Los Gatos, California
Los Gatos real estate, neighborhoods, condos, houses, homes, market trends, history, events, lifestyle, parks, events, businesses, home, Mary Pope-Handy
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Oct. 16, 2009
As readers of this blog know, Los Gatos is full of micro-markets, and that can make generalizations about how the "Los Gatos real estate market" is doing a bit skewed. So whatever you read online, or hear about in your neighborhood or from friends, do take with a grain of salt since your home may or not be similar to whatever other home you're hearing about in terms of how it might sell (or if you're a buyer, the home you may want to purchase may be different....).
Disclaimer aside, I did a few minutes of data-collecting on MLSListings just now for single family homes (houses or attached/duet homes, but not condos or townhomes) in the town of Los Gatos (not Monte Sereno, but LG with zip codes 95032 and 95030). It appears that the general trend continues: the most affordable Los Gatos homes, generally, are selling fairly well.
What I did was run the numbers (agents: using the "preview" button on REIL), then simply added two other criteria: high school district (Saratoga-Los Gatos High School District and Campbell Union High School District) and then list price of up to $1.5 million. Then I figured out the absorption rate, or the months of inventory (MOI). The solds are homes which have closed in the last month.
Where the MOI is greater than 6, it is a buyer's market, and where it's under 6 it is a seller's market - six months is considered a "balanced" market.
So, looking at the first set, for Los Gatos overall the absorption rate is 5.6 months - or very close to a balanced market. But we know that some areas and price points are selling much slower than others. Surprisingly, when all of Los Gatos with "the schools" are considered, the MOI is 7.7. Given that it feels like entry level homes in that part of town feel like they're flying off the market, this doesn't sound right. So look at the second group of numbers, where the price range is limited to those under 1.5 million. We can see that there are only 39 such homes for sale now (vs 101 for all price points) and the MOI is a brisk 3.55. That makes sense. So what's slower are the more expensive homes, generally. Entry level homes in the schools are selling at a healthy pace.
Interestingly, homes in the Campbell Union High School District are faring even better - and the data is inverted, slightly, as to where the sweeter spot of the market lies. For these homes, those under 1.5 mil are going at a quick 2.4 months of inventory. The market as a whole for Los Gatos houses for sale in this area is lower still, though - 2.23. That demonstrates that the market is even faster in the higher priced homes. My belief is that this is the case because those homes - high end homes in the CUHSD - have taken a bigger hit on pricing and buyers are responding. Cannot prove it in this brief blog post entry, though, but that's my (hopefully educated) hunch.
What about your neighborhood, or where you'd like to buy? Get hyper local when you think about how "the market" is. Feel free to visit my Los Gatos Real Estate Report and see local sales in your neighborhood. Make it more precise by indating the beds/baths you want to consider, and how far out (in a radius) you'd like to see the comps, or how far back in time. Best part: you don't have to register, you don't have to leave a footprint. (Your search is not saved on my site, so I will not be showing up on your front porch!) Or call or email me for a confidential, no obligation, no-pressure consultation.
Aug. 24, 2009
Today in my "Valley of Hearts Delight" blog, I did a lengthy, detailed post on The Los Gatos Real Estate Market by Zip Code, School District and Price Point - August 2009. Although the overall market in town is a buyer's market (with about 7 months of inventory or an absorption rate of 7 months), the subsets of the market range widely, from 3.75 months of inventory (a seller's market) to about triple that much! Please visit http://www.SanJoseRealEstateLosGatosHomes.com to see the data!
May. 10, 2009
The Los Gatos real estate market is heating up, particularly in the homes that are most affordable (and featuring Los Gatos Schools) but noticeable in many areas and price points.
Below please find a graph displaying prices and sales (median and average) for single family homes in Los Gatos. This graph uses a 3 month moving average to level out any odd bumps in the data such as seasonal fluctuations.
(image from www.PopeHandy.ReReport.com, a subscription service of mine, and used by permission)
The actual (not seasonally adjusted) "months of inventory" in Los Gatos looks even more dramatic. Below, find the absorption rate for not just Los Gatos, but also Monte Sereno, Saratoga, Cupertino, and the average of all four:
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When looked at together, the overall trend becomes exceedingly clear that the market is changing.
Sellers, the market is better now than it's been in many months. If your home is not getting activity, it's time to get it in line with the market.
Buyers, it's still in your camp in many markets, but your advantage seems to be slipping.
No one knows whether the market will continue along this trend or if this is just a blip in the Silicon Valley real estate market landscape. The threat of more foreclosures throughout Santa Clara County will be the thing which can tip this one way or the other.
Oct. 8, 2008
The condo market in Los Gatos is improving after a few rough months. It remains a buyer's market, but not so deep a one as we saw in late spring and over the summer.
Although days on the market for Los Gatos condos and townhomes are considerably longer than they were a month or a year ago (78 days in Sept vs 32 in Aug and 33 a year ago), and the list price to sales price ratio is slipping (96.4% in Sept vs 98.7% in Aug and 99.2% in Sept 2007), there are some signs of improvement. The number of homes on the market is the same, 44, as last month, but the number of closed sales has risen from 6 in August to 8 in September.
Surprisingly, the sales prices are up too (both average and median), both for month over month and year over year. Here are those numbers (care of The Real Estate Report, a subscription I have):
| Trends At a Glance |
Sep 2008 |
Previous Month |
Year-over Year |
| Median Price |
$850,000 |
$700,000 (+21.4%) |
$800,000 (+6.3%) |
| Average Price |
$768,021 |
$619,167 (+24.0%) |
$741,417 (+3.6%) |
And finally, one of the most helpful ways of understanding the market is the absorption rate, which may be calculated as days, weeks, or months of inventory. It's a reflection of how long it would take to sell off the current inventory if no new homes came on the market and homes continued to sell at the present rate. Below, please find the months of inventory for condos and townhomes in Los Gatos. NB that there is recent improvement in the numbers:
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Next, here's a view of the condo and single family home market of Los Gatos side-by-side:
If you'd like more information on how the Los Gatos townhome and Los Gatos condo market are faring, please visit my Real Estate Report for an interactive online report for all of the Silicon Valley real estate market.
Please call me if you'd like a private consultation about your real estate questions, plans, and hopes.
 
Sep. 8, 2008
The Los Gatos real estate market struggled this summer. Noticeably declining prices were required to effect home sales in some price points, in which it seemed as though housing prices dropped quite sharply and rapidly. Please see www.PopeHandy.ReReport.com for a full interactive report on Los Gatos, Saratoga, Monte Sereno, San Jose, Campbell, and all of Silicon Valley.
There are a number of ways of gauging the real estate market in Los Gatos. We'll look at several of them to get a sense of what's happening.
A particularly accurate method of learning how the real estate market is performing can be obtained by studying the absorption rate. That's the rate at which the current inventory of available homes would be absorbed, or bought up, if no new listings came on the market. Below please have a look at the months of inventory, or absorption rate, for single family homes in Los Gatos since August 2007. NB that shorter months means it's more in the sellers' favor, and longer is more in the buyers' favor. (The National Association of Realtors says that longer than 6 months is a buyers' market.)
As the numbers indicate, it got harder to sell as the summer months progressed. May (reflecting April sales) was the best month since December. So homes listed May and later were challenged by comps that made the situation appear more rosey than it was in reality. (Graph created by Mary Pope-Handy using MLSListings.com data.)
Below, please find a "Market Barometer", care of the Real Estate Report, to which I subscribe, for the town of Los Gatos.
By this accounting, too, April and May were the better time of the year for selling in 2008, and prior to that it was the summer of 2007 before there was a really strong looking Los Gatos real estate market. And a glance over all the years shown reveals that 2005 was a great year for selling homes in Los Gatos.
Next, let's look at median prices in Los Gatos - both 95030 and 95032 - and also Monte Sereno, since it's so close geographically. This chart is from Altos Research, and is another subscription service I have, but instead of closed prices, this reflects asking or list prices. It is interesting to see that Monte Sereno fared the best and the 95032 part of Los Gatos (which generally is less expensive than 95030) the worst, with 95030 right in the middle. The wealthier the area, the better it seemed to do by list price in the last year. And that makes sense as the higher priced homes are less dependent on loans.
Next, let's view the Days on Market in the same three areas: Los Gatos 95030, Los Gatos 95032, and Monte Sereno (which is also 95030). All three follow the same general trends, though Monte Sereno (the green line) swings higher and lower than the two zip codes in Los Gatos. Interestingly, the 95032 zip code decreases its days on the market in recent weeks while the other two areas continue their upward climb. (Again, based on active listings in Los Gatos and Monte Sereno, not closed sales.)
Next, let's review inventory. Here we see that the inventory is rising recently.
Once again, Monte Sereno is the healthiest - it has the lower levels of inventory that correspond to lower days on the market and a higher median price.
Since it appears, from this data, that much of "how the market is doing" appears to be by price point, let's break out the data by median list price quartile within each area.
Los Gatos, 95030
Los Gatos, 95032
Monte Sereno, 95030
The highest priced markets are showing the most change during these months and the lowest priced homes are far more flat in the two parts of Los Gatos than in Monte Sereno.
Overall, list prices are fairly flat (looking at all markets in Los Gatos and Monte Sereno) - nothing really dramatic has happened here in the last 3 months for the majority of Los Gatos homes. Overally, days on market are rising. And overall, inventory is rising.
All of these point to a market which is increasingly a buyers' market, and this idea is strongly reinforced by the very first graph, which displays the absorption rate (for all of Los Gatos).
The glimmer of hope in the broader market comes from the fact that the number of sales is rising countywide for the second month in a row afte 46 solid months of declining sales. It could be that this is the bottom of the market - and the very most ideal time to buy. If this is the case, we'll see improvement in these numbers for Los Gatos in the next few months.
Furthermore, trends that may impact one part of Los Gatos, Monte Sereno, Saratoga, or anywhere else in Silicon Valley may not be of direct consequence elsewhere in Santa Clara County. A quick look at the REReport shows that Palo Alto, Cupertino and other areas are quite strong, despite a high number of foreclosures in South San Jose. So, too, with Los Gatos. What happens in Blossom Manor, Surrey Farms, the Edelen District, or the Almond Grove District may have little to bear with things that happen in the hills behind La Hacienda, new townhomes off Winchester Blvd, older condos on Los Gatos Almaden Road, or the comfortable ranch homes near Quito Road. And all of them are a different market than the large homes on Santa Rosa Drive, Aztec Ridge, or Matiliaja.... Because the real estate market here is a collection of micro markets, it's important to ALSO get information on your exact neighborhood and type of home and property (view, equestrian, vineyard, something in the Williamson Act) if you are in the market for buying or selling.
Please call or email me if I can be of help to you in buying or selling your home here in the Los Gatos area.
Mary Pope-Handy
cell 204-7673
mary@popehandy.com
Jan. 21, 2008
Tired of hearing the doom and gloom regarding the real esate market? Most of that negative press is national news, not local news. Truly, it doesn't impact home values in Los Gatos if prices are falling in parts of Florida, Vegas, or even in Sacramento. The local market - our town plus neighboring communities here in Silicon Valley - is the crucial one.
Things are just not that bad for home sales in Los Gatos overall.
That said, "the market" consists of several sub-markets. It's one thing if you are trying to sell a very expensive home with an unpopular architectural style. It's another if you're marketing a modest or at least non-extravagent home in a good location with great schools. Still another if you have a view property...or a lot that could be split. And no matter what, overpriced just won't work.
A view of the big picture in the Los Gatos real estate market reveals that 2006 was a lot tougher on sellers (and folks watching their equity) than 2007 was. The first three quarters of 2007 were remarkably good for single family homes, in fact. Have a look at the "months of inventory" or "absorption rate" by month for last year for single family homes. (As a point of reference, the National Association of Realtors says that less than 6 months of inventory is a sellers market.)
For the condo and townhome market, it was even stronger. Once again, it was a little more challenging late in the year (not an unusual pattern for any year).
What about now? How is the inventory of homes in Los Gatos right now?
About one house in four is selling in this area overall. That's pretty much the case in Los Gatos, Saratoga, and Cambrian Park. In Los Gatos there are 97 single family homes available and 27 sale pending (in Saratoga it's 61 and 17, and in Cambrian Park it's 140 and 34).
The condo market, which was much stronger throughout 2007 than the single family market, is now cooler than the single family home market in town. As of today, January 21st, there are 26 townhouses or condominiums for sale and just 2 under contract or sale pending. (So instead of a 1 in 4 chance of selling, it's closer to 1 in 10.) In Saratoga it's a little better with 10 available and 3 pending. In Cambrian there are 41 "class 2" (condo/townhome) on the market and 7 which are pending sales.
Every market presents an opportunity for buyers or sellers. Where's the best real estate opportunity in Los Gatos now?
Late in 2007, it appeared to be an ideal time to be a "move up buyer" - to sell that townhouse and to buy a single family home. Now, early in 2008, the opportunity has shifted. It is now a great time to sell that single family home and to downsize into a townhouse or condominium.
The market is always changing and the micro markets can all be different from the general trends in the town. If you'd like to discuss your home, your neighborhood, or buying and selling, please send me an email or give me a call. I'd be happy to set up a time to talk with you about your unique situation.
Mary Pope-Handy
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