Will A Winner’s Curse (And Subsequent Relocation) Be Your Reward?

Nice little house, but:
– The lot is small. 1,738 sf due to it’s end-of-block location.
– No parking. You’ll have to create it if you really want it, and this means lifting the house and digging under. And with a small lot, this limits the expansion potential.
– This is Church Street. Pretty noisy at times.
On the plus side, the location is close to the best of Noe, and the close proximity the light rail will help you living without a car…

Nice digs, but I echo the noise/parking concerns.
And for $1.35M? No chance (but I’ve been wrong before). My prediction: This one drops another $125k in a month to $1.225M and sells or goes off the market and gets rented.

If only this city had alleys like where I used to live in Lincoln Park in Chicago. You had homes with beautiful street elevations and gardens for pedestrians on the front side, and the cars, garage doors, and trash cans were hidden in the rear. I hate to see all of the old homes in San Francisco loose their gardens and sidewalks to additional garage doors and driveways. Too bad there was not better planning back when these streets were built to include alleys.

G-man : I got informal quotes of $50-100K for an excavated garage (no lifting). On another property I got an informal quote of about $200k to lift and create a 2 car garage plus about 300 square feet of living space.
These are just informal quotes. It would be more interesting to hear from some who has recently completed a garage addition to get a real project cost.

“But if prices are going to drop by at least 3.5% per quarter (about 15% per year), what’s the rush?”
For SFRs. In Noe Valley.
Nope! Sorry, can’t let you get away with that level of disinformation today Tipster my man.

I would blame the neighbors to the Left for the difficult sale. Their entire home is covered in a tacky rain forest themed mural.

Let’s see, purchase price at 1.45, plus work to create a garage at 300-500K. That will bring you to 1.75M+
For that price, you can get 4148 23rd.
http://sfarmls.rapmls.com/scripts/mgrqispi.dll?APPNAME=Sanfrancisco&PRGNAME=MLSPropertyDetail&ARGUMENTS=-N935976484,-N219992,-N,-A,-N13976740

Darn, 4148 does not have a garage neither…

But 4148 23rd St has no garage, either– so it makes more sense to compare the prices of the two properties as is.

I tend to agree with Fluj that a SFR in Noe Valley is not going to hold value pretty well

WHOOPS! meant to say

and I tend to agree with Fluj that a SFR in Noe Valley IS going to hold value pretty well

The lot is 24 X 70, there’s no garage, and it’s on Church street. It is also next door to what I like to call “The Jungle Book” house. Just about all the downstairs space they grabbed would probably get eliminated if a garage were to go in. Look a this thing. If you figure that there is currently another 600 feet downstairs, and it’s actually 1700 feet or so, they’re STILL asking ~800 a foot. This is deeply problematic because the issue here is that somebody paid $1.4M for a $1.2M house in the first place.

^^^Gotta side with fluj here – he has brought up certain overvalued properties many times.
This would be one of those.

“Wait, fluj…haven’t you previously told us that San Francisco real estate is UNDERvalued? So how did overpay just three months ago? ”
That was unfair, Dude. No. I told you that that was a theory some have shared to explain the price runup. And that is the extent of what I said on the matter, macro. I have often shared thoughts on particular properties, micro. Feel free to seize upon this one C-level Noe Valley property as a real indicator if you like. Or am I putting words in your mouth, there?

“This is deeply problematic because the issue here is that somebody paid $1.4M for a $1.2M house in the first place.”
I think the bigger problem is that a lot of people paid $1.4M for a $1.2M house. They just didn’t know it at the time and were told otherwise by their agents.

1.2M?
This is a 900K home. Maybe not today, but just wait and see.

Dan,
4148 23rd is 2650SF and for 1.799M, that’ll bring us to 680/sf. Waaaayyyy less than the 1000+/sf asked for 1081 Church. even with the theory of the 600sf downstairs, it’s still way cheaper for the square footage.
And it sits on a regular size block. And it has a great view facing south (1081 Church has no real view).
And 4148 23rd is still not selling, by the way…

I’m a realtor. I’ve referred contractors and subcontractors many times for these type of jobs, I’ve put together groups to purchase properties needing these type of jobs, and I alwas ge competetive pricing from several sources. Additionally I have personally dug out a garage once myself as a homeowner. I’m fairly sure you are now inclined to say something dismissive to me about not including an architect in these processes. But I or the contractor I hire always get engineering.

But you didn’t. You called Add-A-Garage directly. They are known for being very, very expensive. You wouldn’t know that though because your context is too limiting. So you got Add-A-Garage’s bid and it lined up with what Noearch said and “ding ding ding” huh? Naaah. More like, “Bzzz. NOPE. WRONG-O.” Goooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnng! Gene Gene the Dancing Machine!

god, what a bunch of drama queens!
thanks Tipster for that in depth analysis and some very accurate assumptions. and thank you for giving me some credit. I’m not here to inflate my ego. I’m here to offer sound professional advice, cause that’s what I do as AN ARCHITECT. I know this stuff very well. it’s what I do for a fking living. and if you add $100k for permits and fees, it comes to $500k..just what I said.
and you’re right. realtors consistently underprice every kind of remodel. every time. they just dont know what the hell they are talking about. I really wish they would just STICK TO REAL ESTATE!
I dont pretend to be an expert with real estate prices, fees and procedures. I’m an architect,not a realtor.
some of them just don’t get it. bunch of drama queens, that’s what I say.:)

It doesn’t sound to me like you guys (fluj, tipster and noeache) are comparing the same type of project. If you really want to beat up fluj then perhaps you’d better get in alignment first.
Add-A-Garage is an expensive GC selection. and $100K for permits and fees? That sounds astronomical to me. So does $500K total for a garage project.
I’m in fluj’s corner on this one.

Fred,
Very good point. There’s a place up on 23rd where the owner has done just that.
http://www.mapjack.com/?eZxmW7PxbFVD
The car isn’t there, but a subcompact can fit in there.

yes, add-a-garage is an expensive solution..and dont forget, they pretty much just stick to the garage portion of a project. if the house is lifted, say, just 4 feet to gain clearance for car access..then the front stairs would be re-designed. there would be additional structural upgrade probably done to the other two levels.building and planning fees have increased a lot. figure 3%. figure arch-engineer fees (for full service) at “about” 12-15%.
thats how the numbers tend to play out. sorry if I’m not “cheaper”..I’m just not that way.:)

The following article (from September 2007) tacks the price of a garage addition at $180,000 (two-car garage UNDER a home in Bernal Heights).
The guy from Add-a-Garage was quoted as saying garage additions can range from $25,000-$1 million, depending on the project.
**************
Garages add value, stress for S.F. homeowners
Lili Weigert
The SF Chronicle
September 9, 2007
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/09/09/REK1RP397.DTL
Title insurance: A couple thousand dollars.
Property taxes: A few thousand more.
Having your own garage in San Francisco: Priceless.
Well, maybe not priceless—and not easy either, considering the drawn-out, stressful design review and permit process—but a place to keep the car is worth plenty. Jennifer Kauffman of Zephyr Real Estate says a garage can tack $100,000 onto the price of a home.
“Ever tried to get a parking space in the city?” is Jay Hemphill’s response to why garage additions are so popular in San Francisco. Hemphill and his construction crew are in the process of adding a two-car garage under a home in Bernal Heights. The owner bought the home years ago but just recently was able to justify the cost of the addition.
“When she bought this house, this was an inexpensive neighborhood,” Hemphill said. “Adding a garage would cost more than her house.” Now that Bernal Heights is hot, Hemphill estimates that the garage, which he said will end up costing about $180,000, will add at least $100,000 to the home’s value. “When money comes into a neighborhood, then it’s ‘affordable’ to put in a garage,” he said.
And Bernal Heights, like just about everywhere else in San Francisco, has become a difficult place to park.
Vandalism and personal safety also rank high on the list of why San Franciscans want garages. According to John Pollard, owner of San Francisco Garage Co., not having to worry about finding broken glass and your stereo ripped out is a definite perk.
Supervisor Ross Mirkarimi was recently quoted in The Chronicle as saying car break-ins are the “lost casualties in the war on crime,” with 43 reported break-ins per day.
Then there’s personal safety. One woman reported that her physician husband was mugged and shot while walking home after performing a late-night surgery. When he recovered, the couple added a garage to their Marina neighborhood home.
Kauffman says that more of her clients include a garage in their “must have” list, estimating that half won’t even look at a house that doesn’t have one. With higher-priced homes, she says, a garage is “just assumed.”
Fred Pavlow, whose 20-year-old company Add-a-Garage has built more than 350 garages throughout the city, agrees that garages have become critical. “Nowadays, people won’t even consider a house without one,” he says.
Depending on the project, adding a garage can cost $25,000 to $1 million.
But money tends to be the least of problems for San Franciscans who want to add a garage.
Until recently, the process was fairly straightforward. “After meeting with a prospective client,” Pavlow said, “we came back with a firm price that included the design, permits and construction.” In the past few years, though, things have changed.
“Planning decided to change their interpretation of what was allowed,” Pollard said. “Now it’s much more difficult and much more expensive to get anything approved.” Pavlow was even more direct: “They’ve made it hard, if not impossible, to get a permit.”
According to city planner Mark Luellen, garage additions came under heavy scrutiny in 2006 as part of a citywide initiative to heighten awareness of historic preservation. He attributes a lot of it to the election of Aaron Peskin, a preservation advocate, to head the Board of Supervisors. “There’s a very strong pro-preservation voice on board, which hasn’t happened in a long time,” Luellen said.
The Planning Department now has 13 planners devoted to historic preservation, many of whom have advanced degrees and professional expertise in preservation.
“We have more qualified people now,” says Luellen, “So our sensitivity and level of scrutiny has increased.”
In 2006, the department formalized the application process for adding garages, especially for buildings with historic significance. The process is outlined in the Zoning Administrator Bulletin, “Procedures and Criteria for Adding Garages to Existing Residential Structures.”
The Bulletin lists the criteria a garage proposal must meet. It also includes a separate list of criteria for residences considered historic resources, those more than 50 years old. In other words, practically any San Francisco home that was built without a garage.
The year after the Bulletin, Pollard’s company received only five approvals out of 100 permit applications. The year before, 45 were approved.
Bay windows are the biggest stumbling block. “If you have a projecting bay window that goes to the ground floor, it can be a problem,” Luellen said. “Often people try to get around this by raising the building, but the proportions for each level are usually carefully designed. Anytime you start to elongate a floor it can really throw off the composition and balance of the building.” Pollard estimates that 60 percent of the remaining San Francisco residences without garages have this problem.
Not surprisingly, most contractors aren’t happy. It isn’t that contractors are anti-preservation, but more that they see the Planning Department making decisions that encroach on homeowners’ rights to decide how they want to live.
“They take a long time with the application,” Hemphill said. “But I’m not sure they always understand. They may have gone to school and they have the degrees, but they’ve never done the work. When you’re in the field doing it, you see it in a different light.”
By the time he started the excavation in Bernal Heights, he’d secured five or six permits and done thousands of dollars’ worth of work – at which point digging out 500 square feet of packed dirt was the easy part of the job.
“If it were up to the Planning Department,” Pavlow said, “we’d all be riding bicycles.”
Adding a garage?
Some things to consider if your San Francisco home is more than 50 years old:
* “Design new garage door openings to be as unobtrusive as possible. The size of the door must be no larger than absolutely necessary, and the door design must be compatible with the existing building, but not be finished in a way that imitates the historic building.
* Detail the doors to minimize the effect on character-defining features.
* Design new garages so they are not projecting out from the front facade, nor are they recessed so deep as to appear to undermine the base of the building.”
Source: Residential Design Guidelines

Wow! I had to get the popcorn and a front seat to read these comments this afternoon!
I absolutely love the house. It has maintained it’s victorian charm and is very bright. I didn’t care for the countertops in the kitchen, and it would have been nice if the lower floor could have been done in hardwood instead of what looks like laminate. Otherwise, the house is just beautiful, although far out of my price range.

on a side note:
the house is great, I love the outside patio, and just love the deck with the glass railings.

you entertain me much more:)

tipster,
you wrote,
“But at least it provided some educational value about how one should go about getting an estimate for work like this: call an architect!”
um, sure if you want to spend much more.
remember that for this or any substantial building project you NEED a structural engineer, and a builder.
an architect is realistically a space planner-kind of like a decorator/designer. don’t believe the hype.

The Noe Valley SFR market is not a slowly declining market.
1/1/7-6/11/7 — 61 sales 821 $psqft, 1.491M sp
2008: 53 sales 840 a foot, 1.572M sp

5. When you only want to add a garage and have it conform to the existing style.

OK then, anon. Your point is that the market is tanking since March when this one last sold? This is your lead indicator, and the market is tanking since March. That seems to be your point.
Well, let’s see about that. Since March 1 2008, SFR Sales, Noe Valley:
38 sales, 810 a foot, $1.569M
Nope.

“38 sales, 810 a foot, $1.569M”
Meaningless apples-to-oranges numbers in a vacuum.
So let’s look at district 5 as a whole:
May 2007 SFR sales/median: 36/$1,457,500
May 2008 SFR sales/median: 35/$1,299,000
Those numbers don’t lie. That’s a 12% price decline in one year. Pretty close to what tipster noted above. And don’t even try to argue that the market in Noe Valley is dramatically different from the rest of district 5.

Fluj & Noearch, you crack me up.
Why is the world so black and white. Noearch is a full service shop kind of guy, needs to make a living like any other professional in the bay area and probably need to maintain an office with fixed overhead. You pay him for the whole process and you get what you pay for.
This garage job is relatively simple architecturally wise, so you can get someone competent to draw up plans and get the permits for $10K (I know such person), who isn’t going to manage your project and most likely won’t have great design insight. You can avoid the GC overhead and hire the subs directly and now a 500K project can be done for 300K. Obviously the cheaper job is risky but if you have some experience you can could get the exact same quality with a lot more time and hassle.

anon,
No one has “picked up” on your point. You don’t have any numbers that you prove that the market is sinking and fluj doesn’t have any numbers to prove that the market isn’t. Apples to apples on one property doesn’t prove a damn thing and apples to oranges across dozens of properties doesn’t prove a damn thing.

$/sf for one month or two months may not tell you that much, but with each additional month, you know a bit more. And so far, $/sf have held steady or increased or, at worst, slightly decreased, for most districts in SF proper.

“Let’s talk about district 5 as a whole.”
I was gonna say no, let’s not, because for example Glen Park has little in common with Ashbury Terrace. I was gonna say, let’s instead discuss the specific neighborhood a property in a specific thread is located in, YoY.
Then I realized your numbers are only for May. Why May? If this Church st. one sold in late March, why not at least April too?
District 5 YoY:
2007: 145 sales 1.478M 792 a foot
2008: 145 sales 1.601M 828 a foot
YoY 4/1/ — 6/11
2007: 82 sales 1.549M 809 a foot
2008: 80 sales 1.553M 816 a foot
Did you pick May because it’s the sole month that shows a decrease at all? I’d ask you to look a little closer at what it’s really showing. There were some very spendy properties last year, and the difference in number of sales is only one, 35 to 36.

ok noearch, you wrote,
“since paco’s comment was so utterly in inflammatory and well…full of bullshit..or he was joking..
i couldn’t resist commenting. his opinion about only needing an engineer and a “builder” may be correct:
1. when you just want a shit box of a building with no style, architecture or functionality.”
of course you do realize that most victorians in sf were built by using a mail order catalog set of plans. i agree that these buildings need some modernization but i don’t think they have no style,architecture or functionality.
“2. when you’re just plain cheap ass”
you got me there. i particularly love saving the outrageous fees that architects typically charge b/c
“3. when you just don’t value the services of an architect.”
i have a great real life example. my brother (full disclosure-we’re from a family of craftsmen) is adding to the back of his house in sf. 3 level addition including a bed/bath down, a kitchen and a bed/bath up. he drew up some plans (anyone can look online for lots of free/easy help on doing this), and brought them to his structural engineer. the engineer made his calc’s,
designed a tie-in to the existing structure and some footings.
next my brother hires a draftsman (from craigslist) who bangs out the plans, which are then stamped by the engineer.
he takes his plans down to cpb/dbi and gets approval.
long story short-building dept. requires a licensed engineer’s stamp, and a licensed contractor’s commitment to do the work.
they don’t require an architect (b/c they know its a fluff trade).
some people think they need decorators and space planners though, so i’m sure your job is probably still viable…

“Clearly Noe is still hot. Along with this place, 771 Elizabeth and 1556 Sanchez were also reduced today. ”
The fact that individual properties are reduced means only that they were not priced right in the 1st place. If I price a $1.5M property at $2M, I’m going to have to reduce it (multiple times). That tells absolutely nothing about the strength of the market.

“If I price a $1.5M property at $2M, I’m going to have to reduce it (multiple times). That tells absolutely nothing about the strength of the market.”
Exactly. That’s why your bulk numbers tell us nothing because we don’t know anything else about the properties.
We know this was a $1.4 million property three months ago because it sold for that. Now the exact same property is being offered for less, and has been reduced. This certainly does tell us something about the strength of the market. Can’t get more apples to apples than that.

As others have pointed out, an individual property tells us nothing. The reason the “bulk” numbers are relevant is because over time as the sample size increases, variations in qualities of property are normalized. So, over the course of several months or a year, individual variations between properties become less significant in terms of how they affect price per sf. This is relatively basic statistics.

Hellooo! Earth to SocketSite regulars (and real estate agents)! If this guy wants $1,350,000 for a house, I hope he gets it and retires, but there’s another part of me which says he may not get it until the year 2208.
What’s wrong with you people? Are you all real estate agents? If there’s a real estate boom, it’s only in your spoiled little heads!
I wouldn’t pay $1,400 a foot to live in Los Angeles, much less San Francisco, and I personally would pass on this little house–for the next 200 years, if need be.

paco, you raise a valid point. I certainly can’t argue with someone who simply lives his life on the cheap. for some people, life is all about Target and Walmart. Most of us can spot additions like your brothers a mile away. They look home-made. They look amateurish. They look “wrong”.
I have a sign in my office that basically sums up my business philosophy:
We off 3 kinds of service. You can pick any two.
1. Good service cheap won’t be fast.
2. Fast service cheap won’t be good.
3. Good service fast won’t be cheap.
have a good one.:)

Anonymous — I, for one, am not an agent. My only interest is as a homeowner (and potential future seller) in SF. If you’re not interested in owning the house (or likely any house in SF), what interest do you have in this site? Regardless of why you’re here, you can spout all you like about whether SF is affordable, but the numbers don’t lie — there has been softening in the SF proper market, but as for significant declines, those certainly haven’t happened at least as of yet.

I am not a real estate agent (the place I sold was one of my places) and I am seriously bearish on the current market even though I see still some demand in my nabe (pretty close to this precise house). I see houses that sold in the 400Ks in the late 90s that are now going for way more than 1M+ and that’s just plain insane. But some people are buying. Who’s a flipper, who’s an investor, who’s a long-time buyer, this remains to be debated.
About the median household income, you’ll have to put this into prospective with a few things that help fuel this bubble:
1 – SF is a renter’s city and a lot are rent-controlled/protected. 60% vs. 40% or even a bit more. Meaning the rent-controlled people cannot be included in the potential buyer pool. They don’t have to make as much as newcomers to live here. That’s skewing the stats a bit.
2 – Among the potential buyers, there are outsiders, either foreigners with stronger currency or Valley millionaires looking for a cool pad in town. These people are cash-rich or have a lot of leverage.
But ultimately, I agree 100%. Once the market starts correcting, the fundamentals will prevail, and that means that a majority of the people who live here (and are not rent-controlled) should be able to afford a home. By how much the prices should go down is a matter of opinion.

Why should savvy foreigners blessed with strong currencies buy in San Francisco, when they could by in London, New York, or Beverly Hills? And why would these Euros (if that’s who you mean) buy in a very weak market–or even worse, buy in a market that’s only begun to slip? (I’ll let you guess which market that is.)
As for the Silicon Valley money, if I’m not mistaken, and if I know who you mean, they want or wanted to live on Broadway, within a few blocks of the Gettys’ place in the 2800 block! Not Noe Valley, right?

Sorry, “Beverly Hills” should’ve been underlined in that post.

how does anyone know what Pacos brother additions look like? They could be undistinguishable from the rest, besides, he sounds like he knows what he’s talking about. By the same token, many of us, actually I would venture to say that most of us, do not have the construction experience and resources (brother) that Paco has. We have to hire an architect and the engineer too.

anonymous, one of the reasons that foreigners may still want to buy property in San Francisco is because even in the days of Oscar Wilde, SF had a certain cache,(people that had not been seen for a while, were said to have been seen in San Francisco, reference to the high society of the time) Having lived here for a while, I wouldn’t live anywhere else. While we are not a Capitol City, we are one unique and wonderful place to live, and affordable to many foreingers.
I’m not a bull on real estate at the moment, but this is just a hickup, after all, the rest of the nation is basically in a recession and you still see these pretty high prices. The average person in SF will not be able to afford to buy a home without some sort of assistance, windfall, sacrifice or luck, same as it ever was.

Fair enough, Anonymous. I’m just trying to understand your point of view. Do you desire to live or own in San Francisco? Clearly, you think that the housing market is going to crash in SF proper — do you believe it’s already started (the numbers I’ve seen don’t bear that out)?
You’ve also made a couple of comments that suggest that you think LA and/or Beverly Hills are preferable to San Francisco. I’m sure there are some that would agree with that, but there are a lot who much, much prefer SF over either of those places.
Finally, I’d note that the San Francisco market has always been well above other locales. Even if the SF market does retreat, it will never be in line with fundamentals seen in other markets prior to the bubble (lots of reasons for this, but remember, SF is largely a renter’s town)

Lending standards are much tighter than a year ago, and 1-year adjustable mortgages are 5/8 of a percent higher (Bloomberg data). Go ahead, roll the dice.

anon, how are you measuring the “top three markets for foreign investment”? In total dollars or dollars invested per capita? All three of those areas are FAR, FAR, FAR, FAR, FAR, FAR larger than San Francisco or even the Bay Area in terms of population.
Oh my goodness! More money was invested amongst the 20 million+ people in Southern Cal compared to the 800,000 in SF?!?!? No freaking way!

Anonchecker, of course L.A. and New York are massive compared to tiny San Francisco, but that was not my point. My point is that we need to STOP justifying housing prices in places like Noe Valley, by what someone is paying for a flat in Mayfair or Knightsbridge, the Upper West Side or Hong Kong. (Those cities are HUGE and of global importance) I know for a FACT that most foreign investors that give an consideration to Northern California real estate are far far more interested in houses on the Peninsula, than they are in old Noe Valley cottages. I have lived in Los Angeles and New York, and it is not uncommon in condo buildings in both cities to have many foreign owners who use their units part time. Sure there is foreign investment in San Francisco, but even as a percentage, it will be not enough to prop up high housing costs for a tiny old cottage without parking.

actually, I should revise:
the 16th arrondissement has million $$$ properties as well. I forget it as I rarely go there.

Like it or not, individual foreign investment in San Francisco remains more of the exception rather than the rule (see Recap: What’s The Scoop On Foreign Investment In San Francisco?). That being said, SoMa high-rises are more likely to see any benefit versus single-family homes elsewhere in the city.
And once again, back to 1081 Church…

Inspired by this discussion of 1081 Church, I’d like to point out that if you’re right that the citywide average for Paris, France is 6360 Euros per square meter, and if we still use your $1.55=1 Euro as our exchange rate, then the Paris average is not $1080 per square foot, but only $916 per square foot. That’s because there are 10.76391 square feet in one square meter, n’est-ce pas?

I wrote $916 a square foot, not $931. But if it’s gone up another $15 a square foot just within the hour, well, that must be one red-hot real estate market.

“The right to access every building in the city by private motorcar, in an age when everyone owns such a vehicle, is actually the right to destroy the city.” Lewis Mumford
A garage would utterly destroy the charm of this house.

Wow. Way too many comments here. I guess I’ll go ahead and add my $0.02 to the jar. Apologies if someone already said this.
This house is from 1906 and a garage in front would clearly be out of character with the rest of the block, not to mention the height difference with the house next door with the exact same design otherwise would look silly. End of story.
But if it were possible to get permits, over $300k for adding a garage to this property would be over-paying. I know I’m inviting flaming from the architect here; I’m one of those structural engineers with no sense of style. There is something to be said about getting the ne elevation and exterior stair right, but overall, adding garage space under an existing house is not the most architecturally sensitive design challenge. Anyway, my advice to the buyer of this property is to not hold their breath over adding a garage to this home.
To be fair, paco, the DBI requires either a licensed architect or an engineer to sign the plan for most residential. I don’t think architecture is a fluff profession and noearch is right about getting only 2 of 3 things out of your design professionals: quick, cheap or good.

thanks kaya for that support and comment. paco has already made up his mind that he de-values the skills, expertise and talents of architects. A project certainly needs a good contractor..and a good architect, along with a good client to really make it successful.
To compare the services of a good licensed contractor with an architect as an either/or is simply uninformed.
I merely make the point that all projects, large and small..let’s just say in SF…are “serious” and benefit from the expertise of an architect, and often an engineer. Yes, there are flaky and untalented architects, and they do design some of the crap we see here in The City; but good architects create good projects.
They are the projects that catch your eye, respect the neighborhood context, enhance our city, add value to a property, and enhance the owners living style, solve an often complex planning or building code issue..those projects without a doubt: come from an architect’s involvement.

i dunno but i think that noearch brings up some valid points.
he says it in a very non threatening way.
idont get why paco sounds so angry and threatened to be honest..all he says is bullsh*t without explaneing himself.

Noearch called Paco’s brother’s addition to his house unsightly and amateurish without ever having laid eyes on it.

and you, frankly,
you say,
“i dunno but i think that noearch brings up some valid points.
he says it in a very non threatening way.”
as a builder i find noearch’s following comment
” Most of us can spot additions like your brothers a mile away. They look home-made. They look amateurish. They look “wrong”.”
to be arrogant as well as ignorant. but frankly, maybe i’m just too sensitive. let’s do a test. tell me what you do and i’ll
make a similar comment…

yo fronzzz,
i’m politely questioning your unfounded claim
“They have a comprehensive background in structural engineering, building code and so on “.
i’ll bet any local builder knows more about such subjects than
99% of architects.
sorry if that sounds like a rant….

nice try fronzzz.
i’m questioning the validity of your statement above.
i just asked if you had any proof or link.
anyway, i think this horse has been beaten to death.

If it came down to $1.2M, I would probably buy it. Heck, I should probably make an offer on it.

to nvjim and rentagain,
if you are in the market to buy, now is a great time to lowball sellers. lining up financing is v. v. touch ‘n go at the moment and many sellers have seen bids withering on the vine.
most sellers will hope and hold but some really want to sell now.
if you can pre-arrange secure financing you might be able to get
the future doom/gloom pricing now.

Paco, my spouse is starting a new job, so we’re putting our search on hold for a while. I’m just gathering data for now.
Two sort-of-comps in Noe:
4077a 23rd Street is a freestanding cottage with three bedrooms, 2.5 baths. It does have one parking space, but it’s part of a 3-unit TIC. All brand new inside, and some views. Listed at 1.45 million. That seems really steep to me for a TIC.
The other is 561 Elizabeth St, which is totally unrenovated, has a slightly weird floor plan, no parking, but has a yard and 3 bedrooms/2 baths. One bath is in the basement, so maybe it shouldn’t count. Listed at $1.15 million.
Both of these are on quieter streets than Church, of course. I’m curious what people predict these will sell for.

1081 church sold for $1.325mm.
Who was the closest? and who was the blowhard?

So, it appears that I can now begin to justify not having purchase at this price-range during last years’ peak. However, a 5.5% price decline in price, with a 1% rise in mortgage rates, brings one to ___fill___in___the___b(l)ank.

Tipster was a little conservative. He predicted price drops of 3.5% per quarter early in the thread. So far, it’s about 50% worse than that. Maybe those higher mortgage rates Max2 aptly notes are accelerating things.