patrick.net

@Portland Girl,

No one appreciates the last few relatively rain free days more than I but we shouldn't let that go to our heads. We have problems here in Stumptown. I certainly hope that with the exodus of some major employers and a city council that is outright HOSTILE toward business that you're not implying somehow our "special-ness" will provide insulation from a NATIONAL BUBBLE? (Yes I said national).

The last time we had 2 (let alone 3) decent days in a row would have been in September. Enjoy! :(

Raider Jeff,

Too funny! From now on, any time I get caught with my pants down I'll simply say "I'm sorry you feel that way. We'll just have to agree to disagree so there's no point discussing this" and see if my clients let me off the hook?

You will wish me luck, won't you?

I just got an interesting rental observation here in SF. A friend who owns a lovely small building on Nob Hill just renovated a unit in her building that was vacant for the first time in about 25 years. She put in a nice kitchen (yes, stainless/shiny granite), redid the floors, painted. The unit has Golden Gate Bridge to Alcatraz views and is on a very good part of Nob Hill. No parking comes with it.

She said that she received almost no interest in the unit, where as a year and a half ago, when a similar unit she had came up the place was swarmed with applicants.

She told me she had to lower the rent and practically agree to fix the woman up with guys from the yacht club to get her to agree to rent the place. She only had a couple other people come through and look at the place, no one else made an offer to rent it. She said it was hugely different from last year, yet she listed the place in the same listing places as the other apartment.

SFWoman,

Welcome back!

Btw, that makes almost NO sense? Sounds like someone should have snatched that up if for nothing else than the view? Has shiny and dense material gone out of fashion?

Jimbo

My data is coming from the largest agency dealing with +$2.5m homes in SF, and probably the 2nd biggest in the sub $2.5m market. They had a red hot Feb., strong March, but April is showing a lot of under-asking deals and slowing volume. In fact, April seems like the door got slammed there are so few deals. I believe a lot of this is because of the obscenely high asking prices. Also, word is these guys are severely vetting seller clients and not taking on any who aren't willing to "be flexible" on price, or who won't set a market asking price to start with. They're also clearing out old clients who've been too long on market and won't drop price.

If you want to review the data on home sales yourself, subscribe to the sfnewsletter and tell me what you think:

Like I said, perhaps the guy is perpetuating some kind of elaborate scam, but he seems legitimate to me.

Jimbo,
I can't let this one slip by. The supposedly "legitimate" site you refer to is a realtor (TM) and his spinmeister newsletter/blog. How can you call this guy on the up-and-up? Yes, I didn't subscribe to his newsletter, but (a) I don't have a realtor (TM) 's MLS number, and (b) I don't want to pay $100/month to hear his musings about SF real estate.

skibum Says:

> I can’t let this one slip by. The supposedly “legitimate”
> site http://www.sfnewsletter.com/
> you refer to is a realtor â„¢ and his spinmeister
> newsletter/blog. How can you call this guy on the up-and-up?

This guy is basically saying “all you Realtors should pay me since I’m so good at spinning data to trick people in to buying”…

SFWoman Says:

> I just got an interesting rental observation here in SF…

It’s good to have SFWoman back from “Spring Break”…

This guy is basically saying “all you Realtors should pay me since I’m so good at spinning data to trick people in to buying”…

Exactamundo! He's got a slick site, I'll admit. If I were a lowly newbie realtor, I'd consider paying for this Alpha realtor's spinletter and "blog." "Hey, if I can't come up with the fake stories and data, maybe I'll just let someone else do it for me!"

SFWoman,

Good to hear from you! Were the yacht club dates written into the lease agreement? Maybe it was the clause right after the "feed the squirrels" clause? :)

"Too funny! From now on, any time I get caught with my pants down I’ll simply say “I’m sorry you feel that way. We’ll just have to agree to disagree so there’s no point discussing this” and see if my clients let me off the hook? You will wish me luck, won’t you?"

LOL!!! How's it going DinOR.

Yep, I'm going to use those words next year when the time comes to pay taxes.

"I sent Ted Liu and email as well. Do these things help? I haven’t been in the habit of “writing my representative”. How many emails before they start to take notice? 1000? 10000? 100000??"

Good justme, I'm glad you took the time to email, I did as well. I don't know what'll take to get through to these people, but I'm sure going to take note of who is doing what now because someone is going to pay later when elections roll around. What else can I do?

New thread: Housing Un-American Activities Committee

Interesting post, DinOR --thanks. I didn't know there was one such person. I just assumed MBSs were something the banksters or GSEs gradually cooked up, while thinking of new ways to avoid having to do proper underwriting.

"for the first time in history the median home sales price in the United States is likely to decline." Is that true? Hard to believe it is the first time *ever*

The homes closest to me are priced from about 900k to 2.4m. Nothing has sold in the last 3 months, according to ZipRealty.

I think the property that sums up what is happening out here in San Remote is this one:

Price Increased: 12/14/06 -- $744,900 to $775,000
Price Reduced: 01/08/07 -- $775,000 to $739,900
Price Reduced: 04/09/07 -- $765,000 to $749,000

I'm getting queasy on this rollercoaster....

skibum,

I don't think the fixing-up-with-sailors was in the lease, but my friend swears that was part of the agreement. She's bummed because the last time she rented an apartment the market was extremely overheated, and now it seems to be cooling for rentals, although neither she nor I had seen anything in the papers about a cooling rental market here.

She does legal stuff for TICs and she said they are still very hot in SF because they are priced a lot lower than condos and now you can get separate loans on them.

FAB,

I spent part of spring break on the Kona Coast (very easy vacation with kids, expensive food) and a realtor there, who said he was the island's top producer, said the market is starting to tank and he thinks it's in for a major correction. Interestingly, I hadn't heard much about the earthquake there this past winter, but there was a fair amount of damage because of it.

Ooh, SFWoman is back! Was the expensive food at least good?

Anyone know what the Danville area is like/doing?

Claire

Hard to tell. It looks as if asking prices in Alamo have gone up this Spring. I'm tracking a few houses there and they are not selling. I went to a few Open Houses on Sunday and things were quiet.

I checked the Sold homes in the local paper in San Ramon and there seems to have been lots of sales in the past month in the lower price points, however, the prices at the Bridges seem a little softer.

Danville woman,

Thanks for the reply - what's the rental market like too?

Also, do you know if forclosures are on the rise there?

SFWoman,

Welcome back! We really missed you (not in a creepy or pathetic way though).

The newsletter is free. If you want to redistribute, you have to pay.

But i reiterate, there is no way in hell you got a 5.25 fixed loan on a refi in the last 2 years, period.

Perhaps you did not see where I said that I refi-ed in March of 2004. That was more than two years ago. I paid 3/4 of a point to do the refi. It lowered our monthly payment $350 and has already paid for itself. I think it took about two years to pay back the refi cost. We plan on keeping the place as rental property when we move up, so it made sense to do the refi, even if it would have taken longer.

My wife helps finance real estate construction. I know you in the industry have all these gradations of what being in "real estate" means, but to the rest of us, it is all real estate. She is certainly familiar with what the going rate for borrowing money is.

Also, azrob, a few months back FAB was telling us that he got a 10 year fixed 4 1/4% mortgage. So while mine was good, it is certainly not the best one out there.

http://patrick.net/wp/?p=399

Claire

We pay $1995/month for a 3+ bedroom townhouse in Danville. The house has an outdated kitchen but a nice little yard. We started renting this place in June 2005. Our landlord hasn't raised our rent but I have heard that rents are going up.
Lots of nice places to rent in San Ramon, I hear. School system is good and the places there are newer. Having a dog presented some difficulty renting. If you have no pets it will be easier for you.
Check out the local newspaper - San Ramon Valley Times - Hunting for a place is very time consuming and frustrating. Hang in there !

CalHFA

Thanks Danville woman:-)

you quote a loan you got 3 years ago on here for comparison purposes jimbo? wow! i bought a new car for $2000 too! I am much better at getting deal than you! oh yeah that was in 1964...

Uh, we had a big long discussion about various places we had gotten loans and where we had gotten good and bad financing from. Remember this from HelloKitty?

The best loans I ever got were from Wells Fargo and Countrywide going DIRECT -no broker-. I made them match rates by faxing each other the Good Faith Estimate from the other guy.

They hated me for it but put up with me. Wells Fargo beat countrywide and my best loan ever was 4.375 APR amortizing 3/1 ARM (reset in 3 years).

Yet somehow this deal did not raise your ire. You are an odd bird.