Today’s planned post can wait. This is more time sensitive. I can’t get the graphs on MacroMarkets.com work so no visual but according to the just released Case-Shiller S&P Index results, Portland dropped 2% from between this Feb. and last Feb. There has been a monthly decline for each of the last six months.
There is more data available on Standard & Poor’s webpage.
Fun website that one of our clients found and shared. They are moving from a home with a walkscore of 15 to making an offer on a home with a score of 80.
What is Walk Score? We help homebuyers, renters, and real estate agents find houses and apartments in great neighborhoods. Walk Score shows you a map of what’s nearby and calculates a Walk Score for any property. Buying a house in a walkable neighborhood is good for your health and good for the environment.
Assuming you lived at the City of Portland Bureau of Development Services at 1900 SW 4th St., you’d have a walkscore of 88.
The house we are buying has fairly new oil furnace (2000 according to PortlandMaps’ online permits). PortlandMaps also shows an oil tank installation of a 675 gallon oil tank in 1950. Sampling the soil around the tank was a no brainer. Pray for good news, don’t expect it. We didn’t get it. I knew it wasn’t going to be good because you could smell the oil in the soil sample. The soil is contaminated and will require soil removal to clean up the site. How that happens in the transaction is an open negotiation. Alpha Environmental did the inspection.
I started to research some options yesterday. If the furnace is in poor repair, we will probably convert to natural gas. I am meeting with Portland Green Heat, who is mentioned in a previous post about BioDiesel on Tuesday to determine if what we have is a good candidate for B20 or B99 fuel. That post had some great information in the comments. You can run B20 with no modification and B99 with some modification to the system. If we can make that change a 250 gallon tank would be installed in the basement. As of yesterday, Star Oil charges $4.27 for B99, $4.09 for B20 and Pullian Petroleum $3.86 for diesel per gallon based on a 200 gallon delivery. B20 is 6% more expensive and B99 is 11% more than diesel. I don’t know how they compare efficiency wise.
Then the plan is put a smaller natural gas furnace with AC to heat and cool the top two floors. I don’t think the oil furnace is big enough or ducted to the right places for modern day comfort so it should be able to do the main floor and basement without any issues. Using both heat sources will allow for better heat control and since the top floors are really the only ones that need AC, a smaller unit will be able to do the job.
As a side note: the oil in the existing tank belongs to the seller and is personal property. There is a provision in the standard contract that at closing, the oil is sold to the buyer at the prevailing rate. In this case, the tank will be pumped dry ASAP so that no more oil can leak out of the tank so transfer will probably not be an issue.
A lot has been going on in the background for our project home purchase. I’m going to hold off on providing the address until after the inspection period is over. If you happen to figure it out or wish to hazard a guess, please have the courtesy not to post. At this point, the house could be in Medford and it would not change the content of these posts.
We did the sewer scope on Tuesday. Typically the camera goes down the 4″ clean out (usually a threaded cap in the main sewer line inside the house) which we couldn’t find. The camera wouldn’t fit in the 2″ line that did have a clean-out. The next best answer is removing a toilet (which either the homeowner of a plumber can reinstall). This is what we did. The camera is snaked down the line and you watch for cracks, clogs and other issues all the way out to the curb. Once you cross the curb into the street, the City takes over responsibility.
In this case, the camera jammed at 33″ from the cleanout, just outside the house in the front yard. The spot was located and marked. We’d figured we’d be replacing the line, the scope was a confirmation for us and to provide some budgeting information.
Then a funny (for lack of a better word) thing happened. Somone knocked over the orange safety cone in the middle of the room. Right there in the middle of the floor was the cleanout with a straight shot down the line! Without the cone we would have tripped over it. With the cone, we all avoided it and never looked under it as it is an unusual place for the cleanout.
With a straight shot, the camera was able to break through the 33″ clog and make it out to the street trees in the public right-of-way (planting strip between curb and sidewalk). The old tree has destroyed the line.
For us and this project: no biggie (though it isn’t money I want to spend). I expeceted it as part of the purchase. We will not ask the seller to repair. But for a potential buyer who otherwise would have no reason to accept or want a failed sewer line, this is a big deal. Our sewer system is getting to be 100 years old. Age and environmental conditions (growing trees) have impacted the integrety of the system.
Would I become a Realtor in today’s market? Hmmm? Not without a long look at how I was going to make a living at it. Business plan and all. Maybe there is a niche that isn’t being served and I am confident I can crack it. I think the biggest mistake Realtors make is getting licensed and then figuring out the plan while they bleed cash in search of that first client. What is your entry strategy? If you can’t put that together in this market it is gonna be tough for you. I started when it was “easy” but we didn’t get to be where we are now by luck. I think joining a team would be good if you can find one that is hiring (we’re not).
Most Realtors don’t have an exit strategy either. I am working on mine though it is a long way off. The simple answer is turning everything off and sitting on the beach. The smart answer is building tools of value that can generate future income or be sold when no longer working. What is this blog worth? The URL? Our other websites? You could argue worthless without me typing but is that really the case?
Blogging about the process to your first paycheck? I can’t see that working out. You couldn’t say enough about the transaction if it involved a true client and I doubt I would want to be that first client with my story spread across the Internet. I’m having a hard time writing about it where I am the client. Having been there, the process of real estate school wasn’t exactly scintillating material either.
Just my two cents. Don’t let me dissuade you if you think you can succeed.
Fujimo was a beautiful red sailboat that raced on San Francisco Bay in the 80s. Rumor has it that Fujomo was the owner’s acronym for !@# You Jane I’m Moving Out. Urban legend or not, you don’t want your home to become the real estate equivalent of Fujimo. The decision of when and how a property involved in a divorce is sold has many ramifications that are beyond the scope of a Realtor to advise on.
Dan Margolin is our former neighbor and current friend. He is also a family law attorney with a blog that he and his partner write. Their most current post, “I’m going to get divorced, should I sell my home first?” offer a good primer on the considerations that should guide the decision making process when a property is involved in divorce proceeding.
The Sunday Oregonian was at the front door this morning. Included is Outlook 2008, 68 pages on the O’s outlook of everything Portland; including eight pages of real estate. I haven’t read it yet. It is interesting to note though it does contain a lot of ads, it does not have the header that is on the weekly home section: “A publication of the Oregonian Advertizing Department.”
Feel free to read and discuss here. It is not online. The only reference I find online concludes, “Outlook 2008: Inside today’s paper.”
I’m researching property taxes for Multnomah County as I will probably appeal the values on our new project house. This is what I have found. The Exception below answers what sort of remodeling triggers a new assessment.
Each individual property is taxed on its assessed value. A property’s assessed value is the lower of its real market value or its maximum assessed value. Each year, the county assessor determines the property’s real market value and calculates its maximum assessed value. You are taxed on the lesser of the two, which is called the assessed value. Real market value and maximum assessed value are defined below
Real Market Value (RMV) is the value the assessor has estimated your property would sell for on the open market as of the assessment date. The assessment date for most property for the 2007–2008 tax year is
January 1, 2007.Maximum Assessed Value (MAV) is the greater of 103 percent of the prior year’s assessed value or 100 percent of the prior year’s MAV. MAV may be increased above3 percent of the prior year’s assessed value if certain changes, defined as exceptions, are made to your property. MAV does not appear on most tax statements.
Exception means a change to property, not including general ongoing maintenance and repair or minor construction. Changes that could affect maximum assessed value include new construction or additions, major remodeling or reconstruction, rezoning with use consistent with the change in zoning, a partition or subdivision, or a disqualification from special assessment or exemption. Minor construction is defined as additions of real property improvements with a real market value that does not exceed $10,000 in one assessment year or $25,000 over a period of five assessment years. Exception value does not appear on your tax statement.
With our accepted offer yesterday, I have 10 business days for the inspection period. I have to decide what inspections to do. The Oregon Property Buyer Advisory
should be my guide. It begins:
A real estate licensee is vital to the home buying process and can provide a variety of services in locating property, negotiating the sale and advising the buyer. A real estate agent is generally not qualified to discover defects or evaluate the physical condition of property; however, a real estate agent can assist a buyer in finding qualified inspectors and provide the buyer with documents and other resources containing vital information about a prospective new home.
This Advisory is designed to assist home buyers in meeting their obligation to satisfy themselves as to the condition and desirability of property they are interested in purchasing. Common issues in real property transactions that home buyers often decide to investigate or verify are summarized in this Advisory. In addition to investigating or verifying these common issues, the buyer should tell the licensee with whom they are working about any special concerns or issues the buyer may have regarding the condition of the property or surrounding area. Such special concerns are not addressed in this Advisory.
I know that we will strip the interior to the studs and replace all the major systems. I know I am going to have the roof evaluated, scope the sewer and sample soil and locate the (in use) oil tank.
The cat seems to have my tongue. I’m having a hard time deciding if I am nuts, brilliant, a glutton for punishment, lucky or stupid. The truth probably lies somewhere in between and honestly I don’t need help figuring this part out even though I’m sure you’d like to comment.
We bought a house today (an accepted offer with a May 30 closing date). It is a 1906 contributing property to the Alphabet District. It needs work. Lots of work. I’m planning on writing more about it as the process goes on but I am going to stop if the comments get snide, sarcastic or mean. I don’t need it. We’ll all probably learn something (I’m the one that gets to pay for the mistakes) so with that: expect more to follow.
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