I have a thing for Streng homes. I like their modern lines, their open floorplans, the way the front of the home is usually windowless and the back of the home is usually wall to ceiling windows. I like the atrium models. Having a little garden as the centerpiece of a home is charming.
Streng homes were built roughly between 1960 and 1980 in Sacramento. They are reminiscent of Eichler homes from the Bay Area. There's something very holistic about them, when they're properly maintained or renovated. What appeals to me about modern design in all things is the simplicity and cleanliness of it, the way it treats space as being integral to the overall effect, vs. something to fill up with all kinds of frou-frou and junk. It's very invigorating to choose a design style that encourages one to have few pieces of furniture, and emphasize space and geometric form . What is great about Streng homes is that they also encourage the homeowner to interact with the natural environment with use of the atriums and the expansive windows out onto the private areas of the yard.
So, I track Streng homes like a woman obsessed. I rejoice when they appear on the MLS. I grieve when they go inactive. Someday, I will buy one -- but not this day, not this year. Not until prices go back down. (And I believe that prices will go down, but it will take another year for it to really start and it will be another 4 or 5 years until they bottom out.) And since I track all Streng homes that land on MLS via the magic of The Internets, it is pretty hard to pull one over on me and beyond that -- why would anyone want to?
What I'm talking about here is sellers who list their home for a period of time, then pull it off the market, then re-list it. Two of the homes I track have done that. Both had been on the market for over six months. One had dropped their asking price several times, and then came back on the market at the last price it had been. As if somehow, magically, it would be more alluring if we didn't realize how long it had really been for sale. As if qualified buyers would drop from the heavens if only they didn't know that the sellers were having trouble selling the place. The other is even worse -- they kept it on the market for months and didn't drop the price a dime. Then they pull it off, and relist it for about $30,000 less than it had been about a month later. Within days, they had dropped it an additional $10, 000. Why not just leave it on the market, and lower the price? That way, at least we know you're trying. And this re-listing thing isn't really fooling anyone who has the sense to use all the free information that is available to them online --- which is an awful lot of people. I'll tell you the statistic that I find most helpful, and the one that I look up first: the last sale of the house, and the sale price. Here is why:
The "bubble" began forming in the late 90's, but it was slow. Things didn't really take off until 2000 or 2001. (See actual graph of a very nice Streng home's "value" above) That price gives me, as a potential buyer, an idea of where that home's "value" was before the real estate market was driven up by speculators and investors. If the last sale took place anywhere in that big, bubbly curve, I know that the seller is not going to be able to lower their price without losing an awful lot of money. And sadly, most of the people who are selling are doing so because they have to sell. All the come-ons like "make offer -- motivated seller!" and "must sell!" and "owner wants it sold NOW!" don't mean squat if the seller can't lower the price to where the house will sell.
So, where does that leave all of us, no matter what side of the transaction we're on? As far as I can tell, it leaves all of us feeling bitter and resentful. As a potential buyer, I would very much like to buy one of the homes I'm tracking. I make a much better than median income, and I have a great FICO. But I don't have money to burn, and I'm not going to go deeply into debt so that you can retire debt-free. When the cost of buying a home returns to fundamentals, such as 10 x yearly comparable rents, or 3 x yearly income, then I will buy. And my own take on it is that there are very few sellers out there who are able to drop their asking price by much, or they would be doing it by now. I think most of them have no equity in their homes any longer. If they sell short, even if their lender approves, they will have to file the difference as income and pay taxes on it. (How's that "tax break" thing working out for you all now?) If they don't, they're going to be foreclosed on. It is a lose - lose situation for all of us.
And it doesn't make any sense to keep rubber-banding your home off/on to MLS to try to disguise the facts.
