In Appreciation of Flippers

One of my favorite things to do is use Google Maps to find the older image of a newly flipped home. 

Because the google photo car doesn't update but maybe once or twice a year you can often find "before" (on Google maps) and "after" (on the MLS)

Here's an recent excellent example of a San Diego county home that was renovated. This is a small 3 bedroom home that is now on the market for $569.  

Nice work flipper team!

April 2014 - courtesy Google Maps

August 2020 - MLS

References:

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/708-North-Ave-Escondido-CA-92026/16678271_zpid/?mmlb=g,20

https://www.google.com/maps/place/708+North+Ave,+Escondido,+CA+92026/@33.1743615,-117.0857622,3a,54.1y,330.97h,83.8t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1swjuGLp8rQQ1PjEYQoz5nog!2e0!7i13312!8i6656!4m5!3m4!1s0x80db8b66b73dcca5:0x185b4fee3a64a304!8m2!3d33.1745258!4d-117.0858898

Dealing with California rental vacancies during Covid

 I recently posted about the latest regulations affecting evictions and rental payments in California. But what if you are a "landlord" with a vacancy right now? What's the best way to deal with that?

We recently went through it here and I can share the experience.  

Our tenant was moving at the end of the month and understandably did not want us showing the property during the day. Without that overlapping time to show prospective tenants would we be forced to deal with a long vacancy between tenants?

We advertised in three places: Facebook, Craigslist and Zillow. (Zillow by the way is getting really good at this with their multiple websites and messaging tools).

This was around June and we were getting many prospect inquiries. Unfortunately a lot of them went away when we told them we couldn't show until the 1st of July.

We took many photos - maybe 18 were posted. Video would have been better but there was no way to get this done. (The photos were already in our files).

Bottom line is we got kind of lucky. We found a tenant willing to take the place based on seeing the outside, and the photos. Our previous tenant moved out on the 30th and we did a fast cleanup in time for the next day.

Lessons learned:

1. Take photos and videos whenever you can have for the future.

2. Advertise like crazy. Respond to every call and email.

3. Plan on a small period of vacancy between tenants. But if possible try to get move-out dates and move-in dates that minimize this.

Will California Home Prices Drop?

It's been somewhat of a surprise we haven't seen a drop in home prices but we haven't. 

In fact prices (that I've been watching) have actually gone up or remained stable.

 But what are the experts predicting for the near future? Since I'm local to San Diego I'll use that as a starting point.

Zillow, for what it's worth predicts prices will drop  only 0.8% over the next year.  The 5 year chart below shows the nice steady appreciation we've enjoyed followed by a prediction of a not terrible leveling off.

courtesy Zillow

Meanwhile this Orange County Register piece is much more pessimistic about things up there in the OC - forecasting  a 5.2% drop in the next year. That's huge in real estate terms. 

It's a sign of the times that there's no need to say this is all driven by our progress dealing with the Covid-19 virus.

My own interpretation would be we're in a time of great uncertainty. You can see this reflected in the stock market which is a little more reactive than real estate to bad news or good news.

at least CA Real Estate didn't do this!

My conclusion would be that this is at least "not a bad time to sell" if you need to. I wouldn't sell if I don't need to (I'm still pro CA real estate long term), but  if I had to sell I wouldn't feel bad about doing it today.

I note that this is just my personal opinion and not investment advice. Let me know yours in the comments below.

Evictions, Foreclosure and Forbearance Covid Relief: San Diego Update

San Diego City Council Nov 2019: Courtesy KPBS

Let's try to post a simple status update for property owners and renters in San Diego.



Evictions
The Cares ACT (passed March 27 2020) froze evictions but that protection came to an end on July 25, 2020.

But the San Diego City council extended an eviction moratorium up until Sep 30, 2020.

Foreclosure
Lenders on federally backed loans can not foreclose until Aug 31, 2020.

Forbearance
Mortgage payments on federally backed loans can be suspended for up to two 180 day periods- 360 days total.


Not included in the forbearance protections? About 30%, or roughly 14.5 million U.S. mortgages, are privately owned and not backed by any federal agency. Reference CNBC.


Obviously there is a lot more detail and nuance to review. I wanted to make a simple at a glance update. Will try to keep this updated.