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More real estate doom and gloom

dante

dante

Unabomber
Feb 13, 2004
8,807
9
looking for classic NE singletrack
Our housing sales are doing really well, with inventory down to the lowest level since '06.



Prices have started to creep up, although it's probably too early to tell whether that's going to carry through the spring selling season.
 
jimmydean

jimmydean

The Official Meat of Ridemonkey
Sep 10, 2001
41,265
13,382
Portland, OR
Prices in my hood never got all that low compared to a lot of other areas. I am surprised I've seen about a half dozen go from "for sale" to "sold" in less than 6 months with prices I wouldn't pay for it.
 
W

wiscodh

Monkey
Jun 21, 2007
833
121
303
jimmydean said:
Prices in my hood never got all that low compared to a lot of other areas. I am surprised I've seen about a half dozen go from "for sale" to "sold" in less than 6 months with prices I wouldn't pay for it.
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we bought a house in the NE. Houses were pending after 6 hours on the market.... we had to go over asking by 5k and shorten our closing time to 24 days to win the bid war
 
OGRipper

OGRipper

back alley ripper
Feb 3, 2004
10,655
1,129
NORCAL is the hizzle
As an owner, things are looking up in San Francisco. Turns out buying a place two years ago was actually a pretty good idea. I refinanced a few months ago and the appraisal (for what it's worth) made me pretty damn happy. Friends trying to get in now are finding very little inventory.
 
jimmydean

jimmydean

The Official Meat of Ridemonkey
Sep 10, 2001
41,265
13,382
Portland, OR
wiscodh said:
we bought a house in the NE. Houses were pending after 6 hours on the market.... we had to go over asking by 5k and shorten our closing time to 24 days to win the bid war
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Both NE and SE are getting crazy, but NOTHING is as crazy as the Pearl. After GFF dropped me off on his way to his Safeway promo, I found this little gem for sale 2 blocks away.

Pic to follow, work network is killing my upload...




And to think the HOA dues are only $445/month. :rofl:
 
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Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
40,365
16,850
Riding the baggage carousel.
I'd love to live in the Pearl District, but I don't think I'd love it that much. Gads, homes in Wilshire/Laurelhurst/Hollywood districts are going for damn near half as much and those are fantastic neighbor hoods. I stand behind my earlier "Irrational Exuberance" statement. Time to start shorting.
 
mattmatt86

mattmatt86

Turbo Monkey
Feb 9, 2005
5,347
10
Bleedmore, Murderland
dante said:
"Sorry we foreclosed upon your fully-paid-off $300,000 house. Here's $500."
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I do some consulting work for a bank, based upon my assessment of how much work needs to go into a foreclosure to get it back up to "sellable standards" the bank will cut a check to the foreclosed owner anywhere from 500 bucks to 5k. There are other stipulations to get the money but they are all pretty common sense if you're not a dirtbag, the bank calls it "cash for keys."
 
jimmydean

jimmydean

The Official Meat of Ridemonkey
Sep 10, 2001
41,265
13,382
Portland, OR
Pesqueeb said:
I'd love to live in the Pearl District, but I don't think I'd love it that much. Gads, homes in Wilshire/Laurelhurst/Hollywood districts are going for damn near half as much and those are fantastic neighbor hoods. I stand behind my earlier "Irrational Exuberance" statement. Time to start shorting.
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There are some great old Portland Craftsman home in NE/SE (just stay west of 50th) that are incredible. That area used to be the hood when I moved here, now it's all "urban renewal".
 
dante

dante

Unabomber
Feb 13, 2004
8,807
9
looking for classic NE singletrack
Interesting bit on our local home market.

Most analysts put the current national inventory of existing homes for sale at a 12-year low. Dane County in March saw the lowest number of homes and condos for sale since March 2004, according to sales records in the South Central Wisconsin MLS.

With six months considered a balanced market, that means seller advantage — especially for single-family homes, which had only 4.6 months of supply in March, and especially as the scarce supply collides with increasing demand. For each of the past 21 months, since July 2011, home sales in Dane County have increased over the previous year, for a six-year high by March.
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Home prices haven't shifted more than a couple percent (according to the article, 3.7%), but it'll be interesting to see what the drop in inventory does. Will it jack up home prices? Will it encourage the inventory being held on the sidelines to get into the market?

Dunno. I do know that a few friends of mine decided a couple months ago to build instead of buy due to the fact that there's not a whole lot out there, although they could have just been *really* picky. Wonder if it's signalling a return to a more healthy housing market?
 
$tinkle

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
concur: we just went under contract & got full asking.
my wife's first words "we shoulda asked for more"
 
B

bean

Turbo Monkey
Feb 16, 2004
1,335
0
Boulder
If irrational exuberance isn't here already, it's on its way.

My brother has been looking for a house in Fort Collins for a month or two now. Location and price range is largely part of it (within a couple miles of the school and about what people want to pay for income properties), but he's having trouble even seeing houses before they get offers or go under contract. One of them he tried to look at had fifteen offers and went under contract within three or four hours of being listed. Another had a couple offers the day it was listed from people who hadn't even looked at it.

We got very lucky with our timing. Our house has appreciated 17% in less than two years since we bought it, so even with a very small initial down payment, we were able to refi last summer got a better rate, got rid of the FHA loan and dropped PMI.
 
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$tinkle

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
in the past couple years, broomfield has gotten repulsive, and they just keep building

my question: where's everyone coming from?
 
dan-o

dan-o

Turbo Monkey
Jun 30, 2004
6,499
2,805
$tinkle said:
in the past couple years, broomfield has gotten repulsive, and they just keep building

my question: where's everyone coming from?
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Gotten? I remember when 36 between I25 and Boulder was a desolate, rarely travelled road with no exits.
We got a flat tire one night in the late 70s and waited hours before someone drove past.
Of course I also remember when they broke ground for the now gone Crossroads Mall in boulder and 28th street was the outskirts of town, so yeah, im old.
 
dante

dante

Unabomber
Feb 13, 2004
8,807
9
looking for classic NE singletrack
bean said:
If irrational exuberance isn't here already, it's on its way.

My brother has been looking for a house in Fort Collins for a month or two now. Location and price range is largely part of it (within a couple miles of the school and about what people want to pay for income properties), but he's having trouble even seeing houses before they get offers or go under contract. One of them he tried to look at had fifteen offers and went under contract within three or four hours of being listed. Another had a couple offers the day it was listed from people who hadn't even looked at it.

We got very lucky with our timing. Our house has appreciated 17% in less than two years since we bought it, so even with a very small initial down payment, we were able to refi last summer got a better rate, got rid of the FHA loan and dropped PMI.
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Looks like Bernanke's money helicopter is finally starting to work? We're treading water or up/down slightly (+/- 5% or so?) from when we bought at the end of '07. Considering it would cost us ~$400/month more to rent our house than we're paying for our mortgage and property taxes, I'd say we're quite a bit ahead of where we'd be if we were renting this whole time. Plus we have a sub-4% mortgage locked in for the next 28.5 years...
 
stoney

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,647
7,324
Colorado
dante said:
Looks like Bernanke's money helicopter is finally starting to work? We're treading water or up/down slightly (+/- 5% or so?) from when we bought at the end of '07. Considering it would cost us ~$400/month more to rent our house than we're paying for our mortgage and property taxes, I'd say we're quite a bit ahead of where we'd be if we were renting this whole time. Plus we have a sub-4% mortgage locked in for the next 28.5 years...
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We bought our house for $277k 13 months ago. A house around the corner with the same floor plan, an unfinished basement, and far, FAR lower finishings just sold for $295k. We looked at comps and could sell our house and walk with a ~$30k profit in just a year. It's insane. Too bad Wifey won't let me do it.
 
dante

dante

Unabomber
Feb 13, 2004
8,807
9
looking for classic NE singletrack
Our local credit union is offering 30y @3.375%, or 15y at 2.6%. My question is, could you do better investing that money vs paying down your house faster? We're contributing anything additional we would have paid to the principal to our Roths because I'm guessing over the next 28.5 years investing will average somewhat better than the 3.875 that we're at now. So far over the past 1.5 years, we're definitely beating that.
 
B

bean

Turbo Monkey
Feb 16, 2004
1,335
0
Boulder
dante said:
Our local credit union is offering 30y @3.375%, or 15y at 2.6%. My question is, could you do better investing that money vs paying down your house faster? We're contributing anything additional we would have paid to the principal to our Roths because I'm guessing over the next 28.5 years investing will average somewhat better than the 3.875 that we're at now. So far over the past 1.5 years, we're definitely beating that.
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I would expect so, especially if you're able to deduct your mortgage interest on your taxes. It's definitely the route I would go.
 
Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
40,365
16,850
Riding the baggage carousel.
Semi-related:
Bank of America’s mortgage servicing unit systematically lied to homeowners, fraudulently denied loan modifications, and paid their staff bonuses for deliberately pushing people into foreclosure: Yes, these allegations were suspected by any homeowner who ever had to deal with the bank to try to get a loan modification – but now they come from six former employees and one contractor, whose sworn statements were added last week to a civil lawsuit filed in federal court in Massachusetts.

“Bank of America’s practice is to string homeowners along with no apparent intention of providing the permanent loan modifications it promises,” said Erika Brown, one of the former employees. The damning evidence would spur a series of criminal investigations of BofA executives, if we still had a rule of law in this country for Wall Street banks.

.....
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Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
40,365
16,850
Riding the baggage carousel.
WASHINGTON (AP) — U.S. home prices jumped 12.1 percent in April from a year ago, the most since March 2006. More buyers and a limited supply of available homes have lifted prices in most cities across the country, a sign of a broad-based housing recovery.

The Standard & Poor's/Case-Shiller 20-city home price index released Tuesday also rose 2.5 percent in April from March, the biggest month-over-month gain on records dating back to 2000.

All cities except Detroit posted gains in April from March. That's up from only 15 cities in the previous month.

Prices rose from a year earlier in all 20 cities for the fourth straight month. Twelve cities posted double-digit gains. San Francisco, Las Vegas, Phoenix and Atlanta all had price increases over the past year of more than 20 percent, while Detroit and Los Angeles showed gains of nearly that much. Minneapolis posted a 15 percent gain.

The housing recovery is looking more sustainable and should continue to boost economic growth this year, offsetting some of the drag from higher taxes and federal spending cuts. Steady job gains and low mortgage rates have encouraged more people to buy homes.

David Blitzer, chairman of the index committee, said the housing recovery should continue even with mortgage rates rising. Borrowing rates have jumped after Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said last week that the Fed could slow its bond-purchase program, which is intended to keep long-term interest rates low.

"Home buyers have survived rising mortgage rates in the past," Blitzer said, "often by shifting from fixed rate to adjustable rate loans."

Blitzer said the bigger issue for the housing market is banks' willingness to lend. A recent survey by the Fed suggested some banks are easing credit standards.

Still, Stan Humphries, chief economist at real estate data provider Zillow, said rising rates and an increase in the number of sellers should temper price gains in the coming months.

"The national housing recovery is strong and sustainable, but pockets of volatility will emerge," he said. "Buyers expecting home values to continue rising at this pace indefinitely may be in for a shock."

The index covers roughly half of U.S. homes. It measures prices compared with those in January 2000 and creates a three-month moving average. The April figures are the latest available.

Prices are rising because demand is up and fewer homes are available for sale. That's made builders more optimistic about their prospects, leading to more construction and jobs.

A measure of homebuilders' confidence rose sharply in June to its highest level in more than seven years.

In May, sales of previously occupied homes jumped 4.2 percent to surpass the 5 million mark, the National Association of Realtors said last week. That's the first time that's happened in 3½ years.

Excluding two months in 2009 when a home-buying tax credit spiked sales, home sales hadn't topped 5 million since July 2007.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=195486807
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:twitch:
 
$tinkle

$tinkle

Expert on blowing
Feb 12, 2003
14,591
6
as you know, locally the market just tightened up further w/ over 500 homes being a total loss & others wanting to escape the high-risk fire zones.
 
Pesqueeb

Pesqueeb

bicycle in airplane hangar
Feb 2, 2007
40,365
16,850
Riding the baggage carousel.
$tinkle said:
as you know, locally the market just tightened up further w/ over 500 homes being a total loss & others wanting to escape the high-risk fire zones.
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Yea, I'm sure my insurance rates will reflect this in a month or two as well.

Edit: Pretty sure no one who could afford Black Forest is moving into my hood, but supply/demand.
 
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stoney

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,647
7,324
Colorado
I just don't understand how people can take out variable loans at this point. Was nothing learned just FIVE years ago?
 
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stoney

stoney

Part of the unwashed, middle-American horde
Jul 26, 2006
21,647
7,324
Colorado
Pesqueeb said:
Yea, I'm sure my insurance rates will reflect this in a month or two as well.

Edit: Pretty sure no one who could afford Black Forest is moving into my hood, but supply/demand.
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Didn't your rates already go up due to the fires and hail damage? Mine went up ~4% for 2013.
 
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