Martin Yeager

I recently attended a real estate investor meeting regarding buying foreclosures for fix and flips. It was a packed room. As I scanned the faces in the room, I tried to determine how many people were actually investors. The few I spoke to were other agents, financing and loan originators, or contractors. By the nature of the questions to the presenter, there were a number of participants who knew little of the process but eager to learn how they could profit as well.

The continual popularity of Do It Yourself shows on cable channels proves there is a bit of Bob Villa in all of us. The words “Your can do it, we can help” created a confidence in American consumers that they just need to ask any expert in an orange apron and perfection in construction becomes a weekend task. Combine that with the urban legends of fortunes made at the closing table, the interest in fix and flips continue to draw the causal and curiously interested bystanders.

Here are a few preliminary recommendations to remember as you start to explore the idea.

Don’t believe anything after 9PM at night!

Those late night TV promises of fortunes in real estate with no money down are legends, not reality. I don’t know of one legitimate lender who is willing to finance you with no money down. If you are not occupying the property yourself, new circumstances apply. You will need to provide real dollars to make this happen.

Define your comfort level.

This will be an investment. It may be more hands on and carries more personal achievement than a stock portfolio, but it is still an investment. Define the type of return on your investment you are looking for and compare to your existing investments. Find your comfort level in terms of the amount of funds you are willing to commit, the amount of time you are willing to wait for a return (this is to itself a real cost) and what level are you willing to risk.

Study the landscape

Neighborhoods define property values. Two identical homes that are two miles apart could vary tens of thousands of dollars when you go to sell. Actual appraisals are based on subdivisions rather than improvements. It is easy to over improve a home if the neighborhood itself is faltering. Insure you have realistic reports on previous sales, current pricing trends and actual market values after completion. Do your homework and trust the right agent to provide you the necessary data to make the best decision.

Ready-Fire-Aim often leads to shooting yourself in the foot.

It is tempting to feel compelled to move quickly. In some circumstances, it is required but not at the sake of forgoing a real assessment of the property and the deal. Plan on losing the first few deals; someone faster and more in tune with the market is going to be out there. The right scenario will be available for you as well if you remember to Aim and then Fire.

The D formula Distressed=Disclosures and Documentation

Unless you are buying a bank owned (REO property) that has already been foreclosed, most likely you are looking at a pre foreclosure and/or short sale. Consider these properties as DISTRESSED. There are specific contractual procedures you must follow if you are not going to occupy the property as your primary residence. If the homeowner is in default of their mortgage, meaning even one payment behind, you must proceed under the Colorado Foreclosure Prevention Act guidelines. DISCLOSURE is paramount. The seller is given the right of rescission as part of the process as well, even after the contract is accepted. Make sure you have third party documentation of all liens and encumbrances. Even after foreclosure, certain liens are unrecorded but stay attached to the property after a sale. (HOA, water bills etc) Make sure the title company has provided a comprehensive determination of the encumbrances on the property.

In a short sale, you are negotiating with the homeowner and the lender to accept a sales price lower than the current balance of the mortgage. Banks rarely feel obligated to respond in a timely manner, as you would expect in a normal contract negotiation. It is frustrating to both the seller and the buyers. Patience is often required and even less rewarded but it is the only way to complete the purchase.

After the purchase of the home, DOCUMENT the cost of improvements, the permits, and the condition before and after. Appraisers do not favor opinions, only fact and look carefully at the true market conditions rather than appreciating the efforts of your labors. Documentation will assist the inspection and the appraisal of the home.

In conclusion

As properties value start to climb upward in certain neighborhoods, there will be some good opportunities to invest in real estate. The rewards of bringing an ugly property back to a marketable position are found in both personal and financial achievements.
Build a trusted group of advisors, starting with a real estate agent you trust and have a strong dialogue between your resources. Interview contractors and trades professionals to find the best. Talk to the municipalities on securing the permits and understand the basics of building codes. Real estate has long proven to be a valuable and important investment. Discover if it is a viable resource for you.

Mic Ortega

The focus of the U.S. real-estate market lately has been the number of foreclosures and people trying to purchase cheap housing. But Brian Wesbury, chief economist at First Trust Advisors, says that if Americans don’t start focusing on building new houses, the market will have a much bigger problem on its hands.

“We need one and a half million houses per year just to keep up with population growth,” Wesbury said in an interview with Steve Forbes. “And then if you throw in, you know, fires and tear-downs and just worn-out properties, we need 1.6 million or more per year. Right now, we’re down to about six and a half, seven months’ inventory whether you look at new homes or existing homes.”

Privately owned housing starts in December 2009 were at a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 557,000, according to the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development. This is 4% less than where it was in November, which had 580,000 housing starts.

Housing completion numbers also contribute to this dire picture, with privately owned housing completions reaching a seasonally adjusted annualized rate of 768,000 in December 2009. That was down 11.2% from the 865,000 completions in November and down 25.3% from the 1.03 million completions in December 2008.

Some people might shrug these statistics off, considering the number of foreclosures on the market. “Yes there’s foreclosures coming into the market, but we’re only starting right now,” Wesbury says. “… We’re starting one-third of the houses we need just to keep up with population growth, and that can’t last.”

There were 315,716 properties last month with foreclosure filings, according to RealtyTrac. These filings include default notices, scheduled auctions and bank repossessions. Though last month’s filings were 15% more than a year ago, they were 10% less than in December.

Jason Thomas, chief investment officer for Aspiriant, a California wealth-management firm, says he doesn’t see the foreclosure situation getting better until the labor market picks up. “So many people are getting to a point where they just can’t hold on anymore, and we may see another wave of that if we don’t see a pretty robust turnaround in the labor market,” he says.

The unemployment rate is currently 9.7%, down from 10% at the end of 2009, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Thesis Fund Management portfolio manager Stephen Roseman says the likelihood of a housing shortage is slim to none. “You need to have an accurate housing turnover number, and right now we have anything but that,” he says.

There is some demand, though, from companies that are scooping up whole floors or housing developments because they have the cash on hand, Roseman says.

And for those people who can get a mortgage, homes are very affordable. The median price for U.S. existing single-family homes in metropolitan areas was $173,200 in 2009, according to the National Association of Realtors, compared with $198,100 in 2008.

Mortgage rates are also very low. For instance, both JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo are offering 30-year fixed mortgages at 5%, and some can be found for a hair less.

“A mortgage is not difficult to get if you have the right income stream,” says Margaret Starner, senior vice president for the financial services firm Raymond James.

But even if you can get a mortgage, maintaining the income to pay for that mortgage isn’t easy. “There’s a lot of potential problems that can come out if unemployment continues to drag; people deplete their savings and their credit card,” says Michael Ervolini, head of behavioral finance at Cabot Research. “It appears to be more of an income issue than a housing issue that we’re going to be looking at for the next couple of years.”

Martin Yeager

As a parent, those words often resonated from the back seat of the mini van within the first hour of the journey. Interesting, it has become the most asked question to me as a real estate agent. The more defined questions are:

“Is the market finally showing signs of real improvement?”
“Is it really safe to consider upgrading into a better scenario for my family?”
“Is equity going to be our favorite word once again?”

The last three months of 2009 certainly indicated prices leveled off in the metro area and Northwest Denver saw increases. In January, prices in the metro area showed a significant improvement with a 12.8% increase compared to January 2009. Condos also improved by 6.2%. Northwest Denver was one of the more stable neighborhoods last year and January to January still increased by 3.4% while leading the metro area with a 31% increase in sales.

Other indications:

Homes are selling faster.

The average number of days a home is on the market before going under contract is down 9% from last year and Northwest Denver homes are on the market less than other urban neighborhoods, averaging 68 days compared to the overall average of 90 days for the entire metro area.

Fewer foreclosures

Denver was one of the few cities to show a decrease in foreclosure from 2008 to 2009. Denver historically is one of the first cities to show trends and we certainly did in 2007 as our foreclosure rates were close to the top of the list. In comparison, Denver recovers faster as well. We dropped in foreclosures by 4% in 2009 while other areas are still increasing rapidly such as Phoenix and Las Vegas. In those cities, prices continue to fall substantially.

Historically, Denver recovers neighborhood by neighborhood. In Northwest Denver neighborhoods, the number of pre foreclosures and short sales are significantly less than other neighborhoods. A Notice of Election and Demand is the first step in a foreclosure process and occurs 110-120 days prior to the actual auctioning of the property, usually back to the bank that holds the 1st mortgage. A Notice of Election and Demand is a strong indication of trends and neighborhoods to be affected by foreclosures later in the year. Typically, homes in the zip codes of Northwest Denver and Southeast Denver are minimal with less than a few appearing each week out of the 500-600 homes listed along the Front Range.

New homebuyers numbers are growing

With the incentive in tax credits, first time buyers represented 39% of sales in the end of 2009. The average age of new buyers was 29 with women leading men overall. Commuting times were mentioned as somewhat to very important in 77% of those new buyers, offering insights to the increases in more urban neighborhoods.

Bottom Line for buyers.

There is little advantage in waiting to see what happens. The indications that prices are on the rise and increases are still reasonable based on the lower interest rates and the tax incentives. I would not anticipate Congress will approve another round of incentives and interest rates are historically lower than they should be. If rates go up and prices go up, the affordability drops quickly. Take advantage of this unique scenario.

Bottom line for sellers

The good news is equity is returning and buyers are in the marketplace. Moreover, the number of foreclosures down the block is shrinking quickly and values are returning to more realistic levels. Tax incentives for returning buyers remain in place through the end of April and lower interest rates are keeping the option of finding a more appropriate sized home possible. For a free market analysis, check with Live Urban Agents as we combine our unique marketing mix with reliable and up to date research techniques to insure success for our clients.

For a full report of the most recent market statistics, please email me at martin@liveurbandenver.com

Mic Ortega

The pop heard ’round the world when the housing bubble burst brought a lot of bad news — from plummeting home prices to mounting foreclosures.  We didn’t experience it as severely here in Denver as the rest of the country did, especially the east and west coast.  Regardless, it has had a lasting impact on our city and forever changed the way we deal with Real Estate.  The article below offers some really good insight into how the market has changed and what we can expect now to help us avoid the same mistakes in the future. 

But with all bad times comes a slew of good lessons to be learned, says Shari Olefson, author of “Foreclosure Nation: Mortgaging the American Dream.”

Depressed home prices and low interest rates may have you wondering if the real-estate market has reached its bottom. Even if the worst is behind us, it makes sense to take in the lessons of the past few years so we can avoid making the same mistakes again.

Lesson No. 1:Adjust your expectations. Years ago, people purchased a home, lived in it all or most of their lives, passed it down to their children and enjoyed a gradual increase in wealth as the home gained value. But in the last decade, people bought a house expecting it to increase in value about 5 or 10 percent in a couple of years, and they’d move on to something bigger, says Brendon DeSimone, a real-estate agent with Paragon Real Estate Group in San Francisco.

If the housing-bubble nightmare has shown us anything, it’s that you can’t count on a home to be worth more than you paid for it when you’re ready to sell. “It’s back to basics,” DeSimone says. “You have to be in it for the long haul and you can’t be looking at your home value every month to see how much it’s gone up.”

Lesson No. 2:You can’t time the market. When home prices were skyrocketing, many people bought homes they could barely afford — or couldn’t afford — thinking they’d ride the wave of rising equity since the market was on the upswing. Likewise, today, many potential homebuyers are sitting on the sidelines waiting for the market to reach its ultimate low.

“You will never sell at the all-time high and you’ll never buy at the all-time low by planning it,” says Tim Burrell, a real-estate agent for Re/Max United in Raleigh, N.C. “The market will time you. You will sell, and on occasion you may happen to hit the all-time high or happen to hit the all-time low, but to study it and plan it and figure out and actually do it — it doesn’t happen.”

Instead, take a long-term approach to real estate and look for a home that enhances your life and will increase in value over time.

Lesson No. 3:Don’t treat your home like a piggybank. At the height of the real-estate market boom, “We had a whole bunch of people refinancing high-interest credit cards with a low-interest second mortgage on their homes,” Olefson says. Today, some of those people have lost their homes or are in danger of doing so because they were unable to handle the mortgage debt.

“As a country, we’ve all gotten way too comfortable with credit and having debt in our lives,” Olefson says. “But the problem really came when that morphed into our homes.”

As the market rebounds, “We need to promote the value of owning your home free and clear again, because residential real estate really is the backbone of our country. It’s the biggest asset for most people,” Olefson says. Likewise, instead of depending on your home for all of your wealth, continue to build up your cash reserves, Burrell suggests.

Lesson No. 4:Do your own research. Some people ran into trouble before the real-estate market crash when they took the advice of mortgage professionals without doing their due diligence and making sure the advice was in their best interest. The wisdom of speaking to a financial adviser, calling a nonprofit housing agency or even reading books on real-estate transactions before signing on the dotted line became apparent as homeowners struggled with changing terms on mortgages that they didn’t understand. It also makes sense to check the credentials of anyone advising you. “Be careful who you trust, take time to educate yourself, and first and foremost, if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is,” Olefson says.

Lesson No. 5:Think long-term financing. Adjustable-rate mortgages appealed to those who wanted the lowest possible interest rates and expected to be able to either sell their homes or refinance them before the mortgages reset. However, after the real-estate market crash, many didn’t have enough equity to refinance and houses began to sit on the market as prices went into a free fall. When it comes to financing, “you can’t just look at the next six weeks or two months or next year,” DeSimone says. “You have to say, ‘What happens to me in five years?’”

Ultimately, the real-estate market collapse was a lesson in learning to adapt, experts say. “When you see overexuberance, expect that it’s going to change,” Burrell says. “The only thing constant is change.”

Mic Ortega

I had never heard about either of these streets until our office toured a home we just listed on Colfax A today.  And I have to say, I am impressed.  Looking into it further, it turns out it is quite the hidden gem in Denver.  Both Colfax A and Colfax B are located in the historic Snell District just south of Colfax between Madison and Cook in Congress Park.  It is a magnificent street lined with immaculate Denver Squares and more charm than you are likely to find anywhere else.  If you are in the area, swing by and discover this hidden pocket of Denver.

To view this stunning Denver Square currently for sale, click here.

Mic Ortega

Sometimes when I am out and about showing homes, I will run across homes that I am sure I saw on the news in the past year.  Other times, I will be trying to find a home, and the so and so block of blank street will pop into my head and remind me of a news story of a crime committed somewhere around.   Knock on wood, I have yet to run across a true “murder” home, but seeing this article today got me thinking about the impact a horrible crime could leave on a home.  

It made me wonder if I would personally still be interested in a home if I knew a heinous crime had been committed there, or if it would be too much to keep me interested.  Based on this article, murders can significantly impact the resale value of a home, especially if it is public knowledge, another factor to consider beyond the emotional impact.   Take a look through the article below and try to imagine how it might impact your decision to buy or not.

The addresses could be in Any Town, USA where anyone might want to live: 2854 Robert Drive. 965 Fifth Ave. 215 Missouri St. Or 4250 Faria Road.

The 3-bedroom, 2-bath foreclosure home on Faria Road in Ventura, Calif., for example, has a brick fireplace and built-in bookshelves, as well as wood floors and stainless appliances in the kitchen. There is an open-beam ceiling living room with lots of natural light from patio windows overlooking 44-feet of ocean frontage. But you might want to think twice before you put an offer on this home or any of the others. That’s because behind all of their doors, gruesome murders occurred.

What is the fate of a murder house once the blood splatters are cleaned, the crime scene tape is discarded and the media cameras are gone? And how would you know if that dream home you’re eyeing was once the scene of a grisly crime?

The fact is, you probably wouldn’t, but there are ways to find out.

About half of the states in the U.S. have formal seller disclosure laws, and for many of them sellers and their agents do not have to disclose if there was a murder on the premises unless the buyers ask. And even then, typically they do not have to reveal it if the crime happened more than a year or so ago. Seller disclosure laws mostly focus on structural and material defects on the home, such as termites, mold and squeaky floorboards.

If you’re the squeamish type and would like to avoid a house linked to a death, however, your best bet is to simply ask around. Neighbors generally would know if a home had been the scene of a grisly murder. You can also pull police records by address at the precinct serving that neighborhood. If anything looks suspicious, you can ask an officer for more details. These days, even a Google search of the address or “block of” can be revealing.

The Faria house was on the market for $3.25 million in the days leading up to the May 20, 2009 fatal stabbings of a father and his pregnant wife, and there isn’t a buyer in the area who isn’t aware of that house’s stigma, the home’s former listing agent Gary Goldberg of Coastal Propertiestold HousingWatch.

“The value of a murder house goes down dramatically, right away, like OJ Simpson’s house,” said Goldberg, whose agency also had the listing when the couple bought the house in 2006 for $2.57 million and subsequently gutted it and remodeled extensively. But no amount of renovations and price drops will make the home more appealing to most prospective buyers.

The way most states look at it, though, is that if you’re creeped out knowing a murder or suicide occurred on a property, well, that’s your own issue.

The National Association of Realtors has a name for psycho-laden places like these: stigmatized properties. The group has even published a “field guide for dealing with stigmatized properties.” Tainted real estate can be harder to sell, and the goal, of course, is to move properties for sellers and buyers. If a murder is disclosed, the home could take 5 percent longer than comparable homes to sell, and it could price at an average of about 3 percent less, according to an analysis of 100 “psychologically impacted houses” by Wright State University professors James E. Larsen, Ph.D. and Joseph W. Coleman.

Recently soldis a 2-bedroom home with updated kitchen on Potrero Hill in San Francisco. It was the scene of a November 2008 murder-suicide, where the owner-boyfriend is suspected of shooting his girlfriend and then himself. He bought it for $985,000 and it sold for $894,500 in October. When the murder is more high-profile, the real estate impact can be more devastating. The Brentwood, Calif. home where Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman were murdered in 1994 hit the market the following year with a $795,000 price tag. It sat on the market for more than two years before selling for $595,000, ABC News reported.

In other cases, the address of stigmatized homes have been legally changed, or the exterior given a facelift in an attempt to eliminate the blemish. Other homes were torn down, such as John Wayne Gacy’s suburban Chicago home, where he hid 29 victims in crawl spaces and the walls. The lot sat empty for a decade before a new home was built on the site. Jeffrey Dahmer’s Milwaukee apartment building, where he killed 17 people, was razed and still remains an empty lot, reported USA Today in 2006.

For the full article, click here.

Mic Ortega

Just a few years ago you could count on getting the bulk of your money back for almost any home-improvement project you took on. Today merely replacing a toilet seat can feel like throwing caution, and cash, to the wind. According to a study from Remodeling magazine, the average return on value for an upgrade declined from 87% in 2005 to 64% in 2009. But these six new rules will help you maximize your return on your remodeling investment.

Rule No. 1: Repairs get the biggest returns

The smartest money now goes into “undeferring” needed maintenance. That’s because while buyers might appreciate enhancements like Jacuzzis and Sub-Zeros, they won’t tolerate a house with a leaky roof or antiquated plumbing. “If a property is known to have issues, today’s buyers won’t even look at it,” says Austin real estate appraiser Jim Amorin.

And trying to keep problems a secret can cost you big-time. If buyers discover them during inspection, it’s now common practice to ask sellers not only to pick up the tab for the repair but also to pay a penalty to compensate the buyer for the inconvenience of having work done.

So the $20,000 you saved by putting off a roof repair, say, could turn into a $30,000 credit to the buyers at closing, says Amorin.

Rule No. 2: Remodeling beats adding on

McMansions have gone the way of the SUV — and large additions don’t pay off either. “There’s been a fundamental shift toward quality over quantity,” says Warwick, R.I., real estate agent Ron Phipps.

Having a big, formal living room plus an everyday family room is less desirable than having one multi-use common space. So rather than adding on, you’re better off repurposing existing square footage by reconfiguring the floor plan or capturing unused basement or attic space.

Want an eat-in kitchen? Knock down the wall between the kitchen and dining room ($2,000 to $8,000, depending on whether it’s load-bearing or contains plumbing). That will instantly create a large eat-in kitchen and give the whole house a more open feel — without a huge investment to make up at resale.

Rule No. 3: Eco-friendly upgrades can save cash

Some green improvements pay you back long before you sell your house. Install energy-efficient features, such as EnergyStar appliances and extra wall insulation, and you’ll see lower energy bills every month.

Add in the federal tax credit of up to $1,500 that lasts through 2010, plus many local rebates and tax incentives (see dsireusa.org), and the work may pay for itself in just five years. Green features are also increasingly a selling point, says Phipps. “Most people in the market right now are first-time homebuyers in their thirties, and they’ve been raised to care about carbon footprints and being ecofriendly,” he says.

The best way to go green is with a while-you’re-at-it job: When it’s time to replace your furnace, for example, upgrading to super-efficiency might add only $500 (after tax credits), compared with standard new equipment, but it will save you — and your buyers someday — $150 or more in annual heating costs.

Rule No. 4: Tech infrastructure trumps cool gadgets

Home electronics seem like a deal, since prices have fallen about 50% over the past three years and continue to drop, according to Stephen Baker, president of industry analysis at NPD Group, a market research firm.

Still, that doesn’t change the fundamental problem with expensive built-in technology: Put in a $10,000-plus dedicated home theater today, and something better will come along tomorrow and make your system look as if it’s from the Mesozoic Era. With buyers seeking any excuse to low-ball their offers, they’re not going to reward you for an out-of-date system.

Tech infrastructure is different, however. Anytime you’re opening up walls for a construction project, have cabling and Ethernet ports installed. At about $80 a room, it’s a low-cost way to provide the capability for whatever technologies come along.

Rule No. 5: Let the Joneses be your guide

During the boom, you could be the first on your block to have a luxury kitchen, spa bathroom, or in-ground pool and count on others following suit. And even if the neighbors never took your lead, there was plenty of equity growth to cover your costs.

Nowadays that fudge factor is gone. “You really have to keep your house’s amenities in line with the neighborhood now,” says Kermit Baker, director of the remodeling futures program at Harvard University’s Joint Center for Housing Studies.

If other houses on the block have real marble countertops, by all means add one to your house, but if everyone still has faux blue-marble Formica from the ’70s, you’re not getting your money back.

Also, keep your projects design-neutral so they’ll appeal to the greatest number of people. Choose neutral colors and traditional electrical and plumbing fixtures unless your house has a modern architectural style.

Rule No. 6: The new payback time is five years

As with any volatile investment, the longer your time frame, the lower the risk. Don’t take on a big project if you’re likely to move in less than three to five years. There’s just too much chance that any money you put in — aside from necessary repairs or superficial cosmetic work — could be lost while the housing market continues to meander.

But if you plan to stay awhile, don’t delay starting a project. Home improvements are a bargain right now, with contractors bidding 10%, 20%, even 40% lower for the same work than just a year or two ago, says Bernie Markstein, senior economist for the National Association of Home Builders.

Grab them while they’re hungry for work and make it clear that you’ll be getting multiple bids so they’ll be motivated to undercut one another’s prices. You’ll fulfill the first rule of investing: Buy low. Then hope that when you’re ready to move, you can sell high.

For the full article, click here.

Mic Ortega

As Realtors, it seems like we almost always have an answer for your question, or at least know where to find it.  The one question that we can’t answer  is the one we get all the time, is this neighborhood safe?  Constrained by fair housing laws, we aren’t allowed to declare neighborhoods safe or “bad mouth” them either.  All we are allowed to do is suggest that you check out any area you are considering buying.

So the next question we obviously get is, where do I find out the safety of a neighborhood?  To get cold hard facts, you can always go online to get the latest crime statistics and reports.  These will give you a sense of crime rates, but if you aren’t familiar with the graphs and plots and what the numbers really mean, it can be quite confusing.  Luckily, I ran across this article on msn.com about what to look for in a safe neighborhood and found many of the points valuable.  There is no definitive way to know absolutely that a neighborhood is “safe” but these steps can certainly help give you a much better idea of what a neighborhood has to offer.

Trust your Gut

It’s what police have long said, for many situations: pay attention and trust your gut. Homebuyers certainly rely on it, often by taking a drive. Even safety officials reiterate the concept.

“I always feel like if your gut says there’s something wrong, there’s something wrong,” says Robbi Woodson, manager of the National Sheriffs’ Association Neighborhood Watch program, at USAonWatch. “If things don’t look right, then most likely they’re not right.”

But the gut is driven by real information, even when people aren’t aware of it. And some of that information may, in fact, be off, colored by preconceived notions of what a “safe” area is supposed to look like.

To be certain, experts say, prospective buyers need to know what to consider and apply the same methodical inventory they use to evaluate the home. Check off the boxes.

“A lot of people spend so much time looking at the physical configuration of the house, but they forget that they don’t just live in the house, they live in the neighborhood,” Saville says. “Their life is affected by the neighbors.”

A neighbor who cares
If you’ve been paying any attention to the news since the 1990s, when community policing came into vogue, then you’re familiar with the broken-windows theory.

Broken windows, nearly all criminologists agree, along with dilapidated buildings, abandoned lots, missing street lights, rampant graffiti, unkempt yards — basically any signs of neglect — attract crime. The reasons are both practical — dark, lonely spots sit out of view – and psychological — would-be vandals are, ironically, less apt to mess with nice stuff.

As a prospective resident, though, you have to consider an underlying question, too. Will people who let their lots fall into disrepair treat you badly as well? After all, it’s the neighbors, not the police, who will serve as the first and best line of defense.

Areas designed with safety in mind
Now, do you see people? Are they out and about? Can you clearly see the children playing in the park and the man walking to the store?

Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design, a program that brings safety considerations to the drawing board, asks these questions, and the solutions usually align with the adage “There’s safety in numbers.” Safe neighborhoods are those in which people are physically able to see each other. It means they need desirable places to go, and places that are visible from sidewalks and windows.

If you’re walking the neighborhood, here’s what to look for:

• Multiple-use areas: A park is used – and watched – when it’s near a coffee shop or post office. Think about it: Would you rather send your kids to a playground bounded only by tall shrubs and the backs of a few homes?
• Recreational areas with clear entries and exits: This is a form of marking territory. Places that have marked, visible entrances give users a sense of ownership and are less likely to be hijacked for criminal use. It need not be a tall fence, just a clear boundary.
• Land and buildings that are well-maintained: A homeowner, or homeowners association, that takes the trouble to maintain areas will be heavily invested in protecting those areas from crime.
• Unobstructed lines of sight:Shrubs and fences that border walkways should not be taller than 3 feet. Places where people walk and play should be visible from house windows. You want eyes on the street, Saville says.
• Real house fronts:Wait, don’t all houses have fronts? No, some have driveways and giant doors that are always shut. “If I drive down the front of a residential street and all I see is garages, that tells me the life of the house is in the backyard,” says Saville, who also blogs on safe neighborhoods. “What it does is it abandons the life of the street to the cars.”
• A neighborhood nightlight: “Do people keep their porch lights on? They don’t have to be high, bright lights that suck the energy out of the grid,” Saville says, just enough to see approaching figures, as if under a full moon.
• People out walking:“The more walkable a street is, the more likely it is that people are outside to watch you and protect you,” Saville says. “An active street life is one of the best defenses against street crime.”

As a hefty bonus, all of the above also help create a sense of community. This improves the quality of life and bumps up home values.

Crime data on the Web
Now back to the crime data online. A growing number of sites are incorporating crime statistics into informative – dare we say, at times visually stunning – maps that can be searched by neighborhood, date and type of crime.

We’ve noted a few. Just keep in mind, says Saville, the former cop, that these don’t tell the whole story. Incidents are logged only when a person has reported a crime, police have responded and an officer has filed a report. This can skew the results.

The best bet, real-estate agents say: talk to your prospective neighbors. Or, rather, let them talk. Chat with a few and a decent picture of neighborhood concerns will become clear.

Still, the sites do offer useful comparisons. Many area police departments have their own, so check there. Here, too, are a few more:

• EveryBlock.com: Owned by MSNBC, the site compiles news and data for neighborhoods in 15 cities and includes a section for crime. Users can specify an area (up to an eight-block radius) and search by date and types of crime. The crime reports also appear in list form.
• CrimeReports.com: A national site that’s expanded to include information from 600 law-enforcement agencies in North America. Offers free searches.
• NeighborhoodScout.com: A multipurpose site that compares your neighborhood criminal stats with those of the city, state and the nation. It relies on statistical modeling to do so, but claims 87% effectiveness.
• Oakland Crimespotting: An easy-to-view, integrative map that shifts before your eyes. The developer appears to only have a map for Oakland, Calif., but the model could be adopted by other cities.
• National Sex Offender Public Web Site: A U.S. Department of Justice site that links to the public registries for all 50 states, the territories and the tribes.
• Family Watchdog:A national site, searchable by neighborhood, that shows where offenders live and work, and provides e-mail updates. Points out that nine out of 10 sexual assaults against children are committed by a person the child knew.