You can forgive those responsible for the Costa Mesa family shopping if they tend to be suspicious when we go for long without hearing much about inflation. Last Wednesday’s Associated Press headline, “Yes, your grocery bills have gone up,” probably confirmed their feeling from recent supermarket forays. Earlier, the AP had already reported a summer surge at the nation’s grocery stores, illustrated by the fact that July rang up the biggest monthly gain since late 2018. September’s rise (.4%) “was bigger than economists had been expecting,” constituting the sharpest rise since May, which was when pandemic-triggered shutdowns at food processing plants caused a 5.6% spike in prices.

Yet, inflation-wise, Costa Mesa home budgets have emerged relatively…

594 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

The-L3-Rentals-In-Costa-Mesa

When yahoo!finance (the exclamation point is part of the title) puts residential real estate at the top of their feed, a fair number of Costa Mesa readers are apt to come across it. Last Thursday, such was the case with the commentary, “U.S. will ‘become a renter nation,’ says real estate investor.” The report was offered by a reliable reporter, Sarah Paynter—and since the byline included a promise that time-crunched readers would welcome (“2 mins read”), Costa Mesa web surfers probably checked it out.

The real estate investor quoted in the title was making the point that the current historic high residential prices are making homeownership more and more difficult for many to afford. “If you keep pushing prices, you’re pricing people out,” was his…

818 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

Ask any grandparent: “is it actually true that Costa Mesa mortgage rates averaged more than 18%?” They’ll tell you. It happened. And that was less than 40 years ago.

The reason to revisit such an unimaginable scenario isn’t that anyone expects Costa Mesa mortgage rates to repeat that history anytime soon (or anytime, period). It’s useful to recall because the current era of incredibly low home loan rates has been going on long enough that it’s beginning to seem to be the natural order of things.

Psychologists recognize the human tendency called “normalcy bias”—the inclination to overestimate the likelihood that current circumstances will continue. That would be harmless enough, were it not for the fact that it leads otherwise rational humans to…

2550 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

Last month’s U.S. News article headline looked promising: “The Guide to Understanding Your Home Value.” What Costa Mesa homeowner isn’t at least curious about that? Written by U.S. News’s real estate editor, the piece addressed a slew of informational tidbits, some of which are not as commonsensical as you’d think.

Chief among them was a description of “the process of calculating” your home’s appraised value and how that relates to its market value. The relationship between the two—and the reasons they are different—is illuminating. A couple of the tidbits:

FALSE: “…your property value is based on what a buyer is willing to pay for it…” This sounds like it should be true, but it’s not. Unless the buyer is able to buy it singlehandedly, the…

678 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

When corporate leaders seek to communicate good news on their company’s performance, they frequently reach for the ‘R’ word: “robust.” Sales are robust; production is robust; future prospects are robust, etc. The ‘R’ word performs the near-miraculous feat of conveying strength, energy, and accomplishment —all without having to come up with specifics.

Especially in earnings guidance season, you see the ‘R’ word a lot.
So it was surprising that last week’s widely quoted tidings about existing home sales (which were very good tidings, indeed) included the ‘R’ word at all. The news—at least as cited by The World Property Journal—hardly needed the vocabulary assist. The details alone were astonishingly favorable. “U.S. Home Sales Spike in August, Highest…

628 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

The first words of last week’s Realtor Magazine title were reassuring to area homeowners with homes currently included in the Costa Mesa listings: “Sellers Are Calling the Shots…” For most regions across the U.S., that’s become apparent as the summer wore on. Realtor.com’s Chief Economist elaborated: “Prices are rising, and housing inventory is vanishing as fast as it appears.”

The following details bore him out. The Housing Market Index hit 107.7 for the week ending September 5th—nearly eight points higher than January’s. Significantly, that’s the pre-pandemic baseline figure. Median listing prices were up 10.8% annually, comprising the fastest pace of growth in more than two years.

Homeowners mulling the prospects should they decide to add…

717 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

Custom Single Story by the Beach! A HOME is more than just a structure, it is something that has been cared for, cultivated, and loved by the owners. This home embodies all of those things and you feel it the moment you walk in the custom oversized Dutch doorway. The open and spacious layout consists of 4 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and almost 1,500 sq ft of interior living space. Inside, you immediately notice the cathedral style ceilings and the abundance of natural light that exudes throughout the main area. The remodeled kitchen overlooks the spacious family room with the oversized kitchen island as the centerpiece. It features granite counter tops, stainless steel appliances (including a warming drawer), and country style kitchen cabinetry. The master…

620 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

It’s normally tricky business to predict the direction that the U.S. real estate market will be taking in any coming year, but in most years, projecting the situation for just a few months in the future puts the experts on safer ground.

But, alas: like everything else this year, “normally” doesn’t apply. When Forbes queried five of the top housing economists to venture their opinions on what they anticipated the rest of 2020 was likely to bring, that was after acknowledging that the first half of this year was “unprecedented” (hardly an auspicious takeoff point for dependable projections).

The opinions were first published a couple of months ago, which can supply Costa Mesa real estate watchers a strong clue about which have thus far pointed in…

750 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

Welcome Home! This stunning remodeled property is located on a quiet interior street with no neighbors behind you. The front curb appeal is outstanding and features an oversized paver adorned driveway with RV potential, front lawn, and archway accented patio. The interior features 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and almost 1,800 sq ft of comfortable living space. The main level consists of a formal living room, 2 bedrooms, 1 bathroom with shower, kitchen with windows overlooking the picturesque backyard, and an oversized beamed-ceiling family room. Upstairs features a massive master suite with an adjacent full bathroom. The backyard is private, serene, and beautiful with ivy covered perimeter walls, a large lawn, and covered patio area. Some of the other…

573 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post

Last week, those who closely monitor Costa Mesa home loan rates were treated to a literary fit of impatience by the Mortgage News Daily—usually one of the most dispassionate of mortgage journals. On Friday, it became more than clear that MND has had it! The headline read,

No, Mortgage Rates Are Definitely Not Back to All-Time Lows!

The exclamation point is a rarity from financial journalists—as are superlatives like “definitely.” The cause of the editorial apoplexy was spelled out in unequivocal terms—it was “the unified onslaught of news coverage” that had once again dispensed the now-familiar phrase about mortgage rates being “back to all-time lows.” Not so, exclaimed MND—in fact, “today’s rates are actually and unequivocally not even close…

607 Views, 0 Comments

Read Full Post