The Real Estate Market must be improving as the local papers and TV news have not had a feature article on the decline of real estate for several weeks.  I've noticed that many recent articles on housing are guardly optimistic  instead of decidely negative.  So I'm thinking the market must be improving.From the Bloomberg News there is an article quoting Wells Fargo & Co. Chief Executive Officer Richard Kovacevich. He says,  that only 20 percent of the 375 metropolitan statistical areas in the country are experiencing 20 percent declines in home prices. 20% out of 375 major areas is not very high... unless of course you are in one of those areas. Kovacevich thinks next year is going to be better. "There's no way that the housing market is going to be bad if you have 4.4 percent unemploym... 12/19/2006

If you are completely confused about the housing market in California you have lots of company. While prices seem to have dropped on some properties others are maintaining prices and in some cases going up in value. This is especially true in the cities along the coast in Southern California. Properties in coastal cities that are on the beach have seen increases on prime location properties. Builders are not ready to drastically drop prices on new construction. New home sales in many Beach  Cities are slow but prices are about what they were last year.The real estate market has slowed down yet only 24% of buyers in California can afford a home today compared to 28% a year ago. According to several articles in The LA Times, in San Francisco, the highest home price market in the United St... 11/28/2006

I think it's safe to say that the real estate market of 2002-2005 was an  anomaly. Rather like Halley's Comet, that only shows up once every 76 years, it will be a long time before we see something similar.  While this was not the first market to see multiple offers and prices in excess of the asking price I think it was the first that fundamentally changed people's views about real estate.The basic expectations of buyers and sellers appear to have changed rather drastically from a few years ago. Ten years ago you bought a home as a place to live. People bought homes because they didn't want to pay money to a landlord. Your first home was a starter home; something small until you could afford to buy a larger one. You hoped to make some money along the way as an added bonus. It made sens... 11/10/2006

The stories continue about the fall of California real estate. Buyers are waiting for the market to crash and sellers are praying it doesn't get any worse. In some areas prices have definitely declined. Sales volume is  off in the last year.  But not all property prices have taken a nose dive…. in fact some properties are selling for some major money to Big Bucks Buyers.  So why are these guys willing to pay a lot of money in what many say is a crashing market?  Guess what… they know something most people don’t.Let's take a look at the Big Bucks Market along the water (The Strand) in Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach, or any beach city with waterfront properties.  Prices are up and up big time!  Big Bucks Buyers are willing to pay  for  A  location property.  In California that means th... 10/31/2006

On October 28, 2006 The LA Times had an article on page 2 that should have been on page 1. Permits issued in September were the fewest since 1996. September is when builders are setting up projects for the spring. This means that there will be a lot fewer new homes for sale in March, April and May which is our traditional buying season.In my area,  Manhattan Beach,CA, we are built out.  New homes are built after tearing down an existing home.  Builders who are still buying home sites are no longer willing to look at properties that are not premium locations. Marginal locations on busy streets or smaller lots are not being purchased.  They are also not paying the prices they were last year for land.  In the Beach Cties this translates to a slowdown in sales of many older smaller homes on... 10/30/2006

  I always keep articles on South Bay/Beach Cities housing and about once a month I go through and review the ones to keep and the ones to toss. My favorite scare articles are from the gentleman who used to be with the Anderson School of Economics at UCLA but is now on his own. He has been predicting a 30% drop in home prices since 2000 and has been wrong every year. But he never gives up.Looking at the headlines for the last four months about housing is really depressing. However I have noticed that the bodies of the articles and the headline are often at odds. This made me wonder how many people make their housing decisions based on the headlines instead of the articles. We are a nation addicted to the quick. A vast number of us get our news from headlines on our home page or CNN. Art... 10/27/2006