Category: Real Estate News

Fire Season Light Thus Far

Posted

According to the National Inter-agency Fire Center, fire threat is currently rated at a 2 on a sale of 1-5.  Thus far, 2009 has proven to be a relatively mild season for fires.  I recall years where from downtown Bozeman, one could not even see the Bridgers, let alone the Gallatin Range.  We’ve seen some residual effects from the big fires in British Columbia earlier this summer and as we head into fall, the NIFC is only reporting 2 wildland fires in the state.  One is on Lawrence Mountain in the Kootenai National Forest, about 16 miles NE of Libby.  This fire is burning roughly 1,072 acres and it is unknown how much of it is contained.  The second fire, a little closer to home, is 23 miles SW of Phillipsburg, but has only burned just over 100 acres.

Seemingly due to the large amount of snow and rainfall we’ve seen this year, we’re lucky to see such a green fall season.  For more information and daily updates on fire status, visit the NIFC’s website at https://www.nifc.gov/

1031 Tax Exchanges for Investment Properties

Posted

Many clients find that the 1031 tax deferred exchange is an excellent way to purchase investment property.

NCS Exchange Professionals are one of many firms specializing in assisting clients with the process of a 1031 exchange.

Finding the right property, the right loans and the right people to work with are obviously great assets when investing in real estate. There are also ways to save money when you own property by discovering what a 1031 exchange is.

A 1031 exchange or tax-deferred exchange is a method for selling a property that is qualified, and then acquiring another qualified property within a certain period of time. It is unique in that the entire transaction is treated as an exchange rather than a simple sale, which allows the taxpayer to qualify for a deferred gain treatment. In other words, sales are taxable with the IRS, but 1031 exchanges are not.

Exchanging a property represents an IRS-acknowledged approach to the deferral of capital gain taxes, and it is extremely important to understand the components involved and the intent of such a tax deferred transaction. Anyone investing in real estate should use a 1031 exchange when he or she expects to purchase another property after the sale of the current investment property. Otherwise, they would have to pay a capital gain tax that could run over 30 percent in capital gain, determined by the federal and state taxes according to where they live. In other words, when you purchase a replacement property without the benefit of a 1031 exchange, your buying power is lessened and only represents 70 to 80 percent of what it once was before theexchange and payment of taxes.

The rules that apply for a 1031 exchange are the total purchase price of the replacement property must be equal to or greater than the total net sales price of the relinquished real estate property. All of the equity gained from the sale of the relinquished property must be used to purchase the replacement. If these rules are violated, a tax liability will be accrued to the person doing the exchange. IF the replacement property purchase prices is less, there will be a tax incurred. A property transaction can only qualify for a deferred exchange if it follows the 1031 exchange rule of the US tax code and the treasury regulations.

URGE TO EXTEND FIRST TIME HOME BUYER TAX CREDIT

Posted

The $8,000 federal tax credit was a huge success among first time home buyers.  Unfortunately, this credit is set to expire on November 30,2009.  Real estate professionals around the country have been pressuring congress to extend the date of which first time home buyer’s will be able to claim this credit.  According to many economists, it will take more than just first time home buyer’s to change the housing market.  For more information on this topic, please visit http://www.nuwireinvestor.com/articles/new-bill-could-extend-8000-tax-credit-to-all-home-53100.aspx

Park County Studio Tour

Posted

As referenced by the Danforth Gallery

Twenty-four artists from Park County, Montana will open their studios this fall as part of the Annual Park County Studio Tour. Spearheaded by the Park County Friends of the Arts/Danforth Gallery in Livingston, the tour will be held September 26th and 27th from 10:00 AM – 4:00 PM.

The 2-day event will be a self-guided tour and the participating public will be treated to a behind-the scenes glimpse into the creative work spaces of area artists. Artists will be on hand to visit and answer questions. An array of original artwork will be available for purchase during the tour and there will be refreshments provided at many of the studios.

Event coordinator Brad Bunkers is delighted by the large number of artists participating in this year’s tour, “The response from artists has been strong… we have such a variety of talented artists representing all of Park County. From barn studios in Paradise Valley to lofts in downtown Livingston and workshops outside Wilsall, we have an impressive lineup of the area’s best artists working in a variety of mediums.”

Passes on sale Sept. 10th:
Passes for the tour will be available at the Danforth Gallery in Livingston, Sola Cafe in Bozeman, or by calling 406-222-6510. A two-day pass will cost $15 for the general public, $12 for PCFA members and FREE for students. (cost per person, not per vehicle.)

The Danforth will be open during the tour for those wanting to purchase passes on the day of the event.

Participating artists include:

West of Livingston:

 

Fleshman Creek Designs,
Jewelry – Silver, Gold, and Stone
Fleshman Creek Designs produces simple silver and gold jewelry accented by semiprecious stones.

Traci Isaly, Mixed Media
Mixed media figures made from natural elements, depicting various archetypal themes and/or cultural interpretations of the human form.
www.traciisaly.com


Livingston:

Patricia Buckley, Mixed Media
Painted collages and small installations that create other-environments.

 

Brad Bunkers, Painting and Mixed Media
Contemporary visual narratives, bold figurative works, reckless improvisation and wild-souled animal portraits.
www.bradbunkers.com


Janie Camp, Oil Painting
Traditional oils featuring the grandeur of the western landscape.
www.legendsfineart.com


Char Devine Edwards, Fabric Art
One-of-a-kind quilts merge traditional and contemporary styles with a rich palette of colors that are distinctively different from the norm.


Edd Enders, Oil Painting
Contemporary painting including landscapes and townscapes of local area. Bold colors in an expressionistic style.
www.eddenders.com


Bob Newhall, Furniture, Sculpture, Painting
One-of-a-kind fine furniture (wood and metal), sculptural hearts (mixed media), watercolor and oil landscape paintings.
www.rjnewhall.com

 

Carla Pyle, Furniture and Fabric Art
Modern style upholstered furniture made from sustainable materials, hand-dyed and painted textiles, and quilted fiber art.
www.casulostudios.com


Joe Wayne, Oil Painting
Portraits, nudes, still lifes, landscapes, and bronze sculpture.
www.joewayneart.com


Gardiner:

 

Shirl Ireland, Oil Painting and Mixed Media
Oil Paintings, and hand-built artisan lighting in a newly built studio/gallery on the Yellowstone River.
www.elkriverart.com


John Stacy, Oil Painting and Mixed Media
Bronze sculpture and hand-built artisan lighting in a newly built studio/gallery on the Yellowstone River.
www.elkriverart.com


Paradise Valley:

 

Artemis Institute, Architecture and Design
Studio built by Remote Studio students. Come meet some students and learn about green design.
www.artemisinstitute.org


James Bechtel, Fine Art Photography
Fine art Giclee’s of wildlife, western history and scenic subject matter on canvas and watercolor mediums.
www.natrlgraphics.com


Renée Evanoff, Oils, Watercolor and Mixed Media
Personal reflections filled with color and vibrance. Impressionistic in style, rendered using various tools to impact emotion.
www.rockdogart.com


Audrey Hall, Photography
Portraits and photo essays about architecture, cuisine, style and travel featured in numerous magazines and books. Web:
www.audreyhall.com


Ursula Neese, Metal
A forging of metal, imagination and emotion.

 

Robert Spannring, Painting and Mixed Media
Figurative, landscapes, wildlife Spannring specials, small and large need homes.
www.spannringstudio.com


Sue Tirrel, Ceramics – Pottery and Sculpture
Colorfully animated porcelain pottery and rowdy, folk-art inspired western sculpture.
www.suetirrell.com


Shileds Valley:

 

Joanne Berghold, Silver Gelatin Photographs
Signed, numbered, and framed Montana landscapes and horses. 25% off sale during tour.
www.joanneberghold.com


Kristian Brunsdale Studio, Wood
Furniture fusion: blending existing styles with new ideas and materials to create unique works.
www.kristianbrunsdale.com


Iris Dodge, Oil Painting
Dodge’s interest in art is to, “capture the emotion I feel on canvas, whether it’s a child, wildlife or landscape.”
www.irisdodge.com


Diane Draper, Outback Ranch Studio, Oil Painting
Representational oils depicting themes from fly fishing to stampeding horses, and scenes from the Northwest to the Northeast and Italy.
www.dianedraper.com


Sarah Pilgrim, Fiber Art, Handwoven
One-of-a-kind handwoven art: shawls, scarves, garments. Sarah will be giving live demonstrations.
www.sarahpilgrim.com

For more information, call 406-222-6510 or check out our web site at www.pcfadanforth.org.

Montana Solar Power

Posted

We in Montana know a thing or two about sunshine.  We also know what extraordinary powers the suns rays can do to help power our businesses and heat our homes.  Check out the below article to see how solar power is being used in our home state.

http://www.montanagreenpower.com/solar/

What we know about solar in Montana

Montana has an abundant solar resource that can be used to save energy in residential and commercial construction, and farming, ranching, recreation and other industries.

How Solar Energy Benefits Montana

Solar energy can play a key role in creating a clean, reliable energy future in Montana. The benefits are many and varied. Consumers who use these technologies will benefit directly and immediately. Using solar energy produces immediate environmental benefits. Electricity is often produced by burning fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas. The combustion of these fuels releases a variety of pollutants into the atmosphere, such as carbon dioxide (CO2), sulfur dioxide (SO2), and nitrogen oxide (NOx), which create acid rain and smog. Carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels is a significant component of greenhouse gas emissions. These emissions could significantly alter the world’s environment and lead to the global warming predicted by most atmospheric scientists.

The combustion of fossil fuels releases more than 6 billion tons of carbon into the atmosphere each year. The United States alone is responsible for 23 percent of these emissions. Clean energy sources, such as solar energy, can help meet rising energy demands while reducing pollution and preventing damage to the environment and public health at the same time.

Solar energy is an excellent alternative to fossil fuels for many reasons:

  • It is clean energy. Even when the emissions related to solar cell manufacturing are counted, photovoltaic generation produces less than 15 percent of the carbon dioxide from a conventional coal-fired power plant. Using solar energy to replace the use of traditional fossil fuel energy sources can prevent the release of pollutants into the atmosphere.
  • Using solar energy to supply a million homes with energy would reduce CO2 emissions by 4.3 million tons per year, the equivalent of removing 850,000 cars from the road.
  • Solar energy uses fewer natural resources than conventional energy sources. Using energy from sunlight can replace the use of stored energy in natural resources such as petroleum, natural gas, and coal. Energy industry researchers estimate that the amount of land required for photovoltaic (PV) cells to produce enough electricity to meet all U.S. power needs is less than 60,000 square kilometers, or roughly 20 percent of the area of Arizona.
  • Solar energy is a renewable resource. Some scientists and industry experts estimate that renewable energy sources, such as solar, can supply up to half of the world’s energy demand in the next 50 years, even as energy needs continue to grow.

Montana’s solar resource

Solar energy technologies work well in the Northwest. The graph shows that many Northwest cities, including Helena, rank above Jacksonville, Florida, and are nearly as good as Phoenix. Longer summer days and cooler temperatures add up to higher performance.

Montana’s abundant solar resource can be used to save energy in residential and commercial construction, and farming, ranching, recreation and other industries. The amount of sunshine available at a given location is called the “solar resource” or insolation. The amount of electrical energy produced by a PV array depends on the insolation at a given location and the collector bank orientation, tilt angle, and module efficiency.

Montana can be divided for insolation roughly the way it is divided geographically – Eastern Montana and Western Montana. Eastern Montana receives an annual average of 5 hours of full sun; Western Montana receives an annual average of 4.2 hours.

Browse these pages for information about solar basics. Solar dealers and installers are usually the best source of how-to information for people contemplating a solar project for a home or business. A Montana directory of dealers/installers is available on line.

Housing Market Update Reads Positive

Posted

by Kenneth R. Harney – Tue, Sep 1, 2009

Name just about any housing market or economic indicator you can think of, and the odds are good that last week it was much better than the preceding week or month.

Start with resales of existing homes. They were up by 7.2 percent in July over June, according to the National Association of Realtors. That was the fourth consecutive — and by far the largest — monthly increase so far this year.

And check out new home sales. They were up by nearly 10 percent in the latest report from the Commerce Department. The gain was the biggest monthly change in sales since February of 2005. It pushed inventories of unsold new houses to their lowest point in 16 years.

Consumer confidence also was sharply higher, according to the Conference Board’s widely watched index, up seven points in August over July. Lynn Franco, director of the Conference Board’s consumer research center, said “consumers (are) more upbeat in their short-term outlooks for both the economy (as a whole) and the job market.”

The latest Case-Shiller home price index even turned positive! Case-Shiller’s national composite was up 2.9 percent comparing the first quarter of 2009 with the second quarter. That was the first quarter to quarter price improvement in more than three years, and we all know how spooky and bearish Case-Shiller has been throughout the housing downcycle.

Fully 18 of the 20 major markets tracked by Case-Shiller were positive for the quarter, even though on a year-to-year comparison basis, prices in the second quarter of 2009 were still 15 percent below the second quarter of 2008.

Mortgage applications and interest rates continued to be favorable as well. Total applications jumped by seven and a half percent last week, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.

Rates remained low and stable: 5.2 percent for 30 year fixed rate loans, and 4.6 percent for 15 year mortgages.

Equally significant, some prominent analysts are saying the recession either officially ended sometime during the month of August, or will do so shortly, maybe in September.

The Mortgage Bankers Association’s top forecaster, Orawin Velz, said the national gross domestic product or GDP likely will RISE in the third quarter — ringing down the curtain on the deepest recession in decades.

Now, does this all mean that happy days are here again and the housing market can only go up as the recession comes to an end? Not with unemployment still above 9 percent and three million foreclosures forecast for the year.

Look for a slow-mending recovery, but one that looks like it will be led by housing. Today’s Local Market Conditions Report

© 2025 Raich Montana Properties, LLC, all rights reserved