i'll see you sunday morning at 10:00 a.m. eastern. >> i'm bob massi. for 35 years, i've been practicing law and living in las vegas, ground zero for the american real-estate crisis. but it wasn't just vegas that was hit hard. lives were destroyed from coast to coast as the economy tanked. now it's a different story. the american dream is back. and nowhere is that more clear than the grand canyon state of arizona. so we headed from the strip to the desert to show you how to explore the new landscape and live the american dream. i'm gonna help real people who are facing some major problems, explain the bold plans that are changing how americans live, and take you behind the gates of properties you have to see to believe. at the end of the show, i'll give you critical tips

you need to know in the massi memo because information is power. and the property man has got you covered. [ woman vocalizing ] thanks for joining us. i'm bob massi. there comes a time when most people wanna change something about their home. it could be before you even move in or years down the line. but remodeling your home can either add tremendous value or turn into a major nightmare. it's critical to do it right. well, mike christensen, he runs peak one builders and restoration, a veteran-owned and operated general contracting company. >> a lot of the remodeling is high performance, energy efficiency, reducing costs. >> i asked him to bring me by a few of his homes. so, mike, you're going to show me actually two homes. that actually has been gutted out. and then another home that's already finished. >> yep, two different stages. so we've got, uh, basically,

a house that's pre-drywall. and, uh, it's still in the rough-in stage. and then we're gonna go to a finished home that is an energy-rated home. >> remodeling projects usually come about when someone wants to update or change the layout of a home. energy efficiency is not usually something they think about. >> we get asked the questions, you know, we're only doing a remodel. does it make sense to update the portion of the house in a high energy efficiency manner? we know that the rest of the house isn't being touched. and the answer is yes. >> what was this room? >> uh, this used to be part of the old bedroom that was here, a very small bedroom that we are now turning into a laundry room. >> anytime you change something in your home, it's an opportunity to update what you don't see. think about what's behind the walls. one of the things that always concerns me with remodels is the plumbing part. >> yes. >> i can't tell you how many times i've had people come to me where they come home and they did a remodel and there's, you know, the -- the wooden floor is ruined. some -- a pipe broke. >> yeah, so your general contractor should be running cameras down the drains to understand

what he's dealing with before he gets into the -- the actual remodel. the more planning up front, the better of a streamline process and the better experience that that homeowner is gonna -- gonna have. >> you might be updating an outdated bathroom. what that means, well, you've got some outdated things like plumbing, ductwork band insulation. >> you'd be surprised at what we find when we tear drywall off. >> so, when you came in and you had the sheetrock taken off, you start looking up at this insulation. what are some things you noticed? >> uh, right away, we noticed that the insulation that was installed here clearly was a problem. because you've got gaps. uh, you shouldn't see any -- any space for air to escape up into the attic. because anytime you have that, you've got a, you know, energy loss. >> which costs the homeowner more money. >> a lot more money. >> particularly in the desert -- >> yes. >> in the summer. no question about that. insulation is one of the easiest yet most overlooked things to improve. you really need to understand how buildings work. as mike says, how a structure performs. >> building science is more looking at the entire envelope, the structure itself, and how it goes together and how it breathes and --

and prevents air infiltration but also prevents heat loss and, um, losing your air conditioning out your windows or out your walls or out pipes that are going through the ceiling. when we talk about energy efficiency, the first thing we look at is how we, uh, seal those structures up. >> obviously, windows are as important as anything else. tell us about this window. >> windows play a very important role in the structure itself. >> this is thick, man! >> it's a -- it's a very well-built window. um, the thing that's important about this window is that the frame itself is what's called a thermally broken frame. and that means that the frame is actually split in two. there's an air gap in between that allows for, uh, less heat loss from the outside in. >> remodeling is a process that really requires planning and expertise. >> it's extremely important that the homeowner does their due diligence. >> this is not the time to call your cousin because he owns a couple drills and a saw and needs to make some money. and you can't just hire any contractor. >> really get involved with the contractor who's -- who has the experience, who's licensed, bonded and insured,

and has the experience in -- in doing whole-house renovations or -- or whole-kitchen renovations. >> you gotta have a consultation to make sure they get your priorities straight. >> that's one of the initial things that we talk to our customers about, understanding what the wants versus needs are. >> one of the biggest concerns i've seen over the years are change orders on any type of project. if you're gonna ask that contractor to change something from the original architectural plans, make sure it's in writing. and make sure you know exactly how much it costs. on the peak one website, mike's got a list of questions that every homeowner should ask before signing anything. is the contractor licensed and insured and bonded? what other similar jobs have they done in the area? >> does he have experience doing these things while you're living in the house? because not everybody has the opportunity like this where there's nobody living in the house the entire time, so it makes it easier on everybody. >> now we're gonna go see another house that's finished. >> yes. >> that's energy-efficient. >> that's correct. >> let's go take a look at it.

talk about remodel, by the way. these doors are pretty serious. beautiful room. >> yeah, it's a great entertaining area. because the kitchen's right off the great room. this is where people are gonna spend most of their time. >> one of the complaints that you hear a lot of times when you have high ceilings like this, how do you properly insulate? how do you balance the air conditioning? >> yeah, these rooms definitely become a challenging point to keeping the energy efficiency throughout the building itself. but this area is probably the most important part of the house. um, so we get back to the building envelope itself and trying to seal the entire building by spray foam insulation and then batt insulation put up against that. >> so, if it's done properly, it saves the homeowners money, number one. and, number two, there's an easier balance of ventilation in the house whether it be heat or whether it be air conditioning. >> absolutely. >> it's a beautiful remodel. up next on "the property man," most properties i visit, well, they're pretty easy to get to, but not this one.

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♪ >> thanks for joining us. i'm bob massi. if you're feeling adventurous and have a couple of extra million dollars handy, well, you could buy a piece of history in your very own gold mine buried under these mountains north of scottsdale, arizona. >> gold in the desert! they've struck it rich! the prospectors haven't found gold, but gold was here all the time. >> now, it's all for sale, including the rights to six patented gold claims located within it. i asked realtor preston westmorland to show me around. so, you know, this is quite a ride, my friend, to get up to this gold -- gold mine. >> oh, it's unbelievable. and what we're gonna see is the main discovery tunnel, where they tapped in on the vein, went all the way

into the middle of the mountain. and they carved it out. let's take a look. >> let's do it. in 1874, a chance discovery here sparked a gold rush. and the gold hill mine was opened on this beautiful 117-acre property. fantastic. >> there, you see the main vein they tapped into, right there. the whole hill was claimed. and that's why they call it gold hill. but it was one of the most active mining areas in the state of arizona at that point. it's one of the more remote locations in scottsdale. there's no cell service. you can't see anything. it's like you're 100 miles from any major city, yet you're a couple of miles from luxury golf courses and people sipping pinot in a wine bar. >> walk through the nearby town of cave creek and you could still feel that gold rush vibe today. >> the ore, it was so rich, they took it out by burro to cave creek, then trucked it to prescott on a wagon. they went on a train to san francisco. and then they shipped it all the way to england for smelting. and they still make money on it.

>> but, not long after the discovery came, a worldwide economic downturn. >> they canceled all the plants. so it became a very, very small worked mine. there were 14 guys and a blacksmith shop here. >> interest has been ignited a few more times over the decades, 1937 and again, 1963, when a geologist wrote that, if properly handled, it is destined to become one of the profitable mines of arizona. >> okay, we're gonna go inside now. but, before we go in, let's get some helmets on. >> all right. might be little falling rocks once in a while. >> there you go. never know. >> okay. >> and you see that these are where railroad ties used to be. and you see these little blue pieces? this is where the mining companies did assays. and they'd mark that with a location as they mapped the mine. >> one factor you have to look at is that the early miners got the easiest gold and the richest gold first. and anything else

takes a lot more work. >> well, we're in the middle of the mountain, where, apparently, the early miners found unbelievable wealth of gold ore. this is, apparently, where they found the most gold. because they have hollowed out the mountain. you can't even see the top. and there's all kinds of tunnels that go off each side. a lot of this was dug out in the 1880s and 1890s, probably, all of it by hand. >> but, even though testing has estimated that there could be hundreds of thousands of tons of gold ore buried here, no actual mining has been done since the 1930s. >> it's amazing the work they did by hand back at the turn of the century. mine shut down about 1935. never been mined by modern, commercial standards. >> well, the price tag has come way down. but it's still going to be a bit out of reach for the average buyer. >> for 2.9 million, you get a whole gold mine. and i think the big question has always been, below this ore body,

is there another ore body? and some of the geologists i've talked with seem to believe there is. but owning a gold mine has always -- comes with a lot of risk. and sometimes you get a nice reward. but it's the chance that you'd have to take. >> the land is zoned to allow the construction of one home per acre. >> normally, when you show a house as a realtor, you go in and you -- you hope that the toilets there's no food on the sink. en iet a call to show the gold hill mine, you might make sure there's no rattlesnakes in the tunnel, the bobcats are not anywhere nearby, you don't run into mountain lions. and it's just a whole different, uh, realm of -- of real estate property. i -- it's quite exciting. i like it. >> amazingly enough, this isn't even the only gold mine preston has listed for sale. eighty miles west is octave, arizona, and the octave gold mine. >> was a party of men back in 1863. and they saw gold all over the rocks. and -- and the story is that one guy pried 300 ounces of gold in one day off the rocks.

>> from 1895 until 1925, the 25 miles of tunnels at octave produced more gold than most mines in america. >> what my seller did was quite brilliant. he bought the entire octave vein from the bottom of the desert floor to the top of the mountain. >> more than 200,000 ounces of gold and 75,000 ounces of silver were pulled from the ground here. and there's likely to be much more still buried. it's one of arizona's most historic properties. and, for the right price, all 266 acres can be yours, along with its patented gold claims. two live-in caretakers protect the site and its minerals. and the land comes with an 1,100-square-foot home. >> it depends on power from wind generation and solar cells. there's a tv tower on the site. and the rental income from that produces enough to pay all the taxes. the road continues all the way to the top of the mine, where there's about a 300-foot cleared area. could be a helipad or a place

for a -- a really neat house that borders a national forest. >> all that plus a gold mine. up next... did you know that you could actually buy a home using a reverse mortgage and never make a mortgage payment on it? i'm gonna tell you how. [ woman vocalizing ] are allergies holding you back? break through your allergies. try new flonase sensimist instead of allergy pills. it's more complete allergy relief in a gentle mist you may not even notice. using unique mistpro technology, new flonase sensimist delivers a gentle mist to help block six key inflammatory substances that cause your symptoms. most allergy pills only block one. and six is greater than one. break through your allergies. new flonase sensimist listen up, heart disease.)

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who went through it. josh, how you doing, buddy?ow a? >> we meet again, huh? >> good to see you. >> good to see you, sir. >> we're gonna talk all about reverse mortgages. first, let's head in and meet a couple who used one to purchase their home. >> and it's a beautiful home. >> you're gonna love 'em. >> 'kay, let's do it. starla and carl kramer downsized last year after carl retired. starla has been a licensed realtor for over 25 years. >> i was at an open house. and a gentleman came in, was telling me about reverse mortgages. and i really wasn't familiar with the concept. and so we researched it, asked questions and decided to buy this little 1,841-square-foot home. >> they sold their 3,200-square-foot home for $500,000. they were able to put down $143,000 in cash. and they used a reverse mortgage for the rest, a single transaction with no payments. >> this allowed them to keep the rest of the money in their pocket, use that money for whatever else they wish.

>> many people don't realize that, in 2009, hud introduced the hecm for purchase program to allow seniors to buy a new home. >> we kept the rest of the procee from the big home to invest in other things. >> so how does it work? well, it allows you to obtain a reverse mortgage with some of the proceeds from the sale of your previous home or from other savings and assets and buy your next home in a single transaction. >> this is a traditional loan. the difference is, instead of you balance going down and you making payments every month, the payments you would be making are being added to the balance. and the balance is going up a little bit every month. >> no matter how long you live in the home or what happens to its value, you only make one down payment, and that's it. for as long as they remain in the home, they will never have to make a payment. >> carl, we're sort of old-school. we pay your mortgage every month. this whole idea of "you mean we're not gonna have a payment?" how did you react to that initially? >> i didn't have a problem with not having a payment.

>> exactly. >> that's just fine. >> we've had a mortgage for so many years. every month, on the 15th, a big chunk of cash would just automatically go out of our bank for auto-pay. and now on the 15th of the month, we kinda go, "wow, let's go to a movie!" you know. >> and what's nice is we've had some equity gain in the house in the last year. >> now, five years ago, ralph and mary, they did a reverse mortgage on their $550,000 home. >> and i thought, "wow, what a way to leverage your -- your money." >> parker turk was their mortgage broker. >> and it was during that process that we started to explain in the future how he could downsize using a reverse mortgage to purchase the next home. >> and that's when they came back to you, about a year and a half later? >> they sold their big, nice house, were able to, you know, recognize a really nice gain. >> i immediately called parker, and we initiated the sale of this home the same way. >> through the hecm for purchase program, they bought the new house with a reverse mortgage, keeping the leftover cash for their day-to-day expenses. >> if the market tanks, you're gonna lose the equity in your house. but even if you own

your house and the market tanks, it's exactly the same thing. what you're doing is receiving your equity up front, which is, i think, a smart move, if you have a plan. >> so what are the rules? well, the youngest title holder must be 62 years or older. >> at that age, you'll be able to borrow approximately 50 to 52 percent of the value of your home. as your age goes up, your ability to borrow increases. someone who, for example, is in their mid to late 80s can get up to 60, 65, even 70 percent. >> the home must be a primary residence. it has to be a single-family home, two- to four-unit home, or an fha-approved condo. the borrower must complete a hud-approved counseling session -- >> ensuring the borrower and consumer understands what they're going into, understands that they still own their home, understands that their balance is going up a little bit, and understands, most importantly, that they're responsible for paying taxes and insurance and maintaining the home. >> she would ask several different ways during the interview to make sure we were really clear on

that our equity would go down as years went on. >> one of the perceptions is that those who are concerned about leaving their children something, they feel that their kids basically will get nothing. >> as with any -- any mortgage you have, the bottom line is you look to sell the home. whatever you sell it for less the mortgage payoff, that difference, that equity is left to the family, left to the kids, left to the heirs. >> clients, when i try and explain the benefits of a reverse mortgage, they say, "oh, no, i think they come and take your house away." well, we've lived in our home free for 12 months now. and we haven't made a payment. and our home would sell for about 30,000 more than we paid for it. we'd get all that equity back. >> and it's a non-recourse loan, meaning that they cannot come after you personally for any of the debt. >> if the value does drop and the balance of the loan becomes higher than the home value, no one ever responsible for paying the difference, not the homeowner and ultimately not the heirs down the road. >> and i've got much more on reverse mortgages

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♪ >> time now for the massi memo. earlier, we met some couples who had actually purchased their home using reverse mortgages. they put down a large down payment and took out a loan for the rest of the purchase price and never have to make another payment again. this is important for you to understand. you, as the homeowner,

continue to own and maintain the title of your home for as long as the property remains your primary residence. all too often, the optics and the perception of reverse mortgages are you give up your title. you do not. the question i get the most about reverse mortgage is, what about the fees? as with all loans, there are fees. and this is where you need to shop around and compare. there are mortgage insurance premiums. there's origination fees, servicing fees and other third-party charges. all too often, however, people spend the end of their lives with little or no cash flow and lots of equity in their homes that really does nothing for them. it's important to evaluate your individual situation and decide what is right for you. that's all the time we have today. as always, check out our website for more information -- foxnews.com/propertyman. and send us your property stories and questions

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