Antioch, CA

The January 2009 median home price in Alamo CA was $1,357,500 for single family detached homes.* There were 10 home sales of single family detached homes, the highest priced home sold for $4,200,000, the lowest price home sold for $927,000. The average selling price of detached single family homes for January 2009 in Alamo California was $1,737,700 after an average of 136 days on the market. Your Alamo California real estate market update written February 2, 2009.

Details on the listing at 280 Bolla Drive in Alamo that sold for $927,000 after 19 days on the market:

Details on the listing at 247 Michelle Lane in Alamo that sold for $4,200,000 after 175 days on the market:

There are currently 9 single family detached homes pending sale or under contingency contract. The pending home prices range from $599,000 to $3,500,000, with an average asking price of $1,809,105.

To request a copy of future Alamo CA updates via e-mail, click here

Click here to request a current list of homes for sale in Alamo CA

No attached units sold, duets, condos, townhomes or patio villas, in January 2009. No attached homes are currently pending sale.

As of February 2nd, 2009 there are currently 98 properties on the market in Alamo CA. 96 of these are single family homes. The median listing price in Alamo is $1,696,750 for detached single family homes on February 2nd, 2009.

Buying or selling a home in Alamo or Alamo CA real estate, contact me as I am a skilled agent, offering extensive knowledge and strong negotiation skills who is truly focused on "Getting You Where You Need to Be!"

Contact Vickie Nagy REALTOR®, ABR, CRS, GRI e-PRO, SRES (925) 407-7987 or click to e-mail Vickie Nagy

Please contact Vickie Nagy for all of your real estate needs in Alamo, Danville, San Ramon, Dublin, Pleasanton, Walnut Creek and Concord. Search the MLS - Empire Realty Associates

Visit Alamo CA Real Estate for median home prices, local information & featured listings.

Recent archives of Real Estate Market Updates for Homes for Sale in Alamo CA include:

December 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written January 1, 2009.

November 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written December 4, 2008.

October 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written November 1, 2008.

September 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written October 2, 2008.

August 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written September 1, 2008.

July 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written August 4, 2008.

June 2008 real estate market snapshot for homes for sale in Alamo CA written July 6, 2008.

* Based on information from the Contra Costa Association of REALTOR'S® MLS (for the monthly period from the first through the last day of the month). Display of MLS data is deemed reliable but is not guaranteed accurate by the MLS.

A year or so ago, short sales were the ‘S' words that nobody, buyer's agents, seller's agents and buyers themselves wanted to be involved in. Banks were not very cooperative, they put listing agents through the ringer and were not very negotiable on price. If a buyer hung in there long enough and a whole lot of other variables worked out, we had an occasional success story. It came with the cost of frazzled nerves, frustrated and emotionally spent ‘victims' to the short sale process itself. The success level was low at best.

Well, circumstances have changed and banks have seen the light. Banks actually make out better, financially, if they can negotiate a short sale rather going through the costly expense of a foreclosure. Some banks are even negotiating short sales even if the mortgagee (owner) is not behind on payments (hey, that makes sense, keep the money flowing in). So here we are with more ‘express' short sales with many banks giving an approval in 3-6 weeks after an offer and short sale hardship package is submitted, rather than 3-6 months. An added note: Homes with 1 loan/1 bank or 2 loans/1 bank are much easier to negotiate with than 2 loans/2 banks, however all can be negotiated successfully.

But isn't a REO (already foreclosed property being sold by the bank) still a better and more affordable option? Well, sometimes it is, however short sales are being approved now with very competitive purchase prices and in many cases the homes are in much better condition than an REO. One other major factor guiding buyer's to short sale listings, most REO's in better condition are aggressively priced by the bank to sell within 30 days or less which creates multiple bid situations. Yes, there are that many buyers out there right now!

A successful short sale still has many facets. A dedicated professional realtor has to contact the banks involved, as representative for the property owners (via a 3^rd party authorization form and listing agreement with the seller's), and get their specific criteria of required components to the short sale package (every bank is different, but similar), and understand that specific bank's short sale procedure. That realtor must keep all parties accountable and make sure all required documents are received and sent to the bank in a timely manner.

We are experienced Realtors having completed many successful Short Sale and REO Transactions. Give us a CALL with any questions you may have or VISIT our web site.

The bottom line is short sales are becoming more attractive than in the previous year or so, so keep an open mind and don't be afraid to consider a short sale listing when making your new home purchase.

I'll close with a short story about our latest success story. We listed a home recently with 2 loans/2 banks. The second bank was a small credit union and was very willing to cooperate. We started the listing price a little higher to show the bank that we made an effort to get them the most money we could (we showed history). After about 4 weeks, we were at the price we knew would get attention. We received an offer within a few days, forwarded it to the bank with complete hardship package. Within 2 days I was assigned a negotiator, an appraisal was ordered, there was a small counter offer by the bank and we closed escrow about 4 weeks later.

BUYERS: HAPPY SHOPPING SELLERS: CONTACT A REALTOR-CHECK OUT YOUR OPTIONS

For more information please contact Rick and Joyce Tietz (925)628-5105

or visit our web site at http://www.tietzhomes.com

Written by Rick and Joyce Tietz, Realtors RE/MAX Associates

Welcome to Antioch CA Real Estate and General Information

Antioch is located along the San Joaquin-Sacramento River Delta in Contra Costa County, California, US. It is a suburb of San Francisco and Oakland with a growing population of 100,586 which has continually increased over the past few decades. Founded in 1850, Antioch is one of the oldest towns in the state. Nine years later in 1859 coal was discovered in the area creating a huge new booming industry. One of community's assets is it close proximity to San Francisco and Oakland. This provides an easy commute for work. Two of Antioch's main forms of public transportation are the Antioch-Pittsburg Amtrak station and Tri-Delta Transit.

There were a total of 270 closed residential home sales from October 1^st to October 31^st in 2008 compared to 43 in October 1^st to October 31^st of 2007. The average selling price for that period was $222,903 compared to an average selling price of $348,456 for the same period in 2007, a percentage drop of 36%. The median selling price was $225,300 compared to $360,000 for the same period in 2007, a percentage drop of 37%. The average number of days a house was on the market was 52, compared to 96 days for the same period in 2007, almost half the time. Currently there are 878 homes on the market, and it's a great time to buy.

Antioch CA real estate remains abundant and more affordable than ever compared with other parts of the Bay Area. In the month of September 2008, the average sale price in Antioch CA was $214,246 compared to September 2007 average sale price of $340,190. WOW that's a difference of $125,944 drop in average sales price from last year. Prices have dropped 37 percent from the same period last year and over 50 percent from 2 years ago. There has been a slight increase in average sales price of $8,657 in October of this year compared to last September.

There are still many real estate deals to be had and lots of homes for sale in Antioch, but you need a local market expert to help you. Rick and Joyce Tietz are long time residents and are experienced real estate professionals who have more than 10 years of home buying and selling experience between them, overseeing more than $10,000,000 of real estate transactions. For true local and knowledgeable service in the Antioch CA real estate market, contact Rick and Joyce Tietz at (925) 628-5105.

The bottom line is this.

You can aspire to survive, perhaps even thrive during this meltdown... or you can choose to silently go back to doing whatever you did before you got involved with real estate. If you think you are "good enough" you might want to rethink your position.

Because today, good enough isn't.

Background...

For the past several months, the real estate market has been in a well-publicized tailspin, sending shock-waves throughout the entire economy.

The problems with sub-prime loans, negative equity net of sales commissions, and the pull-back by investors in the secured credit markets have led to a highly unstable economic environment for real estate professionals, mortgage brokers and the entire financial industry as a whole.

As of Friday, August 31, even the President of the United States has weighed in on the problem. Since early 2007, over 50,000 people have been laid off in the financial services and mortgage banking area, with another 150-200,000 real estate agents expected to bite the dust... a fall out that will affect the nation as a whole.

The problem is clear.

A "macro-economic" solution for the market at large is far less so.

However, on a day-to-day "micro-level", the dual crises in real estate and financial services has an outstandingly simple solution for each player, regardless of their position.

To survive, perhaps even thrive under these conditions, you will have to out-smart, out-hustle, out-compete, out-produce and out-perform your competition-every single day of your life.

Put simply, this has become a "survival of the smartest" new day in the world of real estate sales and finance.

Only those people with the fundamental skills to perform at the TOP of their performance potential will survive. In fact, these people will not only thrive, but pick up significant market share as their less-productive competitors fade into oblivion.

ThinkTQ.com

- RISMedia - http://rismedia.com - Online Marketing: How One Team Signed on Four New Clients in One Day, despite Economy Posted By Paige On October 8, 2008 @ 3:24 pm In Technology | Comments Disabled By Mike Parker RISMEDIA, Oct. 9, 2008-Rick and Joyce Tietz are REMAX agents in Antioch, California-an East Bay suburb of San Francisco (www.tietzhomes.com ). They’ve been with the same brokerage for six and five years, respectively, and a team for five years. Because of their hard work and good business decisions they are having strong success selling homes online. Through our grapevine, I had heard of this and wrote Rick one Friday (after gaining his agreement to participate), seeking to obtain answers to a series of questions in order to share their methods of success with readers. On Monday morning, I found a message from Rick in my email. Here is exactly what that message said: “Mike: I’m unable to get your questionnaire back by Monday morning due to existing commitments and the additional four clients we picked up this weekend from our site starting Saturday morning. I will get it to you ASAP.” I must say that excuse sounded a lot better than, “The dog ate my homework!” Have you ever picked up four clients from your site over the weekend? The Tietz Team has worked hard to become successful online Realtors: they have sold 14 houses from their site in the past 7 months-in a really tough real estate market-and are on track for 24 for the year. They work their website and their website works for them. When was the last time you sold a home from your website? What do Rick and Joyce know that you don’t? It took a team to make Rick and Joyce succeed in their Internet marketing When you ask Rick what it took to make him and Joyce succeed online, he is direct: “We launched our organic search plan on [February 21 this year] and have no regrets. We obtained our current website free as part of a special promotion CompassSearch offered when we subscribed to our organic search subscription. The switch to the new website provider was easy for me; the editing tools and being able to do HTML editing has made building an eye pleasing, lead capturing and search friendly website a wonderful task. With Blackwater/CompassSearch making the keywords, keyword phrases, page titles, inbound relevant links and Meta tags really go to work for us, we are seeing much more activity than before. “Our conversion rates have also improved tremendously. We also receive monthly support calls (where great ideas come from) and in-depth analysis of where our site is effective and we have really lowered our bounce rate. We have always known that the Internet was the place to increase our business and we had reached the point where we knew we had to make a change in our internet marketing. We did plenty of research and we came across the team for us. These companies have together created one of the best Realtor money-making machines there is. Because we get top search engine placements, we are able to bring prospects to a user-friendly real estate website where they are more than happy to fill out one of many lead capturing forms we have put in place. I get immediate notification on my cell phone that someone needs help and most often Joyce catches them while they are still on our site. Now, I also get to do all this from my home. It just doesn’t get any better than this.” It also takes a team of prospects to make sales happen regularly Says Rick: “We work with buyers, sellers, banks, investors, retirement communities, homebuilders and we relocate clients from all over. The only parts of the business we don’t pursue are the rental business and we don’t do loans. Our plan was to create the dominant web presence in our marketplace and to work every lead that came our way. By tirelessly working with every possible lead generating person we know plus dominating our corner of the Internet, we have prospered while about 50% of the agents in our market quit and the bulk of the remainder are barely getting by. To give you just a hint of how powerful the Internet is for relocation, we have sold homes to folks from Ireland, England, Mexico and France in the past seven months. All these buyers found us online because of our organic search strategy and our hard work following it faithfully.” They set a high goal and they are reaching it, even in a hard market “Back in February of 08, we set a goal to sell 24 homes from our website in the next 12 month period. Seven months later, we have sold 14 in what can only be classified as the absolute worst possible market conditions. We have lots in our pipeline and we are going to do it: we’ll sell 24 homes from our website this year,” Rick adds. “The San Francisco East Bay Area is a challenging market right now. The biggest challenge is the ever changing lender requirements. In Antioch alone there are currently 905 residential homes on the market: 445 (49%) of these listings are REO/Bank Owned, 352 (39%) are short sales and the remaining 108 (12%) are regular owner listings. The overall average list price is $239,564, the short sale average list price is $248,283, the REO/Bank owned average list price is $208,237 and the average list price for individually owned homes is $338,942. “The differences between the average list prices are due to many different variables from destruction to greed. All of these homes are selling for less than half of the average selling price just two years ago. Buyers are taking advantage of these savings in large numbers and we are getting our market share. “From our perspective, surviving this market trumps concern about statistics, but we are better able to evaluate our progress by knowing our market and we are better able to counsel our clients for the same reason. Even in these hard times, we are receiving 8 to 10 solid leads per month from our site and these leads will carry us through the rest of the year. After our years with this brokerage we are experiencing our personal best this year and we are in the top 50 teams for RE/MAX in California and Hawaii, too.” The Tietz’s comments mirror those of the California Association of Realtors, who tell us that in California, sales were up over 50% for the same period last year but that the average sale price is down over 40%. Reporting tools also show that over 3,400 Internet shoppers have visited the Tietz’ site in the past seven months. As their organic search subscription ages, it will continue to get stronger and they will continue to sell more homes from it. Because Rick and Joyce put so much hard work and time into monitoring their Internet marketing (and adjusting, based on what they see), they will also continue to succeed and they will improve their efficiency at selling homes online. Selling homes online has made all the difference for The Tietz Team: their secret source of success is the Internet “All our leads come from our site in some form or other and our costs are pretty much the same throughout the year. I have saved thousands annually spending my dollars on Internet marketing instead of newspaper ads and the results have taken us from barely getting by to being in the top three Realtors at our brokerage with the highest split given and being in the top 50 real estate teams for RE/MAX International of California and Hawaii. I’ll tell you that I enjoy hearing my mobile phone sounding off when we have a lead or feedback from our site. That beeping sound is like hearing a cash register ring. We had another four solid leads alone this weekend (one of them is interested in one of our short sales) and it will start up again later this Monday. Our organic search plan, in just seven months time, has increased our Internet exposure and that has increased our business by more than 30%. I’m looking forward to the continuing growth in the future, and we are confident that 2008 will continue to be a record year for us. Being dominant on our little corner of the Internet has helped us develop the strong belief that we will have nothing less than a fantastic career in real estate as we continue to improve our marketing and our client follow-up program. Real estate is a wonderful career and the Internet is where real estate is happening now.” Rick and Joyce had so much more to say that could not be squeezed into this article, but fundamentally, they represent a minority among agents and brokers: those succeeding online. NAR says that less than 10% of all agents are happy with the yield from their websites. There are reasons this is so and one of them is that as a Realtor, you know real estate far better than you know the Internet. Why don’t you take the first step toward becoming an Internet realtor by finding out why your website isn’t producing for you? Just [1] click here and fill out the form and a staff member will review your site free and help you turn it into an income producing part of your sales effort. Eighty-four percent of all residential real estate sales begin online: if your sales don’t reflect that contribution, you are missing out on a great deal of money and success. Start today and maybe in seven months you will be succeeding online like Rick and Joyce Tietz. About the Author: Mike Parker is a principal at the Blackwater Consulting Group, Inc., and specializes in online marketing services for Realtors® and real estate professionals. You can reach him by e-mail at [2] mparker@theblackwatercg.com. Obtain a free copy of his new booklet “REAL SEO Explained” by writing to [3] realseo@compassinternetsystems.com. It will be sent to you free and no one will call you. To request a free review of your website to determine if it can be found by internet buyers and if it is search engine friendly, [4] click here and it will be evaluated free. RISMedia welcomes your questions and comments. Send your e-mail to: [5] realestatemagazinefeedback@rismedia.com. [?] [6] Share This With a Friend ________________________________________ Article printed from RISMedia: http://rismedia.com URL to article: http://rismedia.com/wp/2008-10-08/online-marketing-how-one-team-signed-on-four-new-clients-in-one-day-despite-economy/ URLs in this post: [1] click here: http://admin.compassinternetsystems.com/inquire [2] mparker@theblackwatercg.com: mailto:mparker@theblackwatercg.com [3] realseo@compassinternetsystems.com: mailto:realseo@compassinternetsystems.com [4] click here: http://admin.compassinternetsystems.com/inquire [5] realestatemagazinefeedback@rismedia.com: mailto:realestatemagazinefeedback@rismedia.com [6] Share This With a Friend: http://rismedia.com/?p=30530&akst_action=share-this Click here to print.