Not every neighborhood in Irvine is well planned. In fact, the section of El Camino Real between Yale and Jeffrey is rather poorly planned, and the property values suffer there as a result.
Asking Price: $559,000
Address: 4882 Flagstar Circle, Irvine, CA 92604
Subdivisions — Rush
Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown
Most of the Villages of Irvine are very well planned. The Irvine Homes blog recently featured my Community Profile of Deerfield. It is a little known but extremely well-planned community.
Deerfield is north of Woodbridge bounded by Irvine Center Drive,
Culver Drive, Yale Avenue and the rail line which bisects Irvine.
Deerfield Avenue is the main collector street moving traffic throughout
the community. There is an apartment complex at the corner of Irvine
Center and Culver, and there is other high-density housing north of
Deerfield Avenue near the railroad tracks. The remaining housing is a
mixture of one and two story dwellings. Deerfield was one of the
earlier communities developed. It’s buildout was complete in 1976.
Life in Deerfield revolves around the large community park. This
park together with an elementary and middle school comprise a large
central greenspace. There are a series of pathways linking three
satellite parks to the community park. This is a great master plan
which allows children to walk or bike to school or the park without
crossing busy streets.
Another important feature of Deerfield is the way vehicular circulation is handled. There is no property in Deerfield that requires you to drive by more than 20 houses before you reach a collector street which leads you to a main arterial. Most people do not notice subtleties like that, but it is important from both a traffic standpoint and an aesthetic one. Driving past 100 or more garage doors while traveling to or from your property is often a traffic nightmare, and it is never an attractive journey.
{book2}
There are some communities in Irvine that are not very well planned. As mentioned in the introduction to this post, El Camino Real is one of them.
Subdivisions like this are created because they are very cost efficient. Long straight double-loaded streets in a grid formation with a minimum of intersections provides the biggest lot yield with the lowest possible cost. That is why you see grids with long streets in old neighborhoods. Builders and developers could not care less about how ugly neighborhoods like this are because they want to produce houses for the lowest possible cost in order to maximize their profits. It is only in master-planned communities where developers believe they can obtain a premium for good planning where you will see layouts other than generic grids.
The map above is the section of El Camino Real between Yale and Jeffrey. At the bottom right of the subdivision, there is a street called Dahlquist. Imagine you live in the middle of that street, and you want to go somewhere. How many turns do you make and how many houses do you pass before you exit the subdivision on either Walnut or Yale? I count at least three internal intersections plus at least one 90 degree turn before coming to the intersections at either Yale or Walnut. Plus, I don’t see a route where you would pass less than 80 driveways on your way out. Scroll back up to the Deerfield map and look how much different (better) the street layout is.
When you drive around this section of El Camino Real, you also notice a lack of street trees or consistent landscape maintenance. Also, over time, residents fill up their garages with crap, and acquire vehicles for teenagers, so the driveways and streets are always full of cars. You don’t get a warm fuzzy feeling driving through neighborhoods like that. Of course, the flipside is that you have no HOA to deal with: no fees and no hassles. The lots and the houses on them are among the largest in Irvine. If you hate HOAs and you want the biggest house on the biggest lot for the least amount of money, El Camino Real is the neighborhood for you.
El Camino Real was planned and built out before Donald Bren bought the Irvine Ranch and committed to utilizing superior community planning to create the Irvine premium. Obviously Donald Bren’s plan has been very successful, and it has justified the additional expense for creative street patterns and additional acreage in parks.
Asking Price: $559,000
Income Requirement: $139,750
Downpayment Needed: $111,800
Monthly Equity Burn: $4,658
Purchase Price: $649,000
Purchase Date: 2/28/2006
Address: 4882 Flagstar Circle, Irvine, CA 92604
| Beds: | 4 |
| Baths: | 2 |
| Sq. Ft.: | 1,202 |
| $/Sq. Ft.: | $465 |
| Lot Size: | 5,500
Sq. Ft. |
| Property Type: | Single Family Residence |
| Style: | Contemporary/Modern |
| Stories: | 1 |
| Year Built: | 1971 |
| Community: | El Camino Real |
| County: | Orange |
| MLS#: | S575268 |
| Source: | SoCalMLS |
| Status: | Active |
| On Redfin: | 1 day |
You will fall in love with this home! It has a very cozy feel to it.
This is a beautiful newly remodeled property!! This home is turnkey and
ready for a great family. Seller just spent $50,000 to remodel/upgrade
inside and out. New kitchen, paint, carpet, landscape, etc etc. No one
has lived in it since the work was done. It is a very family oriented
cul-de-sac. Desirable central Irvine location in award winning Irvine
School District, near many parks, shops, library and easy freeway
access. No HOA or Mello roos and low tax rate. All appliances (brand
new stainless steel fridge) come with the home. This will be a lovely
home for a nice family.
| Foreclosure Record | |
| Recording Date: | 02/11/2009 |
| Document Type: | Notice of Sale (aka Notice of Trustee’s Sale) |
| Document #: | 2009000063375 |
This property was purchased on 2/28/2006 for $649,000. The owner used a $519,200 first mortgage, a $129,800 HELOC and a $0 downpayment. If this property sells for its current asking price, and if a 6% commission is paid, the total loss on the property will be $123,540 which basically wipes out the HELOC.
{book4}
Sprawling on the fringes of the city
In geometric order
An insulated border
In between the bright lights
And the far unlit unknown
Growing up it all seems so one-sided
Opinions all provided
The future pre-decided
Detached and subdivided
In the mass production zone
Nowhere is the dreamer
Or the misfit so alone
Subdivisions —
In the high school halls
In the shopping malls
Conform or be cast out
Subdivisions —
In the basement bars
In the backs of cars
Be cool or be cast out
Any escape might help to smooth
The unattractive truth
But the suburbs have no charms to soothe
The restless dreams of youth
Subdivisions — Rush
Those pictures really look like old printed circuit diagrams.
“That is why you see grids with long streets in old neighborhoods. Builders and developers could not care less about how ugly neighborhoods like this are because they want to produce houses for the lowest possible cost in order to maximize their profits. It is only in master-planned communities where developers believe they can obtain a premium for good planning where you will see layouts other than generic grids.”
I thought that older areas tended to be on grids because they were built in flat areas with no particular views. More recently, the flat, easy to build parcels in LA/OC are mostly used. That leaves places with lots of topography. In such places grids are harder to build, and careful street layout can produce much better views for more homes.
It seems like a safety concern has also become more prominent, and winding streets encourage slower speeds.
Part of it is how they were used before they got turned into housing.
Most of the housing in OC was at one time farmland. Farmers like square fields and straight roads. Square fields and straight roads beget……..straight streets when they are further subdivided.
Also, previous to laser leveling equipment in the early 1980’s, it was difficult to properly grade a curved road to grade. Today it’s a slam dunk.
Old subdivisions were built as a grid almost entirely due to cost. It has only been over the last 30 years that municipalities started exercising the power they have with giving discretionary approvals and forced builders and developers to be more creative and make better communities. If left on their own, builders and developers would create and endless series of perfectly efficient grids. Homebuilders consider their task a manufacturing process, and they want to stamp out cookie-cutter homes at the lowest possible cost to maximize their profits.
You really think the builders are more creative? Or do they just churn out more stuff which looks pretty much alike, but is laid out differently?
I think they have become more creative out of need, but mostly they do churn out the same stuff with slight modifications.
Somehow I strongly doubt that local governments are better at planning neighborhoods than developers are, when the developers stand to gain a lot of money by truly maximizing the profit per square mile (not just by cutting costs, but by developing homesites that can command a premium.)
Grids are a lot more walkable. Who cares how far somebody with a car has to drive? Making people driving around a neighborhood in a car is the antithesis of good neighborhood design. Confining people and kids to a little area is not good either.
That kitchen window placement looks odd. The water on the countertop next to the sink is all going to go down the window sill seam -not to mention that any splash is going to make spots on the window without even trying. Who thought to skip the backsplash near the most important section of the counter for a backsplash (the sink)? So often I see that sellers spend money fixing a place up they way THEY want, and they expect new owners to pay for their (sometimes) poor taste? Bad idea. Even if their taste is neutral, perhaps a new owner would rather fix it up – -and arrange it – -more to their liking (e.g., I don’t think it makes energy sense to put a fridge right next to an oven- -common sense – -yet I see houses, even new construction, with that arrangement, presumably b/c they are too cheap to wire the kitchen so the appliances can be located sensibly). If the kitchen was a disaster, they should have just priced it accordingly. This isn’t like 2006 where a seller like this needs to keep up with the other sellers with granite, etc. – unless (obviously) all they are doing is to get “top dollar.”
You are right, that is by far the oddest looking kitchen window. Some contractor somewhere is hoping nobody ever finds out about this “remodel” they performed for this person. Look at the outlet covers as well, they look like they were cut in half. Something is fishy about this photo.
Danger: replying to my own e-mail. My bad the outlets are turned sideways, I am hoping.
Every time I see a place like this, I think of the same thing. Do I really want to be the last guy to date a dime-a-dance hooker after she has been sprayed with her final shot of toilet water for the evening? Gauwd. The place is a dump. A gussied-up dump is worse than a plain old dump.
Nice yards even though back yard is a bit small. OK location as well. But, 4 bed in 1200 sf , rooms must be tiny.
$350-$425k.
This home at $387/Sq. Ft.: $465,258
There seems to be a bit of a gap between the seller list ppsf and the actual sold ppsf.
I lived in a similar sized home in “The Ranch” and it’s not that bad. The rooms weren’t gigantic, but it was plenty for a family of four.
I’m calling $275K. Maybe not yet, but give it four more years.
Maybe that low, but maybe not. The nice things about this neighborhood is the lot size and lack of HOA. Let’s face it, they’re dumping 2,800 sf houses on smaller lots and asking 3x the price. At least for me, living in So. Cal., the outside space is the premium. Put a fence or courtyard in front for the kids to play, BBQ and Jacuzzi in back, and it’s a perfect starter home
Reporters have a formula for writing “sympathy” pieces. Unfortunately, these don’t work well when it comes to foreclosure stories and the real estate bubble because they all leave out the massive amount of mortgage equity withdrawal that preceded the foreclosure.
Foreclosure in Orange County: ‘Like a death’
I, along with dozens of others, commented on our lack of sympathy for the Brixley’s for having a fifth child when they were already in financial distress (by their own reported timeline of events), and got pregnant with a SIXTH child as they were in the process of losing the home!
Maybe it’s just my computer, but when I went back later, I couldn’t see ANY comments. Where they removed? I think the OCR wanted to generate sympathy, but people seemed outraged over those parents choices!
“A new state law in October has mostly delayed foreclosures, not prevented them, some experts believe.”
Finally someone acknowledged this fact.
“The Brixeys never saw it coming.
Since a bank repossessed their Ladera Ranch house in March 2008, the family — Jaxsen, 9, Mia, 7, Ashtynn, 5, Brielle, 3, Peyten, 2, and Cyrus, 11 months, along with mom Sunny, 33, and dad Jereme, 34 — remains adrift and uncertain about where they’ll eventually end up.”
I know I should be feeling bad for these folks, and the last thing they need is someone poking fun, but I can’t help myself. All their names sound like strippers or adult film stars!
“…mom Sunny, 33, and dad Jereme, 34 — remains adrift and uncertain about where they’ll eventually end up.”
What is there to be uncertain about? I am quite certain they will end up in a rental that is not as comfortable as the house they are vacating. Their lifestyle will change dramatically, and they will learn to live without the things they believe they are entitled to. It is the same faux uncertainty that every other homedebtor facing foreclosure is dealing with.
Exactly. The uncertainty is in whether or not they are going to be able to hold out before they fall off the gravy wagon.
“A new state law in October has mostly delayed foreclosures, not prevented them, some experts believe.”
No kidding. So if these so-called experts were to believe that the state law would prevent foreclosures, tell me, how would honest paying mortgage holders feel (and there are A LOT MORE OF THEM)?
OK, gentlemen, get your wallets ready. Next up, on center stage, Briellllllle! [queue Def-L Pour Some Sugar]
———————————————–
BURNING SAVINGS
Less than a year and a half ago, Palmer was making $70,000 as a property manager and living in the condo he bought in 2000 for $198,000.
A health issue he declined to discuss forced him to take out an adjustable-rate home-equity loan to pay for drugs that weren’t covered by insurance.
In January 2007, Palmer got a letter from his lender telling him his mortgage was going up to $2,850 per month. The higher payments started depleting his savings.
Then, in June 2007, his mortgage payment was adjusted upward again, to $3,550.
Palmer couldn’t afford it.
————————————————-
Something about this is not adding up. We are conveniently not being given all the pieces to the puzzle. Most suspicious of all is this “medical condition” that Mr. Palmer is “declining” to discuss. Why decline to discuss it? Why allow yourself to be interviewed by a reporter if you are not willing to be open about your situation?
What are these drugs that were not covered by the evil insurance company? Why were they not covered? How expensive were they? How much money did he withdraw from his house ATM in all?
His mortgage jumped way up – he must have taken out a lot of money. I find it very hard to believe that all that money was spent on “drugs” especially if he is now able to survive on meager unemployment checks. It seems like too convenient of an excuse to blame the health insurance company.
Is there more to this story than meets the eye?
He was paying 12% on his initial mortgage. That should tell us something.
True. It did strike me as pretty high.
Skeletons in the credit closet?
————————
ENDURING HOMELESSNESS
http://www.crackthecode.us/images/brixley_fam.jpg
The Brixeys never saw it coming.
Their financial slide was gradual.
Jereme graduated from UC Irvine’s MBA program in 2004. He and his wife were hopeful that the degree would lead to a bump in his salary
That didn’t happen.
http://www.crackthecode.us/images/horror.jpg
Jereme was unable to maintain stable work for more than a year.
He eventually began working as a real estate agent
Sunny admits she had dollar signs in her eyes after the value of the house reached $890,000
They reasoned they could capitalize on the hot real estate market by using the cash to pay off Jereme’s $70,000 in student loans, lease a second car and pay off medical bills.
“We desperately looked for a rental and nothing seemed to work out,” Sunny said.
the Brixeys admit that they got sucked into making quick decisions
Jereme’s income as a Realtor dried up.
the family of seven — soon to be eight — had depleted its savings.
one of their cars was repossessed. The second car was taken a month later.
The slide continued until the Brixey family was homeless.
The family has bounced from one place to the next
————————
These two misfits need to find something to do with their spare time other than make babies. Why would you keep having children when you are struggling to get by and drowning in debt?
This is your typical dumbass couple, full of “hope” and pollyanna optimism and totally absent of common sense; mooching off of friends and family and trying to maintain lifestyles that they cannot afford because of their irresponsible choices.
The guy spends 70K to get an MBA all so he can become a real-estate agent? WTF? You don’t need an MBA to do that.
This is classic “path to wealth” vs “path to poverty”. A couple of bubble chasers.
Feel sorry for the kids. Fortunately, it looks like these two parents have quite the network of people to support them while they wait for the next bubble to come along.
It just goes to show you, an MBA doesn’t guarantee intellect. This poor SOB has NO HOPE IN LIFE. He’s up to his eyeballs in debt, with 7 other mouths to feed. If I were him, I wouldn’t even want to get out of bed each morning.
This man is the apitimy of stupidity.
epitome
I think that was an intentional misspelling.
My comment from our forums:
“Jereme graduated from UC Irvine’s MBA program in 2004. He and his wife were hopeful that the degree would lead to a bump in his salary in his field of wireless consulting. (dumb decision #1)
That didn’t happen.
Because of volatility in the business, Jereme was unable to maintain stable work for more than a year.
He eventually began working as a real estate agent (dumb decision #2) — a common line of work in Ladera, where home prices ballooned until 2006.
The family also dipped into savings from selling their Ladera Ranch home in June 2005. (dumb decision #3)
Sunny admits she had dollar signs in her eyes after the value of the house reached $890,000 in 2005 — $440,000 more than the purchase price four years earlier.
They reasoned they could capitalize on the hot real estate market by using the cash (dumb decision #4) to pay off Jereme’s $70,000 in student loans, lease a second car and pay off medical bills.
At the time, friends in the red-hot mortgage industry suggested (listening—dumb decision #5) that the couple do 100-percent financing for a $700,000 house just a couple blocks away from the one they just sold. They ended up buying that house in 2005. (dumb decision #6)
“We desperately looked for a rental and nothing seemed to work out,” Sunny said.”
.
Could these people have done anything more wrong? Every decision they made was stupid, and I find it hard to have much sympathy for them.
Idiots like this are giving the MBA program in Irvine a bad name. I wouldn’t hire this guy to manage a McDonalds.
“We desperately looked for a rental and nothing seemed to work out,” Sunny said.”
I think that line says it all. Who can’t find anything to rent that only needs to “work out”, after desperate searching? They couldn’t find a place that paid them to live in it, the way that they fell into a big pile of money from their first house.
Seems like they burned through that $440k rather quickly (spending $100k per year with zero investment returns?). Like the NYT story of woe last week, there appears to be more to it that is hidden away.
Is this a real case history?
The guy’s field is “wireless consulting”. Does he design wireless networks for major companies or is he a sales clerk at a T-Mobile store, or some such place? My bet is the latter, since becoming a RE agent is clearly a step up for the guy.
Obviously, the wife is not employed and can’t think of anything better to do with her life than pump out babies. Dummies sitting at home breeding more dummies.
What just floors me is that we blame the flagrant credit abuse on a lack of government regulation and oversight. Hooey!! It was government intervention in our economy, specifically Fed easy money policies to goose the economy in combo with the multitude of housing programs designed to make homes affordable to anyone that we’ve promulgated over the past 80 years, that created this situation. Things reached a head in the 200s because our leaders decided to “go for broke” in promoting debt creation and asset inflation as the main (and really ONLY) drivers of the economy.
The government continues to enable and encourage people like those depicted here. Another wave of defaults is setting up right now, for the FHA is underwriting another massive batch of corrupt loans for marginal buyers, with the help of the $8000 tax credit for first time home buyers.
Our government uses its taxing authority and power to drive the economy by means of policy, to enable the incredible credit abuse and personal lack of responsibility of people like this.
The government will do whatever it takes to maintain “order” and keep the masses busy with “jobs” so that they will not bother the owners of America who are hoarding all the wealth for themselves and their puppets in the government.
We must create jobs so that all those disgruntled middle-class carnies don’t have time to march on Washington and protest the government’s engaging in stupid wars, breaking laws, and curtailing the rights of its citizens under false notions of “protection”.
So open up those credit lines, we need to get these cows shopping again so that we can get back to torturing our prisoners within in the peace and quiet of our offshore gulags.
MOO
Are you serious? Not sure where you are going with this. “Keeping the masses busy with jobs” does not make a bit of sense to me. Are you suggesting the government should just come right out and foot the bill for everything? Oh boy, think of all the free time we will have to waste time blogging, not about Irvine housing but about the “owners of America hoarding all the money”.
C’mon Dave your smarter than this.
Hold it, guys, guys, guys!
Stop blaming the government for promoting a culture of spend, spend, spend, of irresponsibilities, of no moral compass.
Who elected a guy with a barely passing C average in his years at Yale MBA?
Who rewarded him a second term, for a total of 8 years? Enough time for him to wreck the whole country?
Who keep on voting for the other clowns in DC to stay in their comfy, lobbyist-sponsored offices?
US, the American public
Because we were stupid.
Because every election is to us a popularity contest. We vote for the guy because we feel comfortable going out to have a beer with the guy, remember? He’s so normal, so down-to-earth.
So start blaming us.
Because we are all sheep, happily to be led to the slaughterhouse.
As I stated in the forums, those FHA loans with 3.5-5% downpayments are really the new subprime loans waiting to happen.
I did FEMBA there back in ’01. Quit because I realized that UCI MBA graduates on average were making only high 5 figures.
Unless you’re in HBS, Wharton or one of those top 10 business schools, forget about getting a bump in anything except perhaps debt.
Amen to that. Everyone thinks the MBA is the big ticket to business success, especially my fellow nerdy engineers; they believe it’s the easy way to transition away from engineering and into the business side of things where the real money can be made. (Nelson says ha-HA!)
The sad thing is that despite the meltdown in the financial industry, I still can’t keep track of all my friends who are still pursuing an MBA with the hopes of working in the finance/banking industry and getting away from engineering.
The problem with engineering is that it is getting tremendously competitive and complex. Forget the H1Bs and oversea competitions. The complexity of new products and specs are enough to throw any senior engineers in a loop. Couple with the fact that, as you get older, your brain isn’t as good as it used to be and you get the picture on why some engineers are trying to get away from it all.
Unfortunately, that’s where the current steady money is (even with layoffs).
George W. Bush showed that an MBA is bs.
Maybe he wanted to minimize his tax liability with all the kid tax credits? haha
When is the media gonna run a story on someone like me, who doesn’t like renting at all. In fact, I hate it! I forced my family to live in a rental (God forbid), NOT because I couldn’t afford to buy, BUT rather because morons like these home-debtors were the tools used by realtors and the lending industry to facilitate this massive Ponzi scheme. As we get further into this debacle, I have less sympathy for these home-debtors.
The quicker these home-debtors get out of our future homes, the quicker we can finally find a true real estate bottom. Until then, it’s like pulling teeth.
Thank You. I have been having to listen to my wife’s family since 2004 pepper us as to when we are going to stop renting.
In 2005, it was “look at all the money you are losing by not buying. Real estate always goes up…”
Now it is “real estate can not go any lower, you need to hurry up and get in before it is too late…”
Plus, I am sick of renting, but not to the point where I am willing to overpay.
At this point the down payment is up to swinging a house and one or two rentals once we get a bottom. But with all the manipulating the government is doing, the bottom could be a long time coming.
Walter … I have been listening to my wife’s family badger me about buying a home for a number of years too. None of them saw this obvious, unsustainable, Ponzi scheme. I don’t take financial advise from my in-laws.
Advice : Those people sensible enough to give good advice are usually sensible enough to give none.
Don’t take advice from anybody who is high on mortgage kool-aid.
People who annoy you about buying are just selfishly trying to convince themselves that they did not make a mistake buy hanging themselves with a mortgage. They want you to go and screw yourself just like they did in order to make themselves feel better.
Whenever anybody asks me when I will buy, I always reply “When it makes sense”.
Very true. I am not taking any of their advice; have not for years and now is not the time to change that policy. The in-laws advice is more an irritant than anything.
Waiting for years to buy a house because I did not want to buy into the Ponzi scheme, this is the real problem.
Dear Walter,
You are good and virtuous, and in a few years’ time will be able to buy anything you like in Irvine. Don’t lose hope!
Sounds like the Blue Fairy in Pinocchio, but this time it’s warranted.
What is truly sad in the majority of these cases are that these “victims” do not know that they do not know.
From their perspective, they are doing everything right; like good little lemmings – wolfing down the ignorance-pie that the government spoon-feeds them.
They have bought into this social contract put forth by the government that dictates how one is to conduct his life by taking on endless debt and making marginal payments for the rest of his life.
Common sense goes in one ear and right out the other as it is immediately dismissed as “Why be so negative?”
The average maturity level on these “victims” is borderline 10th grade. They are still living in a fantasy world bubble where mommy and daddy are insulating them from the outside.
The real victims are the people who played by the rules and exercised a modicum of personal responsibility. The people who asked “Why?” when the government told them to dance like a silly monkey.
Unfortunately, it’s hard to find sob stories about people like that because they are the ones who are faring the best during this depression.
I couldn’t agree with you more, Lee! These stories make me want to vomit. I’m an architect, a business owner, my wife and I drive two paid off cars (one is 13 years old, 200K+ miles) and we’re renting a 1-bed apartment because truly that is what we can “afford” via a conservative allocation of 25% of our net income to monthly housing costs. I’d love to have an OC Register hack come interview me and explain how sad it is in our current status that a responsible professional and business owner has to live life in a ghetto apartment building. Because these scum suck off everyone they know, they put the rest of us in the same boat as themselves.
I agree – lets see some articles on how people who are making an average income and are not facing foreclosure or bankruptcy are actually surviving – how are they making it work – I guarantee they aren’t vacationing in tahiti every year and trading in their car for a new one every other year. Where are those articles – not in the newspaper. But wait, I thought we needed newspapers to give us the truth – yeah right.
I don’t blame you if you’re living in a real apartment building. However, you should be sated that you’re living in a rental SFH unless you overpaid your rent.
Rents rose during the bubble, and now they are falling. Part of the falling rents are due to higher unemployment. At least that’s what most people are saying. However, I still think the increased affordability* brought about by dropping home prices has depressed the demand for rental units — that’s combined with all the real-estate investors/debtors who have had to abandon their hopes of selling their properties and are now renting out their space.
During the bubble, properties were withdrawn from the pool of available housing and held by investors. This decrease in supply drove up rent!
IR has for a long time pointed to the own vs rent price discrepancy as evidence of the bubble. I think he projected that, assuming rents stay flat, the $/sqft where you break even between renting or owning is $250. But what happens when rents drop in half?
When I was looking for an apartment here in Seattle, my wife and I visited one dumpy little place where the overly-talkative property manager admitted to the fact that she had doubled the rents in the past ten years…
*(“increased affordability” should not be confused with actual affordability)
I am one of the grumpy ones who prefer more private land, lower/no HOA fees, etc. However, this entry is a great primer in some of the basics of community planning. Now I have a better idea what to look for and how it could matter.
And I’m one of the grumpy ones who prefer 8 digits in my Vanguard account 🙂
This is the perfect example of one of my biggest architectural pet peeves. Who decided that the most prominent feature of a house should be the ginormous two-car garage? Seriously, in the straight on shot you can’t even see the house, just the garage.
You named one of MY architectural bette noirs as well. In the hinterlands of Chicago, every street looks like a storage facility.
Every newer moderate-to-middle priced subdivision in the outlands of Chicago features houses whose facades are dominated by massive garage doors, possibly because it is the only way the architects could pack in a 2 or 3 car garage beside the house. It was either that, or build a separate garage at the back of the property- too expensive.
I have seen the “alley frontage” developmetns in “planned” cities like Irvine. It shocks me that people can be expected to live like that. Kids are ocassionally run over by a parent backing out of one of the places. I would like to meet the planner.
Frankly I don’t see much planning in Irvine that is not some enhancement to the Irvine Company bottom line. That seems to be all they care about.
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HANGING ON
http://www.crackthecode.us/images/vader2.jpg
Because of an unexpected job loss, Melissa and Bryan Tiffin of Trabuco Canyon haven’t been able to make their $2,900 monthly payment on their first mortgage since March 2008.
http://www.crackthecode.us/images/WillingToNegotiate.jpg
They’ve been paying $1,000 a month on their second mortgage since then as they continue to negotiate with their lender to lower the $2,900 payment.
“We’re sort of in a holding pattern, waiting to see what will happen,” says Melissa Tiffin, 37, a former public relations specialist who is looking for a job while raising three young daughters with her husband, Bryan, 40.
Bryan Tiffin makes a solid salary as a construction executive for Broadcom, but not enough to handily cover all the family expenses.
http://www.crackthecode.us/images/horror.jpg
He and his wife have been forced to sell off some possessions, such as a motorcycle.
Once a month, the Tiffins get free groceries from South County Outreach,
they bought their home for $545,000. It was a not a subprime loan; they got the loan based on two incomes.
They bought their 1,250-square-foot home when the market was near its peak.
They now owe more than it’s worth.
They can downsize, but desperately want to stay.
—————————–
Foreclose IMMEDIATELY, dammit.
They can downsize, but they “don’t want to”. The guy makes a “solid” salary but can’t afford groceries. This couple hung themselves with every last inch of rope that the bank handed to them and now they are trying to strongarm some concessions.
WTF is wrong with this story?
They got the loan on a “dual income” pretense. Anyone remember the bulls on IHB who were all about the dual income loans?
Call out the sheriff.
If they were smart they wouldn’t pay the second mortgage and wait to be kicked out.
They haven’t made a mortgage payment in 14 months, and they receive assistance from an outreach organization … all this despite his “solid salary”. You know, it’s pretty sad when a “solid salary” can’t maintain a 1,250 sqft box in South Orange County.
All this is simply outrageous. Outrageous I say.
GET OUT NOW!
Another point!
A “solid salary” can’t maintain a 1,250 sqft box in Trabuco Canyon. WTF! Think about that. How in the hell are we at, or even close to a bottom in real estate, when you read about schmucks like this hanging on by their fingernails. Our local real estate market is much more distorted than other bubble cities around the country.
When this is all over, we’re gonna look back at this time, and see we were no where near a bottom in prices. Throw your fundamental measuring sticks out the window … they simply don’t matter in this market. That includes rents.
Our real estate prices will (or at least should – provided there is not too much government intervention)fall back to a level commensurate to the importance of our economy on the international level.
Are we exporting goods and services to other regions?
We will soon find out how well our civic planners were at cultivating productive industries over the past decade. Should these industries be many and thriving, then real estate will reflect the infow of well-earned money. If we relied more in the REIC, then its demise will also be reflected in the stabilized home prices – whenever they occur!
I’m of the belief that the world is in a changing process.
I don’t think we’re going back to bubble securitization financing days anytime soon, and even if we do start growing money on trees in the far distant future, it won’t look anything like the scheme that’s unwinding right now. The fundamental factors typically used are Price-to-Rent & Price-to-Income … but are we gonna base these factors on the year 2005, or the prior Ponzi scheme years … say, prior to 1998-ish … some people would say, prior to 1982-ish.
Now, isn’t that NICE… this couple lives in a half-million dollar house, probably have an income 3X what I make, and they are getting free groceries from (I assume) a government-funded entity.
We who are single, childless, and living in rentals can bloody starve on the streets for all anyone cares. Yet we are paying taxes to:
A. Bail out the idiotic financial institutions who lent morons like this 4X their incomes to buy an overpriced junk house;
B. Help the poor distressed f*&# borrower stay in “his” home
C. Feed him and his spouse and kids because they don’t “want” to give up their house they can’t afford.
Well, I don’t want to pay my rent, and I really want to own something. So here, we sit, the Screwed Renters of the world, subsidizing this indulgence through our taxes. If I fail to pay my rent, my landlords will move on me very quickly- I will be out the door with my belongings piled up on the curb within 2 months, but people who over-borrowed can live in their houses without making payments for 6 months or more before the NOD.
Foreclose on these damned people so they can move into a rental and afford their food.
Just to add some perspective, sometimes these subdivisions appear poorly planned, but what may have happened is that the land prices were so high that the builder was forced add additional units which made the layout inefficient. As for the garages, this was the common motif when these houses were built. Garages were a symbol of car ownership, which was a virtue…
For context, I work with an Orange County Property Management Company.
Cheers
I work in the industry as a land planner. I know we have used the excuse of high land prices, and sometimes the municipalities have bought off on the idea, but it is really a matter of maximizing revenue. All bad land planning comes from the basic fact that economically efficient land planning does not create a pleasing environment. To the degree that municipalities allow the economic arguments to win is the degree of ugliness they permit in their jurisdictions.
Just about 35 minutes south of today’s property is this 3000 sq ft 7 yr old home resting on a hill in San Clemente with relative privacy and nice views @ $290 sq. ft. Just listed today on Redfin. No comparison imho.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/San-Clemente/38-Via-Belleza-92673/home/5821473
The common theme in that entire story was “hope”.
Hopefully this… Hopefully that… Lah De Dah…
The levels of wishful thinking that people will engage in is mind-numbing.
Too many years of dumbass parents telling them to “think pothative”.
And I’m sure a lot of stockholders are **hoping** for DJIA to go back to its 14k level 🙂
IrvineRenter,
Maybe this is a dumb question – but what you say that Woodbury’s layout is more similar to Deerfield or El Camino? I know that it was planned to give the feel of easy-walking / convenient access to features such as the park/ central hub and the shopping center nearby, but when I am driving through I do feel like it’s a grid layout with long straight streets that pass several homes. Due to the density, you easily feel as though you are passing more than 20 homes before reaching your next turn. Traveling up Sanctuary or Vintage, for example. Do you consider Woodbury to be extremely well-planned like Deerfield? Thanks.
There are three key differences between Woodbury and El Camino Real:
(1) The streets in Woodbury are not long. A broken grid of short streets is the current compromise land planners strike between efficiency and aesthetics. The grid provides the efficiency and higher yield while the short streets make the layout “cozy” and stops highs-speed driving. If you notice, the short streets in Woodbury almost always terminate in a “T” intersection to break up the sight lines.
(2) You do not see garages in Woodbury. Most of Woodbury is alley-loaded which makes for a much more pleasant street appearance and improved traffic flow. When you drive down a street in El Camino Real, you never know when someone is going to be backing out of a driveway. Since the speeds are higher on the longer streets, this creates safety as well as traffic issues.
(3) The walkability of Woodbury is infinitely better than El Camino Real. You simply do not walk in El Camino Real because at best you have a sidewalk adjacent to the back-of-curb, but often you don’t even get that. Woodbury is very easy to walk because the sidewalks are not broken every 50 feet by a driveway. Also, I would contend that Woodbury does not feel like you are driving by an endless series of houses despite the density because you are not driving by an endless series of driveways.
Grid layout could be very attractive when careful attention in executing the street scene, length, street intersections, focal points, corner parks and town square gathering places.
IR is right about getting to point A to point B should be the most direct and not trapped like a maze grid.
The Neo Traditional Neighborhood and Town Planning concept is also based on a grid but its execution is a place that is exciting and interestion like the Celebration developed by Disney.
The difference between Woodbury and El Camino is obvious and yet both are grid layouts.
Another technique is the modified grid where the street slightly bend like the pattern on a warped netting to improve focal point vista down the street in avoiding the “infinity” focal point. Along the bending road every home will be a focal point for several seconds rather than that poor house at the end of the “T” intersection gets all the glory of all the headlights.
I lived in Celebration for a year. We rented the condo above Max’s Cafe right downtown. It is a fantastic community. Several of their neighborhoods are laid out using a bent grid.
Typo: Above comment should read: “but would you say…”
I like the house, and Talega has both pluses and minuses…but the minuses add up…esp. power lines, Mello Roos, HOAs…and did they ever finish the shopping complexes they started? If not, I’d be worried. We looked at one 1.5 years ago, almost identical to this one, and they couldn’t give it away at 800K asking…their company (he was being transferred) ended up taking it and they sold it for 725K…it had an ocean view as well.
This should have been under Thrifty’s recent post…it didn’t post properly to follow his comment…
there were indications from First American Core Logic that 15-year loans are on the upswing compared to 30 year loans in the refinances that are being done now. So, not everyone’s a dimwit. Funny how those who are still in a position to refinance (i.e. who didn’t buy during the peak or who put a lot of money down) are also those smart enough to recognize the life-time savings advantage of paying off debt faster. (i think this was in the NYTimes Real Estate section).
I love how what is considered a big lot in Irvine is smaller than the smallest permissible lot in Riverside (not counting townhouse/condo type projects). The minimum lot size for a single family residence is 7,000 sq ft in Riverside.
http://www.riversideca.gov/municode/pdf/19/article-5/19-100.pdf
No HOA, now I am kinda interested…
Hard to find an Irvine house without HoA, but will it appreciate from this point? That’s hard to say
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/30871784/
“A survey by Prudential Douglas Elliman released last month found that the median sales price for a home in the Hamptons fell almost 24 percent to $675,000 from the same time a year ago. ”
Isnt is amazing that one can buy a house in the Hamptons for a few bucks more than Irvine…As an Irvine’ite i can pay a million bucks and buy a home that backs to culver. Instead of the ocean the house has a magnificent view of 2 palm trees and the neighbors guest bedroom…I guess IRWD mixes kool aid in the water supply or something.
I just saw a listing in westpark, 19 Belcanto, where the seller increased the price from 650k to 690,000 🙂
“Also, over time, residents fill up their garages with crap, and acquire vehicles for teenagers, so the driveways and streets are always full of cars.”
Is this behavior somehow restricted to people in poorly planned areas, while people in lovely planned areas like Deerfield do something else?
Nobody in Deerfield buys cars for their kids? My experience is that people in OC seem to buy NEW cars for their kids at an alarming rate, regardless of exactly what neighborhood they’re in. And some of the planned areas have the least parking, with ultra short driveways, and very little extra curb space.
Perhaps it’s those HOAs, with the ‘must park your car in your garage’, and planned communities, with few other places to park that avoid piling up crap in the garage, but I think that conspicuous consumption and the over-accumulation of stuff is a common problem, and the usual result is a garage full of shelves and boxes, no matter where you live – curved streets or straight.
IR, I found the above comment to be out of character for you – I didn’t see much in the way of a supporting argument for it. It seems that you rarely criticize people for anything other than their financial behavior. What brought this on?
“Perhaps it’s those HOAs, with the ‘must park your car in your garage’, and planned communities, with few other places to park that avoid piling up crap in the garage,”
It is generally the HOA that regulates this.
I didn’t think my note about the accumulation of stuff forcing cars onto the streets as anything other than obvious. Drive through any old neighborhood without an aggressive HOA, and you will see this problem. It isn’t just OC; it is anywhere. The best support you can find for this argument is to go drive through an old neighborhood and see for yourself.
I see the impact of this daily at work. As a land planner, I have to deal with “guest parking” regulations on anything I design. These requirements have been getting more and more onerous over the years because people keep taking up “guest” parking spaces with their cars because they cannot park in their garages. This issue becomes a real problem in old neighborhoods where people have converted their garages to living space.
Anyone who rents from an IAC apartment complex can attest to the draconian garage inspections. They will force you to clean out your garage space if you cannot fit a car in it. I remember them citing me once, but when I showed them how my tiny car fit just fine, they let me slide.
“I didn’t think my note about the accumulation of stuff forcing cars onto the streets as anything other than obvious. Drive through any old neighborhood without an aggressive HOA, and you will see this problem. It isn’t just OC; it is anywhere. The best support you can find for this argument is to go drive through an old neighborhood and see for yourself.”
In general, I agree that any old neighborhood is prone to more street parking due to owners using their personal space for other purposes than car storage. That is their right, and as you say, it can affect the general look and feel of the neighborhood.
But you drew a direct correlation to communities like ECR (poorly planned) having these problems while Deerfield (planned) does not. I think that just because a neighborhood was planned wouldn’t eliminate such problems. These adjacent communities are populated by people with much the same means and lifestyle.
So, assuming that people in Deerfield and people in ECR have the same number of vehicles per household… where do they put them? “In the garage” is a simplistic answer, since I don’t think the HOA can actually force people to park in their garages, and I’m sure people living in Deerfield accumulate junk at the same rate as the people next door in ECR.
If Deerfield garages are generally cleaner, is it because the neighborhood is newer, has higher turnover, or is populated by younger families. These reasons might make more sense to me than straight vs. curved streets.
“But you drew a direct correlation to communities like ECR (poorly planned) having these problems while Deerfield (planned) does not.”
I see what you are saying. I did not mean to make that correlation. It isn’t the planning that makes the difference as much as it is the HOA and enforcement.
I’m sorry, but I don’t want to get fined by the garage police. If you live in an area with a HOA you give up privacy.
In any case, what is wrong with parking your car on the street, provided the lots are big enough to allow enough street parking?
OT but I really don’t see how consumer sentiment went up so much. Granted, it might go up a bit.
More credits now to spend or what?
So many homeowners fell victim to the rise in home values and the ability to take out large sums of their equity so quickly and easily. California has been hit so hard and I never realized how hard until I started doing short sales professionally.
The 1970’s construction is notoriously poor quality throughout the U.S. It is these neighborhoods, like Mira Mesa in San Diego, that have been some of the hardest hit by this downturn. People now realize how few people actually want to live there if other options are available.
El Camino Real and Mira Mesa could be twin sisters. I lived in San Diego from 2001 through late 2002, and I remember Mira Mesa was somewhat affordable then, but the burned out lawns and cars parked everywhere were a real turn off.
What facts do you base your statement that 1970s construction was notoriously poor throughout the U.S.?
I just got this email from a reader:
Rising inventory of troubled homes could spur fresh wave of foreclosures
Check out this realtor quote. He actually gets it:
“Recent foreclosure slowdowns have sharply cut the supply of bank repos in the Sacramento market since the beginning of the year. The competitive bidding and upward prices that resulted have prompted some real estate agents to start calling bottom. It’s a call that Lyon Real Estate head Mike Lyon has dubbed “fool’s gold.”“
You know, I’ve been waiting for April’s bear rally top and May’s “Sell in May and Go Away” phenomenon. I still don’t see it.
Will June ’09 be another cry wolf on foreclosure?
Let’s see….but I have my doubts.
Signs of a bad neighborhood in a nice city (IR has listed 2 already):
1. Burned out lawn
2. Cars parked everywhere
3. Cement instead of lawn in front of house (for cars)
4. Massive amount of portable basketball courts
5. Large dogs that bark like crazy when you stroll by
6. Older model cars that are not well maintained
6a (bonus) cars on cinder blocks
7. Sheets substituting for drapes/curtains/blinds in the windows
8. Bizarre exterior paint colors.
I’ll combine #1 and #2:
Cars parked on lawns.
Thrifty – The property inspectors that I talk to often joke about the 1970’s construction workers, smoking pot and drinking on the job, cutting corners, etc… There was no such thing as drug testing (which is standard on just about every construction site these days). And I think you need only go into the 1970’s houses to detect shoddy quality… but if you want some hard facts they are easy to find:
Examples are concrete cancer (spalling), mainly to units and are a result of poor building practices during the 1960’s and 1970’s, but was amended with a new Concrete Code in the 1980’s.”http://www.buildingdefects.com.au/
UFFI or Urea Formaldehyde Foam Insulation was an insulation retrofit product used in the 1970’s. http://www.inspect-ny.com/interiors/UFFI_insulation.htm
With all of the building issues we are facing today, it’s the 1970’s approach of the industry as a whole that is allowing these problems to continue. http://www.phoenixhomebuilders.com/new/pages/buying_a_home.html
A Federal Pacific electrical panel… considered dangerous, subject to burnout… This problem is associated with panels and circuit breakers manufactured in the 1970’s http://www.ablehomeinspection.com/inspection-pdf-files/samplereport.pdf
The building code did not require rafter ties until the 1980’s, therefore, many homes do not have them.http://www.examiner.com/x-4647-Honolulu-Home-Improvement-Examiner~y2009m5d6-Construction-Defects
Electrical wiring: Home inspectors look out for aluminum electrical wiring because it is a potential fire hazard. Such wiring was used in homes in the Bronx and all over the United States from 1960 until sometime in the 1970s. The wire does not properly expand and contract and expand, which causes the circuits to overheat and cause a fire. The manufacturers altered the design in the 1970’s, but the problem was made worse. http://www.olympiancares.com/home-inspection-in-the-bronx.htm
Aluminum wiring began to be used residentially in about 1965; however, it did not really catch on until about 1970. When was it banned? It was never banned, however, it received so much bad press, that aluminum wiring stopped going into houses by about 1978. http://media.reliancenetwork.com/media/downloads/RemaxIL/200614473328.pdf
With polybutylene it not a question of “will it leak” but when will it leak? the piping was installed in about one in every four or five homes built during the years in which the pipe was manufactured starting in the 1970’s. http://activerain.com/blogsview/911288/poly-plumbing-a-k-a-polybutylene-and-the-history-of-leaks
Brick exteriors: For houses that have brick exterior walls, there are two types of wall structure, solid masonry and brick veneer. Most brick houses in Chicago were solid masonry construction (two wythes of brick) up until the late 1960s. Most brick houses built after 1970 are brick veneer construction (one wythe of brick with a wood stud wall behind). http://media.reliancenetwork.com/media/downloads/RemaxIL/200614473328.pdf
San Diego Homes Blog:
That was a lot of work. Thanks for including the references. The references do cite specific cities: Chicago, Honolulu, etc. and countrie;eg: Australia. And they mention decades other than and in addition to the 70s. In short, I don’t find enough evidence of nationwide shoddy construction to justify a sweeping generalization that homes built in the 70s are substandard compared to earlier decades. Comparison to later decades isn’t appropriate since codes not only vary from town to city to state but they are constantly updated to meet newly legislated safety, energy, etc. requirements.
It was interesting reading, though. 🙂
Fair enough. Not all homes built in the 1970’s are poor quality… and not all Realtors are slimeballs 😉
Not sure where slimeballs came from. I was simply curious about the 70s construction comment, never having seen it before.
Sorry Thrifty… wasn’t talking about your comment… I guess you haven’t been reading the recent discussions of the past few days… Nevermind.
Thrifty – The property inspectors that I talk to often joke about the 1970’s construction workers, smoking pot and drinking on the job, cutting corners, etc… There was no such thing as drug testing (which is standard on just about every construction site these days). And I think you need only go into the 1970’s houses to detect shoddy quality… but if you want some hard facts they are easy to find (I had to remove the links because the blog otherwise blocked my post):
Examples are concrete cancer (spalling), mainly to units and are a result of poor building practices during the 1960’s and 1970’s, but was amended with a new Concrete Code in the 1980’s. [link omitted]
UFFI or Urea Formaldehyde Foam Insulation was an insulation retrofit product used in the 1970’s. [link omitted]
With all of the building issues we are facing today, it’s the 1970’s approach of the industry as a whole that is allowing these problems to continue. [link omitted]
A Federal Pacific electrical panel… considered dangerous, subject to burnout… This problem is associated with panels and circuit breakers manufactured in the 1970’s [link omitted]
The building code did not require rafter ties until the 1980’s, therefore, many homes do not have them. [link omitted]
Electrical wiring: Home inspectors look out for aluminum electrical wiring because it is a potential fire hazard. Such wiring was used in homes in the Bronx and all over the United States from 1960 until sometime in the 1970s. The wire does not properly expand and contract and expand, which causes the circuits to overheat and cause a fire. The manufacturers altered the design in the 1970’s, but the problem was made worse. [link omited]
Aluminum wiring began to be used residentially in about 1965; however, it did not really catch on until about 1970. When was it banned? It was never banned, however, it received so much bad press, that aluminum wiring stopped going into houses by about 1978. [link omitted]
With polybutylene it not a question of “will it leak” but when will it leak? the piping was installed in about one in every four or five homes built during the years in which the pipe was manufactured starting in the 1970’s. [link omitted]
Brick exteriors: For houses that have brick exterior walls, there are two types of wall structure, solid masonry and brick veneer. Most brick houses in Chicago were solid masonry construction (two wythes of brick) up until the late 1960s. Most brick houses built after 1970 are brick veneer construction (one wythe of brick with a wood stud wall behind). [link omitted]
Our spam filter closed your post, but I reopened it manually. I think it did catch all the links.
Do you know how to use the link command?
a href=”put URL here”>Title
Put a “<" in front of that, and it will make a live link.
I wasn’t sure you’d want all those live links… so I just figured I’d post the URLS without href tags. But I can go ahead and post them since it sounds like it’s ok with you.
Nevermind… I see that the post is above with all the sites. People can copy and paste the URLS if they are interested
I love TR Drive.
It’s a race car dreamland. When we got our 95 Integra GSR I woke really early one spring morning and did a few loops around it with my windows down.
As I set the cars to hit the apexes and drifter out of the turns with the engine racing to redline I could hear the sound echoing off the hills and walls.
I’ve often wondered if we could have the Grand Prix of Irvine on TR Drive.
The damn best race track in Orange County. Constant radius turns, decreasing radius turns, high speed straightaways, elevation drops…. It’s like Laguna Seca in Irvine… ;-D
(Kids don’t do this…)
You could never do that in the flats of Irvine. Try that in Woodbridge. 😛
OH… the 89 CRX Si, 99 Prelude SH and 03 RSX-S were also awesome… ;-DDDD