San Francisco Housing Market Back on Track

From the Real Estate Channel,

San Francisco, CA

All-cash buyers and a fresh wave of investors are stimulating the San Francisco housing market.

Home sales activity in San Francisco is returning to a healthy pace, according to the latest Market Focus report issued jointly by the Rosen Consulting Group of Berkeley, CA and the San Francisco Association of Realtors.

The report finds that by some estimates, all-cash buyers represent 20-30 percent of homebuyers in the San Francisco market; resulting from more stringent mortgage lending practices, as well as a growing demand for investment opportunities as yields for many common investments remain unattractive.

Single-Family Sales Rise by 20.7 Percent Year-Over-Year in January 2011

Completed single-family home sales in San Francisco rebounded during the month of January by 20.7 percent.

Read more at The Real Estate Channel

Single-Family Sales Rise by 20.7 Percent Year-Over-Year in January 2011

From Business Wire,

Completed single-family home sales in San Francisco rebounded during the month of January by 20.7 percent. Year-over-year single-family home sales rose at a noticeably accelerated pace in Districts 2 (Inner Sunset, Central Sunset, Outer Sunset, Parkside, Inner Parkside, Outer Parkside, and Golden Gate Heights)—72.2 percent and District 10 (Potrero Hill, Central Waterfront, Dogpatch, Bayview-Hunters Point, Bayview Heights, India Basin, Silver Terrace, Candlestick Point, Visitacion Valley, Little Hollywood, Sunnydale, McLaren Park, and part of Portola)—46.7 percent where the median sales prices in January 2011 were $619,000 and $414,250, respectively. Pending single-family home sales also increased by an impressive 37.5 percent year-over-year in January 2010, leading the Rosen Consulting Group to believe that the upward trend observed in property sales should continue at least through the early part of 2011.

At the current pending sales rate, this equates to a 2.9 months of supply inventory. By price segment, the months of supply inventory for homes priced less than $700,000 remains narrow at 2.3 months, while homes within the $700,000 to $1.2 million price range had 3.6 months and the supply of homes priced greater than $1.2 million edged upwards slightly from January 2010 to 4.6 months.

District 10: 2009 vs 2010 Median Price and Price Per Square Foot

Matt Fuller of Jackson Fuller Realty writes, 

% Change

 In comparing values in 2010 to 2009, only 2 (real estate district) D10 neighborhoods saw an increase in median home price, and that was in Bayview and Bayview Heights.  All of the other neighborhoods were down, with Mission Terrace being just slightly down (-1.5%) and Hunters Point being substantially down (-46.5%).

Price/Sq Ft

The least expensive D10 neighborhood was Hunters Point, with a median price of $110,000, while Mission Terrace came in as the most expensive with a median price of $571,500. If we try and attempt to adjust for difference in average size by neighborhood and look at price per square foot (which has other issues, as I’ve discussed), then we see the exact same results with Mission Terrace coming in at $459 per square foot and Hunters Point coming in at $94 per square foot.

District 10 has never been known as housing expensive neighborhoods, but I do think that these neighborhoods are where San Francisco has seen some of the greatest impact from the fallout of predatory and just-bad-idea loans that have led to a significant number of short sales and REO properties.

For real estate district D9, which includes political D10 neighborhoods Potrero Hill, Dogpatch, Matt Fuller writes the following,

I live where, now?

In case you missed it back in August, The SF Realtor's Association redefined their district map.


Electoral district D10's renamed neighborhoods include:

Newly added "districts," created within existing districts:

* 10M (Candlestick Point), carved out of portions of 10K (Bayview Heights)
* 10N (Little Hollywood), carved out of portions of 10K (Bayview Heights)

Districts, renamed:
* 9j (Central Waterfront) is renamed Central Waterfront/Dogpatch

Read more at SF Gate