patrick.net

Holy crap, this home is one street over from my old house, in the higher end side, bigger and it sold for way less. In 2017, I sold for $408 a foot.

This is for government friends and family. Unions and bureaucrats take care of themselves well with taxpayer dollars.

Housing Bubble 2.0 - Housing Starts Crash - Home Depot Dips - Case Shiller Weakest in Years - 14.41 minutes

www.youtube.com/embed/YdB1LNJCgUY

Buyers Finally Get the Upper Hand in Hottest U.S. Housing Markets

Homes sit on market, prices cut in Seattle and the Bay Area - Spring selling season approaches with increases in inventory

The real estate frenzies in West Coast cities have become the stuff of lore: buyers jostling at open houses, homes getting offers sight unseen, bids coming in hundreds of thousands of dollars over asking.

That’s all over now.

Just ask Kelly Randall, an Amazon employee who listed her renovated Seattle condo for $539,000 -- a bargain compared with the $615,000 her friend got last year for a smaller place in the same building. Almost four months and four price cuts later, Randall’s still waiting for an offer.

“My timing sucks,” she said. “It’s a little frustrating.”

For the first time in years, the U.S. is entering its key spring house-hunting season with buyers holding the upper hand. Nowhere is the shift more pronounced than in once-hot areas such as Seattle, San Francisco and Denver, where bidding wars are vanishing, time-on-market is climbing and prices are flattening, or even falling. These western cities, the center of the recent housing boom, are now leading the slowdown.

The reasons are varied, from last year’s spike in mortgage rates to volatility in technology stocks. But the simplest explanation is that years of soaring values have put housing in many areas out of reach to all but the most affluent buyers. In many parts of the West, home prices have more than doubled from the recession while incomes have climbed far less.

“There’s a huge disparity,” said Lawrence Yun, chief economist of the National Association of Realtors. “People can’t catch up.”

With prices slipping and more inventory coming up for the busiest time for home selling, buyers who have the means will have a new opportunity to enter the market. Sellers, meanwhile, face a “reality check,” Yun said.

“This is what it looks like when the pendulum starts to go the other way,” said Felipe Chacon, a housing economist at Trulia.

Seattle Slowdown

Seattle is a prime example of the reversal. The area’s median single-family home price doubled since 2012 to $560,000, fueled by an Amazon-led tech boom that brought in a flood of highly paid workers. Houses regularly sold within a week, sometimes garnering 10 or more offers, with buyers waiving home inspections and financing contingencies.

Now, the tables are turning. The median single-family home prices in King County, which includes Seattle, fell 3 percent on a price-per-square foot basis in January, the first annual decline since 2012, according to brokerage Redfin. Roughly a sixth of the metro area’s listings had price cuts in the 12 months through January, twice the previous year’s rate, Trulia data show.

It may just be a brief respite after years of mania. Seattle’s economy and hiring remain strong, and housing is still tight compared with other parts of the country. Home sales have started to pick up from a tepid fall and winter, real estate agents say.

But there’s no question the house hunt has become easier for people such as Hector Perez, who moved to Seattle last year for an Amazon job and had heard horror stories about the crazy market. The Texas transplant and his wife, Kate, were pleasantly surprised when they zeroed in on a new home in the Queen Anne neighborhood that had been on the market for more than half a year.

Already, about $160,000 had been knocked off of the initial list price of almost $1.4 million. When the seller asked if they could do an inspection in five days, the couple said they were traveling and threatened to walk if they couldn’t get 10.

“It was a bit of a risk, but they came back and said, ‘OK,”’ Perez said. “We had a little bit of leverage that we didn’t think we’d have.”

The invisible hand of Amazon may once again be playing a role in the market. There are concerns that the company, which occupies about a fifth of Seattle’s prime office space, may be slowing its growth in the city. Last month, the tech giant said it doesn’t plan to move into the space it leased in a new 37-story tower being built downtown. Amazon, which still has thousands of positions open in the city, declined to comment.

California, Denver

The broad cooling indicates that there are greater forces at play than a single company or industry. Home sales in January were at 11-year lows in both Southern California and the San Francisco Bay area, CoreLogic Inc. reported. Prices in both the Portland, Oregon, and Denver areas fell this year for the first time since 2012, according to local multiple listings services.

In the Bay Area, San Francisco’s market may get a boost as the pending initial public offerings of Lyft Inc., Uber Technologies Inc. and Pinterest Inc. mint millionaires, according to Patrick Carlisle, chief market analyst in the region for the brokerage Compass. But in Silicon Valley, there’s been a dramatic slowdown, he said. Santa Clara County -- home of Google and Apple Inc. -- saw its median house price fall 1 percent in the fourth quarter to $1.25 million, after a 27 percent surge a year earlier.

“Santa Clara was unbelievably hot,” Carlisle said. “But there has been a reaction to the high prices. When you add in last year’s rise in interest rates and the fact that their stock portfolio dropped, suddenly it made people a lot more cautious.”

‘Super Reasonable’

Caution was apparent on a recent sunny Saturday morning in Northwest Seattle’s Whittier Heights neighborhood as Ruslan Polyak propped up an open house sign by the front door of a yellow townhouse. Recognizing the market’s slowdown, he had listed it last month for $810,000, even though an identical unit sold last spring for $835,000, almost $100,000 above asking, he said.

Negotiations are welcome, he told a buyer attending the open house: “My client’s super reasonable.”

Later that day, Polyak cut the price to $787,000.

Randall, the Amazon employee, is waiting for her condo to sell so she can buy a new town home she signed a contract to purchase in November. In a sign of the market’s softness, the builder is working with her, reducing the agreed-upon price as she’s had to lower her own asking price. It’s now $480,000, a $59,000 reduction from the original listing.

Her agent, Bill Jones with Every Door Real Estate, said the changing market isn’t all bad: “I don’t mind not having to compete with 12 other people to win a client a house.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-12/buyers-finally-gain-upper-hand-in-hottest-u-s-housing-markets?srnd=premium

Guys, I actually placed a binding bid in a foreclosure online auction. Even being slightly outbid, the reserve wasn't met. Ironically, I'm seeing real market sales with conventional financing going at similar prices, so I'm close to getting back in. The tumble has started. While I do still see people paying 900K for 1,000,000 houses, I am seeing more and more of those mcmansions going for 4-600K. The higher end homes are plummeting to where I am thinking of upgrading neighborhoods, although Escondido is a great place.

I'm back baby!!!!!

Malcolm says

I'm back baby!!!!!

Please post the address or at least zip code of the foreclosure that you win in the auction. I'd like to see the demographics for the zip code at least ,and if possible the price and tax history for the home (via Zillow).

AD says

Please post the address or at least zip code of the foreclosure that you win in the auction. I'd like to see the demographics for the zip code at least ,and if possible the price and tax history for the home (via Zillow).

Here is the actual property, being relisted,https://www.auction.com/details/961-n-rose-st-escondido-ca-92027-2728404-o_1232l it didn't even go above $300K. The bank is being very unrealistic with their reserve, because it has squatters and since you can't see the inside you have to figure up to $50,000 to rehab it if it is destroyed. With those unknowns, I was budgeting $50K for repairs, and another $50K for debt service, buyer premiums, and selling costs. I held at $200K conservatively putting a selling price, all fixed up at $400-$450. Even though the comps are much higher, because in an even nicer neighborhood, this is happening:

Malcolm says

Here is the actual property,

Below is what I found about this property. I am not sure why it was foreclosed on, maybe there was a major home equity loan taken out by the owner who was unable to pay it off.

1) https://www.redfin.com/CA/San-Marcos/300-Joshua-Ave-92069/home/3837826
Redfin estimates it at $517,267 and that it was last sold in 1998 for $170,000

2) https://www.trulia.com/p/ca/san-marcos/300-joshua-ave-san-marcos-ca-92069--2079584622
Trulia estimates it at $552, 242 and it was sold in 2019 for $390,000

AD says

Trulia estimates it at $552, 242 and it was sold in 2019 for $390,000

I'm guessing the 2019 sale is the trustee sale/foreclosure. Even what I consider a reckless buyer wouldn't go above $300K, and it has now had two tries at open auction. I'm a player at $200, that is the only price to make real money on it. More than $500K and I say impossible for that house in current market.

AD, you remind me of something I was saying to my girlfriend yesterday. This collapse is a little different, in that it is not time bomb loans causing foreclosure. It is loss of income on houses that are actually not under water and the banks are pulling the plug on the refinance game, as they don't want to be holding the bag. I am finding houses worth over a million dollars with unaffordable debt of $380K. Banks know that it isn't actually worth a million and won't do a bailout loan.

Malcolm says

It is loss of income on houses that are actually not under water and the banks are pulling the plug on the refinance game

Loss of income ? You mean they can't rent the homes at a reasonable and sustainable price ?

Or the owners were laid off from their jobs and cannot make the mortgage payments ?

AD says

Loss of income ? You mean they can't rent the homes at a reasonable and sustainable price ?

I definitely think that, though opinions differ on what is reasonable, which I will just define as the going rate in an area.

I personally sold when the rents seemed unsustainable to anyone who was applying. Lots of men seem unemployable for whatever reason. So you’re dealing with a woman supporting a family on 30-50k verifiiable a year, and somehow, even though they have horrendous credit and a criminal record, somehow they are going to rent a house for $2,200 a month.

As for bring laid off? Here are the scenarios I see.

1. Military whose training doesn’t transfer to the civilian market.
2. People burn out or can’t continue a job ie policemen.
3. People who didn’t really have jobs, they just kept taking equity along the way to keep the lenders happy.
4. Divorces cut a household in half, though sometimes it is a woman shedding dead weight.
5. Faking it until breaking it. People faking it and then running out of credit cards and payday loans.
6. People losing benefits.
7. People too old to command the same salary.
8. Professional segments whose industry doesn’t pay like it used to. Ask @Patrick.

There are many more, but full employment doesn’t mean high paying jobs.

I HAVE CAUGHT ZILLOW DELIBERATELY DELETING BANK SALES FROM ITS SOLD LISTINGS.

This is obviously at the request of the Realtor bunch. Now it would seem almost no houses are being sold, since the bank sales were the biggest bunch, however, people will be happy to know that the median price is probably still going up because shedding these sales from the database will make conventional sales appear stellar.

If you are curious about a real example, fortunately I had pasted one of them in this thread. It is no longer showing in sales search results, along with numerous others in the same area that I know sold because they used to be there.

A lot of people now have a false sense of security.

Malcolm says

Either somebody got a deal, or this is the beginning of severe pricing discounts in San Diego County.



This house sold for $205 per foot. It is 70s construction, but it looks like it was somewhat updated. For comparison, I sold for over $400 a foot for $445K last November. My house was under 1,100 square feet. 80s construction, but not even as nice as this house.

These sales aren't always legitimate. Zillow says my neighbors sold their home last year for below market value.... A sold sign never went up and they didn't move.. and a year later they still lived there and have for the last 10 years. I didn't want to be nosy and ask why Zillow listed their home as recently sold for below market value... maybe their parents originally bought it and they bought it from their parents for cheap. This would still register as a sale on Zillow.

Strategist says

Malcolm says

Either somebody got a deal, or this is the beginning of severe pricing discounts in San Diego County.



This house sold for $205 per foot. It is 70s construction, but it looks like it was somewhat updated. For comparison, I sold for over $400 a foot for $445K last November. My house was under 1,100 square feet. 80s construction, but not even as nice as this house.

Anecdotal evidence is not indicative of anything, least of all the beginning of a housing crash.
This is what matter.

https://www.ocregister.com/2018/04/23/southern-california-home-prices-hit-record-highs-in-march-amid-slower-sales/
Southern California home prices soared to...

These below market sales are sometimes anomalies. My neighbors home showed up sold last year on Zillow... but they didn't move and never put a for sale sign up. I assumed maybe their parents originally bought the home for them... and maybe just sold it to them for cheap recently. Pulling 1 random low priced sale is usually not accurate.

Here is a comprehensive sales report for N Co San Diego for February. It is the most current one that I can find.

https://www.mylenemerlo.com/blog/north-county-san-diego-real-estate-market-report-march-2019/

Carlsbad, a very desirable area is really slowing down. The real numbers to watch are how inventory is climbing. They talk about days on market but that is only for the houses that sell. There are many lingering and recent Zillow searches in these areas are showing many many distressed properties, those that are bank owned or pre foreclosure status.

Malcolm says

I HAVE CAUGHT ZILLOW DELIBERATELY DELETING BANK SALES FROM ITS SOLD LISTINGS.

This is obviously at the request of the Realtor bunch. Now it would seem almost no houses are being sold, since the bank sales were the biggest bunch, however, people will be happy to know that the median price is probably still going up because shedding these sales from the database will make conventional sales appear stellar.

If you are curious about a real example, fortunately I had pasted one of them in this thread. It is no longer showing in sales search results, along with numerous others in the same area that I know sold because they used to be there.

A lot of people now have a false sense of security.

I've seen a fake sales on the low end too. My neighbors home showed up on Zillow last summer as "sold"... for about $100K below market value. They didn't move and a for sale or sold sign was never placed in their yard. I didn't ask they, because I didn't want to invade their privacy.. but i assume it was either a zillow mistake.. or maybe their parents had originally bought the home in their name..and just sold it to them recently at a lower than market rate and it showed up as a sale.

Not sure if you can glean too much evidence from some random sales on zillow.... gotta take the median sales prices.

BoomAndBustCycle says

I've seen a fake sales on the low end too. My neighbors home showed up on Zillow last summer as "sold"... for about $100K below market value. They didn't move and a for sale or sold sign was never placed in their yard. I didn't ask they, because I didn't want to invade their privacy.. but i assume it was either a zillow mistake.. or maybe their parents had originally bought the home in their name..and just sold it to them recently at a lower than market rate and it showed up as a sale.

Not sure if you can glean too much evidence from some random sales on zillow.... gotta take the median sales prices.

You are right on most everything you're saying. I would guess your example is an intrafamily transfer of some kind. At the same time, I happened to be researching the latest medians and inventory figures. I was looking for March, but found February. The reason I post particular deals is because someone else asked for specific examples.

So now let's look at the most desirable areas in San Diego's N County area. This search is limited specifically to detached homes. Each and every blue dot is either in pre foreclosure NOD issued, or being auctioned or sold as bank owned.

Proud to see California solidly making the list again.

https://magazine.realtor/daily-news/2019/02/26/where-foreclosures-may-surprisingly-be-picking-up