Oldest Known Residence in Delaware

Ryves Holt House c. 1665

It is believed this dignified shingled home (now used as a local shop) on Second and Mulberry Streets in Lewes is the oldest in Delaware. Built by early Dutch settlers (after the destruction of the ill-fated Zwaanendael colony,) it has been dated to 1665 through wood boring analysis taken from beams used in the structure. This residence is known to have been standing on its present site in l685. At one time, this home was a colonial inn, and this is the house to which Ryves Holt came in 1721 (and subsequently purchased in 1723) when he arrived at Port Lewes. Holt (1696-1763) became the Naval Officer of the Port and was at one time the Sussex County High Sheriff. Along with other appointments and offices, Holt was made the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in The Three Lower Counties on the Delaware River in 1745 and served in this capacity until his death. After Ryves death, Commodore Jacob Jones lived in the house. Following the death of his mother, his father married a daughter of Ryves Holt. Commodore Jones won acclaim when his ship WASP captured the more heavily armed British warship Frolic during the war of 1812.

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

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A 1 -2 Punch at Getting Rid of Tangles

Tired of waking up with matted and tangled hair? Do you end up with more hair in your brush or bathroom sink than on your head? There really is a simple solution to decrease those nasty little hair knots and dryness that leave your perfectly coiffed hair less than admirable.

Chances are, you sleep on a cotton covered pillowcase at night and never gave it a second thought. However, cotton tends to wick natural oils from your hair leaving it dry and maybe somewhat itchy. The friction action between your hair during sleep and the pillowcase can really wreak havoc on your hair so in the morning you end up with a tangled mess that’s difficult to correct. You look with horror at your hairbrush each morning as more and more of your hair ends up in the sink. You may think it’s just the natural aging process, and of course some of it is, but there’s a way to slow down the hair loss problem.

So, what’s the solution? Step away from the cotton pillowcase and slip on a Silk or even Satin pillowcase. Silk is a natural fiber where Satin has a blend of natural and manmade fibers, but both work equally as well. The friction between your hair and the pillow during night sleep will be greatly reduced, thus reducing the tangles. You’ll not only get a better nights sleep, but your hair (and brush) will thank you. And as an added bonus, if you tend to get facial ‘pillow wrinkles’ at night, they’ll be diminished as well.

The second thing to do is spritz a bit of leave-in conditioner in your hair after you shower each day. We tend to wash and condition our hair, then dry. Best to stay away from heat drying when possible. When we rinse out after showering, we also rinse out the conditioner, leaving our hair unprotected and often times looking dry and lifeless. Spritz a bit of leave-in conditioner after showering and maybe even a bit at night before turning in.

Use this simple trick to reduce those unsightly hair tangles and let your hair shine like when you were in your 20’s. Hey, we all want to look our best and what a simple way to look refreshed. You’ll love the way it looks on you!

 

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

 

 

 

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Longwood Gardens Splendor

Originally the tribal lands of the Lenni Lenape tribe, subsequently purchased by then English claimed land in 1700 by George Pierce, and ultimately acquired by Pierre duPont in 1906, Longwood Gardens in Kennett Square Pennsylvania has grown into a mecca for thousands of annual tourists flocking to witness the magnificent splendor of Pierre’s vision.

Although today’s garden has scant resemblance to Pierre duPont’s farm which was in rack and ruin when he purchased it in 1906, the rebirth into what today could be considered one the most glorious gardens anywhere, is nothing short of spectacular.

Each year and with each season, Longwood Gardens continues to delight visitors of all ages and from all over the world. With a nearly $50,000,000 annual budget, 1300 employees, students, and volunteers, Longwood is a special treat to those that visit and work there.

The long range plan of the Gardens to is perpetuate it as a destination garden spot to ensure continued enjoyment for generations to come. This holiday season, Longwood again celebrated in it’s usual fashion with lights, sites, and sounds. If you are a horticultural enthusiast or just love a grand garden, then Longwood Gardens should be your go-to place.

 

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

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Mobile, Manufactured, or Modular?

There is some confusion amongst home buyers with regards to the terms; mobile home, manufactured homes, class-C manufactured homes (or class-C homes,) and modular homes. So, let’s take a brief moment to look at each of these homes and hopefully bring you some clarity.

A mobile home, manufactured home, and a Class-C home all start out the same way. They are built in a factory on a metal structured frame. The distinction between a mobile home and a manufactured home is only in the year in which it was built. Any built prior to  June 15, 1976 is referred to as a mobile home, and those built after that date are referred to as manufactured homes.  The exact same model home could be built on the same assembly line, but the one built on June 15, 1976 would be called a mobile home, and the one built on June 16, 1976 would be referred to as a manufactured home. Mobile homes and manufactured homes are both regulated by the Housing and Urban Development (HUD) division of the federal government. With a mobile home or a manufactured home, each is delivered with an identifying tag, not unlike your automobile.  If the home happens to be a double-wide home, then there are two tags; one for each half.  A mobile home and a manufactured home are considered personal property, just as your automobile is and a DMV title is provided showing ownership.

Now, there is a special classification, referred to as a class-C home.  A class-C manufactured home is one in which the DMV title has been surrendered, the wheels and tongue have been removed, and the home has been permanently fixed to a foundation, just as if it had been built on the spot. Once a manufactured home has the designation of being a class-C home, it is then considered real property and not personal property.  If you are considering a class-C home, always be sure the owner has followed through with surrendering the DMV title. It may be on a permanent foundation, but if they did not surrender the title, the county will still considered it to be a manufactured home.

The real confusion lies with a modular home. Many people confuse a manufactured home (and class-C homes) with a modular home. They equate the two as being the same, and they are not. A modular home is a stick built home, but built in a factory in modules, or sections.  Modular homes must conform to International Residential Codes (IRC) standards the same as if a bundle of wood was delivered to a building site and erected. A modular home is delivered by truck, the modules put together, and set on its permanent foundation. The roof trusts are then installed. Modular homes are considered real property as soon as it is affixed to the foundation. In many ways, a quality built modular home can be better than an on-site stick built home since the construction process is all under roof with temperature controlled environments. Costs can be held down since all materials are available at the factory, and labor cost are held down as well.

So, hopefully you have a little clarity between mobile homes, manufactured homes, class-C homes, and modular homes.

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

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What is Absorption Rate and Why You Should Care

When selling a home, most sellers want to know, how fast will it sell? While there’s no certain way to know for sure, but there is a way to determine what market data indicates when it should sell. This market data is referred to as absorption rate. Always ask your Realtor what the absorption rate is for your neighborhood. (This can be a good clue to you if your Realtor® really has their finger on the pulse of your market.)

So, what is absorption rate? It’s really not a mysterious market factor and it’s not difficult to calculate. The absorption rate should tell you the approximate length of time it may take to sell your home (assuming of course your home is market priced.)

The first thing to do is count the number of active homes on the market in your neighborhood. Let’s say there are 10 homes on the market right now. Then select a time reference; let’s say 12 months. Take the number of homes sold in the past 12 months and divide by 12. That’ll give you the average number of homes that sell in a 30-day period. Take that 30-day average and divide by the number of active homes on the market. That result is the absorption rate.

So, for our example of there being 10 homes for sale in your neighborhood, and let’s say there were 24 homes that sold in the past 12 months, then following our equation; 24÷12= 2 homes sold every month (as an average.) Now, take the 10 homes on the market and divide by 2. Your answer is 5, so in this case it should take 5 months to sell your home. And the rate is 20%, meaning 20% of the homes will sell every month.

As a seller, you want to be sure you’re priced to be the next sale, not the last. Don’t forget, always ask your Realtor® what the neighborhood absorption is.

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

 

 

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Why Won’t My Home Sell?

Selling your home can be a stressful time and when your home does not sell in the timeframe you thought it would, many homeowners begin to want to point a finger and lay blame on someone. Most times, that ‘someone’ is their Realtor. When I ask previous sellers about their prior experience; what did the buying public say about your home, what suggestions for selling did your prior Realtor give you to make it more marketable,? etc, most times the subject of price never comes up.

We always have heard ‘location, location, location’ as the mantra for selling a home. But truthfully there are three things that sell a home; location, condition, and the true king of selling- price! Of course you can’t do anything about your location. It’s not like you can pick up your home and move it to a more desirable neighborhood. The condition of your home is something you may have some control over depending on your ability to lay out some cash for painting, new carpet, upgrades such as hardwood, granite, new lighting, new roof etc. Many homeowners do not have ready cash for this, so that limits their ability to control condition. But, the biggest ticket item when selling is price. The seller has practically total control over that facet.

There is a common misstep with homeowners when deciding on their list price. “I’ll price it at the top, or over the top of the market, and I’ll negotiate with a buyer.” The problem with this is that most buyers will not even look at your home if they feel you are not market priced. Most Realtors look at overpriced homes and caution their buyers against it, not knowing you’d negotiate. I try to use this simile with sellers. If you went to a car lot and looked at three similar autos; two being priced right, and the third being overpriced, why would a buyer be interested in the overpriced auto? Of course the answer is, they wouldn’t. As a homeowner, you’ve got one asset to sell, but buyers have a lot of homes on the market to select from, so why not make your home competitive? When everyone around you is selling, and your home is still there, perhaps it’s your asking price. It’s always best to price it right upfront. Your goal is to get your home sold, not just list it.

Thomas Schoenbeck, Keller Williams Realty, Lewes DE (302)360-0300

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An Evil, Albeit Legal, Manuever

Teresa Fusco thought she had done everything that she needed to do to sail comfortably into her golden years. She owned a condominium unit in Reading, Pa., with an appraised valued of $101,000, and she had a rainy-day fund in case her health failed.So she was shocked when earlier this year she suddenly found herself with no home and a wrecked credit score after a company that bought most of the condo complex sold her unit for less than half of what she thought it was worth. To make matters worse, Fusco (pictured left) is still on the hook for the $71,000 mortgage on the property that she no longer owns.”As a single woman, 56 years old, who works hard and was looking to retire in that place, I had everything set up,” Fusco said.Her plans — and those of 10 other homeowners who say they’ve had their properties stolen from them — started to unravel when Deer Path Woods, the condo complex where they lived, went into foreclosure last fall. Fusco’s unit was one of 11 that were individually owned; another 97 were rental units. When the owner of the rental units failed to pay his mortgage, a company under the control of local developer Kevin Timochenko snapped all of them up for $7,200 at a foreclosure auction.

The purchase gave Timochenko’s company, Water Polo I, LP, control of nearly 90 percent of the units of the complex, arming it with enough votes to dictate condominium association policy. Soon after the purchase, Fusco and her fellow homeowners received a letter informing them that, come January, condo association fees would more than double, to $450 a month. The increase, according to a representative of Water Polo I, was to pay for upgrades to the complex that the tenants had demanded.

“We were all freaking out because we couldn’t afford that in addition to the mortgages that we were paying,” said former unit owner Adrienne Dawkins (pictured with her children below), who took out a $102,500 mortgage to buy her unit at Deer Path in 2007, and has since been forced to leave her home along with her three children. “We agreed to pay $200 when we bought our homes.”

Anxiety over raised assessment fees paled in comparison to what happened next: The new condo owner called a vote to terminate the condo association altogether.

From Condos to Rentals

Dissolving a condominium organization isn’t unusual. Termination reduces management costs, and in a depressed market makes it easier for homeowners to sell their units. It’s often easier to find a buyer for an entire condominium, and a bank doesn’t have to approve the sale. After termination, units of the dissolved condominium sell in bulk and are then typically converted into an apartment complex owned by a single developer.

“By buying the 89 percent of the units at the foreclosure sale last year, [Timochenko] acquired all of the units and all of the votes he needed to approve a termination,” explains Tom Beaver, an attorney whom some of the unit owners turned to for help.

Here’s the rub: Under Section 3220 of the Pennsylvania Uniform Condominium Act, when a condominium is dissolved, the condo association can put the entire condominium up for sale, regardless of who owns the individual units. So in acquiring control of the condo association, Water Polo I also gained the right to sell Fusco’s home.

In April 2012, Deer Path Woods was put up for auction. Beaver, who attended the auction, said it sold for $3.425 million.

The buyer? Another company controlled by Kevin Timochenko. Along with the 97 rental units, the sale included the 11 owner-occupied apartments. The new buyer, Hoya I, LP, then converted the condominium into an all-rental apartment complex, now known as Spring Valley.

“The effect of terminating the condominium was to divest all of the unit owners of their real estate interest,” Beaver said, adding that rentals are especially profitable for developers in today’s market of high rental rates and diminished home values.

A Tale of Two Appraisals

It might not have been so bad if Fusco and the other owners got paid what they believed their homes were worth. Pennsylvania law states that in the event of a condominium sale, unit owners have the right to the fair market value of their homes as determined by an appraiser selected by the condominium association. That means that even though Fusco’s unit had been valued at $101,000 by an independent appraiser earlier this year, she would get only the amount determined by the appraiser hired by the condominium association — in this case, Water Polo I.

And the difference was shocking. After the sale, the 11 unit owners received letters saying that they or their lenders would each receive between $31,000 and $34,219 for the sale of their units. The owners were still responsible for the remaining balances on their mortgages, though. For Fusco, who took out a $94,025 loan in 2008 to buy her apartment, that means she’s on the hook for about $40,000 even after her lender receives money from the sale.

Dawkins is in even more trouble: She owes $98,000 on her mortgage, making her liable for $60,000 even if her lender gets the maximum for the sale of her unit.

“[Water Polo I] really screwed her on this by not offering full market value with a legal industry appraisal and credible comparable condos,” said Fusco’s appraiser, Michael Robinson. “It was sad because she has a liability for the balance of her mortgage now.”

So how is it that two appraisals on the same unit at around the same time could differ so dramatically?

A representative for Water Polo I suggests that the higher appraisals came when the units were treated as part of the now-dissolved condominium association, rather than simply as units of an apartment complex.

That doesn’t hold water with George Schwambach, a roofer who owned his unit outright. Schwambach said that an independent appraiser valued his unit at $90,000 earlier this year.

“I’m losing sleep over this. This is crazy,” Schwambach (pictured at left) said of the figure determined by the condominium association’s appraiser. “My attorney is telling me we can’t do nothing. It raises my blood pressure every time I think about it.” Schwambach added that he had been renting his unit to a tenant, but the tenant, who was familiar with Timochenko, promptly vacated when he learned of the developer’s connection to management.

That may not be surprising, considering a run-in that Timochenko’s had with the law. As president of Metropolitan Management Group, which manages more than 10 apartment complexes in Berks County, Pa. including Deer Path’s successor, Spring Valley, Timochenko was sentenced to 15 months in prison and fined $75,000 in 2006 for stealing gas from a utility company that served his apartments. The landlord’s crime at one point put several tenants at risk of eviction by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, even though they hadn’t participated in the scheme.

No Legal Recourse?

Still reeling from the loss of their units, the former owners have so far been told that they have little, if any, legal recourse. Everything that the companies controlled by Timochenko have done is perfectly legal, Beaver said, and the only way the unit owners could possibly get more for their homes would be to go to court to contest the appraiser’s determination.

But that would cost them thousands of dollars, Beaver said, and since he has found no evidence of malfeasance, it might not result in relief for the former homeowners anyway.

“I checked into the situation and I came back and said, really, there was nothing I could do,” Beaver said.

Pennsylvania State Sen. Judith L. Schwank, after receiving a desperate letter from Fusco, said her hands are tied as well.

“Frankly, I am astounded by the situation, and I will look into what must be done to change the law to prevent such an outrage in the future,” Schwank, who represents the 11th District, wrote to Fusco. “Unfortunately, as you acknowledge in your letter, a future change to the law probably would not affect your rights.”

Squatting in Their Own Homes

After receiving a letter in April of this year telling her to vacate or sign a lease agreement with Metropolitan Management Group, which manages the apartment complex for Hoya I, Fusco left her home. She now rents in Minersville, Pa.

Dawkins held out for more than a month after receiving the same letter, but left in late May once another letter arrived, this one informing her that Metropolitan Management Group was suing her.

But not everyone is going quietly.

David Wendell (pictured right), who said that he owes $61,500 in principal on the Deer Path unit that he purchased in 2008, refuses to vacate his property unless his lender receives a much larger amount for the sale of his home.

“I did not have a ‘for sale’ sign on my door,” he said. “I want to pay off my mortgage, so I can have money to put down on a new home. I had everything planned. I’m going berserk.”

In March, he called his lender, Nationstar Mortgage. A representative there informed him that he remained responsible for his mortgage.

“She was very shocked. She was like, ‘These type of things don’t happen,’ ” he said of her reaction to his situation.

Indeed, what happened to Deer Path is foreign to some other industry observers as well. The Fair Housing Council for the Harrisburg region said that it has never heard of a case like Deer Path’s.

A lawyer for Metropolitan Management Group, Nicole Plank, said several lenders have agreed to forgive the debt on some of the other units acquired by Timochenko’s company. She said that those who remain saddled with their mortgages should seek legal counsel in order to persuade their lenders to forgive their outstanding debt.

 

Reprinted from AOL Real Estate News

 

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Sussex County Ends on a High Note, in the Black

While many towns and counties are sinking in a sea of red ink, Sussex County has finished the 2011 fiscal year in the black – and it’s a much darker shade of black than expected.

Sussex Finance Director Susan Webb gave county council the good news at its Dec. 13 meeting: a projected $1 million surplus in the general fund has more than tripled to almost $3.5 million.

Webb said a $1.6 million increase in realty transfer taxes for fiscal 2011 and a sharp decrease in employee-related expenses added up to put the county well in the black.

The county has been able to eliminate 50 jobs over the past three years through attrition, absorbing work in departments and three early-retirement plans.

A single $750,000 realty transfer created by a partnership change in a medical complex was a big boost to the county coffers in fiscal 2011, Webb said. Even so, the tax has fallen from more than $35 million in 2005 and 2006 to less than $15 million the past four years.

County council wasted little time backing staff’s plan to allocate the funds to four areas: • $136,000 in grants as previously authorized by council. Among the grants is $7,500 to provide streetlights and cover community clean-up costs for the West Rehoboth Community Coalition, an increase of $2,500 per town in local law enforcement grants and $3,000 each to county CHEER centers and Meals on Wheels of Lewes and Rehoboth Beach. • Ten percent of the surplus – more than $347,000 – must be dedicated by ordinance to open-space programs. • Nearly $1.1 million to cover a one-time 8 percent property tax reduction amounting to $8.30 for an average county taxpayer. • Nearly $958,000 to be invested in the county’s pension fund and another $958,000 to be invested in the county’s pension benefit trust fund, which funds healthcare costs.

County Administrator David Baker said it was prudent to take advantage of an opportunity to place money in the pension funds. Although the pension trust fund is funded at nearly 90 percent and the pension benefit trust fund is funded at nearly 75 percent, both funds are still short about $9 million of meeting a 100-percent funding level, Baker said. The county has $68 million in its two pension funds.

As posted in the Cape Gazette. Photo by Ron MacArthur.

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