SF Peninsula Real Estate Guru

I believe it is common knowledge that real estate is very local. The market in Menlo Park, Palo Alto, and San Carlos can be very different from the market in the East Bay or in the Central Valley. Even on the San Francisco Peninsula, markets vary from city to city. At the current time, Palo Alto is stronger than Menlo Park, Menlo Park is stronger than San Carlos and San Carlos is stronger than South San Francisco or Daly City.

In addition, it is common knowledge that within cities, certain neighborhoods are stronger than others.

We are also seeing different markets within cities depending on the price range of the properties being offered for sale.

Below you will see charts for San Carlos, Menlo Park, and Palo Alto broken down into quartiles - i.e. each city is divided into four quartile price ranges - one could label them “low price quartile”, “middle low quartile”, “middle high quartile” and “high quartile”. These prices are for LIST prices.

Here is the chart for San Carlos:

Let’s look at San Carlos…….

In the lowest price quartile in San Carlos, average prices have declined from $825,000 July 2007 to $745,000 July 2008.

In the middle low price quartile in San Carlos, average prices have were $1,075,000 July 2007 dropped to $925,000 in April 2008 and have recently risen to $1,000,000.

In the middle high price quartile in San Carlos, average prices have declined from $1,400,00 July 2007 to $1,300,000 July 2008.

In the high price quartile in San Carlos, average prices have declined from $2,100,000 July 2007 to $1,700,000 July 2008.

In San Carlos:

The lowest quartile price homes are found east of El Camino and prices in those neighborhoods have dropped over the past year. 

The very highest price range in San Carlos has dropped significantly over the past year.

The entry level price quartile (low middle) for homes located west of El Camino has remained fairly steady.

Here is the chart for Menlo Park:

In the lowest price quartile in Menlo Park, average prices have declined from $700,000 July 2007 to $500,000 July 2008.

In the low middle price quartile in Menlo Park, the average price of $900,000 has remained fairly constant over the past year.

In the high middle price quartile in Menlo Park, the average price was $1,325,000 July 2007 and has risen slightly to $1,400,000 July 2008.

In the high price quartile in Menlo Park, average price was $2,500,000 July 2007 and has risen $2,750,000 July 2008.

The lowest priced areas in Menlo Park are in Belle Haven east of Highway 101, property values in that area have dropped significantly.

The higer priced areas of Menlo Park west of El Camino (west Menlo) have increased over the past year even during a very tough market overall. The desirability of west Menlo is matched by the continued financial strenght of the people who want to own there.

The chart does indicate a slight cooling in all prices ranges since spring 2008.

Let’s look at Palo Alto……

In all four price quartiles in Palo Alto, average prices are about the same in July 2007 and July 2008.

The Palo Alto market has remained very strong over the past year.