Last month 10 Fernwood Drive was listed as a “Pre-Foreclosure Opportunity” with an asking price of $1,650,000 (purchased for $1,750,000 in May of 2004). Today, the single-family Monterey Heights home is bank owned and “coming soon.” Would that be a fourclosure?
∙ Four Years Of District 4 Equity Yet Pre-Foreclosure After Four Months [SocketSite]
∙ Monterey Heights Single Family Home – Bank Foreclosure [Craigslist]
You have to love craigslist. I think it is a great indicator of the market. Read some of todays’ postings. Some sellers are sounding desperate. “Seller offering to pay huge credits.”
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/reb/833860429.html
I also love to watch the mls listings that fall off and become rentals. http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/apa/833764031.html
This property was listed for over 30 days, and now, the rental listing is getting moldy. http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/apa/830290696.html
Its a buyers market! If buyers only had money…
Is it a house or a garage with small house attached?
No surprise that this one slid into foreclosure. They really had no serious interest when it was listed at $1.55M as a short sale as of the middle of June (when I visited and talked with the agents).
My guess is that this will fetch around $1.45M. The listing info is not right as regards square footage – it’s 3,030 or so, so the asking price is in the mid-$500 range, which is too much for that spot (I lived around the corner for 6 years, so I know the neighborhod well).
The housegamblers who bought this place in 2004 put down a hefty dowmpayment (like about $300K), but the agents told me that they HELOC’d some back out in order to do some remodeling (looks like they added an island to the kitchen and maybe some wallpaper/updating in a bathroom). I hope for their sake that they took ALL their chips off the table before this one blew up!
Where is fluj?
fluj flamed out
Within 35 minutes of the first mention on SS of this 10 Fernwood property that showed a DECLINE since 2004 (perish the thought!), fluj was IMMEDIATELY on here trying to explain it away, and of course giving inaccurate information that he never bothered to verify:
“Apparently the buyer of the Fernwood property paid $1.725M, that’s 850 a foot, in 2004! Ouch. The neighborhood has averaged 584 a foot over the last two and a half years.” (see Posted by: fluj at July 7, 2008 12:12 PM, and the immediately preceding post by Dude)
https://socketsite.com/archives/2008/07/foreclosure_activity_in_san_francisco_as_mapped_by_trul_1.html
Um, the buyer paid about $577 psf foot in 2004 (major prior renovations had created a pretty nice and large space on the first level), but what’s a difference of 32% in psf costs when you have a point to make!
BTW, fluj gave similarly incorrect information in that very same paragraph about 835 Foerster. EXACTLY the same mistake, and for the same reasons.
Just sloppy, or deliberately misleading?
Now that fluj is gone (and no ghost of fluj has reappeared), there’s no reason to get into it all again, but in fact on MOST of the properties in District 4 that fluj ever challenged me on, he gave incorrect information, and then got all defensive and started calling names when this was pointed out to him. I stopped listening to anything he said when he started going on about how the five houses on Caselli that sold in the last 18 months averaged $900 psf (the real number was around $750).
wow Satchel, fluj isn’t on here anymore, and appologized to you, and you said at the apology that you would drop it. But, no you’re still going on about it. I can’t imagine why he wouldn’t want to be here.
Yeah, to justify a high asking price, RE salesmen will NEVER forget to mention square footage that doesn’t show on record. Truth be told, they do disclose if extra footage was illegal because there could be costs down the line.
fluj was thinskinned to a fault
his singular point of view was undermined by a tendency towards argument by hissy fit
I have nothing to base it on, except on my gut, but I am sensing a kind of a turning point has been reached. NY Times has an article on foreclosures making an appearance in Manhattan. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/07/realestate/07cover.html
“Real” SF seems to be doing its part. Is it possible fluj picked the most opportune moment to depart… right before the avalanche began?
“but I am sensing a kind of a turning point has been reached”
Chuckie, I am seeing the same thing happen in better neighborhoods in Chicago that had zero foreclosures only 4 months ago, but are now popping up almost daily.
yo chuckie,
“In raw numbers, foreclosure filings jumped to 93 in July 2008 from 52 in July 2007.”
your gut is telling you that we’ll see an ‘avalanche’ based on this data?
i guess its correct to take you at your word when you say
“I have nothing to base it on”
Manhattan � Population: 1,537,195
True, Manhattan’s population is large compared to the number of foreclosures. But it there is indeed a trend as those figures are not noise. You don’t need a very high number of foreclosures to cause a ripple effect through the whole RE market. What is that ratio ? 1%, 5% ?
When a barrel of water is tipped over there are first a few drops, then a little trickle.
um MOD,
.00013 per cent (93fc vs 704000 units)
does not make much of a trend, much less the beginning of an ‘avalanche’.
93 foreclosures in Manhattan means nothing. As much as we would all really, REALLY like that to mean something, it doesn’t. Maybe its just 93 corrupt mortgage bankers who were sent to prison for 5 years who defaulted as a result?
Out of 1.5 million people, that would be ONE plausible scenario (out of, say, 1.5 million possible scenarios).
The number of foreclosures should be compared against the number of transactions, not the number of units.
Residential units are a relatively static quantity. Transactions and foreclosures are both dynamic.
And yeah, it will still be a small percentage … at least now.
In no way am I saying that we’re seeing an avalanche. Just a trend that should be monitored.
“Hey boss, the canary just keeled over. We should get out of this mine !”
“Don’t worry, that canary is nothing. You’re a 200 pound man and that bird only weighs an ounce”
or .00013 of an ounce as it were.
you said “Residential units are a relatively static quantity”
so here’s a dynamic one; 9439 permits for new units were filed just in 2007. i take that to mean one hundred times more guys trying to get down the mine shaft than trying to get out of it.
i guess those guys have not heard the news. maybe they should read this site to get informed…(or maybe they’re too busy making money to care…)
How many of those permitted units are in 1RH, tower #2 ?
mod,
thats the permits for manhattan.
in sf we have the BOS to protect our quality of life by restricting the amount of units that get built. n.b. by ‘our’ i mean the landed gentry who enjoy the insane prices of units/rents that are perpetuated by the constriction of supply.
nice dig on 1rh#2 tho, 😉
Proved me gullible : 9000 permits issued in a single year in “preserved in amber” SF ! Du-oh !
Even for Hanmattan that’s a lot of new units coming online, if the developers follow through that is.
“Its a buyers market! If buyers only had money…”
I’ve been hopefully bearish for the past year, but I’m just not seeing any bargains. We’d probably be shopping seriously for a house right now if my dh hadn’t started a new job recently. I thought that holding off for a year (till Fall 2009) couldn’t hurt, but the currently lowering interest rates have me wondering.
At least we mostly like our apartment, and the rent definitely beats the mortgage for a comparable place.
And Manhattin only has high real estate prices because every new U.S. citizen was funneled through Ellis Island and many of them could not afford to leave.
Umm fluji actually put his money where his mouth was. At least he would admit when he was wrong and he provided a hell of a lot more useful info than some of the other posters here who just like to hear themselves talk.
paco, i don’t think anybody knows exactly how this is going to turn out. we’re talking about these foreclosures in sf, so is nyt about foreclosures in manhattan! the fortress ‘sf’ is showing a crack. ok, maybe not a crack. maybe just the beginning of a crack. and a big defender of the fortress ‘sf’ just left the building. coincidences all?
hehehe all in good fun 🙂
Paco didn’t start the NY discussion, you did chuckie. So why tell him it’s not about NY
“And Manhattin only has high real estate prices because every new U.S. citizen was funneled through Ellis Island and many of them could not afford to leave.”
Say what ?? !! That makes no sense at all.
So you’re saying that immigrants who somehow scraped together enough cash for the trip across the Atlantic didn’t have enough leftover for a train ticket to Pittsburgh ? But they did have enough cash to pay for high priced Manhattan housing ?
Use a train of logic here… NY was the first place all of the immigrants came to. A lot of them decided to stay. They breed, they have offspring, many of who also stay, which gives us the reason NY is the most populous US city, and the most crowded. NY now has high real estate prices simply because it was the first dumping location of all of the immigrants who bought cheap real estate, which is now expensive after exponential growth of their families and offspring, causing overcrowding.
I agree with those (“chuckie”) who see cracks forming in the edifice of the better parts of SF, including Noe Valley, though i’m not surprised that “RenterAgain” is not seeing any real bargains yet. This process of deflating the market is going to take some time. Would-be sellers are waiting to see if the market hits bottom before listing and betting that the market is not going to be worse next year. [Some here would take that bet of course.] Meanwhile, inventory from forced sellers — foreclosures, deaths, moves — will gradually build up and give prices their direction (likely flat or down). Inventories will increase, but more gradually then one might expect. All in all, it’s a good time to be a prospective buyer.
I agree with chuckie too. Forty one more foreclosures in NYC this summer means SF is cracking and also fluj picked a good time to bail. chuckie has a feeling about this.
further, fluj’s bailing had nothing to do with regularly reading comments directed at fluj, such as chuckie’s, on a daily basis. promise. nope. comments such as “fluj has gone bankrupt SMILEY.” no nothing to do with that. nor the incessant realtor bashing that occurs in every thread longer than 10 posts or so, from seven or eight other posters, many of whom have a very limited r.e. knowledge base. some of whom just moved here. some of whom don’t know what a recessed can light is yet enjoy weighing in on design cost issues and $psqft building prices in today’s market.
nor does it have to do with people asking for data about oh say the richmond district, seeing its surprisingly strong performance, and then choosing to call it false, or ignoring it all together, yet not seeing the irony in expanding upon Case Shiller CSAs. nor would it have to do with people expecting fluj to do more than cursory research for them when they are beyond rude. or any of the above.
furthermore, manhattan experienced 41 more foreclosures this fall. therefore san francisco is cracking. even noe valley. where everyone sees record pricing and sales closures, daily. in this very forum. apples being more expensive means nothing either. (even though everyone loves apples on here. and when apples close for more money than before, they do not take into account that yes, they actually sold for more money. they instead at that point choose to illustrate in a rather didactic fashion show how much money the seller may or may not have lost. oh. and tax breakds mean nothing, silly. and hey what’s up with people moving away? that doesn’t happen in san francisco! not san francisco! everyone knows people move to san francisco and never leave! it isn’t a transient type of place at all!) but I digress.
so in conclusion i would like to say manhattan is falling apart. forty one foreclosures, up from 52, in a city of over 1.5M is very significant to san francisco’s very bleak outlook.
fluj! you’re back!
Never leave us again. We missed you.
“At least we mostly like our apartment, and the rent definitely beats the mortgage for a comparable place.”
So why would you buy? You’re in a good situation.
“So why would you buy? You’re in a good situation.”
Yes, just a situation contrary to my own expectations. I’ve been a home owner and most of my close friends are home owners (albeit some thanks to inheriting grandma’s home), so it feels odd to be a renter again.
Every time I think home prices are dropping, someone bursts my bear bubble by paying (IMO) a ridiculous price for a house. Like $1.5 mil for that little house on Diamond. Sheesh!
Understood.
But it’s not completely logical. You’re telling me you value the idea of “ownership” (and really your home owns you) at some very high price.
That’s fair. I probably do too. But I’m not sure it’s rational.
Speaking of rational, we’re all irrational because we live on earthquake faults. No rational person would do that. But here I am.
Funny you should mention living on the fault, because I just posted on another thread about how the economic uncertainty reminds me of the time just after the 89 earthquake. I just felt unsettled for a long time.
I’m definitely starting to appreciate the upsides to renting.(No yard work! No maintenance! No cleaning the gutters. Not that we did that stuff most of the time when we were owners…)
“…we’re all irrational because we live on earthquake faults. No rational person would do that.”
I disagree because many (most) people who live in earthquake zones are keenly aware of the risk. Once you know the risk and have decided how to mitigate its effects (insurance, seismic retrofit, choice of home/location, emergency preparedness, etc.) then you have a good idea of what to expect.
Except for the elderly among us, the odds are high that we will experience another “big one”. I’m cool with that and expect to take a financial hit (lost work, property damage : perhaps huge) for the benefit of living here. Its one of the reasons that I have not overextended my finances as far as I think those who outbid me have done. I might be even more conservative than Ex-SFer 🙂
“Speaking of rational, we’re all irrational because we live on earthquake faults.”
Remember, earthquakes don’t kill people, buildings kill people. If you were living in a yurt your chance of dying in an earthquake would be remote.
Luckily for homeowners the value is in the land, not the structure (so I’m told). So an earthquake is just a good excuse to get around the planning department for your remodel. 😉
Come on folks, just because you’ve rationalized it doesn’t make it rational.
No rational person voluntarily lives in an earthquake zone. We’ve all rationalized it though.
I’m sure human beings could rationalize living over radioactive waste if other factors make it a very pleasant place to live. That doesn’t make it rational though.
No rational person would ever get in a car, either. Your risk of being injured or killed in an automobile per year is much higher than living in an earthquake zone.
In terms of the actuarial risk tangent, almost every location has some risk– tornado, flood, earthquake, etc.. In terms of minimizing risk, the actuarial answer is Utah.
Now reduced to $1,499,000. That’s $250K, or 14% less than the 2004 sale.
http://sfbay.craigslist.org/sfc/reb/868862735.html
Here’s a good comp in the making. 10 Fernwood has now been reduced to $1,399,000.
For those keeping score, that’s 20% below its May 2004 sale price.
Sorry, I forgot the link:
http://www.redfin.com/CA/San-Francisco/10-Fernwood-Dr-94127/home/1377889
10 Fernwood closed for $1.32M, about $440 psf. It’s a perfect apple from when it last sold in May 2004 for $1.75M, and although it was a foreclosure this last time around it was in nice shape. So, down about 25% BELOW its 2004 price. I estimate that peak value for a place like this would have been about $1.8 to (possibly) $2.0M in early 2006.