In the last couple of weeks I’ve had multiple clients inform me that they’ve read that the market is slow. They’ve been informed that the January sales numbers were bad both in the Bay Area as well as Nationally. I’ve also heard that a variety of  websites have proclaimed that the local market is struggling to reach the 2004 level in it’s home values. I’ve heard that continued price erosion is inevitable and that 2010 is supposed to be as bad as 2009 was. Of course (and ironically) those same clients have, and are currently, participating in making offers on homes being overbid.

Here’s the funny thing…it doesn’t square with my own personal experience. I could look at numbers and statistics all day long and still be confused.  Having said that, the only really meaningful barometer about the health of this market to me is 1) is my phone ringing and 2) what’s my personal experience representing clients right now.

The answer to the first one is YES, it’s ringing. On fact, I’m probably as busy personally as I’ve ever been. I have as many active buyers that I’m currently showing homes to as I did at the peak in 2005-06. Here’s the thing…I don’t really think I’m all THAT special. If my phone is ringing, there’s lots of other agents who’s phone is ringing too. I KNOW the market is WAY, WAY better in 2010 than it was last year from that fact alone.

How about the day to day experience? Unfortunately, My clients and I are not simply waltzing in and ratifying on home after home. In fact, almost every offer I’ve written this year has been as a part of a multiple offer scenario. Here’s a few of some sales that have involved multiples so far this year:

572 Nottingham Foster City

1121 Catamaran Foster City

18 Dory Lane Foster City

606 Pavo Lane Foster City

733 Celestial Lane Foster City

9 E Court Lane Foster City

17 E Court Lane Foster City

813 Tamarack San Carlos

124 Northam San Carlos

3404 Fernwood San Mateo

3382 Marisma San Mateo

650 Celestial Foster City

1002 Gull Foster City

1599 Beach Park Foster City

105 Wilshire San Carlos

1822 Bayview Belmont

These last three didn’t have pics, sorry.

I’m sure there’s lots more listings that have experienced, or are right now experiencing multiple offers in 2010. It’s just that the above listings are the ones that I personally have been involved with. Too bad we didn’t get them all!! I have absolutely no doubt that there’s plenty of others that have gone multiple too, don’t you? These two facts are the only real barometer as far as I’m concerned. I don’t care what statistics are published. If my clients can write an offer on a property, come in $30,000 to $50,000 under asking with no competition and get the place I’ll write about it here all day long. Unfortunately that wouldn’t be true…the market is pretty darn hot as far as I’m concerned.

OK, I know it’s early but 2010 sure seems to be off to a good start…at least if houses selling is of interest to you. It’s probably not that good of a start if you wanted more significant price erosion. It’s just that it seems like every house I’ve shown since the first of the year has gotten multiple offers. In one case, I had a client interested in a little foreclosure at 960 3rd Ave in Redwood City that got 20 0ffers last week. That’s a pretty good turn out if you ask me.

What really surprised me was my own listing at 18 Dory Ln in Nantucket Cove in Foster City. My clients and I had contemplated listing it last fall but for several reasons decided to wait until this month to put it on. The townhouse category had shown improvement but it still was fairly sluggish. Other similar floor plans to ours had sold at Nantucket Cove last year for less than ours was going to list at ($748,000) and while I had hoped that 2010 would bring some energy I was a liitle concerned.

It came on the market last Friday afternoon, by Saturday morning I had an agent who had written an offer. I told him I wasn’t looking at offers until Tuesday…and on Sunday at the open house I had 80 to 90 people. By Monday afternoon I had handed out 14 disclosure packets. We looked at offers on Tuesday afternoon and we had 7 of them. Four of them were over the asking price. Needless to say, the sellers and I were very happy. There’s very little doubt in my mind that this outcome would not have happened if we had listed in November.

I recall other sluggish markets, the fall of 2001 comes to mind, where the market shifted from asleep to fully awake virtually overnight right after the first of the year. 2009 was a difficult and frightening year for many people. There had to be demand that’s been pent up. For now at least, it sure feels to me like the market is moving forward. Of course it’s way to early to crown the market back again…but we’re off to a good start.

How about this category…

MOST EXPENSIVE CONDO/TOWNHOUSE:

740 Promontory Point #3209 And you thought it was impossible to make money in this downturn? This place was a foreclosure and sold in November 2008 for $750,000. It sold again in March of 2009 for $880,000. Nice!

HIGHEST PRICE PER SQUARE FOOT:

1040 Galley This Bayfront Court unit sold for $750,000, or $521.00 per square foot. The Promontory Point unit above came in at $388.00 per square foot.

LOWEST PRICED CONDO/TOWNHOUSE:

2109Admiralty This 1 bedroom unit went for $310,000…an overbid. Originally listed for $299,000.

LOWEST PRICE PER SQUARE FOOT:

720 Promontory Point #2302 2224 square feet and a purchase price of $635,000. It’s amazing how prices have fallen at this project. It came in at $285.00 per square foot.

LONGEST ON THE MARKET:

Yep, 720 Promontory Point again. A total of 284 days.

GREATEST OVERBID:

857 Canis This place really was an aberration. Sold via auction and priced at a really low, bait price of $300,000…the place got a ton of interest and closed at $564,500. $264,500 over asking. There were several other, normal overbids in 2009…the highest of those was $20,000.

GREATEST AMOUNT UNDER ORIGINAL LIST PRICE:

It’s really sort of painful isn’t it? Once again…720 Promontory Point!  It sold for $290,000 under it’s original list price. Ouch!!

And there you have it…I wonder what these will look like in a year.

I did this last year and it was kind of fun and illustrative…so here we are again.

MOST EXPENSIVE HOUSE:

700 Santa Cruz Wonderful house on a large waterfront lot at Longwater. 3800 sq ft in the house too. It sold for $1,599,000 and closed in November.

HIGHEST PRICE PER SQUARE FOOT:

602 Mystic Another nice waterfront, it came in at $672.00. Mystic must have had something going on in 2009…612 Mystic came in at $662.00.

LOWEST PRICED HOUSE:

398 Chesapeake This foreclosure, a really clean nice house too, came in at $750,000 in June. Last years lowest was $825,000.

LOWEST PRICE PER SQUARE FOOT:

248 Curlew This 3560 sq ft 5 bedroom house sold for $1,065,000…or $299.00 per sq ft.

LONGEST ON THE MARKET:

159 Flying Mist This home was on the market for 320 days. It’s also the winner of another category listed below.

GREATEST OVERBID:

1402 Leeward Interesting that all of the overbids took place in the range under 1 million. This house sold for $56,000 over asking. There were others…this was the highest.

GREATEST AMOUNT UNDER ORIGINAL LIST PRICE:

Once again…159 Flying Mist This place had the dubious distinction of reducing it’s price a total of $550,000 during it’s listing life before it ratified.

Nothing real scientific here…but it’s kind of fun to look at.

While we’re looking at the numbers, let’s also take a peek at the condos/townhouses. Strictly from a numbers standpoint, we’re looking pretty good here too.

2008 FC Condo/Townhouse DataPDF
2009 FC Condo/Townhouse Sales

In 2008 103 condo/townhouse units sold in Foster City…in 2009 100 sold.

In 2008 the average sale price for a condo/townhouse in Foster City was $637,436…in 2009 it was $633,787. Incredibly, less than 1% off of 2008’s number. Pretty decent!

Average days on the market went from 55 in 2008 to 65 in 2009. It’s worth noting that there were several properties that sold in the first week as well as several that took well over 200 days to sell. It was that kind of year. If a property was priced correctly the chances were pretty good that it was going to sell reasonably quickly.

It’s also worth mentioning that, for both condo/townhouses and single family homes, the first part of 2009 was glacial. It was incredibly slow and very little inventory was moved. That’s why it’s so remarkable that both categories ended up at 100 units sold. The second half was really pretty decent and normal. It certainly seems like another reasonable assumption that 2010 will be pretty healthy. I’m betting the numbers will be better than 2009’s for sure. We’ll see…

Seems like in the last few years it’s been a little tense when it comes time to look at the year to date numbers because my teeny little pea sized brain suggests that I’m sure to see a whole lot of bad news. Last year I did this same report…and it really wasn’t that bad! Well, certainly that could not have been the case for 2009…after all almost nothing sold in the entire first quarter. Right? How about we look at the actual numbers.

2008 FC Single Family DataPDF

2009 FC Single Family Home Sales

Just in case you don’t really want to wade through those actual numbers let me offer you the highlights:

In 2008 there were 95 single family homes sold in Foster City. In 2009 there were 100! In 2007…there were 100 too! Hmm…

In 2008 the average sale price of a single family home was $1,112,816, in 2009 it was $1,020,717. (-8.3%) Since the average sale price in 2007 was $1,157,960 it would appear to me that the total decline in the last two years has been about 11%. For what it’s worth, the 2007 number reflects the all time high in average sales price. That’s really pretty darn good in my mind versus the vast majority of the Bay Area…not to mention everywhere else!

One area where there was a clear change (just ask any realtor you know!!) was the average days on the market for a given listing. In 2007 it was 32, 49 in 2008 and 65 in 2009.

Bottom line here is the simple fact that we had 100 sales in what was certainly a down year bodes very well for sales in 2010. It seems unlikely to me that it will go down from there. My prediction is that it’ll be a normal year, many good deals will bring multiple offers and I’m suspecting we’ll have some price appreciation when all is said and done. Anyway, we’ll have to wait and see about that. Should be fun at least!

As I was contemplating the inventory in Foster City the other day it sort of struck me how many new listings there have been in the past few weeks. To me, at least, this seems sort of unusual since December traditionally is a much slower month in this business. I know that I personally have encouraged my clients to wait until January to list. My experience has been that folks sort of go into hibernation mode at this time of year and home shopping sort of takes the back burner to all the rest of the family stuff and other types of shopping that happens now.

What do I know! No less than 9 homes have come on the market in the last 10 days and a couple of them are worth mentioning…even if it’s only to judge just how asleep the market is right now. Both of them are tremendously good values.

1297 Swordfish listed by Laura Bertolacci of Re/Max Today for $776,000. This 3 bedroom house is actually in pretty good shape considering this price. It does have a pretty large foundation problem  but it’s priced accordingly. It should sell quickly.

851 Canis Ln listed by Peggy Ledoux of Cashin Company for $599,000. This 3 bedroom townhouse is an absolute steal! It’s gorgeously remodeled and it’s priced very competitively. I’ll be shocked if it makes it through the week.

Like I say, these two will tell us just how sleepy this market is. Having said all that…I thought it might be interesting to see how it compared to December of 2008. It really is a night and day difference! A year ago there were 27 single family homes listed and only 4 pending sales. Only 1 pending was listed at $1,100,000 or more. Today there are 19 active listings and 15 pending sales! On top of that, 8 of them were listed at $1,100,000 or more. On top of all that, in December 2008 there was a ton of fear. That has abated considerably from last year.

As for condos/townhouses, last year there was 40 active listings and 5 pending sales. Today there are 34 active listings and 18 pending sales. Just think what it would be like if those new listings hadn’t appeared in the last 10 days! It’s safe to say that at least two of them won’t be around by the end of the month. There really is a huge difference, across the board,  year to date.

It’s long been assumed that there is definite seasonality in the real estate market. Every year since I’ve been doing this, things sure seem to slow down right about this time. Typically, folks who are thinking of selling figure they may as well wait until after the new year because the thought of having people visiting their home and holding it open on weekends at the same time they’re planning to receive guests for the holidays doesn’t exactly seem too appealing. Consequently, the market has always seemed to go on a bit of a hiatus in November and December. Usually, this hiatus is really obviously manifested in my office as visits from vendors and attendance by other agents slows down considerably. Lot’s of folks just sort of emotionally check out and come back to life again in January.

2009 has been the weirdest of weird years. Most of us didn’t sell anything until May or so…and then it got very busy! Every escrow was like pulling teeth and the stress level was extremely high. Consequently, I’m kind of liking the idea of slowing down right now. Here’s the problem…I’m not sure the market is cooperating in our usual thinking! Every offer I’ve written in the last month or so has been one of several. Honestly, I went to the Cashin office in San Mateo today to pick up a disclosure packet and discovered that I was one of 8 packets that had gone out on this particular listing this week! So much for slow down! I’ve been hoping that my buyers would have some opportunities during the next month and a half! I’ve heard no less than 9 multiple offer stories in the last 2 weeks alone!

Maybe I’m most bummed because I was sort of looking forward to writing blog posts and coasting the rest of this year. Oh, well!

It sure is remarkable how different the market is right now versus 6 months ago. As I’ve mentioned before, in February there were over 40 single family homes listed  with 3 pending sales. Today there are 20 active single family listings and 9 pending sales. One sort of interesting aspect to these pending sales are the fact that 4 of the 9 are over $1,195,000…all recent sales too. Even more dramatic is the condo/townhouse category with 24 active listings and a whopping 31 pending sales. It’s clearly a turnaround.

Of those single family actives there’s a few that are really interesting and are worth a look.

831 Schooner listed by Jan Majeski of Alain Pinel for $1,138,000. I don’t know what it is about Jan, but she always seems to list spectacular, updated, drop dead gorgeous homes! It’s sort of weird actually! Just once I want to see Jan list a fixer upper…please! This house is really, really nice.

728 Ranger listed by Bernard Accristo, Broker for $1,088,000. This is a pretty interesting house with sort of a fun addition. Sort of modernish. Definitely worth a look.

1402 Leeward listed by Joan Flood of Alain Pinel for $799,000. A single family house, not an REO, at Antigua for under $800,000. OK, it’s only 1470 square feet but that sure seems like a good price to me. I have to admit that anytime I see photos online that don’t include any interior shots I get a little nervous. Still…

839 Lurline listed by yours truly for $1,319,000. OK, it sold already…but it’s my listing and I get to tout it! Plus…it’s gorgeous and it’s on the wide water! (See above pic!) I guess Jan Majeski isn’t the only one who get’s wonderful listings!

It really is a whole new ballgame…homes are selling again!

So, what the heck is this market really doing? Sometimes it seems like it’s doing everything! Foreclosures (REO’s) are getting an incredible amount of interest and in many places it feels just like 2004. In the northern part of San Mateo County it seems like everything that comes on the market that even looks like a discount is getting multiple offers. Who would have thought that Daly City would ever be a hotter market than San Carlos?

Here’s how it seems to be breaking out to me. If a property (single family)is priced below $550,000 you can probably expect a ton of interest. In some areas there’s multiple offers on homes that are listed below $700,000! I wrote an offer on a house at 420 31st in San Mateo on Friday that got 3 offers and went over the asking price…it’s a 2 bedroom, 1 bath houses and was listed for $699,000. I think single family homes in these lower ranges are in real demand. In most of their price ranges FHA loans are available for buyers who have less than 20% down and that’s adding fuel to the fire. I also think that prices have already gone up in many areas from where they were in January or February.

That’s not, however, the case with condos/townhouses in the same price ranges and alot of that may be because of high HOA dues. I’ve had many clients balk at the notion of $450.00 plus dues this year. They would rather have a house.

It’s also not the case with single family in the Jumbo loan ranges. If your house is priced at $950,000 or more, for example I’ll bet you’re experiencing things at a much slower pace. The higher the price…the slower the market.

I think the market is much, much healthier than it was a few months ago…but it’s still not back yet. Yes, I do think that prices have come back to a very great degree in many areas. Demand has certainly come back in most of the Peninsula too, but I think there’s still room for price erosion in the range over a million dollars and in condo/townhouses that have HOA dues over $450.00 a month.