Portland Real Estate Blog

The home inspection is a standard part of most Oregon real estate transactions.  The buyer has the right to waive the contingency but it is highly recommended that the home inspection takes place as soon as practical so that other inspections can be scheduled if there are areas of concern.  The Oregon Real Estate Agency publishes the Oregon Property Buyer Advisory which describes the inspections a buyer might want to have during the inspection period.

The results of a few of our recent inspections:

• An oil tank found under a driveway
• An oil tank found on the opposite side of the house from the existing furnace
• What was believed to be a public sewer actually connected to a septic system (cracks and party sewers are also common discoveries)
• Radon at 7.1pCi/l- “acceptable” is below 4.0pCi/l (radon is the second leading cause of lung cancer behind smoking)

The Professional Inspection Addendum describes what inspections the buyer wants to have and who will pay for them (typically the buyer pays).  The form gives the buyer permission to conduct test where samples may have to be taken that could be considered invasive (such as stucco &  soil sampling).

Last week I wrote about the oil tank locate inspection I attended.  The result was inconclusive.  There is no DEQ record of the permitted tank being removed but no tank was found.  Alpha Environmental had a nagging feeling that a second look was in order.  The tank was found on Sunday!    The tank was located on the far side of the house from the furnace and oil lines, not on the near side which would be the logical location.

The February RMLS Market Action report on the Portland real estate market came out this morning.  When I ran the Multnomah Country report yesterday I said that I thought that inventory would remain fairly static as there is an increase in listings and an increase in activity.  Note the importance of methodology: my report shows and increase in active listings while RMLS reports a decrease in new listings.  My report was also more localized (Multnomah County only).

Today’s Market Action report:

“Comparing February 2010 with February 2009, closed sales increased 18.4%. Pending sales also jumped 45%, and new listings rose 12.4%.

When comparing February 2010 with the month prior, January 2009, closed sales grew a slight 2.9% (1,015 v. 986) and pending sales were up 20.5% (1,850 v. 1,535). New listings, on the other hand, dropped just 1% (3,902 v. 3,937).”

Both Case Shiller and RMLS put today’s home values at roughly June/July 2005 prices from their latest reports.  Case Shiller’s latest report was released at the end of February for December.

We’ll know some time in April what Congress is or isn’t going to do with the Home Buyer Tax Credit.  We have to operate under the assumption that it will expire on April 30th (must be under contract (accepted offer)) and closed by June 30th.  It was extended November 7th- just 23 days before the prior expiration.  April 30th is a Friday which bodes better than what would have been a fairly useless last week of November had it expired just days after Thanksgiving.  There is very little to be found on the Internet even just talking about the subject of an extension.  I still feel that the Credit has been a good thing for real estate but not the make or break for it.

About a month ago I ran the same report for Multnomah county real estate active listings.  This month, the report shows an increase in listings to 5,129 from 4,804.  The number of listings in the market is one of the two components that make the the “Inventory” ratio reported monthly by RMLS.  The Areas are the geographic areas within Multnomah county as defined by RMLS.  I’ll write up February’s Market Action it is released. We’re seeing a lot more market activity in our business in the last couple of weeks but as inventory is a ratio of closed sales, that may not reflect this month.

Oregon DEQ records are the most solid evidence that an oil tank has been removed and decommissioned.  Buyers of any Oregon real estate become the responsible party for soil contamination at closing which makes finding out if there is/was an oil tank an important part of buyer due diligence during the inspection period.

I attended an oil tank locate that came up inconclusive today done by Alpha Environmental.  There are supply lines in the basement which “proves” that once upon a time there was a tank but it could have been above ground in the basement our outside or buried.  Portlandmaps shows a permit for an underground tank in this case (under historic permits tab).  There is a concrete driveway up the side of the house that the furnace is on and the back yard is also impervious near the house.

The first step is a metal detector sweep around the property:

The next step was to hook this machine up to the actual supply line in the basement.  There may be rebar touching the line as the machine pings all around the basement!  Normally the trace of the pipe’s directionality would be clear.

Though inconclusive, the buyer is now possesses all the available information regarding the tank.

Rumors started a couple of weeks that units in the John Ross might be coming.  They are.  KGW reported this morning and Ryan Frank at the Oregonian wrote yesterday that the John Ross is following in the footsteps of  the Atwater Place auction and going to auction on April 11th.

The Mirabella, a senior community, looks like it has topped out to the north of the John Ross.  It is obscured by the Meriwether Condo in this photo, taken from the Willamette River, but now that it is at full height, potential John Ross buyers will be able to confirm their view corridor when looking towards downtown.

Real estate auctions aren’t new but are becoming more prevalent in the Portland Real Estate Market.  This will be the second high rise auction we’ve seen in the last six months and REDC and other firms have held (primarily) single family home auctions.

Stranded on an island in Miami?  You may survive.  Our friends at EarthTechling.com wrote about the proposed Miapolis in Miami.  It would be the world’s tallest building.  What does that mean in Portland terms?  The 3200′ LEED Platnum building (according to the Miapolis homepage) would be roughly six times the height of the US Bancorp Tower:

“The US Bancorp Tower is the second tallest skyscraper in Portland, Oregon. It stands at 536 feet (163 m) with 42 floors. The building has nearly 1.1 million square feet (69,000 m²) of office space inside, making it the largest office building in Oregon in terms of volume, and the second tallest building in Oregon, with only the Wells Fargo Center exceeding its height.”  (Wikipedia)

The highest point in Portland is rough 1000 feet above the Willamette River!

The proposed tower has 1050 condo units.  According to RMLS, there are a total of 278 active condo units in the 97209 zip code which encompasses the Pearl District.

“EVACUATION SYSTEM:

It is a building-wide solution for safe evacuation of tenants and quick transporting of rescue personnel to elevated floors.

The system is an array of five collapsible cabins permanently stored on the roof in a folded position. Upon deployment, the cabins array is lowered to the ground, it then unfolds, enabling emergency responders to board the cabin.

It travels upwards until it stops opposite five elevated floors simultaneously, enabling 150 occupants to enter through specially configured exit windows.  The array is then lowered to the ground and tenants exit as it refolds.”

Guess it beats taking the stairs.

I stopped by the 2010 Portland Street of Dream site on Friday and took these pictures.  Framing has begun on one of the lots and there has been activity on a couple of the others as well.  I started visiting NW Creasp Lane about every thirty days at the beginning of January.  February’s post was on the photoblog.  There are additional March photos as well.  The Show is set for August.

January:

March:

The photos aren’t taken from the exact same angle but are both looking down the street into the cul-de-sac.  Portlandmaps.com shows two open permits online.  There are no active listings in RMLS.

This weekend, March 6th and 7th, is the Home Builders Association of Metro Portland 2010 Tour of Remodeled Homes.  The HBA also sponsor’s the Street of Dreams.

Eighteen homes are featured in this year’s show and they are located all over the metro area.  The $17.50 ticket (one size fits all, including children) is valid for both days (10 a.m. to 5 p.m.).

Image purchased from iStock.com

I posted this picture yesterday on the photo.blog but it merits a blog posting as well.  The city has began the five year, $86,000 process of changing the signs from 39th Avenue Cesar E. Chavez Blvd.

The signs will coexist for five years and then the 39th signs will be removed.  I have not driven the whole 7.2 mile length of the street but did not see new signs around SE Division.

For real estate, the change has been made.  There are 178 active listings on 39th Ave right now and just two on Cesar E. Chavez BLVD.  Property entry into RMLS starts with the tax ID number and the address is auto-populated.  When I tried, it used Cesar E. Chavez BLVD.  I can manually change the street (but why would I?).  A Cesar E. Chavez listing is going to show that it is a new listing (or manually changed) for a time being, much like an MLS number starting with 100 was entered in 2010 and a 90 was entered in 2009.  The difference being that the street can be changed without creating a new listing.

We have history to look at too.  Rosa Parks BLVD was Portland BLVD.  The last house sold on Portland BLVD closed on 5/8/2008.  The official change was made on 12/14/2006.  It isn’t a huge deal for real estate.   I don’t think property values are affected by the change.  When a Realtor is asked, “I saw a house on 39th,” if they can’t find it, they are going to have to search Cesar E Chavez and vice versa but that’s not tough.  Old legacies die hard.  Portland Brewing became Pyramid in 2006 but we still “meet at Portland Brewing.”