The Syrah Versailles is one of four home prototypes available in Toll Brothers’ The Reserve development in Pleasanton. 

Blanca Torres
Reporter- San Francisco Business Times

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In another sign that the single-family home market is rebounding in the Bay Area, Toll Brothers, one of the country’s largest homebuilders, is now selling homes in the Reserve, a 19-unit luxury home development in Pleasanton.

The development, at the corner of Manoir Lane and Vineyard Avenue, is surrounded by vineyards. The homes start at $1.3 million and range in size from 3,800 to 4,160 square feet with 4 or 5 bedrooms.

Toll Brothers (NYSE: TOL) designed four different prototypes for the development, all named after wine varietals including Cabernet, Merlot, Syrah and Riesling.

The company joins other homebuilders including KB Home (NYSE: KBH), Shea Homes and Summerhill Homes, who have been debuting new home developments in the Bay Area.

Demand for single family homes is on the rise and homebuilders say there aren’t enough development sites available to keep up.

Toll Brothers, based in Pennsylvania, reported revenue of $1.68 billion for the most recent fiscal year ending July 31, 2012.

Blanca Torres covers East Bay real estate for the San Francisco Business Times.

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Article source: http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/blog/real-estate/2012/10/toll-brothers-opens-pleasanton.html

The only thing more cold and gloomy than my pre-dawn live shot here in Seattle this morning was the February housing report from the Department of Commerce.

Housing starts plunged 22.5 percent in February from the previous month, and building permits, which are an indicator of future activity, dropped 8.2 percent.

You can’t blame it all on the weather either, as starts were even down 28 percent out West.

Some of the housing pundits this morning are saying this is all a good thing, as there is still far too much supply on the market, and builders need to sell all that before they start building more, but tell that to a home builder. The real issue now is credit. The big public builders can get some cash from the banks, but they represent barely a quarter of the market. The private builders are in real need now.

“Our view is that the housing market will start to get back on its feet this year,” notes HIS Global Insight’s Patrick Newport. “The forecast, however, hinges on builders being able to access credit. If builders cannot get financing to build new homes, housing will remain in the dumps.”

Here in Seattle, California-based Shea Homes is going in a new direction for financing, tapping private equity, which appears to be far more willing to back private builders than the banks.

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