Confidence, or lack thereof, is also still keeping some sellers sidelined.

“There always is a tendency to time the market, which we know is becoming a little bit harder to do,” said Budge Huskey, CEO of Coldwell Banker in an interview on CNBC. “It’s an assessment of their overall impressions of the economy. I think there’s still a little hesitation. People want to see stronger economic growth, people want to see more progress made toward unemployment rates and just feel better about moving on.”

Lack of inventory means it is a seller’s market, despite so much hesitance by potential sellers themselves. That will keep home prices strong, unless and until more people decide to list their homes and home builders ramp up production, which they have been so far slow to do.

(Read more: $1 million summer homes)

It begs the question, what is housing worth today, market-to-market? A million dollars may buy a McMansion in Oklahoma, but barely buy a bedroom in Manhattan.

In an effort to gauge differing values, CNBC is trawling the million-dollar market again, this time in a “back-to-school” edition.

Starting on “Squawk Box” this Friday, two reporters will show two homes without disclosing their locations; they will document the interiors, exteriors, marketed features and one unique bonus offered by each home.

Real estate maven Dolly Lenz will decide which house gives buyers a better bang for the buck.

We will then reveal where the two houses are located, and with that added to the mix, Lenz will choose a winner. That house will then go up against the next mystery location on the next show.

(Follow along on Twitter with the hashtag #MillionDollarHome and see the early winners here as well).

—By CNBC’s Diana Olick. Follow her on Twitter @Diana_Olick.

Questions?Comments? facebook.com/DianaOlickCNBC

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101009330

The $510,000 median for the nine-county Bay Area represents a jump of 30.8 percent from a year ago and a record 17 percent above March’s median price, said DataQuick, a San Diego real estate service that produced the report.

“The Bay Area is getting back to normal fast,” said Andrew LePage, a DataQuick analyst. “We’ve had just the right ingredients for big increases in the median and other price measures. We’ve got drum-tight inventory of homes for sale, an unprecedented level of investors chasing homes, interest rates lower than most of us alive have ever seen, and changes in the types of homes selling and where they’re selling.”

The median represents a midpoint, meaning half of Bay Area homes sold for more than $510,000 and half sold for less. It is influenced both by actual appreciation in home values and by a changing mix of homes sold.

The Bay Area median peaked at $665,000 in summer 2007. During the real estate downturn, bargain-basement foreclosures and short sales helped drag the median down to a low of $375,000 in March 2009. Now, with far fewer distress sales and more high-end homes changing hands, a similar dynamic is buoying it. DataQuick said the median has regained 59 percent of its losses.

Carolyn Said is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. E-mail: Csaid@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @csaid

Article source: http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Bay-Area-median-home-price-hits-510-000-4520145.php

The theory is that people stop doing all the other household, energy-sucking, activities, like laundry, during the game, and they also congregate in one space, leaving lights off throughout the rest of the home. People also attend Super Bowl parties at each other’s homes, leaving their own homes powered down. Last year the Super Bowl saved the homeowners a collective three million dollars in energy costs.

That’s all very interesting, but how does that help you save money on your energy bill?

(Read More: Why Cold Weather Super Bowl Could Be a Financial Boon)

“What Opower does is we work with utilities across the globe to take boring energy data and turn it into interesting insights into people’s energy usage and use those insights to communicate to consumers and to change their behavior,” says Alex Laskey, president and founder of Opower.

(Read more: For Super Bowl Ads, It’s Go Viral or Go Home)

Opower works with 83 utilities, helping their 50 million customers save money on their home energy bills. They say they will help Americans save over $200 million in the next twelve months, about half of what the solar energy industry saves U.S. homeowners each year. Laskey describes how:

“So instead of a bill that comes at the end of the month that is frustrating and confusing because it’s high, and it’s too late to do anything about it, you get a proactive alert that might come in text message or a phone call. It says, you know what, it’s only a week into the month, but you’re on track for a bill that’s 40 percent higher than your typical bill, and here are the things you ought to do to make sure you don’t have the high of a bill at the end of the month.”

Customers will never know these insights come from Opower, because the utilities paying for the information brand it as their own. Whatever the messenger, the message is simple: Studying consumer behavior can help change consumer behavior. That is more important than ever as technology increasingly drives society.

Social media, as much as it connects us ideologically, separates us physically. Just knowing that when we do get together physically, for an event like the Super Bowl or otherwise, we are saving energy, might just change some of our behavior going forward.

Every little bit helps the planet.

(Read more: 12 Unusual Super Bowl Bets)

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100427313

(Read More: Could Rentals Be the New Red Flags in Real Estate?)

Housing inventory usually drops in the winter months, only to rebound in the spring, but this winter has seen a larger than normal decline. Realtors are looking for more homes to come on the market in the spring, but there are still 10.7 million borrowers who owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth, and an additional 2.3 million who have less than five percent equity in their homes, according to CoreLogic. Those homeowners cannot sell without having to pay into their mortgages, so they are largely stuck in place. First-time home buyers are purchasing at an unusually low rate due to tighter credit standards, and many potential sellers simply don’t want to list until prices rise more substantially.

(Read More: Soaring Housing Stocks in Perspective)

“We expect a seasonal rise of inventory in the spring to help, but a seller’s market may be developing,” notes Yun. “Much of the West is already a seller’s market for homes priced under a million dollars, but conditions are much more balanced in the Northeast.”

(Read More: Home Builders Turn to Rental Apartments)

Article source: http://www.cnbc.com/id/100412357

Real estate in some parts of the nation experiences the malaise of fall, buyers cooled off by chilly weather and shorter days, distracted by the impending holiday season. But not the Bay Area. This September, Bay Area property sales made improvements in three key areas: days on the market (DOM); listing prices; and, most importantly of all, sales prices.

ZipRealty recently released September 2012 data in comparison with 2011 for each county in the Bay Area. And that data shows a very hot market, with no sign of seasonal slowdown whatsoever.

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Want some local proof? Here are three San Francisco listings in which the sellers ask a million dollars or more above what they paid for them. In only one case, this first example, has the current seller been in the home more than 2 years.

Number one, Lower Pac Heights

On Buchannan Street in Lower Pac Heights, a splendid Victorian 5 bedroom offers evidence. Public records show it sold for $1,550,000 in 2005. Now it’s listed at $2,595,000—a substantial increase indeed, intimating the home rose over $100K a year in value every year since 2005.

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Number two, SoMa

Or how about the first ever re-sell of an Infinity Tower duplex? This unit at 338 Spear offers 3 bed, 3 baths, jaw-dropping views, and a price to match. After having sold for $1,760,000 2 years ago, this property is now listed at $3,200,000- an increase of over 80% in just 2 years.

Number three, Cow Hollow

Or, this Cow Hollow listing, 3 bedrooms, easy walk to Presidio. Yes, the official write up hints at extensive remodeling (most of it in white, per photos). But that remodeling alone wouldn’t justify new price—we also need that crazy Bay Area real estate magic: according to sales history, the property sold $2,200,000 in 2010. Now, it’s $4,750,000.

So we ask you, readers, what’s next? Low inventory forcing prices up in every corner of the Bay, no matter what the season… how much higher can they go?

Article source: http://blog.sfgate.com/ontheblock/2012/10/25/seasonal-slowdown-not-in-the-bay-area/

The six-acre Red Rock Island, near the Richmond-San Rafael Bridge, is the only privately-owned island in San Francisco Bay.  It had been listed at twenty-two-million. 

Realtor Steven Higbee says he knows what he would do with the island if it were his.
  
“Oh, I’d definitely have a house, a small harbor,” said Higbee. “There’s enough rock — I mean, the island is basically solid rock, so if you want to create a flatter area, you could build, you know a breakwater and stuff so you have your own small boat harbor there.”

The only person who ever lived on Red Rock Island built a home in the 1850s.

Article source: http://www.kqed.org/news/story/2012/07/09/101128/price_reduced_on_sf_bays_red_rock_island?category=bay+area

Meanwhile, sellers in the know are waiting to list. “It seems foolish to put [my house] on the market when there are a thousand people down the street who are about to make a million dollars,” said SF homeowner Adam Holm, whose Potrero Hill home is easy walking distance to Zynga’s headquarters.
· IPOs Stoke San Francisco Housing Market [Reuters]

Article source: http://sf.curbed.com/archives/2011/11/29/yet_again_local_ipos_make_sf_real_estate_dearer_still.php