One of my sisters is a “hot” real estate agent in Los Angeles — she is a top seller with a limo at her disposal — and I have grown tired of her lavish claims and seemingly endless income. A few months back she purchased a condo in San Clemente for $530k as an investment/weekend place/possible flip and suddenly she is frantic in trying to rent the place. I guess her huge income stream may have become a trickle.
Another sister of mine and her “we can handle endless debt” husband put a down payment on a new home in Redlands some months back, and it is almost ready. Of course, they are now finding that their home in Menifee (“we can easily get $650k for it, we have already had offers…”) is going to take a long time to sell, and possibly at a much reduced price. My guess is that they are going to end up with practically no equity left and a huge new mortgage on their hands.
Isn’t it amazing that people just felt like the real estate market would keep going and going and going?
I sold a small vacation home in Pioneertown (yes the area of the recent fires) last year at an absurdly high price and cut our home mortgage in half. At the time I thought “amazing” and am so glad I sold when I did. A friend’s place burned to the ground, and you can’t get fire insurance in some desert areas, at least I couldn’t.
Vehicle-wise, it is the Hummers and huge jacked-up trucks that annoy me. They seem to say “conspicuous consumption is still cool.” Has it ever been?
JS
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Not a real estate professional, just someone who follows the market http://www.johnseed.com
