Betting and Buggs, thanks for your useful posts. There are unincorporated parts up here that suggest your observations are spot on.
As for folks who seem to think address won’t affect home value, with all due respect, get your heads out of the sand. I don’t argue that this makes any sense. Nor do I argue that folks in RSF are better than those in Escondido. That is silly. But I do argue that it impacts home values. And I am not alone. Santaluz selling agents love to point out that it is “adjacent” to Fairbanks Ranch. Do you think they do that to help buyers get an idea of where it is? Why not say it is “adjacent” to Del Sur, or 4S Ranch, or Rancho Penasquitos.
I recall living in Mountain View years ago and going to a meeting for the Los Altos school district and hearing a resident of LA, who was arguing for redistricting a certain part of Mountain View with condos and town homes “out” of the district because people in those areas were of lower income. Mind you, lower income for those areas means under $100k/yr per household because those condo’s and town homes cost upwards of $500k at the time. He further argued that those folks brought down API scores, which lowerd property values. Was he full of it? Sure. Did he have a point? Unfortunately, yes. Did I support the redistricting? heck no.
I lived in Mountain View accross the street from Los Altos. Were those houses 40% nicer than mine on a per square foot basis? no. Were those people better than me? Of course not. That is not even relevant to this discusssion. What is relevant, is despite our kids going to the same schools, homes on a per square foot bases, accross the street were worth 40% more than on my side. Illogical, perhaps; market reality, most certainly.
In Atherton on a certain street, homes are worth about $1,100/sf on average. Just on the other side of their 8′ tall stone back yard fence, in East Palo Alto, they are worth $343/sf on average. Not all of that can be accounted for by difference in build quality or lot size.
Please don’t mistake my query as some sort of an elitist statement. I don’t buy into the mentality I see in some residents of rich areas up here. Else I would not live in San Jose. I think SJ is very nice in many parts, including my own, but I know folks from nice areas on the penninsula that consider SJ beneith them.
I like RSF for the reasons I have stated previously. I actually like Del Mar better, but need more home than you can find there.
