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Friday, December 3, 2010
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39 comments:
me likey :) MOAR PLZ!!!
I see a quick sale.
quick sale doesn't mean list price or above anymore
MM, are you bidding? If so, good luck!
We will see. Market fundamentals would say you are correct as a general matter. I'm not following Arl., but it seems (from this board) that there is alot of demand.
Is this house priced appropriately? It shows well (I like their taste). I prefer vacant, ugly interiors and overgrown grass, etc. because this seems to knock out 90% of buyer competition.
This house is very reminicent (how do you engage "spell check"?) of a house we bought in our mid-20's. Ours, however, was ugly inside. It was a rental with all the accutraments; ugly bright pastel paint, shag carpet over the hardwoods, coppertone and avocado appliances, unkempt yard, etc.
Right up my alley. We had no $$$ and tore out the carpet ourselves, cleaned the woods floors (Murphy soap), painted and bought white used appliances. Central air had to wait a year.
This was our 4th property. We owned 10 by age 30 (including a waterfront weekend place).
It seems everyone here is in a far more favorable financial situation then we were. My son is/will be far better off. He owns a rental property that throws off cash and has a decent stock portfolio (thanks to his parents). Those who believe the boomer's had it made, don't know the current generation of boomer kids.
Hmm, I don't know about your last pgh., VA_I. Some youngsters here may have great salaries/bonuses and potential, but I don't know many people who owned 10 properties by age 30.
Ace,
The accumulation of assets and wealth had to do with time, effort and risk; not any leg-up, gift or huge salaries. Well...by 30 we were making some serious dough but we bought our first house at 22 (then 24,25,26,27,28,29) and multiple places in some years thereafter.
I am just commenting that there seems to be alot of money available to the younger crowd here.
Yeah VA_I, it's all over the place. Money everywhere.
VA_I, I'm going semi-disagree. There are indeed boomers' kids who had school and grad school and the car and the down payment all purchased by mom and dad who may appear to be rolling in the dough. There are some who had one or two of those items, but not all . The rest living too many to a house on the hill on staffer's salaries. I've got peers in all 3 categories at all sorts of starter salary levels.
There are the associates at the big firms with cash to spare, but remember that we tend to assume social security won't apply to us by the time we need to retire, all the pension plans that have been slowly phasing out during the boomer's time are going to be tiny or defunct for us, and we've got to deal with the steep local housing costs earlier in our careers. Plus if we want to raise kids we're facing down the college cost bubble.
I'm not saying the boomers had it easy. And yeah, the kids who have mommy and daddy's money to set them up in life are very blessed. The rest of us are just doing our best.
Also just like the boomers before them plenty of people in my generation are putting up a wealthy front via consumer debt. Behind there isn't much to show for it.
VA_I,
My coomments weren't to imply that you had any unearned advantage; rather that you were doing well by age 30, and I'm not sure that people om average in the 20-30 age range are as well off as you seem to suggest. Some are, some aren't.
VA_I,
I guess I can brag that I bought the exact same house (same floor plan) MM started this thread with for nearly $170k less than the list price given in MM's link because it had pet stained floors, outdated kitchen and bathrooms, and wasn't well staged at all. If that house goes for 80% or better of list price I'm golden. Of course, I'm still updating the bathroom and kitchen...
My $0.02
VA_Investor,
It's all about being entrepreneurial, you can theoretically make a lot of money in any business, grocery store, restaraunt, real estate, etc.
It also involves a lot of risk and opportunity cost (especially for educated people).
Real estate can be a decent source of income, but it usually requires inflationary environment to be very appealing. These days transaction costs and lower mobility offset most of the advantages of homeownership.
mytwocents,
You should congratulate yourself.
K,
It is a business to me and money can be made in any market(my two best deals ever were in 2004 and 2005). I find it odd that people here spend months and years worrying about a single, simple home purchase.
I hope they are making money doing other things (in addition to their regular job). Even if you are very smart and very skilled you probably won't get wealthy from working for someone.
If RE keeps pace with inflation I will be perfectly happy. You make your money going in as mtc just demonstrated.
I don't know what my point is really. We chose very early-on to pursue a "side job". I don't think that path is no longer available. I am perplexed as to why anyone who just wants a home would analyse this stuff to death.
Katie,
I agree with you that people find themselves in various circumstances coming out of school. Most of our friends were classmates of mine at Law School (night school). We were all in pretty much the same boat.
I can't tell you how many times we were told how "lucky" we were. I'll just quote "the Donald": "the harder I work, the luckier I get."
p.s. Mytwocents - we sold that one particular place after two short years for twice what we paid. It didn't hurt that the market was hot and the metro had just opened 3 blocks away (but, of course the metro was why we bought).
VA_I,
My goal is to live here until I outgrow it. At that point I'm hoping to rent it out and move a family into a slightly larger home. Start the RE portfolio if you will. I'm fairly confident this place would already be cash flow positive today so provided I don't need to move before 5 years or so I should be well within the range of covering my mortgage, expenses, and turn a slight profit.
At least, that's the plan.
My $0.02
VA_I,
Myself and few friends have been kicking around the idea of buying some rental properties. It's sort of a choppy time to pull the trigger now seeing as how we all have other primary professions. Though one of my buddies is looking a bit more aggressively at small commercial space rental buildings. Not sure I have enough cash to get in on that. We shall see.
My $0.02
http://franklymls.com/AR7465744
what went on here?
Bought back in the 70's, somehow
went to wells fargo, bought by classic cottages for 2K over the note,
then looks cleaned up and sold for 400K.
sorry - the site kept telling me my post was too long but posted it multiple times anyway!
Darn, now I see all of the posts were deleted even though I deleted only two. Oh well. One part of it was:
Here's a house for contemporary fans:
What do you think of the "rustic" touches (or other aspects)?
26th
And dc2, remember your prediction about the flip on Peary Street? Looks as if it's coming true...no price reduction->sitting, but not so pretty...
Peary
Pat That is one of the areas I mentioned in 22204 that is full of duplexes. There are a lot of rentals throughout Foxcroft. Maybe you could get one of the long time landlords to sell to you directly. Now that the Arlington Co. Human Services has moved from Clarendon to the group of office buildings near Washington Blvd, Arlington has done some clean up in the area. The neighborhood is looking much better, particularly around the 7-11. This is also the area where the old apartment buildings are being expanded. Classic Cottages did some work on the place, most notably adding central air, but it was an easy fix up as those are sold brick duplexes.
Ace,
Sorry. I deleted. Put a little to much stuff in my post.
mytwocents,
I don't know 2 cents about commercial, but there are plenty of good residential deals out there. I am going to buy some more. I just have to restructure some debt. I have too many mortgages (over 10) to take advantage of these great rates.
The residential rental market is strong and has been over the past 30yrs. I wish I were in my 20's.
http://franklymls.com/AR7453649
assessed at 485K, lists at 350K, sells for 376K.
reecon
how would you suggest i find someone who wants to sell in Foxcroft.
Pat What I have done is look in the tax records for Arlington County and if the owner has a different address, he is probably renting the place. You could either send a letter to the owner or find the telephone number and call him. Just ask him if he wants to sell the place. You could do this for any area in Arlington you like. Go to the Arlington County website, to real estate assessments and then to the address you mentioned. You can then click through all the tax records for the area.
reecon,
I used to do that back in the day when you had to use micro-fisch! I'd target certain neighborhoods and seek out out of state owners, properties owned by estates, etc.
There is such a free flow of info these days that the competition is incredible compared to the 80's.
Remember those "foreclosure seminars"? These guru's on national tours would come to town and I'd get flooded with phone calls from attendees demanding to get my "secret" lists of reo's "that all title companies had". LOL.
One for the class: Anyone want to guess on Arlington assessments, going out in a little over a month...
Higher, lower, or about the same?
Dave,
My prediction:
Generally up about 4%. As usual there were be important neighborhood variations--in part because of real differences, and in part because of few sales and so there can be a lot more variation due to mix changes rather than real value changes.
I expect my own neighborhood assessments to go up more than 4%, because they took a greater dip than others' did in the past few years, and there haven't been many sales in this assessment period, but those houses have been mostly updated/expanded or new builds.
What's your prediction?
Dave,
I'd bet Arlington is relatively flat. I think I've mentioned before the bs FX Cty pulled in the early to mid 90's.
I happened to have 7 or 8 properties in FX Cty back then. Every single assessment was unchanged. The "improvements" value dropped and (what a coincidence!) the land value increased by EXACTLY the same amount. I called the Fairfax Journal and they did an article about it.
This year is a little different. I think values have held and that they won't need any sleight of hand to keep the numbers flat (or up slightly).
Of course, assessments always lag - both on the upside and downside.
Assessments will be up, particularly in neighborhoods not affected by short sales and foreclosures. Tax rate will also be up. Overall, taxes will go up about the rate of inflation -- maybe 2%. Arlington needs money as many schools are overcrowded and they need either more trailers or bricks and mortar classrooms. Some of the school costs will be offset by teacher salaries as older higher paid teachers retire and newer lower paid teachers come in. Only about 20% of the households have children in Arlington schools but school take up the major portion of the budget.
Arlington has already increased its building permits and related building costs substantially as they know builders will pass on the costs to homebuyers. For houses most of the buyers have children who are or will be attending the schools. Even in my condo building the number of school age children has increased lately.
Contrarian-
Perhaps sometime way in the future, but as for now VA and the Nova area in general are in very good fiscal shape.
Blogger housebuyer said... Contrarian-Perhaps sometime way in the future, but as for now VA and the Nova area in general are in very good fiscal shape.
Perhaps. But in keeping with his obvious intent, someone probably said the same thing about Chicago a few years back.
Contrarian,
1) The article describes a generous but underfunded, voluntary defined benefit plan.
2) Only about half of all employers (public and private) maintain voluntary plans of any type.
3) The vast majority of those plans are defined contribution plans, not defined benefit plans. Employees get whatever is in their account when they retire. There is no underfunding that has to be made up in such plans.
4) States haven't cheated by underfunding or borrowing from plans in the majority of the small remaining cases. (It's illegal to do that in private sector plans and retain tax-qualified status). IL, Cal., and about 10 other states are in much worse shape than others. And even some state plans that are NOT in terrible shape, but were hurt by the "lost decade" due to low investment returns are cutting vested benefits (also not permitted in the private sector).
So no, what is happening there isn't very indicative of what will happen here.
Contrarian One of the reasons Northern Virginia will probably not go the way of Chicago is in the last sentence of Chap Petersen's proposed legislation #3 in which he says making the owners of mortgages (in the case of Virginia he really means a deed of trust)record the instrument so that the state and local jurisdiction can collect recording fees. Virginia is very good at collecting fees and has been pointed out is more solvent than most states/commonwealths.
Contrarian-
If you want to switch and say you expect disinflation, I will agree with you. I expect that we will have low levels of inflation for at least a few more years, while the economy remains weak. I just don't see deflation coming according to the core CPI. I agree that deflation is possible (although unlikely), but the main reason Krugman talks about it is because he is very political and wants more stimulus.
By the way when most people say that inflation is running at reasonable levels excluding housing they are talking about core CPI ex shelter. If you look at the Core CPI ex shelter and take the average YoY inflation the last 10 year numbers are
Year Avg. Inflation
2001 2.0%
2002 1.4%
2003 0.8%
2004 1.1%
2005 1.9%
2006 1.9%
2007 1.4%
2008 2.1%
2009 2.2%
2010 2.1%
With that data its a lot harder to claim their is disinflation, expect in shelter.
VA_I:
I find it odd that people here spend months and years worrying about a single, simple home purchase.
I have seen so many people jumping in head-first without a moment of thought or hesitation only to royally screw themselves in this housing market. Given the massive down-turn in home prices, it almost sounds like you are joking by saying you think it's odd for anybody to hesitate. If somebody spends eight years going to school to earn a high salary, how is it odd that they wait a mere two years before making a decision that could cost them hundreds of thousands of dollars?
Contrarian-
I figured that was the case, but just wanted to double check :) I think I am a little more optimistic than Krugman, but we are fairly close in thinking a few years of disinflation, with a chance of deflation if we go into a bad double dip.
I think the most likely forecast is unemployment stays roughly at the same level for at least another year.
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