4 Ways to Support Local Businesses in Your Community During COVID-19

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Over the last several weeks, social distancing and other preventative measures have been taken to reduce the spreading of COVID-19 in the United States. Americans are buying an excess of hand sanitizers, cleaning products, and face masks to protect themselves from the novel virus. While we must take steps to protect our health as individuals, we must also be mindful of small businesses during these challenging times. Despite the new norm set forth by social distancing measures, here are four key ways to support your local small businesses during COVID-19.

Order takeout

While many restaurants and bars are closed to the public, some are offering takeout only options to their customers. With a quick online search, you can easily see which restaurants in your local area are open for pickup or delivery. You can still practice social distancing by showing your support of nearby restaurants by ordering takeout a few times a week. Not only will you be giving yourself a break from cooking every meal, but you will be sending revenue to restaurants who need revenue at this time.

Purchase branded merchandise

We live in a digital age where many small businesses have both their own website and online store. If you want to support small businesses in your area, now is a great time to purchase branded merchandise such as t-shirts, sweatshirts, hats, bumper stickers, phone cases, and other items that small businesses typically sell.

Advertise with positive reviews

You can never underestimate the power of word of mouth. Positive reviews of a local business can spread like wildfire. Not only should you tell your friends and family members of open businesses, but you should also consider giving them some publicity over your social media accounts. You can do this by directing your online friends to their websites, creating your own posts, or resharing their content.

Purchase gift cards

Many businesses today sell gift cards to their customers. During this period of social distancing, now is a great time to see if some of your favorite local businesses are selling gift cards online. By doing so, you are showing your support by suggesting to them that you will continue to be their customer even when COVID-19 subsides.

HUD Foreclosures

HUD foreclosures and VA Foreclosures are some of the best homes to buy when price is part of the equation. As with most Americans, price is always a concern. If not buying the same house for less, why not buy more house for the same dollar invested? When looking for a good deal it is hard to do better than the VA or HUD foreclosures market. The simple truth is that there are just more VA and HUD homes on the market, as they represent such a large number of mortgages that are generated each year. This translates into more foreclosures just by the magnitude of difference between all others comparing to the two largest.

The two largest also being government owned and operated means that they have less time to wait to make money back on the home. The FHA is especially known for selling HUD homes for less than the average sales price in a given area. FHA foreclosures represent a fraction of HUD but they are still a significant number of homes and both should be considered.

VA (Veterans Administration) and HUD (Housing and Urban Development) have different and unique opportunities for the buyer. Both are often forgiven for the local taxes normally associated with the purchase of a home (this is on a county by county basis). Be sure to ask the local title company or escrow company to look into it for you before closing as this is often missed due to their are not used to dealing with the 2 to 3 percent of the market that VA and HUD foreclosures represent.

Free Foreclosure Listings

USHUD.com is a website that simplifies the process of finding foreclosures and HUD properties. Everyone thinks they are a real estate web surfing pro until they search for foreclosure homes and stumble upon a numerous sites that want to charge a fee to see their listings. With USHUD.com that’s not the case. When searching for HUD properties or a home finding website for foreclosure it is important to know what you are looking for. It is important to use a niche company that specializes in foreclosures like USHUD.com. We have put together 2 tools that have made the real estate search process of our website much easier to navigate. The Homesearch online tool is filled with foreclosure lists and free listings of hud homes for sale. Most of our users start with a broad search with the homesearch online tool to see the most HUD properties and foreclosure lists in your area and narrow their search down with the Homefinder online tool. The homefinder online tool is a custom filter system that we breakdown the area based upon filters such as convention and foreclosure listings. This give you the option to filter out conventional listings and focus on just the foreclosures in the market. We thank you for making us Americas top home finding website for foreclosure and Hud properties. Free listings of hud homes for sale are hard to come by but should always be free and that’s the way things are going to stay on our website.

Foreclosure Listings Increasing

As the market settled after the mortgage meltdown foreclosure listings also settled and fewer homes were on the market with a placard reading “Bank Foreclosure” in big red lettering. This was a good thing for the entire real estate market. Having an abundance of foreclosures brings the entire market down and it makes it harder for home owners, who would like to move, to get the appropriate price for their home as a similar home down the same street was sold for substantially less and the appraiser is using the foreclosure as a comparable sale.

This is just one of the problems when there are too many foreclosure listings in any area. Another issue is the television set that sits in everyone’s living room harping about the price of homes based on the number of foreclosures and this constant barrage of negative information makes most people sit on the sidelines waiting for the market to either implode completely or to correct itself. Meanwhile while they wait, others are buying foreclosure listings and making great investments.

Whatever the reason, a market can only handle so many foreclosure listings at any given time. The more foreclosures, the lower the market gets and this is a lesson the banks that were foreclosing and selling off realized too late. The market and their investments would have been better off if there had not been a rush to divest themselves of the toxic assets made more toxic by their own actions.