Renters Confidence Index - San Jose

Renters Confidence Index - see: San Jose

48% of renters are determined to buy a home within 5 years, in the San Jose region of California. However, more than 1/2 think it is not a good time now to buy, mainly because of prices. Still, 70% think that buying a home is the best long-term investment.

In particular, 56% of Millenials are determined to own a home, and about 75% of them are pretty confident that they will have the ability to afford a home in the future.  About the same number think it is the best long-term investment.

Source: Pulsenomics - Renter Confidence Dashboard - See: San Jose

Thank you for reading,
Francis

My Home Valuation tool
Detailed, local trends etc... 
Current mortgage rates   (pretty stable, and low.. )

California Renters Still Want to Own a Home

California renters still want to own a home: four out of five renters state they want to own a home some day, and this is in spite of affordability challenges.

Some of the statistics indicate that nearly half of renters say they would purchase a home if they got a new job, a raise, or a promotion, while another 40 % say they would be motivated to buy a home if they got married or were starting a family.

Source: the 2018 California Association of Realtors Consumer Survey.

Thinking of purchasing, or moving soon?  let me know: I can help you decide what is best for your current siuation.  And if you are currently in the market, consider these thoughts:

Click on the image to read better.

Thanks for reading, and sharing.
Francis

America's Rental Housing

America's Rental Housing.

It is no secret that finding a place to call home in the Bay Area has become a problem, both as a purchase and as a rental.  Rents have gone up very significantly in the past 3 to 4 years, with a steep acceleration as early as mid 2012.  The front page of the San Jose Mercury News today 4/16/14 talks about it and prints: " Region's average asking rent is now $2,043 after three years of double-digit annual growth".

But this is not limited at all to our area. Nationwide, there is a similar problem, as studied and explained in the Rental Housing Report of the Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies (Dec. of 2013). In many ways, the situation has to give us pause.

• Half of US renters pay more than 30% of their income on rent,
• 19% of  all renters 10 years ago were paying more than ½ their income on rent; they represent 27% now.
• 31 % of Americans were renting in 2004, they are 35% in 2012.
• Between 2000 and 2013, median rents nationally (adjusted for inflation) increased by 6%, while the median income of renters dropped by 13%. 
• The shortfall in the number of units affordable to extremely low-income renters in the U.S. (those earning no more than 30 percent of the area median) more than doubled from 1.9 million in 2001 to 4.9 million in 2011.

Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies Article.
If you want a copy of the SJ Merc. article let me know.

Francis
Silicon Valley real estate specialist
Detailed, local trends etc...
Current mortgage rates

non-profit organization worth noting: Partners for New Generations.

Condos are "back" !... and other real estate surprises

Bay area condos’ tight supply has buyers scrambling.
And prices are going up a lot as a result.

Across the Bay Area, buyers are fighting for a limited supply of new and existing condos.

Several factors are combining to create this situation:

  -  investors have already snapped up many foreclosures and short sales and are renting them out.

  -  homeowners who might sell in a typical market are either still on the sidelines watching prices rise or are underwater and can’t afford to sell (much fewer now than yesterday!),

  -  those homeowners who do want to move up cannot do so, as they question rightfully their ability to purchase a "replacement property" in this one-sided market (the lack of bridge loans does not help),

  -  demand has been growing, because of the good job market in the bay area, and also - interesting trend - because many buyers who went through short sales or foreclosures are becoming homeowners again, thanks in part to loans from the Federal Housing Administration.

  -  finally, as housing starts have risen in the past year or so, home sales haven’t kept up. The gap suggests that builders are overwhelmingly building for renters, not buyers.  This trend is better studied in this article by Nin-Hai Tseng of CNN.

Investors as well as builders did not fail to notice the significant increase in rental prices that we witnessed in the past 2 years (locally certainly, but nationwide too).  In a way, we can see a small part of this phenomenon unravelling in my last blog about the San Antonio shopping center, where for the time being the only residential units being built there are for rent.

Need to know the value of your condo?  Do not hesitate to contact me,

Thanks for reading, as always!
Francis

Silicon Valley real estate

Trends: Local prices and graphs.

Coming soon: The Peninsula French Fair  - Art, food, and good company!!
Sat. March 23rd, all day.

Rental market: details...

Renters, owners, the balance of the two is changing:

Freddie Mac releases U.S. economic and housing market outlook

Freddie Mac released recently released its U.S. Economic and Housing Market Outlook for June showing that rental market activity has been a bright spot for the housing market, and due to rental demand by those postponing homeownership, further increases are expected in the coming year.

Highlights from the outlook include:

- Over the year ending March 2012, an additional 1.5 million households moved into rental housing, a 4 % increase in a single year.

- Rental vacancy rates have dropped roughly two percentage points over the past two years.
- While nominal rents rose (2 to 4 %) during the year ending March 2012, average rent on an inflation-adjusted basis remained below where it had been for much of the decade prior to the Great Recession.
- Multifamily property values are up on average about 25 percent during the past two years from their trough during the first quarter of 2010, according to the National Council of Real Estate Investment Fiduciaries index, but still about 14 percent below their peak prior to the Great Recession.
- Starts of buildings with at least five apartments have jumped 48 % in the first five months of this year when compared to the same period a year ago.

Freddie Mac Economic and Housing Outlook.


Francis

Silicon Valley Real Estate

Local market trends

useful links

A noteworthy non-profit charity: Random Acts of Flowers