The education has begun. Here is Kayla’s first training video:
In the video I suggest a general rule-of-thumb for house valuations. Below is how they compare to the actual cost-per-sf averages over the last 90 days (and after a furious 12 months of frenzy where the median San Diego County sales price has gone up 24%):
Town or Area
My Rule-of-Thumb
Avg. $/sf Last 90 days
Carlsbad
$300/sf
$316/sf
Encinitas
$400/sf
$424/sf
Solana Bch
$500/sf
$530/sf
Del Mar
$600/sf
$729/sf
La Jolla
$700/sf
$685/sf
Carmel Vly
$375/sf
$373/sf
RSF
$400-$450/sf
$461/sf
Kayla is sporting the new Sony HX50 camera, which looks like a nice upgrade for bubbleinfo.com!
The Raveonettes are a Danish indie rock duo, consisting of Sune Rose Wagner (born 1973, Sønderborg, Denmark) on guitar, instruments, and vocals, and Sharin Foo (born 22 November 1973, Emmelev, Denmark) on bass, guitar and vocals.
Their music is characterized by close two-part vocal harmonies inspired by The Everly Brothers coupled with hard-edged electric guitar overlaid with liberal doses of noise. Their songs juxtapose the structural and chordal simplicity of ’50s and ’60s rock with intense electric instrumentation, driving beats, and often dark lyrical content (e.g., crime, drugs, murder, suicide, love, lust, and betrayal), similar to another of the band’s influences, The Velvet Underground.
Southern California home prices skyrocketed more than 28% in June compared to a year ago, real estate information firm DataQuick reported Wednesday.
The dramatic 28.3% jump was greater than any year-over-year pop seen during the housing boom and the most since January 1989, the first time DataQuick generated the figure.
The Southland’s median sales price reached $385,000 last month, 4.6% more than May and the highest dollar amount in more than five years.
“This market’s getting really interesting,” DataQuick President John Walsh said Wednesday in a news release announcing the figures.
Walsh said there are signs the “blistering pace” of rising home prices won’t continue, citing rising mortgage rates and the belief that the price gains will spur more home owners to place their houses on the market.
Ben Bernanke’s comments today have further calmed down the mortgage rates, now back under the 4.5% threshhold.
Was there much panic in the last couple of weeks? Either a flood of new listings, or buyers rushing in/backing off?
Not really. Here are new listings and new pendings for 7/1 to 715:
Town or Area
Zip Code
New Listings
New Pendings
Cardiff
92007
10
6
NW Carlsbad
92008
8
9
SE Carlsbad
92009
10
6
NE Carlsbad
92010
8
5
SW Carlsbad
92011
14
8
DM/SB
14+75
27
9
Encinitas
92024
38
22
La Jolla
92037
31
15
RSF
67+91
28
9
Carmel Valley
92130
35
30
NSDCC
All
232
134
With the headlines about the worst mortgage-rake spikes in the history of the world, these numbers look about as “normal” as possible. It helps substantiate how our local market is being driven by regular people who are out buying and selling homes for their own personal use.
Furthermore, if there wasn’t a panic during the last couple of weeks, there probably won’t be one. At least not with the buyers – they’ve waited this long, they aren’t going to rush anything now (heck, rates might come down?).
Addressing a gathering of real estate journalists downtown, kickoff speaker Howard Gelbtuch, chair of the Counselors of Real Estate, sees some bright spots for retail space despite the growth in online marketplaces.
“The Internet may be killing retail in some places but not New York City, which has some of the highest retails rates in the world right now,” Gelbtuch said. Another bright spot is Miami, where space in the Bal Harbour area is $3,000 a square foot compared with $300 a foot elsewhere in the region.
Buying opportunities include Sears/Kmart and J.C. Penney sites that have locked up rates at $4 a square foot where averages are $8. There’s an opportunity to buy out these “dowdy” retailers, he said, and replace them with government offices, call centers or dividing them into several stores such as PetSmart or Staples.
Globally, the next growth markets may be South Korea, Nigeria, Bangladesh and Vietnam.
In Latin America, demand is rising for U.S. style offices.
“Africa is where China was 20 years ago,” Gelbtuch said, as the consumer class grows.
Climate change will continue to hammer coastal property markets, increasing the cost of homeownership and building as more safeguards are added. Gelbtuch recently priced a full-house generator for his home at $32,000.
The hits keep coming to Carmel Valley, where the mid-$800,000’s range is rapidly becoming the bottom of the detached-homes-for-sale market:
The property being developed across the street is described below, where they note that removing 30,000 cubic yards of dirt will likely take three months:
SAN DIEGO – Mark Ramirez said he hired the Georggin Law Firm to help repair his credit after he sold his home through a short sale.
“It was my first home. So you know I did work hard for that and unfortunately I lost it and I trusted these individuals to help me out with my credit,” said Ramirez.
Rameriz said he was referred to the Georggin Law Firm by his real estate agent who attended a session run by the firm’s vice president Eric Phillips.
He said the sales pitch Phillips gave him over the phone sold him on the firm.
“Yeah, and that they would represent you if they did have to go to court,” said Ramirez.
Former employee Lindsey Esser explained the program to Team 10. Esser said she worked for the firm for one month and then quit.
“Clients would sell their home through a short sale and the banks would report the missed payments on their credit report. The clients would then take the banks to small claims court for erroneously or inaccurately reporting their short sale leaving the client with open liabilities on their credit report. If the banks were found negligent-they would have to delete the entire account,” said Esser.
Ramirez said he paid the firm nearly $3,000 in October of 2011.
“And part of the deal was if you go to court and you lose in court it’s a 100 percent back guarantee. There’s no questions asked,” said Ramirez.
Phillips is on YouTube videos talking about the guarantee.
“Unheard of for a law firm … you will see our refund policy. If I don’t get the judgment for your client, I hand them a 100 percent refund on the spot. On right there, on the guarantee is my bar number,” he said.
