pizzaman is right. In temecula and murrieta, agents price a home ridiculously low, and the home gets bombarded with offers, the agent then tells each new offerer about all the competition and an unofficial auction is created. I have seen this a few times, on of the worst offenders is this lady… http://redfin.com/stingray/do/printable-listing?listing-id=1415539
this home backs up to a green belt, and you can bag on French Valley all you want, but there is NOTHING this nice for $200k. An agent friend of mine spoke to her (she doesn’t return calls) and she confirmed the scheme. I believe she said it they were looking at an offer for 280k.
Here is another on of her listings.. http://redfin.com/stingray/do/printable-listing?listing-id=875770
Listing Price History
Date Price
Jul 01, 2007 $439,000
Sep 24, 2007 $429,000
Oct 19, 2007 $409,000
Dec 04, 2007 $379,000
Feb 04, 2008 $250,000
Anything that isn’t priced VERY competitively isn’t moving, but I will say that the aggressively priced REOs are moving quite well.
I have a personal theory that there is a temporary decrease in inventory up here while MANY homes transition from failed attempts at short sales to full on bank owned status. I can say that on my street alone there are at least 3 homes in the process of having one sign brought down, only to have the bank take ownership and put another sign up. I’ve seen the banks changing locks on numerous homes. Once even before the home had foreclosed.
