Indianapolis Real Estate News And Information From HomeToIndy.com

This weeks special guest REALTOR® is Kristal Kraft, a relocation expert in Denver, Colorado. Kristal offers some excellent information for making your relocation move as stress free as possible.

Indianapolis to Denver or Denver to Indianapolis;

It is easier than ever to pick up stakes and move from one city to another without skipping a beat.

Today we are equipped with the Internet and can view homes anywhere in the world while sipping java in our pj’s! Reviewing floorplans online, researching school districts and viewing the actual neighborhood...

As I was writing a guest post about short sales for a friend of mine, Gena Riede in Sacramento, I took a moment to look at the current stats of active homes in Indianapolis.

These stats cover all the Metro area, gathered from current Indianapolis MLS listings. When we start talking about the best deals available, we generally include short sales or bank owned homes.

So how many short sales and bank owned homes are there are on the market right now?  

• Current Active Homes: 18,665
• Current Bank Owned: 1165
• Current Short Sales: 1514

Of the current available homes for sale in Indianapolis, only...

This weeks guest REALTOR® is Roberta Murphy from San Diego. Roberta is a luxury home specialist in the city of the most beautiful luxury homes. I know every market has their share of luxury homes, but San Diego is my favorite! When we lived in California, I never experienced a bad weather day in San Diego. Considering, the weather, the beach, shopping, local attractions and home prices, now may be the best time to buy your dream homes or vacation home in San Diego.

The last few years may have been the worst real estate market (for sellers) in recent history. Buyers, however, are seeing some of the best opportunities in years, whether it's for suburban homes in San Diego or lakefront estates in Indianapolis. ...

It's May in Indianapolis and the streets are getting busier as race fans get ready for the greatest spectacle in racing. I'm going to be a little creative this month. Obviously, the picture is of the entrance to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

Now, the contest portion:

Who do you think will win this years Indianpolis 500?

First person to guess correctly (before race day) will win a $50.00 Visa gift card. Just leave your guess in the comments and I will email you if you win. Good Luck and have fun taking in all the excitement of race month.

This week, our guest Realtor is Gena Riede from Sacramento, California. While Gena is searching for the answers to origins of this unique sculpture in Sacramento, she has reminded me, I have not posted my May photo for the photo contest. You can look for it by day's end at HomeToIndy.com. Gena also reminds us homes that are in show condition and priced correctly are selling. That's a universal real estate truth.

In the past few years we've seen several Indianapolis home builders lose the fight against the economic downturn in housing. Last month's news was a bit hard to accept. Estridge Homes was done.

I always looked at Estridge as an icon and one of the best production builders in Indianapolis. They even built some wonderful custom homes. Since 1967, the Carmel-based Estridge Group was a fixture in the Indianapolis housing market.

Over the years, the company built more than 7,000 homes and was the only builder in the state to win the National Housing Quality Gold Award, the home building industry’s highest achievement. As one of the largest builders in the city over past...

Every Tuesday, here on Indy Real Estate Talk, we are featuring guest posts from real estate experts around the country. This week we have, Realtor, Dave Smith, from sunny Tucson, Arizona. I know there's many a Hoosier looking for sunny skies about now. Well, we found them, but - be warned, the sunny skies in Tucson come with some extreme side effects.

Hello from Sunny Tucson. We are about to enter what the rest of the country calls summer; here we call it 'BROIL'. There is a race to any shade, even if it is just the width of a telephone pole. We put sun shields in our windows and sunglasses on our tomato plants.

If you plant flowers and they say they can take full sun for 6+ hours. That means, Indiana sun, or Denver sun, but not Tucson sun. Here those flowers last about 90 minutes; by 6+ hours they look like you set them on your charcoal grill while it was lit. They don't just wilt, they turn black...

Indianapolis has become a favorite of many looking to settle down in a new city. The amount of requests I receive from out of state visitors to my websites, proves people are looking for a change and Indianapolis is on their list.

Some are being transferred, others are looking for a quality of life they haven’t found in their city, many are coming home…….the new group is retirees.

Retirees are looking to find a city where they have access to arts, entertainment and big city feel which is affordable. Indianapolis provides just the right balance for those whose search will find them retiring to the city.

CNN Money designated...