The Housechick Blog

 When I first moved into my current house 4 years ago, I went from living in 2600 square feet into 1000 square feet.  With two adults that need separate home offices, two large dogs, and one tiny clothes closet, space is at a premium.  I’ve learned to make small but constant decisions as to what gets to stay in the house and what goes. 

Two years ago, we bought and assembled a shed in the back yard.  (Note: never assemble an aluminum shed in July in Tucson.  Trust me on this one.)  Since then, it’s been a repository for all kinds of (ahem) valuable stuff that we no longer use, or use very rarely.

I spent a couple hours on Sunday, filling up the car with donate-able goods, filling the trash can, and generally becoming filthy in all the dirt in the shed.  It’s all for good cause: I feel better having simplified all the extra stuff out of my life, and I get to donate used-but-good goods to places and people that can use and appreciate them.

Here’s some good places to donate your good stuff:

Goodwill has several locations throughout Tucson.  The one at 4995 E Speedway has a drive-up donation window.  Extra convenient!

Also at:  1770 S. Cherrybell Strav
2907 N. 1st Ave
4140 W. Ina Rd
4995 E. Speedway Blvd
8321 E. Broadway Blvd
7139 E. 22nd St

The Habistore is at 3840 S Palo Verde Rd.  Proceeds from the Habistore go towards funding the local Habitat for Humanity.  The Habistore sells surplus new and used building and home improvement materials, appliances, and furniture.  Plus, the Habistore will come to you to pick up your stuff.  Just call them at (520) 889-7200.

Casa de los Ninos is at 1302 E Prince Road.  All money generated by selling donations to their thrift store goes to support programs that work toward providing safe permanent and nurturing homes for children that can’t be safe in their own homes.

Photo via Flickr, courtesy of alykat.

We knew it was coming!  The I-10 widening project started this January with minor closures, but the big changes are just ahead.  In 3 weeks, all on- and off-ramps between Prince Road and 29th Street will be closed, and through traffic in that area will be reduced to 2 lanes in either direction.

What to Expect and When:

June 15 - June 22

• Over the weekend, Westbound traffic and all westbound ramps (between Prince and 29th) will be closed.  All Westbound interstate traffic must exit and use the frontage roads.  During weekdays, 2 lanes of traffic may pass through the construction area, but all Westbound ramps will remain closed.

June 22 - June 29

• Over the weekend, all Eastbound traffic and ramps will be closed.  During weekdays, 2 lanes of through traffic will be open, but all Eastbound ramps will remain closed.

June 29 - July 1

• The interstate closes fully in both directions.  All ramps are closed between Prince and 29th.  All I-10 traffic must exit and use the frontage roads.

July 1 - Spring 2010 (estimated)

• All ramps, both East and West bound, are closed between Prince Roads and 29th Street.  2 lanes of through traffic will be open in both directions.

You can sign up to have updates on closures and construction sent to your email from the ADOT homepage for the I-10 widening project.

I couldn’t resist this.  In the Arizona Daily Star today, there’s a big picture and small story about stopping in Yuma (presumably on your way to somewhere else) to see the old Territorial Prison.

The first line of the story is, “Today we’d like to send you to prison.  In Yuma.  In the hottest season of the year.”

The second line of the article: “It’s not as crazy as it sounds at first.”

This probably only seems like a silly idea to those that have actually spent a considerable amount of time in Yuma.

I grew up in Yuma, Arizona.  Yuma is hot.  Yuma is routinely the hottest part of the state, surpassed only at times by Lake Havasu, AZ.  We’re talking regular summer temperatures in the one-TEENS.  The average temp in July is 107 degrees.  It’s hot.  Really really hot. 

Saying “I grew up in Yuma” is a perfectly valid explanation for why I feel chilly if the temperature drops below about 70 degrees. 

The territorial prison is actually a decent side trip.  It’s very close to the freeway, which makes it convenient to those traveling through.  The place is interesting, no doubt.

I just… I mean… it’s Yuma.  In the summer.

I’ve been thinking about using months of inventory (or the absorption rate) instead of days on market as a more reliable market status indicator.  Given that homes can be withdrawn and relisted to “reset” the days on market counter, we know that DOM isn’t the best figure for evaluating Tucson’s market. 

Months of Inventory makes sense to me: that’s the number of months it would take to sell off all the inventory.  There’s a myriad of ways add context to this figure, but let’s keep it simple for now.

Here’s what I’d like to learn from months of inventory:

• If all price brackets are “Buyer’s Markets” or if some price ranges are still balanced
• If certain areas of town have a higher glut of inventory
• How Months of Inventory has changed over time.  We’ll save this one for later.

If we wanted to take this a step further, we could break down price brackets per area of town.  For example, we could show numerically that the market for a $300,000 house in the North would probably be a Seller’s market, while the market for a $300,000 house in Central Tucson would favor the Buyer.  Wouldn’t that be a fantastic way to help a Buyer understand why they would have to compete for the $300k house in the North, instead of having a large selection of homes in the same price range in Central Tucson?

Let’s see what Months of Inventory tells us.

Note: I’m only considering Single Family Homes, and only in the Metro Tucson area.  I’ve excluded all of the outlying areas from these numbers, as those are markets unto themselves.  I’m using the last 30 days of sold data, and I’m not including Active Contingent or CAPA properties, as they are generally not shown nor considered when a Buyer looks for a house.

I calculated Months of Inventory per price bracket, in this chart.  The price point listed in the chart is the upper end of the bracket.

I expected to see slower sales (that is, a higher months of inventory figure) for the higher price brackets, but was really blown away by the months of inventory in the under $200k market.  The price bracket between $100k and $200k has 4.4 months of inventory, which is fairly balanced, and good news for Sellers in that price range.

In general, anything under 2 months is considered a Strong Seller’s Market, 2-4 months would be a Seller’s market, 4-6 months would be considered balanced, 6-8 months would be a Buyer’s Market, and anything over 8 months would be a strong Buyer’s Market.

I calculated a citywide figure as well: 6.7 months of inventory.

Let me restate that for emphasis.  Continue reading �

Sometimes, I get calls from home buyers who are looking through the Tucson MLS and come across houses listed as Active Contingent and Active CAPA, and ask me what that means.

Active Contingent means that the Seller has already accepted an offer, but that there is still some condition, or contingency, to be met.  In most cases, the contingencies yet to be satisfied are just the standard things built into the purchase contract.  These things may include:

• The Buyer’s inspection period
• An appraisal that states the value is at least the sales price
• A round of negotiations if repairs are needed
• The Buyer’s final loan approval

Properties that are Active Contingent may come back on the market if one of these contingencies can’t be worked out between the Buyer and Seller.  If a deal is going to fall apart, it will typically happen in the negotiations for repairs.  Given that inspection periods are usually between 10 and 15 days, I would expect an Active Contingent listing to either come back on the market or change to Pending at about the 2 or 3 week mark from when the property status first changed to Active Contingent.

If you’re interested in an Active Contingent property, and it has only been Active Contingent for a couple of days, you’ve probably got another week or two to wait to see if it comes back on the market. 

As a second option, you can put in a backup offer.  If the Seller accepts your backup offer, then if the first deal falls through, you automatically step up, open escrow, and begin your inspection period.

Also - if a property was under contract and the deal falls through and the house goes back on the market, the listing agent doesn’t have to tell me what purchase price the Seller agreed to for that first offer.  In fact, a good agent should keep that information confidential.

Active CAPA is a whole different situation.  CAPA stands for “Can Accept Purchase Agreement.”  The only time this status is used is when a Seller has agreed to sell their home to a Buyer, and that Buyer must first sell their own home.

Because the deal depends on the Buyer selling their own home first, Active CAPA properties may stay CAPA for a long time.

As a Buyer under contract to buy a house when you have to sell your own home first, your position is less secure, for several reasons:

• The CAPA contract language gives specific time lines by which a Buyer must have their home under contract, and also by which they must have their sale completed.
• If a Buyer doesn’t meet those timelines, they can try to renegotiate or they must walk away from the deal, typically getting their earnest money back.
• If the Seller gets another offer, they can accept that second offer and then turn around and demand that the current Buyer either remove their home selling contingency or go away.  If the CAPA buyer can’t remove their contingency, then that CAPA Buyer has to walk away from the deal, and will usually get their earnest money back.

As someone interested in making an offer on a home that is Active CAPA, there’s a decent chance that you can kick the existing Buyer out of their position, and become the person under contract to buy that house.  However, Active CAPA isn’t a common thing in this market.

Photo via Flickr, courtesy of lars hammar

I’ve been playing with some numbers, trying to get a real (or at least an accurate) picture of our local market conditions.  Most notably, I’ve been looking at days on market and the sales price to list price ratio.

I’m hampered by the way our Tucson MLS system allows agents to access the information for Sold properties.  Exporting the information is crude, at best, so I’d say the results I’m getting are in the ballpark, but probably not to-the-decimal perfect.  I’ll keep futzing with it, to see if I can get real numbers for a broader area, and more accurate figures.

If you follow the market statistics put out by the MLS system, it calculates a straight average days on market for sold listings, but doesn’t consider any previous times that house was listed.  For example:

If 123 Elm Street was for sale by Agent X for 70 days, and then by Agent Y for 90 days, and then by Agent Z for 45 days before it finally sold, our MLS system would consider that 45 days on market (DOM), instead of the cumulative figure of 205 days on market (CDOM).

I want to know what the cumulative days on market (CDOM) is for the various parts of town.

For starters, I considered every single family home sold in Central Tucson since January 1, 2006.  Ideally, I’ll break that into quarterly figures, but for now, we’ll just average everything since 2006.

Result: Average Cumulative Days on Market from 1/1/06 to now: 95 days.

Days on Market as calculated by MLS during the same period: 47 days.

I also calculated the sales price to list price ratio, using the original listing price of the original listing.  When MLS calculates this figure, they consider only the last list price, and not the original list price.  For example:

If Agent Q lists a house for $350,000, then reduces the price to $325,000, and again to $320,000, and the house sells for $300,000, then we calculate: $300,000 / $320,000 = 93.75%.  The house sold for about 94% of the List price.  If we look at the original list price, then the house sold for 85.7% of list price.

Result: Considering the original price from the first listing, houses go for 80% of Listed price.

Considering only the most recent list price, houses go for 97% of List price.

I need more analysis before I can draw any real conclusions.  I have a good idea of what is going on, but I like to see numbers to back up my ideas.  Here’s a couple thoughts:

• Agents have been withdrawing and relisting properties to “reset” the DOM for a very long time in Tucson, it’s an acceptable practice in the area.  If the percentage of listings withdrawn and relisted has stayed fairly constant over the years, does that make the MLS reported DOM a better index of the state of the market?
• If the proportion of listings being withdrawn and relisted has increased (and I believe that it has), then calculating CDOM per quarter back through several years should show a large increase in CDOM over the past 16 months or so.
• Are Sellers overpricing their homes more rampantly than in any other time, at least proportionately?  I’d need to calculate the sales to list price ratio for several years back and watch for trends.
• I’m curious if days on market or sale to list price ratio changes for different price brackets or areas of town.  I’m also curious how days on market varies per price bracket and area of town.
• If a property truly sells in 30, 60, or 90 days, what is the actual ratio of sales price to original listing price?  I’d assume that the faster it sells, the closer it goes to the list price.
• What’s the average price reduction, and when does it occur?

You can tell I’ve got more questions than answers, and am frustrated by the restrictive data available to me.  Hopefully, we’ll get some interesting answers in the weeks to come.  I’ll let you know what I learn.

I do quite a bit of business with people who are relocating to the Tucson area.  Many have never been to Tucson, or have only been here briefly.  It’s always my pleasure to help someone discover this fair city, and to teach people about the different areas of town.

This is an MLS map of Tucson, which divides the city into various areas: West, Central, East, Northwest, North, Northeast, Southwest, South, and Southeast.  There are farther, more remote areas, but those are the big nine.

Click on the image of the map to download the full PDF mapRight click on the map and select “Save Target As” to save the PDF to your desktop.

Each area has a different look and feel.  It is a worthwhile investment to spend the time driving around the various areas of Tucson to find the place that feels like home to you.

Here’s some information for each area of town, for the last 6 months, single family homes only:

Northwest

• Average Sales Price is $336,266, Median Sales Price is $279,900
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1970 square feet
• Northwest has had an explosion of new home construction over the past few years.  Oro Valley and Marana are part of what I consider Northwestern Tucson.  There’s a lot of good infrastructure here, with grocery stores, small shopping areas, and other nice amenities never far away.
• Find Northwest Tucson Homes

North

• Average Sales Price is $690,714, Median Sales Price is $548,000
• Average Home is 4 bedroom, 3 baths, and 2780 square feet
• North Tucson is a rather ritzy area, check out that average sales price!  North is bounded by the Catalina Mountains, and would be what people call the Catalina Foothills.  There’s a good amount of older housing on large lots, intermixed with the newer custom homes on the infill lots.
• Search for North Tucson Homes

Northeast

• Average Sales Price is $446,770, Median Sales Price is $387,500
• Average Home is 4 bedroom, 2 baths, and 2379 square feet
• Northeast Tucson seems more peaceful and laid back than the North, to me.  This is the Tanque Verde Valley, with mesquite bosques, gracious older homes on acreage, and a reasonable amount of new construction as well.
• Search Northeast Tucson Homes

West 

• Average Sales Price is $271,553, Median Sales Price is $220,000
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1660 square feet
• When people think of West Tucson, they think of larger lots than what is found in other parts of the city.  The nice homes have city and mountain views.  West is a fairly small area, comparatively, because it is bounded by the Tucson Mountains.  West doesn’t have as much grocery shopping or dining, but it’s usually an easy trip to find those things.
• Search West Tucson Homes

Central 

• Average Sales Price is $238,815, Median Sales Price is $210,250
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 1.75 baths, and 1483 square feet
• I’m a Central gal, a sucker for the 1950’s double brick ranch style homes.  Central is home to the University of Arizona, and housing in that particular section is pricey.  Otherwise, Central is characterized by older homes, good sized lots, and established neighborhoods.  Central is probably the least homogenous part of Tucson. 
• Search Central Tucson Houses

East 

• Average Sales Price is $252,249, Median Sales Price is $225,000
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1752 square feet
• There’s something about East Tucson that makes people who live East, stay East.  Much of the East is an easy drive to Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, and there’s a lot of cycling in the area.  East is a unique mix of older homes with smaller, infill neighborhoods.  There’s no huge master planned communities, but there’s a nice mix of housing. 
• Search East Tucson Homes

Southwest 

• Average Sales Price is $210,607, Median Sales Price is $198,450
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1693 square feet
• The Southwest exploded with new construction about 3 years ago.  It’s a very affordable area of town.  Most of the new homes are on the far side of the Southwest area, but all of the new housing is sure to draw development of the infrastructure: grocery stores, shopping, and dining.
• Search for Homes in Southwest Tucson

South 

• Average Sales Price is $185,434, Median Sales Price is $185,000
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1572 square feet
• South tends to be a mix of industrial and housing areas, and is home to the Tucson International Airport and a good portion of the railroad.  There are good buys to be had here, for occupying as well as investment property.
• Find Homes in South Tucson

Southeast 

• Average Sales Price is $258,706, Median Sales Price is $222,300
• Average Home is 3 bedroom, 2 baths, and 1779 square feet
• Southeast is also very close to Davis-Monthan AFB, and is largely homes built in the last 10 years.  Southeast includes the city of Vail, which is booming with new construction as the city pushes it’s way along the I-10 corridor.  Parts of the Southeast are well developed by retail and commercial properties, and some parts are still too new to have those amenities close by.
• Find a Home in Southeast Tucson

That’s my city, and the short version of the long tour around town.  Whatever brings you to Tucson, I’d love to show you the city and help you figure out your housing needs. 

It’s a rare week when I don’t have several inquiries from buyers searching online for a home, asking questions about a property and wanting more details.  I’m amazed how many times I look up a home, only to find it no longer listed, sold, or otherwise taken by some other buyer.

So what is the savvy online home buyer to do?  Stick with quality sites, and you’ll get far.

Side Note: Why am I telling you about other MLS searches?  Looking for homes online is such a small part of a real estate transaction, that it doesn’t matter on what site you find the home; what matters is who you select to represent you through the other 98% of the process of buying a home.

Let’s start with my personal favorite…

Housechick.com

• The best feature here is the tight map integration, and the simple interface. You can search by house amenities and area of town, and all the results are shown together on the map. It really puts a good context to where the houses you like are located. I’m working on a new search that will make some very cool improvments, keep an eye out for it. 
• Housechick.com displays everything in the Tucson MLS system, and is updated twice a day.  All pictures provided by MLS are displayed.

Big Brokerage Sites

• The Big Brokerage sites have a variety of ways to search the Tucson MLS. 
• The Long Realty home search allows the user to search by map, MLS number, area, or general home amenities.  I find the map search a wee bit confusing at first, but full detail and pictures are given in the results.  You can also see the status of a house, whether it is under contract, or still Active.  The site contains everything in the Tucson MLS and is updated several times per day.
• The Coldwell Banker site allows you to search by address, map, MLS number, or general amenities.  The national site shows only Coldwell Banker listings, at least in Tucson as far as I can tell, which makes it pretty useless.  Luckily, the local site is better, looks like it includes the complete MLS, with a full featured search either by amenity or by map.  The only thing I miss here is searching by defined MLS area, and seeing all the homes on a single map.
• The Prudential National site makes me register before I can search through the homes.  Bye bye.  Why ever register for information when I can find four hundred other sites that will give me all of the information for free?  The local site has a decent search, but makes me choose between “basic” and the “full detail” and again I must register to get any good details.

Continue reading �

It’s the second question I’m going to ask when we write an offer to buy a house, here in Tucson.  (The first question is how much do you want to offer, in case you were curious.)

How much earnest money do you want to put down?

This is where it begins to dawn on folks that they’re making a large decision to purchase a home: this is where you, the buyer, put your money where your mouth is.

Earnest Money is one signal to the Seller that you are serious about Buying their home.  It is money that you are giving to a neutral party to hold while you and the Seller decide if this is the right home for you or not.  It is consideration for the Seller, because they are taking their home off the market to deal exclusively with you.

Earnest Money is cashed as soon as you and the Seller can agree on the initial contract price and terms.  Whatever you offer as Earnest, it has to be funds that you have NOW, in your accounts.

I should mention that Earnest Money is NOT required by law, but I’ve never seen a Seller accept an offer without some sort of money as Earnest.

So how much is enough, without offering too much?

I’ve seen as little as $100 used as Earnest Money successfully, heading upwards to $50,000 and beyond.  In general, the more expensive the house, the more Earnest the Seller will want.

My general rule of thumb for Earnest Money is to offer 1-2% of the sales price.  In my experience, that amount is usually enough to satisfy the Seller, and the majority of home buyers can come up with that amount of cash.

There are exceptions, and special cases, of course.  One notable factor is to make sure you aren’t putting more down in Earnest Money than you will pay in Closing Costs and Down Payment combined.  You don’t want to overpay your down payment and closing costs with your Earnest deposit - and if you do, you’ll have to take a few extra steps to make sure you get any overage refunded back to you as cash at the closing table.

And as always, rules vary by state, so check with your local authority!  I only know Tucson real estate, but hey, I know it well!

 I received confirmation today that Tortolita Vistas is now selling lots.  I’ve been hearing the buzz about this land subdivision for a couple months now, and it would seem the developer is finally ready to sell off the land.

Tortolita Vistas is 230 acres with 150 custom home sites, ranging from 3/4 acre to a bit over 1 acre per lot.  Based on the location, there ought to be fabulous mountain views of the Catalinas and the Tortolitas.  For those familiar with Northwest Tucson, this development is just East of Dove Mountain.

They should be ready to write contracts in about 10 days.

35 lots are available now.  Pricing starts at $265,000 for 3/4 acres, and runs up to $347,000 for the higher elevation lots.

I can’t post the brochure and price list here, but am happy to email them to you.  Just Ask!

Cottonwood Properties is the developer, and the listing Brokerage is Dove Mountain properties.