Irvine Housing Blog

I remember seeing a one bedroom in this neighborhood listed for $499,000 last fall, and I busted out laughing. The last two fools recently bought into one bedrooms for between $420,000 and $434,000.

But now you can get two bedrooms for almost the same price, as you showed.

From what I’ve seen, prices here have dropped by about $100k already in the neighborhood and there is probably more to come. This is one of my favorite neighborhoods because it’s so easy to track - by far the least expensive properties in the immediate vicinity.

I went to an open house here a little bit back for the heck of it (listing is no longer active, perhaps they pulled it off the market) that was a one bedroom plus loft that they had slapped a door onto (no bathroom on this top floor, so you’d have to go downstairs for that) that they were playing off like a true two-bedroom. The $525,000 asking price didn’t really resonate with buyers, I don’t think. Considering it was empty, I’m sure there were plenty of holding costs.

In case anyone’s interested, I profiled a rent vs. own scenario in this neighborhood a while back on my own blog.

Thanks again for this great blog and keep the entries coming!
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Nice, just a little bit more and i’ll be happy to buy.  It will be interesting to see what the Feds do to interest rates though.  They have to raise them, but that will make everybody universally unhappy. 

-bix

I have been watching both the dollar and the T-bill of late, and both of those markets are signaling a rise in interest rates.

The FED has to raise rates.  Many people are still stuck in the “Greenspan Era.”  AG was the only chairman in history to actively involve the housing market in his monetary policy.  Will he go down as the worst ever???

This place looks kinda dumpy.  382,800 would put this place at 300 per sq ft

Those Candle holder things by the fireplace are just downright White trash-chiek

People like this seller are the ones that have impacted us and kept us out of market.  Had these people not speculated in 2004, prices would have been in the $300K range or less and I would have bought it in 2005.  It just prolonged prices and its taken 3 years to get back. There will be more greedy knife catchers who will prevent immediate price collapse by speculating and getting burned in the process.

92620 zip code appears to lead Irvine market to down, declining sale coupled with declining value. Looks like west Irvine is the least favorite place.
I am also following neighboring cities such as Aliso Viejo, Laguna Niguel and Newport Coast. It’s not hard to find transactions happening at 2004 price for the smaller homes (entry level. For get about asking price, they are almost disconnected from transactions.
In AV, rollback has hit bigger homes too. let’s see when it will happen in Irvine

Correct.

I am seeign massive rollbacks in South OC.  Homes that sold/appraised for 1.1mil to 1.2mil are selling for less than 1mil.

I noticed the same thing in Huntington Beach.

Overall, it looks like the old maxim is proving true again in OC.  The closest to the ocean and the closest to Newport/Laguna the better the properties are holding up.

I wonder what the prices will do in Coto de Caza.  Back in ‘92 I saw a half an acre lot, on the west side of the main valley, almost on top of the hill for $250K.  And I think it sold for less.  If it hadn’t been for the mess in the El Toro Y then, I would have bought it and built a well constructed, 4b/3ba/4 car garage single story 2700 sq. foot SFH (the minimum size allowed).

I didn’t pull the trigger because of the drive.

Seriously, the whole area of “West Irvine” always smelled to me like a big Ponzi Scheme.. sort of like (but worse) that “Westpark I” by Culver and the 405.

You don’t have Irvine Schools, you are not in Irvine (is this the county?), you are way inland where it’s hot and cold, access to the place sucks because you only got a few ways in and out…..

I never liked Northwood because it felt isolated, but “West Irvine” sucks.

And, then, you got to pay a toll if you want to take Jamboree and bypass the whole Marketplace traffic jam!  Yuck.

That area should have been a bunch of Irvine Co. Apartments, but instead Bren and Co. got smart and made out like bandits with all of these condo developments. 

Never made any sense to me and I never understood the fools that bought into that.

“Property needs TLC! ... Large dog on premises”

Place needs to be fumigated and remodeled.

200K! - take it or leave it

There are 45 days left for the 2007 house selling season. On September 1st prices will start dropping at a faster pace.

we are about to witness the second leg of this long-lasting downtrend.
btw, DOW hit 14000, history repeats itself. fear and greed

Let me see… money is still cheap and RE is not working… the economy by and by is doing fine (RE is only a section of it) and the cheap dollar is helping exports.

I figure that so long as money is cheap, stocks are still the place to be.  Well, not all stocks… banks and anything that has to do with Real Estate (including Home Depot) are not good places to be.

Now, once money starts to get expensive, buy yen?

Money is really cheap if your functional currency is the Euro.  The Europeans are buying our stocks at a 37% discount - what a deal.  Expect the Dow to go higher as foreign money buys up American companies due to the cheap dollar.  As Americans finally get pissed off that we’re selling off this country one Euro, Yen and Rembai at a time, maybe the Fed will raise interest rates to stop the bloodshed.

It’s looking ugly for the owner of 1520 Timberwood.  According to the public records…

—1st mortgage for $412,000 (now in foreclosure)
—HELOC for $138,000
—2006-07 property taxes have not been paid
—HOA dues are unpaid (2 HOA liens have been recorded)

I’m thinking this will be bank-owned in about three months, unless it somehow miraculously sells for $440K soon.

200-250k!  Take it!  But that’s just me, he/she/they won’t do it.  They’ll just probably rent it for the time being.
-bix

Ouch, I guess we can pick it up after it goes out….  BUT the question is, for how much is it going to sell?  The 1st shot should be 380ish, but really I think 350ish should be more appropriate.  Time will tell.
-bix

If the bank forecloses, does it need to pay the back taxes?  If I remember correctly, tax liens are senior to 1st mortgage.  What about the HOA liens?  Does the foreclosure wipe those out?

Property taxes are senior to the 1st mortgage—HOA liens would be wiped out.

When European investors buy US stocks they are buying them cheap now but they wouldn’t want the dollar to continue to weaken.  They have to buy US dollars before buying US stocks.  You want the currency that you are holding to appreciate in value.  Once they sell their US stocks for US dollars, they make some additional arbitrage profit if the dollars appreciated against the Euro.  Now they can buy more Euros with the dollars they hold.

Consumer goods are being purchased at record rates because of the cheap dollar.  Once you purchase the goods with US dollars you don’t have to worry about the exchange rate.  If you buy stocks/bonds however you have to worry what the exchange rate will be when you want to convert back to your home country’s currency.

Just an FYI…

Even with all the knife catching mentality I see on this blog, there appears still to be buyers out there.

5 Bottle Tree, Irvine that was featured by IrvineRenter a few days back just closed sale.  It was listed for $814k and sold for $814,900.  It was an REO and were not negotiable on the price.  Looks like it had to be a “multi” bid offer.  House needed work and at least 20k for landscaping.  The carpet they put in was dirt cheap.  It needs another 10-20k at a bare minimum for the insides just to correct for being in that neighborhood. 

I wonder what the new owners were thinking?

That is one lucky bank.

As we track prices in these neighborhoods, it will be interesting to see the fate of these buyers.

Thanks for the update.

Hmm $814,900 with 3% back to the borrowers for needed improvements provides the $25K or so necessary to bring it up to par.

Slightly off topic, but here goes anyway.

I work in the financial services industry for a company that does a lot of business with home-builders.  Today I sat in on a meeting between two execs., one of who has A LOT of dealings with homebuilders in So Cal.  This guy said that some of the homebuilders he talked to are “in denial” about how bad things are and how much worse they will get.  They are holding inventory on the market, and he is advising them to clear it out ASAP, whatever they do, but the homebuilders keep thinking that a turn-around is just around the corner. 

I am a bear, but I hope the “super-bears” are wrong.  A huge downturn will have a devastating effect on the economy.  There’s an inverse wealth effect to real estate ownership…when values go down, people feel poorer, so they spend less.  I’m all for a little more sanity in this market, but not for a big downturn.

The sooner the negative savings and conspicious consumption driven economy ends, the better.  The answer is really simple, it has to end eventually.  Do we end it while we are only $8,887,922,926,372.79 in debt or when we are $10 Trillion or $15 Trillion in debt?

On the bright side, it’s only $30,000 of debt for every man, woman and child in the country.

Interesting link

Bear Stearns Tells Hedge Fund Investors There’s `No Value Left’
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aQKWd1Xc2Vt4&refer=home

I just hate to see this:
- HELOC for $138K
I don’t know, but as I think, this person already got $138K in his/her pocket then now he/she walked away.

Same as some people with too many refinance on their homes, and now CRIED because could not pay the morgate.

Those, I don’t have any sympathy for them. NONE.

You’ll cry when you find out how many of those HELOCs aren’t in people’s pockets, but were spent so that the people could eat out in restaurants, remodel their home, buy a new car, a HDTV, etc.

With the slow down in housing, there are going to be quite a few home owners that are losing $50,000 a year in supplemental income.

Now then… if the HELOC was used in remodeling, wouldn’t that support and raise the value pf the property?

Shouldn’t some of that investment be reflected when we look at the original purchase price?

I realize this won’t be the case every time, but a reasonable remodel that upgrades a home does/can significantly affect the desirability and value of a home.

Tonye, I would agree.  However, I’ve walked through many a home that have claimed $50,000 or $100,000 of remodel and thought, what did they do?

Or as pointed out here on another thread by ,I think you, on an MLS listing claiming $300,000 worth of remodeling.  You could basically rebuild.

Like housing prices, remodel bills 2X or 3X during the boom years.  Homeowners were spending “free” money and contractors had clients fighting over each other for their work.

Combine the amount of the HELOC that was used for consumption combined that which was essentially “wasted” on excess remodeling charges or just plain poor money management and you get most of it just being consumed.

It’s a double whammy, the homeowners have much less to consume with and in turn, the whole feeding chain of the economy supporting conspicious consumption is going to feel a pinch.

Yes… contractors were asking for 400 bucks per square foot in the last few years, so you can pretty much forget about recouping even 50% of the cost of a good remodel.

A bad remodel will actually decrease the value.  There’s a home in the Broadmoor Sierras that had a huge remodel but it’s all wrong.  Those people can kiss off their 800K.  That’s the house I spoke wabout.

In fact, the house would sell for little more than 300 bucks per square feet and is really more designed as a frat house than a normal house:  all bedroom open onto the den.  And it has a cheap electric range.