Thursday, December 18th, 2008 at 6:30 AM
Leucadia Sore Spot
A follow-up tour of Barratt’s project in Leucadia, decribed in detail in Kelly’s article:
Link to VOSD’s ‘In Leucadia, a Subdivision Half-Built’
(1:30 min YouTube video)
Posted on Thursday, December 18th, 2008 at 6:30 AM in Short Sales | 24 Comments » | 
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I ride my bike by those every week. The people who owned the land, which was just vacant greenhouses won that game! Barratt could be making money off poinsettias this time of year vs being tens of millions in the hole(Sorry B of A!) on a dead project thats only life ever was being 6 blocks to the beach and 4 blocks to noisy I-5. The smell of car exhaust overwhelming the salty ocean air in this spot. 2M new, resale at 1.2. Yup the market is 40% down everywhere ladies and gentlemen if you need to sell, not counting the perceived eggs in your basket. This is not just in lesser hoods. A home went pending in Aviara’s Bella Lago yesterday in the 970k range. Those were north of 1.5M 2-3 years ago. Oh yeah, I forgot, that was just a foreclosure. It doesn’t count in Aviara or Carlsbad as a comp!l
doughboy | December 18th, 2008 at 7:13 am“I’m Jim the Realtor and that’s a wrap!”
Tyvek is the new stucco. These cancers are the reason banks are not actively pursuing individual foreclosures. Can you imagine how many BofA lawyers and other staff are tied up in this one alone?
Rob Dawg | December 18th, 2008 at 7:18 amAmazing how a million dollars can evaporate so fast.They look like 500k places to me at the most.Caveat emptor!!!!!!!!!!!!!
arizonadude | December 18th, 2008 at 8:57 amAmazingly, I think one or two of these wouldn’t look half bad if they were on lots 5X the size of the ones they’re on now.
GeneK | December 18th, 2008 at 9:12 amOh yea, Better day’s are yet to come!
Dwalla | December 18th, 2008 at 9:28 am“Tyvek is the new stucco.”
OK – That’s hilarious.
sdduuuude | December 18th, 2008 at 10:18 amhilarious
from their website:
Wrapping a home with DuPont™ Tyvek® weather barriers is like putting a windbreaker over a sweater. DuPont™ Tyvek® helps to reduce nasty drafts, optimize insulation, control air leakage, hold out bulk water which can lead to mold and mildew, and cut energy bills. And Tyvek® can breathe too. That means that if moisture does get inside your walls, DuPont™ Tyvek® lets it pass through to the outside.
Jim the Realtor | December 18th, 2008 at 10:36 amOne word comes to mind, Garish
BO | December 18th, 2008 at 1:01 pmDid you guys read Kelly’s piece? The nerve on that Barratt felow! It’s all BoA’s fault, because it wasn’t willing to go along with an uneconomic project and “share in the loss”. The nerve on the guy! He borrows money, he can’t pay it back, and he blames the bank for not throwing good money after bad by extending even more credit to him. Un-f%$*ing-believable!
Daniel | December 18th, 2008 at 1:27 pmThe sales on the completed houses should have helped cover the cost of completing the others… unless Barratt was immediately transferring the profits from the completed to the parent company and wanting the banks to take all the risk. Initially the construction was quite profitable..
ucodegen | December 18th, 2008 at 1:42 pmJim,
Rob Dawg | December 18th, 2008 at 2:18 pmInterested in hosting a PBS series? “This Old Subdivision.” You can pull up in the Chebby and do the forensic accounting and I can show up with a sledgehammer and my crew of day workers. After we fix the nasties and you clear up the finances we roll the Mercedes out of the way to reveal a market priced home for sale to qualified buyers.
I would watch that PBS show religiously. I would even purchase a tivo to make sure I did not miss an episode. Sounds like a lot of fun.
Neil Diamond | December 18th, 2008 at 2:31 pmAll we’d need to do is knock off the second story of the McMansions, and offer it instead as a 3br+den, 2,400sf one-story plan. We’d have a parade of waiting buyers, and sell ‘em for 10-20% more than similar-sized two-story plans nearby.
Jim the Realtor | December 18th, 2008 at 2:55 pmDo they really have 3 brs and a den on the first floor?
GeneK | December 18th, 2008 at 3:37 pmThey would when we get done.
There is a cottage industry waiting to happen that converts the downstairs into a master suite for the older set who are sick of the stairs, but don’t want to move. It was Rob’s idea too – hope somebody cashes in on them!
Jim the Realtor | December 18th, 2008 at 3:43 pmSo what’s upstairs Granpa?
Why….I don’t remember son….ain’t been up theres in many a moons. Maybe like the movie Psycho….Granny in the rocker…or maybe that there Barratt fella.
Yer scarin me Gramps.
BottomFisher | December 18th, 2008 at 5:47 pmThere is a cottage industry waiting to happen that converts the downstairs into a master suite for the older set who are sick of the stairs, but don’t want to move.
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During the bubble years (and before), every time we’d go into a new home with no bedroom/bathroom on the first floor, I’d question the sales staff about their claims that “Baby Boomers” were coming to buy up all the new homes — and make prices rise to infinity and beyond. Arent’ Baby Boomers nearing retirement? Why would anyone think older folks would want two-story McMansions when their kids are leaving and the knees and hips start going out?
Oftentimes, these homes were designed so poorly, that you couldn’t even convert a portion of the downstairs to a bedroom with a full bathroom if you tried.
CA renter | December 18th, 2008 at 6:46 pmI swear this site cracks me up. I love it. Jim, your drive by tapings and commentary are perfect. I can’t believe you have time to post so much. The comments are always a good read too. I read CR, bigpicture, piggington, Mish, iTulip, redfin SD, etc etc but I think this is my favorite. It’s down to earth, relevant and fun! Kudos Jim, keep it up.
Jbirdfunk | December 18th, 2008 at 8:30 pmI remember the long face our realtor made when we told her not to show us anything that had more than a two-step change in level. And it seemed to us there hadn’t been anything decent built here with only one story since the early 90′s.
GeneK | December 18th, 2008 at 9:15 pmMick Pattinson, Prez of Barratt, was businessman of the year in Carlsbad a couple years ago. I guess they just give out those awards to anyone who donates to the right person.
Freddie | December 19th, 2008 at 6:11 amWhat I can’t figure out is why elevators haven’t caught on yet…for $10-20K, you can have an elevator installed in your home. Of course rewickering the house to accomodate that will drive the price up, but it is certainly do-able.
To me, that would be a helluva lot cheaper than moving to a new house.
jb | December 19th, 2008 at 7:14 amfrom George Chamberlin:
Tina Nova, CEO of Carlsbad-based Genoptix, will be a guest on my TV show tomorrow night on NBC 7/39 at 5 p.m. Also joining me will be Ruben Barrales, president if the San Diego Chamber of Commerce, and Mick Pattinson, CEO of Barratt American. As always, Mick has some biting comments about the situations that have led to the crisis in housing and new home construction.
Jim the Realtor | December 19th, 2008 at 9:38 am“To me, that would be a helluva lot cheaper than moving to a new house.”
Not if the new house is half the price of what you can get for selling your old one, and is in some other location where the COL is lower.
GeneK | December 19th, 2008 at 9:47 amThanks Jbirdfunk – love the handle!
Jim the Realtor | December 19th, 2008 at 6:44 pm