We’re all aware that the housing market is very segmented. Over the last couple of years I’ve been looking at Oakland/Piedmont single-family home sales and to demonstrate that point I decided to divide those sales into just two segments; under $500k and $500k and up. Let’s look at these two cases separately. First, the under [...]

Yesterday I wrote about (The Home Buying “Feeding Frenzy”) how home sales in an Oakland neighborhood have picked up a great deal in the last couple of months. I just came across a newsletter published by Sharon and Stan Hammond, Wells and Bennett agents who live and work in that area, and who have been tracking [...]

I’ve been rather cynical about the possibility of a healthy recovery in home prices, especially in the upper tier where, at least percentage-wise, they haven’t dropped all that much. But facts is facts, and right now, at least in one neighborhood, there’s a virtual feeding frenzy going on. One neighborhood I follow rather closely is [...]

I’ve heard from several sources that there are plenty of hungry home buyers waiting for homes to hit the market. Of course, I’ve heard this mostly from real estate agents, who wouldn’t be in the business if they didn’t let their enthusiasm get in the way of reality on occasion. So I decided to see [...]

A question for you Real Estate Agents out there. How would you compare the cost to the homeowner to prepare a home for sale today to what it cost six years ago?