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Hat tip to daytrip for sending this along:

The stench is only the beginning of the damage someone did to the Bay Shore house. Everywhere you turn, something is ruined and Richard and Scott have no idea who did this.

“I hear from my brother, there was a squatter living in the house. (How did he know?) He passed by and saw the lights on the AC going!” Scott said.

The Scotts haven’t lived in the home for two years. Back in 2009 the house slipped into foreclosure so they put it up for sale and moved down south. In the meantime, the home was torn apart. After police scared off the squatters, in came the scammers.

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Towards the end of this video, Pardee’s Shaw Lorenz development is mentioned, the 136-homesite development which remains quiet (unless someone has heard more?).  They have said in the past that it would be a custom, and semi-custom development, but at this point who knows if they’ll be selling lots or houses.  They’d be smart to continue where Derby Hill left off – there would be buyers willing to pay $1.5 to $2.0 million for those same houses on acre lots, and it would be a safer bet for Pardee than selling vacant lots for custom homes.

Click here for  the last post that covered the same area, but includes jets and the same golf hole. A comment was left reminding us that the connection to the 56 freeway isn’t a done deal.

Click here for the story about the Craftsman home featured in San Diego H&G Magazine.

For those with vision who want to build the ultimate trophy property, this is a deal – now $399,000!

Welcome back from the long holiday weekend everybody – hope it was great!

I took off the last five days to help my mother with moving, so I’m just getting back in the swing.  After checking the November sales yesterday (repeated below), the pendings for this month were expected to be gloomy.  But as you’ll see, the ultra-low mortgage rates are helping motivate buyers and sellers to get together:

Yes, we’ll see how many close, but let’s also tack on at least 10% more sales to the 2010 number below to account for the late reporters – here are the closed counts, as of today:

The vacant properties are a curiousity, here is how today’s active listings compare with previous:

Even the sellers of vacant properties are reluctant to sharpen their price. The avg. days-on-market is 88 days, and only 25% of the listings are REOs!

I could see this in Palmdale, or maybe Victorville…….but could it happen here?

An update on Flint, MI:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/06/20/AR2009062000956.html

An excerpt:

Then he looks at what’s left of the neighborhood – blocks lined with bruised homes and broken windows. Two streets over, someone has nailed a plywood sign to a tree: “No Prostitution Zone.” On three blocks of Jane, the city is targeting 14 homes for demolition, four of which have already been scarred by fires.

“My dad, he can’t come down this street anymore. … It’s too hard to see,” Kildee says. “Because his whole life was here.”

What was once Buick City is largely a cement prairie now, and General Motors, which once employed more than 80,000 in the city of its founding, has cut its Flint work force to about 6,000. Flint’s population, which peaked at 197,000, dwindled to 115,000 in 2007, and falling.

To stabilize the city, Kildee started the Genesee County Land Bank, which has taken title to 9,000 properties since 2002, tearing down 1,000 and selling or rehabbing others.

The foreclosure crisis has made the job even tougher, leaving the Land Bank with at least 1,000 more abandoned homes to demolish.

If you’re looking for a deal, your best chance is with a vacant property.

Here’s a glimpse of the detached and attached ACTIVE listings, and percent of vacants:

Oct. 12th:  6,876 vacant/16,947 total = 40.6%

Feb. 20th:  5,600 vacant/14,518 total = 38.6%

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Here’s a look at the PENDING file:

Oct. 12th: 3,940 vacant/6,095 total pendings = 64.6%

Feb. 20th: 3,940 vacant/5,934 total pendings = 66.4%

Don’t you love the statistical quirks – the exact same number of vacant pendings!

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SOLDS between January 1st and February 19th:

2008 – 1,375 vacants/2,094 total = 65.7%

2009 – 2,484 vacants/3,209 total = 77.4% of all solds were vacant

Though sales are up 53% YOY, you can see why, the vacants are up 81%. 

There are bank deals, and everything else.

Thinking of selling? 

Do what the banks do – vacate the property and price it 5% under the comps!