Irvine Housing Blog

What is with that last photograph in their slide show: the badly rigged florescent light in a bedroom? I am at a loss as to how that got into the listing.

I’m curious—Do they include the square footage of attached garages in square footage measurements in CA?  Because this house sure doesn’t look like it is over 2400 sq ft unless they are counting the garage as part of the square footage.

hi irvinerenter, thankyou for keeping this blog running without it I would have been tempted to buy into this real estate BS hype here in OC last year. I am currently renting with my fiance in turtleridge, managed to get a pretty good deal after getting the owner to lease his property at our terms and what we wanted to pay for the rent!! isnt it amazing when you can command your own rent terms and conditions
anyway everyone keeps telling me now is a good time to buy and blah blah..from your wise words I know that the time is not right and another year or so is when I will finally make my move. my question to you is, will Mello Roos fees ever go away? Will prices drop siginificantly in gated commnunities?

The various price adjustments are very strange. Dropping prices $2K and then $25K and then going back up. Obviously the realtor isn’t at the top of their game. This house will be lucky to fetch $600K in the next few years. The sellers are in no hurry to sell.

Maybe they like people walking through their house every weekend?  (head scratch)

I have seen several properties that have increased their asking price lately. Real estate in Irvine has been moving lately. It’s actually getting a little concerning.

It could be a case where they’re friends of a realtor just hoping to have lots of drop-by visits to drum up business.  Or they hand out a lot of business cards and offers to Tupperwear or sextoy parties and direct-sale programs with NO MIDDLEMAN FEES and AMAZING DISCOUNTS!!!

Or they’re just freaks.

I’ve seen this house when it was priced at $799,000. It was a pretty nice house, but I thought it was still over priced. Shortly afterwards it got into escrow.
  After a couple of weeks, when it fell out of escrow, I thought perhaps now they will be more willing to lower the price, but to my surprise, they increased the price back to $849,000!
  My agent has called their agent and he (or she) let her know that they thought getting into escrow for $799,000 was a mistake and decided to go back to $849,000.
  This is indeed pure greediness. After being on the market for so long, you would think they would be anxious to sell the house, but I guess not

Just a quick observation, before I take the kids to the beach.

My prediction is, these people will likely continue to chase the price down further, as they wait for a “bottom” in values.  The “bottom” is not even on the freakin’ horizon yet, and when the “bottom” does finally arrive, it’ll likely stick around for several years.  Too bad these greedy people are still stuck in 2005.

This property merely reinforces the notion that denial can be a very powerful emotion.  Clearly we have delusional sellers whose foolish behavior is being enabled by their realtard.  Obviously no one has done their homework nor is anyone in this circle of denial interested in reality ... merely fantasies of untold riches and Trumpian mogul-hood.

They’re lucky they can ride this thing down and probably still come out OK.  They’ll likely be bitter about it when the house finally sells for $600K or so but maybe by then they’ll wise-up to the alternative which is foreclosure and/or bankruptcy. 

Oh, and my only explanation for their thinking, greed aside, would be a full dose of the “my house is unique and special and dammit people desire it” cocktail.

Some thoughts on greed.
I often wonder why it is people continue to fall for any type of “get rich quick” scenarios.  Warren Buffett is arguably one of the most successful investors in the history of the markets but even he will admit to a certain amount of luck.  The simple fact is he does his homework and sets realistic and attainable goals.  Not only does this strategy appear to work financially but it’s a formula for success in life. Very rarely does anyone get rich in a very short period of time, those people are notable by their exception.

The successful investor identifies undervalued assets and sets reasonable expectations of gain.  When those benchmarks are reached, they re-evaluate.  Sell or get out, depends on conditions in the here and now ... not some fantasy expectation of wealth. My Grandad had a folksy way of putting it, “you can’t get something for nothing unless someone, somewhere is getting nothing for something.”

Profit is not a dirty word. Greed is. There is nothing wrong with profiting either from good luck or intelligent investment but flying in the face of reality in the hopes of hitting the home run is ridiculous.

A less famous quote from GG that I really like is “a fool and his money were just lucky to get together in the first place.” We’ll be near the bottom when (if) we start seeing more of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYEkzKhFhFM
YouTube - Wall Street Bud’s arrest

This house sounds similar to the one we ended up leasing.  It was for sale at $839k in 2007, and they had an offer for $799k.  Something went wrong in escrow.  Then they had an offer around $750 which they didn’t accept.

Their sale price slowly dropped until the listing expired.  Then we leased it.

This house is one where it looks like Zillow is pretty accurate.  $810 at the peak, $585 now and dropping fast.  By trying to get a few extra dollars, the owners not only paid to keep a vacant house for 8 months after they moved, they also will lose $200k or more by not taking the offer for $750 that they said was “too low”.

Soon this house will be worth less than they paid for it in 2004.  They put 20% down, and it might bottom right at their loan value.

This definitely sounds like false economy. It is crucial to price a house competitively in this property market, especially when the prices in a lot of the regions are still predicted to fall another 10%.

I’m sorry, why is this house worth almost a million dollars?

And you can’t say “because it’s in Irvine”.

I don’t know how I many times I can say this but I seriously question the judgment and intelligence of homeowners and realtors trying to sell an (almost) million dollar home with pictures that wouldn’t close a ten dollar ebay sale.  Is it a complete lack of respect for the potential buyers, outright stupidity or just gross laziness?  It’s got to be one of the three, what do you think?

Some better photos would not hurt.  Those that are displayed are very poor.  For example, in the picture of the kitchen/family room, nearly half of the picture is a white ceiling.  You would think they would try a little harder.

I note that you update the house with the unfortunate young lawyer who did on the post below.  Thanks IR.  I was wondering if the house would ever sell.

That house is about $650k in Huntington Beach. I realize that people like Irvine for various reason, just as people like HB for other reasons, but historically the two towns have been close in prices. There are places at this price a few blocks from the beach at this price.

These people are chasing the market down, and they will continue to be two steps behind. It is the worst place to be: sort of like being behind a bus as you travel down a long, winding road.

Hahha…I remember this house.

These people already have their eyes and mind on a new house but dont want to buy the new house until they sell this. They were totally not willing to come down. We enquired about this house when the asking was 799000..and the lady said that she would not budge for anything less than 750000. And then I dont know what happened. Oh well..I got my place and will move on..chao!

I sold my place in Concord (east SF suburb) and waiting to buy in a better town with good schools.  Prices are still overpriced in cities such as Walnut Creek and Danville.  Lots of inventory and prices should be going down as the houses sit longer unsold.  Sellers still asking crazy prices and even RAISING their prices after not being able to sell after several months.  We buyers need to stick to our guns and wait out these stupid sellers, or give them low, low lowball offers!!!  Actually, these are not lowball offers, rather REALISTIC offers!