San Diego Housing Bubble News and Analysis

Coastal condos are not coming down quickly but they have come down some depending on where in the county you are considering. Getting something within walking distance without any view may help you out some but again, I am not sure if the depreciation you are hoping for has happened yet.

If you are thinking about Carlsbad and perhaps Oceanside and can be happy with something very modest and an older building then you may be able to find something in your price range depending on your timetable and assuming a small condo.

The longer you can wait, the better. It all depends on your timetable.

Here is something I ran across last night:

http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-086016532-22...

A 2/2 in Del Mar, walking distance to the beach, ocean views, looks like it is in pretty good shape...

The seller dropped the price last week from $587k to $450k.

Thanks for your help. Don't know much about that part of Del Mar, but an ocean view would be nice.

This building is on Carmel Valley Road... not exactly what you would call a quiet street without traffic. However it is definitely walking distance to the beach. Austinkid you definitely would not have any problems about living in this area. You may not like how busy this street is, but yep it is walking distance. Also the sales price is 450k but I would be willing to bet they have offers in at at least this price.

I saw that price drop. That has got to be some sort of loss leader pricing to get you in the door - either that or something is seriously wrong with it.

It's hard to imagine one of those with that kind of view going for $450k, but, if so, then all the condos in CV are really overpriced.

BTW, condo prices seem to be coming down dramatically in CV. You can pick up something pretty nice for around $450k now and if you want something older, then they are closer to $400k.

I thought we'd have to wait at least another quarter to see these kind of price drops.

The condos on the bluff in SB are also dropping and the prices in 92008 near the beach for the older complexes are getting very close to $400k.

By December, who knows what the prices will be!

I saw that price drop. That has got to be some sort of loss leader pricing to get you in the door - either that or something is seriously wrong with it.

It's hard to imagine one of those with that kind of view going for $450k, but, if so, then all the condos in CV are really overpriced.

BTW, condo prices seem to be coming down dramatically in CV. You can pick up something pretty nice for around $450k now and if you want something older, then they are closer to $400k.

I thought we'd have to wait at least another quarter to see these kind of price drops.

The condos on the bluff in SB are also dropping and the prices in 92008 near the beach for the older complexes are getting very close to $400k.

By December, who knows what the prices will be!

I agree... it could be a leader just to get offers in to hose out the short sale process with the lender. you never know though.

Agreeed about 92130 condos. FLU has been tracking them bigtime watching them skid.

Not so sure about the bluff Condos. Just when I think they are starting to move in the southerly direction I see stuff like this:

http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-080043914-67...

or this

http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-086032281-13...

The second one looks like it's a Realtor owned unit, they picked it up at auction and thought they could flip it for a cool $200K

The bluff is tricky. That first one is dreaming. Notice what they paid for it last year. Travertine floors just aren't going to get people worked up anymore.

The second one is big and - who knows - the price might keep dropping.

These complexes are circa early 70s and unevenly maintained. They don't have A/C and the bluff assessments are enough to keep you up at night.

Then you have to add in the permenanent residents (sometimes older and rather cranky about their territory) with the endless parade of renters.

And South Sierra is such a dump! The abandoned trailer park is still there and the area just never reall got fixed up like it should have, considering the prices.

My parents bought in Del Mar Beach Club from a plan before it was completed, back in the day when you couldn't find Solana Beach even if you were looking for it and there was NOTHING there. They sold after many years, many assessments and an engineering report that the complex would be in the ocean soon enough.

Pity. I loved going there and often wish I could buy there, even though I know the downsides!

The proximity to the ocean is intoxicating.

I'm assuming CV=Carmel Valley? Is that an area I should be considering as well?

Thanks! I'm just trying to keep an eye on things so I can be ready to by when the time is right. Would love to join you guys out in San Diego at least part time.

If you saw what they are trying to charge for some of the new condos in Central Austin, you'd be surprised. We are talking $400/sq ft in some cases and that is with 3% property tax.

CV=Carmel Valley.

CV is a good choice for a getaway condo for several reasons (if you don't think these are good reasons, then it's not a good choice for you):

1) around 2 miles to the ocean
2) the beach there is awesome - easy parking, can get an annual parking pass and there are nice walking paths around there on the bluff that hug the railroad tracks - feels less crowded and still looks pretty much like it always has, thanks to the lagoon
3)Del Mar is a 10-15 minutes away by car and has great restaurants, a wonderful village feel and is very upscale. La Jolla is about 15 the other way - ditto the Del Mar comments, but LJ is too crowded for my tastes.
3) The Del Mar Highlands shopping center is about as upscale as it gets for shopping pod - what a great way for yuppies to spend a weekend. Plus, the theatre is digital. Nice touch.
4) CV is well planned - it looks pretty, it's clean, it's upscale, the demographics are fantastic (upper educated, upper income)
5) Good location - very easy to get to thanks to the 56. Not too far inland so it's not hot.
6) Really close to UCSD so great access to campus offerings and educational opportunities

My prediction is that a 2/2 will soon be $400k. The downside is the HOA and the M-R, but it has a great vibe and it seems like a pretty safe investment.

CV is a great getaway if you would like to live a place that could be located in major metro in the US except it happens to be close to the beach. No personality whatsoever and as sterile as sterile gets.

Go North to Solana Beach, Cardiff and Encinitas and you are actually in Classic Southern California Beach towns with real unique vibes.

Thanks for the great info. I'll add CV to my searches since it definitely sounds like it has potential. Ideally, I'd like something in one of the coastal beach towns, but I'll take what works for my budget.

I guess, my ideal buying locations would be in this order:

La Jolla (probably won't get cheap enough for me)
Del Mar
Encinitas
Solano Beach
Carlsbad

Any thoughts on the condos/townhomes next to the Del Mar racetrack or the stuff in UTC? UTC seems to be a lot of condo conversions which I'd like to avoid.

I'm not going to get serious about buying out there until this winter, but I want to start keeping my eyes open.

Traffic on Via de la Valle is really awful, so personally, I wouldn't want a condo across from the track.

I don't think of UTC as coastal, and it seems more cookie cutter than CV will ever be.

CV *is* very homogeneous, but I disagree that it could be anywhere. It's very SoCal homogeneous, in that shiny upscale kind of way, and you can make your condo feel coastal, so I think it's a good compromise.

Leucadia is the quintessential SoCal beach town, but in the price point we're talking about, you're not going to find anything satisfactory. Same for Encinitas.

Carlsbad (92011) has some condos in the low $400s, even with ocean views(!), but they are really old. The laundry rooms are in separate buildings, the ceilings need to be scraped, there is probably lead in paint and maybe even asbestos in the ceilings. (My idea of a weekend getaway is NOT living in some decrepit building where I have to feed quarters to a machine next to garage - ick.)

And the Carlsbad neighborhoods are really mixed and pretty rundown if you're just east of the 5 where all the condos are. West of the 5, forget about it (i.e. some nice stuff, but it's not going to be $400k.)

Obviously, it's all about your preferences and what makes you happy. My preferences are for something nice and pretty and close to services and the beach. But everybody's different!

austinkid -

I would suggest perhaps that you maybe spend some time here in town renting for a few months before making a decision on where to buy. The communities are really quite different. The UTC condo country is not anywhere close to a coastal life although technically it is only a few miles away. Conversely Carmel Valley is quite nice but again, it is not a coastal life style. The original condo brought up in this thread is off of Carmel Valley Road, but it is in a location at the far far far west tip of Carmel Valley and I didn't check but may be Del Mar by zip. The fact that you are not familiar with areas like this would alert me to caution you that getting a sense of the county coastline is a good idea before committing a few hundred thousand to the purchase of a condo.

Good point about the apartment complexes along Sierra Avenue. A lot of them are too close for comfort to the bluff and will require expensive seawalls in the future. One can only imagine the assesment for each unit in those complexes. The age and unexpected maintenance costs of the complexes brings about high periodic special asessments for electrical, roofing, balconies etc. All this and most of the units aren't even occupied full time, so the two week a year and part time residents are subsidizing the full timers who probably don't put much wear and tear on the complex at all since they're the cranky and conscientous type.

The beach below these complexes is one of the best in North County in my opinion and the access is superb. Sierra does need to be cleaned up a little but in a way those trailer parks do remind me of when Solana Beach used to be a sleepy beach town. I hope it remains relatively low key in the future.