In this period of very low inventory, we are seeing the properties that do come on the market get LOADS of attention from buyers….making this a great time to sell, since competing buyers is what drives prices upward.

Here is a re-post from SF Gate’s “On the Block”

Back in October, we wrote about the lack of homes for sale. Despite what one would think about a still very weak housing market where prices continue to trend down, the supply of available homes for sale is following suit.  In December, the number of homes for sale in San Francisco hit a 12 month low.  Digging into the raw data, our analytical friends over at Redfin found that given the relatively sparse number of homes on the market, it’s becoming more of a – surprise! – seller’s market out there.

In a balanced market, we’d see five to six months of supply, which is the time it would take to sell all the homes on the market given the pace of sales. In San Francisco, December hit a 12-month low with 1.6 months of supply, meaning it’s even more of a seller’s market.

With less and less homes on the market, is it becoming a seller’s market?

The chart above, courtesy of Redfin, shows the continuous drop in the number of homes on the market since the summer season wound down in September.

Nationally, supply was also at its lowest at year end compared to the last 4 years.  As the Wall Street Journal writes, the lack of supply – while usually it means a good think for the market – could be a bit deceptive in today’s real estate environment.

But appearances can be deceiving, and it remains to be seen whether the drop is the beginning of a real recovery or if inventory is being held down by sellers waiting for prices to pick up and banks moving slowly on foreclosures.

The 1.89 million homes on the market at the end of December represented a 6% decline from November and a 22.3% decline from one year ago, according to data compiled by Realtor.com.

One thing is for certain – if you are thinking of selling, winter has typically seen better results , thanks in part to lower number of homes meaning less competition.  And this is even more true this winter.

 This foreclosed property (right) in the Mission had 15 offers and sold way over the (artificially) low asking price.

The property below was a ‘regular’ sale (not a short sale or foreclosure) in Noe Valley also had multiple offers…. Call us for details!

Google drops real estate listings

Search giant cites low use, proliferation of search sites

BY INMAN NEWS™

Search giant Google will no longer support real estate listings uploaded to its classified listings site on Google Maps, the company announced today.

Consumers will no longer be able to find for-sale, foreclosure, or rental properties through the search function on Google Maps, and real estate professionals will no longer be able to upload their listings to Google Base, the company’s classifieds site, which is being replaced by Google Shopping APIs and will not support real estate listings.

“In part due to low usage, the proliferation of excellent property-search tools on real estate websites, and the infrastructure challenge posed by the impending retirement of the Google Base API, we’ve decided to discontinue the real estate feature within Google Maps on February 10, 2011,” the company said in a blog post.

Home seekers can still use “Google search results to find helpful real estate information and websites” as well as view local businesses, directions and transit times through Google Maps and explore neighborhoods through Google Street View, the company added.

“This does not come as a surprise to me. Even with Google’s huge audience, it shows having listing data is clearly not enough to deliver a good real estate search experience and build audience,” said Pete Flint, CEO and co-founder of property search site Trulia.

The company added that Google’s removal of listings data will not affect its mobile application, which uses the Google Maps API.

Though Google has touted the ability to upload and search for listings on its site, it has also denied that it seeks to create a “universal MLS” or take on real estate search sites.

“We are no more in the real estate business than we are in the cafe or the museum business,” said Carter Maslan, Google’s director of product management, at the July 2010 Real Estate Connect conference in San Francisco. “We view as key … to get (the information) right, but what we really want to do is show it in context.”

In a blog post about the decision, Joel Burslem of real estate marketing and communications firm 1000 Watt Consulting, commented: “Maintaining a national property database, and, perhaps more importantly, its concurrent accuracy, is a huge challenge that it looks like even Google realized is too big a pill to swallow.”

Inman News columnist Gahlord Dewald said Google’s announcement opens up more questions than it answers.

“For real estate, I don’t have data that supports the idea of humans clicking on maps as a search interface ever was real — the technology vendors of map-based search still don’t have adequate analytics baked in to give us that data. Google, I’m sure, has that data,” Dewald said.

“That they couldn’t sustain an interest in the project could mean a lot of things: Maybe Google lacks the imagination to develop a business around the service, maybe people don’t want to use a map as a search interface for real estate, maybe there’s no business there at all.”

Google launched Google Base in November 2005. The Houston Association of Realtors was one of the first industry associations to push members’ listings to the service, in December 2006.

In November 2009, Google added “place pages” to the service, making available on a single page all the information Google has about a property listing — including property details, photos, inspection times, videos, a street-view preview and nearby public transit information.

“This is an interesting move by Google. We saw big changes in leadership last week with Eric (Schmidt), Larry (Page) and Sergey (Brin) shifting their focuses and positions,” said Inman News columnist Tom Flanagan.

“I suspect more changes are coming. I’d really be surprised if Google completely retired real estate — it’s just too big for them to ignore!”

Article reprinted with the permission of Inman News.  The views, beliefs and opinions expressed within the article are those of the author(s) and/or Inman News and not that of American Home Shield.

American Home Shield is providing the information for general guidance only. Due to the general nature of the property maintenance and improvement advice in this material, neither American Home Shield Corporation, nor its licensed subsidiaries assumes any responsibility for any loss or damage which may be suffered by the use of this information.

©2011 American Home Shield Corporation and its licensed subsidiaries. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy

Most buyers make the logical decision to go to their current bank and start the process of getting pre-approved for a mortgage. And why not?  You may have a long -standing relationship with that bank, a proven history of financial responsibility, and you may be offered an attractive rate based on your business with that institution.  But we are seeing more and more instances where the bank finds some reason that they just can’t make it happen in the end.  Remember, the borrower is only part of the equation.

The property you may want to purchase might have something about it that compromises you bank’s ability to make the loan.  Each lender has their own criteria that must be met to complete the process.  A few years ago, many peculiarities that we find in our unique SF market didn’t seem to matter so much, but with stringent guidelines now in place, lenders are putting the property (as well as the buyer) under the microscope.

These days it makes more sense than ever to have a mortgage broker working for you.  They have the ability to match the buyer and the property to a suitable lender, and with competitive rates.  You can tell a broker everything, and he can present your info to a lender in the most favorable light; once you reveal info the a bank, it’s too late to take it back.  Brokers are paid by the lender, not the borrower, and they are not paid until the deal closes, which is a great motivation to get the job done!  They can be flexible and switch lenders quickly if a problem comes up during the course of escrow, and they are usually available nights and weekends, like us agents!

Give us a ring for more information or recommendations!