Open House Palo Alto - Under $2,000,000

[wsugrad03]

Originally Posted by bobby_guz_man

Looking for a point in the rant.....

Still looking....

To entertain other buyers who are currently poking their periscopes up to see if they should take the dive into home ownership. Because honestly....SV homes are complete puke everyone knows it. Don't defend it. Your home isn't charming. It's overpriced. It's in dire need of renovation. If homeowners here actually paid taxes on the assessed value of their home, many of them would have left years ago. Heck, we'd have more liquidity in the housing market and probably cheaper property values as a result.

The purpose of my rant is the same as the OP. Folks gotta vent sometimes. Everyone knows the 5 stages of grief. It starts with denial and then anger (my current stage). Then comes bargaining ("Why didn't we buy in 2010, why didn't we move to SD or Austin, Seattle's weather isn't that bad is it?", etc..). Then there's depression for folks that know they just have to rent and live like poppers for several more years to save up. Eventually comes acceptance where they hold their nose and submit the P&S agreement (most likely many attempts). This cycle may repeat itself several times and people may jump from Depression right back to Anger before completing all 5 stages.

[bigdumbgod]

Originally Posted by wsugrad03

To entertain other buyers who are currently poking their periscopes up to see if they should take the dive into home ownership. Because honestly....SV homes are complete puke everyone knows it. Don't defend it. Your home isn't charming. It's overpriced. It's in dire need of renovation. If homeowners here actually paid taxes on the assessed value of their home, many of them would have left years ago. Heck, we'd have more liquidity in the housing market and probably cheaper property values as a result.

The purpose of my rant is the same as the OP. Folks gotta vent sometimes. Everyone knows the 5 stages of grief. It starts with denial and then anger (my current stage). Then comes bargaining ("Why didn't we buy in 2010, why didn't we move to SD or Austin, Seattle's weather isn't that bad is it?", etc..). Then there's depression for folks that know they just have to rent and live like poppers for several more years to save up. Eventually comes acceptance where they hold their nose and submit the P&S agreement (most likely many attempts). This cycle may repeat itself several times and people may jump from Depression right back to Anger before completing all 5 stages.

Or: You take a quick look and see that foreign investment and lots of highly-paid techies, combined with ultra-tight housing stock have resulted in the state of this market, and either dive into the fray...or don't. No use burning up energy getting upset over it. Unless we want to lay blame on certain entities for exacerbating the situation (businesses/developers/policies/???).

[dburbs1975]

I agree with WSU about the tax situation. This is the only place that a 1950 home that is worth 1.5M is taxes at $758/year. less that a new iphone costs.

there is a taxation problem here, without which supply may actually meet demand.

I may and should voice my opinion on this bizarre setup.

Perhaps it touches a nerve with some.

[Fiona8484]

Amen! It is nice to hear that others (WSU and dburbs) feel the same as me regarding the tax situation.

[Fiona8484]

Originally Posted by dburbs1975

I agree with WSU about the tax situation. This is the only place that a 1950 home that is worth 1.5M is taxes at $758/year. less that a new iphone costs.

there is a taxation problem here, without which supply may actually meet demand.

Couldn't have said it better myself!

[wsugrad03]

Originally Posted by bigdumbgod

Or: You take a quick look and see that foreign investment and lots of highly-paid techies, combined with ultra-tight housing stock have resulted in the state of this market, and either dive into the fray...or don't. No use burning up energy getting upset over it. Unless we want to lay blame on certain entities for exacerbating the situation (businesses/developers/policies/???).

I'm well aware of what is driving housing prices. Doesn't mean I won't complain about the frustrating and agonizing process of buying a home here. If you know of an individual that recently bought a home without breaking a sweat with 20% down, please capture this person safely so that we may study it.

Too bad the bay area doesn't have the equivalent of www.seattlebubble.com. That site had great data analysis into real estate in Seattle. With prices so extreme here, I would have expected someone to do some number crunching of the public MLS data without the Realtor lip service Kool-Aid.

[jk88cal]

Originally Posted by wsugrad03

Too bad the bay area doesn't have the equivalent of www.seattlebubble.com. That site had great data analysis into real estate in Seattle. With prices so extreme here, I would have expected someone to do some number crunching of the public MLS data without the Realtor lip service Kool-Aid.

There are many realtors' blog or website with trend data. Some data are not so special and you can get the same info off redfin, trulia, or zillow. Other do their own calculations, analysis, and assessment. Below are the better ones I have seen:

This blog has unique analysis of the data, done monthly. I find it useful as a summary.
November 2014 newsletter | JohnFyten.com

This website has tons of trend data. By SM & SC counties and by cities. The trend data goes back to 15 years. A lot of data, but no analysis nor commentary. You do your own interpretation of data.
Santa Clara County Home Values - Santa Clara County Real Estate Statistics

This website provides snapshot of current situation. I see similar data elsewhere, so I think this might report sent out to realtors:
Silicon Valley real estate market trend report December 2014

[DMenscha]

Amazingly enough, some sellers don't listen to us and do what they darn well feel like doing.