It’s been a while since we featured a property in Sunnyvale.  Sunnyvale isn’t considered a “prestige” address such as Portola Valley or Woodside.  But there are plenty of advantages to living in Sunnyvale.  How about a two-for-one special?

297 CHARLES St Sunnyvale, CA 94086
$1,100,000

Beds: 7
Baths: 3
Sq. Ft.: 2,516
$/Sq. Ft.: $437
Lot Size: 6,500 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Detached Single Family
Style: Colonial
Stories: 2
View: Neighborhood
Year Built: 1908
Community: Sunnyvale
County: Santa Clara
MLS#: 81025224
Source: MLSListings
Status: Active
On Redfin: 104 days

Open house July 24th today 1-4. AMAZING!!!2 homes on one parcel!First time on market ever!2 car detached garage. 297 Charles St. 1908 Colonial Revival Historical 5bd/2ba, 2,516+-sqft, newer kitchen, carpet, beautiful floors-545W. McKinley 2bd/1ba-700+-sqft. Both have large basements. Gabel dormer, original hardware, Full kitchen upstairs can be used as a rental-separate address 295 Charles.

See, not only do you get two houses for the price of one (if that one were in the Cupertino school district), you also get an agent who doesn’t believe in using both spaces and punctuation at the same time.  Plus you can use the full kitchen upstairs as a rental!  Seriously, talk about prestige!  Two basements! 

And talk about convenience!  These houses are walking distance to both Sunnyvale Town Center and Town & Country Village.  That means they’re  smack-dab in Downtown, but for some reason the agent doesn’t want you to know that.  Maybe it’s because “Downtown” reminds people of the endless reconstruction of both shopping malls.

Alert burbed reader Pralay sent in this news update on the problems.  Poor Town & Country Village!  Not only did it get a mall in Palo Alto named after it, but it’s now serving as a wildlife refuge.  What a boon to property values!

New developer buys Town & Country parcel in Sunnyvale for $19 million

By John Dugan

Posted: 08/31/2010 06:02:44 PM PDT
Updated: 08/31/2010 07:19:26 PM PDT

A San Francisco development company has bought part of the former Town and Country shopping center in downtown Sunnyvale for $19 million, with plans to put 280 housing units and possible street-level retail on the site.

BRE Properties Inc. announced the purchase of 2.4 acres of land in downtown Sunnyvale in a press release Tuesday. The release said the "transit-oriented" site was one block from the Caltrain station and adjacent to the Sunnyvale Town Center.

Santa Clara County property records show that BRE purchased parcels at 101, 201, 301 and 401 Town and Country Village Way, or roughly half of the 4.6-acre Town and Country site, from Capella Holdings, LLC, on Aug. 20.

A BRE spokesman said there is no timetable to begin construction on the site, which has been vacant since the old shopping center was demolished in April. Previous to the demolition, the buildings sat empty for more than a year, and the site drew complaints from citizens and Sunnyvale City Council members alike for its decrepit appearance and rat infestation.

Yes, The Excitement Is Building in Sunnyvale!  The property is definitely easy walking distance to shops… if any of them were open.  Or standing.

Sunnyvale isn’t a prestige address?  Get real.  Not only is this a hundred-year-old million dollar property, the houses are on the corner of Charles Street and McKinley Avenue.  That’s a Prince and a President!  How much more prestige do you need?  And if Elizabeth II ever keels over, then it’s a King and a President!  The only thing that could make it any more prestigious would be a nearby Starbucks.  If only someone would open a shopping mall.

Listed at: $460,000

1780 WAGNER Ave Mountain View, CA 94043

Beds:	3
Baths:	1
Sq. Ft.:	877
$/Sq. Ft.:	$525
Lot Size:	5,100 Sq. Ft.
Property Type:	Detached Single Family
Style:	Ranch
Stories:	1
Year Built:	1950
Community:	North Shoreline
County:	Santa Clara
MLS#:	81036627
Source:	MLSListings
Status:	Pending With ReleaseThis listing is in escrow and all contingencies have been fulfilled. "With Release" means that there’s a release clause with the offer stating that the buyer is trying to sell his current home before closing. A release clause lets the seller back out of the deal if the buyers can’t sell their home within a set time frame.
On Redfin:	23 days

3 BEDROOMS & 1 BATH PER TAX RECORD * CURRENTLY NO GARAGE OR IT HAS BEEN CONVERTED INTO ROOMS WITHOUT PERMIT! REMODELING, ADDED ROOMS & BATHS (PERMIT NOT WARRANTED * )

Thanks to Burbed reader Herve for sending this in.

Is it any wonder that this is already pending? $525 per square foot in Real Bay Area Mountain View? Sheesh – they’re practically giving this house away for free!

What deal! I mean, just look at al the rooms this house has – permits or not. This is efficiency living at its best!

Just look at how efficient this is:

That’s right! There’s a treadmill in the living room next to the sofa-ish things. Now this is green living my friends. Inconspicuous consumption at its best.

If you buy this house, you’ll really need a Smart car to go with it! (In part because there’s no garage!)

If you’ve managed to miss reading this site the last few weeks, you might have not have noticed that burbed was nominated for, and won, this award from Zillow:

There’s one problem.  It turns out there was also an award for Best Blog in San Jose Real Estate, and burbed wasn’t even nominated.  So that means we can’t discuss Palo Alto anymore. 

Good thing burbed reader AJT sent in this San Francisco property, along with a comment about walking by the place and then finding out it was for sale.  And even better, look what was listed two years ago, thanks to Herve:

Burbed reader Herve thought it would be good to point this unique property out. Apparently it’s been on the market 2 years ago for $75 million (really?).

In any case, it is now just at $48 million – another sure sign the real estate market has bottomed out and that it is now a great time to jump back in.

Just think, if you got a smart enough mortgage, you could easily buy this and get at least $22 million in instant equity. Wowsers!

What are you waiting for?

Wowsers!  If the price was cut from $75 million in 2006 to $48 million in 2008, then it should be down to $31 million in 2010, right?

2901 Broadway St, San Francisco, CA 94115
$45,000,000

BEDS: 7
BATHS: 7.5
SQ. FT.: –
LOT SIZE: –
PROPERTY TYPE: Detached, Single-Family Home
STYLE: Custom
VIEW: Panoramic, City Lights, Water, Bay, Bay Bridge, Golden Gate Bridge, San Francisco, Downtown, Marina, Ocean, Park, Garden/Greenbelt, Hills, Mt. Tamalpais, Twin Peaks
YEAR BUILT: 1927
COMMUNITY: Pacific Heights
COUNTY: San Francisco
MLS#: 322933
SOURCE: San Francisco MLS
STATUS: Active
ON REDFIN: 1226 days

Italian Renaissance hilltop mansion on the Gold Coast, near Presidio. Expansive Golden Gate & north Bay views from almost every room. Grand reception hall. Elegant formal rooms. Graceful marble stair leads to family level. 7 bedrooms, 7.5 baths. Master suites. Library. Music room. Office. Rec room. Elevator. Period details. Private winding drive. Garden. Private tennis court. 2007 San Francisco Decorator Showcase. Property history & floor plans on property and agent’s website.

$45 million?  Someone doesn’t understand that if the house won’t sale, your price is FAIL!

I want to look at that “Days on Redfin” number again while my eyes pop out.  1226!  You’d almost think they don’t care if they sell the house or not!  Perhaps the tenants are paying almost enough rent to cover the heating bill.

For the garage.

I’m sure the Assessor’s Office is keeping an eye on this one, as it only paid $7,000 in taxes last year.  To give you an idea how little that is, if you were to buy this house and put $9 million down, your 15 year fixed loan of $36 million would cost you $261,000.  A month.  And that’s assuming you could get the 3.75% mortgage rate Redfin helpfully put in for you.  Do you think you’d have to apply for a jumbo?

One last thing about this expensive, er, expansive, listing.  Here’s what Redfin has to say about the 2008 observation:

The seller has requested that all public comments be removed from this listing. Per MLS rules, we are not allowed to link to blog posts about this home.

Fortunately, we are.  Otherwise we’d have to keep following up on 13 Lucky Street.

91 CONEJO Dr Millbrae, CA 94030

$979,999

Beds:	3
Baths:	2
Sq. Ft.:	2,640
$/Sq. Ft.:	$371
Lot Size:	0.48 Acres
Property Type:	Detached Single Family
Style:	Contemporary
Stories:	1
View:	Bay, Neighborhood
Year Built:	1964
Community:	Mills Estate
County:	San Mateo
MLS#:	81035900
Source:	MLSListings
Status:	Active This listing is for sale and the sellers are accepting offers.
On Redfin:	12 days

Great Fantastic House Pool , Huge Back Yard.

Thanks to Burbed reader SW for this find!

Here’s what SW had to say:

I’m not sure if Millbrae is RBA or not, but there’s something special about a short sale on a place asking 2X its last selling price.

Combine that with the epic realtor description- "Great Fantastic House Pool , Huge Back Yard.", and you’ve got yourself a winner.  That great fantastic house pool happens to be green.  Not like environmentally aware green.  Like teeming with polywogs, malarial vectors and clumps of blooming algae green.

Let’s take a look!

I think the listing forgot to say that this is an “organic” pool.

Thank you to all who voted for Burbed!

Now, this is an award winning website!

You’ve all heard the real estate joke that if you ask an agent what the key point is in selling real estate, she’ll answer, “Location, location, location.”  Of course if you ask her what kind of car she drives, she’ll also say, “Location, location, location.”  Well, stop the presses.  Redfin says they’ve found the real answer.

Redfin: For Real Estate Listings, the First Week Is Crucial

By Emily Peck

Trying to sell your house? Many sellers put their home on the market at a wishful-thinking price, figuring that they could just lower it later.

That strategy could be a misfire. According to a new analysis by Redfin Corp., a Seattle-based brokerage that operates in nine states, a listing gets the most attention online when it’s new to the market. The week that a listing hits the market, Redfin estimates that it gets nearly four times more visits on real estate websites than it does a month later, likely the earliest time that a seller will consider cutting the price.

Redfin looked at traffic to listings in Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Irvine, Calif., Washington, D.C., Boston and Chicago. They considered listings that debuted in the first three months of 2010, sat on the market for at least 60 days and had undergone at least one update. The site used its own traffic data to estimate what traffic would be like to other real-estate sites.

If a picture is worth a thousand words, a graph is probably worth a teal deer.  Redfin’s numbers indeed tell the story:

Okay, red line is web visits to new listings, green line is visits to updated listings.  Clearly new homes, never before listed, get the serious traffic, and soon.  Price it wrong, and you’ve lost your chance, because most of your potential buyers won’t be back.  The little spikes at 30 and 60 days are no doubt the bottom-feeding bargain hunters using the filters.  Is that where you want your home to be?

Redfin also notes that half of all listings don’t sell within a year.  So, if you want to sell your house, even if you live in the Real Bay Area, it’s time to do away with your wishing price.  Unless you don’t believe in useless aggregate data.

New York Has the Most Millionaires

By Robert Frank

New York’s millionaire population has now surpassed the boom times of 2007.

According to the new Metro Wealth Index, created by consulting firm Capgemini, the New York Metropolitan area had 650,000 high-net worth individuals, or people with $1 million or more in investible assets in 2009. That is 18.7% higher than in 2008.

Once again, the New York area topped the list of metro-area wealth centers. Its total was greater than the combined total of the next three runners up–Los Angeles, Chicago and Washington.

Of the top 10, Houston posted the the fastest growth, at 28.9%. But all enjoyed strong growth.

Here are the tallies of millionaires for the top 10, along with the percentage growth:

New York – 667,200, +18.7%

Los Angeles – 235,800, +13.3%

Chicago – 198,100, +15.1%

Washington, D.C. – 152,400 +19.3%

San Francisco – 138,300 +14.5%

Philadelphia – 104,100, +20.1%

Boston – 102,300, + 14.4%

Detroit – 89,100, +12.1%

Houston –- 88,200, +28.9%

San Jose — 86,500, +24.5%

Yeah, but if you add San Jose and San Francisco together, the Bay Area would be ranked at #3 after Los Angeles – at 224,800. And this probably excludes all the thousands of millionaires in Atherton, Palo Alto, etc. That’s probably at least 12,000 or more, which puts us at #2 with 236,800!

And if you think about it – NY has 8 million people. That’s just .08 millionaires per capita. From San Francisco to San Jose, there’s 3,236,662 (and this includes non Real Bay Area like Gilroy!). That puts us at… .07 millionaires per capita.

Damnit! So close! Come on people! Let’s get some more millionaires going out there. Facebook! IPO already!

This listing was sent in by burbed reader sonarrat.  Here’s what sonarrat had to say about this absolutely sparkling home:  “Sparkling isn’t really the first thing I think of when I look at this house.  More like manufactured home.”

1039 Alderbrook Ln, San Jose, CA 95129
$988,888

Beds: 3
Baths: 2
Sq. Ft.: 1,330
$/Sq. Ft.: $744
Lot Size: 7,313 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Detached Single Family
Style: Ranch
Stories: 1
View: Neighborhood
Year Built: 1957
Community: Cupertino
County: Santa Clara
MLS#: 81039029
Source: MLSListings
Status: Pending With Release 
On Redfin: 17 days

This absolutely sparkling home uplifts you the moment you lay your eyes on it. How often you get inspired by a home? With an amazing curve apreal, you will feel right at home. This home is warm & inviting. Newer roof, new crown molding, hardwood flooring, fresh paint, Huge Corner, New window and Front Patio ect. Top cupertino schools!

How often do you get inspired by a home?  Plenty of homes on burbed have been inspiring, as in leading to some incredibly snide copy and even better reader reactions.  Usually they have something notable about them, such as being insanely expensive, or having a lousy location, or not bearing much resemblance to a residential structure.  This one?  I am having a reaction all right, but uplifting doesn’t describe it.  It’s closer to ennui crossed with sticker shock.

Yawn.  Another million dollar crackerbox with Cupertino schools, San Jose services, and five 8s in the asking price.  And it’s pending after only two and a half weeks.  Must have been that amazing curve apreal or the Huge Corner.  I’m kind of amazed that it sold so fast when they only put in one New window.

Wait, 7300 square feet is a Huge Corner?  Maybe it is compared to the zero lot line of a manufactured home.  This picture provided by the agent certainly seems inspired by the trailer park.

What do you think?  Is this house absolutely sparkling?  Are you uplifted?