Arn Cenedella

Archive for the 'San Carlos Real Estate' Category

San Carlos First Time Buyer Down Payment Assistance Program

San Carlos has just enacted a first time buyer down payment assistance program.

San Carlos will make a second loan up to $55,000.

Interest rate will be 3% with no payments for 5 years.

For more information, click here.

A big thanks to Chuck at ReMax for pointing this out.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 4/12/09

Here is this week’s data for San Carlos:

2 new listings this week in San Carlos.

10 new pending sales this week in San Carlos.

62 current active listings in San Carlos.

32 current pending sales in San Carlos.

51.6% pending ratio.

The pendng sale to listing ratio continues to increase. Most activity in the entry level range under $1,000,000 in San Carlos. Market appears to be firming up. Move up market still slow.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 4/5/09

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/29/09

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/22/09

San Carlos update 3/15/09

San Carlos update 3/6/09

San Carlos update 2/27/09

For real-time San Carlos market updates, click here.

San Carlos Real Estate 2009 Q1 report

Trends At a Glance	Jan-Mar 2009	Previous Quarter	Year-over Year
Median Price	$950,000	$855,000 (+11.1%)	$1,196,000 (-20.6%)
Average Price	$985,752	$926,398 (+6.4%)	$1,254,900 (-21.4%)
No. of Sales	33	52 (-36.5%)	50 (-34.0%)
Pending Properties	15	6 (+150.0%)	26 (-42.3%)
Active	70	47 (+48.9%)	50 (+40.0%)
Sale vs. List Price	96.7%	98.1% (-1.5%)	100.8% (-4.0%)
Days on Market	41	40 (+1.7%)	34 (+20.1%)

San Carlos Real Estate Update 4/5/09

Here is this week’s data for San Carlos:

3 new listings this week in San Carlos.

6 new pending sales this week in San Carlos.

67 current active listings in San Carlos.

29 current pending sales in San Carlos.

40.8% pending ratio.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/29/09

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/22/09

San Carlos update 3/15/09

San Carlos update 3/6/09

San Carlos update 2/27/09

For real-time San Carlos market updates, click here.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/29/09

Here is this week’s data for San Carlos:

9 new listings this week in San Carlos.

6 new pending sales this week in San Carlos.

71 current active listings in San Carlos.

27 current pending sales in San Carlos.

38.0% pending ratio.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/22/09

San Carlos update 3/15/09

San Carlos update 3/6/09

San Carlos update 2/27/09

For real-time San Carlos market updates, click here.

Move up buyers stay home while 1st time buyers enter market

Teresa Boardman of St Paul Real Estate – ps she is a great photographer – recently wrote a post about “move-up” buyers in her market want to buy but since they existing home is underwater they can not sell their existing home. Hence they are unable to buy.
Many of her comments about the entry level being the strongest portion of the market with the “move-up” market being very slow or non-existent applies to the market on the San Francisco Peninsula.
Many first-time buyers are getting into the market – taking advantage of lower prices, very low rates and tax credits. Most sales are at the low end of the price spectrum with foreclosure REOs being a large percentage of all current sales. Hence median and average prices continue to go down.
The “move-up” buyer is sitting on the fence. Unlike your area, it is NOT because these potential “move-up” buyers are “under water” but rather they do not have confidence in the economy or the market to make a move-up in a market where moving up means selling for $1.5M and buying for $2M. These folks are just not interested in taking on $500K in additional debt when things look very uncertain. In addition since the price of their home has dropped, they may no longer have enough equity in their current home to put the 20% to 25% down needed to buy and finance their new home with a jumbo mortgage. So they are not “underwater” but lack the down payment to buy the larger house. I believe the “fear” factor is the bigger issue but lack of equity to make the downpayment on their purchase also contributes to the lack of activity in the move-up market.
Arn

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/22/09

Here is this week’s data for San Carlos:

17 new listings this week in San Carlos.

7 new pending sales this week in San Carlos.

75 current active listings in San Carlos.

24 current pending sales in San Carlos.

32% pending ratio.

San Carlos update 3/15/09

San Carlos update 3/6/09

San Carlos update 2/27/09

For real-time San Carlos market updates, click here.

Where are all the foreclosure properties?????

Many buyers are looking for foreclosures – in hopes – of buying a good deal.

While buying a foreclosure propertry (ie REO) may often be a good deal, you will not find many in the prime residential communities of the San Francisco Peninsula where the average home prices are well over One Million Dollars. One can find foreclosures in areas that were financed with sup-prime mortgages – these are typically areas where the peak price was $500,000, $600,000 and maybe $700,000.

Dave Blockhus Coldwell Banker Los Altos, for example reports there are only 3 foreclosure properties for sale in Los Altos.

When I get a change, I will run the numbers for Palo Alto, Menlo Park, and San Carlos but I suspect the numbers will be the same.

11 year history San Carlos closed home sales January February 1999-2009

What is the status of the current market in San Carlos?

The chart below shows number of closed home sales in San Carlos during the months of January and February from 1999 to 2009.

During January and February in San Carlos – over the past 11 years, on average 38 homes closed escrow during the first tow months of the year.

This compares to only 16 in 2009 – 42% of the 11 year average.

San Carlos Real Estate Update 3/15/09

Here is this week’s data for San Carlos:

13 new listings this week in San Carlos.

6 new pending sales this week in San Carlos.

67 current active listings in San Carlos.

24 current pending sales in San Carlos.

San Carlos update 3/6/09

San Carlos update 2/27/09