Real Estate in the Hermosa Beach and Redondo Beach Areas

Third graders at Tulita had Famous People day in the school auditorium and the second graders had character day to top off Book Week. Amazing costumes and monologues were exhibited by the students. Helen Keller, Mark Twain, and Florence Nightingale were there through the students.

Magic,  is a local famous cat in Redondo Beach. He has a natural lightning bolt stripe on his forehead. Look “our he who shall not be named. ” His food is from the local Redondo Beach Store or Torrance branch of Centinella Feed. One evening recently a black and white walked by our window and passed right by Magic, it was a local skunk! Neither paid the other any attention.

Book Book night at Barnes and Noble had a great event with the principal reading several stori es to the families, students and customers.The books sold received a portion of funds for the library. The event followed a book signing by an author.

Home inspections, home showings, writing offers, returning about one check for every short sale offer written, buyers are buying

Realtor Magazine online carried a good story:

Picking Real Estate Pros Is for the Dogs
When Candy Spelling, the widow of legendary Hollywood producer Aaron Spelling, decided to sell her home, she let her dog pick out the real estate professional for the job.

Spelling asked her security service to bring her beloved Wheaten Terrier Madison in each time she met a candidate and watched how the dog reacted. If Madison did not respond pleasantly, she took the individual off the list.

Sally Forster Jones, an associate with Coldwell Banker Previews International in Beverly Hills, was the winner. She will co-list the 56,500-square-foot mansion, known as ¢â‚¬Å“The Manor¢â‚¬Â in the exclusive Holmby Hills neighborhood of Los Angeles, for $150 million, making it the most expensive house on the market in the U.S.

Both Spelling and Jones told the Associated Press that they are unsure how many rooms the 56,500 square feet, three-story mansion has.

Source: The Associated Press, Alex Veiga (03/27/2009)

The Associated Press has long written short stories that are worth telling. Years ago it carried a story about my dad, Knocky Parker, because he left the hospital to visit his class at University of South Florida. Imagine your professor showing up in robe pj’s and slippers to say…”it’s ok folks, I’ll be back.” Short and funny stuff, or heartwarming the news is usually interesting around animals. I loved the story carried in The Christian Science Monitor, of the US veteran and the rescue of a mongrel and what it took to get the dog back home with him. Both the story on my dad and the veteran caused problems with -red tape. The hospital was shocked to find they were in the news as well as the US Govt.

Back to dogs and real estate.

The story of the seller and her trusted dog. Yes its news when its Candy Spelling, the mansion and that nobody knows how many rooms it has.

Hard to see the excess of it all in these times as well. However, trusting dogs has long been around. My very first listing came when the dog chose me.
I was sitting in a room being interviewed by the family selling the home their mother lived in. A small brown dog came into the room and sat down, right on the end of my foot. The moment was sweet and fun as one of the family shouted out-She’s the one! That dog is a toe-sitter and that’s our new real estate agent!  The house sold for 601K in a short time and it broke the record of price in a track of homes that never sold for more than 600K. That was enough years ago that the prices have not gone back to below 600K in that part of Torrance, Beverly Hills or Century City where I worked over those years. Things may change but never our love for dogs. I had some advantage perhaps- in this, I was born in the Chinese year for the Dog.

@pkitano Torrance services are the best, new mortgages transparent!

Torrance services are great. The Fire department come right out when needed. top top quality. Schools . businesses

Inman news article of the day features Tepid recovery. “In “The Global Slump,” one of the economic reports featured in the UCLA Anderson Forecast, senior economist David Shulman states that most of the “contractionary forces” on the economy “will have been spent” by the close of 2009″

 Realtors are already feeling the recovery. Our coaches and network realtors tell us Riverside is getting mulitlple offers. We love it. We are getting multiple offers in the South Bay on any listing that is well priced. Any? You say?  Yes. Torrance zip code 90503 Listing only 3 days old got 4 offers and over asking. If you are not getting offers..you are priced too high. Its pure and simple. The buyers are out there. Open houses are full of people. Torrance 90505 has people anxious for the spring offerings coming out. The Gvt. backed hold on REO’s has held back the tidal wave expected by many since October, extended another 90 days last month. Buyers started buying. It stabalized the fear and the interest rates helped.  If the REO’s pour out in mass it will shock people buying  about the value of any property. The tepid part will be the result of the REO’s and the GVT and the lenders all trying to strengthen up the faith in the buyers. The fact is that the homebuyers who want to buy now and live in the property for 5 to 10 years will get a good deal.

Investors have also hurt this market by keeping the home they like and using the other properties as an ATM machine. They are walking away from investments, turning in the keys ( as Susie Ormand suggests to them) and because everything is upside down and overwhelming people can’t see the good guys from the ones with a real loss, health, jobs and the like.

Positive note….remember in Los Angeles  people are getting homes at 2004 prices.

South Bay investors are sometimes frustrated that few properties are in our local areas. When we do have a bank owned property it will sell with multiple offers if it is a good deal.  All properties have to be a good deal for people to sign up and buy it. That is a fact. 90505 in Torrance had a 4 br 2 bath Bank owned property with a pool. It sold for close to 510,000. this year with 5 offers and no kitchen! 90503 area had a sale of a 3 bedroom home, in great condition for 570,000. with several offers and 2 were all cash. What was the story behind the forclosures? One was that the owner passed on and the relatives who inherited it didn’t pay the bills, the taxes and they lost it. Homes in those zip codes move quickly if they are under the 600K mark. It’s a needle in a haystack to find them. Sometimes out of area agents post the listing in the wrong area. It takes an alert, busy, agent to find the deal and to win the deal. It still goes to the highest offer or the strongest financing.

Foreclosure Activity up 6% in February-Six California cities registered foreclosure rates among the top 10: Stockton at No. 3 (one in 67 housing units), Modesto at No. 4 (one in 68), Merced at No. 5 (one in 74), Riverside-San Bernardino at No. 6 (one in 80), Bakersfield at No. 7 (one in 85), and Vallejo-Fairfield at No. 10 (one in 111). To read the whole article go to http://rismedia.com/2009-03-12/foreclosure-activity-up-6-in-february/

Early in the morning the few came to stake out the volleyball spots. One lone fellow on one and a team came to unwind the ropes to create the in bound locations.

Later on the walk back we see the rows of umbrellas and audience of locals cheering on their players. Such is beach life. Row after row of dogs of all sizes walk the path above with an owner in tow. People stopping to view the ocean including two firetrucks. Everyone wants the lift of eyes, ears and spirit.

The sunny day brouught out all the open house signs.

 crowded in the left over campaign signs at our corners.at Martha’s in Hermosa and a view of the Strand house for sale on the corner. Wow. what a day at the beach.