World Venture Travel

It’s a great time to buy a vacation home.  The prices have dropped,  interest rates are at an all time low, and it’s a buyers market.  You should probably act fast as things probably wont stay this way for long.  In fact in some resort areas prices are starting to move up.

If you are thinking of buying a vacation home you may have decided on where you would like it to be located.  If not consider what you like doing.  Do you like to be besides the ocean, or is a hidden country location more up your alley?  Do you favor a warm weather resort, or do you like to ski?

Whatever location you decide upon also give consideration as to whether you and your family will be the only ones living there – or would you be renting it out for part of the year.  Having a place that can be considered a rental can increase it’s resale value.  Therefore ask if this is allowed by the HOA before buying.

If you do decide to rent it out be aware that there are costs associated with this – cleaning, management, and maintenance, etc.  Also if appliances break down you will have to pay for the repairs.  Do some research on the viability of renting with some management companies in the vacation location.  They may be able to offer you some good advice regarding pricing, availability etc.

If you are planning to take out a mortgage loan you should be able to get a similar interest rate as for a first home – unless you require the rental income to qualify.  If this is the case expect a higher interest rate and a larger percentage down payment.  If you have equity in your primary residence you may consider a mortgage refinance to help acquire the vacation home.

Companies in nearly every industry are learning to use social media and social networking sites to improve their business. This can range from using twitter to find unhappy customers to posting videos on youtube to attract new clientele . Real estate was one of the first industries to realize the value of the social internet to their industry.

There are countless blogs out there written by real estate agents and even property management companies like transglobe property management services . They use them to highlight vacancies and share information on the state of the industry in their locality. They may also share tips and tricks for potential buyers and renters. The best things about blogs is that they are easy to integrate with social sites like youtube and facebook to create a larger community and share information in a variety of forms.

Social networking sites are also a good resource for real estate companies. They allow homeowners to connect with realtors and those with investment properties to find management companies to handle tenants for them. A great site for this type of networking is LinkedIn, which has profiles for transglobe property management as well as individual realtors and larger companies.