3000 feet of climbing outside my door
January 4th, 2010 Categories: San Diego County Bike Rides
CARLSBAD- Back in the day, the climb in coastal north county was Alga. You often times could find pro triathletes doing repeats and it was oft quoted as part of a solid training program. Well that was then and this is now. Thanks to the recent building boom, which has taken away some great rides, it has created new ride opportunities into what used to be mountain bike territory. And if it’s mountain bike territory, you can count on some solid climbs.
The new king of the coastal climbs has to be San Elijo Road/ Twin Oaks Valley. The area of Double Peak in San Marcos, used to be the domain of the rich, the offroader, the mountain biker and the partiers, but no more. I had watched for quite some time as the road was cut up the side of the hill in anticipation of the coming climb and while the road has been open sometime, this morning, I headed out for our meeting.
The route I was going to ride was to have quite a few coastal bumps to climb on my way to King in order to warm the legs up. I headed south down El Camino Real from my home and then east on Palomar Airport Road which then took me through Lake San Marcos to the start of the north climb outside the entry to Cal State San Marcos. 
The climb was very nice with little traffic, a nice road surface and spectacular views awaiting at the summit. It was the type of climb I like where you can select a gear and just steadily tap out a rhythm taking you to the top. No surprises or undulation. It is pretty much straight up.
As I crested the top I was greeted by amazing views with usually hidden San Clemente Island sitting off the coast. I would say the first two thirds of the climb are the most difficult and unlike the outside route at Torrey Pines, once you hit the right hand bend you really are at the finish. Probably the smartest thing the developers and or city did was place a fire station at the crest. Medical help when you may need it most!!
The rest of the route came benefit of living near a fault zone and I had a small climb up to the La Costa Oaks area and then two more from La Costa Avenue to Poinsettia and lastly the new College Ave. climb created by the building in the Calavera Hills area of Carlsbad.
In all it was a comfortable ride with just over 3000’ of climbing in 30 miles. That’s a GREAT training ride outside my door!!
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Will January deliver YOUR new home?
January 3rd, 2010 Categories: Client Testimonials, Real Estate News, San Diego County Community News, San Diego county Real Estate News, San Diego homes for sale
SAN DIEGO- Well another year is behind us and hopefully we continue to move closer to our economic recovery. While there is much to write about over the past couple years, I continue to look forward and concern myself with the present and presently, inventory is getting low in affordable/ median housing.
As the tax credits associated with economic stimulus package approach their end date, I doubt there will be a second extension, I have quite a few buyers that are trying hard to get into their new homes. Unfortunately, there has been a sense that not too many new listings coming on the market and the data supports that intuition.
Now this could be construed as a positive sign that the number of homes or homeowners in “distress” is slowing down or it could just be the banks just are not foreclosing on distressed properties. Some believe the banks are hoarding homes they have already foreclosed on anticipating listing them at some future date when the market is more favorable.Whatever the case the net effect is the reduction in new listings.
When looking at the past two years of the areas I primarily work in, the steady decline is quite evident with the exception of the “central” area consisting of University City, Clairemont, Linda Vista, etc, which has held up pretty well. North County coastal, essentially Oceanside to Carmel Valley, has really experienced a great impact on new listings. In 2008, with the exception of February because of the shorten month, January through July saw a least 1050 new listings a month. In 2009, the highest month was January with 949 new listings, which represents about a 20% reduction when compared to 2008. The lowest month was December with only 517 new listings.
If you are considering taking advantage of the tax credits being offered you have a little less than 4 months. With the clock running out, I strongly urge you to stay away from short sales, UNLESS they already have bank approval. If you do want to write an offer on a short sale you need to make certain you have the right to cancel that offer at any time in order to maintain your ability to write an offer should a better opportunity present itself.
In 2009 I closed numerous homes with first time buyers and would appreciate the opportunity to help you with your first home purchase!!
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Wheelchair accessible home REHAB project
December 27th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
OCEANSIDE-
I have what I consider a great rehab opportunity for an underserved market. This home in the Fire Mountain area of south Oceanside has already had numerous past modifications for wheelchair accessibility and the current asking price is in the mid $300s. It has 3 bedrooms, 3 baths and is 1600 square feet.
I am looking for an investor, contractor or traditional buyer for this home in hopes that it will be remodeled and updated keeping the wheelchair modifications in place. I have worked with clients in the past who are in wheelchairs and there is often times NOTHING for them that is ready to go.
My video skills need polishing, but I feel I am spot on with my analysis of this home’s potential. Click on the picture below for the video and then contact me at 760.415.3329 for more information.
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The Griswalds are alive and well in Encinitas
December 20th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
ENCINITAS- I was on my way to house warming party when I came across this house on Hymettus in Encinitas. With there being just a sliver of moon in the sky this home was a beacon to travelers by land and air. If I owned a small plane, and more importantly had a license to fly the thing, I would be in the air tonight just to see how far out you could see this home. With the black backdrop of the Pacific nearby, this home has to stand out for many miles.
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The $40,000 real estate mistake
December 16th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
SAN DIEGO- Sometime ago I signed up for question alerts through the real estate website. I have rarely participated in the discussions as they are generally bone head questions and not at all worth the time to write a response. This morning this question came through, and while I feel sorry for the person, this is prime example of why things are not as easy as they seem and there are reasons to not play real estate mogul.
Now if you have basic understanding on how mortgages work you may already have an appreciation for this persons situation. If not here is a basic explanation.
The first loan is called the first because when a property sales, they are the first in line to get paid. The second, sometimes referred to as a junior loan, gets paid through the monies leftover AFTER the first loan has been satisfied. If there is not enough money, you have a SHORT SALE, because the proceeds are short the amount required to satisfy the loans against the property. In a short sale situation, the second can refuse to release its lien on the property, which is necessary to transfer the home to a new buyer, and is really the only negotiating chip the
second has to play if they will not take less than owed. But, by doing this, the first lender can just foreclose on the property. In doing this, they get the title to the property and the second gets ZERO.
So this person bought a $40,000 second note on a property worth $110-120. Unfortunately for him, the first is owed $125,000 so his $40,000 is worth less than NOTHING. Buying at auction requires an all cash payment, so in response to his question his only real option is to hope his wife doesn’t find out and pray that this property hits $165K in value quickly. If she does find out, hide the golf clubs!!
Why $164? This way his $40,000 is covered and he may then be able to sell the note again with no loss.
How the heck can you spend $40,000 and not know what you are bidding on?
DISCLAIMER: this is a very basic look at short sales, loans and makes a number of assumption based on limited information from the questioning party.
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Oceanside masters swim team showing the love
December 13th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
OCEANSIDE- Thank you Nancy Chennell and the Oceanside masters swim team for taking a moment to do this!! I am so stoked that I came up with this marketing. So much better than a mailer hitting the trash. I love our local athletic community!!!
Hi Brian,
I swim with the Oceanside Masters team. Initially there was one cap
that said Brian Long on it and we thought Dan was wearing Brian Long’s cap
and that he must be a famous tri-athlete. Then by the end of summer we
noticed that almost all the swim caps said Brian Long on them. So I took a
picture for you. We all thought you’d get a kick out of our unofficial
Brian Long swim team!
Nancy Chennell
Yes, I get a big dumb grin every time I look at it.
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No really, what’s my home worth?
December 7th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
SAN DIEGO- Last month I wrote a blog post acknowledging the joy of still being needed due to the inaccuracy of home value calculators. This week I spent some time with a client and we found a home they liked very much. We discussed making an offer and after providing them with the 
comparable home sales they presented me with what they wanted to offer as a purchase price on the property.
Having just written about how inaccurate online home value calculators such as ZILLOW.com, HOUSEVLUES.com and others can be, I went to my site to check out what my new home valuation calculator would say.
See I am switching my IDX service, IDX is the system that provides the listing data you see when you do a home search. My current service does not update frequently enough and did not have the COOLEST tool we REALTORs have, and that is the ability to custom draw an overlay that selects a very specific area on a map to search. When I found this new service had that feature I jumped on it. Additionally, it has some other pretty handy features. One of these, important to perspective buyers that may not be intimately familiar with a neighborhood is a map that will show the location of local grocery stores, hospitals, schools, etc in proximity to a subject property. Another is the local school’s data, in this case Encinitas, can be accessed so you do not have to navigate to another site. Lastly, there is a very thorough property valuation area complete with many charts showing trends, ownership rates and valuation. I wish I could say this valuation tool is very accurate, but it too is hit and miss and can be very wrong. Click on the picture above to see more.
I GOOGLE’D home value calculators just to see what all was out there and while they all were hit and miss the WORST home valuation calculator I reviewed has to be from QuickenLoans.com.
The only information they required for their valuation model was zip code, purchase price and date, loan payment and amount owed, value of improvements and when they were completed. They did not ask for bedrooms, baths, square footage, if it was an attached or detached home, they did not even care for the address. Obliviously it was little surprise to me when the valuation for my home came up with an error of approximately 20%!!
But what their report did give me was mortgage rates, loan payments options and how quickly they could process my loan. It then hit me; they don’t care at all if their evaluation is correct, they are using this tool for loan lead generation!!! I thought you big dummy, it is Quicken LOANS afterall.
I like their disclaimer-
Home value results are dependent on a number of factors, including how recently the local property records have been updated
They can’t mention the significance of the items I mentioned above such as number of bedrooms, because, 
duh, why aren’t you, Quicken, asking me for that information then? It’s easier for them to pin the potential inaccuracies on a donkey they have no control over, such as timeliness and accuracy of local data.
I understand that it is curiosity that sends people to these sites, shoot I go there too, but just don’t put too much value in this data. You need real data that you can invest in and that comes by working with a REALTOR. Sit down with them at a computer and review the recent sold properties. This way you can see influenticial information such as proximity to negative factors like roads, freeways, small lot sizes or the desirable factors like canyon lots, oversized lots, location in on the street or a NEIGHBOR with an awesome POOL!!! Applying this specific knowledge to the comparable properties data you can be certain you have an accurate value.
If you are considering buying or selling, please contact me at 760.415.3329
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Megan’s law maps are just one tool to use
November 27th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
SAN DIEGO- This morning I read an article in the San Diego Union Tribune regarding the tracking of sexual offenders and while this is the day after Thanksgiving, I still have felt compelled to share my experience on this topic as it is very important to the real estate transaction and the 
community.
Megan’s Law is the name given to a group of laws within the US that govern information given to communities regarding sex offenders. The original Megan’s Law was named for Megan Kanka a 7 year old New Jersey girl that was kidnapped, raped and murdered by a repeat sex offender who had moved in across the street from her home. The New Jersey legislature passed Megan’s Law in 1994 which required that communities be warned when a sex offender moves. In 1996, Megan’s Law was added to the federal Jacob Wetterling Crimes Against Children’s Act which then required all states to notify communities when a sex offender was released into their community. California has required sex offenders to register with the state since 1947!!
So this article spoke to the difficulties of keeping tabs on sexual offenders who are out on parole and back in society. It is the lack of reliable information that has been a hindrance for me in the real estate transaction. IN MY OPINION, the information is so flawed that you can not use it in the decision making process. We have “Megan’s Law” disclosure in at least two forms notifying clients of how and why they may want to research this topic and then it comes up again in the Natural Hazards Disclosures provide during the transaction. There has been some talk of including a photomap in this disclosure packages along with the text disclosure, but again it does not seem to be reliable information so I think it is wise that companies have stayed away from this. I often tell my clients that the single biggest flaw in the system is we have to rely on the convicted offender to report their movement which often times goes against their wishes.
Recently I have been involved in two transactions where the unreliability of the current system has come up. In one situation it has had a negative effect on a client’s home purchase and on the other, the flawed information could have caused my clients to make an uninformed decision.
In the first one, I represented both the buyer and seller of a home. The seller was relocating and the buyers were a great growing family with children. Several months after the close of escrow I received a frantic and upsetting phone call from the buyer regarding the vacant house across the street. It seems the owner had been in incarcerated for sex crimes. I do not have personal knowledge of the charges but was told that it was distribution of child porn. The reason for the 
call was he was due to be released and moving back home in the next day or two and they were just finding out this information from the neighbors!!! There was never any disclosure on the seller’s part who had lived there and was friends with the homeowner during the arrest and trial phase. Ultimately, I am told, there was a settlement reached between the two parties reagarding the non disclosure, but in he current real estate market the family was financially stuck without the ability to sell and move. During the first few days of this news, I worked with the family on things to investigate with the local police department as there is a school nearby. The wife at one point was told, “just don’t let your kids play in the front yard” as a solution from the local police department staff.
The apparent flaw in the system here is, as of this writing, this person is still not on the regional sex offenders map, pictured at the top of this post. So unless you are one of the few that know of this person’s history there is no disclosure. As a real estate agent with this past knowledge, the disclosure on my part would most likely have to be none. Without direct knowledge that this individual is suppose to report his location as a requirement of his release I could be subject to a lawsuit ranging from slander, interfering with a real estate transaction or more if I were to disclose there is a sex offender in the neighborhood. There would be great consultation with our attorneys if I ever have another transaction in the area, but I have been in a similar situation, so have a pretty good idea what I would be told.
In a more current example, I was working with a family on purchasing a home. We had an offer on a property that was countered much higher but my clients were still considering the property when a new home came on the market. We went and looked at this new home, placed an offer on the property that was accepted and opened escrow. A few days later agent #1 called to see if there was any interest in the initial home and I told him we were in contract on this new home. He made reference to a sex offender near home #2 and that I should make my clients aware of this as it may make them reconsider this home and come back to his listing.
I was already aware if this situation and had discussed it with my clients. The flaw in this situation was that while the map showed an offender registered within a half mile of the home, if 
one clicked on the identifying tab, the pop up with all the information showed that this person was in violation of his parole. His violation was that he no longer lived there and had not report his new location yet the indicator stilled showed this initial location.
So the bottom line here is that we need to have these systems in place and with new technologies become less reliant on the criminal to help us keep tabs on them. I will leave that solutions to others more qualified than I on what it should be. Unfortunately, one such attempt with the passing of Propostion 83 has officials saying we are now less safe and the provisions have created a homeless situation among sex offenders.
For you, the client, I strongly suggest using the San Diego sex offenders website as one part of a multipronged approach. Neighbors are a GREAT source of information especially this type. Go knock on a couple doors or if anyone is outside speak to them. They know the neighborhood and are often more than willing to share the good, the bad and the ugly with you. Having said this though, make sure any real negative comments are verified with at least one other source.
Lastly, there are steps you can take to keep from either you, the single women, or your children from becoming victims. Learn and implement them.
“Prevention is everything,” Arlington said. “Ninety percent of self-defense is awareness - knowing who a stranger is, what kinds of lures they can use on children and where to go if they’re in a bad situation. There are a lot of things that kids just don’t understand.”- Tracie Arlington San Diego children self defense teacher from sdnn.com
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What is shadow inventory and does it exist
November 20th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
SAN DIEGO- I had a client earlier this year that kept holding out for the release of the shadow 
inventory another REALTOR told him existed. They said that the banks were holding back foreclosed homes hoping for a better market to release them into, thus creating what became called shadow inventory.
The reason for his procrastination was that the banks could only hold on to these properties for so long and then they would have to release them losing on their gamble. The subsequent release of all these foreclosed home would flood the market and cause prices to tumble. The kicker, and I swear this is not embellished at all, was that he believed the first wave was going to hit April 1. I asked him if he ever really thought about the significance of the date, April Fools Day, and that he may want to base his buying strategy on a more accepted process, like looking at the sold market and judging homes based on that information. Needless to say, I moved on and as of four weeks ago this well qualified buyer still has not pulled the trigger.
Today while walking my dog I ran across a neighbor who also is in the business and the topic of “shadow inventory” came up. Her belief is that there really is a surplus of homes the banks are holding back hoping to create a better market.
Today it was reported that the California median home price is at its highest in approximately a year and the National Association of REALTOR’s economist predicts a home value increase of 4% in 2010. Could the banks plan be coming together?
ForeclosureRadar.com announced the results of a study last month that essentially moved all of this to the urban legend category.
Results from their study show bank’s inventory of foreclosed homes peaked in September of 2008 at 155,269 homes. Since that time this inventory has shrunk by approximately 41% or 4.77 months of inventory. Remember anything under 6 months is considered a seller’s market, so they are operating under favorable terms to get these homes on the market now. Additionally, I am seeing about 10% decrease in new listings in most areas I cover, so the competition is decreasing.
The numbers in this report specific to San Diego county were consistent with a 41% decrease as the number of homes in inventory fell to 914 down from 1552.
The report said California has 4.77 months of repossessed inventory to sell and it takes them seven months to repair, list and sell a foreclosed home. Taken together, these statistics indicate that banks are selling foreclosed houses as fast as they can.
"Bottom line —- there is no ’shadow’ inventory of bank-owned homes being intentionally withheld from the market," the report said.- www.nctimes.com
Happy house hunting.
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First time buyers rise 16% in 2009
November 16th, 2009 Categories: Real Estate News
SAN DIEGO- While this should not be a surprise to anyone who reads some form of media with current economic content it’s good to hear none the less. First time home buyer’s accounted for 47% of US home sales up from 41% in the previous years survey.
The National Association of Realtors are wrapping up their annual conference today in San Diego and it was there that they announced the results of their survey which covered from July 2008 to June 2009.
The typical first time buyer had a median age of 30 with a reported median income of $61,600. Additionally, the typical first-time buyer paid $156,000 for their home, about $9,000 less than in the Realtors’ 2008 survey.
Another demographic increasing in home ownership numbers are single women who now represent about 22% of home buyers while single men represent about 10% of home buyers.
Factors leading to the increase include the following demographic trends: better education, more women working and seeking financial independence, and young women delaying marriage.
Also, women have significantly increased their purchasing power. They own and operate 38 percent of all businesses in America and make up nearly 40 percent of all business school graduates. More immediately, historically low interest rates, affordable home prices, ample housing supply and the first-time homebuyer tax credit are fueling the increase of single women homebuyers.- noozhawk.com
Hey ladies… NICE JOB!!! As a father of two daughters I think this is awesome.
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