April 30, 2010 was the deadline for the federal  home buyer’s credit – if someone wanted to take advantage of it, he or she had to be “in contract” on residential real estate by the end of April.

Did it create a buying frenzy in Silicon Valley?

Not really. The numbers across Santa Clara County were very similar in April as they were in March. In March it was 946 closed houses & duet homes and 325 condos and townhomes. In April we saw 932 and 291. Cumulatively, it was down a little from March. And generally that’s what it seemed like, too, in the trenches: just slightly cooler.

Here’s a look at the numbers* with some historical perspective going back to 1998.  I ran these numbers myself on MLSListings.com and have made every effort for accuracy (but cannot guarantee it).  Our MLS will come out with official stats in a few more days – until then, consider this a “sneak peek” care of Mary Pope-Handy:

Looking at the last 13 years, it’s easy to see that 2010 wasn’t especially active.   It should cause the reader to wonder, though, what would have happened without the stimulus of this buyer program, though, and also ponder if there will be a change one it’s expired. 

Here are the same numbers, and the averages over the last 13 years, without benefit of a graph:

As you can see, our sales for April 2010 are far less than many years, and off about 20-30% from an “average” year in recent history. 

What will May bring? I am not sure, but I am glad that now we have the California state home buyer’s credit – and hope it will help.

*The areas used for this post were the MLS areas 1-23 plus the MLS areas for Mountain View, Los Altos and Palo Alto.  Some of “area 23″ is in Santa Cruz County by 99% of these ares lie within Santa Clara County.

How’s the San Jose real estate market for condos in Cambrian Park?  Let’s have a look at some of the numbers from my Real Estate Report):

As you can see, inventory is way down year over year – it’s down by 2/3!  The market is largely about supply & demand.  Right now, home buyers know that interest rates are poised to rise (one half to one full percent) sometime this year, so many are finally jumping off the fence and wishing they’d done this a year ago. 

Sellers, meanwhile, are not happy about the new, low prices so are holding off on selling.  Hence, we are experiencing a shortage of supply. 

Most of Cambrian Park falls under the 95124 zip code.  If we look at the current inventory of listed homes for sale, we can break it down by quartile care of Altos Research (another subscription I have):

Inventory has been falling like crazy the last 90 days. What about pricing?

Prices are somewhere between rising and staying flat for list prices. Anectodally, I can tell you that homes are selling for a little more each month – prices are rising gently among comparable homes.

Most confusing of all is what’s happening among the “days on market”

The very most expensive condos are having the hardest time selling, probably because folks can buy a house for the same price (albeit in a lesser area). Most of the price points, though, are not too far off from flat.

Cambrian includes a few different schools districts and 3 zip codes, so what is happening in one area or price point may not be true in another. For specific information relating to your home or needs, please contact me!

How is the residential real estate market doing in the Cambrian Park area of San Jose, CA?  We’ll have a look at the 95124 zip code area and the 95118 zip code area of San Jose, which together comprise at least 95% of the Cambrian Park real estate area of Silicon Valley. (A small sliver belongs to the predominently Campbell area of 95008.) The following charts, from Altos Research, represent list prices (not sold prices).

Although the condos in 95124 (green line) have not fared too badly in the last year, the vast majority of Cambrian Park real estate seems to be hurting. The median list price on these homes has been slipping fairly steadily over the last year – often at least 10% of value. This is the broad overview. Next we will view things on more of a micro level.

Next, we’ll view Cambrian in smaller segments, broken down by both zip code and quartile. First, let’s take a look at the 95124 zip code, starting with the single family home real estate market:

Interestingly, most of the houses in Cambrian had a similar downward trend (the lowest price points exhibiting the strongest tendency that way), but the highest price houses seem to be at about the same level as they were a year ago, if not priced a tad higher.  This chart suggests that the lowest priced homes have been hardest hit by the current economic crisis.

And next, condos in the same part of San Jose:

Among 95124 condos, the highest and lowest priced homes had the roughest time, whereas the two middle quartiles are almost on par with where they were a year ago.

And for the smaller part of Cambrian Park, the 95118 area, the same criteria:

The 95118 zip code of San Jose, which is about 1/3 of the Cambrian Park district, mostly has the San Jose Unified School District, which is not considered quite as desireable as Cambrian and Union Schools. In this area, prices have slipped dramatically among single family homes.

And condominiums and townhomes in 95118:

It is interesting to see that among the condominium and townhouse market for the 951118 part of San Jose, the patterns among the four quartiles are extremely simiar overall for the major dip in the market. The highest priced condos, though, appear more impervious to the market pressures, and the lowest priced homes have taken the worst hit.

Overall, Cambrian is a good mirror for the rest of the San Jose real estate market and even the Silicon Valley real estate market. Here, as in the rest of Santa Clara County, the higher priced homes have not been so badly hit on pricing. Schools appear to be a huge impact on whether a property will better retain its value or not.

This is all very broad information. For more specific info relating to your particular needs, please call or email me today!