The OC Housing News
Irvine Renter is writing his entertaining and insightful market analysis at a new website, OC Housing News.
After nearly five years of writing for the Irvine Housing Blog, I feel it is time to expand my gaze beyond Irvine to the rest of Orange County. The Irvine housing market does not exist in a vacuum. Properties in nearby communities compete with Irvine for the attention of buyers. To really understand any housing market, we need to review properties and market conditions in surrounding communities. Therefore, the new blog will examine interesting properties in all of Orange County, California.
Add to your bookmarks
If you like my writing, take a moment to go to ochousingnews.com and add it to your bookmarks. The entertaining and insightful market analysis you have come to expect from me can be found there from now on.
Blog Posts
My usual posts on national, state, and local housing issues have each been categorized as “featured.” One of the first things you will notice about the blog is a post box which rotates through the last twelve featured posts. If you are not a daily reader, and you want to see what interesting topics I have been writing about, this new feature will allow you to quickly browse headlines and excerpts.
In addition to my daily news and analysis posts, I provide a second post on a specific property of interest somewhere in Orange County. The post has a sentence or two on why it caught my eye, then it displays the property data and my proprietary cost of ownership analysis. For those who are primarily interested in properties, these new posts should prove interesting. If you come across a property you would like me to profile, email me at larry@ochousingnews.com.
If you scroll down the page, you will see the last several posts on the ochousingnews.com. The featured posts show cartoons and an excerpt, and property posts display the house, and my reason for profiling the property.
Blog Tour
I want to take a moment to tell you about the new features and information you can find on the ochousingnews.com.
Purple Navigation
As I mentioned in the introduction, the focus of my attention has broadened to the entire Orange County housing market. The purple navigation tabs below the header logo will limit the display of posts to only those about that area or topic. So if you are only interested in what's happening in Newport Beach, clicking on that navigation tab will show you only the posts I have done on Newport Beach.
Main Navigation
Above the header is the main site navigation. This will lead you to features and services not related to the blog posts.
MLS Listings
You can browse the listings from any city or zip code in Orange County as well as the various villages of Irvine. By default, the listings will be displayed by time on the market with the newest being listed first. If you want to quickly see what has just hit the market in a particular area, this is a handy feature. These same queries by city and Irvine village can be found in the right sidebar as well.
MLS Map Search
If you prefer to set detailed parameters to facilitate your search for a particular home, the MLS map search is the best method. You can perform as many searches as you like, and if you register with the system, you can save your searches and receive email updates.
Foreclosure Deals
If you want to find upcoming foreclosure properties to find the best deals in the current market, we have a special search page just for that.
Investment Rentals
As most of you know, I run a fund buying rental properties in Las Vegas to sell to Orange County cashflow investors. My available inventory can be found on the Investment rental tab.
Free Services
As part of my commitment to benefit the community, I provide a number of free services. These include a monthly market newsletter, live presentations, property value reports, an affordability calculator, and a library of educational writings.
Market Newsletter
Each month, I compile the data on real estate transactions in Orange County and publish a newsletter containing my findings. I sort through the information to provide the key data I believe is important to making a buying decision. If you sign up, you will receive this free report by email each month.
Live Presentations
Shevy Akason and I provide a number of free live presentations. We provide first-time homebuyer training, an OC housing market update, a Las Vegas investment property seminar twice monthly, and a short sale and REO workshop. We also put on guest presentations from time to time. All presentations are free of charge.
Value Reports
I developed a proprietary report detailing the value and the cost of ownership. We can prepare this report for any property in the MLS coverage area at your request. It provides both resale and rental comps, our estimation of current value and fundamental value, and a detailed breakdown of the monthly cost of ownership.
Affordability Calculator
If you want to determine what you can really afford and how much a property will cost both up-front and on an ongoing basis, our affordability calculator is designed to tell you. It provides the same cost of ownership breakdown as our value reports, and it allows you to run scenarios and explore options on your own.
Education Library
Over the course of nearly five years of writing for the Irvine Housing Blog, I wrote a number of educational pieces. These writings have been collected and organized by topic into our education library. These same links can be found at the bottom of the sidebar on any blog page.
Finest Agents
I believe I am fortunate to work with Shevy Akason and his team. I believe them to be among the finest agents in Orange County. Our many testimonials from happy clients attests to his skills. If you don't know Shevy, I recommend you come to one of our live presentations and see for yourself what separates him from other agents.
About Me
No blog would be complete without a biography of the blogger.
Sidebar elements
Many of the sidebar elements are shortcuts to the features and services described above. In addition to that, I have a link to my book, The Great Housing Bubble, post tags, recent “thoughtful remarks,” a blogroll of frequently updated blogs I like, and a random collection of my cartoons at the bottom of the page.
Thank you for reading
I want to thank you for checking out OC Housing News and for your years of readership here at the Irvine Housing Blog. As with anything I do, this new site is a work in progress subject to constant and consistent improvement. I appreciate any constructive suggestions you might have to make OC Housing News a better blog and website.
Sincerely,
Larry Roberts (Irvine Renter)
P.S. I will still be known by my blog name Irvine Renter.
It’s about time.
what does this mean for irvinehousing blog? do you write for both or only for the new blog?
I will provide posts for both blogs through the end of the year, then I will post only on the new blog.
Congrats on the new blog venture. How long until OCAr attempts to take credit for “finally” shutting down Irvine Housing Blog?
how come a new blog vs IHB becoming OHB or whatever. are you and zovall parting ways? what will IHB be like without you?
I’m guessing IR is updating his book, and that’s why his focus is widening to OC.
I hope that he has a chapter on homeloaner psychology based on interviews and anecdotes. 🙂
🙁
Glad you’re progressing onward to bigger things, but didn’t realize it meant the end of IHB until I saw your comment above.
Wish you could do both or make IHB a WEEKLY post at minimum to keep it active! Please consider it…
Moving to Irvine next month. I’ll need to change my user name 🙂
It was inevitable that you had to expand out… Irvine is too boring (and I imagine you will eventually run out of HELOBusers… hehe).
Sad to hear you won’t stay active on the IHB… but you know where to go if you want to talk about Irvine stuff. ;-P
Good luck on the new venture… I assume will have to create new logins for comments (is “AZDave” taken?”).
In the tradition of whining about change, my first impression is that the new blog is pretty hard on the eyes. There seems to be way too much going on on the right side of the pages. On the IHB, the font is small enough to get away with it, but it is really distracting on the new page. In the “Subjects of Interest” pane, what is the deal with the huge and small fonts? The far right column might do well on its own page.
I’m in agreement with Dave here (gasp).
It’s even busier than the IHB which I thought was pretty crowded.
I understand you want to present as much information as possible but maybe you don’t need to show every sub-topic for every area.
The “Subjects Of Interest” pane is common in blogs, it’s like a keyword cloud that give more prominence to either the newer and/or more popular subjects.
But with that being said… at least it looks seasoned and has more content than most “new” blogs.
Good luck again.
I’d like for IHB to continue with a focus on Irvine and am currently looking for writers and ideas for posts. If there is something you want to see discussed or if you are interested in participating, you can reach me at zovall@gmail.com.
Wait… so the IHB will continue on, but without Larry?
Interesting.
Will the forums open back up? Or you can point them to another place (hint hint).
Article suggestion: “Why 3CWGs are the best”
Sounds Interesting!
There’s 2 good Frontline shows on PBS this week:
1) Sick Around America (US Health Insurance)
Even the most knowledgeable companies, like benefits analysts, are at the mercy of the insurers, after even 1 employee has a major illness.
There’s 5 US states that offer guaranteed issue (health care to all who want to pay), but the average cost is 3x states that do underwriting.
One strategy for those who can’t get affordable individual insurance is to move to another country that has universal health care (any other developed country), and move back to the USA at age 65 when Medicare kicks in.
2) The Madoff Affair (wrapup on Madoff)
Since the SEC is so toothless, one has to wonder: why not just shut it down and tell everybody “buyer beware”?
Enron’s executives actually died of natural causes before the SEC could jail them.
Irvine Housing Market – 1
Irvine Renter – 0
Game Over
Since Irvine Renter has had this blog, Irvine Housing Market has been a guy dressed in skirt with a wig in the big house. You get my drift PR!
OK. Here’s a study for you, Larry. Given that of late you have made many references to Irvine approaching “rental parity” (I think your formula must include HOA/Insurance/Mello-Roos which is sometimes more than taxes regardles of tax breaks); and given that TIC currently owns 39,000 apartment units with another 6,000 permitted and under some stage of development, thereby allowing them to control rents (and patient capital to run vacancy rates no one will ever know about)which has the effect of boosting prices of “for-sale” housing; please research and apply that to the coming development at Rancho Mission Viejo. The nearest comps there show 63% of listings in Ladera Ranch as distressed, apartment rents all over the place with ‘incentives’ to further distort the picture. Lennar could benefit from Bren’s strategy, provided they build the right product. But RMV is a different horse.
With all the new rental product the Irvine Company is bringing on line, I don’t see how they can raise rants much without dealing with a lot of vacancy. I think rents are going to rise at a much slower rate than most pundits imagine even as the economy improves and people make more money.
If rents don’t rise much, prices will have to come down to absorb the distressed inventory. Plus, recent reports are that much more distressed inventory is on the way.
SEC Sues Former Fannie, Freddie Executives
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203733304577102310955780788.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories
And their ‘consultants’, such as Newt baby?
Rents are already at ridiculously high levels in Irvine, so raising rents is not the issue. And Bren, having such control over most all apartments in Irvine, and having owned many of them for a long time, can afford to run a vacancy level not acceptable to other apartment owners. If you read any of the OC Register’s interviews with him when he received the ULI award recently, it is obvious that he enjoys total control over all that happens and he has the deep pockets to exercise that control. In the early 1980’s when it appeared that the market was out of balance, and there was little move-up activity that he needed for the future communities in Irvine, he embarked on a program of condo-conversion that brought all other condo projects in the County to a total standstill. Laguna Niguel, Aliso Viejo, Mission Viejo….all died. If the apartments are not producing, the retail will; if the retail does not produce, the commercial will. It is a giant monopoly. But RMV does not have those cards in hand.
Lived in an Irvine Co apt once and looked up its property tax. The assessment was ludicriously low. If all those developments somehow via multiple corporations are paying 1970’s indexed tax rates, that’s a pretty big business advantage over other’s paying 2011 rates.
Yes, Prop 13 mistakenly included corporations and inherited RE.
So you know those office buildings you drive by every day?
Every single office building in California belongs to its own shell corporation that will live forever, while its property tax payable approaches pocket change.
The reason for the shell corporation is so that the office building can be bought and sold without losing its original Prop 13 status date.
Any effort to fix that loophole in Prop 13 is met with rage that you’re really attacking little old ladies living out their final days in the family tract home.
Georgia Couple Pleads With Bank of America in Music Video
http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/business/2011/12/georgia-couple-pleads-with-bank-of-america-in-music-video/