For those > 1% rule, are they good investment?

All I can say is this, they are *uncertain* investments. Some may be good for the long term if future appreciation is taken account of. However, one disadvantage is that you have to put down xx% of downpayment to fill the unbalanced cash flow. For example, to bring a 400K house cash flow balanced, you have to put down 150K as down payment. Because this 400K house can only generate $2500/month in rental income, its 1%-rule-value should be 250K (2500/1%), not 400K. The second disadvantage is that you may not know if that community may get more foreclosures and futher pull down the price from 400K, by this time next year it could drop to 300K.

New legislation on Capitol Hill seeks to curb an increasingly popular mortgage concept: providing home loans to applicants using their Individual Taxpayer Identification Number in lieu of a Social Security number.Taxpayer numbers are issued by the Internal Revenue Service to assist immigrant workers who do not qualify for a Social Security number — but do have taxable income — to report their income and pay federal taxes.

Dozens of banks around the country have begun offering home mortgages to undocumented immigrants using taxpayer numbers, but their programs generally have been low-key and small in volume. Bank of America stirred controversy earlier this month when it announced a pilot program in Los Angeles to provide credit cards to resident alien customers who lack Social Security numbers but have taxpayer numbers.

It’s easier to work with an appraiser to make sure all the relevant information about a house and its market are included in a valuation than to challenge an appraisal after the fact.

But agents and brokers faced with deal-breaking low appraisals can mount a successful challenge — if they understand the valuation process, and know what information to bring to the table.

That was the message for real estate professionals at a panel discussion, “The Low Appraisal: Recourses and Remedies,” at the National Association of Realtors convention in New Orleans.