94401 is still 4% above 1988-inflation adjusted psft prices.

Year 94401 94402 94403
1988 $183 $197 $173
1989 $181 $226 $208
1990 $250 $228 $224
1991 $204 $237 $200
1992 $197 $210 $204
1993 $172 $217 $189
1994 $190 $221 $206
1995 $194 $222 $210
1996 $191 $229 $205
1997 $223 $268 $230
1998 $252 $285 $253
1999 $262 $305 $307
2000 $347 $396 $378
2001 $376 $439 $389
2002 $394 $434 $397
2003 $422 $469 $441
2004 $516 $531 $516
2005 $613 $595 $578
2006 $643 $632 $592
2007 $604 $655 $625
2008 $478 $609 $542
2009 $433 $614 $422

Appreciate the geek compliment, a tiger can’t change his stripes!

PropertyShark howto:

First get yourself a PropertyShark account. After you login, click on the “start using PropertyShark” link. At the top of the page it should say “Look up a property in” County X. If County X isn’t Santa Clara, click on the “Santa Clara, CA” link on the left side of the page under the “Other Counties in SF Bay Area” heading.

Enter a street address you know to be in one of the zip codes you are interested in. If you don’t know an address off the top of your head, just go to Redfin and find a property for sale in the region of interest and use it as your reference address. I used “20875 DUNBAR Dr” for Cupertino to find information for zipcode 95104. “1479 NEWFOUNDLAND Dr” looks like a good address for South Sunnyvale, 94087.

Enter one of these addresses in the PropertyShark Search, click “look it up”, and scroll down the page 3/4 of the way to find “Neighborhood Price History”, which details transaction#, median price, price/sqft, etc. since 1988. Copy data into Excel spreadsheet. Repeat with other address. Observe and interpret trends.

Year 95014 94087
1988 172 174
1989 226 210
1990 215 211
1991 205 195
1992 210 199
1993 203 188
1994 205 198
1995 218 200
1996 230 215
1997 260 252
1998 304 282
1999 331 310
2000 460 423
2001 441 403
2002 456 415
2003 447 407
2004 490 462
2005 576 534
2006 599 564
2007 647 600
2008 679 626
2009 666 597

This analysis reveals that South Sunnyvale, 94087 has cost 5-10% less per sqft than Cupertino for the entire duration of 1989-present. I don’t see a clear trend in price differentials here. Perhaps San Mateo is a special case.

(I’ll do it if you can tell me how. I looked at the tools available and promptly fell asleep.)

Looks like (the more desirable) 94402 and (less desirable) 94401 were pretty much equivalent $/sqft during the ’93-’98 lull, and that 94401 surged to 10-20% /sqft more during the ’89 and ’07 bubbles.

Surprisingly, 94401 now costs 20% less than 94402. This kind of divergence is without precedent in the existing data set, and implies that either 94401 is currently undervalued, or 94402 is overvalued. I would guess that 94402 is overvalued, as it has only declined 6% from the peak, whereas 94401 has declined 30%.

94401 is now priced 2% less than 1988-inflation-adjusted pricing. 94402 is 37% higher. 94403 is 7% higher. (assumes 4% annual inflation, a little high, but in line with average wage growth for this period). 2009 data, however, is unreliable as the number of sales are quite low for each zip code (only 7 in 94403).

data from PropertyShark:

Year 94401 94402 94403
1988 $228.00 $197.00 $173.00
1989 $258.00 $226.00 $208.00
1990 $254.00 $228.00 $224.00
1991 $230.00 $237.00 $200.00
1992 $235.00 $210.00 $204.00
1993 $225.00 $217.00 $189.00
1994 $225.00 $221.00 $206.00
1995 $221.00 $222.00 $210.00
1996 $232.00 $229.00 $205.00
1997 $267.00 $268.00 $230.00
1998 $285.00 $285.00 $253.00
1999 $361.00 $305.00 $307.00
2000 $425.00 $396.00 $378.00
2001 $455.00 $439.00 $389.00
2002 $480.00 $434.00 $397.00
2003 $507.00 $469.00 $441.00
2004 $620.00 $531.00 $516.00
2005 $717.00 $595.00 $578.00
2006 $725.00 $632.00 $592.00
2007 $715.00 $655.00 $625.00
2008 $550.00 $609.00 $542.00
2009 $510.00 $614.00 $422.00

(in memory of the Tiananmen Square Massacre)

Oh a tree!

That’s how I read it. I wondered if it was short for Alaska Mountain.

Come on, of course I’m confused. Lower case herve writing to lower case steve? What will happen if Alex, RealAlex and UnrealAlex all post after them?