Forecast: Calif. home prices to drop 9.9%

The OC register reports - Real estate trackers from FiServ and Moody’s Economy.com forecast that California home prices will fall 9.9% in the year ending in June 2011 — fourth biggest drop across the nation.  Essentially, all meager gains from June 2009-2010 will evaporate......

Recent Sales Weigh on 26 Cruisers Bluff

26 Cruisers Bluff, for sale at $5,300,000, is a White Sails model built by Taylor Woodrow in 2004.  It has 4 bedrooms and is about 5000 square feet and has very nice ocean views.  On a per square foot basis, it is priced at $1060 and this home last sold in mid-2008 for $5,175,000.

Two other White Sails homes have recently sold, both about 5000 square feet in size.  2 Gondoliers Bluff sold on November 8 for $4,100,000.  36 Gondoliers Bluff sold just 8 days later for $4,074,000.

Both of these recent sales were sold at prices of about $820 per square foot.  You can draw your own conclusions.....
One last data point - 2 Gondoliers Bluff is a fantastic home, as shown by the photo below:

Laguna Letdown - Housing Prices Flat & Sales Sinking Marketwide - OC Register

More details at the OC Register, but in short, the housing market continued to struggle against fierce headwinds last month, losing ground in the face of tightfisted lenders and edgy buyers.

The median price of an Orange County home – or price at the midpoint of all sales – fell to $438,000 last month, housing tracker MDA DataQuick reported Tuesday.

Last month's median price also fell $12,000 from the 2010 high of $450,000 reached in May and July. That means that all the price gains of the past year have virtually evaporated.

$2 Million+ Homes Not Selling In Laguna - OC Register

It’s common to see homes for sale with prices well over $1 million in Laguna Beach, but is anyone buying those homes right now?  Not really....
More on this from the OC Register is here.

Freshest Dataquick Sales Numbers Show Continued Home Value Slide

The latest housing numbers for sales during the 22 day period ending October 8 have just been released and have been published by the OC Register.

The numbers show a continued plunge in Laguna Beach and Newport Coast.  Corona Del Mar is slightly up year over year, but is unchanged from the September data i previously posted. 

The highlights:
Laguna Beach:
only 32 homes sold, median price down 19.2% to $1,050,000.

Coronal Del Mar:
only 20 homes sold, median price up 3% to $1,498,000.

Newport Coast:
only 19 homes sold, median price down 8.1% to $1,540,000

Awesome Chart - What Year Have LA Home Values Rolled Back To?

This chart was part of the Anderson Forecast presentation at UCLA.  LA home values are at a level similar to that of January 2004.

One Seabourne Home May Sell - Another Seabourn Listing Fails in Crystal Cove

52 Sidney Bay was recently pulled from the market.  Listed at a lofty $2.9 million, it didn't sell and may have been rented for substantially less than the cost of owning at $2.9 million.  I saw a rental listing for this home recently, but cannot find it now.

The owners of 9 Atlantis Cove aggressively reduced their asking price to $2,395,000 and succeeded in drawing an offer from someone who is shopping the Seabourne models in Crystal Cove.  Surprisingly, 9 Atlantis Cove is now listed as pending on Redfin.  If it sells somewhere near the asking price, such a sale price probably would have been what the home would have sold for sometime in 2004, in my opinion.

Will the buyer stick around and close?  Time will tell.

The remaining Seabourne homes for sale have been on and off the market for an average of 688 days.
This is the real time since the homes were first listed, even if they were taken on and off the market.  Real estate agents commonly delist and relist properties so the days on the market (DOM) indicator from the MLS can be a lot less than reality.  I find that my way of looking at DOM a useful indicator of market weakness because it really shows how long the seller has been trying, on and off, to sell a home.

The raw data is:
 
11 Secret Cove - 1731 days - First listed on Jan 31, 2006.
2 Secret Cove - 552 days - First listed in April 2009.
24 Wharfside Drive - 995 days - First listed in February 2008.
62 Sidney Bay - 56 days
5 Atlantis Cove - 106 days

Buyers Remorse Part IV - 16 Archipelago Sells for Less

One of my prior posts is about the 20 Timor Sea home sale last summer and how its lofty, full price sale of nearly $5,500,000 now compares to recent sales of comparable homes in Crystal Cove. 

Well, hang on to your hats because 16 Archipelago just sold for $3,650,000. 

16 Archipelago is a 5000 square foot, 5 bedroom home with a pool and breathtaking coastline views.  20 Timor Sea is a 5000 square foot, 4 bedroom home with a pool and breathtaking coastline views.  You can look at the listings and make your own conclusions, but these homes look darn similar to me.  This does not bode well for the value of the 20 Timor Sea home, in my opinion.....Dare I ask our real estate agent friends if 20 Timor Sea is now worth $3,650,000, a shocking $1,850,000 less than its purchase price of a few months ago???? 

After 3 years, Laguna Beach Mansion Sells for 2003 Price

1302 Skyline, a very high end french country farmhouse style mansion, sold in September for about $3,675,000. The home features 4 bedrooms and 4000 square feet of highly upgraded living spaces.

This home has been for sale on and off the MLS since 2007. One of those old listings was for 5,995,000 by James Ardery of Prudential California Realty. In my opinion, this seller lost millions by not competitively pricing the home in the first place. A competitive price long ago could have resulted in a sale, but instead the home sat on the market while home values sunk even lower.

The home was last purchased in August, 2004, for $4,400,000. The more recent sale price in September 2010 is probably equivalent to what the home would have sold for in 2003 or even 2002! This tells you where the luxury home market is on the OC coast.

What does this mean? If you are buying a home, try to determine what it would have sold for in 2003 - that is one indicator of the home's value today, despite the listing price.

Huge Monthly Losses for 2009 Buyers in Corona Del Mar, Laguna Beach and Newport Coast

The housing numbers for September have just been released and have been published by the LA Times.
The numbers show a sinking market in Laguna Beach, Newport Beach, Newport Coast and Corona Del Mar.  This runs contrary to what I have been hearing from most agents that the market has bottomed out or is increasing.

The highlights:
Laguna Beach:
only 28 homes sold, median price down 13.9% to $1,150,000.

Coronal Del Mar:
only 11 homes sold, median price down a whopping 25% to $1,500,000.

Newport Coast:
only 15 homes sold, median price down 8.3% to $1,650,000

Newport Beach is more or less flat, with some zips up a little and some down.

What does this mean to unfortunate buyers who purchased a median priced home about a year ago?

Losses. Big time.

Laguna Beach:  
$186,000 loss in the last 12 months, which is about a $15,500 loss PER MONTH.

Corona Del Mar:  
$500,000 loss in the last 12 months, which is about a $41,700 loss PER MONTH.

Newport Coast:  
$159,300 loss in the last 12 months, which is about a $12,450 loss PER MONTH

When a real estate agent tells you that it is a good time to buy, don't take their word for it - do your own research and be careful.  You could buy a property that will decline fast and put you underwater in no time at all.  Of course, if and when that happens, your agent will not be around to help you share in the pain.  They will be busy trying to sell houses to someone else and collect the commissions.