Will County home foreclosures highest in Illinois

As we know from the past, the housing market is cyclical. Over-supply and tighter lending practices lead to a slow market. Increased demand is the opposite and if anyone bothers to check, one will see that Illinois and the nation have experienced both with some regularity in the past. Florida is probably the biggest boom and bust state in the nation. With a new shopping mall planned near New Lenox and more schools and the increased traffic from 355, this area represents a good bet for the future. There are still many people in apartments who wish to buy a home eventually. And new couples are still entering the marriage market with eventual family needs. And remember this: 99 percent of the mortgages in America were NOT in default last year and 95 percent of the people in the job market ARE employed. Do not despair.

$8,000 a year for property tax in Beecher is pretty steep. Still a one horse town with the same mentality. Make sure you shop carfully..we sure wish we did.

Of course my home is for sale in Joliet.

Part of the problem is that the realtors won't cut their commission..they expect us to cut prices even when we can't. Our price cuts compared to their obscene commissions aren't really helping us but still benefitting them.

There is no real reason for a realtor to make $10k to $20k on one sale.

If the realtors want to see their sales volume increase, and really want to sell some houses, they need to cut commission. We can't cut the prices enough because we still have to pay off our mortgages when we sell.

I agree with Nick on agents needing to cut their commission. I have a piece of land for sale in trendy SW Michigan. The agent's commission is actually 7% v. typical 6%. She says "it's higher for land", but the unspoken message is it's higher because nothing is moving. Can you believe I have not heard from her even once since we signed the contract in September. I really hate r/e agents. They usually get into selling r/e becuase low barrier to entry & can't cut it in the real, corporate world. Lazy, lazy, lazy. Nick is right - they need to cut their commissions, everybody is in the same boat but they won't budge. The only sweet revenge is watching the agents NOT make money.

Average realtor commision in the Joliet/Crest Hill area is 4%. Not 7%. A good realtor will advise the seller a fair market value for their house that will get it to sell. Most owners want to over price their houses because they have over extended themselves with their loans and would loose money if they sold their homes for what they are really worth. *** I am not a realtor nor do I play one on television but I have lived in the Joliet/Crest Hill for over 10 yrs and am watching the market because we would like to sell this year or most probably next year. ***

All one has to do is drive from Minooka north. You can see why this came about. I live down state. We have the same growth going on on our north end in Peoria. The city has forgotten about down town and has let the city grow out into the fields. In Joliet you see houses upon houses so close you can hear your neighbor sneeze next door. Why would you want to pay for some cheap looking "ticky-tacky" house that looks like everything else? Then you have some ding bat developer and some mortgage broker who have you hook line and sinker.(I sold cars for 3 months) It is easy to get people to buy what they really can't afford. People were and always have been duped. The key is "IF IT SOUNDS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE, ITS 99% LIKELY THAT THE DEAL IS WORTHLESS"
Finally why in the world would you want to live in Joliet when you could live in places closer to Chicago and be able to take the train to work and downtown Chicago for fun? Have you seen the outer burbs people? They have no CHARM NONE zip zilch zero! At least places like Downers Grove have cute little down towns by the train depot. Other than Geneva and St. Charles when was the last time someone said to you I can't wait to move to Elign, Aurora, Joliet etc? Yuck, Yuck, and Yuck.

People like Nick just don't understand. Of course, there's no excuse for a listing agent to not keep in regular communication with their seller. However, cutting commission from 5% to 4% for a 300k home doesn't add up to a bag of beans-certainly not enough to have any significant impact on a selling price. Additionally, in this market, Realtors incur much higher expenses marketing a property, so dropping a percentage point or so accomplishes nothing to get a property sold.

The article is very informative but it doesn’t answer why home buyers from the western and northern portions of Chicagoland aren’t considering Will county. It is almost as if the area was segregated from the west & north. Why is this?

Consider this… Why would a home buyer consider a 2500 sft home in Arlington Heights for $600,000 when they can get the same home on the same lot in Lockport or Homer Glen for $350,000? Homer Glen & Lockport are the same distance to Oak Brook jobs as Arlington Heights and both have access to downtown Chicago via Metra.

Why don’t buyers west and north know about these bargains?

You are incorrect about Joliet and surrounding areas. Joliet has two METRA trains into the loop. The Rock Island goes into LaSalle Street station and the Heritage Line goes into Union Station. The reason that someone would buy in Joliet instead of Downers Grove is about a $100K price difference.$100K is a sizeable difference in home costs.

chip gay wrote:

All one has to do is drive from Minooka north. You can see why this came about. I live down state. We have the same growth going on on our north end in Peoria. The city has forgotten about down town and has let the city grow out into the fields. In Joliet you see houses upon houses so close you can hear your neighbor sneeze next door. Why would you want to pay for some cheap looking "ticky-tacky" house that looks like everything else? Then you have some ding bat developer and some mortgage broker who have you hook line and sinker.(I sold cars for 3 months) It is easy to get people to buy what they really can't afford. People were and always have been duped. The key is "IF IT SOUNDS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE, ITS 99% LIKELY THAT THE DEAL IS WORTHLESS"
Finally why in the world would you want to live in Joliet when you could live in places closer to Chicago and be able to take the train to work and downtown Chicago for fun? Have you seen the outer burbs people? They have no CHARM NONE zip zilch zero! At least places like Downers Grove have cute little down towns by the train depot. Other than Geneva and St. Charles when was the last time someone said to you I can't wait to move to Elign, Aurora, Joliet etc? Yuck, Yuck, and Yuck.

I have to laugh at these derogatory comments about Joliet. I currently live in the South Loop of Chicago in a high-rise condo but grew up in the Joliet area. When I visit my family it makes me sad to see so much quality farmland going to ugly subdivisions and strip malls. While I know nothing will stop "progress" or "change" at least - Joliet does have a charm to it. Maybe it takes growing up there to see it - but growing up I remember down to earth people who were genuine. Something I can not say for many other places in the Chicago area. Joliet has a mix of people of all classes and races just like Chicago so the above comment stating Joliet is a bad place to raise a family is simply not true. However, it this perception keeps racists away from Joliet I guess that is a good thing.

Nick wrote:

Of course my home is for sale in Joliet.
Part of the problem is that the realtors won't cut their commission..they expect us to cut prices even when we can't. Our price cuts compared to their obscene commissions aren't really helping us but still benefitting them.
There is no real reason for a realtor to make $10k to $20k on one sale.
If the realtors want to see their sales volume increase, and really want to sell some houses, they need to cut commission. We can't cut the prices enough because we still have to pay off our mortgages when we sell.

Well, sell it with a for sale sign and use the internet free web sites to market your property. Cut out the real estate agent as compared to the travel agents have been deeply cut out of the travel industry by do it yourself booking travel plans!

Wow! Nice 2 bigotted rants, "Just Southern". Way to stereotype all those minorities. Hey, you forgot about all the Asians and Jews, wanna try your hand at them?

just southern wrote:

Lets face it, people flocking from southwest Chicago were predominately black or hispanic,(many of whom are illegal aliens), and were offered low financing by predatory lenders who looked the other way concerning employment or citizenship. I did not want to live in their midst in southwest Chicago and I will not live with criminals next door to me in Will county. Wake up Will county and run off the undesireables and their is a chance that when the housing market starts up again you may sell a few of these properties, however you will never bring in a desireable element with these people next door, it did not work in aurora, carpentersville, maywood, elgin, the list goes on seemingly forever. Let in blacks and Mexicans and you get drug dealing on the corners and gangs in the streets, no self respecting folks want to bring a family to this type of neighborhood, never have and never will, no matter how much you try to promote it, sorry but real GOOD people will never come, this is your fault and now you have to live with it.

That is correct! White people are always on the run when demographics undergo a change.

The real estate market in Chicago is bad, but it may improve in 2009. I have watched homes and especially condos on the north side of the city drop several times and still no buyers. The Uptown area that saw substaintial apprecaition is now sufferring from one of the worse declines in history. Pick up a 3 bedroom condo for under $300,000 now if you look around. Remember, most of the home sellers picked up those condos for next to nothing several years ago and they want to unload them on you at a big profit. Don't let them! It is truely a buyers market now!!!

Barack wrote:

Wow! Nice 2 bigotted rants, "Just Southern". Way to stereotype all those minorities. Hey, you forgot about all the Asians and Jews, wanna try your hand at them?

What do you know about Maywood, bub? I'm a "minority" myself and these posts are right on. Ghetto types have ruined Maywood and other places. Why do you think middle-class and law abiding working class blacks RUN when communities tip too far? Another white boy with something to prove...

just southern wrote:

Lets face it, people flocking from southwest Chicago were predominately black or hispanic,(many of whom are illegal aliens), and were offered low financing by predatory lenders who looked the other way concerning employment or citizenship. I did not want to live in their midst in southwest Chicago and I will not live with criminals next door to me in Will county. Wake up Will county and run off the undesireables and their is a chance that when the housing market starts up again you may sell a few of these properties, however you will never bring in a desireable element with these people next door, it did not work in aurora, carpentersville, maywood, elgin, the list goes on seemingly forever. Let in blacks and Mexicans and you get drug dealing on the corners and gangs in the streets, no self respecting folks want to bring a family to this type of neighborhood, never have and never will, no matter how much you try to promote it, sorry but real GOOD people will never come, this is your fault and now you have to live with it.

You are a idiot, who doesn't deserve a response. However, based on your post, it's clear that you have a 3rd grade education, an should be ignored.

i moved from the western burbs to beecher. Its not 8K for property taxes but 6K and i LOVE it here.. the UP train is 15 minutes away and Metra has a new line under contruction that will hit steger, chic. heights, crete and beecher.

And you know its NOT only because mexicans and blacks moved out to the south burbs..they are everywhere. Addison (worked and lived there) is like 50% mexican, schiller park, franklin park, some NW and North suburbs have mexicans and blacks as well....

the reason ppl move when minorities move in is b/c many of them get 0-money down, interest only loans, turn the house into a dump and then move in 4 years to do it all again all the while brining their city-trash friends. 1/2 my neightbors are black but our developer did not do section 8, no money down or backrupt etc.. mortgages and they are GREAT people with jobs, nice families, etc... i love them as neighbors.. its not the color but the class..

coffee queen wrote:

<quoted text>
What do you know about Maywood, bub? I'm a "minority" myself and these posts are right on. Ghetto types have ruined Maywood and other places. Why do you think middle-class and law abiding working class blacks RUN when communities tip too far? Another white boy with something to prove...

You are only half right. It's true that many middle class blacks move when communities change, but these posts are not completely true. If you read the post he replyed to, it included all blacks and hispanics, including middle, upper and working class minorities.

Wonderingwhy wrote:

The article is very informative but it doesn’t answer why home buyers from the western and northern portions of Chicagoland aren’t considering Will county. It is almost as if the area was segregated from the west & north. Why is this?
Consider this… Why would a home buyer consider a 2500 sft home in Arlington Heights for $600,000 when they can get the same home on the same lot in Lockport or Homer Glen for $350,000? Homer Glen & Lockport are the same distance to Oak Brook jobs as Arlington Heights and both have access to downtown Chicago via Metra.
Why don’t buyers west and north know about these bargains?

The reason is the traffic congestion going through the area. We live in the Naperville area and it is just terrible. I wish we could go back and do it all over