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The 7th Annual SOHO Historic Home Tour is next Sunday, March 21st.  Enjoy a self-guided tour of six Arts & Crafts homes, designed by Irving J. Gill, William S. Hebbard, Frank Mead and Richard Requa between 1904 and 1913.  My Mom is going to be here next weekend, and I’m hoping to take the whole family!

From the U-T (click here for full article):

“I was 17 and in high school,” Cunning said, and at one point, Eleanor turned to her and since she had no children, remarked, “Someday it’ll be yours.”

Today, that simple promise has turned into a potentially million-dollar makeover to restore what is believed to be San Diego’s first Prairie-style residence, designed by one of its premier early architects, Irving J. Gill, a student of Frank Lloyd Wright. It’s also noteworthy as one of the few homes of the period that used lower-cost single-wall construction and for being part of a clustered housing arrangement around a common courtyard.

But for now, the house hidden behind a gate and a line of tall trees is a drafty, grimy mishmash of old and older design styles and awkward spaces not ready for 21st-century living.

“It’s a little embarrassing to have a house that is a treasure that’s in this condition,” she said.

Even in its unreconstructed state, the 4,000-square-foot-house will make a star turn, open to the public for the first time next Sunday, as the Save Our Heritage Organisation offers a self-guided tour of this storied avenue near Upas Street at the northwest edge of Balboa Park.

This is where San Diego’s merchant prince, George W. Marston, built his house in 1905 and other relatives and friends erected their own homes, many designed by Gill, whose reputation has grown over the decades as a pioneer in the less-is-more Modernist movement. SOHO operates Marston’s residence, also on the tour, as a house museum.

“It’s a street where some of the most famous families lived,” said SOHO Executive Director Bruce Coons. “It has some of the best architecture of the period and of course by one of the greatest architects. It’s one of the streets that is the least changed, and the houses are very much the way they have been.”

A view of the eastbound 56 freeway, then turn north on I-5 at 5:30 in the afternoon:

We’ve been talking about how the quality of schools are critical to the homebuying equation.  Here are the local public high schools, sorted by their totals of four scores from www.greatschools.net:

While it used to be that Torrey Pines had an edge on others around the county, it is remarkable how similar the scores are among the top five schools. I think you also have to hand it to San Marcos HS for making the strides they’ve made too.

With the scores bunching together, how else do you decide? The greatschools website has remarks from parents and students, but you never know what agenda they might be pushing.

P.S. Catholic schools do the same testing, but refuse to release their scores – but the website has testimonials on CCHS, and not all are flattering.

Hat tip to Steve for sending this biomed/VC article along:

How has San Diego’s biomedical industry, arguably the region’s key economic sector, been weathering the downturn, and what’s its outlook for the future?

According to a recent report by PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC) and the California Healthcare Institute (CHI), the industry has suffered along with the rest of the economy, but remains resilient.  Nevertheless, storm clouds loom on the horizon, especially in the form of regulatory and reimbursement issues.

For several years, PWC has partnered with CHI, which advocates on behalf of the Golden State’s biomed industry, to produce the annual study.  It reveals that, in San Diego, venture capital has fallen from a recent high of $1.9 billion in 2007 to $900 million in 2009—a 50 percent decrease that’s slightly worse than the national and statewide fall in seed money.  A similar drop-off occurred in investments directed specifically at life science ventures.

Unsurprisingly, though, San Diego far outpaces the rest of the state in investments in biomedical companies as a percentage of total venture funding.  Unlike in Silicon Valley, where only a quarter of every seed dollar goes to life sciences, the proportion here is more than two-thirds.  Statewide, the computer (hardware, software, and services) industry employs about as many people as the life sciences sector, both of which dwarf any other industry in California.

But perhaps most encouraging is that nearly two-thirds of all venture investments in San Diego are in startup or early stages, far exceeding the national average and auguring positive future developments here.

***************************************************

This article has San Diego ranked seventh in the nation for venture capital:

METRO AREAS BY RANK
RankMetro AreaScore
1. San Francisco 5.50%
2. Seattle 2.71%
3. Austin 1.83%
4. Boston 1.53%
5. Raleigh-Durham 1.35%
6. Denver 1.20%
7. San Diego 1.01%
8. Grand Rapids 0.49%
9. Washington 0.44%
10. Portland 0.43%
11. Atlanta 0.42%
12. Minneapolis 0.42%
13. Los Angeles 0.36%
14. Orlando 0.34%
15. St. Louis 0.34%
16. New York 0.33%
17. Las Vegas 0.30%
18. Miami 0.29%
19. Rochester 0.29%
20. Nashville 0.24%
21. Chicago 0.23%
22. Philadelphia 0.23%
23. Phoenix 0.22%
24. Dallas 0.20%

Thanks to murph2222 for this spectacular video of La Jolla Shores Lane!

Paragliding at Torrey Pines

The big white house is owned by Sheila Potiker. Her late-husband, Hughes Potiker (who died last year at the age of 80), founded Entertainment Publications, the coupon-book publisher.

One of those older houses to the south, probably the one with the above-ground rail going down to the beach house, has an subterranean elevator too – I’ve seen it!

Here’s his second video too, from the ultimate real estate paparazzi:

Paragliding at the La Jolla mansions on my old yellow glider

THINGS YOUR BURGLAR WON’T TELL YOU
 
1. Of course I look familiar. I was here just last week cleaning your carpets, painting your shutters, or delivering your new refrigerator.

2. Hey, thanks for letting me use the bathroom when I was working in your yard last week. While I was in there, I unlatched the back window to make my return a little easier.

3. Love those flowers. That tells me you have taste … and taste means there are nice things inside. Those yard toys your kids leave out always make me wonder what type of gaming system they have.

4. Yes, I really do look for newspapers piled up on the driveway. And I might leave a pizza flyer in your front door to see how long it takes you to remove it.

Read the rest of this entry »

from the U-T:

A glimmer of light is shining through San Diego’s bleak real estate market, judging from the sale this week of the La Jolla oceanfront home owned by Doug and Betsy Manchester.

The six-bedroom, 11-bath estate, with swimming pool and boathouse, closed escrow Tuesday for $18.15 million. The sale price will make the county tax man happy but, even so, it is 44 percent less than the original $33 million asking price by the Manchesters, who are divorcing.

The buyer is Dallas multimillionaire Darwin Deason, the founder and primary shareholder of Affiliated Computer Solutions, which Xerox Corp. is in the process of acquiring for $6.4 billion. Darwin’s wife, Katerina Panos, is a graduate of La Jolla High School and has strong ties to San Diego.

The Deasons, who will be part-time residents, also own a 205-foot luxury yacht, Apogee, which they plan to bring to Shelter Island next year.

Willis Allen real estate agent Edward Mracek, who with Karen Rockwell represented the buyer, says the high-end market seems to be improving. While there have been higher priced residential sales in the county, he knows of only one La Jolla home that has sold for more — the $23.5 million purchase of a large La Jolla Farms estate by attorney William Lerach in 2005.

more photos here: http://www.sdlookup.com/MLS-090008894

The Deasons also are in escrow to buy a home listed at $10.5 million next door to the Manchester property. They plan to merge the two properties, which once were part of a single estate designed by architect Tom Shepherd in 1929.

Today’s home buyers want bang-for-the-buck, and don’t want to compromise.

This new-home tract in Carlsbad is feeling it – three houses sold over $1 million this past weekend, while six others are sitting unsold from $769,000 to the low-$800,000s:

(This was taped last Sunday)

The 2009 Coldwell Banker Home Price Comparison Index (HPCI) found a price gap of more than $2 million between the most expensive and affordable U.S. markets.

In the annual comparison of similar 2,200-square foot homes in 310 U.S. markets, La Jolla, Calif., led the list as the most expensive real estate market in the country with an average home price of $2,125,000. Grayling, Mich., also known as the “canoe capital of the world,” ranked as the most affordable market in America, where a similarly sized home costs $112,675.

La Jolla was joined on the most expensive list by 13 other California markets while Grayling was one of 20 Midwest communities on the most affordable list. Internationally, Singapore was the most expensive market for the same type of home, $1.9 million U.S. dollars, compared with Salinas, Ecuador, which at $69,375 U.S. dollars was the most affordable studied international market.

Differing from most housing reports that compare median prices, the annual Coldwell Banker HPCI, provides an apples-to-apples comparison of similar 2,200 square foot, four-bedroom, two-and-a-half bath homes in the United States, Puerto Rico, Canada and a sampling of countries/territories outside of North America where Coldwell Banker Real Estate has a presence.

http://www.coldwellbanker.com/servlet/News?action=viewNewsItem&contentId=14527705&customerType=News