Showing posts with label neighborhood. Show all posts
Showing posts with label neighborhood. Show all posts
Friday, December 9, 2016
Newcomers rough synopsys of Sunnyvale, CA
Sunnyvale is a very modern, organized, suburban, residential city well-situated in the center of Silicon Valley. Sunnyvale is bordered by portions of San Jose to the north, Moffett Federal Airfield to the northwest, Mountain View to the west, Los Altos to the southwest, Cupertino to the south, and Santa Clara to the east. Sunnyvale boasts one of the most organized road systems - Commuters have multiple East-West road options (El Camino Real, Central Expressway, Highway 101, Homestead Rd, Fremont Ave, etc) and multiple North-South road options (Sunnyvale-Saratoga, Wolfe Rd, Fair Oaks, Mathilda Ave, Mary Ave, Lawrence Expressway, etc.) As part of the Silicon Valley, several high-tech companies such as Maxim Integrated Products, Juniper Networks, Palm, Inc., AMD, NetApp, Spansion, Yahoo!, Simco Electronics, Mirapoint, AppliedMicro and Ariba are headquartered in Sunnyvale. Sunnyvale encompasses the 94085, 94086, 94087, and 94089 zip codes.
Wednesday, May 16, 2012
Santa Clara Neighborhood: SE of Lawrence & Benton - Who's walking around the block at dusk?
Homebuyers often ask REALTORs, "What do you think of the neighborhood?" I often tell them, "I think it's a neighborhood, but it matter more how YOU feel." As an agent, I'm not supposed to give any opinion regarding the demographics, so the best I can do is state FACTS.
At dusk on a Monday night, I walked around the Santa Clara neighborhood that is South East of Lawrence & Benton, South of Earl Carmichael Park, North of Stratford.School, Monticello Academy, and Curtis Practice Field. Who are the people walking around the block at dusk?
7:25pm An older couple taking a brisk evening stroll
7:30pm A mom pushing her new baby in a stroller as her older toddler followed close behind.
7:35pm An engineer from Apple
What kind of neighborhood you like is a personal decision. Your best bet is to do as I do ... walk around the neighborhood and see for yourself what type of people are walking around at that time of day.
At dusk on a Monday night, I walked around the Santa Clara neighborhood that is South East of Lawrence & Benton, South of Earl Carmichael Park, North of Stratford.School, Monticello Academy, and Curtis Practice Field. Who are the people walking around the block at dusk?
7:25pm An older couple taking a brisk evening stroll
7:30pm A mom pushing her new baby in a stroller as her older toddler followed close behind.
7:35pm An engineer from Apple
What kind of neighborhood you like is a personal decision. Your best bet is to do as I do ... walk around the neighborhood and see for yourself what type of people are walking around at that time of day.
Friday, May 11, 2012
Case Study Cupertino Castlewood Neighborhood up 20% over mid 2005 prices
Many people say that during a real estate downturn, houses in good school districts keep their values better. Rather than simply trust this logic, I performed a Case Study.
People say that sometimes statistics are manipulated by cherry-picking statistics that show their intended viewpoint. For instance, data might show housing prices in Sunnyvale increasing by 35%, but maybe that upward shift in prices is simply because more homes are being sold in the more expensive southern part of Sunnyvale rather than the less expensive northern part of Sunnyvale.
To avoid the scenario above, I had to concentrate on one specific neighborhood. I chose the Cupertino Castlewood Neighborhood. This is the quiet neighborhood northwest of the intersection of Miller and Bollinger. The schools in this neighborhood are Eaton Elementary, Lawson Middle, and Cupertino High.
However, even if I restrict to the same neighborhood, the increase in prices might still be due to the change in mix of which particular houses sold. To eliminate even this argument, I looked at two specific houses in the Castlewood neighborhood -- 10791 Brookwell Drive and 6397 Myrtlewood Drive.
Looking at their historical sales price trend, I extracted the data and entered them into an Excel spreadsheet. You can see that 10791 Brookwell Drive sold for $806,000 on 12/1/2005 and actually rose 16% during this downturn to actually RISE in price to $938,000 on 4/12/2012. These are not Zillow predictive prices. These are ACTUAL sales prices. A buyer was actually able and willing to pay $938,000 last month for a house that they knew sold for just $806,000 on 12/1/2005, back in one of the peak years. Based on 10791 Brookwell Drives prices, the asking price of 6397 Myrtlewood Drive of $970,000 is a very close estimate of what 6397 Myrtlewood Drive SHOULD sell for. The $970,000 asking price is a reasonable 21% over the same property's late 2005 price.
To show this continued rise in home values in Cupertino, I plotted the actual sales data in a 10791 Brookwell Drive Chart and a 6397 Myrtlewood Drive Chart. Even during this downturn in real estate, Cupertino Castlewood Neighborhood values are up 20% over mid 2005 prices.
People say that sometimes statistics are manipulated by cherry-picking statistics that show their intended viewpoint. For instance, data might show housing prices in Sunnyvale increasing by 35%, but maybe that upward shift in prices is simply because more homes are being sold in the more expensive southern part of Sunnyvale rather than the less expensive northern part of Sunnyvale.
To avoid the scenario above, I had to concentrate on one specific neighborhood. I chose the Cupertino Castlewood Neighborhood. This is the quiet neighborhood northwest of the intersection of Miller and Bollinger. The schools in this neighborhood are Eaton Elementary, Lawson Middle, and Cupertino High.
However, even if I restrict to the same neighborhood, the increase in prices might still be due to the change in mix of which particular houses sold. To eliminate even this argument, I looked at two specific houses in the Castlewood neighborhood -- 10791 Brookwell Drive and 6397 Myrtlewood Drive.
Looking at their historical sales price trend, I extracted the data and entered them into an Excel spreadsheet. You can see that 10791 Brookwell Drive sold for $806,000 on 12/1/2005 and actually rose 16% during this downturn to actually RISE in price to $938,000 on 4/12/2012. These are not Zillow predictive prices. These are ACTUAL sales prices. A buyer was actually able and willing to pay $938,000 last month for a house that they knew sold for just $806,000 on 12/1/2005, back in one of the peak years. Based on 10791 Brookwell Drives prices, the asking price of 6397 Myrtlewood Drive of $970,000 is a very close estimate of what 6397 Myrtlewood Drive SHOULD sell for. The $970,000 asking price is a reasonable 21% over the same property's late 2005 price.
To show this continued rise in home values in Cupertino, I plotted the actual sales data in a 10791 Brookwell Drive Chart and a 6397 Myrtlewood Drive Chart. Even during this downturn in real estate, Cupertino Castlewood Neighborhood values are up 20% over mid 2005 prices.
Saturday, December 10, 2011
City of Santa Clara "Road Diets" on Pruneridge westward toward the New Proposed Apple Campus
City of Santa Clara "Road Diets" on Pruneridge westward toward the New Proposed Apple Campus
Posted under: General Area in Santa Clara, Traffic & Public Transportation in Santa Clara, In My Neighborhood in Santa Clara | December 10, 2011 12:00 AM
The City of Santa Clara has completed implementationi of its "Road Diets" on Pruneridge and Monroe. These so-called "Road Diets" are the cities roadway lane reductions from 4 through lanes down to 2 through lanes with a two-way center left turn lane on Pruneridge Avenue from Pomeroy Ave to Lawrence Expressway and westbound Monroe from Scott Blvd to Los Padres Blvd. The City of Santa Clara has also "road dieted" Pruneridge Ave from Lawrence Expressway westward to Tantau Ave to connect new bicycle lanes to existing bicycle lanes in the City of Cupertino.
Road diets become feasible when streets operate at less than 50% of the capacity they were originally designed to carry. For instance, Pruneridge Ave was two lanes in both directions but the traffic was fairly quiet west of Pomeroy and west of Lawrence, so the city decided to reduce those sections of Pruneridge to just one lane in each direction.
West of Pomeroy, motorists can pull into the new center two-way left turn lane and wait for a gap in the traffic before completing their maneuver. Unfortunately, no such center lane exists east of Pomeroy. Therefore, parents who drop off their Eisenhower Elementary kids at the tennis court have a harder time now to turn left out of the tennis court parking lot. With the old arrangement of two lanes in each direction, parents only needed to wait for a red light at Pomeroy to turn left onto Pruneridge Ave. Now that the city has reduced the westbound lane to a single lane, the line of cars at a red light at Pomeroy now often stretches far past the tennis court exit. Parents now have no choice but to wait until they finally have a courteous drivers heading west on Pruneridge who is courteous enough to let them onto Pruneridge.
The city trumpets these changes as positive, stating that having only one lane of conflicting traffic as opposed to the original two lanes, makes it easier to see whether backing out of a driveway is safe.
In conclusion, we'll have to wait until the new Apple campus takes shape and is functional before judging whether these recent changes to Pruneridge Ave were good or bad.
Posted under: General Area in Santa Clara, Traffic & Public Transportation in Santa Clara, In My Neighborhood in Santa Clara | December 10, 2011 12:00 AM
The City of Santa Clara has completed implementationi of its "Road Diets" on Pruneridge and Monroe. These so-called "Road Diets" are the cities roadway lane reductions from 4 through lanes down to 2 through lanes with a two-way center left turn lane on Pruneridge Avenue from Pomeroy Ave to Lawrence Expressway and westbound Monroe from Scott Blvd to Los Padres Blvd. The City of Santa Clara has also "road dieted" Pruneridge Ave from Lawrence Expressway westward to Tantau Ave to connect new bicycle lanes to existing bicycle lanes in the City of Cupertino.
Road diets become feasible when streets operate at less than 50% of the capacity they were originally designed to carry. For instance, Pruneridge Ave was two lanes in both directions but the traffic was fairly quiet west of Pomeroy and west of Lawrence, so the city decided to reduce those sections of Pruneridge to just one lane in each direction.
West of Pomeroy, motorists can pull into the new center two-way left turn lane and wait for a gap in the traffic before completing their maneuver. Unfortunately, no such center lane exists east of Pomeroy. Therefore, parents who drop off their Eisenhower Elementary kids at the tennis court have a harder time now to turn left out of the tennis court parking lot. With the old arrangement of two lanes in each direction, parents only needed to wait for a red light at Pomeroy to turn left onto Pruneridge Ave. Now that the city has reduced the westbound lane to a single lane, the line of cars at a red light at Pomeroy now often stretches far past the tennis court exit. Parents now have no choice but to wait until they finally have a courteous drivers heading west on Pruneridge who is courteous enough to let them onto Pruneridge.
The city trumpets these changes as positive, stating that having only one lane of conflicting traffic as opposed to the original two lanes, makes it easier to see whether backing out of a driveway is safe.
In conclusion, we'll have to wait until the new Apple campus takes shape and is functional before judging whether these recent changes to Pruneridge Ave were good or bad.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Selling or Buying a Short Sale Rental Property in a Rent Control Neighborhood
Be careful when you are selling or buying a short sale rental property in a rent control neighborhood.
Below is a list of California Bay Area Localities With Rent Control Ordinances:
City of Campbell
City of East Palo Alto
City of Berkeley
City of Fremont
City of Hayward
City of Oakland
City of San Leandro
City of San Jose
City of San Francisco
Before buying or selling a rental property in a city with rent control, you should consult a real estate attorney familiar with the Rent Control Board of the particular city in which the rental property is located.
For example, what happens if in the months leading up to the short sale, the tenants threaten to move out and in response the landlord drastically reduces the tenants' rent? Will this set a new monthly rental base with which the new owner must use in calculation of his future potential monthly rental rate? Or does a long history of higher market rental rates take precedence over a few short months at the drastically reduced rental rate? One real estate attorney associated with the Oakland Rent Control Board stated that as soon as the owner dropped the rent, he created a new rental rate that was subject to rent control.
The new owner would inherit the drastically lowered rent as his base and could not raise the rent for the existing tenants back to market rate. This killed off any interest from real estate investors.
In one case study, the seller did drastically lower the rent to his tenants soon after putting his investment property on the market. Did the seller unwittingly hurt his own chances of selling? Maybe that was exactly what the seller wanted. It was a short sale, and the seller might have simply been trying to collect as much rent as possible before losing his property to the bank.
To the seller faced with renters who are threatening to leave, then it might be in the seller's best self interest to lower the rent. This has two advantages in the mind of the short sale seller. #1) Better to collect some rent rather than no rent, and #2) The owner collects free rent for longer before losing his home. Making the property less attractive to buyers effectively delays the sale of the property. Since the deal no longer appeals to real estate investors, it will take longer to find a buyer. Only buyers willing to buy and live in Oakland as their primary residence will still be interested.
Every extra month of delay is extra rental income for the seller. However, when faced by an owner attempting such tactics, the banks would probably save a lot of money by simply foreclosing, booting out the tenants, and selling the property as a vacant unit. That seller is counting on his hope that a bank will not respond in this manner.
Disclaimer: I am not a real estate attorney. This discussion is just so you know what issues to think about and what questions you should ask. The bottom line is whether you are selling or buying a short sale property in a rent control neighborhood, you should consult a real estate attorney familiar with the Rent Control Board of the particular city in which the rental property is located.
Below is a list of California Bay Area Localities With Rent Control Ordinances:
City of Campbell
City of East Palo Alto
City of Berkeley
City of Fremont
City of Hayward
City of Oakland
City of San Leandro
City of San Jose
City of San Francisco
Before buying or selling a rental property in a city with rent control, you should consult a real estate attorney familiar with the Rent Control Board of the particular city in which the rental property is located.
For example, what happens if in the months leading up to the short sale, the tenants threaten to move out and in response the landlord drastically reduces the tenants' rent? Will this set a new monthly rental base with which the new owner must use in calculation of his future potential monthly rental rate? Or does a long history of higher market rental rates take precedence over a few short months at the drastically reduced rental rate? One real estate attorney associated with the Oakland Rent Control Board stated that as soon as the owner dropped the rent, he created a new rental rate that was subject to rent control.
The new owner would inherit the drastically lowered rent as his base and could not raise the rent for the existing tenants back to market rate. This killed off any interest from real estate investors.
In one case study, the seller did drastically lower the rent to his tenants soon after putting his investment property on the market. Did the seller unwittingly hurt his own chances of selling? Maybe that was exactly what the seller wanted. It was a short sale, and the seller might have simply been trying to collect as much rent as possible before losing his property to the bank.
To the seller faced with renters who are threatening to leave, then it might be in the seller's best self interest to lower the rent. This has two advantages in the mind of the short sale seller. #1) Better to collect some rent rather than no rent, and #2) The owner collects free rent for longer before losing his home. Making the property less attractive to buyers effectively delays the sale of the property. Since the deal no longer appeals to real estate investors, it will take longer to find a buyer. Only buyers willing to buy and live in Oakland as their primary residence will still be interested.
Every extra month of delay is extra rental income for the seller. However, when faced by an owner attempting such tactics, the banks would probably save a lot of money by simply foreclosing, booting out the tenants, and selling the property as a vacant unit. That seller is counting on his hope that a bank will not respond in this manner.
Disclaimer: I am not a real estate attorney. This discussion is just so you know what issues to think about and what questions you should ask. The bottom line is whether you are selling or buying a short sale property in a rent control neighborhood, you should consult a real estate attorney familiar with the Rent Control Board of the particular city in which the rental property is located.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Near Proposed New Apple Spaceship Campus De Soto Ave at Lawrence Expressway Potential Closure
Near the Proposed New Apple Computer "Spaceship" Campus, the neighborhood residents requested a study of a potential closure of De Soto Ave at Lawrence Expressway and its effects on the surrounding neighborhood. A Notice of Public Meeting was mailed out to residents who live on De Soto Avenue and/or live in the surrounding neighborhood. The postcard calls it a "De Soto Avenue Traffic Calming Study" and the Public Meeting to discuss it is scheduled for Wednesday, October 12, 2011 from 6pm-7pm at the Santa Clara City Council Chambers at 1500 Warburton Ave, Santa Clara, CA 95050.
Friday, May 27, 2011
Fremont condo complex has issue of low water pressure. Very little money to fix it.
Fremont condo complex has issue of low water pressure. Very little money to fix it.
Posted Under: Home Buying in Fremont, Remodel & Renovate in Fremont, In My Neighborhood in Fremont | May 3, 2011 4:07 PM | 71 views | No comments
Fremont condo complex has issue of low water pressure. Very little money to fix it.
Fixing all the units will take more than a year. The complex has only enough money budgeted to fix approximately 10 units at a time. Which units they do next depends on how bad they leak and how bad the water pressure is. You can say "Come look at my unit. My water pressure is the worst in this complex." However, you still aren't guaranteed to get your unit fixed next. The property manager does not have a set schedule to fix all the units. As they have enough funds, they are going throughout the complex and repiping batches of 10 or so units. Without the budget to correct the galvanized steel piping, repiping all the units could take years. The low water pressure will be an ongoing problem. To come up with the funds in one shot, the HOA could charge each unit a special assessment. However, they do not want to charge a SPECIAL assessment because many owners already have enough trouble paying the REGULAR assessment as it is.
Posted Under: Home Buying in Fremont, Remodel & Renovate in Fremont, In My Neighborhood in Fremont | May 3, 2011 4:07 PM | 71 views | No comments
Fremont condo complex has issue of low water pressure. Very little money to fix it.
Fixing all the units will take more than a year. The complex has only enough money budgeted to fix approximately 10 units at a time. Which units they do next depends on how bad they leak and how bad the water pressure is. You can say "Come look at my unit. My water pressure is the worst in this complex." However, you still aren't guaranteed to get your unit fixed next. The property manager does not have a set schedule to fix all the units. As they have enough funds, they are going throughout the complex and repiping batches of 10 or so units. Without the budget to correct the galvanized steel piping, repiping all the units could take years. The low water pressure will be an ongoing problem. To come up with the funds in one shot, the HOA could charge each unit a special assessment. However, they do not want to charge a SPECIAL assessment because many owners already have enough trouble paying the REGULAR assessment as it is.
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