Purchased for $2,360,000 in June of 1999, 2430 Scott was remodeled and its garage expanded in the year 2000.
Resold in June 2007 for $4,200,000, the Pacific Heights property returned to the market asking $4,695,000 in May 2009, was reduced to $4,495,000 in June 2009 (with a “look at me” bump to $4,498,000 in February 2010), and then withdrawn this past March.
The single-family home is now back on the MLS with an official two days on the market and an “original” list price of $4,295,000. The Dow is currently at 10,968, it closed at 13,424 on June 8, 2007 (the day this property last changed hands).
UPDATE (5/6): The list price for 2430 Scott Street has been reduced to $4,095,000. The Dow closed at 10,520 today.
∙ Listing: 2430 Scott Street (4/4.5) – $4,295,000 [MLS]

28 thoughts on “2430 Scott Street: An Entirely Different Dow Theory In Action?”
  1. Dont wanna be critical, but geez hire a photographer for a listing this grand.
    The pics on the MLS provide us with no idea of this home and how it flows, plus that facade pic is worthless.

  2. This house peaked in 2007 and the current owners are struggling with that reality is my guess. It’s a nice home on a nice street. I’d say -500k but a buyer could emerge north of $4m. A orange / salmon color house at 2680 Jackson right on the park with no bay view, no yard and in need of some decent repairs sold about a year ago for $3.5M that is a good comp. This house is bigger and has a view.

  3. Kazee – What are your complaints about the photos ? They are not overly produced but adequate to understand the property. They seem just fine to me. And I appreciate the lack of space warping image stretching. They did kind of over-juice the green saturation on photo #8 of the shubbery though.
    If anything I’d just like to see some more photos, 14 isn’t enough for a house this large.

  4. Aha, someone is listening when I say D7 prices follow the S&P 500 with a lag.
    BTW, Dow Theory indicates a “buy” now, even with the huge run-up over the past year. (I personally don’t make investment decisions based on Dow Theory, though many do…caveat emptor)

  5. this is essentially a FSBO (the owners are the contacts and they paid someone to put it in the MLS), so you get what you pay for, which in this case is nothing.

  6. My gripe was the photos dont seem to represent the home well imho.
    The facade pic doesnt show the full space, 2 & 3 seem to be taken from the middle of the room. The garden pic from above is odd, 10 & 11 are from the wrong angle in the room which results in not adding as much to the feel as could be and the deck photo doesnt represent how large the deck is.
    The interior of this home looks very nice with quality taste and should be represented that way.
    Plus is see from comments above and the MLS that the home is 4400 sq feet, thats very large, but i got that feel from the photos.
    Agreed on not be “overly produced” though, but imho they could be better especially on a 4.2 listing.

  7. This is a fine example of a seller not wanting to pay a commission and trusting this sale to an on-line real estate entity located in the webuverse. Good luck with that !
    The market has changed Mr. and Mrs Seller, lower your price below $4 million if you want to sell.
    Remove the pool table from the living room and take professional and copius photos. I don’t have a clue what this house is like based on these photos.

  8. SF is far too economically diverse to track the Dow closely. I lived in Aspen for a while and people loved the real estate follows equities narrative there (where it is clearly more applicable). However, SF (even D7)doesn’t have half as many hedgies/PEs/promoters per capita as an Aspen or a Greenwich. Maybe it’s simply correlation as opposed to causation. I.e., Credit bubbles drive corporate profits and equity prices, and also drive real estate prices. Price changes in real estate simply take a little longer to show up.

  9. Good luck not using a realtor. I’ve done some sales without one and it works great, just pay $300 to have it put in the mls. I still pay full commission to the buyer’s broker because they’re bringing something to the table, they’re providing a service. But who needs a lister.

  10. Been a while since I’ve seen comments on commissions. I continue to absolutely never use a broker when I am buying. I make sure the seller’s broker gets the full 5 or 6 percent, however. They earn it by screwing the seller. They give me full and truthful information on all other offers and potential buyers, and do whatever it takes to browbeat the seller to do the deal with me, in order to make sure I get it. If anyone else gets it, the broker gets half a commission. Do it with me, they get it all. I’m sorry to see the sellers take it in the shorts but that’s the way it is, it’s a cruel world out there, beware.

  11. It’s a mistake to think buyers in D7 are highly economically diverse. Their ability to purchase seven or eight figure real estate is closely tied to their overall wealth, which is most commonly a function of equity market performance. A previous, recent thread described current D7 buyers as hedgies, PE types, entrepreneurs, etc. All tied to equity markets. These folks either earn fees, or have generated and try to grow their wealth through equities. Many D7 houses (not talking about 1BR in the Marina) are bought with large amounts of cash, sometimes entirely. Even when mortgages are used, it’s often for cash management purposes (i.e. the ability to lock-in a historically long-term low interest rate and use the cash for other higher-yielding investments).
    In contrast, SOMA high-rise condos (1BR, 2BR, most lofts) are a completely different market, with different factors affecting prices. Interest rates, salaries, mortgage qualification, etc. all affect price trends more. The Fed’s wind-down last month of the MBS program could clearly affect prices. For the time being, the carry trade has kept mortgage rates relatively low. Watch what happens when the carry trade starts to unwind, when the Fed removes the words, “conditions warrant exceptionally low rates for an extended period of time” from the FOMC statement.

  12. I agree Joshua. I think also if and when they remove the language that they will resume MBS purchases if necessary. Right now the message that has been conveyed is that they’re willing to go back to that if interest rates spike, and for now the markets liked hearing that.

  13. Odd ownership history on the property that is the subject of this thread. It was purchased by an LLC and then recently transferred to an individual. The LLC is not registered in CA, and the only search result is an IRS case against them in Michigan.
    Two months ago, the home gets transferred from the LLC to a Venture Capitalist. Was it his, and the LLC, Pilot Holdings, was just a holding company for him? Was this intended as a flip by a group of pilots who felt in 2007 that real estate only goes up and now these pilots have transferred the various properties to each other to unwind the LLC and this guy is trying to sell off his share of their real estate empire without losing too much money, so he avoids the realtors and tries to go it alone?
    There is probably a more interesting story here.

  14. There is probably a more interesting story here.
    I spent some time on this yesterday. The LLC is registered in California; I wasn’t able to uncover anything interesting (although the Agent for Service of Process on the LLC seems to have a colorful history). Here’s a good summary of the current owner and his relationship to the LLC.

  15. unwarranted inlaw,
    “I make sure the seller’s broker gets the full 5 or 6 percent, however. They earn it by screwing the seller. They give me full and truthful information on all other offers and potential buyers, and do whatever it takes to browbeat the seller to do the deal with me, in order to make sure I get it.”
    i call b.s. i also like to buy property w/out the use of a broker for several reasons; i get the 2.5/3% discount, seller pays less tax on his gain, buyer locks in a lower prop tax basis.
    what you are describing however is using the listing broker as your agent. you show your colors by characterizing this as “screwing the seller”. while you are right that you may get the property you are incorrect to think that you are getting a better price. maybe your ‘strategy’ works in other places but in the fishbowl that is sfre it does not sound savvy.
    i don’t know where you’ve been but its not like sellers in sf have been under much pressure for the last, oh, decade…

  16. I’m sure on the margin equity markets do play a factor in aggregate D7 prices but probably not as largely as some contend. I know it seems hard to believe but some people actually own illiquid assets (like a business, say Bechtel) which produce income that is then accumulated via savings (what’s that?) over a number of years. For example, say the public equity markets are flat or down, or nonexistent and you own all of Google. Does the amount someone else values your business at change the billions of dollars in revenue you are generating every year? Most fortunes are created over time, contrary to what you read in Fast Company. Strangely, not everyone allows their financial independence to be dictated by their ability to find a greater fool.
    Even equity market based jobs such as a money manager are compensated on a yearly basis. Check the list of top paid hedge fund managers every year. The market goes up, the managers get a windfall, they go down, and the limited partners generally have no ability to “claw back” prior incentive compensation except for certain illiquid positions like you would find in a PE fund. So most fund managers are far from destroyed when there’s a down year unless they’ve been drinking too much of their own kool aid. Further, not every manager is long the S&P. Some of the biggest paydays in the history of asset management have been generated recently during this crisis by managers who were short mortgage securities.
    Extreme bull run-ups obviously create some dumb money from cashing out wildly overvalued assets. This however is the exception rather than the rule. A growing economy and strong business profits drive high end real estate prices in the long term, not the wild irrationality of public sentiment.

  17. ^ Exactly. Recall Econ 101, it’s the marginal buyer/seller that sets prices.
    A few other items for clarification:
    * Owners of long-term successful and private companies like Bechtel typically take their distribution of profits and invest in other assets. “The best way to make a fortune is to concentrate an investment, the best way to keep it is to diversify.”
    * Almost all hedgies are net-long. Try to find 10 net-short investors who have been in business and out-performed over the past 10 years. And PE (vc and buy-out) by definition is long-biased.
    * The lack of claw-backs and other compensation mechanisms in the financial industry creates large paydays for many folks. They’re smart enough to diversify…often into a broad basket of equities.
    * The Bay Area is home to a huge number of tech entrepreneurs and early employees who amassed fortunes over the years. This money is by and large invested in equities, and is enough to fund multi-generational wealth. Don’t underestimate how many wealthy folks live in our fair city/region. Just b/c they don’t go to work doesn’t mean they’re poor. Often the opposite.
    Said it before and I’ll say it again. D7 prices follow the S&P 500, with a lag.

  18. Ah to be young again. So how long is the lag? Here are the price changes in the S&P 500:
    10 years: -21.77%
    5 years: +1.13%
    1 year: +44.44%
    Explain…

  19. ^ Over the past 22 years, Shiller Case data and S&P 500 returns show correlations are strongest in the following order:
    1. SF real estate values lagging S&P 500 by 1 year
    2. SF real estate values lagging S&P 500 by 2 years
    3. SF real estate values compared to S&P 500 in the same year
    All are more powerful than correlations to interest rates and other obvious factors.
    (and thanks for the compliment. i’m not as young as i used to be. but i still know math and finance.)

  20. Sorry, been busy studying for finals… Reading books is quite informative (as opposed to manipulating historical pricing data). Thank god SF real estate prices will be up 44% within a year. Quite a prediction. Check back in 12 months from now. It’s on the record and I’ll be waiting.
    p.s. you should apply for a job with one of the NRSROs. They could use your help. Delusion + Intellectual Dishonesty + Misleading Statistics – Personal Integrity = Big Bonus (and hopefully a criminal indictment)

  21. walked by this house yesterday, the sign outside says fsbo now — anyone know the story?

  22. The list price for 2430 Scott Street has been reduced $200,000 (5%), now asking $4,095,000. Once again, purchased for $4,200,000 in June 2007.

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