Christmas Eve

"Not a creature is stirring," and the sky is clear here in Northern California.
The recent economic news is looking more promising. This morning's Mercury News predicted that Real Estate values would remain at least stable in the coming year.
This is a quiet weekend's pause before a week full of preparing a new listing for sale. The painting, carpeting, and gardening are complete, and the termite inspector crawled under the house and emerged with the good news that there was no infestation.
Next week's schedule is full of the remainder of the work: house and window cleaners on Monday, stager on Tuesday, and then I will meet my videographer on Wednesday or Thursday, depending on the weather report. Right after New Years, this buyer-ready property will be on the MLS. I'm happy that I took my vacation trip early this year!

Too Long Away

I'm back from my annual trip to visit my sister and her family in Florida. The nighttime temperature was 28 degrees when I left West Palm Beach, so there was no shock when I had to scrape frost off my car windows this morning before leaving for the Realtors' meeting. My son and his wife will notice much more contrast when they return to Michigan from their vacation in Hawaii.
In my sales area (Sunnyvale and Cupertino) we get a weekly list of recent home sales published in the Mercury News. The recent sales price is almost always higher than the last selling price. In the Real Estate section of the Palm Beach Post, the situation is reversed. Invariably, the new sales are dramatically lower in price than the same property's sale price of a few years ago. For example, a five year old condo that sold for $592,600 in 2005, now sold for $220,000. A single family house, built in 1996, sold in 2008 for $665,000 and resold recently for $113,800.
Even more frightening, the property tax on a $430,000 condo there is more than $10,000 a year! I'm glad to be back in Northern California.