Last month I blogged about an upcoming reality show on HGTV about real estate agents. Someone associated with the show that saw my earlier blog post emailed me tonite to remind that the show premieres tomorrow at 10 PM. It’s called “Bought and Sold”. I’m glad they reminded me since the first time I heard about the show it was to far away to set it up to record on my TIVO.
Month: April 2007
Wooooo WHooooo!
I got my Aerosmith tickets for the Mid State Fair!! I was kinda scared last night when I was at VONs and there was a kid in front of me buying a deck of cards. He said he was camping out with his mom in front of Boo Boo records to buy tickets. I hadn’t purchased concert tickets for a popular show for awhile so wondered if trying to buy them online was going to work.
It took me about 25 minutes to get the website to respond and find me a pair of tickets and they are 11th row, center stage. Not what I was looking for but I thought I’d better grab them. I then got a pair in the back grandstand section (where I really wanted) so now I can choose which pair I want to keep. If you’re reading this on Friday morning, you may still have a chance to get some tickets. Go to www.midstatefair.com and click the ticket icon in the upper right corner or go to www.vallitixlive.com.
Attention Parents of teenagers!
There’s a product being marketed to teens and already available in some surf shops and clothing shops on the Central Coast called a Reef Dram sandal. The gimmick of this shoe is that it contains a flask that holds 3 ounces of liquid.
With most school districts having zero tolerance of alcohol, while it may seem pretty cool to bring alcohol to school in your shoes, it may end up in a suspension or expulsion. I know that teachers and administrators are already being made aware of these shoes so I don’t think that too many kids are going to get away with anything for that long. If your kid asks for $45 to buy some sandals, make sure you see what they purchased just to make sure.
Desperately Seeking a Good Indian Restaurant
While Central Coast residents have over 100 choices for Mexican restaurants, I haven’t found a good choice for Indian food. I know of only 2 Indian restaurants in SLO County and Santa Maria and they are both in San Luis Obispo. I’ve been to the one on Foothill Blvd for their lunch buffet numerous times. On a scale of 1 to 10, I’d give them a 5 for the food and choice. They used to bring a piece of tandorri chicken to your table but it looks like they stopped this as I haven’t had any the last couple times I’ve gone. There is another Indian Restaurant down on Broad Street near South Street. I went there about a year ago with my wife and let’s just say that we will never go back.
When I travel to either the Bay Area or LA, I usually always seek out an Indian restaurant as I miss a good Tandorri Chicken or Chicken Tikka.
Is there a market for a good Indian restaurant on the Central Coast??
The annual Rib Cookoff is this evening at Farmer’s Market in SLO. Eating and voting begins at 6:15 with the winner announced at 8:00. Looks like tonite should be great weather too so if you have a craving to eat a couple of ribs, check it out!
Ryan’s Mortgage Blog:
The Annual Percentage Rate (APR) is different from the Interest Rate of the loan. The APR is used to determine the true cost of the loan. Basically, the APR takes into consideration the interest rate plus closing costs which determines the “value” of the loan. The Federal Truth in Lending law requires companies to state the APR for programs they advertise which should help consumers compare offers from different companies. This is supposed to prevent lenders from hiding fees. Not only can the APR be confusing to understand, it confusing to create. There is actually no clear rule how to calculate the figure. APRs may be calculated differently from company to company depending on which fees and charges they include in the calculation. The APR is supposed to be helpful for the consumer to determine the “value” of the loan but should not be the end all way to determine which loan to choose. I feel looking at the Good Faith Estimate is a much better way to compare loans. APRs do not include anything about prepayment penalties, rate locks, and balloon payments.
The APR does not affect monthly payments. Monthly payments are based off of the interest rate and the length of the loan. The APR quoted by a company (if calculated properly) should give you a good insight whether there are a lot of fees and charges. Here is an example. Company A quotes an interest rate of 6.0% for 30 years as does Company B. Company A quotes the same loan at an APR of 6.5%, and Company B quotes an APR at 8%. There is a 1.5% difference in APR, but no difference in the interest rate. This means company B is charging a considerable amount more in fees and charges (closing costs) for the same loan. My advice would be to ask company B to explain why their APR is so high, and see if you can get a good faith estimate. Just based on this scenario company A looks to have a much better deal, BUT there are still other variables. Maybe company A has a prepayment penalty on the loan and company B doesn’t. Maybe company A didn’t include some closing costs into their APR calculation, which sounds illegal but really isn’t since there is no set law that I am aware of that mandates how you “officially” calculate the APR. There are industry standards that companies should be following but let’s be honest here, most mortgage companies aren’t known for their honesty. I am lucky to say I am with one of the companies that stand by their word and can deliver quality products and services and that do not hide anything. Sorry, I had to plug that for a second because I am proud of my new company, Peregrine Lending Company.
Hopefully this helped you better understand what the APR is and how to understand it. If you have any questions or comments you can reach me at: RBaker@PeregrineLending.com or 805-540-0866.
School District Boundaries
Some of the school districts have begun to put their school district boundaries on their websites so you can see what schools a home you are considering purchasing feeds.
Lucia Mar has two tools. A map which you can zoom on which shows the boundaries for elementary schools. It gets kinda confusing as you zoom to find the street you’re looking for. You pretty much need to know the area to read this map. See boundary map They also have a nice tool where you enter just the street name (no street, drive, etc. after it) and it will let you pick the address range and show the Elementary, Middle School, and High School it feeds. Click this for street name tool
San Luis Coastal Unified has a text description of the school boundaries. See descriptions here They also provide a map but it’s worthless. It’s a small JPEG with no zoom capabilities.
Paso Robles offers maps. Here’s the elementary school map, and the middle schoo map.
Santa Maria-Bonita School Distict has maps here.
Note: Districts change school boundaries based on enrollment changes. If the home you’re looking to purchase is on or near a boundary line, you might want to check with the District to see when they meet to change boundaries for the upcoming school year.
Don Nelson, the basketball coach of the Golden State Warriors, must like Pismo Beach. He has brought up the “Pismo Beach Panthers” a couple times now. The latest reference is in response to the upcoming playoff game against Dallas.
“We just want to get there,” Nelson said. “You can give us the Pismo Beach Panthers. We’ll take them in a seven-game series.”
But, who are the Pismo Beach Panthers? Does Coach Nelson know that the Judkins Middle School’s mascot is a Panther so is he talking about the Judkin’s basketball team??
This weeks issue of New Times lists some laws in SLO County that you may not know about. For example, did you know that you can’t have a bunny rabbit as a pet in the city of SLO? Or there is no roller skating or skateboarding allowed in Downtown SLO? I knew that the city of SLO didn’t allow drive-throughs in restaurants, but didn’t know this law was created in the 70’s during the energy crisis to not waste gas sitting in drive-through lines.
I updated the Inventory Reports for the individual cities. Some useful information if you’re a Buyer. Remember…Knowledge is Power!
http://www.slocountyhomes.com/#Real_Estate_Statistics
(and click on Inventory Report under a city name).