Earnest deposit has to be received (mailing it) since they only had a fax of a check before. Probably will be cashed on Mon or Tues, therefore. Regardless, I have a bank letter agreeing to the sale, close by mid-June, but I’ll attempt to do so by early May.
I’m not sure if I agree with your analysis of prices:
(a) inventory is very low. This situation may not remain as more sales come online, and also as banks “learn” to deal with the Homeowners’ Bill of Rights and move forward with foreclosures. This is a VERY unusual situation, and I doubt it will last for a long time. This isn’t a bubble. This is a Mexican standoff. The small amount of foreclosures and shorts are basically going by random bizarro lottery. Everything else is just being bid up by people in a frenzy, and it behooves me to exploit that.
(b) if the economy improves, prices in my area (NYC and NJ) will also spike. Right now, they’re close to bottom. I could just take a quick gain, pay tax, put what remains into a market that’s where SD was two years ago. No shame in that. And ultimately, I’m a die-hard New Yorker at heart. (*)
(c) I’m not convinced the economy will actually improve in the next year, beyond the level that it already has. Employment/participation numbers are nasty nationally. PMI is dropping. Hell, we may be in the paradoxical situation of a stock/specific RE market bubble while coming into a recession.
(d) Not sure if I want to hold a non-owner-occupied condo where I’m too far away to be on the board long-term. Too much risk of assessments, rises in common charges. Ultimately, the goal might be to do a few flips and end up with a mixed-use building in a very specific upper-middle-class town in NJ. Property taxes there are similar to San Diego (1.2-1.3% of assessment per annum) and are discouraged from rising by new laws. Cap rates are right bang at 8%.
(*) – always love coming into LaGuardia in evening — tour of the city from 10,000 ft never gets old. Last time I came back from SD, I came back to a rockin’ impromptu street party outside the 125th St. train station and an amazing jazzman playing. Totally random, and you don’t get that sort of randomness in SD. Maybe in SF or parts of LA — most people in SD would probably see this as “ghetto” though.
