Fyi, on this Seattle housing market?
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-----Original Message-----
From: "Satko, Julie" <jsatko@firstam.com>
Date: Mon, 3 Dec 2007 18:05:37
To:vipin@urbantango.com
Subject: Seattle mentioned as a market with room to grow by Forbes!
Gary,
Vipin,
Clients looking for a housing bargain? Forbes magazine has identified five cities, one of them Seattle, where the economy is roaring but home prices are still moderate. Hope this is helpful to you and your clients!
These cities are:
Charlotte, N.C. Forbes says this is one of the cheapest markets in the country on a per-square-foot basis. Financial services jobs are expanding rapidly and non-financial job growth isn't heavily tied to housing production. A typical four-bedroom, two-and-a-half-bath home on a quarter of an acre is selling for about $550,000.
San Francisco. The technology and biotech sectors of the economy in the Bay Area continue to grow and there is no build up of housing inventory here. A typical four- bedroom, two-bath home sells for about $800,000.
Seattle. Seattle missed the condo boom because multi-family residential construction was slow in Seattle in 2002 and 2003. Now, Seattle condo real estate values are climbing at the fastest pace of any condo market in the country, according to Radar Logic, a real estate research firm. An attractive two-bedroom, two-bath, downtown condo property with panoramic views of city and Elliott Bay is selling for about $1 million.
Boston. The housing market in the trendy Back Bay has slowed, while Boston's downtown and waterfront areas are attracting buyers interested in living near its booming tech businesses. A one-bedroom, one-bath condo with a view of Boston Harbor sells for less than $650,000.
New York City. The best place to buy in the nation's most developed and densest real estate market is in the Financial District where the market is being flooded with residential housing and the neighborhood is transforming from a 9 to 5 area to a 24-hour residential area. A condo in a pre-World War I building with two bedrooms and one bath in the Financial District is selling for about $750,000.
Source: Forbes, Matt Woolsey (11/13/200. Full story below or link to full story:
http://www.forbes.com/2007/11/13/undervalued-markets-housing-forbeslife-cx_mw_1113value.html
Don't hesitate to contact me anytime for your title or escrow needs, I'm always happy to be of assistance!
Julie Satko
206-276-3575 Cell
First American Title
9750 3rd Ave NE Ste. 125
Seattle, WA 98115
866-526-0610 Fax
jsatko@firstam.com
Real Estate
America's Undervalued Real Estate Markets
Matt Woolsey, 11.13.07, 6:00 PM ET
When a market goes through uncertain times, investor caution reigns. And whether you're talking about the housing market or the financial services sector, there's been so much bad news lately that it makes sense for buyers and investors to remain wary.
But the good news is that market slumps often result in good buys, and solid investments get tagged with bargain prices due to the volatile market. One place to look for these deals is the housing sector, where worries about a continuing dip in home prices are keeping many buyers on the sidelines, and keeping a lid on prices. Looking across the country for undervalued markets, we came up with five picks for city markets or submarkets that are cheap based on what their particular market fundamentals suggest.
You're most likely to find undervalued real estate in cities where the real estate boom was driven by sustainable factors like job growth and economic expansion--like Charlotte, N.C. The city has quietly become one of America's leading financial centers: Its banking sector, anchored by Bank of America (nyse: BAC - news <http://www.forbes.com/markets/company_news.jhtml?ticker=BAC> - people ) and investment subsidiary Banc of America, has continued to expand even as Wall Street takes its lumps. Airlines are rapidly adding traffic between Charlotte and New York--between Delta, US Airways, Continental and JetBlue (nasdaq: JBLU - news <http://www.forbes.com/markets/company_news.jhtml?ticker=JBLU> - people ), there are 26 daily non-stop flights in each direction.
So there's big money in Charlotte. But based on price-per-square-foot numbers from Radar Logic, a New York-based real estate research firm, the city boasts the third-cheapest real estate in the country, behind Detroit and Atlanta, Ga. Detroit's woes are well worn, and Atlanta has an inventory glut and a fast rate of home construction. But Charlotte is without an inventory problem and has a dipping rate of home starts, according to NAHB.
In contrast, throughout most of Florida, and especially in Miami and Tampa, the real estate market grew more rapidly than local economic growth would have suggested possible, and undervalued property is hard to come by. The same goes for San Diego. (Early on in the year--before the credit meltdown of the last few months--we picked San Diego as the nation's most overpriced market and Miami as the riskiest one, based on real estate market over-expansion and strained conditions in local credit markets).
But job growth doesn't always insure a solid market. Phoenix has had one of the fastest-growing job rates in the country over the last five years. In 2001, at the beginning of the boom, there were 43,600 housing starts, according to the National Association of Home Builders (NAHB). By 2005, there were 65,000. With so many jobs created by that housing boom--and many people are employed in the building of a house--consider what will happen to the Phoenix job market if NAHB predictions come true later this year, and new-home construction slows to 36,400 new starts.
Local credit markets also help create undervalued property. So far, the credit market seizure has mostly affected cities that are more reliant on government-sponsored enterprises--places with a high share of housing stock above Fannie Mae (nyse: FNM - news <http://www.forbes.com/markets/company_news.jhtml?ticker=FNM> - people ) and Freddie Mac's (nyse: FRE - news <http://www.forbes.com/markets/company_news.jhtml?ticker=FRE> - people ) $417,000 limit.
Take Seattle, where the median home price is $395,000, exposing a significant portion of the market to a non-GSE securitization shutdown. There isn't a national lending market, and local banks and lenders were pumping capital into Seattle, yet the securitization problems have affected the city.
Still, the latest Standard and Poor's Case-Shiller housing index numbers suggest Seattle prices are still strong. The numbers don't really tell the full story, though, since they're a running average, not a daily spot-price index.
They also fail to consider the condo market. Talk to builders or investment analysts about Seattle's condo or multifamily construction market, and they'll say there's no glut. In 2002 and 2003, the condo and A-class rental market experienced a huge inventory over-expansion from too much multifamily construction--which either became rental apartments or condos--and was in no position to grow during the tail of the housing boom.
Of all housing units, condos have the most elastic price curve, meaning that they're the most likely to feel short-term fluctuations in good and bad markets. Most markets around the country are in the midst of an incredible condo inventory glut, but not Seattle. A disruption in multifamily residential and commercial real estate construction in 2002 and 2003 kept the Seattle condo market extremely cool, despite strong growth in the single-family home sector. Now, having missed the condo spike, Seattle condo real estate value is climbing at the fastest pace of any condo market, according to data from Radar Logic.
Prime condo properties have seen large price increases in the Seattle market over the last year. This downtown property has panoramic views of the city, including vistas across Elliott Bay and to the Space Needle. It has 1,310 square feet of interior space, including two bedrooms and two bathrooms. It is listed for $1 million through Ewing & Clark.
Commercial real estate investment analysts like Los Angeles-based Marcus & Millichap are bullish about the Seattle A-class apartment-rental market for the same reason the condo market has done well: jobs are up, the tech sector is growing, migration patterns are favorable and there is less supply and less construction in multifamily homes in Seattle than the market can support. Commercial yields on Class-A residential properties were up 6.7% last year as a result, and based on Radar Logic figures, Seattle market condo prices are growing faster than New York's on a dollar-per-square-foot basis.
Why do I tell you this extra detail of not 
