This home, located atop one of Belmont’s mountains, is the best deal of the week for several reasons. Price is obvisoulsy a major factor and this home could easily have been priced at $1,050,000 in our estimation.
It has a great location, a warm micro-climate in the Belmont hills, and a fun floorplan that exudes charm and personality. The rear yard looks great for entertaining and it’s on a huge lot too.
BTW–last week’s best deal already sold in multiple offers.
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This home wasn’t some fantastic steal of a deal but it was a really nice home. I say was because it was on tour Tuesday and has already sold. Who said the days of fast sales are over!
1612 Clee Street, Belmont
$848,500 2/1 1300 Sq. Ft.
Clee Street is a little known side street off of Chevy, another obscure street. Not many homes trade hands on either street. The neighborhood is part of the old golf course. The area was developed in the 1940’s for returning veterans after the golf course went bankrupt. It’s one of the few neighborhoods in Belmont with sidewalks and level streets making it ideal for the stroller set crowd or elderly. And of course it’s always nice to walk on over to Vivace for dinner.
So our best value vote goes to East Laurel Creek. What this home lacks in traditional architecture it makes up for in its bucolic setting. It’s situated across from Sugarloaf Mountain preserve and is more reminiscent of a Tahoe cabin than a traditional home. In fact, inside when you look out upon nothing but trees you might think you are in Tahoe.
3324 E Lauel Creek, Belmont
3/2 1700 Sq. Ft. $768,500
So there’s no garage. At $768,500 we think there’s some real value there and real quality of life living for someone lucky enough to snag this home.
Ever since we launched our foreclosure portal on our web site we’ve been inundated with inquires requesting information on how to purchase one of the many homes going to auction.
What we did not anticipate was the general misunderstanding of the process.
First, the opening bid is inappropriately referred to as the "sale price" when in fact it is more accurately the opening bid price. This sale price is what seems to attract the throngs of interested parties since it sounds too good to be true, and in fact, it is.
Buyers are asking us, "How can I purchase that home?" Of course the answer is you attend the Sherriff’s auction and be the winning bidder.
Then they ask when can they see the home? Unfortunately, the answer is not until after you buy it. 
The Sherriff’s department does not conduct home tours, nor do they perform inspections and provide buyers with illuminative reports on the condition of the home. Bidders show up with 10% of the price they wish to bid and must provide the remainder within 10 days of the auction or forfeit their deposit.
If you are lucky enough to be the winning bidder and manage to get a home for less than what surrounding properties of like kind are selling for-good. Now all you have to do is hope that when you get the keys and open the door the walls are intact, the kitchen is still there and the floors are not ruined.
Unless you are a savvy investor with deep pockets we suggest that buyers stick with more traditional methods with safeguards for purchasing a home.
This home in Daly City is the best deal we saw this week. It’s a short sale and the bank is willing to let it go for $500,000. It worth more than that, though it does need some fixing up. Last I heard there were four offers being submitted.
We thought this home was the best deal this week. It’s in a great area of the Belmont hills on the west side. Carmelita is known for having a warm micro-climate. For $699,000 this price is hard to beat. It has a larger than normal rear yard which is level–a rare find in the Belmont hills.
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Call us at (650) 508-1441 or email dmorgan@morganhomes.com if you’d like to see this home!
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Anyone who owned a home in the Bay Area back in 1989 must remember the subsequent downturn in the market. That downturn was caused by a loss of Bay Area jobs. Home values fell as jobless homeowners sought to liquidate their mortgage overhead. Companies offered out-of-state relocations packages and early retirement to employees while many others opted to voluntarily move out of state. The latest Bay Area job report indicates that for now at least we are safe from that negative market force called unemployment. The nine Bay Area county population grew 1.4% last year and new arrivals helped buoy the housing market—if not more in the rental sector than homeownership. "It’s evidence that the Bay Area is doing better economically than the rest of the state," said Mary Heim, head of the demographics research unit at the state Department of Finance, which released the new population numbers. This link http://www.sfgate.com/webdb/population/ allows you to see any city’s population growth and it’s definitely worth checking out. Whenever there is a market sell-off due to dire circumstances, such as we are experiencing now in the foreclosure arenas, prices drop. Why? Simply put in order to be the next sale you must have the lowest price and/or be the best home on the market. The housing market today is not unlike that of 1990 in that in many areas folks are forced to sell their homes and prices are dropping. But the Peninsula of the Bay Area has been fairing far better. First, there are far fewer foreclosures on the Peninsula and thus virtually no downward pressure on pricing from that market force. There’s market skepticism and a general reluctance on the part of many to enter the market; and we all know the new tighter lending practices have make it difficult to impossible for many to buy a home if they wanted to. But jobs are not one of the issues facing the Peninsula right now. If the unemployment rate rises dramatically or more simply put, if people start to leave the Bay Area (voluntarily or not)—where more people are leaving than are arriving—it could all change. Clearly a prolonged recession could have just such an impact and tip the precariously balanced local housing market in favor of a drastic sell-off. See our homepage at MorganHomes.com for monthly updated local market graphs and our blog page at Beautifulmountainblog.org for detailed market analysis and commentary.
After reading Kenneth Harney’s article titled “Tight credit hitting specialized areas of 
mortgage market†in the May 3, 2008 Real Estate section of the San Francisco Chronicle, it struck me how far we have to go to return to a more normal housing market. Mr. Harney discusses the multitude of new restrictions on home mortgages which all have one glaring similarity—they make it harder for borrowers to get a loan.
Some of the new loan restrictions affecting home buyers are:
· No more zero down financing
· No more stated income for non self- employed people
· No refinancing a property that had a cash-out refinance within the last six months
Some of the new loan guidelines for investors will also hurt the housing industry. A few of these are:
· No investor shall be eligible for loans on more than four properties in total—the prior limit was ten.
This will clearly have a detrimental effect as housing seen from an investment perspective will be effectively limited to four properties—looks like REIT’s will be getting a second life when the housing market does pick up.
What’s entirely possible is that the market may never see another feverish housing boom–the likes of which swept the country in the last decade. Home affordability is still near an historical low, lending standards have never been tighter—the huge confluence of dual income qualification for loans and higher home values is off the table as that market effect has been played out already (we did an article on that months ago called the dual income trap).
Visit our Real Estate web page for monthly updated Bay Area home sale trends MorganHomes.com
Disclaimer: This information is for entertainment purposes only and includes no legal, accounting or real estate advice nor is this intended to be specific to your situation-consult a specialist for your specific situation.
The San Francisco Chronicle just splashed more bad news about the housing industry all over the front page of the Friday (March 14th) issue. Sales are down-way down. Part of the explanation seems to be that tightening lending standards have made it hard to afford a home since qualifying at artificially low teaser rates is no longer acceptable. Stated income loans are only available for self-employed individuals and Wall Street stopped buying mortgage backed securities so rates are up too.
Of course buyers who have been priced out of the market are now waiting to jump in at the bottom, which only adds to the rapid decrease in sales activity.
Timing couldn’t have been worse for Congress to approve raising the ceiling on federally backed mortgages from $417,000 to $729,950 in the Bay Area. Many buyers considering purchasing a home are enticed to wait out the market a little more to see if rates will drop further.
So if we had a crystal ball, we’d say that when the new higher conforming loan cap goes into effect, it’s just possible that many buyers will get off of the fence. And if they all do that at the same time, there just possibly could be competition once again for housing. The biggest fear if you’re a buyer is you get in the market too early and your home’s value could go down before it goes back up; that’s a horrible position to be in if you have to sell while it’s down. The alternative is to get lucky and time it perfectly, or wait to see values going up and be assured you didn’t get the best deal. I don’t know for sure, but history tends to repeat itself and I’ll bet home values go up again sometime in our future. While everyone’s trying to guess when the bottom is not everyone will get it right.
Maybe buying before that happens would be a good idea. If rates do go down further, one could always refinance…
There are great deals to be had on appliances right now. 
Everyone knows that the U.S. economy is driven to a large degree by consumer spending. Tighter post-Christmas spending patterns create a need for stores to offer up sales and financing deals to lure consumers back to the stores. Check out Best Buy and Circuit City to see the amazing deals one can get right now!
This year with consumer confidence low, the average consumer will pull back even more. That translates into great deals for the savvy (or fortuitous) consumer who’s waited to buy. On big ticket items such as plasma TV’s and refrigerators it’s not unusual to see low or no interest rate financing options today—even free delivery.
When will these offers end? They’ll end when consumers return to more bullish spending patterns. When will that happen—of course no one knows. The only indication will be when you are no longer offered deferred or low interest finance rates and deep discounts—watch the ads.
How does that translate into real estate? Actually, perfectly. The same forces are at work and the same indicators available. You’ll know when was the best time to buy just after it passed.
Live your life.
*The information contained is educational and intended for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice, nor does it substitute for professional advice.
Median Price Methodology:
The methodology of reporting median home prices varies depending on the source. The MLS uses the aggregate method of calculating the median based on the preceding twelve month sales. We discuss why in a changing market this system is flawed at best.
Standard & Poor’s methodology is perhaps the most accurate, but it relies heavily on past sales and is therefore better suited for looking at historical trends than illuminating current market conditions. 
We employ another approach which is to examine the most recent month’s sales, and adjust for larger or smaller homes selling to help mitigate wild fluctuations in median price results.
For example, the MLS reported Belmont’s median value for 2007 to be $945,000; yet looking at the median price reported at the end of December it stood at $1,035,000; a significant difference and an overall upward trend from the previous three years.
