Grace Keng, CRS, e-pro

The city of Cupertino where the home town of Apple computer and HP. It is famous for the great school systems and expansive homes. The city of Cupertino is updating the housing element of its General Plan. By rezoning land that could accormmodate an additional 1,170 residential units from them there are 813 units are affordable housing through 2014.

The city council has sceduled to review the updated on May 5 2009. The State law requires all California cities to have an adopted General Plan with a housing element that is updated every 5 years. Each city and county receives an allocation of houseing units, broken down by the income categories.The housing department even address the housing according the cliimate change.

According to a Cupertino city staff report, meeting existing and projected housing needs is the most important and controversial requirement in any housing updates. You may read more about it from the www.cupertino.org/housingelement. The above photo is credit http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cupertino,_California

Lessons has learned from the short sales My short sale listing is approved today after 4 months waiting. I learned the following lessons:

1). Authorization letter from the seller: After you received an offer get the seller to write an authorization letter and sent it to the lenders. Yes! All lenders. No one will take to you.

2).The bank will request some information get them all ready and fax to them once please. The bank usually needs : accepted contract, hardship letter from the seller, 2 months pay stubs, 2 months all bank statement, HUD statement.

3). The Bank will will order BPO to appraise the value of the property.

4). After the bank evaluate this case. If they felt is possible then it will move to a negotator. The negotator will contact you. Please work with him or her efficiently. Be nice to them. They work very hard. This one will be your contact to the bank.

5). When the bank approves the short sale., the lising agent need to read the condition carefully and related it with the buyer’s agent. Do your best to close it on time. Durning the waiting period the listing agent should contact the buyer’s agent every now and then. I have a short sale deal the seller’s water was cut off by the city of Campbell. When we did the inspection, we tried to turn on the water. The pipes are broken. We have to add an addendum that the seller will fix all broken pipes. Do ask the title to research any additional liens on the property. We found a 3rd lien on the property one day before the closing before.

San-Jose-City-Hall-Richard-Meier-1 An overview of San Jose Single Family Real Estate market of March 2008 compared to March 2009 shows some interesting economic changes: 1.) The homes inventory dropped to 1012 this year from last year’s 1212. The sold homes number is higher from 298 last March to 456 this year 2.) The average price of San Jose homes this year has dropped to $454,550 from last years’ $758,457. 3.) It takes average 65 days to sell a San Jose home, but last March was 62 days. We have 200 less San Jose homes for sale this year. The good news is that a lot more homes actually sold this year. The average and median price for San Josehomes dropped about 40% this year from last March to this March. All the above information is from the www.reil.com The above photo of city San Jose is located at the downtown of San Jose from www.exuberance.com

Santa Clara Valley in California Single Family Homes Market An overview of Santa Clara County Single Family Real Estate market of March 2008 compared to March 2009 shows some interesting economic changes: 1.) The homes inventory dropped to 5117 this year from last year’s 5520.The sold homes are higher from 583 last March to 721 this year. 2.) The average price of Santa Clara County homes this year reduced to $592,941from last years’ $984,325. The median price on Santa Clara County homes has dropped from $813,750$ to $450,000. 3.) It takes average 65 days to sell a Santa Clara County home, but last March was 55 days. With all the numbers that show we have more Santa Clara County homes for sale and more of them actually sold. The average and median price for Santa Clara County homes dropped about 33-45% from last March 2008 to March 2009. The home price reflected that this year we have much more stressed sale which could be short sales and REO home sales. The above information is from the www.reil.com and the above photo is from interpro.com/Main/about/about.htm

Cupertino real estate trend March 2009Look at the left graph you can see March 2009 is the right most bar and the 1st from the left bar was the Cupertino homes for sale in March 2008. An overview of Cupertino’s Single Family Real Estate market of March 2008 compared to March 2009 shows some interesting economic changes: 1.) The Cupertino homes inventory rose to 127 this year from last year’s 65.The sold homes are lower from 23 last March to 9 this year. 2.) The average price of Cupertino homes this year has lowered to $1,170,465 from last years’ $1,311,979. The median price on Cupertino homes has dropped from $1,185,000$ to $1,050,000. 3.) It takes average 28 days to a Cupertino home, but last March was 24 days. With all the numbers that show we have more Cupertino homes for sale and less of them actually sold. The average and median price for Cupertino homes dropped about 9- 10% from last March to this March.