Portland Real Estate Blog

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We started running polls last year. Some have been more successful than others in both wording and results but the prediction polls we’ve collected are worth a look. This poll is from May 2007.

This is what readers thought six months later. Clearly the weakness of the poll is the lack of a distinction of median price or average price. RMLS reported an 8.3% average price and a 1.1% median price increase.

The 2008 RMLS market appreciation poll that has been running for the last month is interesting in that the “market will increase” votes seem to have been pretty evenly distributed into the “remain the same” and two “decrease” categories (48% of all votes in 2008 compared to 55% in 2007).

In previous posts and comments there has been some idle chatter about the least sexy way to spend money on your home. Sewers, storage tanks, etc. top the list. Some of the more profitable ways of spending follow in the graphic. Very few return 100% either in the national market or in the Northwest.

The graphic was part of the Prudential Northwest Properties Quarterly newsletter that came out this morning.

The print version of the Portland Business Journal reported on Friday that Prometheus Real Estate Group is the owner of 10th & Hoyt and has signed up as the property manager for the Wyatt which is now apartments rather than the condo development that was planned. Trammell Crow Residential is in the process of building the Alexan South Waterfront; the South Waterfront’s first apartment building. This equates to 900 new high end apartments being built in just three towers. The article asks the question: is there a market for them? The article is only online for print subscribers.

These are the Pearl District pictures I took the same day our first tour of the riverfront area back in November. As we add pictures to the tours, the software remixes the entire show so check back for updates. The still photos of the tour are here.

This is the first tour we’ve produced with Animoto. It takes our still photos and converts them into video. Yesterday’s weather made for some great shots out of the hills towards downtown and within the King’s Heights/Hillside neighborhood in the hills of Northwest Portland. I’ll be posting the tour which rocks along at pretty good pace and then a link to the photos that can be gone through individually at a leisurely pace.

Look at the photo album at your own pace.

This is a live seach map of the area:

Buy at the top of the market and then the market drops. Who’s to blame? This San Diego couple is suing their Realtor. More clearly stated, the wife is suing the agent and the husband is “supporting her.” The expert brought in by the Today Show doesn’t think they have a case:

Sometimes things just happen. There are a few faithful readers that don’t see the value in a Realtor. Put a sign in the yard and sell it. That simple. I have to admit that its pretty ironic that I put a sign in the yard and it sold. But was it really that simple?Back when we started the project of converting a duplex into a single family, I did all the listing paperwork and withheld it from RMLS. Being Realtors, our company policy does not allow us to be a true FSBO- the buyer has to be represented. We would have referred them out to another agent if the buyers did not already have a Realtor. With a construction project you have to forces fighting each other. If you sell it early, you have to share decision making with the buyer. If you wait until it is finished, you have holding costs. The former is probably preferable to the the latter.

A couple of weeks back, I got a call from a Realtor who was outside with her clients. It just happened that I was in the area and it was easy for me to show. Still in the framing stage, it is easy to walk around so in reality, the timing is perfect. The next few weeks as finishes go up, it would have been hard to have on the market as showing it would have been near impossible. We came to an agreement last night: their offer followed by a 17 item seller’s counter followed by one additional item on their buyer’s counter.

It’s hard for me to gauge the experience as I can never be a true FSBO. I’d maintain that the sign in the yard is the easy part and the negotiation and getting to closing (which is a ways off admittedly) is the hard part. This project is a 100% true flip. There have been a lot of negative comments that this area of the market is dead. Build a quality product and there is a market for it.

And at this point in the transaction, from this side of the transaction, it doesn’t feel like zero sum. We are still putting together the quality project we had envisioned and are sharing some of the decision making on finishes.

I stuck my head into the office of Columbia Mortgage’s Shawn Headlee this afternoon. Mainly thinking of myself and that maybe a refinance might be worth investigating. It would be if we were not in a jumbo mortgage situation. He says that rates on jumbo mortgages (over $417,000) haven’t shifted much so no dice for me.

On the other hand, one of our clients that he is working on the loan for got a lower rate than previously locked for free! Things have changed drastically in the mortgage market in the last few days. The refi market may suddenly reappear. Too little too late? Won’t matter, market is toast? Just what the doctor ordered?

Last night KOIN ran a story featuring Rob Levy who is in Prudential Northwest Properties’ West Portland office as well. I think Rob paints an accurate portrayal of our market.

We could talk about the financial markets but this post is regarding the “houseing related” story running nonstop on today’s news. It seems like such a bad idea that I am not going to perpetuate its success or rankings by linking to it here (it is sponsored by GoogleAds so earning income to). I wasn’t even going to look but didn’t think it would be fair not to. The guy linking a youtube video of his neighbor launching fireworks AT him is compelling though.

It boils down to: don’t like your neighbors? Post your gripe about them online for the world to see, address and all. I’m sure attorney’s will have a field day with it as they weed the truth from the slander. They’ll get paid either way. By posting, in my opinion, you ceede that you dislike your neighbor and don’t have the ability to use normal channels (reason, city enforcement, the law) to deal with your issue. You can’t really be thinking about moving as your telling your potential buyer that you hate your neighbors and they will too. You probably hurt your value more than theirs.

This seems like a bad idea all around.