Oakland Ca Real Estate Blog

Oakland Real Estate | The City Walk Condos

Thursday, April 19th, 2007 at 1:28pm. 3008 Views, 6 Comments.

Oakland's City Walk is a community of 252 homes, consisting of flats, lofts and live-work city residences. It will feature 6 levels of metal stud construction, with below-ground parking and 2500 sq feet of retail space at the ground level.

These condos are centrally located, and according to City Walk they feature the following:

• Gated Community
• 24 hr concierge and fitness center
• covered garage with motorcycle and bike spaces
• high quality steel and concrete construction
• floor to ceiling windows
• spacious, well designed floorplans
• Urban retreat with Zen-like sensibilities
• First class design and finishes in the homes and common areas
• Structured Cat5 wiring

The units range from…

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Oakland Real Estate-Sub-Prime Market Update

Monday, April 9th, 2007 at 1:24pm. 633 Views, 0 Comments.

The collapse of the Sub-Prime mortgage industry means that it will be much harder to obtain 100% financing for those who have low credit. In recent years, lenders offered 100% financing to anyone who met the basic qualifications, and the minimum credit score necessary to obtain these loans was pretty low. 

Both lenders and borrowers relied on ever-appreciating home values to offset the risk involved with such loans. The problem is, many of these loans were interest-only type loans which allowed the monthly payment to be significantly less than they would be with a fixed payment. Many borrowers didn't understand how much the payment could increase once the interest rate reset after the two or three year period of interest only payments. In many cases,…

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Mortgage Fraud In the Bay Area

Monday, April 2nd, 2007 at 1:49pm. 691 Views, 0 Comments.

The FBI recently opened a new office in Contra Costa County to deal with the mortgage fraud caseload in the Bay Area. Unfortunately, mortgage fraud is most prevalent in markets with the highest activity, such as ours. There are many variations of loan fraud, but one of the most common scenarios is when a buyer submits an offer on a home and requests credits back at the close of escrow. Typically, credits to the buyer (for repairs or closing costs) are limited to 6% of the purchase price of the real estate. However in recent years, buyers have been requesting credits of 50-100k at the close of escrow. Techinically it was mortgage fruad then, but these credits were approved with most lenders when the market was hot. In reality this type of credit inflates…

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Broadway Grand Condo Development Looks Interesting

Thursday, March 29th, 2007 at 2:41pm. 3957 Views, 0 Comments.

Signature Properties is touting it's Broadway Grand development as Oakland's new premier condo community. Located at the corner of Broadway and Grand ave, this seven story art deco-inspired building is centrally located to Lake Merritt, Old Oakland's Farmers Market, the Paramount Theatre, Bart and Jack London Square.

Signature states, "Every inch of this new sleek and stylish condominium neighborhood has been designed for comfort and style." The eight floorplans range from one bed/one bath condos at 722 square feet that start at $419,900 to four bed/three bath townhomes at 2108 square feet that start at $899,900. The price of the units also varies depending on where they are located in the building.

One interesting aspect of this project is that…

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Guest Article "When sellers won't budge"

Friday, March 23rd, 2007 at 5:09pm. 980 Views, 0 Comments.

WHEN SELLERS WON'T BUDGE

Ask any real estate agent worth her lockbox key to identify the No. 1 reason houses sit on the market. Her likely answer: The sellers want too much for them.

Almost any house will sell if it's priced right, agents routinely preach. But in today's market overpriced houses are increasingly common as supply continues to outweigh demand and would-be sellers balk when told that their house may not be worth as much as it was six months ago.

These anchors on the market ultimately hurt the seller's bottom line, agents say. "When you come on too high, and your property sits on the market with no activity, it gets stigmatized," said Aldo Congi, vice president and managing broker at McGuire Real Estate in San Francisco. "The first…

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Oakland Real Estate-Mortgage Fraud

Friday, March 23rd, 2007 at 5:00pm. 556 Views, 0 Comments.

There's been a lot of talk in the Oakland real estate community about mortage fraud recently. When purchasing properties, many investors and others like to add money to the purchase price, then get the money back as a credit to the buyer at the close of escrow. Sometimes these credits can be in the neighborhood of 50-80k, and according to the California Association of Realtors this constitues mortage fraud and could possibly lead to civil and criminal penalties for the seller and listng agent.

Typically, credits to the buyer are limited to 3-6% of the purchase price of the home, and this is usually for closing costs and maybe repairs. Even in these cases, the credit must be reviewed and approved by the lender. There have been many deals done in this…

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Oakland Real Estate-Prices Down But No Bubble Burst

Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 10:03pm. 446 Views, 0 Comments.

Oakland real estate shot through the roof during the period from 2001 to 2005, with appreciation reaching 120% in some areas. Homes were routinely selling for 60-100k over asking price and more! It was not uncommon for a desirable property to fetch 30-40 offers. I remember one home in the Oakland Hills went for over 300k over asking price!

However that type of market by nature is not sustainable, and the current market is proof of that. Starting in early 05', us Realtors started seeing a noticeable slowdown in activity, which has continued to this day. The ironic thing is, prices are still high. They have taken a slight dip(approximately six percent) in the last year, but our median price is still around 500k. There is much more opportunity for buyers…

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Selling Oakland Real Estate?

Thursday, March 22nd, 2007 at 9:50pm. 510 Views, 0 Comments.

Over the past six months, sellers of real estate in Oakland and surrounding areas have begun to realize that the market is definitely not what it was a couple of years ago. In all reality, the power now lies with serious buyers who know they have more room to negotiate when making offers. Sellers who are not willing to look at hard numbers of recent sales, or who are not realistic about the condition their home is in will end up having their home stay on the market for months at a time and eventually expiring. By the time they realize they should reduce the price, it's could be too late as the listing may have "gone stale".

The two most important factors that sellers need to be thinking about is presentation and price. The best strategy for sellers is…

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