California’s second largest city and the United States’ eighth largest, San Diego is renowned for its idyllic climate, 70 miles of pristine beaches and dazzling array of world-class family attractions. No wonder moving companies are doing such a great business in the area.
San Diego County encompasses 18 incorporated cities and many neighborhoods and communities, including downtown’s historic Gaslamp Quarter, Little Italy, Coronado, La Jolla, Del Mar, Carlsbad, Escondido, La Mesa, Hillcrest, Barrio Logan and Chula Vista.
The city’s real estate market was hard hit during the past couple of years by the recession, but it is bouncing back. Home values rose in February of this year compared with February 2009, according to real estate professionals.
We thought this good news afforded the lovely city of San Diego a best real estate blogs post.
As with the other real estate posts that have gone up here during the past several weeks, the San Diego blogs can help a stranger learn about the city. Whether a user is thinking about moving or is just curious and looking around, the featured blogs offer opportunities to explore neighborhoods, taxes, mortgages and even prices of staples like utilities.
These blogs even help users find the best restaurants, doctors and dentists in the area, so if someone is planning on moving to the city, they can hit the ground running.
BubbleInfo.com, run by Jim Klinge, has more than real estate listings for San Diego and the surrounding areas. You can find San Diego crime data and school information by neighborhood, as well as a short list of recommended service providers, which include everything from insurance agents to piano tuners to home contractors.
Klinge also has a video library that puts the user on the ground in San Diego with virtual tours of properties and luxury REOs in foreclosure, as well as tips and tricks for getting the most out of the real estate market.
The San Diego Home blog is run by Kris and Steve Berg, owners of San Diego Castles Realty. For more than a decade, they have helped literally hundreds of families purchase property, and sell homes and investment properties throughout San Diego County.
The site’s listings feed allows users to view the latest 25 properties that have come on the market in each neighborhood they cover. It’s a great way to take a virtual tour and see what is available in the city.
Peter Toner’s San Diego Real Estate blog features some great articles on home buying, the state of SD’s real estate market and tax credits, as well as fantastic tips for home sellers and renters.
San Diego Real Estate Market blog has a very healthy listings page, with hundreds of San Diego rentals and homes for purchase. The blog also offers visitors a real connection to the city through event pages that list large and small happenings in and around San Diego.
Users that are interested in the social scene will delight in SD Urban, which covers the city’s urban neighborhoods and features art, architecture, dining and community events. It’s authored by Paul Jamason, and really puts the user on the ground so they can see what is happening right now. A lively comments section and diverse blog roll add to the feeling that you are already part of the community.
Voice of San Diego.org/Housing has a great home page with tons of SD housing news. The site is run by voiceofsandiego.org, a nonprofit news organization that focuses on in-depth and investigative reporting. They cover the issues that are crucial to the region’s quality of life: its politics, educational system, environment, housing, economy and more.
You can find really good reporting on this blog, and get an unbiased view of exactly where the real estate market stands in San Diego. Once you get your fill of housing, browse through the rest of the tabs and see what else is happening in this great surfer city.
Related Articles:
The Best Real Estate Blogs in San Francisco
The Best Real Estate Blogs in Minneapolis/St. Paul
The Best Chicago Real Estate Blogs
This blog post was written by Suzanne Grace, a real estate agent in Thousand Oaks, Calif., and a contributor to Relocation.com.
The drumbeat of negative news just seems to keep rolling on for the real estate market.
But does that mean you shouldn’t try to sell your home? This blog post will take you through the issues to consider when mulling over whether to wade back into the game.
And I’ll tell you why, at least in the community where I’m a real estate agent, it makes sense to wait 6 months before putting your home up for sale — and why you might want to consider it for where you live too.
1. How much equity do you have? If you bought prior to 2003, chances are you have some pretty decent equity in your home. But if you bought between 2004-2006, and used a 100% financing option, chances are you don’t.
So pre-2003 buyers who have a decent amount of equity might find it beneficial to sell if you have good reasons for needing to do so.
2. Why are you selling? If you can no longer afford the payment, it may not be in your best interests to sell. Many banks are now working with homeowners to modify their loans, essentially lowering their monthly payments to an affordable level.
While I cannot advise going one way or the other (we’re still early in figuring out how the loan modification program will work), it beats foreclosure. And if you are selling for a reason beyond your control such as a divorce, you may want to meet with your CPA to determine the tax benefits of buying out your partner, or see if you can come to an agreement that allows you to sell later.
There is nothing worse than being forced to sell in a downward-trending market.
3. Where do you plan to move? If you are staying in the area and plan to rent, you might be paying the same if not more than you are currently paying for your mortgage, particularly when taking into account the tax benefits of owning. Rents have increased over the last year to keep pace with demand as people leave foreclosed homes.
4. Are you trading up? If you are selling because you want a larger home, whatever you ‘lose’ on your current home will be realized in the gain of your new home, which has also taken a dive in price.
Wait Six Months?
Whether you sell now or later depends on where you live, of course, but I think my community of Thousand Oaks, Calif., is instructive about what much of the country might be seeing in the next six months.
Thousand Oaks has certainly seen its share of foreclosures, and an average 30% decline in home values. However, homes ARE selling. If you price your home aggressively (ie, at the same level as any bank-owned properties in your area), it will sell – and in most cases it sells within a week.
In fact, we are actually seeing a housing shortage in some areas – yes, a shortage. (Sounds strange in this market doesn’t it?)
However, maybe it’s not so strange.
Six months ago we saw a pre-foreclosure list of approximately 50 pages; today that list is down to 15 pages. I expect that within 6 months, it will be even more beneficial for a seller with equity to sell – we will be entering the peak season, the foreclosure rate will have dropped significantly (if the Stimulus Plan rolled out this month takes effect as planned), and the market will have settled after the changes the election brought forward as well as the Homeowner Stability Plan will have been given a chance to take effect.
The bottom line is this: While only you can decide whether it’s the right time to sell, President Obama’s $75 billion Homeowner Affordability and Stability Plan will help struggling homeowners by providing incentives to lenders, servicers, mortgage holders and borrowers to help modify mortgage loans.
This will definitely keep foreclosures off the market, decreasing the number of homes available – and the lower inventory may actually help bring the price of homes back up.
