Clay Lee
Broker/Realtor®
Read my blog below
College Station Water - Where Does It Come From?
July 3rd, 2009 Categories: Buying Real Estate
Do you ever wonder where the College Station water you drink comes from? 
College Station’s water is ground water from deep wells in Simsboro Sand about 3,000 feet down. The water is pumped from the Carrizo-Wilcox Aquifer.
Is the water hot or cold when it comes up? Would you believe that the temperature for the water is 118 degrees Fahrenheit? The cooling towers at the Sandy Point Pump Station help reduce the temperature down to 85 degrees.
From the Sandy Point Pump Station the water travels about 13 miles to the Dowling Road Pump Station. At this Pump Station chlorine is added to disinfect and have fluoride added. The storage tanks at Dowling Road hold about 8 million Read the rest of this entry »
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Electric Lawn Mowers - Green but Grievous
June 1st, 2009 Categories: Home Improvement & Design
Green Lawn Mower
BRYAN, TX — The Texas Municipal Power Agency encourages homeowners to use electric lawn mowers rather than gas to promote cleaner air. They are offering vouchers worth $150 toward the purchase of an electric-powered machine, corded or cordless.
You’re thinking, I gotta push this reel mower or work my way around power cords? That’s a big sacrifice for clean air. Well, Black and Decker does have a handy 24V battery mower but it will only cut up to 1/3 of an acre at a time. Then there’s a solar powered cordless from Solaris - that sounds neat.
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Do All Homeowners Deserve A Bailout?
March 4th, 2009 Categories: The Realtor's Life
Jeff Gray, a former Marine and unemployed security guard, is begging his mortgage company for a loan modification to keep his family of four from being evicted and put out on the streets. Before you start feeling sorry for him, listen to how he got himself into this situation and how he has been living rent free for the past four years.
Gray and his wife and two children have lived in the home for ten years, purchased in 1999 for $200,000. In 2005 the family came onto tough times, with Jeff losing his security job and his wife’s income being significantly decreased. Credit card bills started to pile up and just when it seemed like there was nothing they could do, Jeff learned that he could refinance his house and pull the equity out to help pay his bills.
He would not have qualified for this refi, except for the fact that he claimed that his monthly income was more than 20 times what it actually was. Under these falsified loan documents, which the mortgage company helped him fill out, Jeff was able to double their mortgage and pull over $175,000 dollars out of the house. This money was used to pay off creditors among other things, but not a penny of the money went back into the house. In over four years, Jeff has not made one single mortgage payment towards his newly refinanced home. Not surprising since this last year on his taxes, he claimed only $7,900 of taxable income. His current mortgage payment is over $2700 dollars.
So far Jeff has avoided three foreclosure notices by filing for personal bankruptcy, and the lender is not willing to work with him unless he first pays $10,000 towards back payments, money he does not have.
Should the mortgage company work with him or should he be throw out of the house? Is this the kind of thing that has gotten this country into the trouble we are in? How do we draw a line between who gets bailed out and who gets thrown out?
See the whole story here on CNN.com
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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Planning an Appeal
February 15th, 2009 Categories: Land & Rural, Market Trends
BRYAN, TX — So your property value drops in a shrinking economy. What can
Property Tax Assessment
you do? Make sure that your tax value is decreasing, as well. Brazos County mails out estimates for the year 2009 in June. That’s four months away, you exclaim. Yes, plenty of time to investigate your property’s current market value and to prepare your tax appeal, I say.
Your case for a request to lower the property’s value is not simply based on your feelings about higher taxes. You’ve heard Benjamin Franklin say it - in this world nothing is certain but death and taxes. So don’t be shocked to find yourself in a recession and asked to pay Read the rest of this entry »
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As Market Picks Back Up, So Do Homebuilders
February 11th, 2009 Categories: Foreclosures, Market Trends, The Realtor's Life
As the real estate market picks back up, so does the progress on new home building. Crowley construction is nearing completion on two if its custom builds, 3515 Matoska Ridge and 303 Timber, and if you haven’t stopped by lately to take a look at either of these, it’s about time you did.
The house on 3515 Matoska is a beautiful farmhouse style home set on 1.27 wooded acres in Indian Lakes. The house is painted both inside and out and the installation of the flooring is nearly complete. Many of the appliances and amenities have already been installed, such as the custom light fixtures, master tub and granite countertops, with the rest of the appliances to be installed soon.
303 Timber is a one of a kind build in the College Station Historic District, featuring huge covered patios, a flexible floor plan and wide open rooms that make this house perfect for entertaining. The exterior was just finished being painted, and the interior will be done within a week. This floor plan is completely unique and if you have not seen it since the drywall went up, you will hardly recognize it!
These great custom builds, priced at $699,900 and $600,000 respectively, will both be completed soon and if its’ been a while since you’ve seen them, you owe it to yourself to go see how far they have come. If you have never taken the time to go check out these homes, located in two of the best areas of College Station, then there has never been a better time to go see what you’ve been missing.
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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How to get rid of PMI - Part One
December 2nd, 2008 Categories: Buying Real Estate, Foreclosures, Home Improvement & Design, Real Estate News, Selling Real Estate
No I didn’t say PMS. If I knew that, then I’d be a millionaire. PMI - your Private Mortgage Insurance protects your lender in case if a borrower defaults on the loan, and the value of the home is lower than the loan balance.
Home Equity and PMI
PMI has been a large money-maker for the mortgage lenders. The amount of the insurance (usually $40/month for a $100k home) is commonly rolled into the mortgage payment. Given the size of the overall note payment, this additional fee is often overlooked. Homeowners continue to pay the PMI even after their loan balance has dropped below the original 80% threshold. This occurs naturally, of course, as the home owner pays down the principal on the loan. On a typical 30-year loan, however, it can take many years to reach that point.
Lenders were under no obligation to tell home owners when they had reached a point where the PMI can be dropped. That all changed back in 1999 when the Homeowners Protection Act took effect. In most cases, this law now obligates lenders to terminate Read the rest of this entry »
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Voting for the Right Reasons
November 4th, 2008 Categories: Politics
How dangerous is an uninformed voter? When asked about the power of voting in a democratic government, Abraham Lincoln replied, “A ballot is stronger than a bullet.” As Americans, we are all armed with bullets to fire in the upcoming presidential election, but it seems many voters don’t even know what they are shooting at.
Recently on the Howard Stern Show, a correspondent went out to Harlem to interview Obama supporters and ask which policies of his they agreed with. Many of them were recorded saying they thought Obama’s plan to stay in the Middle East for as long as it takes was spot on, and also that they supported his decision to select Sarah Palin as his running mate…What? While this hardly stands as a litmus test for the entire country, it has to make you wonder: Just how many people are voting without knowing much more than their candidate’s name?
The semi-famous interview of Matt Damon ripping on Sarah Palin has accumulated over 8 million views on youtube.com. Add that to the number of people who tuned in to the SNL episodes guest starring Sarah Palin and John McCain, 15 million and 12 million respectively, and you have an audience well over half the size of the 57 million viewers who tuned in to the last presidential debate! Is it possible that people are making decisions on who to vote for based on sketch comedy or celebrity endorsements?
The bottom line is this: If we, as a people, choose to elect our next president based on anything other than the issues that matter most to us, then we have done our nation a disservice and should not be surprised if things do not go the way we would like them to. People are turning out in record numbers this election season to cast their votes and fire their democratic bullets. I just hope we don’t shoot ourselves in the foot.
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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Texas A&M Makes National News by Egging Obama Poster
October 31st, 2008 Categories: Politics
Yesterday on the Texas A&M campus, the Young Conservatives of Texas hosted an Anti-Obama Carnival in an attempt to publicly protest his policies. As part of the carnival, students could come “throw away their nest egg” by throwing real eggs at a large poster of Obama that was erected in the middle of campus. This resulted in an uproar from the Obama supporters on campus, who were disgusted by the display and claimed that people were “throwing eggs at Obama, not his policies.” The Young Conservatives of Texas removed the poster of Obama, but pledged to return the following day with a list of Obama’s policies to throw eggs at, claiming that they are simply exercising their first amendment rights. The carnival’s intent was to spark open and intelligent discussion about the candidate’s policies in the upcoming election, and although the carnival was conceived by some as offensive, it is refreshing to see college students with so much to say about politics. So whether you agree with the egging or not, recognize that this was a win for both sides; raising awareness and sparking interest in a group of young adults who are usually perceived as apathetic.
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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4315 Parnell House Priced to Sell
October 30th, 2008 Categories: Buying Real Estate
This past weekend, at the Bryan/College Station Parade of Homes, droves of people stopped by to see the hottest house on the market right now, 4315 Parnell. This beautiful home, designed by the architects at Southern Living to fit the modern family, has a wide open floor plan that gives you more than you would expect from a home of just under 3,000 sq. ft. The price has just been reduced and the seller is VERY motivated. To see this beautiful home for yourself, take the virtual tour or just call to set up a time to see it.
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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A Silver Lining to a Dark Cloud
October 21st, 2008 Categories: Market Trends, World News
Lately, the media has not had a lot of “good news” to report on. The stock market is down… way down. Congress is continually arguing about economic stimulus packages that, if not passed, would mean millions of Americans losing their jobs and retirement funds. Obama and McCain will reportedly spend around 30 million dollars over the last month of their campaigns on mostly negative ads. Thousands of American families are having their houses foreclosed on. And, in a recent pole, about 75% of Americans think things are going badly in our country. Did I mention we are at war? Is there any light at the end of the tunnel? Yes. In fact, look closely and you can see the some light right now. Less than a year ago, gas prices were one of the hottest topics in the news and politics, with people fearing that rising oil prices would mean they could no longer afford to drive their own cars. Don’t look now, but oil prices have dropped dramatically; 53% since July 11th. What was, just a short time ago, our nation’s number one concern has now become a silver lining in the dark cloud that is the U.S. economy. So, while there probably won’t be much to smile about in tonight’s news, try to look at the bright side: at least there won’t be any reports of heart attacks at the gas pump. Everyone keep your heads up and remember that all these things, like gas prices, can get better with time.
If you have any question, feel free to contact me anytime at rclaylee@yahoo.com or 979-255-1839
College Station’s #1 Luxury Lifestyle & Real Estate Expert for over a Decade!
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