Livermore homes may continue to benefit from the Bay Area’s housing market in the near future — regardless of which direction prices go. Depending on who you ask, the Bay Area real estate market is either going strong or beginning to cool. That’s according to differing data recently collected by real estate researchers Redfin and Zillow, and it’s something that has caught the attention of everyone from housing economists to the star of Bravo’s “Million Dollar Listing, San Francisco”. In… read more →
The latest real estate data on the Dublin Ranch Housing Market (and Dublin in general) and its home prices is certainly encouraging for Dublin homeowners: Due in part to a considerable drop in the number of homes for sale since last summer (inventory is only 62% of July 2014’s) single-family home prices have appreciated significantly. Most recently, the median closing price soared to $967,500, which is the highest figure on record for the area. What’s more surprising, however, is that… read more →
If you’ve been following the news in Bay Area real estate, you might have heard that home sales have been dropping. A Pacific Union article attributed the root of this trend to inventory shortages and a lack of “move-up” buyers. The reasoning makes sense: Fewer homes are sold when there are fewer homes on sale, and there are fewer homes for sale because fewer homeowners are comfortable selling their current home and trying to find a bigger or better one… read more →
In June, I wrote about how the Dublin Ranch real estate market was outperforming a significant portion of the United States in home sales and market value. Now here we are, a month further into an especially hot summer wondering, “has anything changed?” The most straightforward answer is “not a lot.” Yet for most homeowners, those words are music to their ears. Here’s why: Dublin Ranch real estate’s median sold price barely budged in June… but that means it continues… read more →
In June’s National Housing Survey by Fannie Mae, the mortgage giant found that consumer attitudes on the U.S. housing market are signaling the approach of a “healthier purchase market” which, according to many real estate experts, may have an impact on the Bay Area housing market and its prices. Among those experts is Zillow’s chief economist Stan Humphries, who believes that an increase in mortgage rates and household incomes will trigger a transition from a “stimulus-driven housing market” to “one… read more →
The “Lifestyle Client Experience”. What does that mean to us? Well, in today’s fast-paced world, it seems like everyone has a smartphone permanently attached to their hand, everyone seems to have less free time than ever, and good customer service feels like a thing of the past. Most companies are trying to distance themselves from their customers, so tasks like checking your bank account balance or paying your electric bill involve complicated phone trees and customer support representatives who are… read more →
Wondering why it was so hot in Dublin, California recently? Instead of looking up at the sky, you might want to check out the neighborhoods. May was a sizzling month for home sellers and helped set an unambiguous tone for what to expect in local real estate this summer. Last month, the median sales price amongst Dublin homes, townhouses, and condos climbed to the highest point in recent years: $797,450, which is a 15-percent year-over-year increase from 2014 and an… read more →
Every once in a while, I have a client who references the Zillow “Zestimate®” of a property as an accurate estimator of its value. Zillow.com has become a popular internet destination, because it gives consumers a place to go to estimate a property value without having to do a thorough analysis themselves and without having to talk to a salesperson. Sometimes, though, I get worried about the level of significance folks place in websites like Zillow. I thought I’d write… read more →
About six weeks ago, we presented several reasons why Dublin home sales, and the housing market in general, were on course to have another “hot seller’s market” in the coming months. Since then, we’ve been watching, working, waiting (and possibly hoping we wouldn’t be proven wrong). So with summer right around the corner, what’s the latest data show? The Bay Area’s housing market is on a healthy trajectory, according to Freddie Mac. The mortgage company’s most current “Multi-Index Market Indicator”… read more →
Good news for buyers and sellers of Livermore Real Estate! Amidst high housing prices and low inventories, an oft-repeated word of advice last summer was: “Look east.” Specifically, buyers who felt squeezed out of the hottest real estate markets—San Francisco, Oakland, San Jose, etc.—found something of a compromise in places like the East Bay, where prices climbed slower and supply was more reasonable. A year later, it appears things haven’t changed: Many parts of the Bay Area still lead the… read more →
It might only be April, but it already feels like it’s summer in Dublin Ranch. That’s not just because of the heat, either—the hottest months are often host to the highest peaks in the real estate market. And the most recent data suggests that we could be pushing into an early (and hot) seller’s summer. We’ve assembled a list of several reasons to think this (and why this may be the perfect time to put your Dublin home up for… read more →
While the most recent Gallup poll indicates that the rising price of gas has impacted confidence in the U.S. economy, a February report by Fannie Mae shows that Americans are still growing optimistic about their ability to find a home, get a mortgage, and become homeowners. But in California — where inventory has been consistently low and many buyers have had a difficult time purchasing homes — a question arises: Is this optimism finding its way into Bay Area real… read more →
While an S&P committee recently published a report with a lukewarm outlook on parts of the U.S. housing market due, in part, to seasonal slowdown, the San Francisco metropolitan area maintains its position as the nation’s leader in the housing recovery. Across the Bay Area, virtually every county has exhibited promising growth that suggests 2015 will be another strong year for the local housing market. With that in mind, some of you Dubliners may be wondering, “What does this mean… read more →
It may come as no surprise that the latest news regarding the local real estate market concerns a significant drop in Bay Area sale numbers. This seems to be a combination of two things: The typical winter slump, and a relative lack of homeowners putting their houses up for sale. An effect of this shortage is that housing prices have been bolstered through the holiday season, benefiting homeowners in many parts of the bay, including the focus of this article… read more →
With winter drawing closer, experts continue to predict a slowdown of the Bay Area housing market. This is nothing new, of course: Historically, the winter season has served as the low-point of annual real estate sales due to a combination of bad weather and holiday distractions. But as demand — one of the key factors that has been driving sales sky-high — “cools” off, there’s a reasonable expectation that the housing market will stabilize. According to Freddie Mac’s Multi-Indicator Market… read more →
Although the summer has heated up most of the Bay Area’s real estate market, it’s fair to say that the skyrocketing gains of places like San Jose and San Francisco have not been shared evenly across the entire region. So while the last few months have brought moderate increases in property values and shorter market times for many areas, this growth may appear a little underwhelming when it’s compared to parts where homes clear the market in less than a… read more →
If we summed up Bay Area real estate according to the news, it would go like this: Sales have dropped, there’s been a slowdown in the climb of housing prices, and inventory remains low. Rising interest rates loom over homebuyers, potentially cutting into future housing sales. And people are even starting to talk about winter, when many buyers temporarily suspend their searches and fewer homes tend to go on sale. But if winter is coming early, the latest statistics suggest… read more →
Lately, the primary focus of local real estate news has been on determining whether or not the Bay Area housing market has peaked. With every dip and spike, experts have pointed at signs that the plateau is imminent, or that we have already reached it. Of course, some parts of the Bay Area have likely peaked (the Richmond Waterfront, for instance). But there are three reasons to think that this does not apply to the East Bay as a whole.… read more →
When the Dublin Ranch market for detached single-family housing first gave signs of cooling off, we looked to the area’s condos and townhouses to see if they were following a similar pattern. After all, Dublin’s condos and townhouses (or simply “CoTH”) have often outperformed single-family homes (or “SFR”s) in various metrics. Notably, in the past year, the typical CoTH property has closed above asking price far more often and has seen a steeper climb in value than the typical SFR.… read more →
Early last month, we wrote about the housing market in the Richmond Waterfront (which consists of several communities, including Point Richmond, Marina Bay, and Country Club Vista) and highlighted conditions that indicated the area was likely “plateauing”. Among those conditions was a “days on market” figure that was twice the Bay Area average and a developing trend of homes selling for less than asking price. Essentially, while the area was projected to maintain most of the gains it made in… read more →
