New staging techniques being used by Realtors in San Jose
3036 BETSY Way, San Jose, CA 95133 | MLS# 80903658
3036 BETSY Way San Jose, CA 95133
Price: $289,000
Beds: 3
Baths: 1
Sq. Ft.: 1,165
$/Sq. Ft.: $248
Lot Size: 5,280 Sq. Ft.
Property Type: Detached Single Family
Style: Traditional
Year Built: 1940
Stories: 1
View: Neighborhood
Neighborhood: Berryessa
County: Santa Clara
MLS#: 80903658
Source: MLSListings
Status: Active
On Redfin: 74 days
This is a nicely kept home in North Valley Area, 3 Bedroom, 1 Bath, Hardwood Flooring Throughout, Detached 2 Car Garage, Close to shopping and other facilities, Great Price for Starter Home.
I don’t know about you, but I’m bored of the cliche staging that seems to be all the rage these days. I prefer more deconstructionist staging that reflects the mood of the times.
Burbed reader sonarrat was impressed by the multi-tone station wagon in the driveway.
Me? I’m all about this:
Booyah. The half open gate. The laundry appliance. The dining room chairs on a dining room table. The shanty wood structure.
THIS IS REAL EVERYONE. THIS IS REAL.
It’s gritty. It helps you feel like you’re living. You see the chaos and your mind races. And it races to buying this $248 per square foot house because you know it’s only going to go up once you make it de-real. But will you? Isn’t this what those hipsters living in the tenderloin or billyburg would want?
It’s your choice, but you’d better act fast!
April 21st, 2009 at 8:19 am
Love how the Realtard says it’s a “nicely kept home.” The abandoned FedEx box on the coffee table, the overflowing garbage can visible in the hall shot, the crap covering every horizontal surface in the bathroom – all fine examples!
April 21st, 2009 at 8:56 am
Well, if the realtard said it, it must be true.
You know what I like? Garbage in the yard and chain linked fences. Perfect for my pit bulls.
April 21st, 2009 at 9:25 am
Who’d have guessed you were so ghetto?
Hey, check this out:
Nov 21, 2005 Sold $565,000
Nov 24, 1999 Sold $265,000
Aug 16, 1996 Sold $162,000
Party like it’s 1999! Was there a bubble from ’96-99 too?
April 21st, 2009 at 9:28 am
The “owner” (before the bank that presumably owns it now) originally put money down to buy it but did a cash-out refi in 2006 to mortgage the place for $575,500. The appraiser was smoking crack I guess.
April 21st, 2009 at 10:21 am
Party like it’s 1999! Was there a bubble from ‘96-99 too?
In actuality, yes. The Bay Area housing bubble started in earnest around 1996-1997. You can see that easily from this graph:
http://mysite.verizon.net/vodkajim/housingbubble/san_francisco.html
Most of that was, of course, driven by the dot com bubble. What I love about that graph is the dip that appears between 2001-2002. That was when we ‘should’ have begun a downturn in housing prices, eventually returning to trend line. However, thanks to Sir Easy Al Greenspan keeping interest rates low, a flood of new exotic mortgage instruments and the concept of the ‘Ownership Society’ touted by President Sh*t for Brains, we instead produced a secondary bubble of a magnitude that made the dot com bubble look like a pimple. As a result, we are now experiencing the worst recession since the Great Depression.
Had we simply allowed things to unwind more normally back then, we would have returned to housing normality by around 2005 and would probably have had a recession more severe than that in 2001 but no where near what we are experiencing now.
April 21st, 2009 at 11:26 am
BuyersAreIdiots,
I’m in total agreement with you on the bubble analysis. So the million dollar question is:
How long does it take for a 10-year housing bubble to retract to pre-bubble prices? (Obviously this number will be different by area, but a general timeframe is what I’m curious about)
What does the forum think?
April 21st, 2009 at 11:36 am
Joe, prices don’t necessarily have to retract all the way (let alone undershoot) everywhere, they can just stay sluggish and underperform inflation for many years.
April 21st, 2009 at 11:58 am
“Who’d have guessed you were so ghetto?”
Excreter, of course!
April 21st, 2009 at 11:59 am
Yeah, I’ve never been willing to commit to a sharp-drop vs. long stagnation – too many variables.
But I’d like to officially blame the Real Bay Area ™ for the entire global economic crisis.
If places like this could be appraised, even for 5 minutes, at $575k, you can make a Ponzi scheme of global proportions. That’s what we did.
We started it, and the rest of the country followed. Then the world.
“You Maniacs! You blew it up! Ah, damn you! God damn you all to hell! “
April 21st, 2009 at 12:00 pm
“$575,500″ – wowoweewawa! lol
“How long does it take for a 10-year housing bubble to retract to pre-bubble prices?”
10 years. Dt’s right, they could underperform on an absolute scale, but if we look at the nominal value my guess is – 10 years.
April 21st, 2009 at 12:33 pm
You’re saying it’ll take 10 years to get to bottom?
I think we’ll get there within 18 months. (My SWAG, opinion, guesstimate only.) I think some areas are already back to pre-bubble prices – or close to it. Once we hit bottom, prices will stick close to inflation for a few more years after that.
April 21st, 2009 at 2:19 pm
For it to reach the upper ranges, yeah. People “trade up” typically every 7 years or so? I believe the trade up theory is how price decline reaches the upper levels. The massive equity burn in the lower levels will cause the upper levels to drop, it will just take a while.
That’s my opinion, at least – for what its worth. (Which is worth just about what you paid for it
)
April 21st, 2009 at 2:31 pm
That was when we ’should’ have begun a downturn in housing prices…Had we simply allowed things to unwind more normally….I think we’ll get there within 18 months.
We started it, and the rest of the country followed.
I like this “we” attitude I’m reading in this thread. I for one, am damn proud of what we’ve accomplished.
April 21st, 2009 at 2:41 pm
How long does it take for a 10-year housing bubble to retract to pre-bubble prices?
Alas, the other posters are correct in that it will likely take an equal amount of time to reach bottom as it did to reach the top. Most bubbles in history are generally symmetrical.
So if, for arguments sake, we say the bubble began in 1997 and peaked in 2006 for the Bay Area, then we are looking at a bottom around 2015 or so.
Mind you, this is (useless *snicker*) aggregate data. Certain areas will bottom sooner while others later. Ultimately, the best gauge to use is to simply rely on the rent versus owning ratio. The closer those two are to each other, the better. And it also depends on what your criteria is for the home you are looking for. If, for example, you found yourself a home you really loved in an area that you felt you could easily spend the next 20 years in, yet you realized that we were not quite near the bottom, it may make perfect sense to purchase the property at that time. Now if the cost to own is double the cost to rent, that’s a poor decision. But nonetheless, plus or minues 10% of the bottom is not likely going to kill you provided you have a long term horizon.
And of course, if you are buying in Real Excretor’s zip code, it’s ALWAYS a good time to buy!
April 21st, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Does this home come with the beautiful cloud sticking at the electrical post on roof? That itself costs $200K.
April 21st, 2009 at 4:33 pm
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Palo-Alto/2064-Harvard-St-94306/home/603228
Can some one tell me what price do you think this one will retract to by next year this time?
April 21st, 2009 at 4:42 pm
And don’t start thinking the foreclosures aren’t coming to a prime neighborhood near you:
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/04/fannie-freddie-report-surge-in-prime.html
April 21st, 2009 at 4:52 pm
Lol
Prime is the new sub-prime.
PA-S, my guess is 1.2mil.
April 21st, 2009 at 8:36 pm
So has A’s comment shut down all comments? (Test)
April 21st, 2009 at 9:50 pm
a. lewis = re
April 22nd, 2009 at 8:52 am
I’d be surprised if the bottom isn’t reached until 2015 – that would mean a lot of people continuing to pay mortgages they can’t truly afford and that it doesn’t make sense to keep paying for a long, long time. I think reality will set in before that and people will be forced to sell at the price that buyers can afford – which will be based on tough lending standards, a poor job market, little trade-up equity, and no illusion of ATM-like price increases.
As for current prices, I think subprime areas are getting close to finding their “proper” price (probably 1997 plus about 25% for inflation), middle tier neighborhoods are in about inning 4 of 9, and areas like Palo Alto and Mt. View in about inning 2 of 9. I think they’ll all get their within 2-3 years and then probably over-correct because of poor economy.
Bottom line, regardless of how long it takes, all areas will fall back to their historical level. For those, you need to look back to around 1997 and then add inflation. From then on, houses will appreciate with inflation like they always have.
April 22nd, 2009 at 9:32 am
And don’t start thinking the foreclosures aren’t coming to a prime neighborhood near you:
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And this guy bailed out before it begins.
April 22nd, 2009 at 2:38 pm
#22 – yeah, we don’t know much of the real story yet, but it’s a disturbing thing.
April 22nd, 2009 at 7:15 pm
I’d be surprised if the bottom isn’t reached until 2015 – that would mean a lot of people continuing to pay mortgages they can’t truly afford and that it doesn’t make sense to keep paying for a long, long time.
I agree and to add anecdotal evidence of why is that for example, I listen to a call in economics radio show every day. I swear like 70% of the calls are from people with serious house payment problems. Either that or they are aggravated by the new reality that even a $100,000 salary won’t buy them squat.
One caller called in today: She and her husband made $130,000 combined. They couldn’t qualify for anything over $400,000, which in the Bay Area still means crappy teardown in the ghetto fixer-upper. 130k isn’t anything to scoff at and well above the average income for the area. There’s still a lot of room to go downward.
April 22nd, 2009 at 8:27 pm
LOL – yep. 2009′s shaping up to be a banner year, isn’t it?
April 22nd, 2009 at 9:13 pm
“130k isn’t anything to scoff at and well above the average income for the area.”
What matters is the average combined income of the buyers, not the average income of the local residents.
April 22nd, 2009 at 9:20 pm
bob – http://www.simplyhired.com/a/local-jobs/city/l-Mountain+View,+CA states that “The average salary for jobs in Mountain View, California is $65,325″. An couple of average local earners makes $130k, which is therefore NOT “well above the average income for the area”. I’ll point out that a couple of firefighters or a couple of engineers can make double that amount, and therefore easily qualify for non-teardown, non-ghetto housing. And there are thousands of non-teardown, non-ghetto houses in San Jose for much cheaper than Mountain View.
Instead of believing everything you hear on the radio, research a little bit before posting.
April 22nd, 2009 at 10:50 pm
Bob says,
>>One caller called in today: She and her husband made $130,000 combined. They couldn’t qualify for anything over $400,000, which in the Bay Area still means crappy teardown in the ghetto fixer-upper.
Yeah, but does this couple live in the Bay Area? If they live in Tennessee they don’t need to qualify for anything over $400K.
April 22nd, 2009 at 10:55 pm
Bob says,
>>I listen to a call in economics radio show every day. I swear like 70% of the calls are from people with serious house payment problems.
You always get this kind of people calling into such shows. You see it on Fox Business News all the time. Some idiot calling in to say they can’t afford the payment on a $200K house, or that they have $30K in credit card debt and are considering bankruptcy. These shows are primarily for entertainment.
April 22nd, 2009 at 11:08 pm
“These shows are primarily for entertainment.”
Just like you, RE.
In all seriousness, bob… Remember, you’re not going to have the creme of the crop calling in to radio shows asking for financial advice.
April 22nd, 2009 at 11:24 pm
…and you’re not going to have cream of the crop renting apartments in trash-smelling area.
April 22nd, 2009 at 11:27 pm
No argument here…
April 23rd, 2009 at 1:07 am
No cream of the crop guys collecting welfare checks either, or not getting up until 10AM in the morning.
April 23rd, 2009 at 1:15 am
pathetically grasping at straws. nobody wants to entertain you today, RE. spend time with your family instead.
April 23rd, 2009 at 10:04 am
These shows are primarily for entertainment.
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Here one more thing “primarily for entertainment” – a self proclaimed helper is trying to “find people who need the most help” in a real estate parody blog and help them from “priced out issues“.