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I must take a moment to run through the past week. There are 115 active listings in the Skaneateles area. There is one new waterfront listing, actually a re-list down almost 10% from the original list price. One home has sold and gone directly to pending - the list price is currently 35% off the original price. Nothing closed. Now it's time for the fun to begin! Skaneateles had 64 closed properties for 2008, as compared with 103 in 2007. The median price was a resounding $410,000 as compared to $300,000 the year before. The least expensive property closed for $68,000. The most expensive closed for $2,066,250 and was not surprisingly waterfront. In 2007 the least expensive was $43,000 but the most was 4.9M. It's the one on West Lake Street currently being remodeled. Camillus by comparison closed 267 this year as opposed to 299 properties last year. They were well ahead of their number until the fall when things seemed to slow. The median price remained virtually the s

Address: 4201 E 3rd St, 90804 Asking Price: $514,900 Year Built: 1922 Size: 2 beds, 1 bath, 1,163 sq. ft. $/Sq. Ft.: $443 Purchase price: $576,250 Purchase date: 11/6/2008 MLS#: S554980 On Redfin: 41 days Down Payment: $103,000 Monthly Payment: $2,900 Income Requirement: $147,000 Description: Wow! Must see this great piece of property located on the corner of 3rd and Roswell. Darling 2 bedroom 1 bath with great patios on the side and in back for entertaining! Great open floor plan with lots of windows, hardwood floors and indoor laundry area. Fully tiled bath and and upgraded kitchen. Oversized garage for great storage. This one will be gone before you can blink! *Blink* *Blink Blink Blink* *Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink Blink

In no particular order, I want to memorialize these thoughts so I can go back and check them next year. And I probably will. Knowing that readers are out there, too, may keep me on the straight and narrow. Whatever it takes! I resolve to sell every home I list in 2009. I know selling is a combination of sellers, buyers and agents as well as marketing and the economy, but what the heck! No goal, no drama. I resolve to establish financial goals that are not all monetary. I will run my business as my business; my personal finances will be separate. I've already gone to M&T and spent a wonderful few minutes with their manager, Mary Adsit, who got me rolling. I've done all right so far with my bookkeeping, but this is another level of expertise I want to add to my list of accomplishments. (Besides, it will be easier at tax time!) I predict that Alex and Rachel will be married under sunlit skies on the lawn of the Sherwood Inn in Skaneateles on July 18th. I resolve to fit int

Back from Vegas with a quick update on a property I featured back in April . To jog your memory, the property was facing a quarter million in equity evaporation if it sold for the then-current asking price of $375,000. Well, I'm happy to report that after a year languishing on the market...it sold! Well, sort of. The house went off the market in September, and in October a sale was posted for $340,000 . Without the actual property records, I'm guessing that's the bank taking it back. Taking it back for $163 per square foot , by the way. OUCHIES. It hasn't popped back onto the market yet, so who knows how much they'll ask. In this neighborhood, that per square foot price sounds reasonable. But then again, the bank just lost -$280,000 and I imagine they want to recoup at least some of that money. Work has been crazy--yes, even during Christmas break--so hang tight for resumption of regular updates. I hope everyone has a safe, exciting New Year's Eve. I, on the o

M E R R Y C H R I S T M A S , Y'ALL!

Count Chocula over at the Diplomat Dungeon reduced the price for the second time in five weeks. As per ususal, the price cut is a meaningless gesture considering the WTF asking price, but it at least shows the listing isn't a joke. I was seriously beginning to think the seller died and everyone just forgot about the listing. But come on, a pathetic 2% reduction in this buyer's market? Why bother? This guy just doesn't get it. If you want to sell in this dismal market (especially in this neighborhood), you've got to be willing to deal. 6% total reductions in nearly two years isn't going to cut it. But I guess after 659 days rotting on the MLS, you already knew that.

I went into the Elbridge M&T Bank last week and ran into Sherri Dattler, their mortgage consultant. I've known Sherri for years, back to Skaneateles days when I first arrived. I thanked her profusely for putting together a mortgage for the people buying one of my listings. She shared that the rates had gone down substantially since they first applied three months ago. I told her about this blog, and asked if she could share what that meant dollar-wise. She eagerly went back to her office (they've just remodeled) and calculated. It means that if you have a 30 year fixed mortgage for $100,000 and a rate of 6.5%, the cost per month would be $634. The rate currently is 5%, so the payment would drop to $538. That's a savings of $96 every month and almost $1,200 per year. Push that out even 10 years and the savings are almost $12,000. That could buy a lot! The point of all this is two-fold. Those homes that seem expensive can be purchased literally for a lot less.

As I bake cookies in our unfinished kitchen I have a great opportunity to marvel at the cards and photos we've gotten this holiday season. We put them up on the wall with tape - the wall is going to be repainted anyway, at least that's what we said last year - and they have become a gallery. We only took down last year's pictures when we started getting new ones after Thanksgiving. As I look at them I realize how much my real estate career has given me. Not just a place to go and people to meet, but entire families with whom I work and stay in contact. As an only child of an only child, I have few relatives. My birthfamily is spread all over, from Alabama to Minnesota to Kentucky to Rochester. Bob's family is here and ever-present, a wonderful gift. But there's always room for more. I want to just tell about a few families, inspired by the baby pictures on the wall. This year we received a lovely photo of three children, all pre-schoolers. They are decked o

Some co-workers and I are participating in a beard-growing contest during winter break. When we come back to the office in a few weeks, our beards will be rated on three criteria: 1) Placement, 2) Creativity, and 3) Overall Toughness. Frankly, I have no idea how we came up with those categories, but there it is. Now, I'm not a hairy guy to begin with and my beards tend to look patchier than a hobo's trousers, but today as I admired my five days of stubble I wondered what kind of mountain man masterpiece I could create with months to spare instead of weeks. And as I pondered the benefits of having that kind of leisure time, I stumbled (stubbled?) upon the famously-bearded Rip Van Winkle trying to sell his condo. Address: 800 E Ocean #805, 90802 Asking Price: $478,900 Year Built: 1928 Size: 1 bed, 1 bath, 839 sq. ft. $/Sq. Ft.: $571 HOA Fine: $973 (WTF?!) MLS#: P571509 On Redfin: 617 days Description: This beautifully appointed condo home features Ocean Views from every room. It

Back when I lived in LA, I used to date this girl. Let’s call her Nadia. Boy, she was something. She was blonde, hot, outgoing, funny, a great kisser, and unafraid to show just the right amount of cleavage. I’m not sure if my mother’s a Long Beach Housing Blog reader, so let’s just say she was outstanding in other ways too. Exhausting might be a better word (I’m talking about her passion for yard work, ma). We would go out drinking, tear it up in Hollywood, draw the spotlight away from absolutely everyone in attendance, and maul each other like mad when the night was over. When we were full of booze and out on the town, we were a stellar pair. She was incredible. And expensive. However, it began to dawn on me that below the surface, this relationship didn’t have much in the way of substance. In fact, outside the realm of bars, clubs, or the bedroom, the relationship didn’t actually exist . There was nothing to talk about, not many common interests or beliefs, and no tangible connection

You would think nothing would happen at this time of year, but my listings are being shown or at least inquiries are being made. And why not? The mortgage rates are going down and there are deals to be made. There are 117 active listings in the Skaneateles real estate market. Only one new one came on this week and that was a re-list. Of particular interest to many is the marking of 11 Onondaga as contingent - again. We believe this sale will go through, but in the event it deosn't back up offers are more than welcome. A newly pended home is in the village - it never bothered to go contingent, just pended! I think everyone is a bit gunshy right now and would prefer to wait until the commitment comes across our desks. We had three closings this week - three! In the town a home closed above the list price - imagine! In the village a small investment opportunity closed at two-thirds of the original list price. Waterfront also closed - but at a reduction of about 25% from the o

Last Friday Syracuse University got a new football coach. He is Doug Marrone who played for SU in the 80s. Not that I remember him, but he was part of a good group of strong SU supporters, Tim Green and Scott Congel to name two. He played under Coach Mac. I am still skeptical. Alex is willing to bet me $100 of his hard-earned money that SU will have a winning record in two years. I want it in one year, and apparently so does Coach Marrone. I like what he says. He wants to take the players who are there and build his offense around their strengths. Coach Robinson believed differently - take HIS offense and make the players use it. It didn't work. Now this may seem far-fetched, but I can relate this to the real estate market. Hang in there! If you use Marrone's philosophy, you analyze the situation (the players) and work with them. The economy is the situation in real estate and home-selling must accomodate the market. G-Rob said "This should work!" as in t

Anonymous strikes again: "Hey retard..... this property just closed for $365,000 I dont [sic] see that as a problem do you? Maybe you should focus on combing the MLS for typos and keep your other opinions to yourself." You seem awfully angry, little buddy. And yet you return every day to keep that anger alive. I assure you, it's not worth the stress. Be honest: How many times a day did you keep checking for my response to your comment? BE HONEST. Of course I don’t have a problem with someone putting this seller out of their misery. Why would I? Knife-catchers are the only thing keeping this economy together! You seem to be chalking this sale up as some kind of victory, but for whom? Obviously not the seller, who lost $20,000, plus $23,000 in commissions and $20-$30,000 in upgrades and maintenance, not to mention four years of grossly inflated carrying costs. My OPINION was that they would lose money, and they did. So, is it a victory for the new buyer? If they can afford

Somebody got the memo! Our favorite eyesore —ERRR, “Mysterioursly [sic] private and breathtaking” beauty dropped the price for the second time in 22 days. And the agent seems particularly proud of the seller’s abject failure—ERRRR, generosity . To wit: "MAJOR PRICE REDUCTION ONE MILLION DOLLARS!" In some circles, lopping off a million dollars from the original asking price would signify a desire to get serious about selling or at least a willingness to negotiate. I’m not in that circle. No, considering the original asking price was a trust fund-busting $3,250,000, all the million-dollar reduction makes me think is, “A good start for a petulant, greed-faced ignoramus.” In fact, I’d be willing to bet you see a price increase in spring of 2009. If they were truly serious about selling, then how do you explain the 438 days it took to finally scalp a million clams from the asking price? Slow learners? Nah, I’m sticking with petulant, greed-faced ignoramus. But if I’m wrong and th

The news has been so poor lately that I thought I'd write about what is good that's happening out there. As I came through Yahoo to get here I caught a brief "Five Reasons to Suspect Your Job is in Jeopardy" headline. I'm sure I could return for more bad news, but who needs it? This morning in the paper ( www.syracuse.com ) a real estate deal was announced. In Elbridge, the residents of the Champion Mobile Home Park have banded together to buy their park for 3.6 million dollars. They formed a homeowners association and borrowed money to do so, all with the gentle nod of the owner who had kept it running in good form for years. That means 350 families became home owners today. I think that's wonderful! I opened my mail for my monthly bill from M&T. I borrowed, like so many did, from my home equity line of credit this year to get past a very slow real estate spring and a very expensive tax season. The interest rate has dropped from about 5.5% six mo

Address: 35 Linden Ave #204, 90802 Asking Price: $295,000 Year Built: 1987 Size: 2 beds, 2 baths, 1,031 sq. ft. $/Sq. Ft.: $286 HOA Fee: $285 Purchase price: $240,000 Purchase date: 11/2008 MLS#: S556668 On Redfin: 1 day Down Payment: $59,000 Monthly Payment: $1,900 Income Requirement: $84,000 Description: LOCATION LOCATION! This 2 bedroom 2 bath condo is close to everything. It is within walking distance to the Marina, the Aquarium, Pine St. and the East Village. The condo has been updated with graite counter tops in kitchen and newer cabinets. Beautiful tile flooring is in kitchen and living room. Large living room with a fireplace. The building is secured and the subterranean parking is secured. Don't miss this great oppuritunity to own a condo in this great area and at a great price. “Graite” counter tops? Did he misspell “granite” or fail miserably trying to spell “great” phonetically? “Oppuritunity”? Ugh, what a mess. And by the way, how inept do you have to be as a listing a

Everybody hop into the Way Back Machine, because I have an update on a Long Beach Housing Blog classic! In one of the very first posts on this blog (man, I can't believe it's almost been a year) I featured a property with the most outrageous price per square foot in Long Beach. Well, browsing through Redfin I stumbled upon the property again...still decomposing on the market. Kind of lonely out there, eh guy? Interestingly, a few things have changed since the glory days of January, namely: 1) It is now suddenly a "fixer-upper" 2) The price has been reduced by -$1,505,000 for a new asking price of $2,995,000 3) That discount translates to a new price per square foot of $936, which forfeits the record for highest price per square 4) The days on market have stacked up to a mind-blowing 416 days 5) This beautiful photo has been added: Cool ladder. Do you want to hear the strangest part about this 416-day saga? The place went on the market for $4.5 million before it was e

It feels as if I just did the weekly update. The world is moving swiftly again. Since I last wrote, three of my homes with contingencies on them seem to be getting ready to close. The waiting is over. I wish the same for everyone out there this holiday season! This week there are 121 active single family residential homes listed in the Skaneateles area of the multiple listing service. Two new ones have come on - one in Marcellus Schools but Skaneateles township, and the other a village re-list with a slightly reduced price. There are only 2 properties listed as contingent and now 10 marked pending. No new home has been publicly announced to be sold. There are 57 closed properties as compared to 97 last year at this time. Both are village homes in the higher range ($400,000 to $750,000). But neither, for once are waterfront. I went back and looked at my blog of six months ago to see how far we've come. There were 149 active listings (about to balloon to 169), only 18 had cl

Address: 837 E. Ocean Unit #??, 90802 Asking Price: $234,500 Size: 2 beds, 1 baths, 1,206 sq. ft. (built in ??) $/Sq. Ft.: $194 HOA Fee: ?? Purchase price: $389,534 Purchase date: 3/2008 MLS#: 08-333463 On Redfin: 1 day Down Payment: $47,000 Monthly Payment: $1,500 (assuming $200 HOA) Income Requirement: $67,000 Description: Bank-owned property in prime Long Beach location move-in condition 2 bdrm, 1 bth with great open floor plan. Kitchen opens to living room and dining area with nice front porch. In heart of downtown only 4 units in charming building. This listing is utterly useless. We don’t know about the parking situation, air conditioning, HOA fee, how old the building is, the unit number, or whether there are laundry machines in the unit, let alone on the premises. Thankfully, Redfin comes through with some information that speaks volumes. Specifically, during the peak of the housing bubble, in late 2006, this condo sold for an astounding $525,000. Incredible. In March of 2008,

Back from Atlanta, ready to blog! You know, the most rewarding part about the housing collapse is the demise of some of the most ill-conceived conventional wisdom we were bombarded with (often with a quite condescending tone) for years. For example, during the bubble, buyers and sellers gladly accepted the premise that small, entry-level condos in so-so areas were “worth” $350,000. As absurd as that would have sounded in, say 2002, by 2005, it suddenly became Truth. They said some form of "That's just what condos cost now." Any disagreement or suggestion these “values” were seriously misaligned with fundamentals or common sense was widely ridiculed. In conjunction with their blind acceptance of REIC (Real Estate Industrial Complex) lies of “a new paradigm” of economics to support such prices indefinitely, hardly anybody expressed concern that $350,000 was in some cases EIGHT TIMES the median household income! Insanely, this substantial 350k sum wasn’t even referring to a

An old friend came into the office today to show me the Tuesday Wall Street Journal ( www.wallstreetjournal.com ) article he had found about creative home selling. There were several examples of incentives offered by owners: Austin, Texas - Buy the house, get a $50,000 Porsche Boxster for free! Of course the list price is two million.... Phoenix, Arizona - Buy the house, get a pool, patio and professional grill installed prior to closing. Don't want them? - take $100,000 off the price of 1.5 million. "The market is so bad, it's hard to get people to even take a look at the area right now." LaHabra California - Buy the house, get free yardwork for 6 months, a washer/dryer, flatscreen tvs and all furnishings (maybe). "Saving people a little time is pretty attractive." New York, New York - Buy the house (or condo), get 10 personal-training sessions, a $500 American Express gift card, or a romantic getaway to an inn upstate, or a free bike for a place

I spent a great deal of time yesterday going over the numbers for some people interested in selling their home. I pulled out active listings, closed, re-listings, changes of price. Since I love numbers and statistics, what I found fascinated me, just as the weekly updates I do for this blog keep me well-informed. Self-imposed homework. This week there are currently 120 active listings in the Skaneateles area. Two new listings came on, one a truly new lake rights listing and the other a re-list (or reconfiguration actually) of an existing listing. In the contingent category the number remains the same (4) as well as in pending (8). There were two new closed properties that although vastly different - waterfront and double wide - had similarities. Both were first listed in the fall of 2007. Both came down in price substantially and then closed within 10% of their last list price. However, they closed at 35% of their original list price. Now, before anyone suggests that all proper

This pricing strategy comes to us straight from the Plaxico Burris School of Poor Decision Making. Address: 2601 E Ocean Blvd #608, 90803 Asking Price: $399,900 Size: 1 beds, 1 baths, 672 sq. ft. (built in 1973) $/Sq. Ft.: $595 HOA Fee: $290 Purchase price: $230,000 Purchase date: May 24, 2002 MLS#: P622255 On Redfin: 292 days (!) Down Payment: $80,000 Monthly Payment: $2,600 Income Requirement: $114,000 Description: Priced well below comps for you to make an offer!! Welcome to the Versailles! A distinquished Long Beach beauty! Steps from the Sand, the Long Beach Museum of Art, Downtown Attractions, Belmont Shore and Freeway Access. This one bedroom Oasis offers the finest in Uptown living at the Beach with Designer touches throughout. Newly upgraded bathroom with the Impressive Textiles, Freshly Painted, East facing Beach views from both the Living Room and Bedroom balconies, walk in closet, Parking, Pet Friendly community and much more!!! Community Ammenitites plentiful. Quick questi

Over the past week I have used my time efficiently and prepared holiday cards for my clients and friends. I bought them at Chestnut Cottage this year. Usually we go up to the Adirondacks in September to the Great Camp Sagamore and I find cards in the Old Forge Hardware Store, but this year the family went to the Poconos and I stayed back to sell and list that weekend. I digress. The point about the holiday cards is that it takes all day because I want to write something personal in each one. In order to do this, I have to bring up faces and conversations and homes from the past. I have been in contact with most of my clients/friends over the course of the past year, amazingly enough, but for some this is the only time I will contact them. I want it to be a postive contact. When I was an administrator in the Waldorf School in Saratoga I learned to slow down and consider each child and family as I got ready to sleep. The teachers were supposed to bring up faces and incidents from