Belmont Homes Sales – May 2009

What’s happening in our local market is the number one question we receive so here’s the good the bad and the ugly for May 2009 in Belmont.

Bel May 2009

The Good

The number of homes sold in creased in May to 15 from April’s paltry 12. Still, compared to 2004 when 32 homes sold there’s not a lot of activity.

The number of days it took to sell a home in Belmont went from 48 in April down to only 37 in May.

Of the 15 sales in May, 5 sold over the asking price, none sold at asking, and 10 sold under the seller’s asking price.

The Bad

Homes which were originally overpriced took a beating.

Overprice Homes

10

Homes Priced Well

5

DOM

 

76.8

DOM

 

18.8

Percent Received of Original List Price

89%

Percent Received of Original List Price

101.4%

Real Dollar change

$67,000 less

Real Dollar Change

$5,000 more

 

The number of overpriced homes reaching a factor of 2-1 over well priced homes is indicative of the disconnect between what sellers feel their home is worth as compared to what a buyer will actually pay. It’s clear by looking at the numbers though that the number one mistake a seller can make continues to be overpricing their home.

The Ugly.

The median price in Belmont continued its correction in May.

 

May 2009

April 2009

May 2008

May 2007

Median Price

$820000

$775,000

$1,098,750

$1,036,733

* Corrected for size of home

$820,000

$855,000

$952,300

$1,106,533

May Δ in percent

 

-4.09%

-13.94%

– 25.89%

 

*We endeavor to report the true median price as accurately as possible. In doing so, we must take into consideration if larger or smaller homes are selling in a given period.

 

*Date retrieved form the Multiple Listing Service of San Mateo County.

Market Report–Belmont Home Sales April 2009

The homes sale report for April shows a continuing slide in both sales and median price for the Peninsula cities, though we appear to have a lull in the action.

Take the median price of single family homes in San Mateo County for example. In April of 2008 it stood at $925,000. This April that number came in at $610,000–a whopping 34% decrease. Sales have dropped 15% over last year at the same time and 40% off the peak of the market in 2005. Yet every month so far this year the median price has been creeping back up, ever so slightly. Exciting news? Not really. The median price almost without fail creeps up this time of year.

Belmont Apr 2009

(Click on the image to see a full sized graphic)

For Belmont, April home sales came in at a disappointing 13 for the entire month, a 38% decrease over last year’s more typical 21 sales for the month.

The median price came in at $775,000, considerably off of the $930,000 reported just last April. The size homes which sold last April were only slightly larger–3.7%. Which means that the calculated median home price loss of 16.6% might be closer to only 13%, if that makes anyone feel any better.

And don’t expect to get close to what you are asking. On average in Belmont sellers are receiving only 94.84% of their asking price and it is taking about 33% longer for them to get less for their home.  Don’t think that isn’t hurting agents too. Agents who are listing homes for sale are finding it takes longer to sell a home. Longer listing periods can mean thousands more in advertising costs and with values dropping, thousands less in commissions.

Click here to see April sales report for surrounding cities.

Belmont Housing Report–March 2009

The home sales are in for Belmont for the month of March 2009 and they exhibit all the indications of a continuing declining market. We wrote a short post on what the numbers mean when compared to the same period just a few years back.

Belmont-March 2009

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the same period just twoyears ago…

Macrh 2007

Belmont and the Bay Area Peninsula Housing Downturn

If you’re wondering where the housing downturn is headed in Belmont you can get a good indication by these two snap shots taken for the month of March 2007 and 2009.

We use 2007 as a benchmark since it was the last year where the impact of the housing crises had not yet been realized in our market.

Here are some startling yet revealing statistics:

The far right column of this chart says it all. Every indicator in red illustrates a deterioration of the seller’s market which has prevailed for so long.

You may notice that even though larger homes sold in 2009 the median price still dropped $161,500 in 2009. Adjusting for this, the real median price drop is actually $252,850 or 26%.

Today, on average it will take almost three times as long to sell a home in Belmont; when you do sell you are likely to receive under you asking price. In fact statistically you no longer have any chance of getting over your asking price and the odds of getting less than your asking price has increased by 50%. Sellers now receive on average only 96% of what they ask for their home compared to over 103% in 2007. In real dollars that translates into a swing of $52,000.

In the end, this much anticipated market correction will produce a more stable real estate market. Affordability is increasing and eventually sales will increase as buyers feel more optimistic about the future, including job security and housing stability.

Considering the drop in value we are experiencing, for sellers who are debating a moving out of the area, sooner rather than later will probably produce a better result. In all likelihood it will be many years before inflation drives price points back to levels seen in 2007.

A down market is typically an attractive time for sellers who are thinking of a move up. The logic behind this is a more expensive home is less in real dollars–and also saves you thousands of dollars in property taxes over the life of your ownership. Our current market also includes attractive Interest rates that are at historic lows, though Jumbo loans are not enjoying the full benefit of the government’s intervention.

Buyers who have stable jobs and are planning to live in their first home for five years or more are benefitting the most from the current conditions. Prices are at a low not seen in years, interest rates are at historic lows, the government is paying them $8,000 to buy a home this year, multiple offers are for the most part non-existent and the high inventory levels means there are a lot of homes to choose from.

In every market, there are opportunities. If you would like advice on how to make the most of our current economic climate give us a call at (650) 508-1441.

*Data retreived from the MLS

The information contained in this post is educational and intended for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal or tax advice, nor does it substitute for legal or tax advice.

HOUSING REFORM-2009 Panacea or Panic?

The news is full of housing reform stores but the shelf life for reform legislation seems shorter than that of freshly baked bread—what made the news just yesterday is often obsolete by today.Congress

We expect 2009 to be a turbulent time in real estate. Knowing how to weather the storm is paramount to the survival of homeownership.

Key Elements

President Obama signed a $787 billion stimulus bill which includes many features to protect homeownership.

These are a few of the incentives targeted to help 4-5 million responsible homeowners stay in their homes:

\\· Provide access to low cost refinancing where borrowers who have less than the required 80% loan-to-value could refinance to lower their monthly payment.

· Seventy-five billion will be spent on homeowner stability initiatives to help struggling homeowners who, because of the recession, are hard pressed to make their mortgage payments and cannot afford to sell or refinance their home due to a drop in value.

· No aide to speculators. The initiative has no provision for assisting investors or speculators.

· Provide support for homeowners who are at imminent risk of default before they miss a payment.

· Provide loan modifications to bring monthly payments to sustainable levels.

· â€Pay For Success”—Initiative for loan servicers to receive $1,000 per month each month a borrow stays current on their loan.

· â€œHelp Borrowers Stay Current”—Provides a $1,000 per month reduction in a home owners’ principle loan balance for five years if the borrower keeps their payments current.

· â€œReaching Borrowers Early”—An incentive of $500 to loan servicers and $1,500 to mortgage holders if they modify at-risk loans before the borrow falls behind.

· â€œHome Price Decline Reserve Payments”—Holders of mortgages modified under the program would be eligible for an additional insurance payment (from a newly formed entity under the Treasury Department) on each modified loan to offset declines in the home price index.

There are quite a few more initiatives to help homeowners. Though many do not apply to the majority of the loans on the Peninsula since they are not held by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.

Lenders Are Worried.

Recently, many lenders have been modifying loans without incentives just to keep their head above water. However in contrast to the President's incentive plans, many banks require the homeowner to be months behind in payments before any relief is possible.

â–ºIf your mortgage is scheduled for an interest rate increase which you feel you may not be able to afford, we encourage you to contact your mortgage holder immediately and see if they will modify your  existing loan. It’s in everybody's best interest if homeowners can continue to make their monthly payments, even if it takes a loan modification to make it happen.

 

Belmont–A Month in Review January 2009

The first month of the year is in the books as we close out the sales for January 2009 in Belmont.

Belmont Jan 2009

With 40 homes on the market, inventory is showing signs of creeping up. Looking at past January inventory levels, they typically hover in the low 20 range. Higher inventory levels usually means sellers will get less than their asking price as the supply and demand is in imbalance.

It’s always interesting for us to see why inventory levels are up. There can be several factors but they almost all have a common thread and that’s the market is slowing down.

Most buyers can easily get a loan, despite whatever impression from the media one might have. Sure you need to have a better credit score than last year, and you actually must have a downpayment now, but lenders are happy to make good loans and they’re doing so at a frenetic pace.

But if buyers are afraid that the market is tanking, or that they may be about of a job soon, they’ll sit on the sidelines and the inventory will grow.

Seller’s who think they had better get out now, or sadly ones who have perhaps already lost their job, need an exit strategy now—they can’t wait for the market values to return.

Together these factors cause inventory levels to grow and that has an inverse relationship on values.

In Belmont the median price has dropped below $900,000 for the last two months in a row; and though we occasionally dip down under $ 900K (due to a shift in the size of homes selling), one has to go back to 2004 to see the median price stay this low.

Belmont’s Beautiful Mountain Blog Revisited

 

In 2008 we began several new series on our blog site. Most of our content centered around the turbulent real estate market on the Peninsula, but we also endeavored to comment about the market in general and small town happenings in Belmont.

Some of our posts simply required too much time away from the business of selling homes, and we’ve decided to eliminate a few of those.

What we will be discontinuing is the weekly update of new listings and sales. Rather, we encourage you now to subscribe to our automated system for getting listing alerts in real time—including new listings and recent sales; we just felt that we were being a little redundant and this trade-off will allow us more time to concentrate on our business.

You can still count on getting a monthly wrap-up of homes that have sold. We feature Belmont home sales in detail on this blog site and you can always get surrounding cities and the entire San Mateo county stats at our MorganHomes.com web site under “How’s the Market”; we also implemented the Fusion style graphs that are more interactive and interesting.

We’ll continue to add occasional posts in our series “Frequently Unasked Questions” Unasked3 whenever we stumble across an issue we think you should know about, and probably don’t.

 

The Podcasts we began in 2008 will still be around when we want to discuss the market in general and we hope that you continue to stay tuned to those.Podcast

We think this more focused and succinct blog format will help our readers get the real estate information they want, and know that they can rely on our regular posts whicht have attracted the most readership.

Thanks for being patient as we enjoy an exciting 2009.

Best Dressed homes in 2008

IStock_000006475100XSmall With a nod to Carlmont High’s class of 2009 starting their first full week after winter break , and real estate just coming out of winter hibernation, we thought we’d take some of our downtime to summarize a few of our sales in 2008 and offer a big thanks to the many clients who hired us to help them get their perfect home this year.

 

Most Likely to Succeed

Hillsborough I guess you could say this Hillsborough home has already succeeded in many ways. At 10,000+ square feet it’s the largest home we’ve ever sold and at $10,990,000 it’s also the most expensive.  

 

 

 

 

What a deal though, Hillsborough3our buyer received an offer for over a million dollars more than what they paid for it a month later (they turned it down). LISTED for $10,990,000 SOLD for $10,900,000.

Hillsborough2

 

Check out the cool backyard with pool, tennis court and guest house!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Most Creative

Teredo Terrance and Patricia have grand plans for this modest home in Redwood Shores. We won this home for them in multiple offers. Plans include a two story addition which will give them views of the San Francisco bay! LISTED for $859,000 SOLD for $ 889,000 in four days. Good luck with your remodel!

 

 

 

 

Class Favorite

Laurel Everyone who has seen this home falls in love with it just like Chris and Tracey did when Chris found it online. We’d been looking for the perfect home for several years when lo and behold this estate came up in Los Gatos. Laurel2 

This has to be one of the neatest homes we’ve ever sold. Check out the outdoor entrainment possibilities with the coolest veranda we’ve seen. Laurel3 

Oh yeah, did we mention the weather down there makes outdoor dining a summer standard. Great housewarming party BTW. LISTED for $4,500,000 SOLD for $4,250,000

 

 

 

 

 

 

Best Dressed

Cape2 Hands down for Best Dressed was this home in Redwood Shores. Chris and Tracey had an amazing home which we were happy to sell. Even our stager said she wouldn’t change a thing! Cape 

Check out the rear BBQ area that's the envy of the neighborhood. And thanks to Tracy’s interior design skills, she made this an easy sell and was rewarded with the highest sale ever in their neighborhood. LISTED for $1,428,898 SOLD for $1,400,000.

 

 

 

Most Talkative

Hallamark1 Our listing in Hallmark gets the nod for most talkative since the neighborhood was abuzz when we listed it. We’d been prepping it for a month and being that it was on Hallmark Drive, it got quite the visibility. We were absolutely deluged at our open house and when we sold it in one week (in the midst of the financial melt-down) the calls were rolling in asking how we sold it so fast. Hallmark 

The answer is the seller did everything we asked of him and readied is home with professional staging and enhancements. There’s a neat video if you want to see the before and after pictures. Thanks Eiji—you were a pleasure to work  with and we are still saddened that you lost your cat one day before you moved—we’re always on the lookout for him. LISTED for $1,298,890, SOLD for $1,285,000 in about a week.

 

Thanks again for making 2008 another great year!

Real Estate re-cap–2008

Before we wrote this year’s forecast, we went back and re-read our assessment of where the market might be headed in 2008. Graphs

 

Of course very few people could have predicted that the dire real estate woes would drag the entire economy to the brink of collapse and we were no better than most.

 

However, for your enjoyment we’ve clipped a segment out of our 2008 market forecast made on January 4th 2008—and highlighted some of our more interesting comments:

 

“This is precisely why the Peninsula should fare better than other areas [in 2008]”.

 â€œHowever, it’s entirely possible we are on a precipice which could collapse at any time. What is [currently] impacting the Peninsula is the rising cost of energy—especially gasoline.”

“What could have an incalculable impact would be a prolonged recession and loss of local jobs; either of these would undoubtedly bring a decrease in home values to the Peninsula”.

In 2008, Investors eventually began to snap up undervalued properties in the central valley and a few of the nine bay area counties which were hard hit by foreclosures. This had the desired effect of liquidating the tidal wave of inventory but the undesirable effect of sinking the reported median price by skewing the sales mix to smaller homes (since smaller homes and distressed properties sell for less). The media meanwhile continued its relentless reporting of the falling median home price without appreciable application of responsible journalism. Bombarded by the media’s lack of analysis, invariably many buyers were frightened by the reports of falling home values and quite reasonably and expectedly took a “wait and see” attitude. That’s not to say the media’s information was wrong, but they do choose what to report and what to leave out and in many cases they reported numbers without the necessary perspective leading many to believe the housing situation to be far worse than it was in some areas, and far better than it was in others.

Although clearly there were several other factors which inhibited the ability of people to purchase homes—not the least of which was tighter lending standards and higher interest rates—our intrinsic evidence suggests that most credit worthy buyers on the Peninsula withheld from purchasing a home based on the fear of values spiraling down, not because they wanted to wait and “time the absolute market bottom” or couldn't get a loan.

 

Belmont–Housing Week in Review January 10, 2009

Welcome to 2009 and our weekly review of homes for sale in Belmont. This year we’ve been slow to get out of the gate with new listings. The inventory of homes for sale in Belmont is currently at 31 but that includes 29 carried over from December which didn’t sell. To give an idea how out of whack that is the average days on market (including the two new listings in January) is at 125! With the average home selling in Belmont in 2008 in 44 days these stale listings are going to need some serious price reductions in order to sell in 2009.

So we begin the year with over three months of inventory which is the same as last year but double what it has been averaging during an active market year.

Here are the only two new listings so far in 2008:

NEW LISTINGS

Palmer2 2408 Palmer Ave. 3 Bed 1 Bath 1200 Sq. Ft. home on a 5,200 Sq. Ft. lot LISTED for $749,950. This home is a little tired but with a little fresh paint and some cosmetic work it could be a fine home in a great neighborhood—just around the corner form Cipriani Elementary school and the dog park. The downside is the one car garage buy at this price it rivals homes listed on the east side near 101. We give this a BEST DEAL of the week and not just because we don't have much to choose from. Listed By Sandy Paoli, RE/MAX Today. OPEN SUNDAY 1/11 1:30-4:00

Bcr 2662 Belmont Canyon Road– 4 Beds 3 bath 2205 Sq. Ft. home on a 14,375 Sq. Ft. lot LISTED for $ 1,013,000. If this address sounds vaguely familiar it should. It was listed last year in April for $1,188,888. It received an offer when listed at that price in July but soon fell out of escrow (no we do not know why). It was lowered to $1,035,000 but never sold. It’s a nice home, though it resides on a rather steep hillside which could turn off people with small children. Listed By Christina J. Galletti, Alain Pinel Realtors. NO OPEN HOUSE INFORMATION AVAILABLE.

 

SOLD HOMES

 

As you might expect it’s too early in the new year to have many homes close escrow, and most buyers like to close at the end of the year for tax purposes, but this home slipped into 2009.

 

Lower lock2 ↑3407 Lower Lock—3 bed 2 bath 1,550 Sq. Ft. home on a 5,500 Sq. Ft. lot LISTED for $ 899,888 SOLD for $905,000. So the first sale of the new year went over asking. Nice.