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sdrealtor
ParticipantLindi,
Two quicks points. As we move toward short sales, the sellers become the lender not the “homeowner”. The lenders have the assets to ride this out for now, so the sellers aren’t as different as the homeowners of old with equity cushions.Also, the buyers are not all like you. Many buyers are saying, prices have dropped to a level I feel comfortable with, the crash in prices has been overhyped, the economy looks good and I believe things are going to be OK. If they were all like you we wouldnt be seeing the healthy sales volume we are. Right or wrong, this is what is happening.
ParticipantClealy my point has been missed. I have lived in one of the wealthiest suburbs of SD for almost 15 years and most of the businesses I frequent are owned by national entities. Finding a quality locally owned business is a rarity and when I am lucky enough to find one here, I generally become a loyal customer. Where I used to live and visit often, people rarely step into national companies because the locally owned companies are much better. Rather than being staffed by $40K managers with college degrees who are resume building, they are staffed by family members who started at the bottom knowing they would definitely rise to the top by starting at the absolute bottom , working the butts off and truly learning the business. The quality of service and knowledge of most retail/service employees around here is abysmal.
OLD money is not just Vanderbilts and Rockefllers, it can be found in every community that I have seen back East in tire stores, plumbing firms, exterminators, pet stores, jewelers, bakeries and yes even paint stores. It is as common among so called average joes as it is the upper crust.
ParticipantLindi,
I’d be careful about saying there’s no way the trend will stick. It isnt really a totally different type of buyer and seller out there. No one really knows what will happen. I don’t pretend to know everything that the market will do, I only comment on what I actually see happening. The short sellers are moving very slowly and the banks don’t know how to handle them yet. I have heard of a few lenders turn down short sale offers only to foreclose and relist at a much lower price than they turned down. It doesn’t make sense but it is happening.IMHO, The easy portion of the decline already happened. Further declines will be slow and painful. Here is the conversation, people will be having with themselves all over San Diego this year
If I was thinking about selling this year and saw comps that said my house was worth $100,000 or more less than it was a year or two ago I wouldnt sell it. I would say to myself
“Self $100,000 tax free money is alot and I don’t know how many paydays I’ll see like that in my lifetime. My house was once worth $100,000 more and if it happened once, it will happen again. If it takes 5 or 10 years to reap that $100,000 tax free profit, I’m willing to wait”
Right or wrong, this is how many people think. I see more and more people staying put and those that have small mortgages hanging onto to properties as rentals.
ParticipantYup its a foreclosure
ParticipantUpdate time
1,192 (about 6% higher) up from 1,122 last week. Distress sales are increasing at a regular rate but the lenders arent giving anything away…..yet.
Total SD County listings for attached and detached properties are 15,460 up from 15,200. Inventory continues to increase at a very slow pace. I now have enough data to start calling it a trend. I have tons of data for my sub-market in the North County Coastal area going back 3 years when I started collecting it.
When I look at the inventory trend it looks alot like early 2005 and not like early 2006. If the trend holds, inventory won’t start increasing in earnest until early April. This would allow the market to build a firm price level based upon relatively thin inventory for the rest of 2007. If this happens, I believe sellers after Spring will hang their hopes onto the prices others got in the 1st Quarter. The result will be a very slow change in prices this year unlike last year.
Participant“I don’t quite get the attempted distinction between East and West Coasts.”
I lived both places for a long time each. They are very very different in that respect.
AN,
Unless you grew up and lived there a long time there is no reasonable expectation that you would understand the difference. The difference is out West many people are starting businesses while back East there are TONS of family owned very successful businesses that have been around for 50 to 100 years. Out here most of the communities havent existed that long!The example I provided was but one. I could sit here all day and write similar stories.
ParticipantGood Luck Chris! Its my pleasure to help. The most valuable advice I could give you or anyone is that while prices may not actually decline much more, the risk of them climbing rapidly is almost nil (i.e. some downside risk but virtually no upside risk).
In RE you are always making decisions based upon a snapshot of limited information and there is no way to know what will come on the market tommorrow. Take the time to educate yourself on the various areas you think you might like and do your best to find exactly what you want. In the long run, the return will be much higher and more important in terms of happiness with where you are than how much your home is worth.
ParticipantChris,
Just a word of caution, evaluate the asset on its own merits not the salespersons motivation. A hungry stock broker pushing a stock does not change the underlying value of the asset just as a hungry Realtor doesn’t lower the value of the home.SDR
ParticipantThere is money in places you wouldnt even suspect back east that you just dont find here. Here’s an example, in Socal we have Frazee Paint stores, Dunn Edward Paint Stores, Vista Paint Stores, Home Depot, Lowes and Dixieline which I guess pay their employees $10 to $15 an hour.
Where I grew up we have local family owned companies. The family of one of my best friends growing up owns 3 large Wallpaper and Paint stores. All the kids go to college for a degree and some fun. How they do really isnt important. When they graduate, they come back to an entry level position (stock boy) at a salary of at least $100,000. Everyone in the family starts this way and works their way up. They all work very hard and there is plenty to go around (there are at least 20 family members working in the business). Spouses marrying into the family work there and get the same deal. My friend is now a co-manager of one of the stores (probably somewhere between #5 and #10 in the company) and takes home at least $300,000 a year. More if he needs it. His wife has a high paying job there too. They own all the shopping centers where their stores are located and have handful of tenants in each.
In SoCal, all the money would go to a corporation, my friends position would be filled by an assitant mgr earning $40K and the Commerical Real Estate would be owned by a REIT. Back East these companies are family owned and operated as they have been for generations.
ParticipantI wouldnt fault him either I just dont think he’s anywhere close to seeing what he needs to see to be ready based upon my very limited knowledge of what makes him tick.
Also, I said 50% won’t not 50% aren’t planning on it. I remember back to when i bought by first place in SD. It was about 1 year from the absolute bottom of the market (all luck by the way) and it was still very very scary. For the price that I paid for a 1300 sq ft townhome, I could have bought a 2800 sq ft home on a 1/2 acre in an area more upscale then I live in now and where incomes were significantly higher (i.e. avg income over $100K). I dont believe it will ever “make sense” to buy here and that it will always take a bit of a leap of faith.
ParticipantI was just out in Vista and was wondering what that thick black smoke was coming from the Escondido area.
ParticipantI’m sorry if you thought I was posturing. I wasnt. At the very beginnng of the thread Chris stated upfront that he has no intention of doing anything anytime soon. From what I know about him after reading his posts and his blog he is a very skilled market timer that makes decisions when he see’s clear and convincing signs to do so. Those signs are very very very likely to be at least a couple years away. Even if he found the perfect house, I believe he is an unemotional decision maker that would still wait for a better time as he has the assets to get what he wants today and even more than wants tommorrow. When I said he’s my kind of guy, I meant people like him are my favorite clients to work for. He isnt my client and I wasnt nor have I ever postured to get clients from this board. Just not my style!
Personally, I doubt more than 50% of the people on this board will ever buy a home in SD.
ParticipantJim
You are really barking up the wrong tree if you think you could sell even the absoltely perfect house to Chris in this market. He is clearly a calculating technician when it comes to investments and not an emotional buyer. To his credit he pciked the cherry off the top of the home price sundae and I have no doubt he’ll do it again. He’s defintely my kind of guy!SDR
ParticipantThats a Great Euphamism
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