2008: RIP

It’s not that there was no good news from the year.  The surge in Iraq succeeded spectacularly; Islamic terrorists failed, again, to terrorize on US soil; anthropogenic global warming, as we enter our tenth consecutive cooling year, was delivered the final nail, leaving only the hysterics and The Oregonian as True Believing fans; and we’re treated […]

September Yawn

Almost entirely as expected.  Sales down (roughly) 20%; median price now down 10% from peak to $270k, lowest since October, 2006; MSI staying at 9.9 months.  Biggest surprise to me:  Homes going under contract were only down 2%.

I still think we’ll need to get to ~ $250k to see an uptick in sales.

As always: click on […]

A Farewell to Farms

Contrary to Bubbler fantasy, it’s impossible to do an adequate job for clients as a part time broker.  There’s simply too much involved. 
So, for now, I’m sending my license back to Salem.  I’ve turned my clients over to my brother John - he’s just closed one, another is in escrow - and will come back only when […]

A break from politics for some real estate … August Numbers

More of the same.  Since last year the September numbers started to reflect the credit crunch, beginning next month there should be a less dramatic decrease in sales, but for now it’s still not pretty.
Note Terradatum has changed format somewhat, now offering one year monthly increments and YoY comparisons.  The following is for the Portland […]

July PDX numbers: More of the same.

July and August, 2007, were the peak months for Portland Metro median price, both @ $300k.  The mortgage crisis hit in late August, so I think by September we’ll see a deceleration of the 35% drops in sales and an acceleration of the drop in median price.  But not this month.
Median price:  $290k, down 3.3%.  […]

Portland Metro Housing Affordability

In the interesting but not definitive category:
Each quarter RMLS publishes a little talked about Housing Affordability Index, another due out when they release June numbers in a week or so.  It takes into account median family income (via HUD), median home prices and prevailing interest rates; then, assuming 20% down on a thirty year fixed […]

Portland Housing Blog, PMI, Transparency

Mainstream media love to denigrate blogs and bloggers for their lack of journalistic integrity and oversight - compared, say, to The Oregonian.  But blogs are held accountable by readers and other blogs, and the good ones earn credibility by immediately correcting errors of fact.  Thus I trust Glenn Reynolds infinitely more than anything I read […]

June Median Price for Pending Sales Ties All-Time High!

And so it goes.
The actual headline will be more like this:  “Median price up From May 1.6%, Down Only Slightly - 1.2% - from June 2006.  Portland Real Estate Market Much Better Than Most of U.S.!”
But.
Here are the prevailing price trends; blue is pending, green the actual sold price:

Clearly the gap between list price and […]

May Numbers; On Being Accustomed to Food

Something I admit but can’t fully reconcile:
There are two parts of being a successful real estate agent:  Doing the job an agent is hired to do, professionally representing clients in the buying and selling of real estate.  I’ve said before, good agents earn every cent of what they’re paid: that’s testified to by the fact that the […]

A (Real Estate) Tale of Two Cities and Four Zip Codes

For those who still doubt that all real estate is local, I thought it would help to compare two areas with approximately the same number of listings (detached single family).  The first - the southeast zip codes of 97202 and 97206, encompassing Woodstock, Eastmoreland and Sellwood - has 438 active listings; and the second - […]

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