CAR May Sales and Price Report

Quick Facts:

· Existing, single-family home sales increased 35.2 percent in May to a seasonally adjusted rate of 556,590 on an annualized basis.

· The statewide median price of an existing single-family home increased 4.2 percent in May to $267,570, compared with April 2009.

· C.A.R.’s Unsold Inventory Index fell to 4.2 months in May, compared with 8.7 months in May 2008.

[Note: Large changes in local median home prices typically indicate both local home price appreciation, and often, large shifts in the composition of housing market activity. Some of the variations in median home prices for April may be exaggerated due to compositional changes in housing demand. The DataQuick tables listing median home prices in California cities and counties are accessible through C.A.R. Online athttp://www.car.org/economics/historicalprices/2009medianprices/may2009medianprices]

My comments:

The overall huge drop in unsold inventory was aided by a foreclosure moratorium earlier this year, with a new 90-day moratorium enacted in Ca that started this June. In Pasadena and surrounding areas, good inventory remains low to almost non-existent, so when a good property hits the market, the multiple offers are just piling in. Also, interest rates had dropped to an unbelievable 4.5% a couple mos ago, which made the inventory suddenly very affordable to a larger number of buyers. At roughly 5.5% today, affordability is still good and many buyers are competing in this low-inventory market to try and get in while the rates are still low.

With the combination of low inventory levels and low interest rates, Ray and I are actually noting value increases in recent sales compared to the beginning of the year!

Read article HERE

Consensus Among Lending Industry Analysts That Mortgage Rates Will Remain Low

This is good news for both sellers and buyers. The low interest rates have boosted buyer affordability, bringing more buyers in to the market, and the increase in buyer activity has resulted in many (well-priced) sellers receiving multiple offers.

Read the LA Times article HERE

Affordability Improves In California

Read the full article HERE

CAR Reports March Home Sales Increased 63.8%, Median Home Price Declined 39%

Quick Facts:
· Existing, single-family home sales increased 63.8 percent in March to a seasonally adjusted rate of 522,980 on an annualized basis
· The statewide median price of an existing single-family home increased 2.2 percent in March to$253,040 compared with February 2009
· C.A.R.’s Unsold Inventory Index fell to 5 months in March, compared with 12.2 months in March 2008
· The median number of days it took to sell a single-family home declined to 48.3 days in March 2009, compared with 56.8 days in March 2008

Read the full article HERE

New Listing in Pasadena's Playhouse District

Sophisticated condo with open floor plan and spacious master suite. This light and bright unit is located near Fuller, Caltech, PCC, cultural attractions, shops, restaurants, and transportation.

Offered at $399,000

For more details and pictures, Click Here.

Virtual tour is located at http://www.286northmadison.com/ .

New Program Allows For Refis Up To 105% Value

Everybody wants to refinance right now and take advantage of these historic rates, but unfortunately it has been difficult for many to do so due to the fact that home values have dropped. Many folks have been told that refinancing is not possible because there is not enough equity in the home (it is standard for lenders to only offer a re-fi with 20% or more equity). Obama's new Making Home Affordable program will allow millions of homeowners, who don't have 20% equity in their homes, to refinance. The loan must be currently guaranteed or owned by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac, and it can not have more than one 30 day late payment in the last 12 mos to qualify. For more details regarding this program, READ THIS.

Good News For The Jumbo Loan Market

Several lenders are about to once again begin originating jumbo loans between $750k and $1.5m at interest rates in the upper 5% range. This is great news for our area as much of our inventory falls in this price category. We expect this will have a good impact on our local market and help move some of our higher priced inventory....

Read the full LA Times story HERE.

The Home Buyer Tax Credits, Explained

From MarketWatch:

There's the $8,000 federal tax credit for first-time home buyers. And now California has upped the ante, offering a tax credit worth up to $10,000 to any home buyer, first time or not, of any income level, who buys a home between March 1, 2009 and March 1, 2010.
There's just one hitch to the California tax credit: You have to buy a newly-constructed home that's never been lived in.

Read the full article HERE

The View From Where We Are Standing...

Since the beginning of this quarter, we have observed some changes from last year. Most sellers in '08 were still insisting on listing their homes as if prices were not declining, and sales, as a result, were pretty stagnant.

This year, however, with the sad state of the economy on the front pages every single day, sellers have woken up to the fact that property values are in decline, and will probably be so for a while. Also, appraisers have tightened their criteria to only looking at comps no more than three months old, and then depreciating those comps at 1% a month. Armed with this information, sellers who then properly price their home anywhere from 1-3% under their most recent comps have seen a lot of activity. Our most recent listings, priced just under the most recent comps, have all had multiple offers. People frequently ask us "in what price range?". Well, in our case, it has been happening in various price ranges; low $400k, high $600k, and low $1mm ranges.

We have noticed that buyers who had sat on the fence all through '08 are hopping off that fence now, and are back in the search for property, due to the fact that they are finally seeing better values on the market, combined with historically low interest rates. Many of these buyers are finding themselves in competition with multiple offers, although prices are not being driven up significantly by the multiple offers as they had in the past. Now more than ever, the buyers with the best chance of having an offer accepted and moving towards a successful close are the ones with a sizeable down payment...no less than 20%, and preferably 25-35% to be safer.

Although we have seen values in our area decline, they have not tumbled quite as far as the outlying areas, chiefly because of our outstanding location and wonderful communities. We do believe that there will not be a market recovery for several more years, however we remain optimistic that our prime location will shelter us from the more severe declines of outlying areas.

New Listing

This is a wonderful Spanish-style home in North San Gabriel....on a beautiful street, and with lovely mountain views. It has not been on the market for several decades, and has been lovingly maintained by its previous owners (only the second owners since it was built in 1924!).

For more information and additional photos, CLICK HERE

Fourth Quarter '08 Market Report Per Zillow

Nationally, U.S. home values continued to slide for the eighth consecutive quarter, declining 11.6 percent from a year ago, and falling 17.5 percent since the market peak in 2006.

On a local level, some areas have seen a steeper decline, while others have not seen quite as much depreciation. Here are some local 4th quarter results per Zillow:

Pasadena -13.7%

Altadena -16.8%

Sierra Madre -9.3%

Arcadia -3.7%

South Pasadena -8.5%

San Marino -6.6%

San Gabriel -9.1%

Glendale -20.7%

Arcadia and San Marino home values are holding up stronger than surrounding areas, largly due to the strong public schools in those two cities.

Letter from NAR regarding Stimulus Pkg

Dear Fellow REALTOR®,

Here's our take on the Stimulis Bill and Treasury announcements made this week. We look at the Stimulis package AND the Treasury's package holistically, in compliment with each other - mostly because that's how the Obama team is looking at it. Your representatives, the NAR Board of Directors, asked us in November to do 4 things (with an unspoken but clearly understood mandate to PRESERVE what we already have). Here they are: 1) get loan limits raised for high cost areas, 2) make the $7,500 tax credit NOT a loan, 3) try to find ways to push interest rates down (which are higher than they should be due to systemic risk right now) by 200 basis points, and 4) help provide solutions to the foreclosure/short sale problem.

So here's what we have achieved: 1) the loan limits will be raised to $727,000 in high cost areas, 2) the tax credit will be raised to $8,000 with NO payback [a true credit], 3) interest rates have come down 125-150 basis points, and 4) the bill has over $50 billion in it for foreclosure mitigation, with Geitners Treasury plan signaling that the second half of TARP and TALF will be used to mitigate foreclosures through a government guarantee, drive down interest rates by buying another $200-300 billion of mortgage paper from the GSES's thereby freeing them up to do the same with new mortgages, and Fannie has just agreed to lift the cap of 4 investment properties eligible for loans and raise it to 10.

In addition, we preserved what we have - which some tend to forget is always on the table when these negotiations start up again - mortgage interest deductability, real estate tax deductability, and the $250,000/$500,000 cap gains exclusion (an overall package worth more than $100 billion and for some a very attractive funding source for their pet projects).

We did make a run at the $15,000 credit -- and we would have loved to have gotten that or the Homebuilders $22,000 credit idea as well as their 5 year loss carryback deal, but they were considered too rich for this program. What it did do though is totally take the debate off of whether a tax credit should be reinstated at all (it expired last year) and whether it was a true credit or a repayable loan, and kept the conversation on how much it should be. It also kept the debate off of 'what we are willing to give up to get a $15,000 tax credit' and kept the debate again, on how much it should be. It's pretty hard to complain when they give you what you ask for and you lose something you never had.

While we study the Treasury specifics on their major role in providing the rest of the housing solution -- there is much more to come and we are working diligently with the Administration to help 'unclog the pipeline' and get capital flowing into housing again.

Sincerely,
Charles McMillan, CIPS, GRI
2009 NAR President

The new rules of mortgage lending

From Cnn.com

If you're shopping for a mortgage these days, it's a whole new world out there.
"There have been a huge number of changes over the past few years in mortgage borrowing," said Gibran Nicholas, founder of the CMPS Institute, which trains and certifies mortgage advisors.
Of course, many of the subprime loans that helped fuel the housing boom - those that didn't require borrowers to show any proof of income, or that let homeowners make minimum payments - are are simply no longer available.
But even buyers looking for a traditional mortgage are now faced with different factors to consider.
Here is what you need to know: (click here)

Pasadena Heritage presents: 2009 Spring Home Tour

The California Style: Johnson, Kaufmann & Coate


Advance Discounted Tickets On Sale - Feb. 27

A Drive-yourself House Tour:Sunday, March 29, 20099:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

Pasadena Heritage presents The California Style: Johnson, Kaufmann & Coate, a tour exploring the beautiful residential designs created by these significant Pasadena-based architects. Working with inspirations that ranged from Spanish and early Californian to Anglo-Colonial architecture, Reginald Johnson, Gordon Kaufmann and Roland Coate created the quintessential California style of the 1920s and 1930s. As a firm and individually, these architects created opulent yet informal homes perfectly suited to the Mediterranean climate, with interior spaces linked to expansive terraces, reflective pools, and lavish gardens.

Featured residences on the tour will include the John Barber House, designed in 1925-26 by Roland Coate on the banks of the Arroyo. The home is one of the finest examples of the Monterey Colonial Revival style in Pasadena, and features much of the original landscaping designed in the 1920s by the prominent landscape architect Katherine Bashford. Also open for visits will be “El Naranjal”, a Mediterranean-style house designed in 1922 by Reginald Johnson and named for a magnificent orange tree on the property. The home has been painstakingly renovated to reflect Johnson’s original designs while keeping intact a pavilion created by the prominent mid-century architect Thornton Ladd in the 1940s.

Guests will drive themselves to the featured houses where docent-guided tours will be ongoing between 9:00 am – 4:00 pm., rain or shine. We suggest 5 hours to complete the tour.

For more information visit http://www.pasadenaheritage.org/

Home values in L.A., Orange counties higher than reported, Zillow.com says

This recent article published in the LA Times (click here to read) points out what we have been noticing here for some time...that the real decline in values is not nearly as severe as the average median value declines reported in the news. And here in the prime location of the west San Gabriel Valley, the declines have been even less severe. Yes, we have noticed a drop in value, but it has not been very deep. From the peak, we have noticed a roughly 10% decline in value for prime properties (more severe discounts are seen on less-than-stellar properties and/or locations). It reminds me of the old adage "location, location, location"...during the heady days of the crazy market, I found myself on many occasions discouraging buyers who were desperate to get in to "anything" from buying properties that were not up to par in location or floorplan. I would remind them that this market, too, shall pass---a decline is in order, and when that happens, the properties in a poor location or with a wacky floor plan will take a larger hit than a good house, with good bones, in a good location, location, location!

Worth Reading!!

Time Magazine's 25 best financial blogs

Multiple Applications For Mortgages

Anecdotal evidence suggests only 50 percent of borrowers applying to refinance are being approved, down from 60 to 70 percent during previous refinance cycles. Homeowners with FICO scores below 700 or with little equity in their homes likely will not qualify to refinance. To increase the likelihood of receiving approval, some borrowers are applying with multiple lenders.
Lenders can lose money on a loan locked in with investors if the borrower decides to go with a different lender. To discourage borrowers from applying with multiple lenders, some lenders are charging up-front deposits.
To read the full story, please click here

Fast Facts

Calif. median home price - November 08: $285,680(Source: C.A.R.)

Calif. highest median home price by C.A.R. region November 08: Santa Barbara So. Coast $1,200,000 (Source: C.A.R.)

Calif. lowest median home price by C.A.R. region November 08: High Desert $148,580 (Source: C.A.R.)

Calif. First-time Buyer Affordability Index - Third Quarter 08: 53 percent (Source: C.A.R.)

Mortgage rates - week ending 12/31/08 30-yr. fixed: 5.10% Fees/points: 0.7% 15-yr. fixed: 4.83% Fees/points: 0.7% 1-yr. adjustable: 4.85% Fees/points: 0.5% (Source: Freddie Mac)