The New Housing Policy – Will It Repair the Housing Market?
Recently a friend and colleague, Robert Hahn, encouraged the readers of his own blog to submit posts for his upcoming 'Carnival of Housing Policy', hoping to collect thoughtful discussion around the potential changes in housing policy. I've been somewhat reluctant to participate so I'll start wit…
Read more...Goodbye Formal Living Room, Today’s Orange County New Home
New home construction has begun again in Orange County. But there are some significant differences from the standpoint of the developers, as well as the product that is being offered, and who is actually working with the home buyer. Few things are as they were during the construction boom of the…
Read more...Potentially a Decade of Recovery?
My friend, Mike Simonsen with Altos Research (they provide the charts for my 'How's The Market?' pages) was recently interviewed on the Fox Business Network, along with Anthony Sanders, Finance Professor at George Mason University. Interesting conversation, but not particularly uplifting. Simonsen indicates that it "...could be a decade of recovery. Banks have tons of homes on their books and they are reluctant to let them go at all because they have to then start doing things like 'mark…
Read more...The Housing Bottom? Not Yet
The housing bottom can be an elusive thing. Determining when we've actually arrived can only be seen in retrospect, but clearly there are some signs that indicate, we haven't quite seen the end of this housing recession. As I've said before, there are several things that have me concerned about…
Read more...Microscope on the Market – Wagon Wheel
Wagon Wheel Wagon Wheel is small community in Trabuco Canyon located off Oso Parkway not far from the south gate of Coto de Caza. The homes were built in the mid 90's by Kaufman & Broad who subsidized the original mello roos bonds making it known in part, for it's very reasonable tax rate. H…
Read more...Foreclosures Will Be on the Rise
No crystal ball needed here - we are about to see a sharp increase in foreclosures in the coming months. The foreclosure report for the month of March was recently released by Foreclosure Radar. During the final months of 2008, many lending institutions participated in a voluntary moratorium on…
Read more...Microscope on the Market – Laguna Niguel
So many of the media numbers focus on Orange County performance, but real estate performance can vary dramatically within our large county, and particularly at various price points. Today's Microscope on the Market focuses on the Laguna Niguel real estate market. Homes Under $500,000 # of Sales Short Sales Bank Owned Equity Sellers Active 119 63.9% 5% 31.1% In Escrow 71 53.5% 29.6% 16.9% Closed* 18 27.8% 38.9% 33.3% In the under $500,000 mark…
Read more...Microscope on the Market – Coto de Caza
So many of the media numbers focus on Orange County performance, but real estate performance can vary dramatically within our large county and particularly at various price points. Today's Microscope on the Market focuses on Coto de Caza. If you aren't from Orange County - yes this is the home of the infamous Real Housewives of Orange County, although I can't say that the friends that I have living in Coto are anything like the woman as depicted on that show. It's really a beautifu…
Read more...How We Got Here – Understanding Mark to Market
While many of us have a loose understanding of how the housing and financial markets contributed to our current recession, many of us are unaware of the ways that the accounting method - Mark to Market - contributed to the magnitude of the crisis. I've heard the term 'Mark to Market' before, but my understanding was loose at best. It was a blog post written by Pasadena's local expert, Irina Netchaev, that really broke it down in a way that was simple enough for me to get my head around. U…
Read more...The Hits Keep On Comin’
The other day, I mentioned my astonishment at the Housing Affordability and Stimulus Plan and how it really leaves California (the most troubled housing markets in the country) out in the cold. Then the announcement came regarding an $8,000 tax credit. Forgive me, but whoop-dee-do. While thi…
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Linsey Planeta
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