Actually I don’t think it is as much as a pipecleaner as you think. Digging through the main point of the original poster, Santa Luz has been depreciating bigtime. Our investment group considered buying a Santa Luz property awhile back at trustee sale and we did not and were VERY surprised at what the home went for. We think that that particular buyer will be hosed but you never know. If you really dig into the comps and study them, this is not an outlandish price and would represent about a 2/3 hit to the 1.5 paid for the home a few years ago.
In general I would agree with the premise of the original poster however step up buyers going into a 900k or 1M home is a healthy step up and maybe I would say it is second step up buyers, not first step up buyers.
So no I do not classify this listing as a pipecleaner at all.
