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joec.
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July 5, 2014 at 9:51 PM #21165July 6, 2014 at 2:53 AM #776070
CA renter
ParticipantIf I lived in the Bay Area, I’d be selling so fast right now.
POP!!!!
July 6, 2014 at 3:40 AM #776071
CoronitaParticipantYou underestimate the amount of money floating in the Bay Area…
Folks that think income inequality and real estate is unaffordable is bad in San Diego, its much worse in the Bay Area….
You have a bunch of people that made it in banking and tech that have a lot of money, and you have bunch more people who are struggling to keep up.
We lost quite a number of people to Apple and Google recently. People willing to pick up their bags in SD and relocate to the bay area, despite the insane home prices…
Real estate prices in the Bay Area move in much different ways than they do down here. A lot of it (plus rental prices) are driven by the tech industry…If you think home prices are bad there, wait until you look at rental prices..
If you have a home in the bay area, you’d be best serve keeping it for the long term. Because unlike here, there really isn’t that much more places to build in the Bay Area, and housing will always be tight in tech capital.
July 6, 2014 at 10:13 AM #776093spdrun
ParticipantYou underestimate the amount of money floating in the Bay Area…
People have been saying this about the SFBA since the gold rush. This hasn’t changed the propensity for bubbles and bursts.
Secondly – there is room to build relatively close to SF. Oakland. East Palo Alto. Areas need to gentrify, but this will happen.
July 6, 2014 at 12:46 PM #776110bearishgurl
Participant[quote=spdrun]
You underestimate the amount of money floating in the Bay Area…
People have been saying this about the SFBA since the gold rush. This hasn’t changed the propensity for bubbles and bursts.
Secondly – there is room to build relatively close to SF. Oakland. East Palo Alto. Areas need to gentrify, but this will happen.[/quote]
spdrun, if you mean by “gentrifying” building up or increasing density, save for city centers, I just don’t see any significant upzoning happening in those areas. Past Boards of Supervisors and city officials in SM and SC Counties never allowed in or permitted huge multifamily units for very good reasons. Any city/county leader who makes a motion to do so now will undoubtedly face the fierce opposition of their constituency to any attempts at upzoning.
OTOH, Oakland (and its close-in small surrounding cities) ARE in the process of gentrification … to their betterment, IMO. Positioned in East Bay, Oakland is a completely different animal than SF and SV (where “East Palo Alto” is located – partially zoned industrial). Although hilly going eastward, there are many areas of Oakland which could still be redeveloped. (On a much smaller scale, compare some parts of Oakland to SD’s Dtn and East Village prior to redevelopment taking place.)
I’ve had “saved searches” in realtor.com on SFRs in 12 close-in cities (encompassing 18 zip codes) in the bay area (6 peninsula + 6 East Bay) for over two years now and only rarely does a listing trickle in my in box (by the time I click on it, its usually pending or removed). My sf req was set at 1200 and my garage req was 1 car. I had no age preference and my upper price limit was set at $800K. The truth is, the vast majority of SFR listings in the close-in bay area which are priced under $1,200,000 have an accepted offer prior to or simultaneous to being placed in the MLS.
This has been going on for ten years minimum and I don’t see it abating any time soon. They’re not making any more land there.
spdrun, those large swaths of “vacant land” in the peninsula (and in ALL bay area counties) you’re seeing on your map-reading expeditions from your comfy perch in Manhattan, NYC are protected. By that I mean they are National or state preserves and/or parkland. As such, they will NEVER be built on so there goes your “gentrification theory.”
July 6, 2014 at 1:10 PM #776113Participant[quote=flu]. . . If you have a home in the bay area, you’d be best serve keeping it for the long term. Because unlike here, there really isn’t that much more places to build in the Bay Area, and housing will always be tight in tech capital.[/quote]
Absolutely.
The few places there ARE left to build are 1.5 – 2.5 hours from the city one way by car barring unforeseen (but relatively common) circumstances. And of course, those areas which still have buildable land for subdivisions will have VERY high MR. For example, Tracy and Patterson’s gubments and school districts currently have more population than they can comfortably handle. Money for city services for thousands of new residents will have to come from somewhere.
flu forgot to mention the millions of well-pensioned retirees from every level of government and type of industry whose longtime homes are mostly situated in the most established, desirable bay area communities. The vast majority of them have and will retire in place, IMO. There’s no reason to move (and thus sell) with such low property taxes and the world, literally, at their feet (everything at their disposal). The bay area (and points northward from there) are awesome places to retire!
July 6, 2014 at 1:23 PM #776114Participantpatb, the “tech bubble” in Silicon Valley already popped once, in 2000. In less than two years, residential RE in the close-in bay area communities was climbing in value again. Even during the “fog a mirror, get a loan” period (2004 – 2007), SFR listings were hard to come by in SF and the close-in bay area. As such, SF and SV weren’t impacted by the fallout of the failed exotic financing schemes anywhere near as much its inland neighbors (Sacramento, Stockton and surrounds) and Central and Southern CA.
In any case, patb, you’re in Wash DC, no? Any minor blip in prices or a random fixer popping up (or about to pop up) on the market is already being heavily watched (for YEARS now) by enterprising folks who already reside in the immediate area. So, if you were thinking on cleaning up on a “bargain” RE deal in SF, you can’t do it from where you’re sitting. These things don’t generally get put up on the MLS or get signs put in the yard (in many cases, there is no front yard, lol).
July 6, 2014 at 5:51 PM #776116joec
ParticipantYea, being from the bay area and growing up there, I really wouldn’t be worried with the housing prices or rush to sell. I think anyone who held on in San Francisco is sitting on massive profits and San Francisco, on the West Coast at least is probably considered the premier/BEST property market in the west. It obviously tops Seattle, San Diego, most parts of LA other than extreme coastal I believe due to what they offer.
I know my dad has sold places in the past which have now gentrified in SF and is probably selling for double now or even more. Everything he has purchased is way up I believe.
There really is little/no building other than small lot places if any is built and good luck with prices. You have 2 bedrooms apt even in Santa Clara / San Mateo counties going for insane prices for month. There’s also just way too much money there with every tech company having to be there (or most at least).
If I had property and I bought years ago, I’d just sit and I will be very comfortably just renting it all out…
I’m sure SF proper is far more resilient than near every place in the US (probably more than NY too due to low number of wall street types)….
Edit: Just for fun, I looked for the 1 bedroom apt I rented on the Peninsula area and the rent is now over 2k/month for 1 bed 1 bath. It’s DOUBLE than what I paid and this used to be a pretty bad area (relatively)…
Heck, it’s probably near 3k for 2 bed and that’s already more than my mortgage already now.
This is also why housing prices can’t go down since I’d assume for some people, if you aren’t making the IPO bucks, you might get old and tired and want a larger place for more comfortable lifestyle.
July 6, 2014 at 6:35 PM #776118Participant[quote=flu]You underestimate the amount of money floating in the Bay Area…
Folks that think income inequality and real estate is unaffordable is bad in San Diego, its much worse in the Bay Area….
You have a bunch of people that made it in banking and tech that have a lot of money, and you have bunch more people who are struggling to keep up.
We lost quite a number of people to Apple and Google recently. People willing to pick up their bags in SD and relocate to the bay area, despite the insane home prices…
Real estate prices in the Bay Area move in much different ways than they do down here. A lot of it (plus rental prices) are driven by the tech industry…If you think home prices are bad there, wait until you look at rental prices..
If you have a home in the bay area, you’d be best serve keeping it for the long term. Because unlike here, there really isn’t that much more places to build in the Bay Area, and housing will always be tight in tech capital.[/quote]
No doubt about the amount of money in the Bay Area, and I totally get the fact that rents have skyrocketed along with prices and incomes, making the price/rent and price/income ratios better than they would appear to be at first glance. But I think that the stock market is the biggest bubble, and, IMHO, Bay Area housing prices are largely affected by the stock market and crazy IPOs.
Agree that holding onto houses there will probably be a good bet, even if there is a bubble, but still think that if the stock/credit bubble bursts, then the SF area will be affected as well.
Just surmising, of course.
July 7, 2014 at 11:04 PM #776218patb
ParticipantIt’s a bubble here in DC.
I just think that when prices are hitting in the millions it will start
choking SFO>Lets say you are some mid sized company do you want to find yourself in
the arms race with google and Apple?people who are retired, it may be time to bail.
If i owned a shitbox near the zoo and could sell it for $2 Million it may
be easier to bail and buy something in Denver.July 8, 2014 at 7:29 AM #776227Participant[quote=patb]It’s a bubble here in DC.
I just think that when prices are hitting in the millions it will start
choking SFO>Lets say you are some mid sized company do you want to find yourself in
the arms race with google and Apple?people who are retired, it may be time to bail.
If i owned a shitbox near the zoo and could sell it for $2 Million it may
be easier to bail and buy something in Denver.[/quote]The problem with this way of thinking is that for people to bail, they would need to want and need to bail. People who bought years ago aren’t stressed that prices are high.
I have tons of family and friends in the bay area and no one is moving because all their family and friends are there too. If you bought already, you are, again in NO RUSH to sell. If prices go up higher and is more crazy, you feel great! If prices crash and go down, you’re still doing perfectly fine since you were able to afford your mortgage 10 years ago, you can still afford it now and it’s unlikely to CRASH (> 30-50% declines). Rents are just way too high for that to happen and as mentioned in here and numerous news outlets, rents are more expensive than buying in some markets…Maybe not SF in the city, but that place has probably rarely penciled out due to rent control, etc….
The people who should leave are young, poorer people who can’t get ahead due to housing costs. After you have a place to live, most other services in the bay area isn’t that much more than any other place in America…
In the end, the wish for a housing crash is just that, wishful thinking…on most of our parts…or not…
As for moving, some people just don’t want to leave their friends/family/job, etc…money is clearly not everything for the people with it.
July 8, 2014 at 7:46 AM #776229The-Shoveler
ParticipantThat is the biggest complaint I hear from bay area workers, retirees don’t move!!
You do not hear that as much in LA or SD but there is a lot of I am staying until they carry me out here as well.July 8, 2014 at 8:25 AM #776230CoronitaParticipant[quote=spdrun]
You underestimate the amount of money floating in the Bay Area…
People have been saying this about the SFBA since the gold rush. This hasn’t changed the propensity for bubbles and bursts.
Secondly – there is room to build relatively close to SF. Oakland. East Palo Alto. Areas need to gentrify, but this will happen.[/quote]
And neither has the dominance of tech capital in terms of wealth and housing prices. Housing prices have always been expensive in the bay area…
And even if East PA or Oakland would be gentrified (which would take a long long time), housing would still be in short supply…
The housing prices go up pretty exponentially relative to the school district in the Bay Area. Look no further than Cupertino, Palo Alto, and Mission San Jose..And in SF there’s always banker hill, which is spoken for by your elite 0.05%.
July 8, 2014 at 8:27 AM #776231ParticipantI’m sure SF proper is far more resilient than near every place in the US (probably more than NY too due to low number of wall street types)….
Manhattan is extremely resilient because most apartments are co-ops and they require 10-20% (or more in case of insane buildings) down. A small % are condos and houses, the rest are multi-family buildings which are typically owned by investors wanting to make money. Either bought with cash or mortgaged in a way that makes sense, since banks wouldn’t finance a losing proposition.
Wall Street types are actually not as large of a % of owners as you might imagine.
July 8, 2014 at 8:42 AM #776232ParticipantI was talking to a colleague in the NY/NJ area and he was saying a good percentage of Wall-street workers live in the burb’s some even in NJ.
They have much better train service from the burb’s to the city than we have on the west coast.
Also most of our work is NOT downtown on the west coast so that maybe why.
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