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| 2009/1/29-2/6 [Reference/RealEstate] UID:52485 Activity:kinda low |
1/29 S&P Case-Shiller 20-city home price index shows San Francisco
1 year home value change: 30.8%.
\_ + or -?
\_ http://money.cnn.com/2009/01/27/real_estate/home_price_losses_continue
\_ SF MSA... includes Oakland, Bay View, Novato, etc.
\_ Bay View is SF
\_ Yes, but including it in SF numbers doesn't really give a
picture of someone who wants to buy in SF and not get shot.
I've been waiting and waiting for prices to fall and only
in the past 6 months have I see a decline in areas that I'd
be interested in, like the Mission, Hayes Valley, Alamo Sq,
Duboce Triangle, Noe, etc.
\_ Tell me about it, I'm in the same boat. I just know
that when prices go down x% most of that is in the
shittier areas. And from what I've seen prices have hardly
dropped in the places you are looking. It's frustrating.
\_ The less desirable areas are first down and last up.
That doesn't mean prices in nice areas haven't dropped,
because they have. It will take interest rate hikes
to bring prices down. As long as you can get a
mortgage for 4.5% prices will remain pretty high.
\_ TIC rates are well above 6% so 4.5% is not relevant...
although the TIC auction ideas are promising.
\_ If TIC = APR (which I think it would be) then nope.
Under 5%.
\_ You clearly have no idea what you're talking
about. If P=NP=Bananas=Sputnik, then under 5%.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/31/BUM615JQNS.DTL
\_ How much have prices dropped in the areas you are
interested in? |
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| money.cnn.com/2009/01/27/real_estate/home_price_losses_continue -> money.cnn.com/2009/01/27/real_estate/home_price_losses_continue/ com) -- An index of home prices in 20 major metropolitan areas fell at a record annual pace in November, to levels not seen since 2004, according to a report released Tuesday. That brought the index to its lowest point since February 2004. Eleven of the 20 cities showed record declines, and the 12-month price drop for 14 of the cities was a double-digit percentage. "The freefall in residential real estate continued through November 2008," said David M Blitzer, chairman of the Index Committee at Standard & Poor's, in a prepared statement. He said the 20-city index has fallen for every month since August 2006, a total of 28 consecutive months. The decline was very broad, with prices down at least 1% in every region of the nation during the October-November period. Eight regions recorded record monthly declines, according to Blitzer. As has become the norm, Southwest cities were the hardest hit, with Las Vegas prices dropping 39%, the nation's worst decline. New York and Cleveland prices fell by only 1% for the month, the smallest November drops. The best 12-month performer was Dallas, where prices slipped by 33%. Other 12-month, single-digit percentage drops were recorded by Denver, at 43%, Cleveland, at 52%, and Charlotte NC, at 53%. The Case-Shiller numbers just underscore how tough the market is for home sellers, according to Mike Larson, a real estate analyst with Weiss Research. But there was some positive news in Monday's report from the National Association of Realtors, which showed a bump up in the number of existing homes sold during December. "We're clearly seeing some of the impact of falling prices," said Larson. Specialized Bikes' startup story Founder Mike Sinyard battled finicky customers and the brink of bankruptcy to build his profitable $500-million-a-year bike brand. As many big companies are announcing mass layoffs, these 20 top employers have at least 350 openings each right now. Which Best Companies to Work For are doing the most recruiting and what kind of candidates are they looking for? Business Leader Council Live Quotes automatically refresh, but individual equities are delayed 15 minutes for Nasdaq, and 20 minutes for other exchanges. Market indexes are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. |
| www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/31/BUM615JQNS.DTL Comments Georgia (default) Verdana Times New Roman Arial Font | Size: Waiting to go condo is San Francisco's version of waiting for Godot. Building owners can spend years vying for one of 200 condo-conversion slots awarded annually via a lottery. But this year San Francisco is considering letting people skip the line, offering a one-time chance to the hundreds of folks on the lottery list to go condo now - for an extra fee. The goal is to generate more revenue for the cash-strapped city and to create building-industry jobs, because condo conversions generally require some construction work to bring buildings up to code. A proposal to expedite condo conversion would require approval by either the supervisors or the voters - no easy task in a city where housing issues are famously contentious. Tenant advocates say the practice hurts renters who get evicted when buildings convert to tenancies in common, the step before going condo. Previous proposals for increased condo conversions have failed miserably. Supporters say the sour economy could change the dynamics this time around. "What's different this year is that the city is in such a financial hole, this is a way to help," said Mike Sullivan, board chair of Plan C San Francisco, a moderate civic organization that supports the idea. "If all the city did was grandfather in the 1,500 people waiting behind the lottery, just doing that would help the city's budget." Supervisor Sean Elsbernd, the proposal's instigator, said the extra fees would directly benefit affordable and supportive housing, as a way to remediate the plan's impact on the rental housing market. A total of 2,030 individual units are entered into this year's lottery, which takes place Friday. Also on that day, Plan C is organizing a demonstration at City Hall to protest the lengthy wait for condo conversion. The units converting to condos are tenancies in common, in which a group of people own a building together, as opposed to each family owning an individual condo unit. Condos are more valuable because of their separate ownership structure, and can more easily be sold or tapped for equity loans. Pricing for the one-time chance to convert is still up in the air. Currently, condo conversions cost a little less than $10,000, money that directly reimburses the city for the cost of inspections and other services. The controller's office is crunching numbers to determine what would be a reasonable fee, Elsbernd said. Ted Gullicksen, director of the San Francisco Tenants Union, said the proposal ultimately would hurt renters. "The easier we make it for tenancies in common to become condominiums, the more TICs will be created. The larger issue is that people are creating TICs to get around the condo conversion law" that provides more tenant protections. Miguel Wooding, executive director of the Eviction Defense Collaborative, agreed. "The condo conversion law has been around for a long time and has been an important protection for preserving rent-controlled housing stock," he said. A one-time mega conversion "sets up expectations of the possibility of increasing TIC conversions in the future. You have an increased motivation to increase evictions (to create TICs) if you have that possibility." But for TIC owners who've been cooling their heels in the lottery, the idea has a definite appeal. "Being strapped in a loan with other people is just very difficult," said Liz Johnson, a project manager at Kaiser Permanente who owns a TIC in a three-unit building in the Mission that's been in the lottery since 2004. Stuart Lustig, a child psychiatrist whose three-unit TIC is entering the condo lottery for the first time this year, likes the proposal in theory but wants to find out "how much it is going to cost to jump the line, as it were. "The city also will make more money when property taxes go up, when they reassess the units (as condos rather than TICs)." On the other hand, TIC owner Daniele Mills, an administrative assistant at Genentech, said she thinks the proposal doesn't seem democratic. "It has a lot of repercussions for people with less income than other people," she said. Hearst Newspapers Be the first to share your thoughts on this story. Proposal: Pay fee, skip condo-conversion line BU Waiting to go condo is San Francisco's version of waiting for Godot. Building owners can spend years vying for one of 200 condo-conversion slots awarded annually via a lottery. |