Best Realty's Lake Oroville Real Estate Blog

Seaching for homes in the Oroville real estate market, the Chico real estate market, and the Paradise real estate on your mobile device just got a lot easier and more convenient with the recent release of REALTY WORLD’s Mobile Connect home search program.
 This new platform allows buyers to obtain listing information, nearly instantly, on any residential property for sale in the area in which they are currently located by simply texting  as simple two letter code. There is even a QR code available for you iPhone and Android users.   No more searching through cumbersome apps like REALTOR.com, Zillow and Trulia looking for a specific property that you are standing in front of trying to get updated information. And no more hassles when calling the phone number on a yard sign and getting hold of an agent that has no idea of what property you are asking about.
With this new system you get not only the information on the specific home you are texting for, but you also have the option of seeing the 5 other homes for sale that are closest to the home you are looking at. I have included a couple of links here that will provide further information on this awesome new system. The benefits to buyers and sellers alike are explained in the flyers.
To sign up for this program just give me a call or drop me an e-mail with your cell phone number and I will get you enrolled. As always there is NO CHARGE for this service and there is NEVER any abuse of your contact information. In fact, I will make you this promise: I will not ever call you about any home you inquire about through this system unless you ask me to.
Mobile Connect for Sellers
Mobile Connect For Buyers
Happy House Hunting!!!!!!!!!!!!

My intent today was to report the weekly sales of the Lake Oroville real estate market to you for last week.
But during my number crunching I realized that it  has been a while since I had updated my charts that I have been using to track the monthly and annual Lake Oroville home sales. 
After updating these charts I noticed an interesting long term trend in one of the charts that I thought you needed to see. From past blog posts, you all know that I do not take the  month to month numbers that are released into the media on an ongoing basis as important as what has happened over longer periods of time. I think the media is far too focused on what this month did compared to that month, which in turn has focused the consumer on the very same thing.  This narrow focus is what I believe is going to cause many buyers to miss  the great opportunities that currently abound in the marketplace as far as prices and interest rates are concerned. 
Now before you get excited, thinking this is another one of those real estate blogs posts that tells you to BUY NOW!!!!, let me tell that it is not. This market is going to provide great buying opportunities, for those of you that still have jobs in this economy, for the foreseeable future.   What I am telling you is to look at this chart and see for yourself what this Lake Oroville real estate market is whispering to you. When looking at a chart like this most people look at the peaks to see how high things have gone. What I suggest that you look at here is the lower side of this chart. The former stock broker in me says ignore what is happening in the high side and pay close attention to what is happening on the low side. In the stock broker world a stock that showed a trend of higher lows was one to pay attention to and was a good signal that the stock was poised to move to higher highs.  (Click Here or on the Chart to Enlarge)
As indicated on this chart, the number of homes sold on a monthly basis in the Lake Oroville real estate market have been setting higher overall lows since 2008. The indication here is that, as far as the number of Oroville homes sold is concerned, the worst appears to be over and if this trend continues we will eventually begin selling units at a higher pace than the pace at which new listings are coming to market.  It will be this difference between supply and demand that will result in an increase in values and prices. Let’s be clear here. We have a LONG way to go before any appreciable change in prices and values. The current state of our local, state, and national economies are now the main cause of the drag on the market. Unemployment has now surpassed the loan scandals of the past few years as the culprit for this ugly market.  
Hopefully, information like this will keep you from being surprised while thinks SLOOOOOOOOWWWWWLLLLLLY gets better. 

Here are your weekly home sales numbers for the Lake Oroville real estate market for the week ending 8/25/2011.
We had a significant drop in the numbers across the board this week when compared to the unusually strong numbers of the previous week. The home that sold for over $600,000 in the previous week helped set up the negative numbers this week. To me, the biggest disappointment in this week’s numbers is the number of Oroville area homes sales that closed escrow. Only 5 this week coming off a count of 16 the previous week is somewhat disheartening.  But, as I say: “One week does not make a market.”

MLS Stats for Oroville Area
 Week Ending
Week Ending
Weekly % 

 
8/18/2011
8/25/2011
Change

# of Total Sales
16
5
-68.75%

# REO/Short Sales Sold (SS)
10
1
-90.00%

% Sales that are REO/SS
62.50%
20.00%
-68.00%

Avg. List Price
$175,786
$136,780
-22.19%

Avg. Sold Price
$167,683
$127,600
-23.90%

Sold Price % of Listing Price
95.39%
93.29%
1.63%

Avg. Days On The Market
102
52
-49.02%

Total Sales Volume
$2,682,930
$638,000
-76.22%

For all of you interested in the foreclosure trends in the areas that I service, which includes the real estate markets of Lake Oroville, Paradise, Chico, Yuba City, Marysville, and Tehama and Glenn counties, here are the latest stats as compiled by ForeclosureRadar.com
These one year charts show that an interesting long term trend has begun to develop that we have not heard too much about in the media.  These charts are beginning to show significant reductions in the number of foreclosures filings taking  place.  Although the charts are a little roller-coaster-like when looking at the monthly numbers, the overall trend is slowly working its way down.
To be sure, we are certainly not out of the woods by any stretch of the imagination when it comse to the impact foreclosures are having on the overall value of the home across the state.  It is encouraging to see that the long term trend is beginning to head south ever so slightly. Will it stay down? That is hard to say given the recent events with the foolishness surrounding the debt ceiling, stock market gyrations, and the fact that consumers have a general feeling of despair when it comes to the current economic climate in which we find ourselves. What I do know is that with the media so focused on the incompetence in Washington, D.C. there is a good chance that this news will not be considered important enough to share, simply because it is not “dramatic” enough.
On this blog site we take the drama out of the market and replace it with just the facts so you can decide for yourself what is happening.
I have placed links at the bottom of this posting for each area of the real estate market I service. Click on whichever area in which you are interested in seeing.
Oroville Foreclosure Report      Chico Foreclosure Report
Paradise Forclosure Report      Marysville Foreclosure Report
Yuba City Foreclosure Report     Glenn County & Tehama County Foreclosure Report

For those of you in the Lake Oroville housing market and the real estate markets of Chico, Paradise, Yuba City, Marysville, Gridley, Biggs and Durham, who did not see the Facebook posting I made on my business page yesterday at Facebook/RealtyWorld.CA, and, since I have not seen this recommendation from any other area real estate agent anywhere on the ‘net, I will repeat what I advised my Facebook readers to do:
If you are working on a loan for the purchase or refinance of a home, you need to have a SERIOUS  discussion with your lender about locking your interest rate ASAP.

California Mortgage Rates
CurrentLast Week

30 Year Fixed

15 Year Fixed

5/1 Adjustable

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Home Mortgage rates

As a former financial advisor with a major Wall Street firm, I have seen this type of market volatility before and I will tell you that when you get the gigantic drop that the stock market took today and the huge drop in interest rates that came with it, there is a better possibility that that stocks and interest rates will “bounce” off these lows very quickly, then there is of rates continuing to fall in a fashion that makes it worth the risk to “wait and see” what happens.
There are two events coming up that make it a good idea to consider locking your rate as soon as your loan officer is available to do this for you.
1. The monthly employment numbers will be released tomorrow. If the numbers are at all better than analysts are expecting, or even in line with expectations,  I anticipate that interest rates will tick up slightly. If, as some suspect, the number is worse than the overall consensus expectation you may see rates tick down on the news. But not by much (unless the number is some off the wall number like 10% unemployment).
2.  The weekend is here. In a volatile market like this, and with rates as low as they are now, waiting through the weekend may cost you. If there is any positive economic developments from the international markets over the weekend it most likely will cause some upward movement in rates before your feet even hit the floor Monday morning.
Obviously, there is no way to know exactly what rates are going to do in the coming days, and , as I am no longer a professional financial advisor, the above comments should not be considered financial advice. I want you to be sure and make your own decision about this based on your current financial situation in consultation with your personal finance management team.
Related articles

How the Bond Market Relates to Your Mortgage Interest Rate (marketconsultingmortgage.wordpress.com)
Living in a low interest rate world (financialpost.com)
Market dive could rattle homebuyers (lansner.ocregister.com)