About a year and a half ago I wrote a post about bad mls photos and I thought it was time for another. I swear, there sure has been a glut of really bad photos of homes in the MLS lately! Maybe it’s becasue of all those short sales? It always seemed to me that an agent took photos of their lsitings to show off those properties. A photo is supposed to put a home in it’s best possible light…at least that’s what I thought. Below are some goodies from homes on the Peninsula currently on the market. They’re amazing to say the least!
Ummm…what’s for sale here?
I guess it was a tad too much work to move those boxes?
Nice shot!…of the screen!
Maybe if it was in focus?
See, the idea is to make the room look as large as you can…
What’s with all these TV’s being on? Hey, is that ESPN?
Any chance we could take last night’s dinner off the counter during the photo shoot?
Maybe there’s no bedding available?
Now really, can any of you imagine exposing your home to the marketplace like this? It’s hilarious…
So, I’ve had this very interesting experience so far this year. I had a couple of listings in Foster City that sort of experienced a feeding frenzy and then followed those up with a listing in Daly City at a project called Pointe Pacific. The interesting part is the fact that although Foster City is only 19.5 miles from Daly City…it really is worlds apart when it comes to real estate values and sales.
Believe me, I’m in no way bashing Daly City. My listing at Pointe Pacific is adorable, the project is immaculately kept and many of the properties there have some of the best views I’ve ever seen. It’s just that there’s a dramatic difference in the market activity from there to here. Particularly when it comes to condos and townhouses.
On Tuesday I wrote that post about overbid activity around here and the fact is that since January 1 26 condos/townhouses have sold in Foster City in prices ranging from a high of $788,000 to a low of $396,000. Only 2 of those are short sales. There’s 33 active listings in Foster City right now too. During the same period of time in Daly City there have been 23 sales, but 16 of them have been short sales or foreclosures. The highest priced unit to sell was $415,000. 21 of them are actually under $400,000. 16 units are actually priced under $300,000.
If my Point Pacific listing was in Foster City at $399,000, (that’s our price in DC) we would have gotten 7 or 8 offers on it easily and it would have sold in the first week. In Daly City, we have the most upgrades of the 6 units for sale in this project and we also have the lowest price…and nothing in 30 days. Strangely, we’re at the upper end of the market at Pointe Pacific. Can you imagine the upper end of the Foster City market at $400,000? Can you also imagine 2/3 of the pending sales in Foster City being short sales of foreclosures? (For those of you that can imagine this…read Tuesday’s post!)
I guess what it all means is that real estate is an incredibly local business. Drive a few miles and the whole thing can very easily change.
Here comes a rant. The title above implies a joke is coming…it is! In September I wrote a post about the difficulty of buying a single family house using an FHA loan. Hilariously, I thought that was difficult! Silly me! Wait until you see what it’s like buying a condo around here using FHA!
Here’s the thing, up until about a year or so ago FHA didn’t really exist around these parts. The mortgage meltdown and the pounding that Fannie and Freddie took brought about a new era of lending to folks who had less than 20% down and the burden of that fell onto FHA. FHA backed loans are possible for all of those folks, but if you’re a buyer and you have less than 10% down you’re certain to need an FHA loan. It’s certainly understandable that FHA would have strict criteria since the risk is greater with buyers who have 5% or less down. Often the process is daunting to say the least to qualify for one of these loans. The appraisals, for one thing, are much more rigid than conventional loans and often seem to be more like inspections. If there’s an outstanding problem the deal could easily be at risk. Consequently, many listing agents are fearful of buyers with FHA loans since the risk to their seller is so much greater. If a seller has a choice between a buyer with a conventional loan and one with an FHA loan they almost always take the conventional buyer.
Well, we now have a new and more painful twist. For condo/townhouse buyers, FHA prefers to loan on projects that are approved in advance by them. Since FHA is almost new to this area there are very, very few projects that have gone through their process and have been approved. In Foster City, Marina Point is the only approved project. In Redwood Shores, none of the projects have been approved. It’s like that in most of the Peninsula communities…and why not? FHA is new to the Peninsula…their approval was never important before.
FHA has, up until now, allowed a “spot” approval process that made an exception for condo and townhouse projects that were not on their official list and thus local buyers with less than 10% down could actually purchase a home here. As of February 15, however, FHA has scrapped the “spot” approval program. If you want to buy a condo at the Admiralty, or a townhouse at Nantucket Cove for example, the whole project will need to go through the approval process before you can close. Depending on who you talk to that could take months…if they do it at all. I also heard today that the process will require that HOA’s change their master insurance policies to cover interior walls…a level of coverage that hasn’t been required before.
What does this all mean? I’m thinking it could mean that FHA is taking first time condo/townhouse buyers with less than 10% down out of the marketplace all together. It means that if you have a condo at the Admiralty and want to sell, the pool of prospective buyers just got alot smaller. If you’re a seller and an offer comes in with an FHA loan, why would you want to consider it at all? If this insurance issue is correct, why would any HOA want to be approved at all? It also means that if you’re a buyer…you better save enough for a 10% minimum down payment so that you can qualify under a conventional loan. For what it’s worth, here’s a website that allows you to check, by town or zip code, approved condo/townhouse projects. If it shows “error” that means there are none in that area.
If you’re looking for a way to exercise your skills, or lack of them, in the area of patience you need go no further than attempting to purchase an REO (foreclosure). There’s plenty of things in life less frustrating…like waiting in line at Starbucks or the security screening thing at the airport, or going to the DMV to renew your drivers license. Think those are fun? Wait until you buy a foreclosure, or worse yet, a Short Sale!
Just for the purpose of brevity, we’ll only discuss the REO process here today. Mostly because I think I’ll need medication to discuss the short sale process! A home gets listed as “bank owned”. It’s looking good at a discount price and even though it needs work of some kind, it’s going to get offers. The listing agent sets an offer date which is published in the MLS and encourages you to meet that deadline and requires you to be approved by one of their reps as a condition of offer presentation. Sometimes the bank offers you some kind of rudimentary disclosures, maybe their rules for REO sales, maybe some HOA docs if it’s a condo/townhouse…or maybe they give you nothing at all.
A fairly new trend is for the listing agent to state openly that phone conversations are not OK. Any and all questions or communication needs to be done via their assistant and only by e-mail. Sounds friendly, huh? So, you present the offer…and you wait. After 2 or 3 days the lender comes back with a boilerplateish kind of document that essentially asks you to raise your offered price. Technically, it’s their request for you to come back to them with your “highest and best” offer since they are now letting you know officially and in writing that they have multiple offers. They’re also letting you know that they reserve the right to continue to look at offers even though your now way past their published deadline for offer presentation.
OK, you sign this document, and maybe you sweeten the pot for the lender too. At this point do you know what happens? You wait some more. The bank also is OK with collecting more offers if they can, possibly rendering your “highest and best” irrelevant again (who knows?). After a week of stage two waiting, you hear (if your lucky)that you’re the winner. At this point you’re sent a 14 page addendum telling you, among other things, that the bank is still OK marketing this place and booting you out of first position at their discretion. They also want you to sign a clause that has you agree to pay them a fine of up to $350.00 a day if you are late closing the escrow. If you agree to all of that you probably will get the home. Maybe.
Doesn’t it sound fun? Then you get to inspect the property and find out all the details that the bank has so far not provided you. Like I said, buy an REO or hang out at the DMV? Hmmm….
There’s two very important reasons to watch this FCTV video highlighting the most recent City Council meeting. First, because it’s possible to see our good friend, perennial Blog participant, and Foster City’s new Finance Director Steve Toler wearing a nice dress shirt and a tie. I told him I’d refer to him here as a stud, but I promised not to go that far, so let’s just say that he’s looking “studly” and be good with that. Secondly, and possibly of slightly greater importance, is the actual content of what he’s saying. In a nutshell, the City’s finances are in pretty darn good shape. There’s actually a significant reserve and financially Foster City is a very well managed community.
It also means that if you live in Foster City you’re pretty spoiled to tell you the truth. Many of Foster City’s sister communities here in the Mid Peninsula are not even close to the position that FC finds inself in right now. Let’s take a look at San Carlos for example. San Carlos is quite possibly the most coveted community in the area. It’s shown wonderful growth, it’s schools rank well (though not as good as FC’s) and it’s downtown has become a Mecca for shopping and dinning. I like San Carlos, don’t you? Guess what? Because of severe budget shortfalls the Parks and Rec department have recommended that 6 parks be closed by July 1 of this year. Not only that, the plan is to actually fence off these parks to prevent their use.
Sound bad? That’s not all. It’s also recommended that the youth center be closed for 10 months out of the year. The other two months will be open only for revenue generating activities. In addition all off season sports will end. Spring soccer, fall baseball and softball will receive no field time at all.
Imagine this scenario in Foster City. Catamaran and Boothbay parks closed…and fenced off! Not only can you not use the fields but the tennis and basketball courts are off limits too. Ketch, Turnstone, Killdeer, and Sunfish Parks closed as well. The Vibe closed for 10 months out of the year. Half Moon Bay, San Bruno and Millbrae are a mess too for what that’s worth…and their restaurants aren’t as good as San Carlos either.
No matter where you live it’s not uncommon to hear some bashing from time to time of local government. In my opinion at least, Foster City has done a remarkable job in managing it’s financial situation and they should be commended.
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.
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.
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.
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!
Jim Minkey 
Anurag 
kavita 
Colin 
Shrikant 
SteveTinFC 
carol 
I guess it was a tad too much work to move those boxes?
