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A side effect of higher prices in the California real estate market is that houses are often remodeled before putting them on the market, because the price bump
by skybrian 6mo ago
A side effect of higher prices in the California real estate market is that houses are often remodeled before putting them on the market, because the price bump is more than the cost of the remodeling.
So, price per square foot may not be the whole story. They are often nicer homes with the same square footage. Some improvements are superficial but there are real upgrades too.
Who loses? Home buyers who would rather save money by buying a house that hasn’t been fixed up. If you wanted to buy the same house that the people there lived in fifty years ago, you can’t, because that house is gone. But other buyers presumably thought it was worth it.
- ralferoo 6mo agoI remember getting burned by this a bit over 20 years ago trying to get on the housing ladder. At the time, the going rate for property where I was looking was around £80k, but I'd seen one wreck go for £60k and I was waiting around trying to get another for that kind of price. Unfortunately for me, I never did find that bargain, and that year saw massive property price rises, and in the end I had to pay £120k for a house that was the same as those that had been selling for £80k a year earlier. My guess is that most of the bargains were bought by people who knew how to flip properties, as a lot of the properties were a very high standard around then. Just to rub it in, after a 50% rise in a year, the prices were then pretty stagnant for the next 12-13 years. At a guess, its value has approximately doubled in the decade since the stagnant period.