Closing on a house is an exciting moment for every future homeowner.

At the same time, it can be an overwhelming and confusing experience, particularly for those who have never purchased a home before. Therefore, if you are planning to purchase a home, it is in your best interest to learn as much about the closing process before you reach this big step.

Who to Expect At Your Home Closing

Before heading into a closing situation, it is helpful to know who will be in attendance.

The number of people who will be present at your closing will vary depending upon the state in which you are purchasing your home as well as the circumstances surrounding the purchase.

At a minimum, you will meet with the real estate agent who sold you the home, but you might also bring a settlement attorney to represent your side of the purchase. In some cases, mortgage brokers participate in the closing, but don’t be surprised if someone representing the financial institution from which you are borrowing is not present. Individuals representing the seller, such as the seller’s agent and an attorney representing the seller, may also be present at the closing. If you’re buying a home in Austin, expect to have all of the above present.

Plan Enough Time for Your Closing

While there is no guarantee regarding how long it will take for the closing to take place, you should plan on it taking about an hour.
This is because there is a significant amount of paperwork that needs to be reviewed and signed during the closing. If any issues arise during the closing process, it could easily take much longer to complete.

Bring the Right Paperwork

Although your real estate agent will bring most of the required paperwork to the closing, there are a few pieces of information that you will need to bring with you.

The two most important things you need to bring to your closing are a cashiers check and a home owner’s insurance policy. The cashier’s check will be used to pay the closing costs, while the home owner’s insurance policy will provide the proof you need to show that you have obtained the proper coverage for the house you are purchasing.

Take Possession of the Home

Although the seller is advised to keep his or her home owner’s insurance in place until the sale is officially recorded in city hall, you will take immediate possession of the home after you have completed the paperwork.

As such, you will receive the keys to the home before you leave the closing. You will also receive any necessary paperwork regarding the equipment that you purchased with the home, such as the owner’s manuals for your washing machine, garage door opener, refrigerator and any other items that come with the house.

If you’ve tried to replace a small counter with a piece of granite, you probably ran into a common problem: granite fabricators don’t want to sell a little piece, they want to sell the whole slab.

Or, they want to charge you an arm and a leg for the piece you need.

Fortunately, HGTV has popularized the use of granite remnants for small counter tops and has encouraged people to call around to local granite companies asking for remnants.

Smart companies sell what people want to buy, right?

Call Your Local Granite Company and Ask About Small Pieces

I had a listing last spring that needed a small counter top to replace some seriously ugly brown tile in the bathroom.

Fortunately, the owner’s niece runs Toluca Granite here in Austin and was able to cut a few counters from her supply of granite remnants left over from other jobs.

I know the owner of Toluca Granite personally, and have picked through her selection on many occasions, looking for small tabletops, or the occasional piece of marble for a cheese board.

Before and After: A Granite Remnant on a Small Bathroom Counter

You can see that the update to this bathroom was pretty much paint and the piece of granite. The little fabric skirt covered up the whole under the sink because the doors were missing.

Questions to Ask When You Call for Remnants

If you know the particular type of granite or marble you want, ask for it by name

Ask if you can come see the selection to pick out your counter top

If they don’t have what you want, ask to be put on a list to be called when a suitable piece comes in

If you need two or more small pieces, ask if they have remnants that match – pieces left over from different slabs might be called the same name but might not actually look the same due to variations in the natural stone

Ask if they charge extra for fancy edges, or for the sink cutout

Ask if they sell sinks to go with with your new counter – you might get a discount for buying the sink and the counter from the same company and some of the new counter-mounted vessel sinks are very very interesting

Ask what the turn around time is, after they come out to measure the space for your new counter

Make sure you select the actual piece they will use – because pieces of the same name as what you saw somewhere else may very well not look the same – some have large patterns, swirls or splotches that can either be lovely and interesting or just plain ugly

Have you ever wanted to do something really cool but couldn’t find the right metal thingy at Home Depot or Lowe’s?

Maybe something for your yard, like some yard art for an Austin classic funky landscaping twist, or maybe a neat cut-metal sign with the numbers of your house that isn’t just like all of the others on the street?

Sheet Metal: The Artist’s Friend or Foe

If you’ve tried to cut sheet metal yourself, maybe you got a nice smooth cut.

Maybe, though, you got a ratty-tatty raggedy edge that snagged on your hands and clothes and just didn’t look very artistic or professional?

Yeah – you know – those tin snips didn’t work as well as you thought, did they?

I have a whole pile of copper toe kicks on the garage floor because I thought they would be cool under the kitchen cabinets. Five, yes 5, years later, I haven’t figured out how to cut them to the right size without messing them up, so they’re still developing their patina as they sit collecting dust and cobwebs.

Some things are better left to a pro.

Get Your Metal Cut by an Austin Metal Pro

Orlando has a project.

He’s going to make a steady-cam for shooting video, because the ready-made ones are seriously expensive. He’s been watching YouTube videos, drawing out plans and having a blast.

We’ve been making most of our real estate appraisal videos in our home studio, but it would be better if we could shoot some in the field without too much camera shake.

The main part of his project is a curved piece of metal that he’s having cut by H.J. Lockhart Metal Service on Hydro Drive in Austin. H.J Lockhart is a custom metal fabricator – they have the machines to cut, bend, punch and do all sorts of stuff to metal sheets, bars, rods and so on.

We dropped the plans off on Thursday and will pick up the pieces on Monday.

This round may end up just being a prototype for the one that actually works, but hey, we’ve had a blast since we realized we could find some of the parts ready-made and have the rest cut by a local metal fabricator here in Austin.

Photos from the Austin Metal Shop We Visited This Week

(photos shots with either a Canon 24-70mmL or the Canon TS-E 24mmL Tilt + Shift on a 5D Mark II, so yes, the blurry parts are intentional!)

You love your truck, your boat, your RV, or maybe the airstream trailer you use for selling food down on South Congress.

Your HOA might have a different view of those vehicles and where you can, or can’t park them.

HOAs (Home Owner’s Associations) can restrict what you do with your own property, including what you can do with stuff you own. Stuff like the truck you drive to work every day, or the one you use to haul your RV to camp grounds on the weekends.

Zoning Regulations and HOA Restrictions

Towns and cities like Austin have zoning regulations that describe the approved uses of a property. For example, zoning regulations specify which land can be used for single-family homes, for public works (schools, libraries) and which land can be used for commercial purposes.

HOAs for individual subdivisions can further restrict the use of the property within a subdivision, and many do.

Things that are often restricted:

Sizes, numbers and types of vehicles (trucks, campers, jet skis, trailers, etc.)

Satellite dishes

Exterior paint colors

Height, type and location of fencing

Materials used in landscaping

Architectural details on the exterior of the homes

Solar panels

Clothes lines

And so on

The Big Green Truck

Our home owners association hates my truck, the one I love so much that I turned it into digital art for this article.

They say it is too big (it isn’t), they say it isn’t registered (it is), they say I need to park it in the garage (I don’t). We go a round or two on this every few years. Bottom line: they just don’t like an old truck in a neighborhood full of nice new cars. It looks like a work truck (it is) and I’ve only seen one other like it anywhere near where we live in NW Austin.

So although I am annoyed that my truck is frequently targeted for attention, I also know that the reason why my neighborhood is so nice and clean and neat is because the HOA really keeps on the homeowners about keeping up with property maintenance and things that might otherwise lead to a trashier-looking neighborhood.

Sometimes, however, I wish I lived somewhere where I could have an ATV track in the backyard, a huge out building for working on old cars and a great big chicken coop or a little barn for some goats. Oh, and someplace to park a trailer to haul behind the big green truck for our weekend tours around Texas.

Know The HOA Restrictions Before You Buy

If you live here, you know that Austin has a very diverse set of neighborhoods.

Old, new, big lots, small lots, small homes, gigantic homes. Some neighborhoods, like mine, are very restrictive and some aren’t. Some have home owners associations that don’t enforce the HOA rules, and others are completely gung-ho about enforcing every line-item of the restrictions.

If you already own a home in Austin, did you know for sure what the HOA restrictions were for the neighborhood before you bought your home? Did you read that piece of paper in the giant pile of paperwork you received during your home buying process? Did your real estate agent go over it with you?

Have you had any trouble keeping your property in-line with the rules?

If you’re looking to buy – is HOA-free living something you need? Do you need to park a big, ugly vehicle in your side-yard so you don’t have to go haul it in from out of town when you need to use it?

It might be a nuisance to have to think about it when you just want to buy that cute home NOW, but it’s a much bigger nuisance to discover a restrictions you don’t want to live with later on.

HOAs and Green Living Trends

One last thought – green living trends are encouraging city dwellers to do things that may run afoul of many HOA rules.

Things like hanging laundry on a backyard clothes line to dry, replacing water-hogging grass with drought-tolerant plantings or crushed stone, or raising chickens for fresh eggs instead of buying ones that have been hauled half-way across the state to the grocery store.

All are forbidden in my neighborhood, and all are on my list of things I really want to do. The HOA rules may force us out of the suburbs and up into Leander or Liberty Hill, to get back a little of the freedom we signed away when we bought our current home.

So tell me, what do you think about HOA rules – love ‘em? Hate ‘em? Love some and hate others? Do you see any trends towards greener living in your area that are bucking some of the rules?

I’d love to hear what you think – good, bad or ugly!

You know, the eye that can spot the treasure in the trash at a flea market? Or the one that spies the really good piece of furniture covered in dust at an antique store that never seems to change inventory?

If so, you’re going to love Austin’s own Backyard Salvage and Garden (BYSG), located at the old Howard’s Nursery on the corner of Avenue F and Koenig (2222).

We spied this lot full of reclaimed materials while lost, looking for the next house on the chicken coop tour this past weekend, then doubled back later in the afternoon to really dig through the piles.

You Gotta Dig

If you want shiny, new, matchy-matchy baubles for your home and garden, architectural salvage yards full of reclaimed materials are not the place for you.

But if you really like digging through piles, studying the offerings, and contemplating how marvelous some old rusty thing might look in your yard, then an architectural salvage yard can be a fantastic way to spend a few hours on a pretty afternoon.

To be clear, we probably wouldn’t call this a “true” architectural salvage yard, meaning the kind that has old gargoyles from pre-war buildings and plaster medallions from razed Victorian mansions. The most famous of those is probably Urban Archeology in NYC – or was 20 years ago when I stumbled into it and had to be dragged out by friends who didn’t relish the thought of spending the way digging through 100 year-old hand-carved, glass-front store displays.

Where to Find Austin Backyard Savlage and Garden:

Cut to the Chase: What Did We Find?

What we found instead at Austin’s Backyard Salvage and Garden was . . . stuff, and lots of it:

Piles of old wood flooring

Row after row of interior and exterior doors, some old, some not so old

Two very very cool rounded-top doors like you might see on an old bungalow in Hyde Park

Things that cover the bottoms of old street lamps – rusted, gloriously rusted things

Rusty bathtubs – perfect for a backyard planter

Lots of rusty porch railings and wrought iron railings – perhaps for trellises for those tomato vines that keep overgrowing the cheapy, short, galvanized metal ones you got from Home Depot

Battered screen doors, the kind that slam shut when the kids run out to the backyard to chase butterflies

Old Windows – but didn’t get a chance to really see the offerings, so see for yourself

And all sorts of stuff you could use to spiff up your backyard and patio area, so you can spend more time outside enjoying the Texas sunshine this summer.

How To Make Salvaged Stuff Work For You

If you’re thinking it would be waaay cool to get some of this stuff and spiff up your back yard, we have some advice for you: keep an open mind.

Survey your backyard with a critical eye: how much space do you really have and what do you really want? We love how so many of the homes on the chicken tour in Central Austin have homemade water fountains, vegetable gardens, fire pits with brick pavers for the patio, surrounded by old rusty chairs. The yards on the tour are used and used hard, not just admired from inside. Is that the kind you want?

Rip out ideas from magazines and stick them in a binder to remind you of what is possible for using reclaimed materials or architectural salvage

Visit Backyard Salvage and Garden in Central Austin and see what they have. Really look deep and take your time to walk around. Bring a friend to help you “see” the possibilities.

Go home and plan out your spaces, measure, weigh, photograph, etc. Yeah, “weigh” was a joke to see if you’re actually paying attention.

If you’ve got the eye, you may be able to put your backyard retreat together with stuff solely from the salvage yard. You might need to supplement with a few things from Home Depot, but maybe not.

Then Give Us a Call

If you’re serious about using salvaged materials for your yard and you live anywhere near Austin, give me, Alison, a call at (512) 585-4758. I’d love to come out and photograph the before-during-and-after of your project and if you’re game, to write about it on this blog. I am a Realtor, photographer and insatiable home renovation and decorating junkie and would love to share your joy!

Happy Hunting

If you’ve already done the salvage thing, we’d love to hear about your experiences – good and bad.

If you have other favorite haunts for finding salvaged or reclaimed materials, please drop me an email and I’ll go visit them as well.

Where to Find Austin Backyard Salvage and Garden

View Larger Map

How do people find the value of a home? Meaning, what a home (usually their home) is worth?

Of the most common ways to find the value of a home, a formal house appraisal is the most accurate.

If you REALLY want to know what a property is worth, you need to know why most (cheap and easy) ways to find a home value aren’t accurate. If the value you find for a property isn’t right, then what good is that?

Ways to Find Home Value

On-line (Internet) “instant” home values websites
These are probably the worst way to find the home values – they rely on incomplete information, and the data is often out of date. Yeah – they’re fast but what good is fast if it’s wrong?

What a neighbor’s house sold for last year
Another unreliable source of information – unless the neighbor’s house is exactly like yours and the sales price has been confirmed by someone with access to the real numbers for the sale. Even then, the market TODAY might not be what it was when the neighbor’s house sold and we all know that timing matters a lot in real estate.

The tax records
Although these should be a good source of home values information, tax records are frequently wrong since the tax district doesn’t usually know about updates or renovations to a home unless the updates required a permit. Tax records also don’t show that the homes sales prices in an area are going up or going down. Tax values also rely on huge databases of information that may not be up to date.

A local real estate agent
An experienced real estate agent can give you information about other homes that have sold in your area, which can give you an idea of what your home might sell for if you are planning to sell it.
Unless you really are planning to sell, though, and are looking for an agent to list your home, a local agent might not want to spend the several hours that it takes to pull the best sales data for homes like yours that sold in the last few months.

A house appraisal
Otherwise known as a real estate appraisal, a house appraisal is the formal way to find the value of a home. Real estate appraisers have to have formal training, pass difficult exams and use very well-defined ways (approaches to value) to figure out the actual, current market value of a home. Read the article Appraisal Steps: Determining Market Value of Property to understand what an appraiser does to figure of the value of a property.

Which Way Will Work For You?

Sometimes, you just want an idea of what the value of a home is. In that case, check out the on-line home value sites. Or, check out the tax records just for fun.

If you’re planning to sell your home, call a local real estate agent who knows your area well.

If your home is unusual (really big, really small, on a huge lot, heavily upgraded . . .) or you want the most accurate market value opinion for your home, you should bite the bullet and call a local real estate appraiser to do the job.

Short answer: the amount of real estate appraiser education and training, as defined by the Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board (TALCB).

Also: the types of properties the appraiser can appraise.

The table linked in from TALCB, above, provides the best summary of the differences in Texas between the licensing levels for a Certified Residential and a Licensed Appraiser (as well as for a General Appraiser, the highest-level of license that also permits the licensee to appraise commercial property.)

Certified Appraiser Licensing Requires More Experience and Education

To obtain the license level of a Certified Appraiser in Texas, a candidate needs more education (both undergraduate education and appraiser-specific education) and more documented hours of appraisal experience, over a longer period of time.

Each licensing level requires the applicant to pass an exam (the National Uniform State Appraiser Examination) specific to that level of licensing. The exams are developed by the Appraiser Qualifications Board (AQB).

The Bottom Line on Certified vs. Licensed

If you want to join the profession: study the differences and talk to appraisers at different license levels to decide which level to pursue (hint: Certified).

One More Thing: How Much Property the Certified Appraiser Can Appraise

“May appraise 1-4 unit residential properties without regard to transaction value or
complexity of the appraisal for federally related transactions (FRT) and non-federally related transactions (Non-FRT).

May associate with a Certified General Appraiser, who must sign the report, to appraise nonresidential properties.”

(From TALCB)

As a Texas REALTOR, I get asked frequently where buyers can find the list of FHA Approved Homes in Central Texas.

If you’re looking for a home that you know you’ll be buying with an FHA loan, you may be asking the same question.

So, where IS the FHA Approved Homes List?

Well, there actually isn’t one.

So How DO You Find a Texas Property for an FHA Loan?

Here is your short list for finding FHA approved homes – details to follow:

1. Find a good real estate agent
2. Find a good mortgage broker or lender (an FHA Approved Lender) – preferably referred by your agent
3. Find a house you can afford with an FHA loan
4. Get the house under contract
5. Get the house inspected to make sure it’s not a total dump
6. Get the house appraised by an FHA Approved Appraiser
7. Negotiate Repairs
8. Close and Move in!

Low Down Payments Mean You Probably Need an FHA Loan

First, if you’re buying a home with an FHA loan, you probably don’t have a lot of money saved up for the down payment and closing costs.

That means you’ll need to find a home that fits within BOTH the FHA loan limits and your own financial means, in other words, something you can afford the payments on.

In 2011, in most areas of Texas, the upper limit on FHA loans is $271,050.

In my experience, most homes that are purchased with FHA loans in the Greater Austin Area are well below that limit.

First Things First: Find the Right Mortgage Lender for an FHA Home Loan

Before you go shopping for your home, you need to talk to an FHA Approved Lender.
By now, you’ve probably already hooked up with a real estate agent. He or she can probably refer you to an FHA approved lender that he or she has worked with well in the past.

If you don’t already have an agent, you can still find an FHA lender by checking on the FHA Approved Lender search page on the HUD website (US Department of Housing and Urban Development, the folks behind the FHA loans).

This step – finding an FHA approved lender – is really important.

You really can’t go shopping for a home until you know how much home you can qualify to buy!

The FHA approved lender will take all of your information (how much you earn, how much you owe, how much you have saved), will check your credit scores and can give you a really good idea of how much house you can go shopping for.

Now What? Go Shopping!

Now that you know how much home you can afford, you can go shopping with your real estate agent.
He or she should ask you a lot of questions, to help you find the right area and the right house, based on what you want the most: schools, commute to work and so on.

When you find a home you want to buy, within the price range you can afford, you can write an offer with your agent.

Although “writing an offer” sounds scary, your agent will be using standard forms used for almost all single-family home purchases in Texas and will be able to walk you through the whole form and answer your questions.

If your offer is accepted, you will first get the home inspected by a state-licensed inspector of your choice. Then, if you decide you still want to buy the property, you will let your lender know and he or she will send an FHA appraiser to the property to see if it is worth what it needs to be worth for the loan you want on the property.

NOW is when you find out of the home will qualify for an FHA loan.

Kind of the long way around for finding FHA approved homes, isn’t it?

Safe and Sound: FHA Loan Requirements

Basically, the home will need to be safe and sound, and if it needs repairs to make it safe and sound, the repairs will need to be made before the loan will be approved.

Who Determines What Repairs are Needed?

The house you have under contract will need two inspections – the first one by a licensed home inspector, and the second one by an FHA approved appraiser who will be a state-certified real estate appraiser.

If you read our article about FHA Appraisals, you will know what you need to know about how the home you have under contract will be appraised. You will also find information about what “safe and sound” means in that article.

You and your agent will need to find the licensed home inspector – your agent might have a list but you should do your own research on this one.

The appraisal on the property – to determine the actual market value – will be ordered by your FHA approved lender.

The House is Safe and Sound!

Now, if all has gone well, the house you want to buy is both safe and sound, in other words, in decent shape, AND it has been determined to be worth as much as the purchase contract amount.

When that happens, AND you have finished your loan approval process so both you and the home have been approved for an FHA loan, your home purchase transaction can close – be finalized, and you can move in!

The real estate agent you choose to guide you through this process is critical , so make sure you do your research and pick one that knows the area you want to buy a home in, and is willing to explain the things you need to know to buy your FHA approved home!

No List, But You’re Still HOME

When you first stopped by, you were looking for the list of FHA approved homes.
We hope this article helped you understand the basic steps for finding a home that meets FHA loan requirements.

If you still have questions, give me – Alison – a call at (512) 585-4758 and I can help you find the answers to the rest of your questions.

Once upon a time, Savings and Loans (S&Ls) ran amok. FIRREA (Title XI of the Financial Institutions Reform, Recovery, and Enforcement Act of 1989 (aka “Title XI”)) was passed in 1989 in response to the Savings and Loan Crisis after it bankrupted the Federal Savings and Loan Insurance Corporation (FSLIC).

American taxpayers footed the bill for over $75 billion (according to Mortgage News Daily).

Definition of “Federally Related Transaction”

FIRREA (Title XI)

and

The Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Act (Section 1103.001) of the Texas Occupations Code (Chapter 1103) define a Federally related transaction to be a real estate-related transaction that:

Requires the services of an appraiser; and

is engaged in, contracted for, or regulated by a federal financial institution regulatory agency.

What are Federal Financial Institution Regulatory Agencies?

According to Section 1103.003.6-b of the Texas Occupation Code, these are:

The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve
System;

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation;

The Office of the Comptroller of the
Currency;

The Office of Thrift Supervision;

The National Credit Union Administration; or

The successors of any of those agencies.

Why Should You Care?

A real estate appraisal used in a federally related transaction must be performed by a state-licensed or state-certified appraiser to be considered valid.

Who Regulates Texas Appraisers?

The Texas Appraiser Licensing and Certification Board (TALCB) licenses, certifies and regulates real estate appraisers in Texas. Other states have similar licensing boards.

As A Homeowner, Do You Really Need to Know This?

The good news for you if you are a homeowner is this: you won’t be the one ordering the appraisal for a federally related transaction. The person ordering the appraisal is usually a mortgage broker or lending institution and the appraiser receiving the appraisal will need to certify that he or she is properly licensed by his or her state to perform the appraisal for the property in question.

We visited the Triangle in Austin late on an overcast April day, drawn by the Wednesday Farmer’s Market and the opportunity to walk around a gawk a bit at the marvelous selection of shops, eateries and nicely landscaped areas.

The Austin Triangle is located south of the intersection of Lamar and Guadalupe, north of the UT campus, bounded on the south by West 45th Street.

The Austin Triangle was boldly designed to attract urbanites interested in a lifestyle where you can work, play and live in close proximity – much like you might find in older urban city centers where you can walk out of your apartment for dinner at a nice cafe or stroll around the sidewalk-bordered park after a long day of work.

Austin Flats, Lofts and Townhomes

Over 500 apartments define the edges of the community, lining the sidewalks along Lamar and Guadalupe. The apartments are part of the 22-acre mixed-use community that has space for 120,000 square feet of retail shops, commercial space and of course, lots of restaurants.

Architecturally, the Austin Triangle buildings are reminiscent of the Mueller Airport Re-Development Area, another mixed-use development that emphasizes the work-live concept albeit in a more spread-out way.

According to the Triangle Residences Website, prices to rent an apartment range from about $1220 for a 650-ish square foot one-bedroom all the way up to $2375 for about 1350 square feet containing 3 bedrooms.

Why We Visit

We live in NW Austin, land of the sprawling suburbs. We have a golf course and a few parks within walking distance, but sometimes we want more and different things to do – something that reminds us of why we live in Austin!

In the Spring and Summer, we visit the Farmer’s Market, and let the kids run around in the water fountain (really, water squirting up out of the pavement). They chow down on fresh-fruit icees and beg for locally made organic tamales.

Before heading home, we load up on free-range, locally-produced beef or pork, fresh produce like beets and tomatoes, and maybe an armload of flowers or a few pots of herbs for the garden. My parents dragged us to a Farmer’s Market when I was little, and I want my own kids to “get” the difference between the mass-produced, low-flavor vegetables in the stores and what you get when you buy locally grown food that may have only been out of the dirt since early that morning.

We Would Live Like This If We Could

If we didn’t have 5 kids and work out of our home, we’d love to live in a place like the Austin Triangle. Years living in Brooklyn, NY hammered in the benefits of being able to walk a block and grab a sandwich or the newspaper and some flowers, plus light fare for dinner later on.

For now, though, we’ll visit during the week and taste just a little bit of the urban lifestyle enjoyed by the Austinites living this bold and beautiful life.

Google Map of Triangle Austin TX

View Larger Map

Have you ever wondered how the architectural photography you see in magazine and coffee table books avoids the architectural perspective distortion commonly seen as FOBS (Falling-Over Building Syndrome) that plagues most amateur real estate photographs, including the majority of those taken for listing real estate for sale?

See the really crappy architectural photography example at right in the photo we took in Taylor, Texas last month.

(Seriously, we took that one and brought it home to edit planning to use it on this site, and not as an example of bad real estate photography!)

The answer to correct architectural perspective lies in the use of a very specific type of lens called a Tilt and Shift lens (through frequently called a Tilt Shift Lens). More specifically, the Shift part of this type of lens permits the photographer to eliminate, or reduce architectural perspective distortion.

How Does Perspective Distortion in Photography Happen?

What do we naturally do when we want to photograph something that is too tall for the normal view of the camera? We lean back and point our camera upwards, effectively tilting the plane of the sensor of the camera away from the building. Even a little tilt like this can introduce visible perspective distortion.

If we’re really lucky, or really in a hurry, we might not even be standing front-and-center of the building, and then we have a leaning back, leaning over, all edges wonky building in our photo, like the first one in this article.

To give you some incentive for reading more, here are two photographs to better illustrate what I’m talking about, although both were taken with the same Canon 24mm f/3.5L Tilt Shift Lens, only the second one employed the Shift function of the lens.

Bad: Distortion

Better: Less Distortion with a Tilt Shift Lens

Now, that wouldn’t be the best example of architectural photography or real estate photography but it should suffice for the purposes of this article. I was really trying, really I was, to get you a few really good ones. We packed up the kids, and headed over to my current favorite spot for architectural photos in Austin (Mueller), had dinner, then located the PERFECT building! It was tall, well-lit at night and free of parked cars in front. I enlisted my 9 year old son’s help and set up the tripod and the camera. And then, Oh No! No CF card! Augh! Not in the camera, my bag or the car! Augh! Drove home, grabbed the CF card and went back to the Arboretum with just my 4 year old son in tow. While he worried me by playing on the grass of the parking median, doing flips and singing really loud songs, I set up the tripod in the middle of the street and waved cars around me while I grabbed a few shots for this article using the tilt shift lens that has become my favorite lens of all time!

Methods for Avoiding or Correcting for Architectural Perspective Distortion

There are a few different ways to avoid, or correct for the perspective distortion in real estate photography commonly seen as FOBS (Falling-Over Building Syndrome). Let’s talk about the ones that don’t use a tilt shift lens, first.

1. Back Up, No, Back Up Even More
You can back way up, until the whole building is in your viewfinder, without having to tilt your camera upwards.

The main advantage of the Back Up, No, Back Up Even More approach is that you can use any camera, even a point and shoot.

Disadvantages of the Back Up, No, Back Up Even More approach, however, are many.

You might be so far across the street that your images are full of cars and pedestrians, trees and utility poles.

You lose significant details of the building because so many of the pixels in the images are full of the stuff you didn’t want in your picture (people, cars, etc.).

2. Stand on Something Really Tall
You could also stand on something really tall, like a really tall ladder, or take your image from the roof of a building across the street, or out of the edge of a parking garage.

The main advantage of the Stand on Something Really Tall approach is that you can use any camera, even a point and shoot.

The disadvantages of the Stand on Something Really Tall approach are many.

I mean, really, who carries a 20 foot ladder with them?

How many homeowners or business are going to let you on their roof?

How many fantastic architectural specimens or multi-story homes are across from a parking garage?

3. Correct in “Post”
Some degree of perspective distortion can be corrected in post-processing, i.e. on your computer, to mimic the effect of using an actual tilt shift lens. Adobe Lightroom and Photoshop both have the ability to adjust images to re-align out-of-alignment edges and leaning buildings.

The main advantage of the Correct in “Post” approach is that you can use any camera, even a point and shoot.

The disadvantages of the Correct in “Post” approach are many.

You have to edit each photo individually, to pull the top or the edges of the building back into alignment. (I’ll be writing another article on this soon).

You lose some of your resolution because your adjusted image will have wonky edges and will need to be re-cropped, which cuts out some of your data.

Your image is unlikely to really look “right” because you’re effectively compressing some of the data and expanding some of the rest, so the clarity and sharpness of detail won’t be consistent.

4. Use an Ultra Wide-Angle Lens
Ultra wide-angle lenses will permit you to get closer to a building while avoiding some of the need to tilt the camera back to get all of the subject in the frame.

The main advantage of the Use an Ultra Wide-Angle Lens approach is that a wide-angle or ultra-wide angle lens like the Canon 10-20mm can be purchased for most DLSR cameras, and even the iPhone has a little lens that can be attached to increase the angle of view.

One (significant) disadvantage of the Use an Ultra Wide-Angle Lens approach is that most wide-angle lenses have distortion at the edges. You may have avoided some of the distortion associated with FOBS (Falling-Over Building Syndrome), but you will likely introduce edge distortion and your pictures still won’t look professional.

*Whew*, now that we’ve covered some of what you might have been thinking when you first started reading this article, we can get on to the good stuff:

5. Use a Tilt Shift Lens
The most exacting approach, as you may have guessed by now, is to use a Tilt Shift Lens, commonly designed and sold as a Tilt and Shift Lens.

Using a Tilt Shift Lens, or more specifically, a Shift Lens essentially makes the camera think you ARE on top of a really tall ladder, while keeping the plane of the camera’s sensor parallel to the face of the building.

It does this by shifting the lens up a few (or many) millimeters relative to the camera’s sensor.

A few millimeters mat not seem like a lot but when you figure the sensor of a full-frame Canon camera like the 5D Mark II is 24mm high, a few millimeters is actually quite a lot.

Clear as mud? I thought so! Here is another tilt shift lens illustration that might help.

The Canon Tilt+Shift Lenses

We have a single tilt+shift lens from Canon, the TS-E 24mm f/3.5L II. This lens is a wide-angle lens that is amazingly sharp and distortion-free from edge to edge which means we can take photographs free of architectural distortion. This lens has +/- 12mm of shift capabilities and +/- 8.5 degrees of tilt. (The glorious benefits of Tilt will be the basis of another article).

My Canon 5D Mark II is a full-frame camera, with a 24x36mm sensor. This means that the 12mm of shift in the lens is 50% of the height of the sensor. In easier terms, this means that as I shift the lens up, while watching the effect using the Live View feature of the camera (the screen on the back), it’s like someone is raising the camera 10, 20 or more feet in the air.

That means even pretty tall buildings can be encompassed in the frame without having to lean the camera back at an angle – see the images of the Cheesecake Factory earlier in this article – a building that is probably the equivalent of 4 to 5-stories tall.

I did a LOT of research before buying this lens, and even then, I erroneously thought it was the Tilt function I needed.

When the sales guy (Cole) at Precision Camera here in Austin told me it was the Shift feature, I was baffled. I kept asking (over and over and over, because that is how I am), why that was better than just squatting down low, or raising the tripod up higher. I even demonstrated my question by squatting down and jumping up for him.

I didn’t get it, at all, that the 12mm of shift is relative to the sensor of the camera (24mm high), NOT relative to the height of the camera vs. the building.

I had to see it to believe it, so now it is time for a little bit of video so you can see it, too.

Other Canon Tilt Shift Lenses

Canon makes several lens in their tilt shift line-up. The two most popular ones with architectural photographers are the one we have, and the Canon TS-E 17mm f/4L UD Aspherical Ultra Wide Tilt-Shift Lens.

Check out the video – you might decide that a tilt+shift lens is the next one on your list, too!

We ran downtown this evening after dinner to Austin’s over-the-top costume store Lucy in Disguise on South Congress to get a tri-corner hat for Sam’s school performance tomorrow morning.

Yeah, we hate last-minute school-stuff-for-tomorrow errands just as much as you do.

Since we don’t get down to SoCo that often, I dragged along my camera and the Tilt/Shift lens, hoping to grab just a few architectural shots of some older buildings between Elizabeth and Monroe. Lots of South Congress shops are located in really funky old buildings that have even funkier facades and signs out front and that makes for some interesting photographic subjects.

I didn’t get 10 feet out of the costume store with my $8 hat before falling under the spell of one of the marvelous little South Congress boutiques you hear people rave about in Austin: Maya Star.

Yeah, This Isn’t About Real Estate

What makes living in Austin so compelling is that we have all sorts of locally-owned, one-of-a-kind or first-of-a-kind stores you don’t find in a lot of other cities.

If you like clothing and jewelry that stands apart from the big box stores and brands, you can wander down South Congress, south of the bridge, and find all sorts of boutiques offering everything. Everything, meaning: handmade jewelry, exotic silk scarves, glorious stiletto heels, vintage frocks and Jackie O type coats. All mixed in with screen-printed local band t-shirts and ripped up jeans.

While you’re at it, you can get a tattoo, snarf a cupcake and try on some vintage cowboy boots. If that doesn’t wear you out, pull up a curb and just watch all of the interesting people go by. You won’t be disappointed – there is always someone interesting to look at on South Congress.

Sometimes you just have to visit to get it.

Maya Star: from Work to Play to an Evening Out

Maya Star, at 1508 South Congress (just south of Monroe and just north of the parking lot full of vintage airstream food trailers) offers the kind of clothes you feel glorious wearing: fun and flirty pieces you can layer under a jacket if your office is over air-conditioned, then skip out of the office in after work to meet friends for drinks without wanting to go home and change first.

This is the kind of store that makes South Congress in Austin a destination, not just something you drive down on the way home after working downtown.

The racks were full of beautifully neutral pieces mixed in with colorful florals, stripes and whimsically ruffled dresses. Coral and teal fabrics – the good kind, not the condo-in-Florida kind – popped off the racks to add just the perfect splash of color to a spring and summer wardrobe.

The adorable ruffled dress in the photo below was featured in the March 2011 issue of Glamour magazine.

Stuff like that. Really really pretty stuff like that.

Prices range from just under $100 for some of the earrings to several hundred a pair. Beautifully styled leather bags were $300 to $400+ (including ones from sought-after designer Rebecca Minkhoff) and dresses ranged from $40-ish to several hundred, with a nice selection at all of the price points in-between. This is not a store full with every piece in every size – which means you are far less likely to see someone else wearing your most recent find.

Chatting with the Owner of Maya Star

One thing I love about living in Austin is that everyone seems to want to talk about photography.

Like I said at the beginning, I didn’t mean to spend an hour in a clothing boutique, it just happened. It happened because while setting up the tripod on the sidewalk outside and fiddling with the Tilt/Shift (to avoid architectural distortion of the tall building facade), one of the owners of Maya Star, Richard Gordoa, walked out and struck up a conversation about my camera.

And, ooooh, I love love love my camera and anyone that wants to talk gets the whole tour.

After a few minutes, I had my exterior shots and spying a bright orange dress peeking through the doorway, asked if he’d mind if I took a few interior photos.

The rest is history, Austin history. Or actually, Austin in the here and now.

Visit South Congress, visit Maya Star, and scarf a cupcake from Hey Cupcake on your way home.

The rest of the Maya Star photos are on my Flickr Stream.

Google Map for Maya Star on South Congress

You’ll find Maya Star on South Congress between Monroe and Elizabeth, on the western side of the street.

View Larger Map

If you follow 290 from Austin towards Houston, eat a little BBQ in Elgin and load up on the water bottles and sun screen, you’ll be ready for the Sherwood Forest Faire in McDade Texas (Bastrop County). The faire is open for one more weekend in 2011 – the weekend of April 2nd and 3rd. Check out the official site linked above for details.

Oh, and be prepared to be hot, dusty and entertained.

Medieval Costumes, for Peasants to Royalty

We dragged three kids down to the sprawling Sherwood Forest Faire compound there last weekend and spent a few hours wandering around between little medieval shoppes selling fantastical medieval clothing such as corsets and renaissance shoes (leather, funky, some curled up toes!).

The fascinating guy on the right said he made his whole medieval costume by himself, down to dyeing the sheep fur for his wrap. He graciously showed me the inside – stained with the colors of dye he experimented with until he got the color he wanted. Orlando had to drag me away – I coulda snapped photos of him all day long – he was holding up in the heat better than the rest of us, for sure.

Renaissance Leather Working

We were particularly fascinated by the quality of the leather wares, and the number of people skilled in the craft of sewing leather by hand into period renaissance costumes. One glorious vest was for sale for $550 and I envy the lucky man who gets to wear that home.

The hands of the man working on the brown leather in the other photo were moving so fast it was hard to capture the skill of his leather sewing with the camera. In, out, up and down, around and around he just kept adding stitches as I snapped away.

He said he’s used to posing for photos, but that most people want pix of him, not pix of his hands!

Medieval Weaponry

One BIG deal at the ren faire was medieval weaponry: knives, axes, bows and arrows. Anything that could be used to slay an enemy, fell your dinner, or pick the grit out from under your fingernails.

The weaponry stuff was cool, as in, I wanted some, and so did the boys, apparently, since I had to drag them away from the shoppe selling knives, really really sharp knives.

The kids had some fun at the archery area, making me wish I’d allocated more cash for the afternoon – good exercise, good fun, good experience all around.

Play Hard, No Electronics Allowed

In between gawking at the period wares, the kids played a few games like “stay on the log while slamming your sister with a pillow”, and “who can make good on their boasting that they won’t fall off the spinning rope ladder”. Most of the games they played cost $2 or $3 but lasted a lot longer than typical carnival games and were far more physically involved, which is good for wearing out little boys.

Medieval Jousting

The final hit of the day was a little jousting fun between two knights. Mounted on huge horses, clad in medieval armor, these guys really know how to put on a show.

The one in silver got knocked off in an early round and the act of getting him back on his horse was quite the spectacle – how would you climb back on loaded down with all that metal, a feathered helmet and cowboy boots?

The Sherwood Forest Faire compound will be hosting a Medieval Jousting Tournament on April 9th, 2011. That day isn’t a “faire day” but the official web site says that some shoppes will be open and they’ll have food and beverages.

If you like period stuff, and want to spend some quality outdoor time, it’s worth the drive down to McDade for an afternoon. They’ll probably be packed this weekend, so get there early and save yourself a long schlepp across the dusty parking lot.

Texas Renaissance Faire Photos

Google Map for Sherwood Forest Faire in McDade Texas

View Larger Map

Shadow inventory is a real estate term that estimates:

the number of properties owned by banks, PLUS

the number of additional homes that have been foreclosed but are not yet on the market, PLUS

properties where the owners are behind on their payments and will probably end up in foreclosure.

As real estate professionals and homeowners we care about the numbers of properties in the housing shadow inventory because it gives an idea of the amount of time it might take before the housing market returns to “normal”. I put that in quotes because we’re not convinced that there IS such a thing as a normal real estate market anymore.

(For a detailed look at how Selma Hepp, a Research Economist for NAR, the National Association of Realtors estimated the national shadow inventory, please see the in-depth article posted on NAR’s Economists’ Outlook website, State by State Estimate of Shadow Inventory.)

Shadow Inventory in Texas

According to Hepp’s analysis, Texas ranks at #5 in sheer (estimated) numbers of properties in the shadow inventory, coming in behind Florida, California, Illinois and New York and slightly ahead of New Jersey and Ohio.

Hepp’s report indicates that it may take as many as 11 months to clear Texas’ shadow inventory, compared to a high of 51 months in New Jersey down to a low of 7 months in Nevada.

Two other interesting points to note, taken from NAR’s Mortgage Delinquencies by State Presentation (for 2010) is that in Texas, 1.9% of mortgage were in the foreclosure inventory for the 4th quarter of 2010 (below the median rate) and that 5.1% are considered to be seriously delinquent, which is also below the median.

What does the Texas Shadow Inventory Mean to Texas Homeowners?

If you’re planning to sell your home, you may be competing with properties that were foreclosed that are now on the market.

New foreclosures may hit the market after you list your home for sale.

Some of these homes are being sold by the bank, and some are being sold by investors who bought them at auction, fixed them up a bit and are hoping to make a return on their investment.

Investor-owned homes are usually priced to sell quickly, a little below actual market value.

Foreclosures being sold by banks are also frequently priced below market value.

What Can Texas Home Sellers Do?

For your specific situation, your best bet is to talk to one or more knowledgeable Realtors who are very familiar with your local market.

You will want to set aside several hour-long appointments with different agents so that you have time to review the numbers with them before selecting an agent to represent you if you decide to sell.

Some markets in Central Texas are selling very well this spring, and yours might just happen to be one of them.In other words, the shadow inventory might not make much difference to your chances of selling your home at a decent price. Or, local foreclosures might be a serious problem in your area. How do you figure out which is which?

If you are someone who likes to know hard numbers, some questions to ask might include:

What do you consider to be the local market area for my home (which neighborhoods, subdivisions, areas)?

How are homes selling in this area (for this first quarter of 2011, compared to the last 6 months of 2010)?

Specifically for homes that would be considered competition for YOUR home if you were to list it for sale:

How many comparable homes are currently for sale?

How many have sold in the last couple of months (3 months, 6 months) and how does this compare with the number of homes that sell in a typical month?

(What you’re asking about is the absorption rate and inventory. If 6 houses sold in the last 6 months and 3 are currently for sale, then your absorption rate is 1 home per month (6 in 6 months) and your area has 3 months of inventory. You care because if you want your home to be the one most likely to sell in a given month, it has to be the best one for the best price.)

Tell me about the foreclosures that are considered to be comparable to my property and how they might affect the ability of my house to sell quickly and for top dollar.

The agent you decide to work with will need to know and understand the answers to the above questions and should be able to explain the answers to you in simple terms.

He or she should also be able to show you real numbers for how homes are selling in your area, and more specifically – homes that are similar to yours, so that you have an idea of how easily your home might sell (or not).

Eating BBQ in Texas is like breathing: you just gotta do it, and do it a lot.

We wrote about the town of Lockhart Texas a few weeks ago but we ran out of time for shooting the town (meaning: we ran out of sunlight and the kids ran out of patience) so we decided to go back and finish the job.

Ok, here is the real story: I needed more Black’s BBQ, and I don’t mean needed as in lowercase. I mean NEEDED Blacks BBQ as in NOW.

If you know me, you know that means: load up the kids ’cause we’re going on a road trip.

Black’s Barbecue

This time, we only took a few photos of the jail in Lockhart on the way in to town, and spent the rest of the evening hanging around Black’s at the edge of downtown. It was a Saturday evening and the crowd surged in and out like a well-choreographed dance.

The barbecue and sides line moved quickly and everyone seemed to know exactly what they wanted.

We waved a few groups around us because we wanted it all, since we’d only managed to try a third of it on the first round. A few regulars realized we were new at this and pointed out their favorites on the line. That is one of the things we LOVE about Texas – good old fashioned hospitality and what you’d expect from a BBQ joint that has been in the same family since 1932.

My youngest son kept trying to grab the jello, so we sent him and our older son into the dining room to grab a table.

We’d regale you with the tale of what we ate, but that would be too easy. You need to go and try if for yourself. The brisket is melty meat and heaven and the turkey is the juiciest we’ve ever had, anywhere.

Google Map for Black’s BBQ – Lockhart TX

View Larger Map