Homescopes

We don’t like to go to the doctor.  Twenty- and thirty-somethings especially don’t.  Of course you’re healthy, fit, invincible, able to scale mountains, right?  We certainly hope so, but a check up now and then establishes that valuable baseline that you may appreciate more later in life…trust me on that one.  Getting a financial baseline before buying your first home is equally important.  For many first time home buyers here, it could take a long time to save the money necessary to purchase a home on your own.  It is just darn expensive to live here in San Mateo County.

This may hurt a little:  get a financial diagnosis from an experienced mortgage professional who can explain your loan options to you.  Forget the ads that tout “Find Your Dream Home”.  You are not in that market!  The most important consideration in a fixer is how it’s built - “bones”, lot size, and location. 

Next, get the treatment plan together with a local Realtor.  Realtors commonly have clients’ needs in mind when they tour new listings every Tuesday.  Sometimes great properties do not last long or are sold before they get onto the MLS.  He/she will ask you questions like…

• Commute considerations - distance, transportation, timing, etc.

• Lifestyle considerations - are you a surfer (ocean, that is), movie watcher, entertainer?  After all, you will need a break from working on the house from time to time!

• Finding the right fixer - how much of your free time can you spend improving your new home?  Every night - one day each weekend - once a month? 

Just as you hope to develop a partnership with your medical/health professional with the goal being your overall well-being, create a partnership with a Realtor with the long term goal being homeownership well-being.  Enjoy your journey toward homeownership health and happiness…and keep climbing mountains, or whatever you do to stay fit.

Yes, for those of you gents who still may be holding on to the rather relaxed “grunge” look from the 1990’s, I’ve got a newsflash for you: grunge, along with the current housing crisis, is over.  

Articles about the housing crisis ending have been few and buried in their respective periodical, my favorite of which was in TIME magazine back in February titled, “Ignore the Headlines“.  But now we have the Wall Street Journal. claiming that the trough was reached in April with an article from May 6, “The Housing Crisis is Over“.

I agreed with Peter Lynch back in February.., and it’s becoming more an more apparent that the longer prospective home-buyers sit on the fence, the more expensive that home purchase will become.  And this is not just because I believe that home prices will rise, it’s also because I believe that both long and short term interest rates will rise.  The 10-year Treasury Note, for example, is up over 1/2% since the middle of March, and the 10-year Treasury Note is a decent barometer to use when you want to know what the trend in long term mortgage rates have been.

That written, if you really want to continue with the grunge look, might I suggest saving it for your next camping trip?

As always, kindly consult with your trusted real estate, tax and mortgage professional before seriously considering any home purchase.

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• Memorial Day weekend — expect little open house traffic, and not many open houses to check out. Most Realtors take a break this weekend. #

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• http://twitpic.com/1dat - Testing from email with attachment #
• 2 new Palo Alto listings in last 24 hours: 2916 Ramona ($2.5M; 5/3) from
  Lynn Chou; 890 N Cal. ($1.6M 5/2.5) from Tim McKeegan #
• Eye candy alert: 5070 Alpine Road, Portola Valley. Only $8.4M! 7800 sq ft
  home. Listing agent Pat Looney #
• Palo Alto median home price now just under $2M #
• http://twitpic.com/1e76 - Bummed I couldn’t make broker tour today. Wanted to see 12335 Stonebrook in Los Altos Hills — $45M mansion, l … #

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As new online consumer-oriented real estate sites emerge such as Zillow and Trulia, it is fascinating for me to watch how Realtors and consumers respond to this segment of our industry’s growth.  For years Realtor.com was the primary real estate site that consumers used outside of individual Brokerage sites such as Californiamoves.com.

I’m a fan of transparency, which you already know if you’ve been reading this blog, so I’m excited that consumers have more resources.  However, along with new choices comes some confusion and growing pains.  Here’s a bit of clarification regarding some of Zillow’s data for my corner of the world - the San Mateo County coast including Half Moon Bay and nearby towns.

Zillow just posted Q1 results for 30 Metropolitan Statistical Areas (MSA).  Look at the Quarterly Home Value Reports map to start.  Our San Mateo County Coastside area is included in San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont (called San Francisco Metro area).  For geographic reference, near us is San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara (called San Jose Metro area).  East Bay and North Bay communities are also included in the Bay Area’s general region.

Find San Francisco, CA on the list of cities on the left.  Zoom in a little and notice the colored icons near Moss Beach, Princeton By the Sea, and Half Moon Bay.  Note:  Montara is not on this map just a mile north of Moss Beach and Princeton By The Sea is also a neighborhood.  Princeton By the Sea is part of El Granada; Seal Cove is part of Moss Beach.

When you’re on the Zillow site, click on the green (the color refers to the amount of appreciation or depreciation) icon near Half Moon Bay to get this:

According to Zillow, the Half Moon Bay change is -5.2%.  The Zindex is $815,000.  Note:  this picture is of a recently sold - 3/11/08 - bank-owned house in the El Granada highlands - MLS # 768007 - for $615,000; not located in Half Moon Bay.  Zindex means median zestimate which is the current median price for a given Metropolitan Statistical Area, I think.

For a Big Picture tool, it’s not too far off…but as one would expect, not entirely accurate either.  They’re statistics - a tool… not the be-all-end-all of our homes’ value.  I’m looking for whether it’s in the ballpark.  Homeruns are only achieved with local expertise.

In my last post comparing Q1 2007 to Q1 2008 for Half Moon Bay see below.  Figures for El Granada, Moss Beach, and Montara are in the actual linked post.

Additional home value statistics are in my 2008 Coastside Report compiled in January 2008:  Coastside Market Report by Marian S. Bennett - January 2008

• @PhoenixREGuy Give my regards to your whole crew! Wish I could have been there as well… #
• Testing from twittermail #
• Listings are random…case in point: About 8 listings on Palmer Lane/15th Ave in Fair Oaks in a 3 block area. #
• Plus, many of the current Fair Oaks listings are HUGE — uncharacteristic of this neighborhood. 4 current or recent homes have been $1.5M+! #
• Sam Anagnostou’s listing at 523 Palmer Lane (Menlo Park) has already sold. Amazing interior, very tasteful. #
• http://twitpic.com/188q Menlo Park days on market is back to ~20 — right where we would expect it. #

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After a writing hiatus, I’m back! It’s been a crazy spring. As a Certified Foreclosure and Short Sale Specialist, I’ve been very busy consulting with homeowners and working with them to avoid foreclosure. Every day, I’m talking with people who are facing the prospect of losing their home.

In part 1 of this 3-part series, I talked about the options a homeowner has to keep their home. In this part, I’ll discuss the three options that allow them to get out of the house and out from underneath their loan.

The first option is a conventional sale. This obviously is only an option for homeowners who have equity in their homes. It’s not out of the question that someone may have an adjustable rate mortgage which is going to reset soon, or recently has, and is too much for them to afford. In this case, if the homeowner has enough equity to afford the costs of selling a home (which can commonly totals 7% of the sales price), including title insurance, escrow fees, brokerage commissions, county taxes, and other miscellaneous fees, then they can get out of the loan through a conventional sale.

The second option is a short sale.  If the homeowner is “underwater,” meaning that the total value of the loans against the property are more than the current market value, then they might be able to attempt a short sale. This involves putting the home up for sale at current market value, and getting the lender to take the loss on the difference. As I discussed in a previous post, “What is a Short Sale?“, this is accomplished by sending the lender a “Short Sale Package” which includes many documents supporting the fact that the borrower can no longer pay their mortgage and must sell the property at a loss to the lender, and the only other alternative is foreclosure. This whole process is best conducted by a Realtor who is experienced in short sales, because the process is long, tedious and complicated. Many agents, in a desperate attempt to get any business they can, are trying to do short sales and not getting very good results.

The third option for getting out from underneath the loan is to simply give the home back to the lender in what is known as a deed in lieu. When a lender foreclosing on a property agrees to allow you to deed the property back to the lender before the foreclosure is complete, it is called a “deed in lieu of foreclosure.” This can be advantageous to lenders because they get the property back sooner from cooperative homeowners which mitigates their losses. It can be advantageous for a homeowner because they may have less damage to their credit and they can move on with their lives without a stressful foreclosure hanging over your head. This option is usually not available if there is a 2nd mortgage on the property, because the 2nd mortgage would still be on the title after the deed-in-lieu-of-foreclosure is completed. The only way for the 1st mortgage holder to clear the 2nd mortgage from the title is to proceed with the foreclosure.

As you can see, the most viable option for homeowners tends to be a short sale. Since so many people bought homes over the past 5 years with either subprime loans or simply have adjustable rate mortgages which are resetting to a higher interest rate, it’s no wonder that fully 28% of the 8,592 homes for sale in Santa Clara County are short sales. But as I said, these are no easy feat. It takes an agent with patience, knowledge, skills and training to successfully negotiate a short sale with a homeowner’s lender. In the end, because most agents don’t have this training, a very small percentage of short sales actually close. If you are facing foreclosure, and would like to get out from underneath your loan, don’t let this happen to you - talk to an agent who has experience closing short sales. If you need a referral to someone in your area, let me know. If you live in Santa Clara County, and would like to discuss your situation, give me a shout - I’d be happy to help in any way I can.

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I recently listened to Joanne Garrison the author of Burlingame Centennial. She was a guest at the Burlingame Hillsborough Newcomers Club and told us why “living in Burlingame is a special privilege”.  If you are interested in knowing how the town of Burlingame was started and what changes the city of the trees has seen over the decades, this book is for you. A great coffee table book with a beautifully designed cover by Jean L. Silveira and an interesting historic read. The book can be purchased through the Burlingame Historical Society for $ 70. www.burlingamehistorical.org

The Belmont Real Estate market has definetly moved from a balanced market to a buyers’ market. Currently there are 58 single family homes for sale in Belmont. As of April 30th we saw 56 active listings with an average DOM of 44 (days on market). This compared to April of 2007 when 32 houses were listed and stayed on the market only for 15 days. The condo market trend looks grim in comparison. 8 condos are for sale right now but their DOM is 102! What sells right now are price, up-grades and fantastic views. The eight condos which have sold since January 1, 2008 must have had the right formula. 

As a 10 year resident of Sonoma County, one of the only things I really missed when I moved up here from the San Francisco Bay Area in early 1999 was my fantastic 3 Bridge SF Bay view with spectacular sunsets every night from every room in the house. It was a great way to transition from a busy day by enjoying the sunset in the evening. My current home is not situated to take the western views in, although when I feed the horses, that is my sunset viewing time.

That is why I love the listing at 2210 Pleasant Hill Road in Sebastopol, and offered to Pamela Bernier, the listing agent, that I would hold it open this Sunday May 18 1-4 PM in the hopes that I might introduce the property to some folks looking for a lovely 2.6 acre parcel, home and small horse setup set way back near the end of a peaceful country lane. The entire home faces the rolling western hills of Sebastopol with panoramas of vineyards, orchards and distant redwoods. The acreage is very usable and would accommodate horses or livestock, an avid gardener or grape grower or just some folks who want to kick back on the decks at sunset and unwind in a their very own Shangri-la.

Come visit tomorrow and learn about this or other properties on the market, as well as current Sebastopol and Sonoma County real estate market trends. This last week I toured 11 new property listings on the market in Sebastopol, as well as others around the county, so I can fill you in!