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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May. 2, 2008
It remains a buyer's market in Los Gatos, but not as deep a buyer's market as in many other parts of Silicon Valley.
Below please find links to reports on the local Los Gatos housing market, broken down by zip code and housing type, current as of April 28, 2008. One of the most helpful aspects of the Altos reports is that it breaks the activity down by market quartiles, so that the activity in entry level homes, for instance, is differentiated from the luxury home market. Have a look:
Los Gatos Single Family Homes in 95030
Los Gatos Single Family Homes in 95032
Los Gatos Condos and Townhomes in 95030
Los Gatos Condos and Townhomes in 95032
These are care of Altos Research, which uses list prices (rather than sales prices). In a week or so we'll have the data on solds in Los Gatos from April, care of another subscription I have, the Real Estate Report. Please check back soon to get that information.
Apr. 8, 2008
Short sales are on the rise in Silicon Valley. Note the change of active listings identified as short sales in just the last 13 days! The list below does not include pending sales.
Related Posts on Short Sales in Silicon Valley by Mary Pope-Handy:
Are there many short sale listings in the Los Gatos, Monte Sereno, Saratoga area?
Apr. 1, 2008
 Please have a look at my latest market update for the town of Los Gatos, broken down by zip, for this week. (Data from Altos Research, a subscription service I have. Disclaimer: they use list prices for their reports.) The following links are to pdf files for these reports.
Mar. 25, 2008
We won't have the March stats (or first quarter statistics) for the Los Gatos residential real estate market for another week or two, but I wanted to provide a snapshot of the realty market to keep you updated.
As of this morning, there were 149 single family homes available (as "status 1") for sale in the Town of Los Gatos (zip codes 95030 and 95032). There were also 28 pending sales of single family homes (so an 18.7% ratio). As before, approximately one home in five is selling right now.
Breaking it down by price point (but all areas), in the under two million dollar range, there were 86 homes available and 20 pending sale - so a 23% ratio. Homes are selling better in the more moderate price ranges. Looking lower at the up to and under $1.3 million, there were 41 for sale and 8 pending (19.5%).
Looking at just the $1 to $2 million range, there are 25 for sale and 5 pending (20%) in the Campbell Union High School District, and 41 for sale and 13 pending in the Los Gatos-Saratoga Union High School District (30.2%).
The sweet spot in today's Los Gatos real estate market, then, is the moderately priced house "in the schools". Any home that is nicely improved, staged, marketed, and above all priced well can sell in today's market, though - it's all about positioning for the current market conditions.
Feb. 15, 2008
A few days ago, I did a post about the biggest, most common mistakes sellers make that cause their homes to not sell. The # 1 error is overpricing, and often that's connected with hiring an agent who tells you what you want to hear instead of what you need to hear (or sometimes it's the agent not understanding the market and accidentally misguiding the owner).
Are prices rising or falling in Los Gatos? Both! It depends on what part of town, what price point, what school district, you are considering. We don't have just "one market". It is imperative to understand the micro-markets to get the pricing right.
So let's look at "the market" and "the markets". Let's have a look at the information that homeowners are using to determine how to price their Los Gatos (or Saratoga, or San Jose) home. Below, see a general view of the "Los Gatos Real Estate Market" for single family homes (very broad, including two zip codes and even more school districts). This is relating to list price, not sold prices.
Would this help you to understand pricing trends? To a degree, yes it would.
But it would also add a lot of insight to see how the market is performing within zip codes:
As you can see, there is a vast difference in performance between the town as a whole and the 95032 zip code.
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What is going on here? Clearly, the 95030 part of town shows rising list prices, while offered amounts in 95032 have been falling. The zip codes are a little different demographically, with 95030 being more expensive and being all within the prized Los Gatos School District. Some of 95032 is in that same district, but some is assigned to the Union School District or the Moreland School District. (Unfortunately my data is not available by schools.)
Another point to consider is the pricing range. Here's a view of Los Gatos single family homes by listed price quartiles:
The town overall appears to be "flat". But is the market really flat?
And let's see again the quartiles, but this time broken out by zip code:
In 95032 you see a distinct slide in the 2 middle percentiles especially, but also in the lowest range of homes.
Now let's see how things look in 95030:
In contrast, pricing are rising across the board in the 95030 area. The highest cost homes have suffered the most volatility in the market.
For months, we've heard that we have a "bifurcated market" here in Silicon Valley. We know that homes in east San Jose, south San Jose, and south county are under a huge oppression of short sales and foreclosures. Prices have fallen dramatically. At the same time, homes in Palo Alto and areas closest to it are experiencing a strong sellers market. Los Gatos does not have a ton of short sales or foreclosures, but it does have both a buyers market and a sellers market all at the same time.
The above chart looks like there isn't much movement, just a slow and gradual upward push...but have a peek along the quartile lines and you'll see it's not really flat. Here's a view of the 1st quartile of each zip code over the last year (I'm not going to run all 4 here, contact me if you want more info about a different price point):
and ...
If a home is "in the schools" and has no issues (like high voltage lines, train tracks, busy road, or a disfunctional floorplan), and if it's priced between one and two and a half million and is priced appropriately, marketed well etc, there's a good chance it's going to receive multiple offers.
If a home is NOT in the Los Gatos School District, prices are falling and buyers are probably waiting rather than buying in most neighborhoods.
To complicate matters, we have very few solds to use as comparable properties. If agents and sellers are using "comps" from 6 or 9 months ago (when the last similar home sold), they might be too low in 95030 and too high in 95032 (mostly along school lines, in my experience). It is imperative to adjust for market conditions. For example, if a home was worth $1,500,000 last March (since the charts begin there), it has possibly swung up or down in value by $100,000 to $200,000 depending on the area of town.
Warning: if you are in an area where prices are falling and you list your home too high, you may experience the unpleasant phenomena of "chasing the market down". A Realtor friend of mine from Long Beach, Laurie Manny, did a post on this topic that I highly recommend: "Chasing the Market Down - Are You Guilty?"
What is the market in your area of town doing? I would welcome feedback. Are homes selling, and if so, are they going fast? Are they "just sitting" and taking price reductions? What do you see happening in your area, with your type of property? Feedback is posted immediately - please chime in!
(Coming soon - a similar post on condos and townhomes in Los Gatos.)
Dec. 7, 2007
The Condo and Townhome market in Los Gatos is a mixed bag. Values are holding and appear to even be rising slightly, the "days on market" are short (a mere 14 days in November), and the list price to sales price ratio is amazing at over 101%. But just as with single family homes, the number of sales is way down.
Is this seasonal or is it "the market"?
One way to check against a seasonal fluctuation is to look at all recent Novembers and see how this one compares. Let's have a look:
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As you can see, the 5 closings in November is the least number of sales over the last decade. Sales are way, way off. And, like with single family homes viewed the same way (see yesterday's post), it's about half of what's average.
If we look at the months of inventory, or the absorption rate, does it look any better?
The condo market remains under 6 months of inventory, which is the point at which the National Association of Realtors would say it moves from being a sellers' market to a buyers' market. These numbers are much better than those for the single family home market in Los Gatos (which had 8.79 months of inventory for November - and those numbers appear to be rising steadily, wheras these numbers are up and down so they appear less predictable).
As of today, there are 5 pending condos or townhouses in Los Gatos (zip codes 95030 and 95032) and a total inventory of 26 available townhomes or condominiums in town. So approximately 20% of the homes on the market are selling. Those that do sell, sell fast and apparently for a great ratio.
But that leaves 80% of the homes that aren't selling at all. So all the good news about "fast days on market" and "great list price to sales price" is not very heartwarming to that 80% whose homes don't seem to want to sell.
In a market like this one, buyers are passing up homes (whether houses or lofts or anything else) with "issues" like busy roads, deferred updating, and of course especially overpriced homes. The property which is fixed up, in a superior location and priced aggressively - the gem, the deal - is selling fast.
This is not a market to see if you can get a price. It's a market for people serious about putting a home in top condition on the market, and pricing it to attract a buyer who's frankly looking for a good deal. Your home needs to be that good deal to sell right now.
Will it be better in the spring? Possibly. The market is really not bad now. There are always overpriced homes in less than ideal locations and with less than perfect condition that don't sell because the price isn't low enough to compensate for the problems. So don't let the failure of some properties worry you about yours. Just get it in the right shape and price it for what today's market will bear (not what you want it to be worth, not what you need, not what someone else told you it is worth).
 If you are buying another home after selling the condo or townhome, you are in luck. The market gets softer as you move up the ranks, and there's a good chance you will make up for any felt loss on the next purchase. But hurry. No one knows whether it will suddenly become a different kind of market in the new year!
Call me if you'd like to chat about your real estate needs. I'm around and working through the holidays with just a couple of days off near Christmas - and I have time to visit with you and strategize to help you get the best deal when selling your home.
Wishing you and yours a very Happy Hanukkah, a Merry Christmas, and a Happy New Year (and anything else you might be celebrating in these days)!
Best regards,
Dec. 6, 2007
For the MOST CURRENT Los Gatos real estate market information, please click on the header above to visit the most recent posts. Each week there will be an update to the housing market in Los Gatos, so return often!
The real estate market for single family homes in Los Gatos is moving more into a buyers' market. Values may be slipping some, but the big story is the fact that so few homes are selling and closing. Whether you compare November 2007 against other recent months or against other Novembers in the last ten years, sales are clearly, and dramatically, way off.
Let's take the number of closed sales from November for the last 10 years, then we'll look at the absorption rate, or "months of inventory" for Los Gatos in recent months.
As is apparent in the graph, closings are at an all-time low for November over the last decade, and in fact is about half of average. This movement is not exclusive to Los Gatos but is being seen all over Silicon Valley; this is the reason there are so many layoffs among lenders, title companies, and real estate offices (in support staff, not commissioned sales people). So even "seasonally", this is unusual.
Next, let's look at the "months of inventory", meaning how long it would take to sell off the current inventory (how many months) if nothing new came on the market and homes continued to sell off at the rate of the closeds for the month. Here, too, the figures show a deepening buyers' market. (Under 6 months is considered a sellers' market by the National Association of Realtors, over 6 months a buyers' market.)
Again, the month to month view is a clear reflection of the slowing market and the reality that fewer homes are selling. The larger the number of months, the harder it is to sell.
Some experts predict that things will calm down in 2008 and we'll have a flat or normal market, or very slight appreciation at best. Other experts predict a worsening real estate market.
Silicon Valley often marches to the beat of its own drummer. Since we have geographical constraints (two sets of mountains and a bay), a good economy and a housing shortage, I believe things will go fairly flat for most of the valley in the next year or two.
It always comes down to supply and demand. Right now there's plenty of supply in Los Gatos (about 108 homes). In neighboring Saratoga, though, there are fewer than 75 homes available - so the absorption rate there looks very different. If, in the new year, there are a lot of homes on the market, it will put downward pressure on pricing and homes will sell for less than they're selling today. If inventory tightens up, that won't happen.
Tomorrow: the real estate market for condos and townhomes in Los Gatos.
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