The Band was a Canadian-American roots rock group formed in Toronto, Ontario in 1968 by Rick Danko (bass guitar, vocals), Garth Hudson (keyboards, saxophone), Richard Manuel (keyboards, vocals), Robbie Robertson (guitar), and Levon Helm (drums, vocals). The members of the Band first came together as they joined the rockabilly singer Ronnie Hawkins’s backing group, the Hawks, one by one between 1958 and 1963.
In 1964, they separated from Hawkins, after which they toured and released a few singles as Levon and the Hawks and the Canadian Squires. The next year, Bob Dylan hired them for his U.S. tour in 1965 and world tour in 1966.[1] Following the 1966 tour, the group moved with Dylan to Saugerties, New York, where they made the informal 1967 recordings that became The Basement Tapes, the basis for their 1968 debut album, Music from Big Pink. Because they were always “the band” to various frontmen, Helm said the name “The Band” worked well when the group came into its own.[2][a] The group began performing as the Band in 1968 and went on to release ten studio albums. Dylan continued to collaborate with the Band over the course of their career, including a joint 1974 tour.
A surge in the 65+ population will probably prolong the market conditions we’ve seen lately – those are the people who got in first, and are probably settled enough that they won’t be moving.
But those who are relying on pensions might get a surprise, and it would take an unusual monetary need like that to cause them to sell their house – or get a reverse mortgage. An interesting note – the number of HUD reverse mortgages funded in the 2017 fiscal year was the lowest since 2005.
My buyers and I have been pursuing a reasonably-priced CV home south of the 56 for at least the last 12 months, and the competition has been fierce. Most have multiple offers, and sell for over list price!
It might get so bad that we see an occasional flurry of supply! H/T daytrip:
More than half of California voters say the state’s housing affordability crisis is so bad that they’ve considered moving, and 60 percent of the electorate supports rent control, according to a new statewide poll.
The findings from UC Berkeley’s Institute of Governmental Studies reflect broad concerns Californians have over the soaring cost of living. Amid an unprecedented housing shortage, rents have skyrocketed and tenants have faced mass evictions, especially in desirable areas.
“It’s an extremely serious problem,” said poll director Mark DiCamillo. “People are being forced to consider moving because of the rising cost of housing – that’s pretty prevalent all over the state.”
Of the 56 percent of voters who said they’ve considered moving, 1 in 4 said they’d relocate out of state if they did.
We got into the future of realtors over the weekend.
It started with the crowdfunding effort to raise money to build a realtor-owned portal, and the goal is $1,100,000. But less than $200,000 has been donated so far, so it’s unlikely the effort will be successful.
It’s a good idea though!
I explained why here, and then kept it going in the comment section:
But talk about the future may make you wonder what will happen here.
What is the future of the bubbleinfo.com, and JtR?
While most of the house-selling industry is going to the big agent teams, I’m going to stick with the personal-consultant approach, and use this blog to help differentiate myself from the rest of the pack.
I’ll risk being seen as irrelevant, but I’ll take that chance and try to appeal to those who are curious for more data/insight about our local market.
It is astonishing how many visitors still come to the blog! Don’t people stop reading real estate websites once they buy or sell a house?
Yet the Google Analytics above show that we’re still getting almost 5,000 unique visitors per months with virtually no promotion at all. Even if most of those hits are the sexy internet bots, I’d be happy if we had 500 people!
Thank you for being here!
What’s Next for JtR and Bubbleinfo.com:
More Kayla – I’ve said it before, but I mean it this time.
Grow the Staff – Interviews began today to hire one more person. Not looking for the big-team, just need more help with the little things.
Blog Upgrades – Work is underway to add a home-search feature, and consolidate others. Hoping to tune up the mobile access too.
Blog Content – This paragraph below is included in every sale, and I think it gives permission for agents to be honest and provide the transparency that is wanted and needed – not sure how far I will push it though:
Videos – I am more enthusiastic about videos than ever, and have been converting to Facebook Live as an alternative. Not that many people watch the videos here, but I’ll keep them coming and hope to improve on them because they are the future. Every blog post is automatically uploaded to that Facebook account, so if that is a preferred way for you to receive your knowledge, then like/follow the page there and you will get everything you get here, and then some!
Documentary Film – Today is the deadline for Sundance, and Giorgio has been screening privately to industry insiders to get valuable feedback before submitting. We discussed last week about including some of my old foreclosure videos, so there is hope I won’t end up on the cutting room floor.
Stick around, there’s plenty more to come!
Tell your friends and family who are thinking of buying or selling to use this blog as a resource, and to employ Kayla and I to be their realtors! I’d appreciate it!
Examples of people who moved away, with good and bad results:
Raya and Michael DeMarquez both grew up in San Jose, got married here, raised their kids here, bought a house here more than 20 years ago and felt settled in the Bay Area life — for life.
Then they lost that house after the 2008 recession, lost their jobs. In the ensuing years, they worked hard to put things back together, rebuilding their careers, renting a house. Yet all the while, they sensed the encroaching costs of change: the tech boom, the swelling prices, the thickening traffic, the culture shift. They started to feel like outsiders in their own home town.
So in 2015 they did something they never would have considered a decade before. They moved. Away.
To Portland, Oregon, in fact, as many Californians have done, often to the chagrin of Oregonians. And while there have been some adjustments and trade-offs (think weather), they’re truly happy they did it.
“We’d never go back to San Jose,” says Raya DeMarquez. “We’ll see if (Portland) is where we’ll stay. We’re giving it through this winter to decide if we can handle the weather — it was rough last year.
This should be a boost to Carmel Valley real estate:
E-commerce giant Amazon is boosting its footprint in San Diego — leasing office space in University City with room for more than 500 employees.
The Seattle-based online retailer confirmed this week that it has signed a lease in the Campus Pointe office park from Alexandria Real Estate Equities, said Sam Kennedy, corporate communications manager at Amazon, in an email response to questions.
Amazon is taking nearly 107,000 square feet at 10300 Campus Point Drive. While Amazon has a small office in Solana Beach, as well as distribution facilities in the region, this is its first major office/engineering presence in the county.
Google’s decision to set up shop in San Diego was linked in part to its acquisitions of local start-ups, including sensor developer Lumedyne Technologies. Amazon is planting roots without an acquisition.
“Is this part of a larger trend? I think it could be,” said Kevin Carroll, head of Tech San Diego, a software industry trade group. “UC San Diego graduates 10,000 students a year. If you are Google or Amazon, you’re looking at that and saying there is going to be a good local pipeline of talent.”
Greg should disclose the secret weapon mentioned – because if the new website isn’t substantially better than Zillow, then we are wasting our time and money. His list of features is not impressive, and no one is going to leave Zillow – consumers or agents – unless he has a spectacular idea up his sleeve.
Having our own portal is a good idea and within reach if every agent chips in a few bucks. Are there enough who care? Most will assume it is a duplication of the MLS and not really needed.
But the reason we need it is because having our own portal would help create the ultimate club for agents. Let’s build the portal outside of the N.A.R. and other top-heavy administrative bodies that suck down profits yet provide little if any benefits to agents themselves.
You would think groups like N.A.R., C.A.R., Zillow, big brokerages, etc., provide some structure for the industry, but they don’t. Yes, there are rules, but nobody enforces them. Brokers who are supposed to be supervising their agents will look the other way if it means making more commissions.
We don’t even need rules – an agent’s reputation among their fellow agents is enough to keep them in line. The rule most broken is the sharing of listings with fellow agents, but that’s been abused for so long that most agents don’t remember signing that form when they joined the MLS. We will have to live with single agency (aka dual agency for now), but it is already upon us anyway.
More of the upstart companies are choosing to advertise on radio and TV, and distorting the truth is widespread. If we eliminate all the unnecessary money-grubbing entities, be honest with ourselves and the public about the (no) rules, take the gloves off and fight it out with our fellow agents for the business while cooperating on our own powerful portal, then the best agents would survive – which is ultimately what the consumers deserve.
