patrick.net

It's ridiculous. I can't tell you how many run down shacks we've seen for a million.
We saw what can only be described as a renovated dog kennel for $819,000 this weekend.
Because of the staging it could pass for a nice mobile home.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/8482-Brier-Dr-90046/home/7119536
It looks way better in the staged redfin pictures, I know why they didn't include any front exteriors but you can see if you go to google street view. I'll attach.
Also, I love the way they dare you to verify the square footage.
1500 sq ft? No way - not even if you include the enclosed porches.

We're through with the LA market. Yes, it WILL cost you appx. $1mill if you want to purchase a lovely sh*tbox in a passable neighborhood of LA.

Banks must not be asking for 15-20% down, and LA's 12% unemployment must have no effect as there is apparently a mass quantity of LALA bucks $$$ always going around to buy up this overpriced junk. $1mill goes a long way to financial security in many other parts of the country, and I defy you to find a town with bigger d-bags, overrated restaurants, and pseudo-culture than LA, so we are making our escape from LA shortly.

P.S. Your choice of lovely $400k stucco huts awaits you in Dirtville (Inland Empire) if you don't mind the 50 mile commute to work every day.

Prices are still inflated in the bay area too. I am hoping for some "transparency" and exploration of real California home prices this year. Time will tell.

You haven't seen a shit box for 1M till you see what you get in the bay area for that price in the "desirable" areas...that are not even desirable. At least that house was staged and updated on the inside, and close to a lot of amenities and job centers. Up here an 800k house in a similar location would be the same house from the outside, but not remodeled on the inside for 50 years, and called a "handyman special". Plus all your neighbors houses would probably be dumps to from the outside since nobody can afford to maintain their properties here or just choose not to. It is really pathetic. Ugh! The bay area used to be all blue collar so a lot of the housing stock here was originally designed for the middle class working still...not the tech millionaires who seem to pay over 1M for these dumps! Gah!

samsmom says

You haven’t seen a shit box for 1M till you see what you get in the bay area for that price in the “desirable” areas…that are not even desirable. At least that house was staged and updated on the inside, and close to a lot of amenities and job centers. Up here an 800k house in a similar location would be the same house from the outside, but not remodeled on the inside for 50 years, and called a “handyman special”. Plus all your neighbors houses would probably be dumps to from the outside since nobody can afford to maintain their properties here or just choose not to. It is really pathetic. Ugh! The bay area used to be all blue collar so a lot of the housing stock here was originally designed for the middle class working still…not the tech millionaires who seem to pay over 1M for these dumps! Gah!

Yeah, what a bunch of "shit boxes" in horrible neighborhoods...
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Orinda/16-La-Plaza-Dr-94563/home/1026256
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Lafayette/40-Chapel-Dr-94549/home/1126306
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Walnut-Creek/1574-Springbrook-Rd-94597/home/1200915
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Alamo/30-Augusta-Ct-94507/home/1857813
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Oakland/5817-Harbord-Dr-94611/home/1619419
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Berkeley/1110-Milvia-St-94707/home/1459282
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Mill-Valley/61-Bayview-Ter-94941/home/991624
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Mill-Valley/18-Hazel-Ave-94941/home/1206954
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Mill-Valley/340-Carrera-Dr-94941/home/782556

Tude says

Yeah, what a bunch of “shit boxes” in horrible neighborhoods…

You are right these are not “shit boxes” in horrible neighborhoods…
They are highly decorated "shit boxes" in wealthy neighborhoods. A lot of
2 bdrms in the list. In most other places some of these would be considered
modest. I guess the east bay area (and Mill valley) is special.

These Bay area houses you listed are a helluva lot nicer than the ones for a million in LA.

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/2424-Laurel-Pass-90046/home/7124349
But Jim Morrison lived there! That's gotta be worth at least 800,000 in bragging rights!

Yeah, what a bunch of “shit boxes” in horrible neighborhoods…
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Orinda/16-La-Plaza-Dr-94563/home/1026256
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Lafayette/40-Chapel-Dr-94549/home/1126306
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Walnut-Creek/1574-Springbrook-Rd-94597/home/1200915
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Alamo/30-Augusta-Ct-94507/home/1857813

Orinda, Lafayette, Walnut Creek, and Alamo are overpriced small towns with a 1 hour commute minimum to major job centers of San Francisco and Silicon Valley. This is like the OP pulling up homes in the San Fernando Valley or Santa Clarita and saying "look there are some semi decent places if you don't mind sitting in a parking lot 2 hours per day to get anywhere"....or being equally far (in the case of the east bay and Santa Clarita) from shopping/dining that rivals LA or downtown San Francisco. Plus most of your examples are very small homes. I would think you could get more than 2K sqft for 1MM living 1 hour in traffic away from San Francisco.

Mill Valley OTOH...come on! A 2 bd 1ba 1100 sqft for 819k? Thats a real bargin. LOL
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Mill-Valley/61-Bayview-Ter-94941/home/991624

2 bd 1 ba 1100 sq ft for 819k?

just for contrast on what location location location will do to those of you in Bubble Valley

i bought my first home in Aug 2007. 2bd 1ba 1200 sq ft for 136k. I live in fly by nightsville USA, undesirable i guess to the hustle and bustle type that enjoy all that Cali has to offer. Comps were going for around 210k spring of 2007. i was already a patrick.net reader back then, and had been renting this place since 2004. My landlord was told by a realtor 'friend' that he could get damn near 200k for this place without having to do anything to it. So he decided to sell, without doing anything to the place. As the tenant i didn't want to move, so i let the property go to hell, landscape was overgrown, never cleaned the place (and the realtor nor the landlord ever said anything about it?). It hit the market at 189k,,,,then reduced to 169k,,,,,,so now it's summer 07 and credit is showing signs of freezing up. My landlord was leveraged to hell and expanding a business venture. I asked him what it would take for him to sell to me because we were on a friendly basis, and he asked what would i pay. I told him i'd see what the numbers were if he told me what is best price was (break even mortgage + pay his back taxes on the property). I had been telling him about what i would read on these housing bubble websites and he believed it enough that he figured it best to get out while he could.

again, this is certainly not fabulous California. We are top 10 county in the nation for jobs and retirement, with single digit unemployment and low crime, house prices here never bubbled like the coasts. i'm on an acre lot, and can walk to the best schools in the county. in comparison with that picture posted above, i'd say this property is certainly nicer then what damn near a million draws in Cali. not boasting, just giving you Calif's a comparison to what a semi-normal housing market draws for that kind of house. oh yea, we have basements here as well, so it's 2400 sq. ft of house but for property tax and energy purposes, it's 1200 sq ft in real estate speak. worked out good for him and me, his business is doing well and i re-fi'd a year ago down from 7.125 to 5.0%

819k is the price you pay to live in sunny california. but for 1/6th the price, you can get more land and more house, and a state government that isn't always on the brink of collapse. but then again not every female here is beach ready tan year round, and there isn't an abundance of gangs and cheap mexican labor. i guess it's all a matter of personal preference. oh yea, and we pay a sane amount of property taxes as well, and thanks to the prop 13 experiment in cali, i'd hope that we learned a lesson not to vote ourselves cheaper property taxes, save we end up like California.

spend my days with a woman unkind, smoked my stuff and drank,,,,,all my wine.
made up my mind, make a new start, i'm going to California with an aching, in my heart
someone told me there's a piece of overvalued property out there, that is sore on the eyes, and will make you lose, ALLL YOUR HAAAAIIIRRRR!!!!

took my chances, trusted a realtwhore
never let them tell you that prices always go,,,,,,,,,,,,,,up
My checking accounts in the red, but the sky's always blue
I wonder how so many people, could ever be so stu- pid

stillrentinginLA says

These Bay area houses you listed are a helluva lot nicer than the ones for a million in LA.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Los-Angeles/2424-Laurel-Pass-90046/home/7124349
But Jim Morrison lived there! That’s gotta be worth at least 800,000 in bragging rights!

There must be some really really wealthy writers/musicians/actors around this town that would love that place. I haven't met them, but I'm SURE they exist. Oh wait. Don't all the really wealthy writers/musicians/actors live in Malibu now? 1 Mil. is so beneath them... :p feh

LA has lots of wealthy people who can purchase multiple property with cash and wouldn't experience much financial distress if the value of their properties decline in value. Really wealthy people can afford to buy lots of stuff that depreciate in value like cars and designer clothing. They can also throw money away on vacations, private jets and other stuff that doesn't have any resale value. They just have a lot of expendable money and amass more wealth relative to the people earning a lot less, at the same time, they are paying historically low income tax rates. The top marginal federal income tax rate from 1950 to 1981 ranged from 50% to 91%. Now it's 35%. Essentially, wealth is being siphoned to the top, and LA has a disproportionately high number of multi-millionaires compared to other parts of the US.

It seems like my last post is awaiting moderation...

I didn't ever talk about the area around Pleasanton (including Danville and San Ramon). There are a lot of jobs now in that area, a BART station, and nice homes and good schools for a million and less.

samsmom says

Yeah, what a bunch of “shit boxes” in horrible neighborhoods…

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Orinda/16-La-Plaza-Dr-94563/home/1026256

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Lafayette/40-Chapel-Dr-94549/home/1126306

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Walnut-Creek/1574-Springbrook-Rd-94597/home/1200915

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Alamo/30-Augusta-Ct-94507/home/1857813
Orinda, Lafayette, Walnut Creek, and Alamo are overpriced small towns with a 1 hour commute minimum to major job centers of San Francisco and Silicon Valley. This is like the OP pulling up homes in the San Fernando Valley or Santa Clarita and saying “look there are some semi decent places if you don’t mind sitting in a parking lot 2 hours per day to get anywhere”….or being equally far (in the case of the east bay and Santa Clarita) from shopping/dining that rivals LA or downtown San Francisco. Plus most of your examples are very small homes. I would think you could get more than 2K sqft for 1MM living 1 hour in traffic away from San Francisco.
Mill Valley OTOH…come on! A 2 bd 1ba 1100 sqft for 819k? Thats a real bargin. LOL

http://www.redfin.com/CA/Mill-Valley/61-Bayview-Ter-94941/home/991624

WTF are you talking about? Orinda is a 20 minute BART ride into San Francisco and has the best schools in the Bay Area. Lafayette and WC are another 10-15 minutes on BART and are gorgeous little towns. Maybe the homes in Mill Valley are small, but they are FAR from shit boxes, and Mill Valley is one of the most desirable areas in the Bay Area (and an easy commute to SF on the ferry). You can also get homes in Piedmont and Montclaire for a million and less.

Your post is ridiculous.

No. My post is NOT ridiculous. It takes 1 hour door to door minimum by the time you park your car at Orinda BART, wait for train, spend the 30 min. cattle car commute ride, walk or take bus to office. Repeat coming home. Add 10 min for each stop east. Driving through the tunnel and across bridge has taken a painful 1 hour 45 min in bad traffic. The only time it takes 25 minutes to get to SF from Orinda is when you are driving there at 3AM with zero bridge or tunnel traffic.

Yes these are "cute little towns", but not worth the prices currently charged to live here...especially if you have to commute to SF or worse Silicon Valley for work and want to regularly enjoy the culture, dining and shopping opportunities in the city. The traffic here is horrendous. I would say as bad or worse then the going from the SFV to LA on the 405. That is the worst kind of torture....not to mention unhealthy and not worth 1MM to endure every day....but maybe to you it is acceptable.

Anyway....taste is subjective. One persons trash is another persons treasure.

The outer East Bay Areas are quite affordable. Fremont and Concord has some great deals with homes in the 400k range and 200k range respectively. But be prepared for a costly commute that's a minimum of one hour no matter what mode of transport you take to SF. Better yet, find a job in the East Bay if possible. This is the time to think about transit oriented development, mixed-use buildings, and walkable cities.

samsmom says

No. My post is NOT ridiculous. It takes 1 hour door to door minimum by the time you park your car at Orinda BART, wait for train, spend the 30 min. cattle car commute ride, walk or take bus to office. Repeat coming home. Add 10 min for each stop east. Driving through the tunnel and across bridge has taken a painful 1 hour 45 min in bad traffic. The only time it takes 25 minutes to get to SF from Orinda is when you are driving there at 3AM with zero bridge or tunnel traffic.

As someone who has commuted for many, many years from Orinda BART to the financial district in SF and now to uptown Oakland, I can categorically say that you are full of crap. Even driving the Orinda from El Sob and walking up to the Transamerica building it took me about 45 minutes door to door. The house I posted in Orinda is walking distance to BART (I used to live on that same street).

"22% of all houses FOR SALE in LA are listed at over $1MM" is very different from "22% of all houses in LA COST over $1MM." Firstly, the upper end of the market is not moving, so houses are piling up in that price range, distorting the percentage. The meltdown is finally hitting the upper end. Secondly, just because someone's asking price is over $1MM doesn't mean the house is worth over $1MM. Houses are sitting forever and when they sell, it's often with big discounts.

A reasonable commute, no matter where you live, imho, is under 30 min door to door. I believe this is why property values are staying so high in places like LA and the Palo Alto/San Francisco areas.

People are clearly willing to pay a premium for keeping more of their time.

High end housing is still holding firm on asking prices in LA County
75th percentile - is close to where it was in 2007.
25th and 50th percentiles are way down from that time period.

http://www.housingtracker.net/asking-prices/los-angeles-california/

JAN 2007
25th percentile $429,920
50th percentile $549,100
75th percentile $749,280

JAN 2010
25th percentile $275,000
50th percentile $424,950
75th percentile $744,000

Asking prices are not that far off from actual sales price in the high end areas.
I'm looking at these zip codes.

The NOV sales from DQ News
Wst Hollywd/LA 90046 17 homes sold median price $810,000 -6.1% from NOV last year
LA/Hollywood 90068 13 homes sold median price $848,000 -14.9% from NOV last year
Studio City 91604 15 homes sold median price $738,000 -13.4% from NOV last year

(Please stick to LA topic on this thread, If I want to read about the commute in the bay area I'll look at any of the thousands of threads on SF)

samsmom says

A reasonable commute, no matter where you live, imho, is under 30 min door to door. I believe this is why property values are staying so high in places like LA and the Palo Alto/San Francisco areas.
People are clearly willing to pay a premium for keeping more of their time.

WHAT?! Have you ever LIVED in Los Angeles?! ROLFLMAO.
And living in SF does not give you an automatic short commute. It took me longer to commute from the Richmond district to the financial district than from the East Bay.
You are seriously not making any real sense. There are job centers all over the Bay Area. The only reason some area are ridiculously high is HYPE and the desperate need by some people to live in a perceived "hip" or "cool" neighborhood.

Please stick to the topic of Los Angeles on this thread. If I want to read about the commute in the bay area I’ll look at any of the thousands of Bay Area threads on this site.

Blue Swan says

I doubt if this will change. There is such a range of income and savings in America that for some — a lot — of people, a million dollars is like a thousand dollars. I mean, suppose you earned 10 million through a job, stocks, inheritance….if you spent 1 million on a house, you still get to pay the same amount as everyone else for food, cars, etc. You still have 9 million!
The only answer is for people who didn’t “win” in the last 3 decades to move somewhere else. You can get bargain houses in Nebraska, Wyoming, Ohio, Indianapolis. Look at San Fransicso….it went sky high in the 70s and never ever came down again…

Do you have any facts or statistics to back up these sweeping statements?

Blue, that's exactly what I was talking about with LALA money--it's like there are two sets of $$$ in LA, zillionaire play money and working-poor chump change. The thing is, I don't get what is so great about LA that people with worldclass wherewithal will just blow money on overvalued/poor resale properties to live here of all places.

Let's break it down: no food culture in LA (oh, wait, we have taco Tuesdays and highly-reviewed food trucks); worst traffic ever outside of Atlanta, GA.; the landscape and cityscape are coated in filth and homeless people; high unemployment; unplanned, uncontrolled sprawl; high crime even in the nice areas--yes, all of Westside, even Beverly Hills (what a thrill); activities/culture are rather hit n' miss.

I just don't get the pull of LA. Oh, wait, right, the weather.

Another factor in SF is the trend to where DINK is the dominant demographic. For every gay couple there's Beautiful People Straights who recoil at the icky poo notion of children. Lotsa extra spending power for housing and culinary pursuits.

Sounds like you had a bunch of kids you can't really afford and you are jealous of the people that didn't. Being bitter doesn't get you anywhere sybrib.

Philistine says

Blue, that’s exactly what I was talking about with LALA money–it’s like there are two sets of $$$ in LA, zillionaire play money and working-poor chump change. The thing is, I don’t get what is so great about LA that people with worldclass wherewithal will just blow money on overvalued/poor resale properties to live here of all places.
Let’s break it down: no food culture in LA (oh, wait, we have taco Tuesdays and highly-reviewed food trucks); worst traffic ever outside of Atlanta, GA.; the landscape and cityscape are coated in filth and homeless people; high unemployment; unplanned, uncontrolled sprawl; high crime even in the nice areas–yes, all of Westside, even Beverly Hills (what a thrill); activities/culture are rather hit n’ miss.
I just don’t get the pull of LA. Oh, wait, right, the weather.

Yeah, let's break it down...
1. There are plenty of middle class people in LA
2. From your comments, it's obvious you don't get LA, so don't live here. We don't want you anyway.
3. No food culture? I have excellent choices of every ethnic type of food within 2 miles of my house
4. Traffic, urban sprawl and homeless - yes it sucks, I won't argue that, but so does every major city in every country I've been to. If you like living in the sticks or the burbs go right ahead.
5. Crime rate has been going down for the last 10 years. It's hardly a consideration in the high end areas, you're just making stuff up now.
6. Activities and culture in LA are fantastic. Theatre, restaurants, movies, A-list comedy shows plus outdoor activities like biking, hiking, and beaches are great almost all year round.
You still don't get it? Oh yeah...the weather - besides some occasional rain, the weather is fantastic.

I used to be like you, putting down LA, and then I moved here and changed my mind.

Philistine says

Blue, that’s exactly what I was talking about with LALA money–it’s like there are two sets of $$$ in LA, zillionaire play money and working-poor chump change. The thing is, I don’t get what is so great about LA that people with worldclass wherewithal will just blow money on overvalued/poor resale properties to live here of all places.
Let’s break it down: no food culture in LA (oh, wait, we have taco Tuesdays and highly-reviewed food trucks); worst traffic ever outside of Atlanta, GA.; the landscape and cityscape are coated in filth and homeless people; high unemployment; unplanned, uncontrolled sprawl; high crime even in the nice areas–yes, all of Westside, even Beverly Hills (what a thrill); activities/culture are rather hit n’ miss.
I just don’t get the pull of LA. Oh, wait, right, the weather.

Dude, there are jobs in LA.....while everyone else is griping about unemployment we are working.

stillrentinginLA says

Philistine says

Blue, that’s exactly what I was talking about with LALA money–it’s like there are two sets of $$$ in LA, zillionaire play money and working-poor chump change. The thing is, I don’t get what is so great about LA that people with worldclass wherewithal will just blow money on overvalued/poor resale properties to live here of all places.
Let’s break it down: no food culture in LA (oh, wait, we have taco Tuesdays and highly-reviewed food trucks); worst traffic ever outside of Atlanta, GA.; the landscape and cityscape are coated in filth and homeless people; high unemployment; unplanned, uncontrolled sprawl; high crime even in the nice areas–yes, all of Westside, even Beverly Hills (what a thrill); activities/culture are rather hit n’ miss.
I just don’t get the pull of LA. Oh, wait, right, the weather.

Yeah, let’s break it down…
1. There are plenty of middle class people in LA
2. From your comments, it’s obvious you don’t get LA, so don’t live here. We don’t want you anyway.
3. No food culture? I have excellent choices of every ethnic type of food within 2 miles of my house
4. Traffic, urban sprawl and homeless - yes it sucks, I won’t argue that, but so does every major city in every country I’ve been to. If you like living in the sticks or the burbs go right ahead.
5. Crime rate has been going down for the last 10 years. It’s hardly a consideration in the high end areas, you’re just making stuff up now.
6. Activities and culture in LA are fantastic. Theatre, restaurants, movies, A-list comedy shows plus outdoor activities like biking, hiking, and beaches are great almost all year round.
You still don’t get it? Oh yeah…the weather - besides some occasional rain, the weather is fantastic.
I used to be like you, putting down LA, and then I moved here and changed my mind.

I agree with all of your points....But you have to agree LA has a lot of stupidity and is very dirty in comparison to Chicago, SF, and Miami. Overcrowding has caused me to want to live in Oregon.

Wong,
I don't think the marketing term is all that new. I recall hearing it when I has in high school. And as you pointed out the trend in SF is not new either. But it is still a trend, grinding away for decades now, with spurts in the 1970's (gays) and in the dot.com era (Hip and Beautiful), but year over year, decade over decade, more and more a city of DINKs with dogs and neurotic DINKs with cats, fewer and fewer families with children, declining enrollment in the schools.

stillrenting,
You are wrong, I am not bitter. We've afforded our kids thankyouverymuch, and a great big thanks to the DINKs for helping pay for the schools (such as they are). It is not Hip and Beautiful to chaperone field trips and help with homework, but the unhip and ugly find it rewarding. To each our own.

I have no problem with you having kids if you can afford them, and thanks for pointing out that those of us that don't are subsidizing you, but you seem to be bitter because you constantly mention "hip and beautiful" to refer to people in a sarcastic way. Did I call your children rugrats? No.
So fess up, why so bitter? Are people not allowed to make different choices without your being condescending about it? What makes the choices you made so great that everyone that didn't do the same gets sarcasm from you?