The New York Times pronounces “A Chill Is in the Air for Sellers,” especially in San Rafael. In principle we agree, but based on what we know about the market, something just didn’t jibe with at least one part their article. So we did some quick fact checking. From the Times:
A house at 57 Marina Boulevard in San Rafael, across the bay from San Francisco, was originally listed at $1.45 million. The owner recently dropped the price to $949,000 when a competing house on the same street lowered its price to $959,000, from $989,000.
It’s true, the list price of the house at 57 Marina Boulevard has been reduced (in fact, twice). But the original listing price, back in March, was $1,045,000 (not $1,450,000). After a month on the market it was reduced 4.5% to $997,500, and then again by 4.9% to $949,000 last week (for a total reduction of about 9%).
And yes, a 9% reduction is noteworthy, but it’s a far cry from the 34% drop the New York Times is reporting. As far as the rest of the article, it seems right, but we’re still checking…
[Update: Rest assured, the principal in charge of proof reading for SocketSite will be reprimanded for not catching that ‘principle’ blunder…]
∙ A Chill Is in the Air for Sellers [NYT]
According to Zillow, the house was sold in 2004 for 735k and again in 2/2006 for 700k. Why do you think it lost 35k during two of the most crazy appreciation years for real estate in the bay area?
Mike – great question. We’re still doing some checking, but an initial hypothesis is that they split the lot between 2004 and 2006.
Looks like 57 Marina is two lots with separate parcel numbers…
FYI: The times published a price correction to their article two days later.