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Wednesday, February 18, 2009

"a pool in the front yard, right where you need it"

11 comments:

  1. This one's pretty excruciating

    Assuming you were hoping to see something excruciating tonight...

    Jim the Realtor

    oh, boy

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  2. JTR rocks!

    The husband has been a big fan of JTR for years. He (my husband, that is)WAS a Realtor in Phoenix. When Jim agreed with his assessment of the market, we sold our house. Two years ago - just before the famed Phoenix fall.

    Whew.

    Husband just pointed out the math lesson:
    Median home prices should correlate to median income. During the bubble, prices spiked and borrowers got loans they can't afford.

    Additionally, median home prices should correlate to rents.

    An example: we rent a 4400 sq ft house for $1900/month. If rents correlated to sales price, this house should be worth $265K. Zillow lists it at $435K.

    Unlike Chula Vista - our house still has the pillars and appliances.

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  3. This is probably the naive country hick in me talking but man, those are some big, ugly houses and in a big ugly location. I don't get why they're so expensive. If you pay that kind of money for a house here you're getting a mansion on an island with it's own helipad.

    Gosh. Those are just gruesomely bloated subdivision houses.

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  4. Who is Jim the Realtor??

    I never heard of him 'til yesterday.

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  5. Dawn----

    You have never gone house hunting in the Southlands!

    When we bought our first house, we looked at houses in L.A.

    We saw teardowns priced at $300,000 -- and this was over 20 years ago.

    I'll never forget going inside some of these houses & finding virtually no furniture or appliances except for a TV & a VCR. (VCRs cost a thousand then.)

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  6. Median home prices should correlate to median income.

    You can say that again.

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  7. If rents correlated to sales price, this house should be worth $265K. Zillow lists it at $435K.

    We'll buy it if it gets to $265k!

    Good friend WAS a Realtor in Southern Cal. - Torrance, Redondo, Hermosa & Manhattan Beach areas. Five years ago, she sold $500K cottages to all her friends & neighbors. Then those friends got really greedy and tried to flip them for a million in 2 years. She left the business. I wonder whether those people can still afford their places?

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  8. Why did she leave the business (this was before the crash, right?)

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  9. We sold our cottage in Studio City for 500K.

    It was a little bigger than a cottage by the time we sold it since we'd added a fairly large fourth bedroom & had expanded the kitchen a bit.

    Basically, it was a cottage with a pretty nice master bedroom suite added on.

    Not unlike our current house, actually.

    Though our current house has a master suite and a family room added on.

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  10. Why did she leave the business (this was before the crash, right?)

    She was disgusted by her client's greed. She now runs a spice store. I haven't asked, but I'll bet she wishes she stayed in RE a little longer and reaped the benefits before the crash. Can't be many people buying gourmet spices in So. Cal right now.

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  11. According to one of the many housing bubble blogs that I read, the sales price should be no more than 100x the monthly rental. So in the case of a $1900/month rental, that should sell for ~$190K.

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