About Belmont's Belcrest Gardens

Just thought I'd share this with everyone.

We've always enjoyed astronomy and I love it when there's a new moon and we can get a good look at the night sky.

In Belmont, we're pretty close to the city (San Francisco) and get a lot of city light which tends to wash-out the night sky.

If we look south-south-west however it's much darker as we're looking towards the Santa Cruz mountain range.

When I got up early this morning I had to grab my camera and capture one of my favorite constellations-Orion.

This was taken today, October 9^th 2010 just after six in the morning.

I used our Nikon D70 with a shutter speed of 30" at f4.8 and ISO of 1600.

If you’ve been thinking like we have, you're probably wondering when will the weather get a little warmer.

The wind has been relentless this month. Our Davis weather station located at our home in the Hallmark area of Belmont, has been collecting data since we moved from Barclay Way in 2001. We’ve been broadcasting it live since January 2002 and it receives more hits than any of our other web pages each month.

A recent software upgrade has allowed us to extract data for analysis and this is my first graph. It illustrates the wind at time intervals for the Month of May, 2008—to date.

Notice that there hasn’t been one day so far this month that there hasn’t been any wind between the hours of 12:45 PM to 11:00 PM!

The positive ions wind can create may actually have a negative affect on the body by raising stress levels. Ever wonder why lying near a stream or waterfall feels so relaxing? Moving water creates negative ions which counteract the effects of positive ions created by the wind. Try washing your face with water after a bike ride. We hear it’s not just the coolness of the water that feels so good; it’s the positive ions being cancelled out by negative ones that have a calming effect. Admittedly these articles are not from scientific scholars, but sometimes experiencing something for yourself is all the affirmation one needs.

After awhile, the wind begins to grow a little tiresome and we’re just waiting for a calm mild day—I know a lull before the storm.

Days on Market and Price Received Correlation

Though the nation's mortgage industry is tumultuous at best, the peninsula market in the Bay Area is faring much better.

Last month 17 homes sold as compared to 14 in 2006 and off the high of 25 in 2005. That's a glimpse the market may not be getting too much worse.

Of those 17 sales eight sold over the seller's asking price, two sold at asking and seven homes sold under asking.

The average time it took to sell a home was 39 days. Of the homes which sold over asking however, they took only 18 days to sell and on average sold for 3.61% over what the seller was asking. Seller's which received their asking price took on average 40 days to sell, and homes which sold under the asking price averaged 56 days on the market and sold for 5.26% less than their original asking price.

Clearly, pricing a home correctly remains a crucial factor in getting the most for a home. These numbers illustrates a swing of almost 9% in what a seller received between a home priced to sell quickly and one which lingered on the market.