NAPLES — Last week, the Naples Area Board of Realtors reported that the sales of high-end homes are picking up.  Friday, there was more evidence of this when a 6,406-square-foot, waterfront single-family home in Port Royal sold for $9,560,000.  Mark Weber, real estate broker and owner of Whitesands Realty, said the home sold for about 20 percent less than the original list price.

“Clients in the higher-end market are feeling more confident in the economy and at the same time they are looking for a good value and a good deal,” Weber said. “I think these are all signs that the higher-end market (homes) are starting to see a comeback, too.”  This is the second-highest priced home to sell in the upscale Port Royal community this year. In April, a home on Rum Row sold for just more than $14 million.

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The Bonita Bay Club Turnover Committee and Bonita Bay Group today reached an agreement in principle for the members of the club to purchase the club assets for a total of $12 million, including contributions of $11.5 million from the members of the new club, according to a statement released today by the company.

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The foreclosure rate in Lee County in November slowed to levels last seen more than two years ago as the real estate boom’s glut of heavily financed, inexpensive homes finally burns itself out.

But commercial properties and more expensive homes could fuel a new wave of foreclosures – perhaps not as many but at much higher values per property.  The number of foreclosures filed in Lee County fell in November to 1,404 from 1,628 in October, according to statistics released Tuesday by the Southwest Florida Real Estate Investment Association.

It was the lowest number since 1,220 were filed in September 2007. A year ago, 1,681 foreclosures were filed for November, the report states.

Jeff Tumbarello, director of the association, noted that 64 percent of homes bought now in the county are strictly cash deals, so eventually “the foreclosure trend has to end.”

For the most part, national lenders are the ones foreclosing now, he said. “The local community banks are all out and the regionals have largely disappeared.”

That doesn’t mean the coast is clear, however.

More commercial properties are showing up in foreclosure now and more expensive homes are still falling in value even as the less expensive ones stabilize in price, Tumbarello said. “Homes above $400,000 are taking a horrific beating.”

That has caused concern that, with unemployment at high levels, more people will walk away from the more expensive homes as they fall in price, or simply run out of money to keep paying their mortgage.

“We have to wait and see if this is really a petering out of the foreclosures or just the eye of the storm,” said Brad Hunter, who directs Metrostudy’s market research operations in Southwest Florida.

Builders are not out of the ballgame completely now, although they’re having trouble competing with cheap foreclosed houses being put back on the market by lenders, he said.

But a completely new house comes with a warranty and without the risks of issues such as Chinese drywall, Hunter said.

Tim Rose, president of Arthur Rutenberg Homes in Lee County, said he expects the recovery for builders to be slow but inevitable as the inventory of existing homes is bought up.

Already, he said, “You find very few new homes in inventory that are terrific deals” and some people are learning the hard way that a foreclosed house can come with expensive problems.

Charlie Green, clerk of court in Lee County, said the dropping rate of foreclosures is welcome, but that it likely won’t be over soon. “I think we’re going to see 1,200 to 1,600 a month for a while.”

The court system still has a backlog of 21,000, down from the peak of about 23,000 about a year ago. So-called “rocket dockets” of mass foreclosure hearings by judges have helped grind away at that number, he said.

Green said he’s optimistic for the long run.

“We’ll see an in-migration of people who will use up this inventory,” he predicts. “I think it’s people who can afford to move here. In 2005 they couldn’t. Now they can.”

The average interest rate for a 30-year mortgage dropped to a record low of 4.71 percent this week, pushed down by an aggressive government campaign to reduce borrowing costs.

The rate, published Thursday by Freddie Mac, is the lowest since the mortgage finance company began tracking the data in 1971. The previous record of 4.78 percent was set during the week ending April 30 and matched last week.

The Federal Reserve is pumping $1.25 trillion into mortgage-backed securities to try to bring down mortgage rates, but that money is set to run out next spring. The goal of the program is to make home buying more affordable and prop up the housing market.

Despite the government support, qualifying for a loan is still tough. Lenders have tightened their standards dramatically, so the best rates are available to those with solid credit and a 20 percent down payment.

Freddie Mac collects mortgage rates on Monday through Wednesday of each week from lenders across the country. Rates often fluctuate significantly, even within a given day, often tracking yields on long-term Treasury bonds.

This week drop reflects a rush of investors into the security of government debt after concerns about financial trouble in Dubai drove investors to safe harbors. But rates climbed back later in the week, and analysts say they are likely to remain volatile.

“There are no guarantees that mortgage rates are going to stay at these low levels,” said Greg McBride, senior financial analyst at Bankrate.com.  And millions of American families have not been able to take advantage of them, particularly in the areas where home prices have fallen the most.

About 11 million households, or 23 percent of homeowners with a mortgage, owe more on their home loans than their house is currently worth according to First American CoreLogic, a real estate information company.  That makes refinancing difficult.  While the government has launched a program designed to help these “underwater” borrowers, only about 140,000 homeowners have used it so far.

The Club at Mediterra is now officially owned by and under the control of its members, according to a Bonita Bay Group release issued today.  Mediterra is a 1,697-acre community on the border of Lee and Collier counties. It was developed by Bonita Springs-based Bonita Bay Group.

Bonita Bay Group and the Mediterra Members’ Advisory Board today completed the sale of the club assets to the members of the club for $6.8 million in cash and the assumption by the new club entity of approximately $15 million in Community Development District (CDD) debt, the company’s release states.

The purchase includes The Club at Mediterra and its two golf courses, a 1,800-square-foot golf learning center with short-game practice area, a 25,000-square-foot clubhouse and a sports club. It also includes the private Mediterra Beach Club on the Gulf of Mexico with an elevated swimming pool, expansive sundeck and indoor and al fresco dining overlooking 200 feet of shoreline, according to the release.

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Home sales surged for the second month in a row in October, climbing to the highest level in 2½ years as first-time buyers rushed to take advantage of what they thought was an expiring tax credit.

Sales nationwide rose nearly 36 percent from their bottom in January, data Monday showed, though they are still 16 percent below the peak in autumn 2005. At the current sales pace, a seven-month supply of homes is on the market and in some areas there are bidding wars.

In the Fort Myers-Cape Coral market, home resales rose 96 percent in October. There were 1,413 single-family sales, up from 720 in the same month a year ago, according to Florida Realtors, the voice for real estate in Florida. The median price of those sales was $91,600, down 34 percent from $139,500 a year ago. The median is the price at which half the homes sell for more and half for less.

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The federal agency overseeing the investigation into Chinese drywall has approved a screening test for homes with potentially tainted drywall, says U.S. Sen. Bill Nelson.

Shortly after the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) released a report Monday detailing its investigation, the Florida Democrat said that he had spoken with the agency’s chair, Inez Tenenbaum.

Some Southwest Florida homeowners are among those who have complained for months about Chinese drywall in their residences.

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A private buyer has paid $3.2 million in cash for 72 Naples condominium units that had once been apartments, which some real estate agents believe is a bottoming out of prices in a slow market.

The 72 units in The Reserve at Naples, a 300-unit development near Pine Ridge Road and Interstate 75, went for about $44,400 per unit, said Jonathan Richards on Wednesday. Richards is a senior associate for CB Richard Ellis who represented the bank in the sale.

“It establishes a floor for condos of this type, fractured condo projects,” Richards said of the development where some units condominiums and others are apartments.

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Your real estate agent isn’t returning your calls, your bank wants your income tax returns for the last 15 years, and you’re getting some weird vibes from the people who live next door to the house you’re trying to buy.

These home-buying potholes won’t prevent you from taking advantage of the $8,000 first-time homebuyer’s credit, so relax. A bill signed into law Friday by President Barack Obama extends the credit, originally scheduled to expire Nov. 30, until next spring. That gives you plenty of time to Google the neighbors before closing the deal.

And that’s not all. The legislation also expands the credit, making it available to some homebuyers who already own a home but would like to trade up to a nicer place.

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Home resales rose more than 60 percent in October in Lee County.

Members of the Realtor Association of Greater Fort Myers and the Beach Inc. closed 63.6 percent more single-family homes last month than they did in October 2008. Nearly 70 percent of those transactions involved foreclosures or short sales – sales made for less than the bank is owed.

More than 48 percent of last month’s sales were bank owned and a little more than 30 percent were traditional sales, according to the Realtor association.

Many first-time homebuyers scrambled to take advantage of an $8,000 federal tax credit that was scheduled to expire on Nov. 30, which has now been expanded and extended until next year.

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