Fifth Avenue Forum

You already own the land, so your rebuild costs wouldn’t be as high as your home value is. I had that conversation recently with my own insurance company.

Lots of reasons why the market value =\= the replacement cost

Yeah, my closing attorney also brought it to my attention, but I provided the underwriter a copy of the premium and disclosures. So I guess I will do nothing with it.

You already own the land, so your rebuild costs wouldn’t be as high as your home value is. I had that conversation recently with my own insurance company.

True dat. If it burns the land is still worth what it's worth.

I'm just ignoring this altogether. At least now I have you guys to blame.

Yeah, my closing attorney also brought it to my attention, but I provided the underwriter a copy of the premium and disclosures. So I guess I will do nothing with it.

What is the discrepancy? Now I'm curious why the attorney would mention this.

Think about it like this. The insurance coverage is to pay the cost to repair damage incurred via the events described in the policy. The premium you pay is tied to that coverage amount, but the insurance payout is never going to pay out more than the cost to fix the damage, so the maximum amount of coverage that the insurance company is going to provide is the replacement cost value (the cost of rebuilding the entire house). I know for some types of insurance, the provider cannot insure the property for more than the RCV, that might be different for property insurance, but I think that would be a boutique insurance product to get a pay out above RCV to pay for other stuff, and I am guessing that would lead to massive headaches upon a loss trying to figure out what the insurance claim amount is going to be.

I mean, I think i'd just be pissed at my closing attorney for thinking this is something you should worry about. The policy you have likely has language saying it's covered to the replacement cost. So were you to experience a total loss, the insurance is going to pay to rebuild. If you think that the insurance is going to rebuild you a shitty house because the RCV is too low, that would be a lawsuit against the insurance company for trying to rebuild you a microhouse or something, and that's not in their best interest (immediate publicity issue: homeowner who suffered total loss, now insurance company won't cover the damage).

If this were flood insurance, I would be more concerned, but I assume you are not in a flood zone, and we're talking about hazard insurance. And, only because flood damage is more likely to occur and is inherently more problematic to deal with.

My policy is fr $74k less than my appraised value. All he said is "hey I noticed this, you may wanna check on it with your agent".

It felt like it was more of a friendly gesture than being an attorney.

I knew it was coming, but the local school district is appealing our school tax amount since we bought our house for significantly more than what it was last sold for.

Is it worth getting a lawyer or should I just go and try to do the appeal myself? I fully understand it will go up, and I haven't gotten an actual amount yet of how much they want to increase it, but I just don't want to get bent over too much. I will have to do this go around again next year with the county as I believe next year it is time for Allegheny county to do it's county wide re-assessment.

We stayed in a McMansion style townhouse thingy in Rehoboth beach this week while some work was being done on our house. It wasn’t even close to walking distance from the beach or from restaurants and shops and you share a wall with your neighbor. IDGAF since it was freezing, but we checked out Zillow and the going rate is $650k for that floor plan in that block.

What on earth are people doing? 650 for a delaware beach house that is 2 miles and a 10 minute drive from the beach. How is this possible? I would have guessed 400k Max, and that’s just cause it had reasonably nice finishings.

Refinance closing complete. Still don’t know how or why we were offered 2.25% on a 30 year, but here we are. Who knows where rates will be at in the future but it makes it hard to fathom moving again at some point. Our original mortgage was 4.5% and would have taken 14 years before more principal than interest was applied from the monthly payment. Now that will be the case starting with the first payment.

2.25 has got to be a world record low rate.. Lol.

We got notice today our loan was sold to Stearns lending. Haven't even made the first payment yet.

Our 15-year is a 2.375% loan (through Better.com). Passed on a 2.20% 30-year at the time because it didn't make sense. I check every once in a while to see if the 15's have gone down, because I'll refinance again if it makes sense financially.

For those of you who have MetLife insurance (@robbiestoupe), Farmers is in the process of acquiring them: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insu ... quisition/

For those of you who have MetLife insurance (@robbiestoupe), Farmers is in the process of acquiring them: https://www.forbes.com/advisor/car-insu ... quisition/

Don't have MetLife, still on AllState. Our company offers Met at a discount, but when I went through with the online quote I kept getting kicked out for whatever reason. So never finished the process.

Maybe Farmers will be easier to use so I'll give them a try if my company continues to give a discount

Hmm, I thought it was you who mentioned they had MetLife. My bad,.

Bum ba dum bum bum bum bum.

Couple tidbits on the housing market:

The Pittsburgh business times ran its annual who's who in real estate article this week. They mentioned that as of February, listings were down 54% compared to last February. In February 2020, there were 7,200 homes in Western PA listed. This February, 3,289. They said the lack of inventory is driving a never ending cycle. No one wants to list before they find a house to buy. Everyone is willing to overpay so they can list their existing place. And so on.

There was a house the kangaroo was keeping an eye on. Same community, slightly bigger than casa de marsupial but in a less ideal location. It was listed for 5% less than casa de marsupial and sold for 13% more than casa de marsupial. And casa marsupial was purchased last November.

So its getting weird out there people.

There are 3 houses on the market on my street, with a 4th about to go on in two weeks. 1 sold recently. There are maybe 25-30 houses on my street.

And it's not even the peak of selling season yet.

I feel very lucky we bought when we did last year. A similar house to ours right now would be 20-25k more based on the recent sales in our area.

Two brand new modulars insyalled about a mile and a half away from me, and that was just this week!

I know the Pittsburgh area housing market is screwy, but friends of ours are moving to Richmond and put in an all cash offer @ $50k over list price ($450k), with no contingencies and free rent for two months while the sellers wait for their new house to be finished. Sellers received 26 offers on the official day of listing and their real estate agent was told their offer didn’t even make the top 20. That’s **** nuts.

What in the actual ****

I know the Pittsburgh area housing market is screwy, but friends of ours are moving to Richmond and put in an all cash offer @ $50k over list price ($450k), with no contingencies and free rent for two months while the sellers wait for their new house to be finished. Sellers received 26 offers on the official day of listing and their real estate agent was told their offer didn’t even make the top 20. That’s **** nuts.

This is almost the exact same scenario as our neighbors across the street. Listed 2 weeks ago, had a constant stream of people looking at it and received 9 offers. Ended up taking the first offer, which was $50k over list. Buyers are waiving all contingencies.

I'm really happy for them because they worked their tails off getting the house ready. Felt bad because the owner is a single mother of 3-4 kids (not sure as some don't live at home) who had a stroke 2 years ago right after signing divorce papers. Her mom, who has to be in her 70s/80s, has been working tirelessly to get the house ready. Her kids have been doing the same, while also doing school. Wish we could have helped them but our schedules are just jammed with 3 kids and maintaining our own house.

Real estate everywhere in this country appears to be nuts. A friend's house in our neighborhood went on the market on a Wednesday morning. They had 5 showings Wednesday and Thursday morning, and four offers by that evening. $10K over asking, no contingencies, quick close. Other houses in our neighborhood aren't even putting up signs, and going over asking price in under 48 hours.

If I lived near a city and had a house that was decent but interested in something new, I'd list my house looking for a "make me move" offer and figure out a short term solution.

I'm seeing 2% 15-year refinance rates on Better.com with some points, and 2.25% with just under a point. I may have to refinance again...