Are those genuine granite counter tops?

http://www.burbed.com/2007/01/17/599000-includes-street-art-on-street-sign/

(BTW, I’m just being snarky)

Have you ever seen what $599,000 gets you in the Bay Area?

http://www.burbed.com/2007/01/17/599000-includes-street-art-on-street-sign/

Last house hunt, I was prepared to look for years. She wasn’t. I was able to hold her off for 6 months, but that was getting into dangerous territory.

This house hunt, I am not going to even broach the subject until I feel the market’s right.

I’ve told her 2010. It may be sooner, but I won’t tell her that.

Knowing the market, if a deal appears we will be in a positin to take advantage of it. The trick is to not force it, there’s no need to panic, smile.

I am ready to go back to Indiana where I can get a huge well built house for 150k or less. Starting to wonder what the heck I am doing here. There is nothing all that special about Seattle.

“Whether a first time homebuyer or a seasoned real estate investor, all the indicators seem to point to January as an optimum time to purchase a home.” — Right, because you know people who earn $150K/year were only waiting for the median SFH price to rise even more before buying.

Uncle Bill has already issued a press release stating that anyone who doesn’t buy Vista is a bitter loser renter who hates housing, America, and freedom.

Bush was supposed to upgrade MSFT in his SOTU speech last night but I guess he forgot. The terrorists win again :(

I could not agree with you more. I was looking at 3/2 houses in Carnation less than 2 years ago for 220k. Flippers came in and snatched them up through 25k in upgrades that I could care less about and puthem back on the market at 310k. I like Carnation but the charm of a small town is the small town price, though steak adn beer night on wednesdays is nice.

Even if affordability wasn’t an issue, can anyone in their right mind justify paying $400K for a house that was priced at $250K three years ago?

This is NOT a great time to buy. This is an INSANE time to buy!

Lots of incentives in the Bothell area. Rate buy downs to 3.375% smells of desperation.

Wow, I haven’t been looking as hard at as many properties as you have, but your observations exactly parallel my own. What a strange twilight-zone of inventory and comps we’re looking at right now.

I came back from the last place we walked through (SFH in Greenlake listed at $699, which was absolute junk inside) with a resolve to renew my apartment lease through 2007 – let the flippers flop.

The only thing worth less than a “fixer” is a house where someone did a crappy remodel/flip on a fixer. Now I have to tear out all your shoddy garbage and re-do it. Honestly!

I agree most are not selling $400k for a 980 sq ft rambler, gimme a break, they were $320k in June and still overpriced. I have to admit the craziness and stupidity of this market really gets to me more than maybe it should. I just don’t see how this will end well. What good does it do this country to not have middle working class families afford ANY home.

I enjoy messing with the realtors. They ask if I am in the market and I say, “No, I’m currently priced out of this market. I only make $X per year.” (where X is significantly above the mean income for the area). The last realtor I said this too got excited and started telling me that the owners would probably sell for less than the asking price and that he could get me a good deal on the house.

1) Pretty much everything you’ve heard about flipper renovations is true. These people are morons. I’ve seen some work so shoddy that it would blow your mind. We toured a home in Newport Hills and the owners were still there – he pointed at the electrical plates and said, “we upgraded to the latest style!” Um, yeah. You went to Home Depot and dropped a hundred bucks and spent the afternoon with a flathead screwdriver. No.

2) The $400k-$500k unrenovated properties are bottom of the barrel garbage. Borderline unliveable. Most of these are in such a state of disrepair they will probably need to be torn down. We saw a house in Finn Hill that had been vacant for quite some time. It smelled like death. My wife said, “this place is haunted!” I saw something – I’m not sure what – but it was brown, papery, and slightly organic looking in the fireplace. I asked our agent what it was and she just said, “let’s get out of here!” And a steal at only $450k.

3) Prices are all over the board and don’t appear to be based on recent nearby sales or appraised value + whatever. People are just asking whatever they feel like and seeing if they can get any bites.

4) The increase of inventory is definitely accelerating. It’s all crap though.

5) Most builders are idiots. They will shoehorn a house into just about any space, regardless if the front door of one house is directly facing the house next door. Yeah, I want to look out of my living room window and see my neighbor reading the newspaper in his bathroom. Most are still not offering concessions.

6) I’m not seeing any of these houses move. No one is buying them. However, if a decent house at a decent price does get listed, it is snapped up immediately. The crap is sitting forever though.

7) This has been one of the worst and most depressing experiences of my life. I’ve seen more than one house that *could* have been nice but had been ravaged by a flipper and had the price jacked up $100k from the purchase price a year ago. It seems every flipper runs out of money and you can tell exactly where they did – 4 out of 5 rooms will have hardwood floors, for example. The last one will have 30 year old filthy carpeting in it. 3 out of 5 closets will have been redone – the last two look like something like the meat locker from Texas Chainsaw Massacre.

Anyone who thinks this is a “healthy market” is certifiably insane.

My own personal view is that the decision to buy is really a highly personal one, based on your financial state of affairs. If you can afford to only owe 3 times your annual income (or less), and spend less than 15% of your pay on the home, then go for it and buy. It doesn’t matter if it is the market is rising, falling, or flat.

However, if you have to really stretch your finances to buy, then DON’T do it.

It’s that simple.