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A Novel Approach

December 15, 2008 By 4 Comments

A new listing came up last week at 231 Barkentine listed by Jeanette Cook of Coldwell Banker for $999,888. It’s a very large (3873 sq ft) home that could easily have 7 bedrooms…should you need it. The house has just about everything, including a pool and all of the work was permitted. When I first saw it come on the market the price really surprised me! Considering what’s offered here, it sure seems low.

What’s the catch, you ask? The total loans on the home are $1,275,000 and the house was appraised in October for $1,350,000. According to the listing agent, the seller won’t accept an offer for anything under $1,350,000.

Why the asking price of $999,888? It’s a novel approach to generate interest in the house and hopefully get offer(s), which then will presumably be countered at $1,350,000 if they’re lower than that. It’s an approach that I haven’t heard of before, and I think it’ll be interesting to follow this listing and see what happens. Some questions do come to mind, such as, what happens if the buyers can afford $999,888 but can’t afford $1,350,000? Like I said, it’s going to be interesting to watch this unfold. This market is certainly changing and we’re likely to see all kinds of novel approaches in 2009. This’ll probably be only the beginning.

 

Filed Under: Buyer info, Real Estate, Seller Info

Killdeer Park

December 13, 2008 By 2 Comments

Killdeer Park is a very busy one almost everyday, thanks to the fact that it’s located right next to Audobon School. It’s located between Sandpiper Ct, Killdeer Ct and Stilt Ct. It has this kind of unique sandpit with a fish sculture in it that’s pretty interesting. Nice large open grass area too. Here’s a map link:

KilldeerMapLink 

Filed Under: The Parks

Let There Be Light(s) 3

December 12, 2008 By 22 Comments

I really think this display is my favorite. It’s hard to make out all of the details in this photo but it reminds me of some of the animated store windows I grew up gazing at around this time of year. Lot’s of small moving parts, including Santa on a teeter totter opposite some frightened looking Raindeer. All this in front of a townhouse too!! It’s really clever stuff and is well worth a special trip to see it, especially if you have kids!

It’s the product of Jeff McCarty and his wife Kim Kempton and it’s located at 747 Neptune in the Edgewater Townhouses. You’ll need the map on this link above for sure if you’re going hunting for it because it’s a little tucked away and it’s not visible from any major streets outside of this project. This one may also require that you hurry to see it, as some folks from the HOA are beginning to make a fuss about these lights conflicting with the CC&R’s. I hope they’ll make it through the month. It’s really, really cute stuff!

Remember, all the rules of this contest are available to see on the bar above. Any and all comments placed in this, or any of the other “Let There Be Light(s)” posts will qualify as an entry into the drawing for $100.00 gift certificate to Turtle Bay Restaurant. Voting will also take place as to which entry (there’s 7 of them) is the best lights display in Foster City 2008. Feel free to comment early and often as each comment will be thrown into the hat. Thanks folks!!

Filed Under: Christmas Lights in Foster City

Invest O Mania

December 11, 2008 By 3 Comments

Three or four years ago an agent in my office was all excited about the idea of buying investment property in Oklahoma. He had been visiting there and discovered that you could buy a property cheaply, rent these places out and have the most amazing thing happen…you could have positive cash flow! In other words you could rent these places out for more than your mortgage payment on them. He and some partners bought 15 of them! I chickened out and didn’t join that party.

It wasn’t too much later that we were visiting some family in Peoria, Illinois where we ended up in the little rental house of some cousins. They were paying $750.00 a month to rent a small 2 bedroom, 1 bath house with a full basement. When we were leaving I noticed that a house down the street was for sale, and I walked down there and grabbed a flyer from the box on the “for sale” sign. It was listed for $34,900! I started thinking…we could advance ourselves the down payment ($6980=20%) on our Visa cards and buy this house right then and there! The principle and interest on this house, even at 6.5% interest on a loan of $27,920, is $176.47. And similar houses are renting in the area for $750.00?

Meanwhile around here it was possible to put 50% down on a property and still not have positive cash flow. The difference is that these places will appreciate alot faster. In 10 years that little house in Peoria might be worth $40,000! Honestly, I didn’t buy one of those either…but my brother in law did. The only problem was that it became a royal pain to deal with a rental property from 2000 miles away. Coincidentally, his tenants moved out in the middle of their lease, taking all of the house’s appliances with them, the same week that their property management company went out of business. To put it simply, owning investment property when you’re a long way away can be a pain.

Now, amazingly, that’s all changing. Take, for example, this 3 bedroom, 2 bath house at 84 Oceanside in Daly City that’s pictured above. This house sold in 2006 for $710,000. It’s now a bank owned foreclosure that was listed and sold for $382,900. It closed on Monday. You know what else? It’s in pretty good shape too! Click that link and check out the pics. Assuming the more stringent current lending environment forces you to put down 30% on this place and assuming you get an interest rate of 6.5% as well you’re principle and interest here is going to be $1692.36 a month. When I checked craigslist today I discovered a similar 3&2 in the same neighborhood asking $2465.00 a month in rent.

It’s been a very, very long time since this kind of investment vehicle existed in San Mateo County. You literally can get both cash flow and appreciation. I’d sure rather have my money in a home in Daly City, 30 minutes from me by car, than in Oklahoma or central Illinois (or Stockton & Sacramento for that matter). Of all these areas, which one do you suspect will appreciate better in 10 years?

I think there’s some really good opportunities out there right now.

Filed Under: Buyer info, Real Estate

Let There Be Light(s) 2

December 9, 2008 By 11 Comments

OK, I’ve managed to reduce down the number of potential winners in the lights contest to a total of 7 places. All of them are very, very good too! The photo’s will run twice a week with the last one being published the day after Christmas. All of the rules of this contest are available to view via a link on the bar above. Remember, any and all comments you make on any of these seven posts enters you into the drawing for the $100.00 gift certificate to Turtle Bay Restaurant. If you write 10 comments, or send me 10 e-mails through that link on the right hand margin titled “Ask Me”, you’ll get 10 shots at the prize. Voting will take place in the last week of the year to see which home will be crowned best lights in 2008. That homeowner will also win a $100.00 gift certificate to Turtle Bay.

Today’s fabulous light show is located at 547 Trinidad and is the product of the Cave family. It’s really fantastic and features lots of well displayed painted images. There’s a nice stream of blinking lights that descends from the roof into the front yard that makes this house stand out from a long way off. The house is a waterfront and I didn’t see it from that side, but I’ll bet it presents well that way too. Great stuff!

Filed Under: Christmas Lights in Foster City

Endangered Species

December 8, 2008 By 1 Comment

I’ll bet you thought it was extinct! No, not the winged frog above…I’m talking about the multiple offer driven home that closes escrow over the asking price. Believe it or not there are still a few of those around this area. Leading the hit parade here was George Chopoff of Re/Max Star Properties’ listing at 112 Flying Mist in Foster City that closed escrow right before Thanksgiving $12,000 over asking. That’s not all though, we also saw closings occur at 1500 Escondido Wy in Belmont ($125,000 over asking!), 42 Williams in San Carlos ($35,000 over asking), 2308 Casa Bona in Belmont ($26,00 over asking) and 751 Matsonia in Foster City ($19,000 over asking). All together there have been 40 single family homes in Foster City, Belmont, San Mateo, San Carlos and Redwood City close over asking since September 15…the day Lehman went belly up and the stock market started it’s downward slide. To be fair, there’s been 205 total closed escrows in those towns at the same time…and plenty of them closed well under asking! Still, 40 closings over asking is almost 20% of the total…that seems surprising to me.

The year end numbers are going to be somewhat painful as we examine where values are going in this area and December sure seems to be an extremely slow month, but this large number of overbids right now certainly demonstrates to me just how viable this area has been, is right now, and will be going forward.

I guess it’s not all doom and gloom after all.

Filed Under: How's The Market?, Real Estate

Sunfish Park

December 6, 2008 By Leave a Comment

Sunfish Park is my favorite neighborhood park. It’s 2.41 acres of really well manicured enjoyment. It’s got a basketball court, kids play area and a vast open green space. It’s accessible from Seahorse Court, Sunfish, Mullet and Halibut streets. Here’s a map link:

SunfishMap

Filed Under: The Parks

Let There Be Light(s)

December 5, 2008 By 13 Comments

And now for something completely different! I’m suspending the Foto Contest for the rest of the year and in it’s place we’re going to have a contest of a different kind. This time we all have the opportunity to vote on the home with the best Christmas lights in Foster City. Each Friday, and maybe Wednesday’s too, I’m posting a photo of a Foster City home that out does itself with a light display. This will include condo/townhouses as well as single family homes. Unfortunately, our camera isn’t perfect when it comes to capturing the full impact of these places, but we’re trying our best! There’s two types of winners for this contest, 1) the homeowner who created these displays and 2) you who will vote on which one’s best. How will that work? On December 29 I’ll have a post with all the choices and you can vote for who’s best. The winner of the best display get’s $100.00 gift certificate to Turtle Bay Restaurant at the Metro Center. How can you win? All persons voting will be entered into a drawing for another $100.00 gift certificate to Turtle Bay. You win and the light creator wins too! Just to make it a little more fun, since we won’t be voting until all of the photos are published, any comment you make on these photo posts will be considered an entry into the drawing. Also, if you send me a message through the link on the right hand margin that says “Ask me Something, I know stuff” I’ll consider that an entry as well…You can just say “hi” as far as I’m concerned.

It’s all a little kooky, I know, but I wanted to try something different plus I wanted to be in the spirit of the season!

This particular photo is of the house at 1101 Catamaran and it’s the product of the Klink family. They’ve really gone all out here, with lots of moving parts and Santa in a little airplane on the roof with a moving propeller! It’s great stuff! Go see it…and have a great weekend!

Filed Under: Christmas Lights in Foster City

Condo/Townhouse Inventory-December

December 4, 2008 By Leave a Comment
Street Address List Price Orig List Price DOM Status Beds Baths Bldg SqFt
720 PROM PT LN #2401 1499900 51 A 3 3 1/2 2927
720 PROM PT LN #2305 979000 999000 47 A 2 2 1/2 2224
1017 LIDO LN 890000 949000 52 A 3 2 1/2 2140
720 PROM PT LN #2302 889900 925000 52 A 2 2 1/2 2224
720 PROM PT LN #2109 889000 13 A 3 2 1/2 2264
1035 RUDDER LN 810000 38 A 3 2 1/2 1880
847 COLUMBA LN 759000 788888 73 A 3 2 1/2 1546
1127 FORRESTAL LN 759000 43 P 3 2 1530
7 BINNACLE LN 749888 794888 46 A 2 2 1/2 1730
1012 STERN LN 739000 745000 65 A 3 2 1/2 1540
1103 NIMITZ LN 735000 1 P 3 2 1350
986 CARTIER LN 727000 16 A 2 2 1260
804 CENTAURUS LN 715000 17 A 3 2 1/2 1618
625 PORTOFINO LN 712000 66 A 2 2 1395
1023 HELM LN 710000 739000 175 A 2 2 1240
1033 GREBE ST 709950 739950 119 A 3 2 1/2 1530
37 COMMONS LN 699900 24 A 2 2 1530
48 E COURT LN 699000 749000 48 A 2 2 1/2 1530
808 RAM LN 699000 719000 28 A 3 2 1/2 1618
857 CANIS LN 698000 739000 120 A 3 2 1/2 1546
885 BALBOA LN 688000 41 P 2 2 1270
882 URSA LN 669000 45 A 3 2 1/2 1546
880 MERIDIAN BAY LN #207 668000 147 A 2 2 1350
853 LYNX LN 659000 6 A 3 2 1/2 1546
1204 MOONSAIL LN 634999 649900 61 A 2 1 1/2 1350
802 JUNO LN 629888 659888 59 A 2 2 1/2 1278
880 MERIDIAN BAY LN #103 629000 669000 95 A 2 2 1350
780 SEA SPRAY LN #103 599103 599101 82 A 3 2 1499
1131 COMPASS LN #314 568000 63 A 2 2 1349
1131 COMPASS LN #303 565000 58 A 2 2 1286
840 SEA SPRAY LN #313 552000 17 P 2 2 1213
1061 BEACH PARK BL #00307 550000 585000 292 A 2 2 1286
820 SEA SPRAY LN #206 550000 638206 77 P 3 2 1535
1171 COMPASS LN #109 529000 47 A 2 2 1286
1051 BEACH PARK BL #201 505000 81 A 2 2 1349
914 BEACH PARK BL #77 499000 111 P 2 2 1087
1061 BEACH PARK BL #114 498800 43 A 2 2 1349
1025 SHELL BL #8 490000 54 A 2 2 1042
1041 SHELL BL #3 485000 35 A 2 2 1032
924 BEACH PARK BL #14 479750 497750 95 A 2 2 1060
7205 ADMIRALTY LN 439888 60 A 2 1 1/2 998
840 SEA SPRAY LN #116 439000 84 A 1 1 995
7214 ADMIRALTY LN 434000 454000 74 A 2 1 1/2 998
7209 ADMIRALTY LN 395000 25 A 2 1 1/2 998
6104 ADMIRALTY LN 272500 289900 40 A 1 1 748

Again, similar to single family, the condo/townhouse inventory has 40 active listings and 5 pending sales. 6 of them are highlighted but I noticed that 914 Beach Park just closed escrow (at $480,000). There’s also been plenty of withdrawn, canceled and expired listings in this category as well (21 actually). I can’t help but feel sorry for the folks at Promontory Point as only one unit sold there this year…and it was a foreclosure that went well under market at $750,000. There’s another, albeit larger, unit currently for sale there for $1,499,900. Interestingly, the average days on market here is 64, single family was 68.

Just like with single family, the first quarter next year will be really illustrative regarding how these values hold. It’s pretty chilly out there right now.

Filed Under: How's The Market?, What's For Sale?

Single Family Inventory-December

December 2, 2008 By 5 Comments
Street Address List Price Orig List Price DOM Status Beds Baths Bldg SqFt Orig List Date
100 FLYING CLOUD IS 2100000 2275000 117 A 3 3 3382 8/6/2008
813 GRENADA LN 1948888   35 A 5 3 1/2 2780 10/27/2008
159 FLYING MIST IS 1880000 1980000 161 A 5 3 1/2 3691 6/23/2008
610 BAINBRIDGE ST 1499000   11 A 4 2 1/2 2790 11/20/2008
982 FLYING FISH ST 1488000   54 A 5 3 1/2 3000 10/8/2008
602 PORTSMOUTH LN 1450000 1498000 122 A 5 2 1/2 2540 8/1/2008
330 SAILFISH IS 1398800 1398800 48 A 4 2 1/2 2457 10/14/2008
710 SOMERSET LN 1338000 1439000 176 A 4 2 1/2 2700 6/8/2008
365 THATCHER LN 1338000   78 A 4 2 1/2 2550 9/14/2008
602 SOMERSET LN 1330000   59 A 3 2 2340 10/3/2008
602 CORNWALLIS LN 1299950   11 A 5 3 1/2 3130 11/20/2008
350 STAYSAIL CT 1299921 1399931 87 A 4 3 2250 9/5/2008
650 CAYMAN LN 1299000 1357000 63 A 3 2 1/2 2300 9/29/2008
116 GOLDHUNTER CT 1299000 1350000 29 A 5 3 1/2 2600 11/2/2008
711 TENDER LN 1249000   8 A 3 2 1/2 2300 11/23/2008
618 GREENWICH LN 1190000   15 A 3 2 1/2 1800 11/16/2008
201 SPINNAKER ST 1188888   50 A 5 3 2560 10/12/2008
112 BARKENTINE ST 1168000 1235000 116 A 4 3 2360 8/7/2008
127 FLYING MIST IS 1150000 1335000 199 P 3 2 1820 5/2/2008
1112 HALSEY BL 1150000   125 A 3 2 2030 7/29/2008
1194 ESSEX LN 1095000 1275000 140 P 3 2 1/2 1790 6/14/2008
811 LURLINE DR 1095000   15 P 4 2 1/2 2670 8/18/2008
701 RANGER CI 1058000   94 A 4 2 1/2 2190 8/29/2008
1290 RIBBON ST 1050800 1178800 104 A 5 2 2010 8/19/2008
411 PORT ROYAL AV 1025555 1095000 28 A 4 2 1950 11/3/2008
517 SAINT VINCENT LN 999000   47 A 3 3 1520 10/15/2008
198 BOOTHBAY AV 999000   11 A 3 1 1/2 1620 11/20/2008
1387 TARPON ST 969000 998000 52 A 4 2 1950 10/10/2008
1181 MARLIN AV 965000 995000 80 A 3 2 1890 9/12/2008
226 SANDPIPER CT 915000   38 A 5 2 1930 10/24/2008
300 BODEGA ST 899999 939888 48 A 3 2 1280 10/14/2008
1659 BEACH PARK BL 850000   4 P 4 2 1890 11/2/2008

 

 Well things have certainly changed, no doubt about that.  27 single family houses listed in Foster City with only 4 pending sales. The pending sales are highlighted in red type. Interestingly, there’s also been 11 houses come off the market either through cancelation, expiration or withdrawl since September.  19 out of 31 have experienced price reductions at some point during their listing lifespan. Also interesting is the fact that only one of the pending sales is on a listing priced over $1,100,000…while 19 listings are priced over $1.1mil. Average days on the market right now are 68 days. That’s not really long if your house is listed in most other parts of the country, but in Foster City and on the Peninsula that’s a really long time. As in most of the other Peninsula communities right now, the price range over $1,300,000 is really, really  slow. It hasn’t really started yet but I would expect some significant reductions in those prices in the future. 2009 is going to be very interesting and the first quarter in particular will be very important in determining where values will go.

To put things in perspective a little though, I’m showing a house in Half Moon Bay this afternoon that came on the market a year ago, in a great location, for $1,650,000. It’s come down in price several times and yesterday it reduced to $1,100,000. Foster City hasn’t experienced anything like that…so far.

Filed Under: How's The Market?, What's For Sale?
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