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powayseller
ParticipantSteve, I didn’t comment on the population change, because I know that immigrants and births are causing population to increase. BUT, San Diego adults ARE LEAVING at the rate of 44,000 annually. This is a start reversal, because we used to have more than that moving INTO San Diego. The guess among Census Bureau was these 44,000 people are going to Riverside, Inland Empire, or other states, anywhere where the cost of living is less.
There are 8 homes to choose from for every buyer, based on current sales and inventory. Got this from a realtor. I think June sales were 3,000, and with inventory at 23K, that’s about how it works out.
If you enter the MLS data into Excel, you notice that high end was 8.5% of sales last year, and is 10% of sales this year. High end is still Hot. I am puzzled how you can disagree with data. ” I don’t think that the current figures are skewed by more sales of higher-end homes.” There’s nothing to think about, it’s a fact. The low end got soft first, because those buyers got squeezed out by rising interest rates and rising prices. Look, you could get an entry level house 2 years ago for say, $1500/month; today, with higher prices and higher interest rates, that same entry level house might cost $1900/month. I made up the numbers, but the point is made.
Are you a realtor, Steve? If you are, I shouldn’t have to explain the housing prices to you. I can’t be everyone’s gopher.
There is a housing shortage for cheap housing, like $120K houses, and apartments costing $300 – $700/month.
One last comment: I can’t waste my time anymore repeating stuff that I’ve written about multiple times. Go back through the threads, and read the Bubble Primer, and then come here with new questions. I can’t be everyone’s gopher or personal secretary. I am only interested in discussing new ideas, not rehashing all the old stuff. If you think housing prices will level off, go buy a bunch, and stock up! If you think they won’t go any lower, go buy downtown condos. There are some great discounts out there. Take advantage, Steve. “It’s a buyer’s market”, after all….
ParticipantI wonder if the people using ARMs are mainly young people, under the age of 35, or those who never bought before. It seems like those over age 45 would remember what happened. The over-55 age group just shakes their head at what is going on with the ARMs.
My friend’s dad has a vacation home in Flagstaff, AZ, which is a Phoenix heat escape. He said home prices have gone up dramatically in recent years, but now every other house or condo is listed For Sale. A glut of listings. He shakes his head at the ARMs. He is probably in his early 70’s.
People do forget, and live as though recent history will continue forever.
ParticipantBugs and sdr, it comes back to this: why does the County Assessor publish this information online, making it so easy for all to see? Anything recorded with the County Assessor is free for all to see: tax payments, tax liens, purchase price of house, % downpayment, type of mortgage. If this is bothersome, write a letter to the County Assessor, outlining your privacy concerns, instead of telling us not to look at it.
ParticipantThank you for sharing your views on this topic. I wonder why the County Assessor makes this available for us to see?
Anyway, I find the County Assessor tax payment site a useful gauge for the real estate downturn, just as my subscription to foreclosure.com. I find this data and stories (even suicide stories) helpful in assessing the economy and housing market.
ParticipantDoes it really help to raise the buyer’s agent commission, as this U-T syndicated article says?
I was told that “about 80% of buyers are searching the internet for homes. Since most of the sites they look on are direct feeds from the mls it is safe to say that when they buy they are buying homes that they have seen on the nternet Also, they estimate that about 70% of buyers and sellers are
finding their agent on the internet.”My realtor friend went on to say that to prove his point, “I searched 6 zip codes for solds by commission and guess what. There is no evidence that a higher buyers commission got the seller any more money. As a matter of fact in many cases the avg selling price of the higher commission was lower than the lower commission. The internet is radically changing this market and we are only seeing the beginning.”
So for the realtors out there, what happens if your buyer wants to see a house that is paying less than 2.5% commission? Will you try to talk your buyer out of looking at that house? If a house your buyer did not seek out is paying 3.5% commission, will you suggest that you all swing by and have a look? What is your experience with the importance of commission? I would think it has an effect.
ParticipantI’ve read some of the SD County government projections, and they are overly optimistic. Have you ever heard SANDAG admit that people are leaving San Diego? Their projections take the recent influx, and extrapolate it at an increasing rate. Now that the trend has reversed, their projections are less useful.
Eventually people will return to SD en masse, but for now, we have overbuilt, and we have 8 houses for sale for every buyer. Too many houses for the people here, and that is a fact.
ParticipantFarls, thanks for the correction, my mistake. I was told that 80% of buyers look for homes on the internet.
What’s really cool now, is the realtor has you on automatic e-mail updates, so when a new listing comes on the MLS with your criteria, it is e-mailed to you. Buyers come to the realtor with a list of homes they’d like to see. The realtor adds value to this by adding to this list, showing the buyer other homes that the buyer never thought of.
ParticipantThis data point is certainly relevant, but unpleasant. I remain interested in data, whether unpleasant or not.
ParticipantGood one. Noticed lots of people at the movie theater and the restaurants (Cheesecake Factory was packed outside…)
Maybe they came for the chef presentation in the courtyard. Chef Bernard was there, with a big setup. In all my years of shopping at Fashion Valley mall, I have NEVER seen a demo in the courtyard.
I have never seen 70% off at Lily Pulitzer either. This was on their entire summer line, a wonderful assortment. Things have definitely turned. I hate shopping, so I didn’t go into any other stores, besides the book store where I got a book by Dr. Leeb on $200 oil and the coming economic collapse… Does anyone else have any stories of car dealers, Home Depot, etc?
ParticipantCan you find out the precipitating factors? Or ask your colleagues to what they attribute the rise, so we can get a general idea without knowing any one person’s personal business.
Participantmerlin, we have overbuilt, people are leaving San Diego at the rate of 40K/year, and 30% of listings are vacant. Don’t worry about demand being strong: we have 8 homes for every buyer!
Steve – we covered the uselessness of the median ad nauseam yesterday. Basically, high end is hot and low end is stalled, skewing distribution of homes sold. Accurate pricing you can get from Case Shiller index or OFHEO.
ParticipantI guess that explains my affinity for realtors. My other realtor was Cindy Ellison from ReMax in Rancho Penasquitos. Great experience also. I’ve had real good realtors in my life.
ParticipantHere’s more data predicting a recession. Since 1971, the year over year change in retail employment was negative 5 times, each time in a recession. This is the 6th time it is negative.
See calculated risk chart. He writes “Of course, the spin doctors are sure to dismiss the negative growth in retail employment. Sure, every time it’s happened since 1945 it’s presaged a recession. But it’s bound to be different this time. Of course.”
I was at Fashion Valley, and could barely find a parking space. I circled a long time, and then had to wait for someone to pull out. Oh, retailers at Fashion Valley are defying the downturn, I thought. But, wait… One of my first stops was the Food Court, to get a bite to eat. The kids were off shopping, so I was alone and looked around. During my 20 minute lunch, I observed at least 1000 people. 90% of them had NO shopping bags, but were just walking around, sometimes with a drink in hand. Of the people with bags, 99% had Nordstrom Half Yearly sale bags.
At Neiman Marcus, it was sheer desperation. My daughter gets her makeup there, and I’ve been there often. Today, there were THREE salespeople barraging people who commonly walk through the store, begging them to stop for 2 seconds to try the eyeliner, or get a perfume sample. It was really annoying. Each customer was barraged by all THREE of these people, who were lined up in the corridor that is used by people walking through the store. It was obvious they were desperate. FYI – Lilly Pulitzer is having 75% off most of their summer merchandise; ladies, go get some great bargains! Overall, the Apple store, Nordstrom, and probably Victoria’s Secret and Borders and the Food Court were busy; the rest was empty.
I keep noticing Help Wanted signs in the WINDOWS of the stores. It used to be in the Classifieds, but desperation has forced it to the windows. Since last night, I saw Help Wanted signs at Starbucks in Del Mar, and the Cleaners and Round Robin Pizza and Henry’s in Poway.
Does anyone else have any retail downturn stories, and Help Wanted desperation (which proves people are moving out of San Diego and employers cannot find help).
ParticipantHere’s more data predicting a recession. Since 1971, the year over year change in retail employment was negative 5 times, each time in a recession. This is the 6th time it is negative.
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