Traffic patterns and San Diego real estate prices

[mixxalot]

Here is what is bizarre but accurate.

It seems to be that the most overpriced and expensive real estate in San Diego tends to also have the worst traffic and most congestion. Case in point, listen to the morning and evening commute broadcast and weekend traffic reports and north coastal county has horrid traffic and real estate prices! It seems that Del Mar, Carlsbad and any place on the I-5 coastal areas are ALWAYS major traffic delays. Why in god’s name would I want to overpay and be stuck in nasty traffic
on a constant basis to go anywheres?

With gas prices rapidly approaching $4 a gallon and tons of folks commuting 2-3 hours daily between North coastal counties and San Diego I wonder how long it will take for these prices in the inflated Del Mar, Encinitas and Carlsbad places to drop? The gas prices must be hitting these folks pretty hard.

[SD Realtor]

mix I am not sure I agree 100%… I think there are some pretty pricey neighborhoods in La Jolla, Mission Hills, even Kensington. Also it goes without saying coastal properties are going to be higher in price simply because of the proximity to the ocean.

I do agree with your points though about paying a high price to pay simply to grind through an hour or 45 minute one way commute. I just don’t buy into that and could not agree more with you on that point.

SD Realtor

[Ozzie]

Well, those communities are actually going up in price not down so I think you’re barking up the wrong tree. I actually think you’ll see those prices continue to go up for the simple reason that:

#1 Those are top notch school districts (with the exception of Carlsbad HS)

#2 They are coastal

#3 You will see a lot of businesses moving to Carlsbad over the next 10 years. They are aggressively building top notch business parks in the Carlsbad (just north of Bressi Ranch)and they will find a way to get tenants in there.

#4 I think you are assuming everyone commutes. In my aree of Encinitas I’d say 1 in 5 homeowners goes to San Diego everyday. Most work a few days a week out of their house if not everyday.

#5 Lastly, very little future development and the beach and good schools will always be in demand.

[temeculaguy]

I think you will find that the residents of Carlsbad, Del Mar, Encitias, etc. don’t need to drive to get “anywhere.” A long time ago I lived in Cardiff and rarely went more than ten miles in my car, ever. Those areas have jobs, schools, stores, entertainment and beaches. You don’t have to leave. If they can throw down a cool million for their house I don’t think $4 gas is going to ruin them.

[PD]

Prices in expensive parts of SD will be affected by reductions elsewhere because the premium, relative to other areas, will remain somewhat constant.
Only the super rich or the stupid fail to do some sort of cost benefit analysis when buying (“But honey, it costs an extra 200k for that school district. Is it really worth it? This other school district is pretty good. And we can have a nicer house!”)
Oh, wait. You all think it is different in Carlsbad. It’s the weather, baby! And hey, they aren’t making any more land!!!

[Cow_tipping]

Yes, its all mathematically related.
Local trends affect it and I’d say serve to change the multiplier if you can think of it in those terms.
Say 10 years ago, a particular La Jolla house was X 3 a particular El cajon house.
2 years ago, it would ahve still been 3X, unless the higher $$ had more liars loans seekers, then it becomes 4 or 5 X.
Now, El cajon has more offices and highways comming in. It could now make up extra ground and be 1/3 the LJ house again. Then more liars loans are sold to El cajon. It can gain more on LJ. Then the market collapses with liar loans that reset leading the way. That means LJ gets hit first. Cos it had Liars loans come in first. At some point LJ is less than 3 X. Soon EC gets liars loans trouble. It crashes to the 1/3rd LJ price.
The probem in most of this is … at any given instant someone can say, see I told ya, the nicer areas aren’t getting hit … wait for it to fully unravel, then again, we are always in the middle of somehting ravelling or un ravelling.
Cool.
Cow_tipping.

[sdrealtor]

Yes it is all related but not on a 1 to 1 basis or as simply as Cow or PD tries to make it sound. Trying to compare El Cajon and La Jolla really shows how clueless Cow is. They just dont understand how RE works. For current SD residents they tend to be more likely to evaluate one community against the next but relocation buyers tend to think very differently. Here are a couple examples.

A past buyer of mine not satisfied where they were living decided to move. The father’s career allows him to live anywhere within 30 minutes of an airport. The family pulled out a map of the US and identified 3 places they would live of which North San Diego County was one of them. After spending a couple days here the choice was Encinitas/South Carlsbad. They also visited the other places on their list on the west coast. Ultimately they were comparing Encinitas with communities near Portland and Seattle.

A current client of mine works from home and can live anywhere. His wife works in the jewelry business and can work anywhere she wants. They are evaluating portions of Orange County (closer to family) with Encinitas/Carlsbad (more affordable, nicer and close to GIA).

Past client relocated here from East Coast and moved his business here. Because of climate, type of community they were looking for and schools they only considered Encinitas area or Carmel Valley.

Relocation buyer considering two job opportuniteis with same multi-national corporation. Was looking at Carlsbad/Encinitas vs. Beach areas south of El Segundo in LA (Manahattan beach, Redondo, Hermosa etc.). Liked SD area better but ultimately chose LA because of job opportunity.

None of these buyers were evaluating communities relative to other parts of SD. They were comparing them to other parts of the country, which are more expensive or which they ultimately found less desirable.

[CardiffBaseball]

I live in Cardiff and work off of Genessee and I-5. Ask if me if I’d rather make the commute down south on 805, and I’d say hell no. I mean if we are comparing commutes, then for my income range Sorrento Valley and UTC are less commute time. I decided a few minutes more (and generally 30 minutes or less) to travel up north 12 miles. La Jolla is out of the question, but getting to the surface streets after work, isn’t exactly easy. Two non-coastal communities that are less commute time are Rancho Penasquitos and Sabre Springs. In any case, the I-5 traffic I encounter is a slow down around the area of Via De La Valle everyday and this happens in both directions. Often this area is slow on weekends as well.

[Author]

Posts