NorCalSci said: You cannot put in a window like the ones that have been functioning perfectly fine in your house for 50 or 100 years or more. Instead you need a double or triple pane, low E window and most likely it needs to be made of tempered glass. Things like this make simple construction and home improvement tasks cost five to ten times more than they should cost (with dubious benefits in return).




I can't believe that you write things like this with a straight face.

It reminds me of a car salesman who is pitching the Christmas-tree freshener with the car lot's name stamped on it, as "ornamental faux evergreenery scented by hand in an exotic foreign country and imported here for the exclusive use by our dealership. And we'll throw that in at no additional cost to you".

I would like to see the code references that require the Design Review police to verify that your glass is up to par. There is no law barring the use of single pane glass in homes, and I hate to be the one to inform you of this, but very few homes in CA are 50 to 100 years old. Most were built since the 1970's.

Call any glass place around and ask if they offer single hung windows. You will see for yourself.


ETA: If you live in a residence with an HOA, the HOA may have something to say. Solution: don't buy a resident where there is an HOA.

gludlow typed: If you think that material costs and permits are driving prices in California, you're nuts. Do shingles cost 150% more than they did 5 years ago? Wood? Siding? Bricks? Of course not.Materials are MUCH higher than they were 5 years ago! A friend of mine actually built a steel house because it was cheaper than using wood! Copper wiring is at least 3x more than it was then. Where have you been?!

The supply prices at wholesale lumber yards are outrageous, as well as at Home Depot and Lowes.

beadedmonkey said:NorCalSci said: You cannot put in a window like the ones that have been functioning perfectly fine in your house for 50 or 100 years or more. Instead you need a double or triple pane, low E window and most likely it needs to be made of tempered glass. Things like this make simple construction and home improvement tasks cost five to ten times more than they should cost (with dubious benefits in return).



I would like to see the code references that require the Design Review police to verify that your glass is up to par. There is no law barring the use of single pane glass in homes, and I hate to be the one to inform you of this, but very few homes in CA are 50 to 100 years old. Most were built since the 1970's.

Call any glass place around and ask if they offer single hung windows. You will see for yourself. Be careful with this link, it's 8.8 MB 344 pages:
California Residential Energy Compliance Manual

My current home is 68 years old, my last home was 108 years old. I believe there is only one home in my neighborhood that is less than 40 years old.

My post about construction costs was to point out that new construction in our area is very expensive, and that remodeling costs are so much MORE than outrageously expensive that there is something out of whack.

However, knowing that construction and remodel costs are VERY expensive PLUS the fact that land is very, very expensive here might help some of the conspiracy theorists understand another possible reason why homes are expensive in California, beyond all those greedy families trying to profiteer by buying homes for their greedy little children.

I am not saying that the high construction costs are justified, I am just saying they are extremely high. Add the fact that land is expensive and maybe you will reevaluate your estimates of the profit margins here, at least in some cases.

beadedmonkey said: There was a false shortage created by lending money to people who should never have been qualified for the loans, and then those people competed with one another for these type of places.

If borrowed money hadn't been made available to them, places such as these would have never sold for what they sold for.Sorry, but that is a tinfoil hat statement...

There is currently population and job growth in California. The state recently announced its treasury coffers are unexpectedly heavy.

New construction has slowed. The population is growing. Earnings are increasing.

What do you think is going to happen to rental costs in the next few years, particularly if home sales decrease?

(Hint: Look at the current vacancy rates in San Francisco...)


If people begin to pay more for rent, a lot more, are you going to claim there is an artificially stimulated rent bubble?

What about San Diego?

San Diego is up there as one of the Metro areas /cities with the biggest median price drop (-6%) over the past year .Chicago is kinda surprising me that it is still holding on pretty well to it's current price median,it's holding on better to it's median price than cities on the East and West coasts-NYC and California according to Case-Shiller.

Why is Seattle the only city able to hold onto double digit median price gains(10% in the shiller-case index) over the past year.What is so special about seattle that it's bucking the whole trend of the rest of the country?

By Rex Nutting, MarketWatch
Last Update: 12:51 PM ET May 29, 2007


WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- U.S. home prices dropped 1.4% in the first quarter compared with a year earlier, the first year-over-year decline in national home prices since 1991, according to the S&P/Case-Shiller index released Tuesday.

A year ago, home prices were rising at an 11.5% pace. Prices have been falling for the past three quarters.
The Case-Shiller indexes cover three geographical areas. The national index is released quarterly, while the 10-city and 20-city indexes are released each month.

The 10-city Case-Shiller price index fell 1.9% year-on-year through March, while the 20-city index dropped 1.4%. The 10-city index has fallen nine months in a row, while the 20-city index has fallen for eight straight months.

All three Case-Shiller indexes show continued deterioration in home prices. Prices were falling or rising slower in most U.S. cities.
The national decline "is reaffirmation of the pullback in the U.S. residential real estate market," said Robert Shiller, chief economist for MacroMarkets LLC, and co-inventor of the index.

"This fall is consistent with the ongoing trend that has developed over the past year," wrote Goldman Sachs economists, who said they believe the Case-Shiller index is the best gauge of home values. "We remain comfortable with our forecast of house prices falling by 5% over 2007."
Falling home prices have squeezed many borrowers who have been able to extract equity from their homes or refinance their loan to avoid a sudden increase in mortgage payments as their adjustable-rate loan reset.

As a result of falling prices, foreclosures are rising nationally, especially in regions with a weak economy, such as the Midwest, and in the bubble regions of Southern California, Florida, Nevada and Arizona.
Thirteen of 20 cities in the Case-Shiller index have seen falling prices in the past year, led by Detroit (down 8.4%) and San Diego (down 6%). Home prices rose 10% in Seattle, 7.4% in Charlotte, N.C., and 7% in Portland, Ore.

Prices in Phoenix and Las Vegas, Nev., have fallen the furthest from their peak. After growing at a 49.3% pace in September 2005, home prices in Phoenix are now down 3% year-on-year. In Las Vegas, price gains went from 53.2% in September 2004 to negative 1.6% in March 2007.

Among other major cities tracked by the index, home prices are down 4.9% in Boston, down 4.8% in Washington, down 3% in Tampa, Fla., down 2.4% in Cleveland, and down 2.3% in San Francisco. Prices fell 2% in Denver, 1.9% in Minneapolis, 1.4% in Los Angeles and 1.1% in New York.

In addition to the price gains in Seattle,Charlotte and Portland, prices rose 1.6% in Dallas,and 1.3% in Chicago.

The Case-Shiller index is considered a superior gauge of home prices compared to the median sales-price data released by the Commerce Department or National Association of Realtors, because it tracks multiple sales on the same property and is therefore not influenced by a different mix of homes sold in a period.

gludlow said:NorCalSci said:
2002 +9%
2003 +7%
2004 +15%
2005 +12%

So much for flatulent predictions...

If you think that material costs and permits are driving prices in California, you're nuts. Do shingles cost 150% more than they did 5 years ago? Wood? Siding? Bricks? Of course not. Builders are (were?) making huge profits because people are overpaying for homes. They don't build and charge cost; they build and charge whatever people will pay. And if people pay for monster homes on .01 acres, they'll build those, too. That doesn't mean they'll hold their value.

I'd like to see some numbers to support your claims that there is a housing shortage increasing demand, too. What is the population increase in California over the past 5 years?

I think you and many people just believe that houses should cost that much, and it's a self-supporting myth. That's fine; I'll live somewhere else and saves tons of money.

why they always avoid the main point: can average people afford?

some dealers from down south can buy 10 luxury homes on a day without thinking, their buying powers are significantly higher than the general public, but should that be the basis of our country's market?

population is meaningless too, some people just ignore the fact that in some areas, undocumented residents are actually more than documented ones....

http://money.cnn.com/2007/06/14/real_estate/mortgage_rates/index.htm?postversion=2007061410

Mortgage rates: biggest spike in 4 years

Rate on 30-year fixed mortgage gained 21 points in past week, to 6.74%, highest level since July 2006
By Rob Kelley, CNNMoney.com staff writer
June 14 2007: 10:47 AM EDT


NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) -- Mortgage rates made their largest upward movement in nearly 4 years, and the 30-year fixed-rate reached its highest level since July 2006, Freddie Mac said Thursday.

The average rate on 30-year fixed-rate loans climbed to 6.74 percent for the week ending June 14, from 6.53 percent the previous week. That marked the biggest one-week increase since July 2003.
Last year at this time, 30-year mortgage rates averaged 6.63 percent. The rate is the highest since July 20, 2006, when it averaged 6.80 percent.

The 30-year rate stood at 6.15 percent on May 10th, just before it turned sharply up.

Doug Duncan, chief economist for the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA), expects mortgage rates to top out near 7 percent by the end of the year.

Rising rates, among other factors, have caused the MBA and the National Association of Realtors to push back their forecasts for a home price recovery. Both groups are now looking to early 2008, compared with a previous outlook for mid-2007.

Rates: Latest problem for a sluggish market
Home prices and mortgage rates are closely connected. If rates go up, would-be home buyers face higher monthly mortgage payments, cutting into overall affordability.

The 0.59-percentage point increase since May 10 represents a jump of $115 a month on a $300,000 loan.

The rate on 15-year loans averaged 6.43 percent, up from 6.22 the previous week, Freddie Mac (Charts, Fortune 500) said. A year ago, the 15-year rate averaged 6.25 percent.

Five-year adjustable-rate mortgages rose to 6.37 percent from 6.24 percent last week. The five-year ARM averaged 6.23 percent a year ago.

One-year ARMs averaged 5.75 percent, up from 5.65 percent last week and 5.66 percent a year ago.

Mortgage rates, of course, are only one third of the affordability equation that plays out in the housing market. There's also home prices themselves and household incomes, both of which have been positive lately for buyers, according to DeKaser.

caonima said:population is meaningless too, some people just ignore the fact that in some areas, undocumented residents are actually more than documented ones....How is population meaningless? It's a major contributing factor to the amount of housing demand in a specific area, and demand has a direct impact on housing prices.

If an average person can't afford a home in a certain area, they get more average people to live with them to help out. This is especially true with immigrants (documented or not) who are used to this kind of living situation in their native countries.

nickmckinney said:Video of the 50% off auction that just happened in Fort Meyers Florida


If this doesn't show the true nightmare of Florida real estate, I don't know what else to say. Do you have anything new to add?

I'm just thinking if we wanted to read your posts from the previous thread, we would just read that thread instead of this one...

Are you losing track of your blogs...???

jack07002 said:What about San Diego?

San Diego is up there as one of the Metro areas /cities with the biggest median price drop (-6%) over the past year .Chicago is kinda surprising me that it is still holding on pretty well to it's current price median,it's holding on better to it's median price than cities on the East and West coasts-NYC and California according to Case-Shiller.

Why is Seattle the only city able to hold onto double digit median price gains(10% in the shiller-case index) over the past year.What is so special about seattle that it's bucking the whole trend of the rest of the country?Two word, job market.

Another report showed Seattle passed the low point early this year and it's back to 2 digit increase.

Personal Observation:

The old saying about location matters a great deal this region. The so called outer laying area (out of the I-5, I-405 loop) has slowed down and I see listing just sits for months but the prime area in Seattle and Bellevue are still very hot. House don't sit for more than 2-weeks in the prime area, even with listing $ going up and up. The horrible traffic situation is partly responsible for this. Also, these house are not sold to "liar loan" people either.

I predicted the slowdown in 2-3 quarter of 07 for Seattle in Part 2 of this thread, looks like I might be off. The slowdown has came and gone.