Updates, February 19, 2006

Here are some quick market updates. According to the Los Angeles Daily News on January 16, 2006, home sales in Southern California in January fell to their lowest January level in 5 years, shedding 7.4%. However DataQuick pointed out that January is one of the weakest homeselling months of the year.

Sales have now fallen for two consecutive months, according to John Karevoll of DataQuick, but this does not signal a trend, he said. It will take until March to get a sense of how the market concludes a long boom cycle.

However, Annette Haddad of the LA Times used starkly different words.

Six months of gains in Southern California's median home price were wiped out in January while sales activity dropped sharply, further signs that the region's once-hot real estate market continues to lose steam.

Last Sunday (February 12) we stopped by this new construction, which is currently being offered at $1,299,900. It has been on the market since February 7. We didn't bother to go in.

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We actually stopped at the open house at 0212 Ruofud #20. This is one of 28 condos in a complex just two doors from us. The open house was our very first chance (after living in this neighborhood well over 10 years) of seeing the inside of this complex. It is actually rather quiet inside, and the courtyard seems spacious. However the condo itself, although nice, with a shaded patio, seemed cramped, with small rooms (it is 3 bd/3 bath, 1368 sq ft). This was listed last year at $579,000. That listing expired and it has been relisted at $570,000 since January 25, 2006.

Unit #19 in this complex is also for sale, with identical beds/baths and square footage. It was listed October 19, 2005 at $610,000, which was reduced December 1 to $595,000. The current asking price of $589,000 was set December 20. We are not sure why #19 warrants an asking price of about $19K over #20, since #20 is actually off the street and has even more privacy.

Here are the recent price histories I could find for these units:

Unit #19 10/02/1998  $190,500
Unit #20 09/17/1997  $157,700
Unit #20 05/05/1997  $170,900

Zillow estimates are as follows:

         Zestimate Value range 
Unit #19 $525,976  $462,859-$568,054 ($589K asking)
Unit #20 $531,852  $468,030-$574,400 ($570K asking)

If Unit #19 sells right now for its current asking price, that's a 209% (over 3X) gain in 7 years, 4 months. If Unit #20 sells right now for its current asking price, that's a 277% (over 3.7X) gain in 8 years, 5 months.