Havasu inventory up and so are Prices...

[bigq]

This is happening all over. Huge inventories and slow sales, but prices are still going up. interesting to say the least.
There are almost 1,100 single-family homes on the market in Lake Havasu City, the largest number of homes for sale in about three years.
The Havasu Real Estate Report issued monthly by Carl Flusche of Flusche Realty, shows 965 homes in the single-family residential zone in March, another 67 for sale in the residential-estate zoning, 16 in residential-agricultural zone and 20 model homes.
“There's no simple answer, other than we have more homes on the market than buyers,” said Flusche. “We're starting the summer season so we'll probably have a few good months and hopefully sell off some of this inventory.”
Home prices are on the rise as well, with the average price for a single-family home selling for $307,383. That's up 23 percent from last year when the average price was $250,908. And the average price of a newly constructed home with land is $392,546.
Meanwhile vacant lot costs are also moving higher, as the average costs of a vacant R-1 lot year-to-date is $145,292 and a residential-estate lot is selling for an average of $234,646.
The upward trend comes on the heels of the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation's announcement that mortgage rates jumped to their highest level in four years last month, with 30-year fixed rates averaging 6.53 percent. In 2005 30-year fixed rate loans were averaging 5.80 percent.
Meanwhile California home sales fell in March, the sixth month in a row of slumping sales in that state. A total of 54,500 single-family homes and condominiums sold, down 12.5 percent from the same time last year.
It's conventional wisdom among builders and Realtors that Lake Havasu City follows the trends of southern California, generally six months to one year later. But Bill Ullery with DBU Homes said slumping California sales and higher Havasu lot costs have not slowed local construction.
“With the increase in the price of lots here, the type of house that's going up is quite different now. You don't put a $120,000 house on a $170,000 lot,” said Ullery. “Our business is almost all large custom luxury homes now.”
Flusche said he's also seeing an increasing number of local sales in the $300,000 to $500,000 range with a surprising number selling over $500,000.
Ullery added that while construction of high-end homes stays steady, it's the low-to-moderate income buyers that are getting squeezed out of the local market, with higher home prices more of a factor than rising interest rates.
“My sense is that a lot of the customers coming in from southern California, about two-thirds of our market, are coming in with adequate financial resources,” Ullery said.
Instead low-to-moderate income buyers seem to be moving north, Ullery said, and many Lake Havasu City residents mirroring the actions of the Southern Californians - selling their Havasu home high and buying a bigger home cheaper in the proposed subdivisions in the unincorporated areas of Mohave County, Bullhead City or Kingman.

[C-2]

And I saw an RV salesman on the news today, telling everybody $5.00 per gallon will have zero impact on RV sales and they expect a record setting year.......

[Jyruiz]

I am all for Havi prices going up. :)

[Kilrtoy]

I disagree somewhat, I am seeing house prices falling, albeit bigger houses are now more common ....

[bigq]

Out of Riverside yet C-2?

[Sleek-Jet]

And I saw an RV salesman on the news today, telling everybody $5.00 per gallon will have zero impact on RV sales and they expect a record setting year.......
He's probably right.
Since I don't drive my RV everyday, it really doesn't hurt (well ok, a little) that it costs a C-note more to fill it up. I want to use it, so I pay the penalty and go drive it, at 3.00/gal at least. 5.00/gal might give me a little pause.

[Throttle]

just tryin to help the economy out there... can't wait till my house is completed

[RiverOtter]

Interesting read. In the FL panhandle prices are down and inventory is WAY up. In TN, NC, SC prices are way up from investors moving away from hurricane worries to the mountains.

[Hardly Satisfied]

THROTTLE When will your house be done??

[Freak]

People still have the mindset that their home will only go up in value and they can still get top dollar on the sale. That will change soon.

[KREGER]

I am doing more loans for Lots than homes YTD in Havasu. If you guys did not know, we can go as little as 5% down on a 5 year Interest only Lot Loan up to a $400K loan amount. You could buy the median lot in Havasu for less than 10K down OAC. :)
I think one thing RV's and Havasu have in common are the people who make up that market have larger resources to make purchases and are not affected by trends. Another example is Palm Springs CA. There is a high number of people who come in to town and pay cash. :mad: :)
THROTTLE where are you building at? We have a place up Palo Verde North. Congrats on that! :)

[yamamoto]

I am doing more loans for Lots than homes YTD in Havasu. If you guys did not know, we can go as little as 5% down on a 5 year Interest only Lot Loan up to a $400K loan amount. You could buy the median lot in Havasu for less than 10K down OAC. :)
I think one thing RV's and Havasu have in common are the people who make up that market have larger resources to make purchases and are not affected by trends. Another example is Palm Springs CA. There is a high number of people who come in to town and pay cash. :mad: :)
THROTTLE where are you building at? We have a place up Palo Verde North. Congrats on that! :)
5% down & interest only (in a low interest rate environment) doesn't seem like "larger resources" to me. It seems like a 2nd home or a speculative property

[KREGER]

They buy the lots for the second homes. With a small down they have more liquid to move on the a construction phase. We are on the same page. I seperated the paragraphs for a reason. The first pargraph was an FYI. Thanks

[HM]

People still have the mindset that their home will only go up in value and they can still get top dollar on the sale. That will change soon.
Real estate always goes up. It will have short periods were prices go down, but it always goes UP. People seem to think that there is no way real estate can keep going up, and they have been saying that for 30-40 years and longer. People have no idea the power of inflation and real estate has a fixed supply (they stopped making land a while back) and a constantly growing demand.

[KREGER]

What HolyMoly said :)

[572Daytona]

With the cost of building materials and fuel to transport them going up I see new home prices rising which will also bring up the price of resales. Also if they ever do figure out a way to reduce the number of illegals, I see the price of labor going up too which will also bring up the price of new homes.

[Wmc]

I work for Provident Bank Mortgage in Rancho Cucamonga, CA. We recently received our licensing to do loans in Arizona & Nevada. We offer 100% financing on 2nd Home purchases. So if you need some help please do not hesitate to call me or PM me for some pricing.
Thanks, Wendi
951-990-0328
www.pbmwholesale.com
"Your 50 year Amortized Lender"

[Havasu Cig]

I am doing more loans for Lots than homes YTD in Havasu. If you guys did not know, we can go as little as 5% down on a 5 year Interest only Lot Loan up to a $400K loan amount. You could buy the median lot in Havasu for less than 10K down OAC. :)
I think one thing RV's and Havasu have in common are the people who make up that market have larger resources to make purchases and are not affected by trends. Another example is Palm Springs CA. There is a high number of people who come in to town and pay cash. :mad: :)
THROTTLE where are you building at? We have a place up Palo Verde North. Congrats on that! :)
Yeah, they are paying cash from home equity loans from the California houses. :rolleyes:

[Havasu Cig]

Real estate always goes up. It will have short periods were prices go down, but it always goes UP. People seem to think that there is no way real estate can keep going up, and they have been saying that for 30-40 years and longer. People have no idea the power of inflation and real estate has a fixed supply (they stopped making land a while back) and a constantly growing demand.
But it cycles, and you have to be able to make the payments through the down cycle. When the market dropped in the early 90's my dad had to hold onto some stuff for a long time before it came back. Other stuff he dumped at a loss because it was not worth holding. On top of this there was not the "creative" financing like there is now.

[HM]

But it cycles, and you have to be able to make the payments through the down cycle. When the market dropped in the early 90's my dad had to hold onto some stuff for a long time before it came back. Other stuff he dumped at a loss because it was not worth holding. On top of this there was not the "creative" financing like there is now.
Agreed - survival is the name of the game. My brother lost his house in the early 90's in Huntington Beach because he was not prepared to survive. He put $300K down on an $800K house and five years later the value dropped to $500K and his loan was due (he had a 30 due in 5 which was the loan flavor of that decade). He was not able to get 100% financing and walked. Now, that house is worth over $3 million. Even if that house adjusts now at 50%, it is still worth more in this valley than it was in the previous peak.
Today, there are lots of financing tools (creative financing as you put it) to help people survive. Also, people who put little to no money down on homes are in a better negotiation position to survive as the lender does not want to lose their ass foreclosing on these types of loans. They would rather foreclose on all the people with enough equity to make the foreclosure profitable. Personally, I like the lender to be more nervous about their money than I am.

[westcoastcat]

I have a question for you guys…
We want to buy a house in Havasu, but my husband says we should wait till this winter to do it.
Do you see any benefits to this, like lower prices or more selections?

[yamamoto]

Real estate always goes up. It will have short periods were prices go down, but it always goes UP. People seem to think that there is no way real estate can keep going up, and they have been saying that for 30-40 years and longer. People have no idea the power of inflation and real estate has a fixed supply (they stopped making land a while back) and a constantly growing demand.
I agree real estate is a great long term investment, but the cost of housing can only rise as long as there is something to support it. Demand itself is not enough to support it. Income and more importantly affordability is what is necessary to support the real estate market.
The real estate market and the stock market are very efficient at pricing themselves appropriately over the long term, but we do run into periods of inefficient pricing in the short term. While the prices on real estate have doubled in the past 5 years, I don't think the average household income has doubled in the past 5 years. So there could be a good chance that prices move sideways for a long time, or decline to come in line with affordability. The creative financing that has been going on over the past few years will financially crush many families, once the honeymoon period of there loan expires and the loan fully indexes and ammortizes.

[KREGER]

Right what he said..
Do not buy over your head!
Also, never sell it once you have it. You do not have to sell to use money from your property in other investments. There are countless benifits you can reap from property.. Investing in the stock market does not make your income taxes go away :)

[CBadDad]

This is happening all over. Huge inventories and slow sales, but prices are still going up. interesting to say the least.
This is interesting, but as I read the article, I wonder how the prices would break down when averaged per square foot? Are prices really rising?

[Wake Havasu]

"...a lot of the customers coming in from southern California, about two-thirds of our market,..."
Two thirds of the Havi deal is because of the damn CFers!

[CARLSON-JET]

This is interesting, but as I read the article, I wonder how the prices would break down when averaged per square foot? Are prices really rising?
This is a very interesting point.
I am one to call a spade a spade as I see it. This is a similar situation that happened during the last big fall when the Lincoln savings & loan problem occurred. But IMO a much larger scale.
The banks own most of the houses and if all goes to H E double hockey sticks, fore closers start to happen. The banks do not have to make a mortgage payment or pony up ridiculous fore closure fees.
The banks will once again sell to the larger corporate bidders for 10 to 30 cents on the dollar instead of the common folks who have to jump through a lot of red tape. That's right.... After the feds got tired of lenders trying to qualify new buyers on fore closed homes @ 100% value they gave up and let big corps move in @ well below market value. That was another major wealth shift in this nation.
I personally like to use minimum wage as a reference point for real earnings. With this in mind, what has the average wage earner gained in the last 10 years? what has the housing market done? the numbers do not match up.
Sure you can point out CEO's making 400 million but they do not own 90% of the housing. You might also consider your home rising in value as income. But when the bank owns 50, 60 or maybe 90% of it's value that is not personal gain if fore closed upon.
California does not represent even close to 25% of the housing in this country. Nor does Cal. represent 25% of the income in this country. But it seems to have a rather large domino effect on the rest of the nation.
I have not covered all specific bases but IMO this is a basic gist of what I have noticed in the last 20 years. Please don't take this as a bash at California as I know the average joe has 0 control of the economy. Also, If my facts are way out of touch please let me in on what really happened during that era.
I feel If you are not rich, start tightening your belt. We are in for a bad fall. R.B.

[haulina29]

572 hit the nail on the head supply and demand wasnt the only reason real estate sky rocketed in the last 5 years materials have also gone thru the roof and until they come back down prices will remain high it will also help the resale market . Chekout the price on a roll of 12-2 romex or simpson hardware even a sheet of 1/2 inch struc one plywood dont look for these prices to ever return to where they were 5 years ago . With the cost of energy and the inflation it brings things will remain high also during times of high inflation existing homes do very well as far as appreciation goes , :argue:

[Freak]

The corruption never ceases to amaze me and a taste of things to come, I daresay. These people aren't building wealth. They're looting their customers, employees, and shareholders.
One of Bush's largest donors...now he gets to be..
Ambassador! Yeah...
You've been living in a dream world Neo.......
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
May 3, 2006 -- Billionaire Roland Arnall, who built Ameriquest into the largest mortgage lender for poor credit risks, is shutting down most of his company to focus on being the new U.S. ambassador to the Netherlands.
The embattled firm yesterday said it's closing 229 branch offices, firing 3,800 mortgage staffers, and consolidating into just five call centers.
Arnall, 67, earned his $3 billion fortune lending money at high rates to the 50 million Americans with poor credit. He was one of the top 10 donors to President Bush.
In the bloodbath yesterday employees were assembled in their offices with security guards and fired en masse by a telephone recording from Ameriquest CEO Aseem Mital.
"It was cold, and short and sweet - we were told to turn in our keys, empty our desks and get out by the end of the day," said mortgage broker Carl Edgett, one of nine brokers left jobless in the firm's South Ferry, Conn., office.
"If we had questions about our severance and commissions due us, we were told to call a number - but when we called it was just an answering service's voicemail box."
Included in the shutdown was the sister mortgage chain, Town & Country, whose branches have ceased to opereate.
http://www.nypost.com/business/67937.htm

[Freak]

Real estate always goes up. It will have short periods were prices go down, but it always goes UP. People seem to think that there is no way real estate can keep going up, and they have been saying that for 30-40 years and longer. People have no idea the power of inflation and real estate has a fixed supply (they stopped making land a while back) and a constantly growing demand.
Well we are entering interesting uncharted territory now. We are on starting a down cycle and the high cost of enery will affect home prices. Let's just say in 2008 gas is 7 bucks a gallon. Do you think the homes in the country are going to get top dollar or are the homes closer in to the city and work will? I think less and less people are going to be able to afford the commute. People are pawning stuff now for gas. Those houses will be listed with few buyers. Now homes closer in should jump. So saying real estate will always go up might not be the right thing to say anymore. We shall see...
Now that I think about it I have read where some mid western states are giving land away free just trying to get people to move there. Real estate always goes up? I don't think you can say that.

[Havasu Cig]

Right what he said..
Do not buy over your head!
Also, never sell it once you have it. You do not have to sell to use money from your property in other investments. There are countless benifits you can reap from property.. Investing in the stock market does not make your income taxes go away :)
Yes, but the money you make in the stock market is real money that you don't have to pay back when you cash some out. The stock market has payed for a lot of our boats, and I don't have a home equity loan to pay back because of it.

[callbob4homes]

I work for Provident Bank Mortgage in Rancho Cucamonga, CA. We recently received our licensing to do loans in Arizona & Nevada. We offer 100% financing on 2nd Home purchases. So if you need some help please do not hesitate to call me or PM me for some pricing.
Thanks, Wendi
951-990-0328
www.pbmwholesale.com
"Your 50 year Amortized Lender"
50 YEARS? kinda like a 20 year note on a boat or RV IMO. May get ya in, but won't get ya out.
Interesting times now for sure