'Promises, Promises, Promises'

From the Sacramento Business Journal:

[Leslie] Appleton-Young’s job includes overseeing the association’s analysis of the statewide housing market and industry trends. Realtors want to know what’s ahead, so sometimes she has to make predictions. Usually, she’s right. [LOL!] Sometimes, she’s not.

Last fall, she estimated that median home prices in California would drop 4 percent in 2008. Recently, she revised her estimate to 8 percent to 10 percent. [The median has dropped 19.1% since December.]
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[Appleton-Young:] What jumped out at me, in looking at the statistics, was that the percentage of first-time buyers was low, 26 percent of all home buyers. That’s the lowest number since 1979, and it’s a testament to the affordability hurdles that first-timers face.

Jim Wasserman has the latest TrendGraphix figures. The SAR numbers for June are available here.

From the Sacramento Bee:

The bailout of mortgage firms Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae will help stabilize the wobbly recovery in Sacramento's real estate market, analysts said Monday. But the collapse of big mortgage lender IndyMac Bancorp Inc. last week continued to shake Wall Street, depressing the prices of other bank stocks, and showed that many perils remain.

From the Sacramento Business Journal:

“The government sector seems to be strong when we need it to be and the private sector is strong when it needs to be,” said Bob Burris, deputy director at the Sacramento Area Commerce and Trade Organization. “It’s kind of a hedge in difficult times.”
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Nobody is discounting the concern about 10 percent across-the-board cuts in state government, but there appears to be consensus that actual job losses will not be significant. “Our thought is the state employee reduction will largely be absorbed through elimination of vacant positions or retirements,” said Michael Cohen, director of state administration for the Legislative Analyst’s Office.

From the Sacramento Business Journal:

Steven Cochrane: Prices peaked in late ’05, though the plunge really started about a year ago. The trouble is there’s no end in sight yet. It’s going to get worse before it gets better.
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I’m fairly certain when the budget is passed, we will start to see some cutbacks in state employment. Sacramento will be the hardest hit — Sacramento and any other area that has a high concentration of state government.
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Suzanne O’Keefe: The market is maybe reaching a bottom.
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Sanjay Varshney: The foreclosure rates are still high. Yes, there are a lot of foreclosures that have been picked up by buyers, but that certainly hasn’t had an impact on declining values of existing homes.
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Sacramento is much more vulnerable. The reason is that Sacramento does not have the paychecks to support the housing market that evolved in the last five years...Really, we need to go back to ... when a good 3,000-square-foot home was only $250,000.

From the Appeal Democrat:

Patti Clary, director of YouthBuild for the Yuba County Office of Education, said the $165,000 three-bedroom, two-bath house on Pine Street — on the market for a year — would have been snapped up during the boom days of California home-buying. "These were a real deal," Clary said. "Now they're not."

The YouthBuild houses still represent a good buy, excellent construction and a program that provides 18-to-24- year-olds training in building and other skills, said board of education President Sidney Muck..."The question still looms whether it's overpriced," [Mercy Housing vice president Greg] Sparks said. "I don't think that they're way out there."

From the Sacramento Bee:

A number of small school districts in the foothills of Placer County are considering a merger to combat years of dwindling enrollment and shrinking funds from the state....Placer Union High School District initiated a preliminary study of district reorganization by the Placer County Office of Education to see how merging school districts would improve the schools' financing.
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The additional cash flow might entice districts hit hard by a struggling housing market, an older population and fewer students to keep schools open.

From the Stockton Record:

The dramatic decrease in this area's population growth may be some of the best news possible for our cities. Census Bureau figures released last week show that from 2000 to 2007, Stockton's population grew roughly 17 percent, to 287,245. That makes Stockton the 62nd-largest U.S. city.

But much more interesting, perhaps, is that population growth slowed considerably starting in 2005, coinciding with the start of the real estate market meltdown. The collapse of the overheated housing market throughout California, but especially in San Joaquin County, with its proximity to the Bay Area, means this area has grown increasingly less attractive to Bay Area residents looking to escape stratospheric housing prices.

From the Modesto Bee:

When Joe Melendrez bought his home in Bridle Ridge, a master-planned community on Oakdale's southwest edge, the promise of a park and friendly neighbors were crucial. "I assumed I'd look out the window to a park and could cross the street to visit my neighbors," he said. "I'm still waiting for both."

Rather than a lush park, with kids playing and families enjoying picnics, Melendrez looks out over a field of knee-high dead weeds and construction debris..."Promises, promises, promises" Melendrez said. "The only activity around here is when they dump more concrete in the field that was supposed to be a park."
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At least two builders in Bridle Ridge declared bankruptcy, city manager Steve Hallam said....

LA Land: Waiting in line: That was then... This is now.