Yesterday was my birthday. I had a beautiful day receiving so many greetings from family and friends and at night had a gathering at my sisters house with my family and some close friends. I decided to start the day by not having to think of what I had to do. As I have been feeling less and less pain on my ankle and simply getting used to this apparatus, I have been focusing more on what I need to do. My eternal list of to do’s.
As a big list writer, I try to prioritize what is the most pressing thing to do today. A lot of times I get distracted by minute details where I am completing the “to do”, sometimes I forget the big picture that ultimately will be more productive for me. This is my Achilles heel, even though I am good at getting things done.
For the last three weeks since I have been in my house away from other distractions in my normal day to day life, I have been thinking a lot about this. Why do I get distracted from the bigger picture? I am good at visioning. I have done so much to train my mind and release old patterns of lack, I am disciplined even if I work out of the house(no TV or music), I exercise, I eat well. I generally feel good in my body. What is it that causes me to lose the big picture? And now that I have had time to think about this more in this recuperation mode, I realize that the main reason is lack of confidence.
Since I am worn out from the breakdown of all my real estate deals, depletion of my funds, and on top of it not being able to walk for a few months because of an ankle surgery, I definitely was not on top of the world mentally.
As one of my friends said last night, I am not feeling invincible like I usually do. Its like I have a huge file in another computer waiting to burst with creative ideas, visions, projects and I had to put the brakes, like a pause, to reassess and really closely examine where my time should go in the next year.
I daily read newspapers from Wall Street Journal, USA today, Daily Business Review, South Florida Business Journal and the Miami Herald to get a bigger picture of what is happening in this foreclosure crisis. This week it says that Miami is #2 in the nation in drop in prices and as I have also read recently top in foreclosures and mortgage fraud. So besides being a realtor, I also have called Miami my home since I was two years old, this is very present, this pain just like the throbbing of my ankle after my surgery is very present in my own city. And it’s a quiet pain. It is affecting every income level. This is happening in expensive multimillion dollar neighborhoods as well. I had a realtor call me the other day on a listing that I have. She has an executive relocation buyer, ready willing and able to purchase a $1.5M home. But as all buyers are nowadays, they are nervous with the uncertainty of whether we are hitting bottom yet or not. She said that out 5 houses she showed him, 3 are overleveraged and even if the buyer made an offer on a price that the seller wanted, the deal wouldn’t eventually close because of the appraisal.
And more alerting is that the appraisers are looking four months ahead to determine a price, not just 3-6 months back. These 3 homes in the next year will be short sales. The sellers are just buying time. The banks are also buying time. I read about a bank that filed foreclosure proceedings but delayed actual possession to avoid paying maintenance fees and taxes on a multimillion dollar condo in the Bath Club in Miami Beach, one of the newest, high end condo developments. The bank is waiting for the market to come back up. So many people are buying time. Tick tock.
And then what is going to happen if that upswing doesn’t happen in the next 6 months. Yes there is plenty of money coming from all over the world. They say in the investment world, all eyes are on Miami. That is a good thing, but all those eyes want deeper discounts and the banks are not yet there to give those discounts. They can’t. They have loan documents that stipulate they cant discount below a certain amount per unit. So while the developer may be in default, the bank is paying the mortgages with their reserves. Tick tock again.
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