kaulat

After many long days I now have a brief moment to write this blog.  It's truly remarkable how busy summers can be - not just the mowing and getting the camp ready, but all the wonderful events.  I've been to a wedding shower in Rochester for our nephew, then a graduation for our niece.  We also found time to go to the Merry-Go-Round Playhouse in Owasco to see "Anything Goes" with Bob's mother.  Of course that meant eating out at Connie's (any excuse!).  All that in the past week on top of 12 hour days which included two open houses and countless showings.  What a marvelous time of year! So here we are, in no known order, just as they came up in computer.  All are listed as being in Skaneateles, although a couple are in Sennett with Skaneateles Schools, and another in Spafford.  Some are village (3) and some are waterfront (4) and two are lake rights.  The prices are their sales prices. 3391 East Lake Road - $430,000 2052 West Lake Road - $752...

Nine months ago I was telling him housing was in a pickle - huh? Six months ago his ears prick up - oh yeah? Three months ago he acknowledged he'd noticed the same - the market is slow. Today he's telling me the market is falling - but then he tells me his big plans, apparently this falling market thing bears no relation to his own house. When 'they' say real estate is local, they aren't kidding. It's not the region; the suburb; the street; or even the house - it's the mind. While not medically proven yet, there's a housing gland in everyone's head and some people are unlucky enough to have a tumour grow on that gland. That tumour puts pressure on the housing gland, which then secretes house hormones that endlessly inflate the value of your house - in your own mind. I couldn't imagine how big his tumour was, but all logic flew out the window. Despite the signs of the housing apocalypse - an apocalypse he readily acknowledged - he intended to reno...

To those of you who bought during the last few years because of a growing family, a desire to lock in a low interest rate for 30 years, newfound affordability, renter's fatigue, or you simply got tired of waiting, congratulations. Whatever the reasons, they were your reasons, and I sincerely hope you're enjoying home ownership. But to those of you who believed economic "experts" and commission-hungry tea-leaf readers who proclaimed 2009 was "the bottom" and planned to sell in a few years for profit... WHAT THE HOLY HELL WERE YOU THINKING? In addition to losers who bought during the bubble, I have documented quite a few 2008 buyers who purchased based on the false assumption that "the worst is over," and then faced total annihilation when they tried to unload just a few years later. Well now I'm starting to see more 2009 buyers who believed all the bullshit about "the bottom" being in spring 2009 try to sell their "wise invest...

6/14/11 - Sold $305,000 After years of bullshit wishing prices, this turkey has finally been put out of its misery. In the last update, I said, "...$277 per square foot seems reasonable enough to nab a buyer." It ended up going for $281 per square. Of note, the robo-appraisal was actually dead on! $207,276 $300,400 $414,552 I don't take much joy in being right anymore -- I mean, who really cares? The delusional realtards have long since accepted the truth expressed on this blog and conceded defeat. Plus, it doesn't take a whole lot of effort to make these accurate predictions. As I've said since the beginning, it's just a simple matter of what local incomes can support. This price is now generally in line with the median income, so it found a buyer -- not exactly a shocking development. For the record, this sales price represents a $240,000 discount from the original batshit-crazy asking price. Delusional? Yeah, just a tad. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++...

It's been longer than I like to go as far as writing here.  No excuse.  I simply was extremely busy, had friends in over the weekend for dinner at Bluewater on Friday and Rosalie's on Saturday.  As I get older I realize that the friends I had as a girl are the ones I am more likely to stay in touch with - which is odd in a way, because as I look at our stats we are vastly different.  Life style - only four of the eight are married (still), five of us have grown children, only one is a grandmother, and only three of us have full-time jobs.  We all agree on having pets, dogs and cats and even horses, and that may be the only thing.  Plus we like each other mostly, and can generally pick up where we left off.  My world is certainly richer for their continuing presence. But back to Skaneateles and the new listings that have appeared in the past 16 days.  The listings can be summed up by saying they are half re-lists - houses that have been refres...

  Some days it's bad news being a bum renter. The packing. The moving. The unpacking. That waft of drugs from the apartment across the hallway. The fact you're posting using the free WiFi at McDonald's, desperately hoping that guy sitting behind you isn't a real estate agent who has figured out who you are and will be waiting to cave in your head outside, in the car park.  But then you calculate your rent against how much it would be to buy this dump. Renting is half the price of buying. And why are you renting this place? Because for the past six months they've been unable to sell it. Oops. And then when you finally get your TV tuned in, you see people are crying on Today Tonight because they're defaulting on their mortgage. The price of missing out on some free downloads ain't that bad. But now the financial gurus at Today Tonight offer the wet dream solution of every real estate pumper - raid your superannuation. Just pray you weren't in MTAA super, c...

Irvine Renter, author of the Irvine Housing Blog (a major inspiration for this blog), filled me in on something pretty disturbing. According to the OC Register : The Orange County Association of Realtors has filed a grievance against an Irvine real estate broker who writes a blog that takes critical looks at the housing crash, homebuyers and real estate agents. Larry Roberts, who writes the IrvineHousingBlog.com, freely admits going “over the top” in his posts, which are particularly harsh on homeowners who default on loans. He frequently shows MLS photos of properties that have gone into foreclosure. He also has accused real estate agents, in general, of being dishonest. The grievance says Roberts and two other people have violated a code of ethics rule stating that “Realtors must not knowingly lie about competitors” as well as a general set of regulations governing how MLS information is used on the Internet. Roberts says OCAR is trying to impinge on his freedom of speech, and that t...

inventory down 3% vs. March inventory down 10% vs. last year sale-to-list at 98%

If there's one thing that stops this heinous blog in its tracks, it's the revelation 25% of Tasmanian property sales in the last quarter were to mainland buyers. Tasmania's property boom, which was retardedly called a 'mini-boom' in The Advocate recently (WTF is that?), was kicked off by mainland weasels looking for cheap properties to hoover up, do absolutely no maintenance to, fill with a mendicant tenant - aided by rental assistance - and watch the capital gains go boom boom boom. It was an easy gig and little more than a rigid black shaft stuffed in Tasmania's nubile buttocks. Locals who wanted to buy a house were competing with mainlanders buying sight unseen on double and triple the wages earned by the local. The local, until the past eight years, was used to houses that went up, sideways and back, then sideways again before going back. They knew of houses as a place to live first and an investment that you could count on... well never. Then suddenly, hous...

 2220 Glencove Road  I was speaking with the owner today of this wonderful home and we were looking at pricing in Onondaga County.  I told her that over the past few months I've kept an eye on the Post-Standard's Sunday Home page and the property's that have closed.  Each week I am amazed that the prices aren't higher.  The paper publishes the 5 highest-priced houses that sold the past week - generally the fifth house is somewhere around the $300,000 level.  I checked it out on the ML for verification - only 28 homes have sold in the past 12 months in Onondaga County over $500,000.  So we "monitored and adjusted" the price of this Otisco Lake waterfront year-round home to $449,000.  Come and get it! But what's been happening in Skaneateles?  I've been so busy that the poor second half of this blog got pushed back and back.  (Yes, busy with listings and offers!)  I will catch us up to the minute - this minute, before I go take another listin...

Apologies for lack of posting.Will return within a week.