residents.

But many apartment owners and residents often have resurfaced questions on what exactly is the definition of an Apartment Owners’ Association? How is one formed? What is its purpose, its legal powers, its duties?

Formation of the association is a vital task and apartment owners or residents need to be aware of all the related laws and regulations. The onus lies with the residents to enroll themselves as members of the association or cooperative housing society to safeguard their rights and titles.

Tags : Welfare Associations, Apartment Community,Legal Power & Duties,Cosmic Projects,Cosmic Structures.

Read More

What Is a Real Estate Mutual Fund?

A real estate mutual fund is a type of investment made up of securities, usually stocks, of companies that purchase real estate with money collected from investors. Factors affecting the return of real estate mutual funds include the real estate market in general, housing starts, residential and commercial vacancy rates and interest rates. 

CosmicIndia.in

Function: According to survey, real estate mutual funds "tend to focus their investment strategy on real estate investment trusts (REITS) and real estate companies." real estate investment trusts are companies that buy and manage real estate with funds collected from investors. Real estatecompanies run the gamut, from firms that sell real estate to firms that support real estate ventures, like real estate software providers and property management companies. A real estate mutual fund can include shares of stocks in a number of real estate investment trusts and in a number of real estate companies.

Advantage: Real estate mutual funds are an alternative to purchasing investment property, especially if you want to limit your investment, level of risk and involvement in management. They are also an alternative to real estate investment trusts if your goal is for your investment to continue to grow; the IRS requires real estate investment trusts to give all profits back to the investors annually, which means that the profits are subject to federal tax annually. Profit on mutual funds remains in the fund unless you sell. Real estate mutual funds, like all mutual funds and unlike real estate itself, are relatively liquid. You can usually sell them in one day.

Disadvantage: When you own real estate mutual funds, you have no role in deciding what companies are invested in or how they are run. Unlike directly owning stock in a company, you do not have voting privileges on issues having to do with the fund. Your role is diminished compared to most other types of real estate investment. You do not receive tax benefits like depreciation, although if you hold your mutual fund investments for more than a year your profits are taxed at the capital gains rate, just like actual real estate.

If you decide you'd like to invest in real estate mutual funds, do your research first. Use online stock screener to find funds specializing in real estate. Look at the funds' track records: see how they have performed over short-, mid- and long-term periods of time. Read the fund's prospectus, a report covering all the basics of a fund: who runs it, what the fees are, what the minimum investment amount is and what individual companies the trust owns. The prospectus will also describe the level of risk associated with the fund and define the fund's goals.

Investing in real estateinvestment trusts and buying a property yourself are the two obvious alternatives to real estate mutual funds. Real estate investment trusts are a good transition into actually purchasing investment property; you can actually go visit properties the real estate investment trust owns and read expense and income statements for them. One way to begin with your own rental property is to buy a new home and turn your former home into a rental rather than selling it; this way, you're already familiar with the expenses and taxes owed on the property, and can set the rent accordingly.

Related Posts :

What is in store for real estate ?

Can your home earn you a pension

Tags : real estate property trends, real estate returns, Cosmic Projects, Cosmic Structures.

Read More

Real Estate Investment: A healthy choice

It is common for investors to own multiple pieces of real estate, one of which serves as a primary residence, while the others are used to generate rental income and profits through price appreciation. For many people, real estate is the easiest to understand investment because it is simple, straight-forward and involves a fair exchange between a property owner (the landlord) and the property user (the renter).  As long as the hot water keeps flowing and the rent arrives on time, everyone is happy and benefits.  Investing in real estate is much more complex than this, though, because there are several different types of real estate investments including residential, commercial, and industrial, as well as real estate that trades on stock exchanges, which are called REITs.

Investment in Real Estate

Investment inreal estate has been booming as a top investment phenomenon to multiply the wealth. India Real Estate Investment has proven to be the highest yielding investment opportunity in the recent few years. The realty industry in India is at its zenith and is thereby attracting the maximum investment not just locally but overseas too.

However, there are various factors which initiate the investors to invest in real estate. Most important factors are better return and tax benefits. Real estate sector gives higher attractive returns as compare to the stocks and bonds. Also, one can avail huge tax benefits on investing in real estate. According to the report of the Technical Group on Estimation of Housing Shortage, there is an estimated shortage of 26.53 million houses during the Eleventh Five Year Plan (2007-12), which indicates the huge demand for the residential property in future and provides a big investment opportunity for the investors. This is another major reason to invest in this booming industry.

Many Banks and Financial Institutions like HDFC Property Fund, Dewan Housing Finance Limited-DHFL Venture Capital Fund, Kotak Mahindra Realty Fund, Kshitij Venture Capital Fund (A group venture of Pantaloon Retail India Ltd) and India Advantage Fund (ICICI), provide the funds for real estate development to the Builders and Developers for construction of these structures and to the investors. Therefore the funding becomes lot easier. Along with this there is more cash flow and value appreciation in the real estate investment. 
http://www.cosmicindia.in/

The most important factor that has been a major factor for the growth of real estate and investment are the initiatives taken by the government. A major share of the FDI or the foreign direct investments is tailored to the Indian real estate sector these days. The Indian government is also putting in more money in real estate and many old regulations have been fine tuned to attract more money into the sector. The property tax act, the rent control system, land ceiling regulations have also been updated and made more investor friendly for people wanting to put their money into real estate. Along with domestic laws, the foreign exchange regulation act has also been made more liberal to get more people from aboard into Indian real estate buying, selling and investing.

These all factors indicate that real estate sector would be the hottest sector from the investment point of view.
http://www.cosmicindia.in/

Read More