Beautiful Mountain Blog of Belmont

Belmont Greek Festival - Free Tickets Just for Asking

It’s that time of the year again for the Greek Festival in Belmont.

Each Labor Day weekend the Greek Orthodox Church hosts its annual Greek Festival at the Church of the Holy Cross at the corner of Ralston Avenue and Alameda de las Pulgas. This year, the Greek Festival in Belmont will be held September 3^th-5^th 2011- Saturday, Sunday from 12:00 PM to 10:00 PM and Monday noon-8:00 PM . If you love to try great food and spirits you’ll be in heaven. The Greek Festival never disappoints when it comes to entertainment for the whole family.

As a supporter of the Greek Festival, we have complimentary tickets for you and your family. Simply use this form to request your tickets and we’ll get them to you A.S.A.P.

 

Here’s some more information on the event from their web site…

Find the meaning of kefi (joy) in this three-day true Greek extravaganza. The Belmont Greek Festival will feature delicious Greek meals and desserts, nonstop music and dancing, exciting exhibition folk dancing, choral folk singing, a captivating mythology play, a fun children’s amusement area, and children’s entertainer Andy Z.

Up to 20,000 people are expected to attend, festival organizers said. All guests will receive a special 40th Anniversary commemorative program book containing articles about Greek culture, recipes, Greek language phrases, information about the festival’s history and photos from past festivals.

“Greeks are famous for their hospitality,” said Festival Co-Chair Gary Brenner. “Our Belmont festival was the first Greek festival in Northern California, and we’re so proud to welcome guests of all ages to our 40th celebration weekend.

“It all starts with lots of fantastic, mouth-watering food and drink,” Brenner continued, “and it keeps on going with the fun and excitement of our dancing, music and theater. Before you know it, you’ll be shouting, ‘Opa!’ just like the Greeks.”

Some of the favorite festival menu items will include souvlakia (Greek shish-kebab), barbecued lamb chops (with special Greek seasonings), spanakopita (spinach and cheese stuffed inside layers of filo pastry) and dolmades (grape leaves wrapped around ground beef and rice). Not forgetting the best Greek salad west of Athens, and roast lamb – the festival will feature 10 spit-roasted whole lambs turned for hours by hand before visitors’ eyes!

There will also be traditional homemade Greek pastries such as loukoumades (doughnut holes covered with honey), baklava (layers of nuts and filo pastry soaked in honey), kourambiedes (crescent-shaped butter cookies covered with powdered sugar) and galactobouriko (filo pastry filled with custard and covered with syrup).

Visit the taverna to sample Greek libations such as ouzo (anise-flavored aperitif), retsina wine and Metaxa brandy, and enjoy special wine tastings featuring Greek and American labels. Draft microbrewery beer and bottled Greek beer will also be offered to complement your meal, or just enjoy a glass sitting on the plaka (central plaza) while watching fellow visitors dance.

Cooking demonstrations will be offered daily – learn the secrets of Greek cooking and bring the benefits of a Mediterranean diet home!

Visitors also will enjoy continuous music from a live Greek band so they can dance the traditional kalamatiano, tsamiko, zeimbekiko and other Greek dances. The amazing “Sons of Ulysses” will dazzle the audience by lifting tables and chairs with nothing but their teeth!

In addition, several award-winning folk dance groups will perform throughout the weekend in their colorful, hand-made costumes. In an outdoor amphitheater reminiscent of the ancient theaters of Greece, children and adults alike will enjoy a special drama production featuring the heroes and villains of Greek mythology. The popular Festival Singers and Folk Ensemble will also perform Greek folk songs in the amphitheater.

Look for the Fun Zone children’s area in the shadow of the windmill, boasting games, rides, bouncy castles, crafts and more, just for young people. Don’t miss nationally-known children’s favorite Andy Z, a local singer-songwriter-guitarist who brings his award-winning show to the amphitheater on Saturday and Monday.

Tours of the award-winning Byzantine-style church, including the recently-installed mosaic iconography, will be given throughout the weekend, and the Holy Cross Church Liturgical Choir will sing during the church tour on Sunday at 2:00 PM.

Speak Greek? Visit the Greek Language School’s cultural booth, malista (yes)! Other festival highlights will include art, clothing, jewelry and gift boutiques, as well as religious icons and a bookstore.

The Church of the Holy Cross supports many charitable groups throughout San Mateo County, and each year, the church donates a portion of the festival proceeds to several local charities. Previous recipients of festival donations have included Samaritan House, Interfaith Network for Community Help (INCH), Children’s Advocacy Council, local schools and churches and the Belmont mayor’s choice of charity. In addition, Holy Cross Church sponsors several children from the Children’s Receiving Home of San Mateo County as special guests of the festival.

The hours of the Belmont Greek Festival are Saturday, September 4, and Sunday, September 5, from Noon to 10 PM, and on Monday, September 6, from Noon to 8 PM. The Fun Zone for children closes at 7:00 PM all three days. The Agora (our "White Elephant" room) closes at 6:00 PM all three days.

Admission is $5 for adults and $2.50 for seniors and youth ages 13-17. Children 12 and under are admitted free, accompanied by a parent or guardian.

For more information, explore their website further, or call (650) 591-4447. Yassou!

Belmont Just Became a More Safe Place to Live-Limiting Real Estate Signs

Helping to spur the real estate recovery, and at the same time tackle the city’s need for cash, we can thank the great leaders of Belmont for taking on one more urgent problem in the midst of our city’s financial crises—rampant real estate signs. "You have to hand it to Belmont for taking on such a controversial issue in the midst of the worst real estate market in our country's history. They [Belmont] are once again leading by example and ending decades of carnage caused by the deluge of real estate signs on Sundays", said a Belmont resident who wished to remain anonymous.

On March 11^th the city of Belmont adopted an update to its zoning ordinance regulating the use of temporary real estate signs during open houses.

The new ordinance will limit directional “A” frame type signs to three per open house. These signs are limited to private property and cannot be displayed in the public right of way. “Perfect”, said founding member of BADD, Belmont against Dumb Directionals. “These signs are totally out of control. They’re everywhere and they’re confusing. One will point in one direction and another right next to it might point in a completely opposite direction. How is one to know which way to go? And they are literally in plain view for hours [1-4] on Sunday! It’s distracting to say the least and more often than not an accident waiting to happen”.

 

According to folklore purportedly instigated by the indigenous Ohlone inhabitants and perpetuated by modern day Devil Canyon worshippers, many potential buyers who have innocently followed the dizzying display of open house signs into the San Juan canyon (Diablo Canyon) have never returned. “It’s a problem we’ve been dealing with for years—[real estate] agents will lead buyers down into our vast canyons with no clear signs of how to get out. This new ordinance will put a stop to that. There’s no way a buyer will be able to find an open house on our windy roads with three stupid signs. This end-run will solve our problems”. They continued, “We had considered sneaking it in with the tree ordinance but then someone mentioned a view ordinance and that’s the last thing we want on people’s minds so we stuck with or original zoning law changes”.

Citizens Rebel Against Public signs, CRAPS, founder said “It’s completely understandable why this emergency ordinance was implemented. Real Estate signs have caused an untold number of traffic related deaths in our fine city. Panicky homebuyers desperate to be the first to an open house have tunnel vision—once they see a real estate sign that’s all they can focus on. They are hell-bent-for-leather getting to an open house and they have no respect for the laws of our fine city. Believe me when I tell you, if this doesn't work we’ll look next at outlawing open houses altogether. Who needs them now anyway, that’s what virtual tours are for”.

How bad is it? The traffic cameras at Ralston and El Camino which were installed with great success, reducing an incalculable number of fatalities, are evidence that this new ordinance needed to be enacted. “We noticed that red light violations skyrocket when open house signs are in plain sight. Having real estate signs on public property can longer be tolerated. It's a public nuisance like everything else our citizens do”.

Belmont may save millions of dollars with this new law. “We were going to hold a special election but we snuck this one in and managed to avoid public scrutiny. That’s efficient government at work and will help solve our city’s financial woes”.

In addition to the many citations which will gleefully be handed out to unwitting real estate agents, the city hopes to cash in on the storage fees for each sign collected. “We haven’t established any exact dollar amount but it will be proportional to the price of the home being sold—that’s only fair—perhaps one percent will stop these agents or at least put them out of business”.

 

 

 

 

 

Belmont Just Became a More Safe Place to Live-Limiting Real Estate Signs

Helping to spur the real estate recovery, and at the same time tackle the city’s need for cash, we can thank our great leaders of Belmont for taking on one more urgent problem in the midst of our city’s financial crises—rampant real estate signs. "You have to hand it to Belmont for taking on such a controversial issue in the midst of the worst real estate market in our country's history. They [Belmont] are once again leading by example and ending decades or carnage caused by the deluge of real estate signs on Sundays", said a Belmont resident who wished to remain anonymous.

On March 11^th the city of Belmont adopted an update to its zoning ordinance regulating the use of temporary real estate signs during open houses.

The new ordinance will limit directional “A” frame type signs to three per open house. These signs are limited to private property and cannot be displayed in the public right of way. “Perfect”, said founding member of BADD, Belmont against Dumb Directionals. “These signs are totally out of control. They’re everywhere and they’re confusing. One will point in one direction and another right next to it might point in a completely opposite direction. How is one to know which way to go? And they are literally in plain view for hours [1-4] on Sunday! It’s distracting to say the least and more often than not an accident waiting to happen”.

 

According to folklore purportedly instigated by the indigenous Ohlone inhabitants and perpetuated by modern day Devil Canyon worshippers, many potential buyers who have innocently followed the dizzying display of open house signs into the San Juan canyon (Diablo Canyon) have never returned. “It’s a problem we’ve been dealing with for years—[real estate] agents will lead buyers down into our vast canyons with no clear signs of how to get out. This new ordinance will put a stop to that. There’s no way a buyer will be able to find an open house on our windy roads with three stupid signs. This end-run will solve our problems”. They continued, “We had considered sneaking it in with the tree ordinance but then someone mentioned a view ordinance and that’s the last things we want on people’s minds so we stuck with or original zoning law changes”.

Citizens Rebel Against Public signs, CRAPS, founder said “It’s completely understandable why this emergency ordinance was implemented. Real Estate signs have caused untold number of traffic related deaths in our fine city. Panicky homebuyers desperate to be the first to an open house have tunnel vision—once they see a real estate sign that’s all they can focus on. They are hell-bent-for-leather getting to an open house and they have no respect for the laws of our fine city. Believe me when I tell you, if this doesn't work we’ll look next at outlawing open houses altogether. Who needs them now anyway, that’s what virtual tours are for”.

How bad is it? The traffic cameras at Ralston and El Camino which were installed with great success, reducing an incalculable number of fatalities are evidence that this new ordinance needed to be enacted. “We noticed that red light violations skyrocket when open house signs are in plain sight. Having real estate signs on public property can longer be tolerated. Its public nuisance like everything else our citizens do”.

Belmont may save millions of dollars with this new law. “We were going to hold a special election but we snuck this one in and managed to avoid public scrutiny”. That’s efficient government at work and will help solve our city’s financial woes”. And in addition to the many citations which will gleefully be handed out to unwitting real estate agents, the city hopes to cash in on the storage fees for each sign collected. “We haven’t established any exact dollar amount but it will be proportional to the price of the home being sold—that’s only fair—perhaps one percent will stop these agents or at least put them out of business”.

 

 

 

 

 

70 State Parks Slated to Close in California

The What:

Govenor Jerry Brown announced today the closing of 70 State parks in California.

Voters had a chance to save the parks back in November when proposition 21 was on the state ballot.

It would have imposed an $18 vehicle registration fee to provide a windfall of cash for ailing parks. The measure would have provided for $500 million a year as a new permanent funding source for parks, protected from the year-to-year roller coaster of the state's general fund.

But voters gave the measure a strong thumbs-down.

It failed 58 to 42 percent, winning in only 10 of California's 58 counties, nearly all of them in the Bay Area.

The Where:

So what parks will be closing?

• Anderson Marsh SHP
• Annadel SP
• Antelope Valley Indian Museum
• Austin Creek SRA
• Bale Grist Mill SHP
• Benbow Lake SRA
• Benicia Capitol SHP
• Benicia SRA
• Bidwell Mansion SHP
• Bothe-Napa Valley SP
• Brannan Island SRA
• California Mining & Mineral Museum
• Candlestick Point SRA
• Castle Crags SP
• Castle Rock SP
• China Camp SP
• Colusa-Sacramento River SRA
• Del Norte Coast Redwoods SP
• Fort Humboldt SHP
• Fort Tejon SHP
• Garrapata SP
• George J. Hatfield SRA
• Governor's Mansion SHP
• Gray Whale Cove SB
• Greenwood  SB
• Grizzly Creek Redwoods SP
• Hendy Woods SP
• Henry W. Coe SP
• Jack London SHP
• Jug Handle SNR
• Leland Stanford Mansion SHP
• Limekiln SP
• Los Encinos SHP
• Malakoff Diggins SHP
• Manchester SP
• McConnell SRA
• McGrath SB
• Mono Lake Tufa SNR
• Morro Strand SB
• Moss Landing SB
• Olompali SHP
• Palomar Mountain SP
• Petaluma Adobe SHP
• Picacho SRA
• Pio Pico SHP
• Plumas-Eureka SP
• Point Cabrillo Light Station
• Portola Redwoods SP
• Providence Mountains SRA
• Railtown 1897 SHP
• Russian Gulch SP
• Saddleback Butte SP
• Salton Sea SRA
• Samuel P. Taylor SP
• San Pasqual Battlefield SHP
• Santa Cruz Mission SHP
• Santa Susana Pass SHP
• Shasta SHP
• South Yuba River SP
• Standish-Hickey SRA
• Sugarloaf Ridge SP
• Tomales Bay SP
• Tule Elk SNR
• Turlock Lake SRA
• Twin Lakes SB
• Weaverville Joss House SHP
• Westport-Union Landing SB
• William B. Ide Adobe SHP
• Woodson Bridge SRA
• Zmudowski SB

The When:

Expect the closures to begin in September, with all 70 closings completed by July 2012.

Happy Easter! Dutch Baby Recipe for a Wonderful Brunch

Dutch Babies have always been a favorite of mine for brunch. If you are looking for an easy to make brunch item that will impress your friends, family, titillate your taste buds and bring the kids hopping to the breakfast table, look no further.

 A Dutch baby pancake, sometimes referred to as a German pancake, a Bismarck, or a Dutch puff, is a sweet breakfast dish similar to Yorkshire pudding and derived from the German Apfelpfannkuchen. It is made with eggs, flour and milk, and usually seasoned with vanilla and cinnamon, although occasionally sugar is also added. It is baked in a pan with sloped sides and puffs up like a popover before falling soon after being removed from the oven. It is generally served with fresh squeezed lemon, butter, and powdered sugar or fruit toppings or syrup.

The Dutch Baby was originally served as three small Dutch babies served with powdered sugar and fresh squeezed lemon juice but eventually the "Big Dutch Baby" was invented and gained popularity. The Big Dutch Baby is usually what is referred to when reading about Dutch Babies.

I prefer to make some vanilla sugar a few days in advance by adding a whole vanilla bean with some super fine sugar in a small jar for the recipe.

So how easy can I make this for you? Alton Browne of the Food Network has a great recipe which is easy to follow and produces a great Dutch Baby or Yorkshire pudding (less the sugar).

We'll top these with fresh berries and they're hard to beat!

Dutch Baby

Recipe courtesy Alton Brown, 2008

Prep Time:

15 min

 

Cook Time:

30 min

Level:

Intermediate

Serves:

4 servings

 

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons butter, melted and divided
• 2 3/8 ounces all-purpose flour, approximately 1/2 cup
• 3 tablespoons vanilla sugar, plus extra for serving
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 cup whole milk, room temperature
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• Lemon wedges

Directions

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Place 2 tablespoons of the melted butter into a 10-inch cast iron skillet and place in the oven. Set the remaining tablespoon of melted butter aside to cool slightly. Wait 10 minutes before assembling the other ingredients.

Place the flour, vanilla sugar, salt, milk, eggs and remaining tablespoon of melted butter into the bowl of a food processor or blender and process for 30 seconds. Carefully pour the batter into the preheated skillet. Bake on the middle rack of the oven for 30 to 35 minutes or until the edges are puffed and brown. Sprinkle with additional vanilla sugar and serve with lemon wedges.

 

Happy Easter!

 

 

 

 

Today's Mystery QR Code

What is a QR code?

Wikipedia defines it as: "A QR code (short for Quick Response) is a specific matrix barcode (or two-dimensional code), readable by dedicated QR barcode readers and camera phones. The code consists of black modules arranged in a square pattern on a white background. The information encoded can be text, URL or other data.

Common in Japan, where it was created by Toyota subsidiary Denso-Wave in 1994, the QR code is one of the most popular types of two-dimensional barcodes. QR is the abbreviation for Quick Response, as the creator intended the code to allow its contents to be decoded at high speed."

You'll need an app for your phone to decode this which varied depending on your operating system. My Blackberry Storm uses ScanLife with good results but other blackberry devices may use code cruncher--just Google them and you'll find one that works. Then simply snap a picture of this QR code with your phone's camera (with the app open) and it runs out to the internet and delivers...well, in this case your FREE Friday photo.

We use these codes on our web site and flyers to deliver information to people's phones rather than wasting print advertising paper resources. You’ll also see them on our sign post at a listed home in case the flyers run out or someone has the ability to be eco-friendly and download rather than take a printed flyer.

Our Mystery FREE Friday Photo can be downloaded here by scanning this QR code--try it; we think you'll like the new technology.

 

Happy Friday!

 

UPDATED VIDEO Belmont Pedestrian Decoy Program Nets 77 and 1 Accident

Today the Belmont Police department held true to a promise to hold a decoy pedestrian sting operation along several locations on Ralston Ave. and El Camino Real in Belmont.

The message was clear; beware of pedestrians in the crosswalk. Unfortunately it also netted one accident. Sergeant Brake mentioned in the official Belmont Police press release that the decoy had yet to step off of the curb and into the crosswalk when a truck that stopped suddenly to yield to the pedestrian and was hit from behind. However, a witness spoke to us stated the decoy had in fact actuated the crossing light and stepped into the crosswalk causing the driver to react quickly and the driver following too closely behind to not react quickly enough.

To hand out this many citations is amazing in the short span of time the decoy operation was in progress. It just goes to show how important this operation was to elevate public awareness.

As for the unfortunate accident that occurred, it could have happened any day with or without decoys. 

 

The Belmont Police Department, in cooperation with, Millbrae, Burlingame, Foster City, San Mateo Police Departments, the San Mateo County Sheriff's San Carlos Police Bureau & the California Highway Patrol will be conducting a joint Pedestrian Decoy Operation on Tuesday, March 22, 2011 in the City of Belmont.  The Belmont operation will be conducted between 8:30 AM and 2:00 PM at several intersections in Belmont. 

[official story continued below]

EDITORIAL COMMENT: I poke fun at this piece but I literally sit near the crosswalk in front of our RE/MAX office next door to Vivace with our admin assistant and I watch day dreaming drivers nearly slaughter 30 pedestrians a day (her estimate not mine—she has a slightly better view). And the pedestrians don’t help the matter. They wait until a car is barreling down upon them and set out in front of the oncoming car as if the crosswalk afforded them some sort of "force-field" protection from a ton of metal on four wheels at 30 mph with an oblivious operator at the helm--or not. In my opinion both camps are to blame. I did a piece on this issue when they first installed the flashing lights on the street. Many pedestrians approach this with an argument “Hey, it’s the law, the cars must stop when I’m in the crosswalk so I’ll just set right out and cross whenever I want to”, as if to tempt or defy Darwin’s evolution theory of survival of the fittest; and they don’t look first either. How else could a pedestrian get hit by a car except for stepping out when they probably shouldn’t while not paying attention? PEDESTRIANS--Wait for the light at Alameda to turn red and all the cars will start slowing down anyway, and then hit the flashing light and cross the street once you are SURE the cars will stop. Unless it’s pouring rain, it’s the courteous thing to do and what you’d like a pedestrian to do when you are out of your shoes and into theirs—pedal to the metal. DRIVERS--Now it’s not the fault of the cars it’s the drivers who are usually not paying attention. Focused with the tunnel vision seen only under the most stressful of situations they are glued to the mesmerizingly colorful traffic signal at the intersection of Alameda as if willing it to stay green will work—if they just stare at it hard enough. This is done all the while making dinner plans on their cell phones of course. They invariably miss the flashing crosswalk lights and fortunately the miss the pedestrians too—if only by a few inches. Now much of this could be resolved if the city simply moved the crosswalk to the next block east near the video store and handed out "how to cross the street" pamphlets. You see the corner of our RE/MAX building harbors a blind spot to on coming west bound suburbanites and affords a perfect location for daring or unwitting pedestrians to hide before making their startling presence in the crosswalk just milliseconds after actuating the warning lights—sometimes performed with the adeptness of a track and field star. But don’t they use a closed course?

 

Police personnel in plain clothes will be used to cross the roadways in marked crosswalks, while motorcycle officers will watch for pedestrian right of way violations.  Motorists failing to yield the right of way to the pedestrian will be stopped and may be issued a citation under section 21950 of the California Vehicle Code. 

"Our goal is to raise drivers' awareness of their responsibility to stop for pedestrians in marked crosswalks," explained Sergeant Mike Braké of the Belmont Police Department.  "This is an opportunity to educate the motoring public on pedestrian right of way and related traffic laws", continued Sgt. Braké [and increase our city coffers]. 

The departments will carry out enforcement of pedestrian right of way violations on a continuous basis and will continue to work together on future pedestrian decoy events in their respective cities.

 

It’s close to Saint Patrick’s Day and corned beef is all the rage—at least in America. Those of you who think boiled meat sounds tepid might consider our twist on this holiday staple.

Nothing beats a good barbecued brisket and a corned brisket can be just as delicious. But boiling the brisket extracts the same flavor out of the meat as boiled ribs. Sure they are tender, but they’re only as good as the BBQ sauce you apply.

This year try baking the brisket as we do. Narsai David had a recipe like this years ago and it’s pretty straight forward so we’ll tell you our version.

But first, Alton Brown from the Food Network offers a great recipe for brining your own brisket. We include this link more so you know what goes in a good brine. His recipe takes ten days advance prep and we’re already too close to Saint Patrick’s Day to try that. We recommend you simply buy an already corned brisket from your favorite butcher; And try to get the pickling packet along with it or get one from the spice department.

Like pork shoulder or ribs, brisket requires low and slow cooking to break down the connective tissues. You'll typically find brisket sold as a flat cut or a point cut. We prefer a whole brisket for BBQ but for today’s event the point end of the brisket is preferred. While the flat or thin part is leaner, less fat means that it will not be as moist or as tender (or flavorful). Let your conscious decide which cut is right for you.

Preheat the oven to 225.

Trim some of the excess fat from the top of the brisket leaving at least a half inch of fat.

Now lather the brisket with salt and pepper and a generous amount of Coleman’s prepared mustard. 

In a roasting pan, add the brisket fat side up and cover with foil.

Bake it for about two hours and remove from the oven.

Sprinkle a generous portion of brown sugar over the top of the brisket and add the carrots and onions around the side of the pan. Cover with foil again and return to the oven for another two hours. Depending on the size of your brisket, it could take anywhere from a mere 2.5 hours to 5 hours to get to an internal temperature of at least 145—165 is preferable.

The way you know when a brisket is done is by the feel. Since many of you probably don’t know what that feel should be you can simple whack off a small piece and test for tenderness by chomping down a few bites (it’s great to be the cook). Remember though that the outer pieces will be more done than the center so take your temperature reading in the thickest part.

The only trick with brisket (if you could even call it that) is to not let it get so done that it’s dry or stringy, but done enough that it’s not tough.

Once the brisket is done you’ll want to let it stand and rest covered with foil for at least ½ hour---again depending on the size.

Meanwhile, in a separate pot on the stove you can add enough water to cover your new potatoes along with pickling spice and a bottle dark beer like Guinness—saving just enough to whet your palate. Bring the brine to just under boiling until the potatoes are near done—add the quartered cabbage and cook for ten more minutes or so.

Slicing the Meat

Think of the brisket like the trunk of a tree. The grain runs in one direction and you want to cut across it, not with it. When you serve you’ll have some nice caramelized carrots and onions along with the cabbage and some brined boiled potatoes and cabbage. The leftover corned beef makes excellent sandwiches but scrape off the brown sugar if you are making hash out of it. Now for the best part—you have five bottles of Guinness left over for the meal with your friends.

You all were so accurate at predicting the school bond poll results we thought we’d send out another one to see if this year retailers will get in the black.

We’ve been out shopping for Thanksgiving and are seeing a lot of activity in the stores. That caused us to wonder if people feel confident enough about the economy, and have the wherewithal, to spend more than last year on entertaining or gifts.

Let us know what you think and maybe you’ll even get an indication if that special gift you’re after will be on sale the day after Christmas, or fly off the shelves weeks before.

Anyone wondering where the beef was in the Ranger’s hitting squad during the world series need look no further…we’ve got a recipe for you to chew on straight from Texas.

When I was travelling to Austin last year I would contemplate where I could dine next to pass my culinary time. A Friend of mine and local Austin REALTOR , Jeff Niemeyer recommended I try Houston’s near the arboretum; trying to stick to lighter fare when on the road, I’d often eat salads for lunch and or dinner and so when I arrived and found a Thai Beef Salad of the menu I was set.

Many of you may have already experienced restaurants by the Hillstone Group who own among other restaurants Houston’s in San Francisco and the new Los Altos Bar and Grill.

Once I tried the Thai Beef Salad at Houston’s in Austin I never ventured any further down their menu. It was absolutely one of the best salads I have eaten. People who know me well know I enjoy the challenge of deconstructing something I have tasted while dining out to detect what ingredients were employed. Often times it’s fairly easy as some flavors overpower the dish and are easily identified. But every so often a chef develops a recipe that is so complex, so well balanced that it titillates the taste buds with a mosaic of contrasting flavors where one could spend days attempting to deconstruct the recipes—or as in my case eating the salad many times and taking copious notes.

First and foremost the salad plays with all the senses of taste—bitter, sweet, sour, salt and introduces spice and umami with perfectly contrasting flavors of just enough heat and spice followed by refreshingly chilled mango. It further satisfies your sense of umami with refreshing rice noodles and perfectly grilled beef filet.

The salad starts with a bed of rice noodles which have been cooked, fried lightly and chilled to room temperature then ever so lightly tossed with sesame oil. A medley of julienne red bell peppers, carrots, tomato wedges, shredded cabbage and cubes of mango add complimenting textures, and wonderfully wild flavor combinations which serve to further enhance the colorful presentation and add more depth with each refreshing bite.

The dressing offers the spice and bitter with the introduction of fresh lime, orange juice and fish sauce while Srircacha adds a kick and is well paired with shiso to create depth to the dressing while the scallions and crunchy dry roasted peanuts offer a nice contrasting crunch.

While each ingredient has been carefully chosen to perform its respective roll of adding texture, color and smacking all the senses of tastes, the warm cubes of medium rare beef filet lightly marinated in the dressing then charcoal grilled adds the ultimate umami to finish the dish.

When I returned home—notes in tow—I checked on the internet to find out if Houston’s posts the recipe—no luck. But I did find an interestingly close approximation written by Kayla Williams which you can find here—with my notes added in pen as to what I felt brought it closer to the recipe I had in Austin. For example, the shiso which is most often associated sitting alongside your plate of sushi as the Japanese equivalent of parsley, is introduced in the salad as a complex version of what might be confused as mint and cilantro combination—and in fact if you can’t find shiso that’s a relatively logical substitution.

So without further ado here’s my collaborated best approximation of one the best salads I’ve had:

http://www.morganhomes.com/recipes/Thai_Salad.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

Just thought I’d share this with everyone.

 

We’ve always enjoyed astronomy and love it when there’s a new moon and we can get a good look at the night sky.

In Belmont, we’re pretty close to the city (San Francisco) and get a lot of city light which tends to wash-out the night sky.

If we look south-south-west however it’s much darker as we’re looking towards the Santa Cruz mountain range.

When I got up early this morning I had to grab my camera and capture one of my favorite constellations—Orion.

This was taken today, October 9^th 2010 just after six in the morning.

I used our Nikon D70 with a shutter speed of 30” at f4.8 and ISO of 1600.

What's that wafting about in Belmont? The rumblings sure aren’t from the Allied Garbage trucks but rather disgruntled garbage workers.

If you live in Belmont you must have heard, if you haven't smelled it yet, that the garbage strike has left San Carlos and Belmont’s waste removal program canned for the time being. Apparently the garbage workers decided to strike when contract negotiation broke down with Allied Waste--while it’s actually the truck drivers who joined their co-worked in a showing of solidarity that stalled the pick-ups.

The only thing worse than the stench of garbage sitting on the curb for days is the foul way it was handled by the Allied Waste management.

Wednesday night at 11:05 we received two phone calls, courtesy of Allied Waste, telling us our garbage would be picked up on Friday. Couldn’t they have waited until morning? Pick-up would be for two more days. Another wasted opportunity to demonstrate customer service.

So if you’ve got the blues thinking your neighborhood is going downhill with trash littering the street take heart, Allied promises to dump their current strategy and resume pick-ups soon.

 

 

 

There you go again…

That line was made famous by Ronald Reagan when he was running for office against President Jimmy Carter in 1980. It was used by then Mr. Reagan as a way to diffuse opponents who harped upon the same issues over and over.

Well the media is at it again. The media loves its headlines and of course they need to sell papers so it’s not put past them to choose a sensational attention grabbing headline and find data to support it.

Take the August 19, 2010 report on home sales in the Bay Area. The headline in the San Jose Mercury read “Peninsula home sales plunge in July”. Define plunge?

They reported, “After steadily rising for several months, Peninsula home sales plummeted to near-historic lows in July as demand remained tepid and the federal homebuyer tax credits that had helped caffeinate the marketplace in the past year finally went away".

When were these “near historic lows”? How near and how low were they?

Clearly the article is saying sales are down, and they are, but they fail the test of balanced journalism when they neglect to add the caveat “as expected”.

The accuracy of their article is subject to scrutiny as well. I reviewed our own analysis which we do every month since I didn’t recall being impressed by the large discrepancy in year-over-year sales mentioned in their article.

Our data is mined from the Multiple Listing Service. It doesn't contain all home sales—just ones which were listed with real estate agents. The percentage of homes which transfer ownership without the involvement of a real estate professional remains consistently a small percentage of all the homes which transfer—consistent being the operative word since the delta from one month to another is negligible.

Our statistics showed 385 single family homes closed escrow in July 2010, down from 393 in July 2009. According to our data the number of fewer sales this July compared to last were just eight, or 2%.

The San Jose Mercury claimed it was the lowest month for home sales in 20 years. But how many fewer homes sold? They don’t say. They also don’t mention that Dataquick, the source cited in their article as the resource for their reporting, issued a statement on August 19^th, 2010 (the date cited as being used by the San Jose Mercury) saying that they only estimated the sales for San Mateo County:

“San Diego-based MDA DataQuick is a division of MDA Lending Solutions, a subsidiary of Vancouver-based MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates. MDA DataQuick monitors real estate activity nationwide and provides information to consumers, educational institutions, public agencies, lending institutions, title companies and industry analysts. Because of late data availability, sales were estimated in Alameda and San Mateo counties.”

But more to the point, industry experts predicted that home sales would drop after the expiration of the housing stimulus tax credit on May 1, 2010. Last year—the year used for comparing sales—the tax credit was still available in July.  One only has to go back to 2007 to see sales as low as they were this July, not 20 years.

In Santa Clara county they report: “1,159 single-family resale homes that closed escrow represented a drop of 24.3 percent from the 1,531 sold a year earlier, making this the second-slowest July since 1990, according to figures released Thursday by the real estate information service MDA DataQuick.

I didn’t bother to verify any of this information. But let’s assume it’s more accurate than what they reported about San Mateo County. Sales haven’t been this low since…1990. Why does that date ring a bell? It’s the date of the last housing downturn. So what their report tells us is home sales drop when the housing market drops, and sales have not started to pick up yet, because they no doubt will someday.

But what the report does is continue to fan the flames of consumer skepticism. Unless and until the housing market recovers, the rest of the country will suffer. Responsible reporting might help us get back on track sooner rather than later. We expect the facts—the news—good or bad. Just don’t skew what you choose to report to further your own agenda.

"Some 60% of the 109 economists and other analysts surveyed by MacroMarkets LLC expect home prices to decline this year, up from 40% in May."

via online.wsj.com

I found this amusing. If their numbers are right, at 66% the economists are no better than the Supreme Court Justices at arriving at a consensus, and probably no more accurate than our local weather announcer when they do.

Happy New Year!

We’re closing in on the year end home sales statistics, and for that matter the decade end as well. We’ll take a look at the past ten years as compared to 2009 to see how it all stacks up. For now, we’ll leave you with wishes for a prosperous, healthy and happy New Year!

Thanksgiving!

What a great time to be appreciative of all that you have; your health, happiness, friends and family. Our Thanksgivings are typically not typical at all. The family descends upon our home with the enthusiasm eclipsed only by a FREE four star resort vacation, which is close to what they have come to expect. Somehow, we wouldn’t have it any other way.

We both love to cook so cook we do. Drew owned his own food service company and is an accomplished cook in his own right, and in another lifetime I worked for Bill Graham Presents and helped run the catering operations to feed the bands. Needless to say our experience cooking for the masses comes in handy when the troops are home for the holidays.

What’s on our menu?

What’s not? We tend to view Thanksgiving as traditionalists and stick to dishes that conjure up fond memories of comfort foods prepared by our mothers with all of the love (if not creativity) imparted to the meal. But we also add one or two extra dishes that help keep the whole preparation less perfunctory and more fun.

This year we’re doing Oysters Rockefeller but reverting to the original recipe from Antoine’s in New Orleans, rather than the typical oysters with spinach and hollandaise so prevalent at today’s seafood houses. We’ve actually made these once before—just not at Thanksgiving—and they are amazing! Here’s the recipe we used and the key ingredient is fresh Chervil & Taragon so forget going to Safeway. BTW—The Blue Point Oysters at the Crystal Springs Fish and Poultry at the Crystal Springs Shopping center looked awesome when I was there yesterday (11/25/2009).

Now well pass along a few tips for this year’s Thanksgiving for those of you who cook a traditional Turkey.

To brine or not to brine?

Brining a Turkey helps it retain moisture. We’re not here to discuss whether or how to brine; some good recipes and the basics behind brining can be read here.  But here are several brining tricks:

· Put your turkey in the vessel you will use for brining and cover it with enough water to submerge the bird completely. Now take the Turkey out of the brine and measure how much water was needed. That will determine how much water you need for your brine recipe.

· Only use half of the water required for the brine recipe to dissolve the sugar and salt. Once your brine has been cooked—bringing out all of the bouquet and dissolving all of the salt and sugar—remove the pot from the stove and add the remaining amount of water in the form of ice cubes. That will enable you to quickly submerge your bird without first having to chill the brine. How many ice cubes do you need? Remember if you need a half gallon more of water that’s 64 ounces. Simply keep filling a plastic bag with ice cubes until you reach 64 ounces in weight.

· If possible, store your brined bird in the refrigerator being sure it remains completely submerged. If you’re like most and don’t have the room, you can line an ice chest with a clean plastic bag (be sure it’s not made from recycled materials), and place the bird in the bag and cover with brine, then pack around it with bags of ice.

Give your bird plenty of rest.

By the time it comes down to cooking everything you and your bird probably need some rest. This is just the time to get out your iced-down bird and let it begin to come up in temperature. If you are deep frying your bird, this is a critical step. Once submerged in hot oil a cold bird can drop the temperature of your oil by over 100 degrees.  Equally important though is allowing your bird to air dry. You can even point a fan at your bird to expedite the process of removing water from the bird’s skin which will ultimately produce a crisp outer skin.

Cooking Tips:

If you are deep frying your Turkey be sure and start the oil at a higher temperature than the recipe calls for. Most recipes call for cooking a bird at around 350 degrees so starting your oil at around 400 will help the oil recover faster from your cold bird taking the plunge. Alton Brown, who I respect immensely, has a recipe that calls for starting the bird at 250 and slowly bringing it up to 350. Personally, we believe cooking it faster allows for less absorption of the oil and produces a crisp skin. Our 15 pound bird last year needed only 45 minutes and it was cooked perfectly. Be careful though, plopping a cold bird in hot oil can cause oil to spill over the top and risk a fire. One way to avoid this is to dip your bird in the oil for about 3 minutes when the oil is only around 290. Then pull it back out and allow the oil to reach temperature. Now you’ve successfully removed some of the surface water from the bird that could overreact with hotter oil. If you want to remove the risk of a flash fire always turn off the fire when lifting your bird in and out of the oil.

And for anyone who thinks deep frying a Turkey is sacrilege, we thought so too until we tried it. It actually produced a bird with less fat than the traditional roasting method. That was quickly demonstrated when we went to skim off the Turkey fat from the pot of Turkey stock the next day and there was none! Think about it…the leanest piece of bacon you will ever eat is one that has been deep fried—the process renders all of the fat form the meat. That said, we’re opting for a rotisserie version this year; brined and with a hint of Lavender smoke.

Enjoy your holiday and stop in again soon!

 

Cheers,

Drew & Christine

I found the picture that accompanied the article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Saturday November 15^th 2008 title “Increase in Deaths, injuries on dangerous San Francisco Streets”  a bit symptomatic of the problem.

The article is reciting the statistics on just how dangerous the streets are for pedestrian and bicyclists and the picture shows a pedestrian walking right out in front of a car without even looking at the driver of the vehicle which is poised to potentially run him over.

(click on the picture for a full-sized view)

Don’t get me wrong, in most accidents drivers are in fact at fault and hitting pedestrian accounts for more than half of the fatalities each year in San Francisco. That doesn’t mean we should subjugate personal responsibility or common sense for laws. Traffic lights are there to tell drivers they need to stop, and laws are there to help enforce that they do so, but if they fail to stop who really wants to be dead right?

I applaud Belmont for installing the flashing crosswalk signals to alert drivers that a pedestrian is about to cross. This extra “heads-up” could save many lives if it were employed in San Francisco. And while their proposal to install cameras to award citations for failure to stop will generate much needed traffic fine revenues, it will do little prevent accidents; remember the citations are given after the fact—once there has already been a violation. That said, if the fines generate enough revenue to be self-sustaining or better yet offer extra revenue to fund lighted crosswalks I’m all in favor.

Not being privy to the statistics, intuitively, I’ll bet that the person who purposely runs a red light does so by just missing a yellow one. If the lights were timed with a little more delay, a pedestrian would not receive a green light until well after the opposing light had turned red. The real danger is in drivers who plow on through a red light oblivious to its warning, well after the driver should have stopped—giving pedestrians ample time to wander out in front of an oncoming car.

When I was a child my mother taught me to stop, look and listen before crossing a street. Somehow those simply life saving lessons have been lost as people become more reliant on traffic lights and less reliant on common sense—traffic signals do not substitute for common sense and personal preservation. Sure people are supposed to stop, but pedestrians fail to remember that sometimes they don’t, or can’t always do so.

I’ve driven around Belmont for many years and I’m always amazed as I approach an intersection to see for example, a mother with a stroller fixated on the WALK signal in front of her and not on whether I am poised to heed my signals. They’ll blindly push their stroller right out in front of my vehicle on the assumption that in a perfect world I will see the red light, heed the laws, that I will physically be able to stop and my car will mechanically be able to do so—should you really have that much faith in the average driver or the maintenance of their vehicles?

Look, listen, be aware of your surroundings and a lot of these accidents could be avoided.

Each year I post a new message on the anniversary of the “Shoot out at the OK Corral”, and also on Wyatt Earp’s birthday, March 19^th (1848).

October 26^th bears a lot of meaning for me. Most importantly it was the day my mother was born—and event without which this blog would not exist. My mother was a stall worth advocate of learning and the history that surrounds us. I fondly remember mornings when I would awake to find new message on our chalk-board in the kitchen that recounted some historical trivia—she was the first who said “What happened on this day in history?” It also marks the day of the famous shoot out near the OK Corral.

In 1992 I saw the movie “Tombstone”, and I thought at the time, “What an interesting movie, I wonder what really happened?” That led me on a decade of research into the life and times of Wyatt Earp and the Wild West.  Since then I have read every book I could get my hands on regarding the topic.

*Kurt Russell plays an excellent Wyatt Earp in the 1992 movie Tombstone.

In 1998 I had occasion to meet with several prominent authors of Wyatt Earp history. We met  in Tombstone, Arizona for a trip to recount the facts and places that preceded the shootout as well as that which transpired after the events on that fateful October 26^th day in 1881 when the Clanton’s, Mc Laury’s, the Earps and Doc Holliday had it out in proximity to the OK Corral.

The trip was enlightening to say the least, and as is often the case, finding the truth is more fascinating than the Hollywood fiction.

As you’ve probably gleamed the famous shoot out at the OK Corral never really happened at the OK Corral—it was around back in a vacant lot close to Fly’s photo gallery. But who fired the first shot? Those who know for sure are long gone but many believe it was Wyatt Earp—the only one to come out of the fray unscathed. Interesting enough one of the most important details omitted from every movie ever made was the trial that took place after the shootout which could have sent the Earp clan and Doc Holliday to the gallows. There were many witnesses to the gunfight that day and as you can imagine every one of them told a slightly different version of what happened.  In December of that year the trial ended with the exoneration of the Earp’s and Holliday and with that the murder charges were dropped; but the acquittal set off a string of events including Virgil being crippled for life, the murder of Morgan Earp and the bloody massacre of the Clanton gang by Wyatt and his cronies.

For a good book to get a better understanding of the political environment which created the tension in this small silver mining town, I suggest you read a thesis now in book form written by Paul Mitchell Marks titled “And Die In The West”, still in print at Amazon.com.

Catch phrases are being overused, don't you think?

They're like a good song that gets played so much you're afraid to turn on the radio for fear of having to hear it played once more.

It's Friday and call it "fried-day" if you've had as hectic of a week as I-and with only two more work days to go, this seems like the best day to get off a rant.

Allow me to digress...If the 90's were defined by conspicuous consumption than the "Ought's" so far have turned out to be years filled with anxiety, uncertainty and fear.

Before the new millennium ever even got started we had to worry about the Y2K. Even naysayers of that alert surreptitiously logged into their bank accounts the next day just to be sure. Then the 21^st century really hit and we ushered in new paradigms.

We voted for a new President that year but that too was after much anxiety in our nation. We never really knew without question if the President we voted for was supposed to be in office or not.

Things settled down and seemed to be humming along fine until September 11^th 2001, when our country faced an unparalleled attack. More anxiety, uncertainty and fear.

That's when our country's paradigm shifted to a fear based society. Even our government leaders told us to go about living our lives, while looking over our shoulders; all while our mail delivery person was supposed to watch out for suspicious activity. We had to be alert, 24/7.

Then all of a sudden we needed to be green. Of course it would have been nice to think green all along; and in fact many people have. But suddenly everything had to be about "going green" and it starts to be disingenuous when corporations are going green as a marketing ploy.

Now with gas prices soaring, the housing market crashing and ruining everyone's party, the only fun anyone we're having is riding the stock market roller coaster-more uncertainty.

And now everything has to be transparent-transparent? Who coined that word to describe the new millennium business model?  In order to compete in real estate all of a sudden you have to be web 2.0 savvy and completely transparent. Not even the people using the phrase web 2.0 can agree on its meaning. And what about transparency? Don't you think Coke owes it to us to make their recipe public? After all, we do drink their product...

Am I the only one who thinks the word transparent has a slightly negative connotation to it-as in there's no substance, "it's completely transparent"; or, "he's so transparent", as in you can see right through his gimmicks?

I've never started a catch phrase before but could we try something with a little more integrity, such as "apparent", as in "His business style is completely apparent"-perhaps not.

It's hard to be green and transparent at the same time. The only thing that seems transparent to me right now is that everyone is so busy trying to be transparent, in the meantime, they are.

Have you ever driven around Belmont and wondered how a street got its name? You might even live on a street named Lyon for example and wondered if it too is a French derivation.

How about that funny round turret of a building on Alameda de las Pulgas (now that’s a name)—who lived there?

We’ll answer a few, but Belmont does have a historical society which is fun to visit and you’ll meet volunteers with all of the answers. There’s even a book titled “Heritage of the Wooded Hills” by Ria Elena MacCrisken that will satisfy some of your curiosity and make driving the windy roads of our little town more interesting. Now for some answers:

In an apparent attempt to fashion Belmont after Hillsborough, in 1925 the Belmont Country Club Properties were formed by Messrs Lee Monroe, Lawrence Miller and Arthur Lyon (apparently Mr. Lyon had more pull as both his first and last names were used for street names).

Across the street from the $65,000 club house located at 751 Alameda de las Pulgas (now the Congressional Church of Belmont) was a tiny round sales office offering homes around the golf course for sale. What golf course? Find out in our next blog page at

BeautifulMountainBlog

Ever since we launched our foreclosure portal on our web site we've been inundated with inquires requesting information on how to purchase one of the many homes going to auction.

What we did not anticipate was the general misunderstanding of the process.

First, the opening bid is inappropriately referred to as the "sale price" when in fact it is more accurately the opening bid price. This sale price is what seems to attract the throngs of interested parties since it sounds too good to be true, and in fact, it is.

Buyers are asking us, "How can I purchase that home?" Of course the answer is you attend the Sherriff's auction and be the winning bidder.

Then they ask when can they see the home? Unfortunately, the answer is not until after you buy it. The Sherriff's department does not conduct home tours, nor do they perform inspections and provide buyers with illuminative reports on the condition of the home. Bidders show up with 10% of the price they wish to bid and must provide the remainder within 10 days of the auction or forfeit their deposit.

If you are lucky enough to be the winning bidder and manage to get a home for less than what surrounding properties of like kind are selling for-good. Now all you have to do is hope that when you get the keys and open the door the walls are intact, the kitchen is still there and the floors are not ruined.

Unless you are a savvy investor with deep pockets we suggest that buyers stick with more traditional methods with safeguards for purchasing a home.

It’s pretty exciting this time of year. Don’t you just love coming home to a full answering machine with voice mail messages from your representatives in government? I don’t know about you, but I feel pretty darn important when Bill Clinton calls and asks me to vote for his wife; or it’s Arnold Schwarzenegger himself calling to see if I’ll vote to be taxed a little more so he can balance the budget.

This year it’s the year of the postcard. Funny too, since all of the candidates are claiming to be going “green” this year.

Richard Holober’s postcard is not really a postcard at all. It’s an 8.5” x 11” glossy full page ad where he claims to be supported by the Sierra Club. I wonder how many trees the Sierra Club donated to his cause? At least one of his flyers appears to be printed on recycled paper. But the one with a picture of him standing next to a tree he is claiming to protect is absolutely ironic.

Gina Papan must own interest in a paper company for all the mail I’ve received from her lately.

Jerry Hill is another “Sierra Club" sponsored candidate according to a printed flyer I received from him. In fact, several other candidates who aren’t even running appear to have helped Jerry by sending out print flyers for him. Good for him. I like more mail too.

Perhaps they could all take a page from the Internet playbook and start blogging. Barack Obama has been sending me emails almost daily and I’ve yet to get one single piece of paper mail from him.

It’s going to be lonely around here after the election is over—I know I’ll never hear from any of them again.

If you’ve been thinking like we have, you're probably wondering when will the weather get a little warmer.

The wind has been relentless this month. Our Davis weather station located at our home in the Hallmark area of Belmont, has been collecting data since we moved to from Barclay Way in 2001. We’ve been broadcasting it live since January 2002 and it receives more hits than any of our other web pages each month.

A recent software upgrade has allowed us to extract data for analysis and this is my first graph. It illustrates the wind at time intervals for the Month of May, 2008—to date.

Notice that there hasn’t been one day so far this month that there hasn’t been any wind between the hours of 12:45 PM to 11:00 PM!

The positive ions wind can create may actually have a negative affect on the body by raising stress levels. Ever wonder why lying near a stream or waterfall feels so relaxing? Moving water creates negative ions which counteract the effects of positive ions created by the wind. Try washing your face with water after a bike ride. We hear it’s not just the coolness of the water that feels so good; it’s the positive ions being cancelled out by negative ones that have a calming effect. Admittedly these articles are not from scientific scholars, but sometimes experiencing something for yourself is all the affirmation one needs.

After awhile, the wind begins to grow a little tiresome and we’re just waiting for a calm mild day—I know a lull before the storm.

Anyone who owned a home in the Bay Area back in 1989 must remember the subsequent downturn in the market. That downturn was caused by a loss of Bay Area jobs. Home values fell as jobless homeowners sought to liquidate their mortgage overhead. Companies offered out-of-state relocations packages and early retirement to employees while many others opted to voluntarily move out of state. The latest Bay Area job report indicates that for now at least we are safe from that negative market force called unemployment. The nine Bay Area county population grew 1.4% last year and new arrivals helped buoy the housing market—if not more in the rental sector than homeownership. "It's evidence that the Bay Area is doing better economically than the rest of the state," said Mary Heim, head of the demographics research unit at the state Department of Finance, which released the new population numbers. This link http://www.sfgate.com/webdb/population/ allows you to see any city’s population growth and it’s definitely worth checking out. Whenever there is a market sell-off due to dire circumstances, such as we are experiencing now in the foreclosure arenas, prices drop. Why? Simply put in order to be the next sale you must have the lowest price and/or be the best home on the market. The housing market today is not unlike that of 1990 in that in many areas folks are forced to sell their homes and prices are dropping. But the Peninsula of the Bay Area has been fairing far better. First, there are far fewer foreclosures on the Peninsula and thus virtually no downward pressure on pricing from that market force. There’s market skepticism and a general reluctance on the part of many to enter the market; and we all know the new tighter lending practices have make it difficult to impossible for many to buy a home if they wanted to. But jobs are not one of the issues facing the Peninsula right now. If the unemployment rate rises dramatically or more simply put, if people start to leave the Bay Area (voluntarily or not)—where more people are leaving than are arriving—it could all change. Clearly a prolonged recession could have just such an impact and tip the precariously balanced local housing market in favor of a drastic sell-off. See our homepage at MorganHomes.com for monthly updated local market graphs and our blog page at Beautifulmountainblog.org for detailed market analysis and commentary.

Is crosswalk etiquette dead or did it ever exist?

View Larger Map

This is our city, Belmont California; and this is our office, Carlmont Associates. Here we are smack dab in the middle of Belmont on the corner of Ralston Ave. and Villa--obviously a big enough intersection to get Google's attention.

The cross walk you see here is the topic of today's rant. You see the city installed an illuminated cross walk—you know the ones with the flashing yellow lights imbedded into the street—to assist pedestrians in crossing the road. Well not really to help them get across, but to help them get there more safely by making it easier for them to be noticed.

Clearly in order to get to my office I play the role of both a driver and pedestrian. First, in defense of the drivers, it's really hard to see people when you are staring into the sunset. Spin this interactive camera around and you'll see what we mean. It’s much easier to see the lights flashing in the road than to see a pedestrian standing off to one side—especially when they are often obscured by opposing traffic.

Don’t get me wrong--I think these lights are a great idea. Especially since my night vision isn’t what it used to be. But pedestrians take advantage of the "It's the Law" rule that one must stop for them in a crosswalk. When I'm the pedestrian (which I often am getting to and from our office), before I leap out into the crosswalk and stop traffic like Moses parting the Red Sea, as a common courtesy, I stop to see if the light at the corner of Ralston and Alameda is red or green. If it’s green, I’ll wait patiently and let the cars make the green light and only when it turns yellow will I press the power button to halt all traffic in deference to my presence. Do I have to do this? Of course not. The law is on the side of the pedestrian. Is it the courteous thing to do—of course.

Visit our web page at MorganHomes.com for detailed housing market analysis and I promise, no rants.

After reading Kenneth Harney’s article titled “Tight credit hitting specialized areas of mortgage market” in the May 3, 2008 Real Estate section of the San Francisco Chronicle, it struck me how far we have to go to return to a more normal housing market. Mr. Harney discusses the multitude of new restrictions on home mortgages which all have one glaring similarity—they make it harder for borrowers to get a loan.

Some of the new loan restrictions affecting home buyers are:

·         No more zero down financing

·         No more stated income for non self- employed people

·         No refinancing a property that had a cash-out refinance within the last six months

Some of the new loan guidelines for investors will also hurt the housing industry. A few of these are:

·         No investor shall be eligible for loans on more than four properties in total—the prior limit was ten.

This will clearly have a detrimental effect as housing seen from an investment perspective will be effectively limited to four properties—looks like REIT’s will be getting a second life when the housing market does pick up.

What’s entirely possible is that the market may never see another feverish housing boom--the likes of which swept the country in the last decade. Home affordability is still near an historical low, lending standards have never been tighter—the huge confluence of dual income qualification for loans and higher home values is off the table as that market effect has been played out already (we did an article on that months ago called the dual income trap).

Visit our Real Estate web page for monthly updated Bay Area home sale trends MorganHomes.com

Disclaimer: This information is for entertainment purposes only and includes no legal, accounting or real estate advice nor is this intended to be specific to your situation-consult a specialist for your specific situation.

You’ve got to admit, renters have had a hard time. After being squeezed out of the homeownership market for years they now face getting squeezed out of the rental market as well.

But more to my point…ever notice that plane crashes come in three’s? Do they, or does the media just report them that way? Ever notice after a plane does crash you hear nothing but planes crashing all day. Are planes suddenly dropping out of the sky in some fit of protest? Hardly.

I’ve also noticed a distinct pattern to the San Francisco Chronicle’s Sunday Real Estate section. Each week they organize this section into a theme. Last week’s “theme” was the bad news for renters with headings such as these: “Bay Area rents still rising”, (James Temple, Chronicle Staff Writer, Friday, April 18, 2008), “Apartment rents throughout West still rising”, (MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writer, Thursday, April 17, 2008), “A look at apartment rents in western United States”, (The Associated Press, Thursday, April 17, 2008).

The San Francisco Chronicle’s recent reports on the rental market have been rather telling in regards to the overall housing picture. With more buyers unable or unwilling to buy, competing with homeowners thrust back into the rental market due to either voluntarily or involuntarily leaving homeownership, it will be just a matter of time before rising rents and lower home values make owning vs. renting a no brainer. I’ve seen it before and I’m sure I’ll see it again.

But then I read what appeared to be an op-ed piece by Marcie Lewis of Bankrate.com. That headline read “Rental Market Hit by Mortgage Crisis”. I thought I was going to read more of the same—doom and gloom for renters. But the piece ended by stating the opposite of what all the other articles had to offer about the dwindling supply of rental units by saying:

“Other homeowners have opted to rent out their entire home because they've relocated, but can't sell the home for enough money to pay off their debts, which might include a home equity loan or line of credit in addition to a first mortgage. This trend increases the supply of rental housing.” (Lewis 4/2008, p K11)

And…

”Many cities experienced a boom in conversions of apartments into condos, but now, due to lower condo prices, some builders and owners have opted to rent out units they'd intended to sell. This trend also adds to the supply of rentals.” (Lewis 4/2008 , p K11)

So wait a minute; do we have more available rental units or less? I guess they’ll follow up next week with the answer.

                                                                                                                                            Lots of large homes are on the market in Belmont while the inventory of homes for sale is  reaching a high not seen since 2003. Just 22 of the 52 homes for sale are listed under $1,000,000; while the median home currently for sale is just over 2,000 square feet, the median home in Belmont is only 1550 square feet.

And Inventory levels have hit near all time highs. There are currently 52 single family homes on the market and only twice in the last ten years has there ever been more—both times the U.S. was in a business cycle trough—the 2001 recession and again in 2003 during a mid cycle slowdown. We expect inventory level to grow even more in May and June of 2008.

In the past ten years there never has been a month with fewer sales than last month—March 2008 where Belmont had only five sales, except for the month before when there were only four sales. Normally, Belmont will have on average 23 per month; percentage-wise that equals only 18% or normal.

If you’re a Belmont seller and trying to sell during the peak period to obtain the highest price that window of opportunity has already passed. If you are a buyer interested in Belmont, there’s plenty to choose from and we expect favorable buying conditions to continue for at least the next year and probably well into 2010. But timing the market can be a fool’s game. While waiting for home values to drop interest rates may rise, offsetting any monetary gain.

Plenty of buyers have been waiting years for an opportunity such as the current buyer friendly market conditions to purchase a home—well, now’s their chance.

Buyers have bought one thing--that's the media's pounding that home value are falling. Indeed they are in a lot of areas, but if you want to live in San Carlos, CA and are waiting for prices to drop, don't hold your breath too long.

I recenly did this anaylsis for a client who wondered if their home values have dropped. They bought in an excellent area of San Carlos four years ago and paid the then prevailing purchase price in multiple offers of $885,000 for a three bedroom, two bath home which is approximately 1650 square feet.

The follwoing is my brief analysis for them:

The home which just sold on your street is not a bad comp, but it’s not the best either. Logically it’s the same size, in near proximity and (I suppose) condition, yet it is lacking the very things that attracted throngs of buyers to your house when you bought it—character. People pay dearly for that in San Carlos.

Have the values gone down recently? Everyone believes they have but the numbers do not bear that out. Your home might have sold for more in 2005/2006 but that would probably have to do with the overbid process which has diminished, but not disappeared. Unless you are planning to move soon I’d just hang in there and it will almost certainly be even higher in the next few years.

I have included data going back to 2004 when you purchased your home. I specifically targeted sales comps that were 3 bed 2 baths and between 1500-1600 square feet. I know when you bought your home the seller claimed it was 1650 and it may be (look at your appraisal and you’ll get a better idea), but the county has it at 1540 so that is the range I used for comparison. If your home is indeed larger, than you’ll be in even a better position than my data suggests.

I hope this helps you understand our fickle market.

Some interesting facts:

The median price for comparable homes has been going up since you bought your home. Notice that the exact same size homes sold in 2004 and 2007 making the appreciation data extremely accurate. This data concludes a 26% increase in the median home price from 2004-2007; which if applied to your home’s purchase price would suggest it to be worth $1,115,000. Straight-line appreciation numbers are flawed though in part because the reason homes have gone up in value that much is the typical homeowner will put in excess of $100,000 into their home. Factoring that in, the appreciation levels are almost half so if you’ve done nothing to your home you would be closer to $1,050,000. Don’t even try and follow the numbers exactly because I’m factoring in a slight bump for the intangible “WOW” factor of your home’s appeal.

Median Price 2004 $825,500 2005 $977,000 2006 $996,500 2007 $1,042,000

You purchased your home at $885,000 in March of 2004 when the median price for the 3/2’s was $825,500.

Your home was probably larger than the median home at the time. At 1540 sq. ft. your home sold for $574 per sq. ft. and it was truly 1650 sq. ft. it sold for $536 per square foot. The median at the time was $532 per square foot:

2004 2005 2006 2007

$ per Sq. Ft. $532 $639 $633 $686

But the median home size was also smaller—smaller homes sell for more per square foot:

2004 1560 2005 1530 2006 1570 2007 1560

Notice how the median price for comparables homes is more-or-less in step with the median appreciation:

In summary, depending on the current condition of your home and the improvements you may have made, your home is probably worth $1,050,000 on the low side to $1,150,000 on the high side.

A front page article in the Sunday edition of the San Francisco Chronicle titled "Lenders Retreat as Market Plummets" (Sam Zukerman-staff writer April 6, 2008) may frighten some people into cashing their home equity line checks fast.

The article states that many banks such as Bank of America, Country Wide Financial and Washington Mutual are freezing homeowner's equity lines in fear of losing more money to foreclosures. Let's hope Wells Fargo continues to believe in the Bay Area like Bank of America used to.

This could spell a downward spiral as lenders cut back on honoring equity lines that might just be the thing which could keep some folks from losing their homes. The opportunity to tap into existing equity to forestall a foreclosure, even just pay the bills may be just the shot in the arm credit worthy people might need yet now many banks appear poised to pull the plug.

Of course bank don't want people spending their equity line of credit like they used to-especially if home values in their area have dropped significantly; but cutting them off may just send many more of their customers to the front of the foreclosure line.

IF WE AREN'T ALREADY IN A RECESSION, WE COULD BE SOON

This could spell more doom and gloom in the economy as less available cash for spending-or simply knowing that emergency cash flow could be cut, will likely be the nail in the coffin for economic growth this year.

It's a calculated risk on the part of the banks-at least we hope they have calculated it. They don't want to throw good money after bad but by freezing equity lines when people need them most they could mean they end up taking back more property than if they left these loans in place.

The San Francisco Chronicle just splashed more bad news about the housing industry all over the front page of the Friday (March 14^th) issue. Sales are down-way down. Part of the explanation seems to be that tightening lending standards have made it hard to afford a home since qualifying at artificially low teaser rates is no longer acceptable. Stated income loans are only available for self-employed individuals and Wall Street stopped buying mortgage backed securities so rates are up too.

Of course buyers who have been priced out of the market are now waiting to jump in at the bottom, which only adds to the rapid decrease in sales activity.

Timing couldn't have been worse for Congress to approve raising the ceiling on federally backed mortgages from $417,000 to $729,950 in the Bay Area. Many buyers considering purchasing a home are enticed to wait out the market a little more to see if rates will drop further.

So if we had a crystal ball, we'd say that when the new higher conforming loan cap goes into effect, it's just possible that many buyers will get off of the fence. And if they all do that at the same time, there just possibly could be competition once again for housing.  The biggest fear if you're a buyer is you get in the market too early and your home's value could go down before it goes back up; that's a horrible position to be in if you have to sell while it's down. The alternative is to get lucky and time it perfectly, or wait to see values going up and be assured you didn't get the best deal. I don't know for sure, but history tends to repeat itself and I'll bet home values go up again sometime in our future. While everyone's trying to guess when the bottom is not everyone will get it right.

Maybe buying before that happens would be a good idea. If rates do go down further, one could always refinance...

There are great deals to be had on appliances right now.

Everyone knows that the U.S. economy is driven to a large degree by consumer spending. Tighter post-Christmas spending patterns create a need for stores to offer up sales and financing deals to lure consumers back to the stores. Check out Best Buy and Circuit City to see the amazing deals one can get right now!

This year with consumer confidence low, the average consumer will pull back even more. That translates into great deals for the savvy (or fortuitous) consumer who’s waited to buy. On big ticket items such as plasma TV’s and refrigerators it’s not unusual to see low or no interest rate financing options today—even free delivery.

When will these offers end? They’ll end when consumers return to more bullish spending patterns. When will that happen—of course no one knows. The only indication will be when you are no longer offered deferred or low interest finance rates and deep discounts—watch the ads.

How does that translate into real estate? Actually, perfectly. The same forces are at work and the same indicators available. You’ll know when was the best time to buy just after it passed.

                                    Live your life.

*The information contained is educational and intended for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice, nor does it substitute for professional advice.

Let’s point fingers. It’s the American way—when things go awry, we want to know who's to blame. There’s got to be somebody out there whose hands are dirty? And if we can’t find them we’ll pick an easy target.

So who’s is to blame for the mortgage fiasco? Might there be enough blame to go around for everyone?

The banks and lenders who made the loans certainly had to know the risks involved—they designed the loans in the first place. They are the ones that lowered the qualifying standards so that a buyer could get approved for a loan at a minimum negatively amortized payment option.  One might even argue this is what the banks wanted. Countrywide, the nation’s largest lender may have specifically designed these loans to bring themselves to the brink of bankruptcy. Why? We’ll leave that one to the conspiracy theorists.

The brokers who made the loans must have also been aware of the pros and cons; how else could they sell the products? Why didn’t they just tell people that these were risky loans, I’m sure no one would have opted in had they been aware of a potential down side…

Real estate agents must bear some culpability too. After all, they sold these people homes they knew they could never afford for the short-sided interest of getting a commission check. Let’s just hope they all go down with the sinking ship—that’ll teach them. Many of these buyers could never have dreamed of owning a home and real estate agents should have told them to forget about homeownership and stay renters.

And all will be well in American if we can just find someone to blame.

The fact is other than some unscrupulous lenders, bankers, mortgage brokers and agents who participated in these loan schemes without disclosing the downside, one really cannot blame the average industry professional for doing their job—selling a product—anymore than one could blame your local supermarket for selling tobacco, alcohol, butter and bacon. Those products might not be the best for you but they’re available— it’s up to the buyer to be aware of the health issues and indulge in moderation.

If you think the buyer suing her agent in California over the value of her home is a case to watch, wait until homeowners start suing the banks for offering them loans the banks should have known they could not afford.

The reality is this is probably the best argument against privatizing Social Security. Most people do not possess the business acumen to handle their own finances. I can just imagine the uproar over that bailout now…

Median Price Methodology:

The methodology of reporting median home prices varies depending on the source. The MLS uses the aggregate method of calculating the median based on the preceding twelve month sales. We discuss why in a changing market this system is flawed at best.

Standard & Poor’s methodology is perhaps the most accurate, but it relies heavily on past sales and is therefore better suited for looking at historical trends than illuminating current market conditions.

We employ another approach which is to examine the most recent month’s sales, and adjust for larger or smaller homes selling to help mitigate wild fluctuations in median price results.

For example, the MLS reported Belmont’s median value for 2007 to be $945,000; yet looking at the median price reported at the end of December it stood at $1,035,000; a significant difference and an overall upward trend from the previous three years.

Days on Market and Price Received Correlation

Though the nation’s mortgage industry is tumultuous at best, the peninsula market in the Bay Area is faring much better.

Last month 17 homes sold as compared to 14 in 2006 and off the high of 25 in 2005.

Of those 17 sales eight sold over the seller’s asking price, two sold at asking and seven homes sold under asking.                                                                                     

The average time it took to sell a home was 39 days. Of the homes which sold over asking however, they took only 18 days to sell and on average sold for 3.61% over what the seller was asking. Seller's which received their asking price took on average 40 days to sell, and homes which sold under the asking price averaged 56 days on the market and sold for 5.26% less than their original asking price.

Clearly, pricing a home correctly remains a crucial factor in getting the most for a home. These numbers illustrates a swing of almost 9% in what a seller received between a home priced to sell quickly and one which lingered on the market.

Help Us Go Green! Help us continue to decrease the need for environmentally demanding postal mail while enriching our schools—all while keeping abreast of Belmont’s housing market and local issues. For a limited time, for every verified email address we receive on our Newsletter Form we’ll donate $1.00 to Belmont’s School Force.* As Real Estate agents and homeowners in Belmont, we are directly involved with fielding questions about the local schools. The importance of quality education, beside the obvious responsibility of providing education as a social benefit, has a direct bearing on a city’s quality of life which translates indirectly into higher home values. Whether a homeowner has children benefitting from the great education Belmont’s schools provide or not, supporting the local schools is one of the least expensive and best investments a homeowner can make to increase property values. The Belmont/Redwood Shores school district continues to excel and part of their success is attributable to Belmont’s School Force™, a non-profit organization founded in 2001 which concentrates their efforts on improving the quality of education in our schools through fundraising for programs which would otherwise be discontinued. Our commitment to minimizing the impact we have on the environment is accomplished through available communication technologies such as our e-market updates and newsletters; our local Belmont blog, BeautifulMounatinBlog.org and our market reports web site MorganHomes.com. We’re running a business and part of our advertising campaign is to remind people of our services. We currently mail our Belmont Market Report, and the Morgan Report real estate update, to thousands of Belmont residents. With the prevalent adoption of high speed Internet access and quality HTML e-mail delivery options, our goal is to replace our postal mailing with e-mail and significantly reduce paper consumption and our costs so we may continue to offer aggressively discounted fees to our clients—it’s a win-win situation for everyone including Belmont’s schools! * Certain reasonable restrictions apply such as being limited to one email address per household, the email must be a verifiable, working email address and the request must come from a current Belmont resident so we can remove them from our mailing list—that’s it! Sign-up now!

Elizabeth Warren, A Harvard Financial Law Professor writes in a very revealing article titled “The Middle Class on the Precipice” wherein she examines the dilemma now facing dual income families as spouses no longer have the added ability to enter the work force if even to temporarily buoy a family's income.

Ms. Warren’s assertions can be seen as they apply to this year’s increase in foreclosures. In the 1970’s many households were single breadwinner families who purchased their home based upon a single income. This of course meant that if the sole money earner lost their job the other could fill the income void with temporary employment. Now that families are reliant on dual incomes, and qualify for their home loan based on two incomes, a loss of either income can be catastrophic if sufficient reserves do not exists.

Where will the next infusion of income growth come from? It seems highly unlikely that another source of income as significant as when dual incomes materialized will could arise in the future; leading one to speculate that the rapid increase in home values as experienced in the last 30 years is unlikely to continue at the same pace.

• Housing is a necessity yet also very much a part of one’s financial portfolio—especially in the Bay Area. Own a home and let your equity develop.
• Over the long term home ownership continues to be a sound investment. Buyers who are looking to purchase their first home should consider their job security.
• There are better opportunities than in recent years but the days of 7-15% appreciation are over for now and flipping a home in a year almost impossible.
• Qualifying on a dual income bases means you're also reliant on two incomes and should also be considered.
• Having to move due to job relocation or layoffs could put a financial hardship on a new homeowner if values have declined or not risen enough to cover selling costs.

Much of the current real estate media attention has been focused on foreclosures and sub-prime lending practices. The media’s relentless impending doom stories have certainly rattled the nerves of the many would-be buyers. The question is should a buyer stay in the housing market hunt or let it go?

Buyers tend to fall into at least one of three groups; buyers who believe the market will go down and are waiting on the sidelines, ones who can no longer qualify for a loan due to tighter lending guidelines, and buyers who see the new opportunities to own a home.

The Buyers who can no longer qualify for a home loan are probably better off not trying to get in over their head anyway. Stretching the ability to repay a loan is a recipe for disaster and many of the people who find themselves in foreclosure are probably wishing they had never bought in the first place.

The buyers who are aggressively looking for a home and seeking the market’s opportunities will most likely fare the best in years to come; buyers who wait until the media gives them the “all-clear” sign, will find they waited too long. Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway, arguably the best investor of all time, states very succinctly in his business model that investors “…will understand that volatility provides investment opportunities and will use market drops to make good purchases." Mr. Buffet has also been quoted as saying “A good investor learns to insulate himself from market emotions and to make a distinction between market price and intrinsic value.”

Therein lays the dilemma. Is there any intrinsic value in Bay Area homes or are the prices overinflated?

Much has been made of possible housing bubble and many would claim it has burst while others feel the air is slowly being let out. Looking at historic trends in real estate we see that indeed the California and the Bay Area in particular outperform the country as a whole in housing appreciation.

This graph illustrates the median home price in the United States since 1968 as compared to California’s—the Bay Area was included as of 1982.

As one can see California has outpaced the country and the Bay Area outpaced California. It’s interesting to note that California and the Bay Area are more-or-less in step with each other while both clearly have grown faster than the country as a whole. But is this value real? Why does the Bay Area command these high home costs and can it continue? This is the very sort of data which leads many to conclude that California as a whole, and particularly the Bay Area, cannot sustain the price discrepancies with the rest of the country.

The Dual Income Infusion:

Twenty years ago, more and more California families became dual income families which increased their incomes by 75% and the ability to pay more for a home; and since a larger percentage of California families earned two incomes at higher pay, California began to outpace the rest of the county. Additionally, the advent of technology rich companies in the Silicon Valley infused a great deal of wealth to the Bay Area perhaps forever altering the discrepancy in home values. This added ability to spend more on housing is easily seen in the above chart discrepancy between the cost of a home in California vs. the country as a whole.

Where will the next infusion of income growth come from? It seems highly unlikely that another source of income, as significant as when dual incomes materialized, will develop--leading one to speculate that the rapid increase in home values experienced in the last 30 years is unlikely to continue at the same pace.

Buyers who are looking to home ownership should consider their job security. There are better opportunities than in recent years but the days of 7-15% appreciation are over and flipping a home in a year is currently all but impossible. Qualifying on a dual income bases means you are also reliant on two incomes and should also be considered. Having to move due to job relocation or layoffs could put a financial hardship on a new homeowner if values have declined or not increased enough to cover selling costs.

Locally, there has already been a slight decline in home values but we feel if economic conditions remain the same—or improve—this will be a short-lived adjustment. The market rebound will likely be slow to moderate with less aggressive growth and a healthier more sustainable market.

Housing is clearly a necessity. If you feel your job is secure and you have the wherewithal to afford housing now is an excellent time to entertain the possibility.

Read tomorrow's article on The Dual Income Dilemma

Well almost, actually it was 1:52 pm.

Today marks the 126th anniversary of the famous “Gunfight at the OK Corral” in Tombstone Arizona—then called the Arizona Territory.

Here are some quick trivia facts about Wyatt Earp and the shootout at the OK Corral:

Wyatt Earp was first and foremost a simple business man who lived to be 81 and died in Los Angels in 1929. (I happen to own a copy of his death certificate.)

Wyatt Earp was never a U.S. Marshall

The “Shoot-out at the OK Corral” was started by an argument over some stolen mules?

Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday stood trial for their part in the shooting which lasted a month—they were both acquitted.

Wyatt Earp’s favorite city was San Francisco until he stood accused of throwing a prize fight in which he was asked to referee—it made all the papers.

• Wyatt Earp owned a mine outside L.A. near what is now Earp, CA. which he worked the rest of his life in the dessert
• Wyatt Earp loved ice cream, drove a car, and helped consult on some of the earliest films about the Wild West in the 1920’s and became friends with actors like Tom Mix
• The debate about who were good and bad guys in the famous shootout confrontation continues to this day.
• Wyatt Earp was deputized by his brother Vrigil Earp so that he could legally carry a gun on the streets of Tombstone that day.
• The Clantons practiced religioulsy with their six-shotters at their ranch yet as with most peopple of the day, couldn't hit much when under pressure.

Wyatt Earp was cremated and buried in the Jewish cemetery in Colma California named Hills of Eternity—I took the contemporary photo which circulates on the web to this day. Many movies have been made about this shoot-out (near the OK Corral) and glorified it in a way that only Hollywood could do. Unfortunately, the facts have become so distorted that the real story has become lost. As in many cases, the truth is more interesting than fiction. In 1993 the movie Tombstone with Kurt Russell as Wyatt was released and it helped shed some light on who Wyatt Earp really was—a business man, not gunfighter. Later Kevin Costner’s Wyatt Earp was also released further gaining interest in Wyatt’s story. Which movie is best? I believe Tombstone was more realistic. Although they used composite characters and rearranged event timelines as Hollywood will do, their costumes and many of the lines in the movie were from court transcripts and newspaper accounts after the shooting. The 1990’s movies on Wyatt Earp inspired me to find out more about what really happened.

Those movies led me to read “And Die in the West” by Paula Mitchell Marks. It chronicles the political behind the scenes details of what led upon to the famous gunfight in Tombstone. But it goes much deeper than that and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to understand more about life in the frontier west. From there I read every book I could get my hands on including a grossly exaggerated version of Wyatt’s life titled “Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshall” written by Stuart Lake and released shortly after Wyatt’s death. I eventually traveled to Tombstone and met with several prominent authors who toured me around the back country retracing the steps of the Earp and Clanton clans. To find out more visit Gary McLelland’s Wyatt Earp web page and relive the Wild West as it really was.

Today marks the occasion of the “Hunter’s Moon”. A full moon which occurs each October but this year is special. Tonight's full Moon is the biggest full Moon of 2007. It's no illusion.  The Moon's orbit is an ellipse with one side 30,000 miles closer to Earth than the other. The full Moon of Oct. 25-26 is located on the near side, making it appear as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons we've seen earlier in 2007.

This can be found on NASA’s web site, “According to folklore, October's full moon is called the "Hunter's Moon" or sometimes the "Blood Moon." It gets its name from hunters who tracked and killed their prey by autumn moonlight, stockpiling food for the winter ahead. You can picture them: silent figures padding through the forest, the moon overhead, pale as a corpse, its cold light betraying the creatures of the wood.

So how many moons do we really have? Twelve to be exact:

• January - Wolf Moon 
• February - Snow Moon 
• March - Worm Moon 
• April - Pink Moon 
• May - Flower Moon 
• June - Strawberry Moon 
• July - Buck Moon 
• August - Sturgeon Moon 
• September - Harvest Moon 
• October - Hunter's Moon 
• November - Beaver Moon 
• December - Cold Moon

Ever wonder why the moon appears so large at the horizon and so small up in the sky? This phenomenon referred to the “Moon Illusion” is best explained by scientists but it has everything to do with your brain’s perception of relative size as it compares the moon to objects on the horizon. Try taking a picture of the same moon and you’ll be sorely disappointed that your camera doesn't see things quite the way you do.

Enjoy the show tonight and as the moon rises near sunset and appears to fill the sky.

I have brought the idea of a proposed tree ordinance to the attention of several of the influential people I know in Belmont—some who hold sitting positions. They do not appear inclined to take-up the idea since I believe they tend to shy away from anything which is a political hot potato (unless it’s on their personal agenda). Though I give credit to Bill Dickenson for occasionally challenging his fellow council members, most of the members of our current council (and Planning Department) seem to believe that anything progressive is a threat; as opposed to the other extreme which believe that development should march forward unchecked. The problem with both of these positions is that they are extreme, and we need more fair minded, balanced, and objective people to help make Belmont a great town—prosperous, and with a sustainable and alluring quality of life. Don't get me wrong, I too love our open spaces and trees but there needs to be a balance struck when considering growth and changes. Until our Belmont City Council becomes more like real council--for the people--and less concerned with their own agenda’s, I fear nothing will change.

One need look no further than the example of the council’s decision to ban smoking in Belmont to see that these folks are thrusting upon us their personal agenda (see "Where there’s Smoke There’s Fire").

I bring this point up because it's just one more an example of what needs to change in Belmont. We need a council who will do what is right for the citizens of Belmont, not what is right for their personal vision of a town they want to create.

The current list of candidates includes two candidates who are strongly supported by the current council members Coralin Feierbach and Dave Warden—two like-minded members who would love nothing more than to eliminate any challenges to their control of the current council; Christine Wozniak, who currently sits on the oppressive planning department and David Braunstein, a teacher from Carlmont High School, who’s legacy is organizing the creation of the Belmont library.

The other opposing two Candidates Jason Born and Broderick Page are challenging the status quo and who the majority of the council desperately want not to win. It is my belief with the shenanigans of Dave Warden trying to decide if he should attempt a write-in campaign, and Dave Braunstein getting back into the race, has everything to do with Dave Warden wanting to leave the council yet clone himself before he does so by convincing David Braunstein to come back to the fray after dropping out. As found in this article by the San Mateo Daily News; "Mr. Warden said at the time, "… [He] was comfortable leaving the council because he endorsed two of the challengers running to take his place"; saying, "Mr. Warden believed newcomers Born and Page lacked experience."

Ask him how much experience he had when he got elected.

Want to make a change? Make a change in the council. I’m passing this along to Jason Born and Bill Dickenson since if there’s anyone who would even consider this I believe it to be them. Now all the citizens of Belmont have to do is vote.

The smoking ordinance in Belmont was a classic example of what Belmont's city council is all about. Sure second hand smoke is bad but the issue brought before them was second hand smoke in attached adjacent living spaces--the genesis of the original complaint. However our council (coached by their cronies in other departments with similar agendas—can anyone say Planning Department?) decided to pursue a ban on all outdoor cigarette smoking in Belmont—notice I didn’t say all smoking?

Be clear, this was a personal agenda. Mayor Coralin’s trama had to do with being exposed to second hand smoke from her father and Council Member Dave Warden wanted Belmont to be a "smoke free city". Mr. Warden apparently anointed himself with deciding how one should personally care for themselves stating, "…This ordinance may save lives as it may force smokers to quit or limit smoking".

What they neglected to address was wood burning fireplaces and outdoor BBQ's--no doubt much worse contributors of air borne carcinogens. Mr. Warden’s argument for not banning other more caustic causes of airborne particulate matter such as that expelled by SUV’s was answered with—"[but] we need cars". So what’s his answer to this one—banning outdoor BBQ’s will stop people from eating unhealthy carcinogen laden foods AND stop the air borne particulate matter they cause. Why wasn’t that a part of the ordinance?

Did anyone notice the volumes of billowing smoke at the Save The Music benefit in Belmont wafting by the children

as they sang on stage? The city doesn’t need to bring in experts to intuitively know that the smoke produced that day alone no doubt exposed more people to more carcinogens than any outdoor citizen puffing away on a cigarette. This council is clearly about tolerance (or lack thereof) and what they personally believe should be acceptable.

Why did they ignore addressing these two issues if their real concern was for the health, welfare and safety of their constituents? Because they only wanted to trample on a minority who they knew would not garner any support; they knew that adding a ban on outdoor BBQ’s and wood burning fireplaces would raise too much opposition—they simply stuck with an ordinance which would get them maximum media attention with minimal resistance.

This is an interesting article from the New York Times about agents getting out of the real estate business. Sorry, but I got in the business in 1990 when it was waning and made it through the tough times for the next five years. If these agents aren't committed to making real estate a career and were only in it for the fast bucks--well, bye then.

I've seen plenty of new agents coming along without the commitment and drive necessary to take this industry and their business (and mine) seriously. In fact, they've dragged our existing business down with less than professional behavior. (Call first then key safe what does that mean?)

And this article quotes none other than the owner of that company in Seattle, He is quoted, "Some who want to stay in the business are taking a second look at working for commissions." As if to say traditional agents don't? He goes on, "People who used to turn up their nose (sic) at working for us are now drilling holes to get into the building," said Mr. Kelman of Redfizzle, which pays a salary and a bonus based on customer satisfaction. "He said that during the first six months of 2007, Redfizzle received 2,000 résumés and hired 34 agents, bringing the total at Redfizzle to 40. Mr. Kelman says he expects to hire 35 to 50 more agents in the next year."

OK. Simple math tells me he had 6 employees in the beginning of the year! This was a company that you might remember was working with 60 minutes last year and was to represent the new model which would do away with ”traditional agents". Does ABC have an interest in his company? How can a guy with 6 "virtual employees" single handedly alter forever the "traditional" agents’ way of doing business on a comprehensible level? You know the one where agents actually show property?

Read my post on "traditional Agents" and the scam being propagated by "virtual agents" to differentiate themselves when the only difference is the service they provide (or lack thereof).

Drew & Christine Morgan, MorganHomes.com Belmont Real Estate

Belmont—or beautiful mountain (beau mont)—is one of the most unique and charming cities on the peninsula. It’s heavily forested hillsides and undulating hills make for a delightful backdrop against the busy peninsula transportation arteries.

Belmont offers impressive views of San Francisco and the open space around Sugarloaf Mountain, the San Francisco Bay, and on any clear day Mt. Tamalpias, Mt. Diablo and Mt. Hamilton.

Belmont’s attributes are many but its highly coveted views are among the top reason people choose to live in Belmont.

The hills of Belmont weren’t always so heavily wooded as suggested by this rendering—published in "Heritage of the Wooded Hills—A Belmont History, by Ria Elena MacCrisken and available at the Belmont Historical Society. As Belmont neighborhoods developed tress were planted which forever changed the natural foliage into forested hillsides (one needs to look no further than the Watershed open space to see what Belmont’s hills probably looked like before it was populated).

Ironically, Belmont has no view or tree ordinance which regulates whether or not a tree can obstruct the view of a homeowner; one can’t build a structure to block a view but there’s nothing to regulate allowing a tree to grow unchecked into what once was someone’s impressive vista.

Many of the trees in Belmont which grow unattended such as eucalyptus are not indigenous to Belmont and in fact are not protected under Belmont’s existing tree ordinance—yet those are some of the most offensive trees in terms of obstructing views (well, and they’re pretty messy too).

When living in a society where our existence impacts others it’s essential to have ordinances to protect the health, safety and welfare of the public. We currently have ordinances to protect the quality of life and Belmont should seriously consider adding a view ordinance which will allow for the responsible ownership of trees.

Balancing the rights of a homeowner to maintain their view against that of a nearby property owner to plant and grow trees where they wish is difficult as property ownership rights are always held in high regard—as they should be. Like anything else though, these views must be preserved and a balance must be struck between the property ownership rights of both parties.

Are trimming trees counterproductive to living green? Absolutely not. The International Society of Arboriculture not only recommends tree ordinances they go so far as to suggest how to structure one. Furthermore many adjacent towns which benefit from similar views already have such ordinances in place. Cities such as Tiburon and Berkeley, both where property values are substantially affected by their views, have adopted view ordinances to cope with urban tree growth and should serve as a guide to Belmont to act to preserve our declining views.

The "Traditional" Broker Myth

The somewhat fledgling emergence in the real estate industry of on-line brokers would love for sellers to believe that "traditional" agent commissions are limited (some even state that on their web page). Commissions are negotiable and many "traditional" agents are offering very non-traditional commission structures-as in by the hour. And yes, there are some arrangements (as in when your home sells in one week) that you may feel your agent was overpaid-and you might be right. But most sellers hire their agent to get their home sold for the most money in the shortest period of time. And if the agent did that in a week one would think a seller would be pleased. The alternative would be to sell the home after a long period of time (probably for less) and inconvenience to the seller-ending with the same result-a sold home. What about when a seller overprices their home against the agent's advice and it takes months to sell; is the agent over compensated then?

On-line brokers have their place in the market but remember you will be doing most of the work, not them.

It's akin to a homeowner deciding to do a remodel. As a homeowner you have the right to act as your own general contractor; what you have to ask yourself is a) do you want to take that on (do you have the time and ability) and b) are you qualified-as in knowledgeable. You also have the right to hire the cheapest general contractor you can find. But why complain about more expensive ones when cheaper ones are available. Hire who you want-there are options.

Look around; ask for references and experiences from your friends. Determine what level of service you need, or want, and hire someone (or not) accordingly.

The information contained in this piece is educational and intended for informational purposes only.  It does not constitute Legal, Real Estate, or Accounting advice and is not specific to your situation, nor does it substitute for professional advice. 

The Worst Thing I Ever Did in Real Estate--Coming Clean...

Agents-ever "Just Want to Get Away?"

It rained that day, but that wasn't why I was reluctant to show property-the 49ers were playing.

Being new to the business, I was determined to take my very first buyer out to see property regardless that my home team was playing and I had to forfeit my season pass seats; this was the first buyer I had the possibility of showing homes to and I was excited at the opportunities that awaited me; I was new. I was eager.

The year was 1991. The 49ers were coming off several recent Superbowl wins and remained the talk of the town. If you were a buyer out during a Sunday game-you were a serious buyer, and agents knew it.

The stores were quiet, the streets empty, and only the local pubs benefited from the excitement; nearby, a recent bride awaited anxiously in her new home for her husband's return from the store; she was nervous at the prospect of entertaining his friends for the first time. All was well in America.

Most of the homes we visited were resale properties being hosted by reluctant agents playing the football game in the background-as if to satisfy house hunters who undoubtedly wished they already had a home in which to watch the game and host a party.

Entering a new development, we signed in at the main office-you know-the ones with carpet samples on the walls? Knowing I had to accompany my buyer, we strolled along the manicured gardens and walkways to the first open door.

There we were greeted by a gracious host who also had the game on for our enjoyment and offered us a beverage which we of course courteously declined. Strolling about the lower level of the home, we then began to wander upstairs. That's when the host asked us who we were and I obliged by relinquishing only our first names.

Upon returning downstairs our gracious host asked us how we met Mike. I of course responded with "Who is Mike?" Mike, she said, is her husband who was due back from the store any minute and if we didn't know Mike then why were we at their 49er party?

You can imagine my surprise to learn we had stumbled into one of the occupied homes which had apparently been sold smack in between other models for sale.

We moved on with our apologies and asked if we could return should we not find a suitable home that day.

It's was everything I could do to keep a semblance of composure.

Care to share a story?

Belmont Pedestrian Decoy "STING" Operation

The Belmont Police Department, in cooperation with, Millbrae, Burlingame, Foster City, San Mateo Police Departments, the San Mateo County Sheriff's San Carlos Police Bureau & the California Highway Patrol will be conducting a joint Pedestrian Decoy Operation on Tuesday, March 22, 2011 in the City of Belmont.  The Belmont operation will be conducted between 8:30 AM and 2:00 PM at several intersections in Belmont. 

[official story continued below]

EDITORIAL COMMENT: I poke fun at this piece but I literally sit near the crosswalk in front of our RE/MAX office next door to Vivace with our admin assistant and I watch day dreaming drivers nearly slaughter 30 pedestrians a day (her estimate not mine—she has a slightly better view). And the pedestrians don’t help the matter. They wait until a car is barreling down upon them and set out in front of the oncoming car as if the crosswalk afforded them some sort of "force-field" protection from a ton of metal on four wheels at 30 mph with an oblivious operator at the helm--or not. In my opinion both camps are to blame. I did a piece on this issue when they first installed the flashing lights on the street. Many pedestrians approach this with an argument “Hey, it’s the law, the cars must stop when I’m in the crosswalk so I’ll just set right out and cross whenever I want to”, as if to tempt or defy Darwin’s evolution theory of survival of the fittest; and they don’t look first either. How else could a pedestrian get hit by a car except for stepping out when they probably shouldn’t while not paying attention? PEDESTRIANS--Wait for the light at Alameda to turn red and all the cars will start slowing down anyway, and then hit the flashing light and cross the street once you are SURE the cars will stop. Unless it’s pouring rain, it’s the courteous thing to do and what you’d like a pedestrian to do when you are out of your shoes and into theirs—pedal to the metal. DRIVERS--Now it’s not the fault of the cars it’s the drivers who are usually not paying attention. Focused with the tunnel vision seen only under the most stressful of situations they are glued to the mesmerizingly colorful traffic signal at the intersection of Alameda as if willing it to stay green will work—if they just stare at it hard enough. This is done all the while making dinner plans on their cell phones of course. They invariably miss the flashing crosswalk lights and fortunately the miss the pedestrians too—if only by a few inches. Now much of this could be resolved if the city simply moved the crosswalk to the next block east near the video store and handed out "how to cross the street" pamphlets. You see the corner of our RE/MAX building harbors a blind spot to on coming west bound suburbanites and affords a perfect location for daring or unwitting pedestrians to hide before making their startling presence in the crosswalk just milliseconds after actuating the warning lights—sometimes performed with the adeptness of a track and field star. But don’t they use a closed course?

 

Police personnel in plain clothes will be used to cross the roadways in marked crosswalks, while motorcycle officers will watch for pedestrian right of way violations.  Motorists failing to yield the right of way to the pedestrian will be stopped and may be issued a citation under section 21950 of the California Vehicle Code. 

"Our goal is to raise drivers' awareness of their responsibility to stop for pedestrians in marked crosswalks," explained Sergeant Mike Braké of the Belmont Police Department.  "This is an opportunity to educate the motoring public on pedestrian right of way and related traffic laws", continued Sgt. Braké [and increase our city coffers]. 

The departments will carry out enforcement of pedestrian right of way violations on a continuous basis and will continue to work together on future pedestrian decoy events in their respective cities.

 

Corned Beef Brisket for Saint Patrick's Day

It’s close to Saint Patrick’s Day and corned beef is all the rage—at least in America. Those of you who think boiled meat sounds tepid might consider our twist on this holiday staple.

Nothing beats a good barbecued brisket and a corned brisket can be just as delicious. But boiling the brisket extracts the same flavor out of the meat as boiled ribs. Sure they are tender, but they’re only as good as the BBQ sauce you apply.

This year try baking the brisket as we do. Narsai David had a recipe like this years ago and it’s pretty straight forward so we’ll tell you our version.

But first, Alton Brown from the Food Network offers a great recipe for brining your own brisket. We include this link more so you know what goes in a good brine. His recipe takes ten days advance prep and we’re already too close to Saint Patrick’s Day to try that. We recommend you simply buy an already corned brisket from your favorite butcher; And try to get the pickling packet along with it or get one from the spice department.

Like pork shoulder or ribs, brisket requires low and slow cooking to break down the connective tissues. You'll typically find brisket sold as a flat cut or a point cut. We prefer a whole brisket for BBQ but for today’s event the point end of the brisket is preferred. While the flat or thin part is leaner, less fat means that it will not be as moist or as tender (or flavorful). Let your conscious decide which cut is right for you.

Preheat the oven to 225.

Trim some of the excess fat from the top of the brisket leaving at least a half inch of fat.

Now lather the brisket with salt and pepper and a generous amount of Coleman’s prepared mustard. 

In a roasting pan, add the brisket fat side up and cover with foil.

Bake it for about two hours and remove from the oven.

Sprinkle a generous portion of brown sugar over the top of the brisket and add the carrots and onions around the side of the pan. Cover with foil again and return to the oven for another two hours. Depending on the size of your brisket, it could take anywhere from a mere 2.5 hours to 5 hours to get to an internal temperature of at least 145—165 is preferable.

The way you know when a brisket is done is by the feel. Since many of you probably don’t know what that feel should be you can simple whack off a small piece and test for tenderness by chomping down a few bites (it’s great to be the cook). Remember though that the outer pieces will be more done than the center so take your temperature reading in the thickest part.

The only trick with brisket (if you could even call it that) is to not let it get so done that it’s dry or stringy, but done enough that it’s not tough.

Once the brisket is done you’ll want to let it stand and rest covered with foil for at least ½ hour---again depending on the size.

Meanwhile, in a separate pot on the stove you can add enough water to cover your new potatoes along with pickling spice and a bottle dark beer like Guinness—saving just enough to whet your palate. Bring the brine to just under boiling until the potatoes are near done—add the quartered cabbage and cook for ten more minutes or so.

Slicing the Meat

Think of the brisket like the trunk of a tree. The grain runs in one direction and you want to cut across it, not with it. When you serve you’ll have some nice caramelized carrots and onions along with the cabbage and some brined boiled potatoes and cabbage. The leftover corned beef makes excellent sandwiches but scrape off the brown sugar if you are making hash out of it. Now for the best part—you have five bottles of Guinness left over for the meal with your friends.

Do You Plan on Spending More This Year Than Last?

You all were so accurate at predicting the school bond poll results we thought we’d send out another one to see if this year retailers will get in the black.

We’ve been out shopping for Thanksgiving and are seeing a lot of activity in the stores. That caused us to wonder if people feel confident enough about the economy, and have the wherewithal, to spend more than last year on entertaining or gifts.

Let us know what you think and maybe you’ll even get an indication if that special gift you’re after will be on sale the day after Christmas, or fly off the shelves weeks before.

Houston's Thai Beef Salad - or a Close Approximation

Anyone wondering where the beef was in the Ranger’s hitting squad during the world series need look no further…we’ve got a recipe for you to chew on straight from Texas.

When I was travelling to Austin last year I would contemplate where I could dine next to pass my culinary time. A Friend of mine and local Austin REALTOR , Jeff Niemeyer recommended I try Houston’s near the arboretum; trying to stick to lighter fare when on the road, I’d often eat salads for lunch and or dinner and so when I arrived and found a Thai Beef Salad of the menu I was set.

Many of you may have already experienced restaurants by the Hillstone Group who own among other restaurants Houston’s in San Francisco and the new Los Altos Bar and Grill.

Once I tried the Thai Beef Salad at Houston’s in Austin I never ventured any further down their menu. It was absolutely one of the best salads I have eaten. People who know me well know I enjoy the challenge of deconstructing something I have tasted while dining out to detect what ingredients were employed. Often times it’s fairly easy as some flavors overpower the dish and are easily identified. But every so often a chef develops a recipe that is so complex, so well balanced that it titillates the taste buds with a mosaic of contrasting flavors where one could spend days attempting to deconstruct the recipes—or as in my case eating the salad many times and taking copious notes.

First and foremost the salad plays with all the senses of taste—bitter, sweet, sour, salt and introduces spice and umami with perfectly contrasting flavors of just enough heat and spice followed by refreshingly chilled mango. It further satisfies your sense of umami with refreshing rice noodles and perfectly grilled beef filet.

The salad starts with a bed of rice noodles which have been cooked, fried lightly and chilled to room temperature then ever so lightly tossed with sesame oil. A medley of julienne red bell peppers, carrots, tomato wedges, shredded cabbage and cubes of mango add complimenting textures, and wonderfully wild flavor combinations which serve to further enhance the colorful presentation and add more depth with each refreshing bite.

The dressing offers the spice and bitter with the introduction of fresh lime, orange juice and fish sauce while Srircacha adds a kick and is well paired with shiso to create depth to the dressing while the scallions and crunchy dry roasted peanuts offer a nice contrasting crunch.

While each ingredient has been carefully chosen to perform its respective roll of adding texture, color and smacking all the senses of tastes, the warm cubes of medium rare beef filet lightly marinated in the dressing then charcoal grilled adds the ultimate umami to finish the dish.

When I returned home—notes in tow—I checked on the internet to find out if Houston’s posts the recipe—no luck. But I did find an interestingly close approximation written by Kayla Williams which you can find here—with my notes added in pen as to what I felt brought it closer to the recipe I had in Austin. For example, the shiso which is most often associated sitting alongside your plate of sushi as the Japanese equivalent of parsley, is introduced in the salad as a complex version of what might be confused as mint and cilantro combination—and in fact if you can’t find shiso that’s a relatively logical substitution.

So without further ado here’s my collaborated best approximation of one the best salads I’ve had:

http://www.morganhomes.com/recipes/Thai_Salad.pdf

 

 

 

 

 

Orion in the night sky in Belmont

Just thought I’d share this with everyone.

 

We’ve always enjoyed astronomy and love it when there’s a new moon and we can get a good look at the night sky.

In Belmont, we’re pretty close to the city (San Francisco) and get a lot of city light which tends to wash-out the night sky.

If we look south-south-west however it’s much darker as we’re looking towards the Santa Cruz mountain range.

When I got up early this morning I had to grab my camera and capture one of my favorite constellations—Orion.

This was taken today, October 9^th 2010 just after six in the morning.

I used our Nikon D70 with a shutter speed of 30” at f4.8 and ISO of 1600.

Garbage Strike Hits Belmont and San Carlos

What's that wafting about in Belmont? The rumblings sure aren’t from the Allied Garbage trucks but rather disgruntled garbage workers.

If you live in Belmont you must have heard, if you haven't smelled it yet, that the garbage strike has left San Carlos and Belmont’s waste removal program canned for the time being. Apparently the garbage workers decided to strike when contract negotiation broke down with Allied Waste--while it’s actually the truck drivers who joined their co-worked in a showing of solidarity that stalled the pick-ups.

The only thing worse than the stench of garbage sitting on the curb for days is the foul way it was handled by the Allied Waste management.

Wednesday night at 11:05 we received two phone calls, courtesy of Allied Waste, telling us our garbage would be picked up on Friday. Couldn’t they have waited until morning? Pick-up would be for two more days. Another wasted opportunity to demonstrate customer service.

So if you’ve got the blues thinking your neighborhood is going downhill with trash littering the street take heart, Allied promises to dump their current strategy and resume pick-ups soon.

 

 

 

Suppressing Consumer Confidence--It's all in the headlines

There you go again…

That line was made famous by Ronald Reagan when he was running for office against President Jimmy Carter in 1980. It was used by then Mr. Reagan as a way to diffuse opponents who harped upon the same issues over and over.

Well the media is at it again. The media loves its headlines and of course they need to sell papers so it’s not put past them to choose a sensational attention grabbing headline and find data to support it.

Take the August 19, 2010 report on home sales in the Bay Area. The headline in the San Jose Mercury read “Peninsula home sales plunge in July”. Define plunge?

They reported, “After steadily rising for several months, Peninsula home sales plummeted to near-historic lows in July as demand remained tepid and the federal homebuyer tax credits that had helped caffeinate the marketplace in the past year finally went away".

When were these “near historic lows”? How near and how low were they?

Clearly the article is saying sales are down, and they are, but they fail the test of balanced journalism when they neglect to add the caveat “as expected”.

The accuracy of their article is subject to scrutiny as well. I reviewed our own analysis which we do every month since I didn’t recall being impressed by the large discrepancy in year-over-year sales mentioned in their article.

Our data is mined from the Multiple Listing Service. It doesn't contain all home sales—just ones which were listed with real estate agents. The percentage of homes which transfer ownership without the involvement of a real estate professional remains consistently a small percentage of all the homes which transfer—consistent being the operative word since the delta from one month to another is negligible.

Our statistics showed 385 single family homes closed escrow in July 2010, down from 393 in July 2009. According to our data the number of fewer sales this July compared to last were just eight, or 2%.

The San Jose Mercury claimed it was the lowest month for home sales in 20 years. But how many fewer homes sold? They don’t say. They also don’t mention that Dataquick, the source cited in their article as the resource for their reporting, issued a statement on August 19^th, 2010 (the date cited as being used by the San Jose Mercury) saying that they only estimated the sales for San Mateo County:

“San Diego-based MDA DataQuick is a division of MDA Lending Solutions, a subsidiary of Vancouver-based MacDonald Dettwiler and Associates. MDA DataQuick monitors real estate activity nationwide and provides information to consumers, educational institutions, public agencies, lending institutions, title companies and industry analysts. Because of late data availability, sales were estimated in Alameda and San Mateo counties.”

But more to the point, industry experts predicted that home sales would drop after the expiration of the housing stimulus tax credit on May 1, 2010. Last year—the year used for comparing sales—the tax credit was still available in July.  One only has to go back to 2007 to see sales as low as they were this July, not 20 years.

In Santa Clara county they report: “1,159 single-family resale homes that closed escrow represented a drop of 24.3 percent from the 1,531 sold a year earlier, making this the second-slowest July since 1990, according to figures released Thursday by the real estate information service MDA DataQuick.

I didn’t bother to verify any of this information. But let’s assume it’s more accurate than what they reported about San Mateo County. Sales haven’t been this low since…1990. Why does that date ring a bell? It’s the date of the last housing downturn. So what their report tells us is home sales drop when the housing market drops, and sales have not started to pick up yet, because they no doubt will someday.

But what the report does is continue to fan the flames of consumer skepticism. Unless and until the housing market recovers, the rest of the country will suffer. Responsible reporting might help us get back on track sooner rather than later. We expect the facts—the news—good or bad. Just don’t skew what you choose to report to further your own agenda.

Home Sales Decline As Tax Credits Expire - WSJ.com

"Some 60% of the 109 economists and other analysts surveyed by MacroMarkets LLC expect home prices to decline this year, up from 40% in May."

via online.wsj.com

I found this amusing. If their numbers are right, at 66% the economists are no better than the Supreme Court Justices at arriving at a consensus, and probably no more accurate than our local weather announcer when they do.

Happy New Year from MorganHomes.com

Happy New Year!

We’re closing in on the year end home sales statistics, and for that matter the decade end as well. We’ll take a look at the past ten years as compared to 2009 to see how it all stacks up. For now, we’ll leave you with wishes for a prosperous, healthy and happy New Year!

Time to Brine?

Thanksgiving!

What a great time to be appreciative of all that you have; your health, happiness, friends and family. Our Thanksgivings are typically not typical at all. The family descends upon our home with the enthusiasm eclipsed only by a FREE four star resort vacation, which is close to what they have come to expect. Somehow, we wouldn’t have it any other way.

We both love to cook so cook we do. Drew owned his own food service company and is an accomplished cook in his own right, and in another lifetime I worked for Bill Graham Presents and helped run the catering operations to feed the bands. Needless to say our experience cooking for the masses comes in handy when the troops are home for the holidays.

What’s on our menu?

What’s not? We tend to view Thanksgiving as traditionalists and stick to dishes that conjure up fond memories of comfort foods prepared by our mothers with all of the love (if not creativity) imparted to the meal. But we also add one or two extra dishes that help keep the whole preparation less perfunctory and more fun.

This year we’re doing Oysters Rockefeller but reverting to the original recipe from Antoine’s in New Orleans, rather than the typical oysters with spinach and hollandaise so prevalent at today’s seafood houses. We’ve actually made these once before—just not at Thanksgiving—and they are amazing! Here’s the recipe we used and the key ingredient is fresh Chervil & Taragon so forget going to Safeway. BTW—The Blue Point Oysters at the Crystal Springs Fish and Poultry at the Crystal Springs Shopping center looked awesome when I was there yesterday (11/25/2009).

Now well pass along a few tips for this year’s Thanksgiving for those of you who cook a traditional Turkey.

To brine or not to brine?

Brining a Turkey helps it retain moisture. We’re not here to discuss whether or how to brine; some good recipes and the basics behind brining can be read here.  But here are several brining tricks:

· Put your turkey in the vessel you will use for brining and cover it with enough water to submerge the bird completely. Now take the Turkey out of the brine and measure how much water was needed. That will determine how much water you need for your brine recipe.

· Only use half of the water required for the brine recipe to dissolve the sugar and salt. Once your brine has been cooked—bringing out all of the bouquet and dissolving all of the salt and sugar—remove the pot from the stove and add the remaining amount of water in the form of ice cubes. That will enable you to quickly submerge your bird without first having to chill the brine. How many ice cubes do you need? Remember if you need a half gallon more of water that’s 64 ounces. Simply keep filling a plastic bag with ice cubes until you reach 64 ounces in weight.

· If possible, store your brined bird in the refrigerator being sure it remains completely submerged. If you’re like most and don’t have the room, you can line an ice chest with a clean plastic bag (be sure it’s not made from recycled materials), and place the bird in the bag and cover with brine, then pack around it with bags of ice.

Give your bird plenty of rest.

By the time it comes down to cooking everything you and your bird probably need some rest. This is just the time to get out your iced-down bird and let it begin to come up in temperature. If you are deep frying your bird, this is a critical step. Once submerged in hot oil a cold bird can drop the temperature of your oil by over 100 degrees.  Equally important though is allowing your bird to air dry. You can even point a fan at your bird to expedite the process of removing water from the bird’s skin which will ultimately produce a crisp outer skin.

Cooking Tips:

If you are deep frying your Turkey be sure and start the oil at a higher temperature than the recipe calls for. Most recipes call for cooking a bird at around 350 degrees so starting your oil at around 400 will help the oil recover faster from your cold bird taking the plunge. Alton Brown, who I respect immensely, has a recipe that calls for starting the bird at 250 and slowly bringing it up to 350. Personally, we believe cooking it faster allows for less absorption of the oil and produces a crisp skin. Our 15 pound bird last year needed only 45 minutes and it was cooked perfectly. Be careful though, plopping a cold bird in hot oil can cause oil to spill over the top and risk a fire. One way to avoid this is to dip your bird in the oil for about 3 minutes when the oil is only around 290. Then pull it back out and allow the oil to reach temperature. Now you’ve successfully removed some of the surface water from the bird that could overreact with hotter oil. If you want to remove the risk of a flash fire always turn off the fire when lifting your bird in and out of the oil.

And for anyone who thinks deep frying a Turkey is sacrilege, we thought so too until we tried it. It actually produced a bird with less fat than the traditional roasting method. That was quickly demonstrated when we went to skim off the Turkey fat from the pot of Turkey stock the next day and there was none! Think about it…the leanest piece of bacon you will ever eat is one that has been deep fried—the process renders all of the fat form the meat. That said, we’re opting for a rotisserie version this year; brined and with a hint of Lavender smoke.

Enjoy your holiday and stop in again soon!

 

Cheers,

Drew & Christine

When A Little Common Sense Goes A Long Way

I found the picture that accompanied the article in the San Francisco Chronicle, Saturday November 15^th 2008 title “Increase in Deaths, injuries on dangerous San Francisco Streets”  a bit symptomatic of the problem.

The article is reciting the statistics on just how dangerous the streets are for pedestrian and bicyclists and the picture shows a pedestrian walking right out in front of a car without even looking at the driver of the vehicle which is poised to potentially run him over.

(click on the picture for a full-sized view)

Don’t get me wrong, in most accidents drivers are in fact at fault and hitting pedestrian accounts for more than half of the fatalities each year in San Francisco. That doesn’t mean we should subjugate personal responsibility or common sense for laws. Traffic lights are there to tell drivers they need to stop, and laws are there to help enforce that they do so, but if they fail to stop who really wants to be dead right?

I applaud Belmont for installing the flashing crosswalk signals to alert drivers that a pedestrian is about to cross. This extra “heads-up” could save many lives if it were employed in San Francisco. And while their proposal to install cameras to award citations for failure to stop will generate much needed traffic fine revenues, it will do little prevent accidents; remember the citations are given after the fact—once there has already been a violation. That said, if the fines generate enough revenue to be self-sustaining or better yet offer extra revenue to fund lighted crosswalks I’m all in favor.

Not being privy to the statistics, intuitively, I’ll bet that the person who purposely runs a red light does so by just missing a yellow one. If the lights were timed with a little more delay, a pedestrian would not receive a green light until well after the opposing light had turned red. The real danger is in drivers who plow on through a red light oblivious to its warning, well after the driver should have stopped—giving pedestrians ample time to wander out in front of an oncoming car.

When I was a child my mother taught me to stop, look and listen before crossing a street. Somehow those simply life saving lessons have been lost as people become more reliant on traffic lights and less reliant on common sense—traffic signals do not substitute for common sense and personal preservation. Sure people are supposed to stop, but pedestrians fail to remember that sometimes they don’t, or can’t always do so.

I’ve driven around Belmont for many years and I’m always amazed as I approach an intersection to see for example, a mother with a stroller fixated on the WALK signal in front of her and not on whether I am poised to heed my signals. They’ll blindly push their stroller right out in front of my vehicle on the assumption that in a perfect world I will see the red light, heed the laws, that I will physically be able to stop and my car will mechanically be able to do so—should you really have that much faith in the average driver or the maintenance of their vehicles?

Look, listen, be aware of your surroundings and a lot of these accidents could be avoided.

October 26th 1881--A Day in History

Each year I post a new message on the anniversary of the “Shoot out at the OK Corral”, and also on Wyatt Earp’s birthday, March 19^th (1848).

October 26^th bears a lot of meaning for me. Most importantly it was the day my mother was born—and event without which this blog would not exist. My mother was a stall worth advocate of learning and the history that surrounds us. I fondly remember mornings when I would awake to find new message on our chalk-board in the kitchen that recounted some historical trivia—she was the first who said “What happened on this day in history?” It also marks the day of the famous shoot out near the OK Corral.

In 1992 I saw the movie “Tombstone”, and I thought at the time, “What an interesting movie, I wonder what really happened?” That led me on a decade of research into the life and times of Wyatt Earp and the Wild West.  Since then I have read every book I could get my hands on regarding the topic.

*Kurt Russell plays an excellent Wyatt Earp in the 1992 movie Tombstone.

In 1998 I had occasion to meet with several prominent authors of Wyatt Earp history. We met  in Tombstone, Arizona for a trip to recount the facts and places that preceded the shootout as well as that which transpired after the events on that fateful October 26^th day in 1881 when the Clanton’s, Mc Laury’s, the Earps and Doc Holliday had it out in proximity to the OK Corral.

The trip was enlightening to say the least, and as is often the case, finding the truth is more fascinating than the Hollywood fiction.

As you’ve probably gleamed the famous shoot out at the OK Corral never really happened at the OK Corral—it was around back in a vacant lot close to Fly’s photo gallery. But who fired the first shot? Those who know for sure are long gone but many believe it was Wyatt Earp—the only one to come out of the fray unscathed. Interesting enough one of the most important details omitted from every movie ever made was the trial that took place after the shootout which could have sent the Earp clan and Doc Holliday to the gallows. There were many witnesses to the gunfight that day and as you can imagine every one of them told a slightly different version of what happened.  In December of that year the trial ended with the exoneration of the Earp’s and Holliday and with that the murder charges were dropped; but the acquittal set off a string of events including Virgil being crippled for life, the murder of Morgan Earp and the bloody massacre of the Clanton gang by Wyatt and his cronies.

For a good book to get a better understanding of the political environment which created the tension in this small silver mining town, I suggest you read a thesis now in book form written by Paul Mitchell Marks titled “And Die In The West”, still in print at Amazon.com.

Transparent. Frankly, I'm sick of the word...

Catch phrases are being overused, don't you think?

They're like a good song that gets played so much you're afraid to turn on the radio for fear of having to hear it played once more.

It's Friday and call it "fried-day" if you've had as hectic of a week as I-and with only two more work days to go, this seems like the best day to get off a rant.

Allow me to digress...If the 90's were defined by conspicuous consumption than the "Ought's" so far have turned out to be years filled with anxiety, uncertainty and fear.

Before the new millennium ever even got started we had to worry about the Y2K. Even naysayers of that alert surreptitiously logged into their bank accounts the next day just to be sure. Then the 21^st century really hit and we ushered in new paradigms.

We voted for a new President that year but that too was after much anxiety in our nation. We never really knew without question if the President we voted for was supposed to be in office or not.

Things settled down and seemed to be humming along fine until September 11^th 2001, when our country faced an unparalleled attack. More anxiety, uncertainty and fear.

That's when our country's paradigm shifted to a fear based society. Even our government leaders told us to go about living our lives, while looking over our shoulders; all while our mail delivery person was supposed to watch out for suspicious activity. We had to be alert, 24/7.

Then all of a sudden we needed to be green. Of course it would have been nice to think green all along; and in fact many people have. But suddenly everything had to be about "going green" and it starts to be disingenuous when corporations are going green as a marketing ploy.

Now with gas prices soaring, the housing market crashing and ruining everyone's party, the only fun anyone we're having is riding the stock market roller coaster-more uncertainty.

And now everything has to be transparent-transparent? Who coined that word to describe the new millennium business model?  In order to compete in real estate all of a sudden you have to be web 2.0 savvy and completely transparent. Not even the people using the phrase web 2.0 can agree on its meaning. And what about transparency? Don't you think Coke owes it to us to make their recipe public? After all, we do drink their product...

Am I the only one who thinks the word transparent has a slightly negative connotation to it-as in there's no substance, "it's completely transparent"; or, "he's so transparent", as in you can see right through his gimmicks?

I've never started a catch phrase before but could we try something with a little more integrity, such as "apparent", as in "His business style is completely apparent"-perhaps not.

It's hard to be green and transparent at the same time. The only thing that seems transparent to me right now is that everyone is so busy trying to be transparent, in the meantime, they are.

The Streets Around Us

Have you ever driven around Belmont and wondered how a street got its name? You might even live on a street named Lyon for example and wondered if it too is a French derivation.

How about that funny round turret of a building on Alameda de las Pulgas (now that’s a name)—who lived there?

We’ll answer a few, but Belmont does have a historical society which is fun to visit and you’ll meet volunteers with all of the answers. There’s even a book titled “Heritage of the Wooded Hills” by Ria Elena MacCrisken that will satisfy some of your curiosity and make driving the windy roads of our little town more interesting. Now for some answers:

In an apparent attempt to fashion Belmont after Hillsborough, in 1925 the Belmont Country Club Properties were formed by Messrs Lee Monroe, Lawrence Miller and Arthur Lyon (apparently Mr. Lyon had more pull as both his first and last names were used for street names).

Across the street from the $65,000 club house located at 751 Alameda de las Pulgas (now the Congressional Church of Belmont) was a tiny round sales office offering homes around the golf course for sale. What golf course? Find out in our next blog page at

BeautifulMountainBlog

Foreclosures have pitfalls for buyers

Ever since we launched our foreclosure portal on our web site we've been inundated with inquires requesting information on how to purchase one of the many homes going to auction.

What we did not anticipate was the general misunderstanding of the process.

First, the opening bid is inappropriately referred to as the "sale price" when in fact it is more accurately the opening bid price. This sale price is what seems to attract the throngs of interested parties since it sounds too good to be true, and in fact, it is.

Buyers are asking us, "How can I purchase that home?" Of course the answer is you attend the Sherriff's auction and be the winning bidder.

Then they ask when can they see the home? Unfortunately, the answer is not until after you buy it. The Sherriff's department does not conduct home tours, nor do they perform inspections and provide buyers with illuminative reports on the condition of the home. Bidders show up with 10% of the price they wish to bid and must provide the remainder within 10 days of the auction or forfeit their deposit.

If you are lucky enough to be the winning bidder and manage to get a home for less than what surrounding properties of like kind are selling for-good. Now all you have to do is hope that when you get the keys and open the door the walls are intact, the kitchen is still there and the floors are not ruined.

Unless you are a savvy investor with deep pockets we suggest that buyers stick with more traditional methods with safeguards for purchasing a home.

Going "Green" is all about image, not substance

It’s pretty exciting this time of year. Don’t you just love coming home to a full answering machine with voice mail messages from your representatives in government? I don’t know about you, but I feel pretty darn important when Bill Clinton calls and asks me to vote for his wife; or it’s Arnold Schwarzenegger himself calling to see if I’ll vote to be taxed a little more so he can balance the budget.

This year it’s the year of the postcard. Funny too, since all of the candidates are claiming to be going “green” this year.

Richard Holober’s postcard is not really a postcard at all. It’s an 8.5” x 11” glossy full page ad where he claims to be supported by the Sierra Club. I wonder how many trees the Sierra Club donated to his cause? At least one of his flyers appears to be printed on recycled paper. But the one with a picture of him standing next to a tree he is claiming to protect is absolutely ironic.

Gina Papan must own interest in a paper company for all the mail I’ve received from her lately.

Jerry Hill is another “Sierra Club" sponsored candidate according to a printed flyer I received from him. In fact, several other candidates who aren’t even running appear to have helped Jerry by sending out print flyers for him. Good for him. I like more mail too.

Perhaps they could all take a page from the Internet playbook and start blogging. Barack Obama has been sending me emails almost daily and I’ve yet to get one single piece of paper mail from him.

It’s going to be lonely around here after the election is over—I know I’ll never hear from any of them again.

Belmont is in need of some negativity

If you’ve been thinking like we have, you're probably wondering when will the weather get a little warmer.

The wind has been relentless this month. Our Davis weather station located at our home in the Hallmark area of Belmont, has been collecting data since we moved to from Barclay Way in 2001. We’ve been broadcasting it live since January 2002 and it receives more hits than any of our other web pages each month.

A recent software upgrade has allowed us to extract data for analysis and this is my first graph. It illustrates the wind at time intervals for the Month of May, 2008—to date.

Notice that there hasn’t been one day so far this month that there hasn’t been any wind between the hours of 12:45 PM to 11:00 PM!

The positive ions wind can create may actually have a negative affect on the body by raising stress levels. Ever wonder why lying near a stream or waterfall feels so relaxing? Moving water creates negative ions which counteract the effects of positive ions created by the wind. Try washing your face with water after a bike ride. We hear it’s not just the coolness of the water that feels so good; it’s the positive ions being cancelled out by negative ones that have a calming effect. Admittedly these articles are not from scientific scholars, but sometimes experiencing something for yourself is all the affirmation one needs.

After awhile, the wind begins to grow a little tiresome and we’re just waiting for a calm mild day—I know a lull before the storm.

Bay Area Population Growth Helps Bouy Housing Demand

Anyone who owned a home in the Bay Area back in 1989 must remember the subsequent downturn in the market. That downturn was caused by a loss of Bay Area jobs. Home values fell as jobless homeowners sought to liquidate their mortgage overhead. Companies offered out-of-state relocations packages and early retirement to employees while many others opted to voluntarily move out of state. The latest Bay Area job report indicates that for now at least we are safe from that negative market force called unemployment. The nine Bay Area county population grew 1.4% last year and new arrivals helped buoy the housing market—if not more in the rental sector than homeownership. "It's evidence that the Bay Area is doing better economically than the rest of the state," said Mary Heim, head of the demographics research unit at the state Department of Finance, which released the new population numbers. This link http://www.sfgate.com/webdb/population/ allows you to see any city’s population growth and it’s definitely worth checking out. Whenever there is a market sell-off due to dire circumstances, such as we are experiencing now in the foreclosure arenas, prices drop. Why? Simply put in order to be the next sale you must have the lowest price and/or be the best home on the market. The housing market today is not unlike that of 1990 in that in many areas folks are forced to sell their homes and prices are dropping. But the Peninsula of the Bay Area has been fairing far better. First, there are far fewer foreclosures on the Peninsula and thus virtually no downward pressure on pricing from that market force. There’s market skepticism and a general reluctance on the part of many to enter the market; and we all know the new tighter lending practices have make it difficult to impossible for many to buy a home if they wanted to. But jobs are not one of the issues facing the Peninsula right now. If the unemployment rate rises dramatically or more simply put, if people start to leave the Bay Area (voluntarily or not)—where more people are leaving than are arriving—it could all change. Clearly a prolonged recession could have just such an impact and tip the precariously balanced local housing market in favor of a drastic sell-off. See our homepage at MorganHomes.com for monthly updated local market graphs and our blog page at Beautifulmountainblog.org for detailed market analysis and commentary.

Crosswalk etiquette, a lesson for Belmont

Is crosswalk etiquette dead or did it ever exist?

View Larger Map

This is our city, Belmont California; and this is our office, Carlmont Associates. Here we are smack dab in the middle of Belmont on the corner of Ralston Ave. and Villa--obviously a big enough intersection to get Google's attention.

The cross walk you see here is the topic of today's rant. You see the city installed an illuminated cross walk—you know the ones with the flashing yellow lights imbedded into the street—to assist pedestrians in crossing the road. Well not really to help them get across, but to help them get there more safely by making it easier for them to be noticed.

Clearly in order to get to my office I play the role of both a driver and pedestrian. First, in defense of the drivers, it's really hard to see people when you are staring into the sunset. Spin this interactive camera around and you'll see what we mean. It’s much easier to see the lights flashing in the road than to see a pedestrian standing off to one side—especially when they are often obscured by opposing traffic.

Don’t get me wrong--I think these lights are a great idea. Especially since my night vision isn’t what it used to be. But pedestrians take advantage of the "It's the Law" rule that one must stop for them in a crosswalk. When I'm the pedestrian (which I often am getting to and from our office), before I leap out into the crosswalk and stop traffic like Moses parting the Red Sea, as a common courtesy, I stop to see if the light at the corner of Ralston and Alameda is red or green. If it’s green, I’ll wait patiently and let the cars make the green light and only when it turns yellow will I press the power button to halt all traffic in deference to my presence. Do I have to do this? Of course not. The law is on the side of the pedestrian. Is it the courteous thing to do—of course.

Visit our web page at MorganHomes.com for detailed housing market analysis and I promise, no rants.

And just one more reason real estate sales are down…

After reading Kenneth Harney’s article titled “Tight credit hitting specialized areas of mortgage market” in the May 3, 2008 Real Estate section of the San Francisco Chronicle, it struck me how far we have to go to return to a more normal housing market. Mr. Harney discusses the multitude of new restrictions on home mortgages which all have one glaring similarity—they make it harder for borrowers to get a loan.

Some of the new loan restrictions affecting home buyers are:

·         No more zero down financing

·         No more stated income for non self- employed people

·         No refinancing a property that had a cash-out refinance within the last six months

Some of the new loan guidelines for investors will also hurt the housing industry. A few of these are:

·         No investor shall be eligible for loans on more than four properties in total—the prior limit was ten.

This will clearly have a detrimental effect as housing seen from an investment perspective will be effectively limited to four properties—looks like REIT’s will be getting a second life when the housing market does pick up.

What’s entirely possible is that the market may never see another feverish housing boom--the likes of which swept the country in the last decade. Home affordability is still near an historical low, lending standards have never been tighter—the huge confluence of dual income qualification for loans and higher home values is off the table as that market effect has been played out already (we did an article on that months ago called the dual income trap).

Visit our Real Estate web page for monthly updated Bay Area home sale trends MorganHomes.com

Disclaimer: This information is for entertainment purposes only and includes no legal, accounting or real estate advice nor is this intended to be specific to your situation-consult a specialist for your specific situation.

Renters Hit Hard As Prices Climb

You’ve got to admit, renters have had a hard time. After being squeezed out of the homeownership market for years they now face getting squeezed out of the rental market as well.

But more to my point…ever notice that plane crashes come in three’s? Do they, or does the media just report them that way? Ever notice after a plane does crash you hear nothing but planes crashing all day. Are planes suddenly dropping out of the sky in some fit of protest? Hardly.

I’ve also noticed a distinct pattern to the San Francisco Chronicle’s Sunday Real Estate section. Each week they organize this section into a theme. Last week’s “theme” was the bad news for renters with headings such as these: “Bay Area rents still rising”, (James Temple, Chronicle Staff Writer, Friday, April 18, 2008), “Apartment rents throughout West still rising”, (MICHAEL LIEDTKE, AP Business Writer, Thursday, April 17, 2008), “A look at apartment rents in western United States”, (The Associated Press, Thursday, April 17, 2008).

The San Francisco Chronicle’s recent reports on the rental market have been rather telling in regards to the overall housing picture. With more buyers unable or unwilling to buy, competing with homeowners thrust back into the rental market due to either voluntarily or involuntarily leaving homeownership, it will be just a matter of time before rising rents and lower home values make owning vs. renting a no brainer. I’ve seen it before and I’m sure I’ll see it again.

But then I read what appeared to be an op-ed piece by Marcie Lewis of Bankrate.com. That headline read “Rental Market Hit by Mortgage Crisis”. I thought I was going to read more of the same—doom and gloom for renters. But the piece ended by stating the opposite of what all the other articles had to offer about the dwindling supply of rental units by saying:

“Other homeowners have opted to rent out their entire home because they've relocated, but can't sell the home for enough money to pay off their debts, which might include a home equity loan or line of credit in addition to a first mortgage. This trend increases the supply of rental housing.” (Lewis 4/2008, p K11)

And…

”Many cities experienced a boom in conversions of apartments into condos, but now, due to lower condo prices, some builders and owners have opted to rent out units they'd intended to sell. This trend also adds to the supply of rentals.” (Lewis 4/2008 , p K11)

So wait a minute; do we have more available rental units or less? I guess they’ll follow up next week with the answer.

Belmont Buyers--Now's Your Chance

                                                                                                                                            Lots of large homes are on the market in Belmont while the inventory of homes for sale is  reaching a high not seen since 2003. Just 22 of the 52 homes for sale are listed under $1,000,000; while the median home currently for sale is just over 2,000 square feet, the median home in Belmont is only 1550 square feet.

And Inventory levels have hit near all time highs. There are currently 52 single family homes on the market and only twice in the last ten years has there ever been more—both times the U.S. was in a business cycle trough—the 2001 recession and again in 2003 during a mid cycle slowdown. We expect inventory level to grow even more in May and June of 2008.

In the past ten years there never has been a month with fewer sales than last month—March 2008 where Belmont had only five sales, except for the month before when there were only four sales. Normally, Belmont will have on average 23 per month; percentage-wise that equals only 18% or normal.

If you’re a Belmont seller and trying to sell during the peak period to obtain the highest price that window of opportunity has already passed. If you are a buyer interested in Belmont, there’s plenty to choose from and we expect favorable buying conditions to continue for at least the next year and probably well into 2010. But timing the market can be a fool’s game. While waiting for home values to drop interest rates may rise, offsetting any monetary gain.

Plenty of buyers have been waiting years for an opportunity such as the current buyer friendly market conditions to purchase a home—well, now’s their chance.

The Numbers Just Don't Jive with many Buyers' Sentiment

Buyers have bought one thing--that's the media's pounding that home value are falling. Indeed they are in a lot of areas, but if you want to live in San Carlos, CA and are waiting for prices to drop, don't hold your breath too long.

I recenly did this anaylsis for a client who wondered if their home values have dropped. They bought in an excellent area of San Carlos four years ago and paid the then prevailing purchase price in multiple offers of $885,000 for a three bedroom, two bath home which is approximately 1650 square feet.

The follwoing is my brief analysis for them:

The home which just sold on your street is not a bad comp, but it’s not the best either. Logically it’s the same size, in near proximity and (I suppose) condition, yet it is lacking the very things that attracted throngs of buyers to your house when you bought it—character. People pay dearly for that in San Carlos.

Have the values gone down recently? Everyone believes they have but the numbers do not bear that out. Your home might have sold for more in 2005/2006 but that would probably have to do with the overbid process which has diminished, but not disappeared. Unless you are planning to move soon I’d just hang in there and it will almost certainly be even higher in the next few years.

I have included data going back to 2004 when you purchased your home. I specifically targeted sales comps that were 3 bed 2 baths and between 1500-1600 square feet. I know when you bought your home the seller claimed it was 1650 and it may be (look at your appraisal and you’ll get a better idea), but the county has it at 1540 so that is the range I used for comparison. If your home is indeed larger, than you’ll be in even a better position than my data suggests.

I hope this helps you understand our fickle market.

Some interesting facts:

The median price for comparable homes has been going up since you bought your home. Notice that the exact same size homes sold in 2004 and 2007 making the appreciation data extremely accurate. This data concludes a 26% increase in the median home price from 2004-2007; which if applied to your home’s purchase price would suggest it to be worth $1,115,000. Straight-line appreciation numbers are flawed though in part because the reason homes have gone up in value that much is the typical homeowner will put in excess of $100,000 into their home. Factoring that in, the appreciation levels are almost half so if you’ve done nothing to your home you would be closer to $1,050,000. Don’t even try and follow the numbers exactly because I’m factoring in a slight bump for the intangible “WOW” factor of your home’s appeal.

Median Price 2004 $825,500 2005 $977,000 2006 $996,500 2007 $1,042,000

You purchased your home at $885,000 in March of 2004 when the median price for the 3/2’s was $825,500.

Your home was probably larger than the median home at the time. At 1540 sq. ft. your home sold for $574 per sq. ft. and it was truly 1650 sq. ft. it sold for $536 per square foot. The median at the time was $532 per square foot:

2004 2005 2006 2007

$ per Sq. Ft. $532 $639 $633 $686

But the median home size was also smaller—smaller homes sell for more per square foot:

2004 1560 2005 1530 2006 1570 2007 1560

Notice how the median price for comparables homes is more-or-less in step with the median appreciation:

In summary, depending on the current condition of your home and the improvements you may have made, your home is probably worth $1,050,000 on the low side to $1,150,000 on the high side.

IF WE AREN'T ALREADY IN A RECESSION, WE COULD BE SOON

A front page article in the Sunday edition of the San Francisco Chronicle titled "Lenders Retreat as Market Plummets" (Sam Zukerman-staff writer April 6, 2008) may frighten some people into cashing their home equity line checks fast.

The article states that many banks such as Bank of America, Country Wide Financial and Washington Mutual are freezing homeowner's equity lines in fear of losing more money to foreclosures. Let's hope Wells Fargo continues to believe in the Bay Area like Bank of America used to.

This could spell a downward spiral as lenders cut back on honoring equity lines that might just be the thing which could keep some folks from losing their homes. The opportunity to tap into existing equity to forestall a foreclosure, even just pay the bills may be just the shot in the arm credit worthy people might need yet now many banks appear poised to pull the plug.

Of course bank don't want people spending their equity line of credit like they used to-especially if home values in their area have dropped significantly; but cutting them off may just send many more of their customers to the front of the foreclosure line.

IF WE AREN'T ALREADY IN A RECESSION, WE COULD BE SOON

This could spell more doom and gloom in the economy as less available cash for spending-or simply knowing that emergency cash flow could be cut, will likely be the nail in the coffin for economic growth this year.

It's a calculated risk on the part of the banks-at least we hope they have calculated it. They don't want to throw good money after bad but by freezing equity lines when people need them most they could mean they end up taking back more property than if they left these loans in place.

Allow Me to Think Out Loud...

The San Francisco Chronicle just splashed more bad news about the housing industry all over the front page of the Friday (March 14^th) issue. Sales are down-way down. Part of the explanation seems to be that tightening lending standards have made it hard to afford a home since qualifying at artificially low teaser rates is no longer acceptable. Stated income loans are only available for self-employed individuals and Wall Street stopped buying mortgage backed securities so rates are up too.

Of course buyers who have been priced out of the market are now waiting to jump in at the bottom, which only adds to the rapid decrease in sales activity.

Timing couldn't have been worse for Congress to approve raising the ceiling on federally backed mortgages from $417,000 to $729,950 in the Bay Area. Many buyers considering purchasing a home are enticed to wait out the market a little more to see if rates will drop further.

So if we had a crystal ball, we'd say that when the new higher conforming loan cap goes into effect, it's just possible that many buyers will get off of the fence. And if they all do that at the same time, there just possibly could be competition once again for housing.  The biggest fear if you're a buyer is you get in the market too early and your home's value could go down before it goes back up; that's a horrible position to be in if you have to sell while it's down. The alternative is to get lucky and time it perfectly, or wait to see values going up and be assured you didn't get the best deal. I don't know for sure, but history tends to repeat itself and I'll bet home values go up again sometime in our future. While everyone's trying to guess when the bottom is not everyone will get it right.

Maybe buying before that happens would be a good idea. If rates do go down further, one could always refinance...

Sales That Drive Our Economy...

There are great deals to be had on appliances right now.

Everyone knows that the U.S. economy is driven to a large degree by consumer spending. Tighter post-Christmas spending patterns create a need for stores to offer up sales and financing deals to lure consumers back to the stores. Check out Best Buy and Circuit City to see the amazing deals one can get right now!

This year with consumer confidence low, the average consumer will pull back even more. That translates into great deals for the savvy (or fortuitous) consumer who’s waited to buy. On big ticket items such as plasma TV’s and refrigerators it’s not unusual to see low or no interest rate financing options today—even free delivery.

When will these offers end? They’ll end when consumers return to more bullish spending patterns. When will that happen—of course no one knows. The only indication will be when you are no longer offered deferred or low interest finance rates and deep discounts—watch the ads.

How does that translate into real estate? Actually, perfectly. The same forces are at work and the same indicators available. You’ll know when was the best time to buy just after it passed.

                                    Live your life.

*The information contained is educational and intended for informational purposes only. It does not constitute legal advice, nor does it substitute for professional advice.

Butter or Bacon--How Do You Know What's Good For You?

Let’s point fingers. It’s the American way—when things go awry, we want to know who's to blame. There’s got to be somebody out there whose hands are dirty? And if we can’t find them we’ll pick an easy target.

So who’s is to blame for the mortgage fiasco? Might there be enough blame to go around for everyone?

The banks and lenders who made the loans certainly had to know the risks involved—they designed the loans in the first place. They are the ones that lowered the qualifying standards so that a buyer could get approved for a loan at a minimum negatively amortized payment option.  One might even argue this is what the banks wanted. Countrywide, the nation’s largest lender may have specifically designed these loans to bring themselves to the brink of bankruptcy. Why? We’ll leave that one to the conspiracy theorists.

The brokers who made the loans must have also been aware of the pros and cons; how else could they sell the products? Why didn’t they just tell people that these were risky loans, I’m sure no one would have opted in had they been aware of a potential down side…

Real estate agents must bear some culpability too. After all, they sold these people homes they knew they could never afford for the short-sided interest of getting a commission check. Let’s just hope they all go down with the sinking ship—that’ll teach them. Many of these buyers could never have dreamed of owning a home and real estate agents should have told them to forget about homeownership and stay renters.

And all will be well in American if we can just find someone to blame.

The fact is other than some unscrupulous lenders, bankers, mortgage brokers and agents who participated in these loan schemes without disclosing the downside, one really cannot blame the average industry professional for doing their job—selling a product—anymore than one could blame your local supermarket for selling tobacco, alcohol, butter and bacon. Those products might not be the best for you but they’re available— it’s up to the buyer to be aware of the health issues and indulge in moderation.

If you think the buyer suing her agent in California over the value of her home is a case to watch, wait until homeowners start suing the banks for offering them loans the banks should have known they could not afford.

The reality is this is probably the best argument against privatizing Social Security. Most people do not possess the business acumen to handle their own finances. I can just imagine the uproar over that bailout now…

Median Price Methodology Examined

Median Price Methodology:

The methodology of reporting median home prices varies depending on the source. The MLS uses the aggregate method of calculating the median based on the preceding twelve month sales. We discuss why in a changing market this system is flawed at best.

Standard & Poor’s methodology is perhaps the most accurate, but it relies heavily on past sales and is therefore better suited for looking at historical trends than illuminating current market conditions.

We employ another approach which is to examine the most recent month’s sales, and adjust for larger or smaller homes selling to help mitigate wild fluctuations in median price results.

For example, the MLS reported Belmont’s median value for 2007 to be $945,000; yet looking at the median price reported at the end of December it stood at $1,035,000; a significant difference and an overall upward trend from the previous three years.

Seller's Can't Afford to Overprice Their Home

Days on Market and Price Received Correlation

Though the nation’s mortgage industry is tumultuous at best, the peninsula market in the Bay Area is faring much better.

Last month 17 homes sold as compared to 14 in 2006 and off the high of 25 in 2005.

Of those 17 sales eight sold over the seller’s asking price, two sold at asking and seven homes sold under asking.                                                                                     

The average time it took to sell a home was 39 days. Of the homes which sold over asking however, they took only 18 days to sell and on average sold for 3.61% over what the seller was asking. Seller's which received their asking price took on average 40 days to sell, and homes which sold under the asking price averaged 56 days on the market and sold for 5.26% less than their original asking price.

Clearly, pricing a home correctly remains a crucial factor in getting the most for a home. These numbers illustrates a swing of almost 9% in what a seller received between a home priced to sell quickly and one which lingered on the market.

Help Us Go Green!

Help Us Go Green! Help us continue to decrease the need for environmentally demanding postal mail while enriching our schools—all while keeping abreast of Belmont’s housing market and local issues. For a limited time, for every verified email address we receive on our Newsletter Form we’ll donate $1.00 to Belmont’s School Force.* As Real Estate agents and homeowners in Belmont, we are directly involved with fielding questions about the local schools. The importance of quality education, beside the obvious responsibility of providing education as a social benefit, has a direct bearing on a city’s quality of life which translates indirectly into higher home values. Whether a homeowner has children benefitting from the great education Belmont’s schools provide or not, supporting the local schools is one of the least expensive and best investments a homeowner can make to increase property values. The Belmont/Redwood Shores school district continues to excel and part of their success is attributable to Belmont’s School Force™, a non-profit organization founded in 2001 which concentrates their efforts on improving the quality of education in our schools through fundraising for programs which would otherwise be discontinued. Our commitment to minimizing the impact we have on the environment is accomplished through available communication technologies such as our e-market updates and newsletters; our local Belmont blog, BeautifulMounatinBlog.org and our market reports web site MorganHomes.com. We’re running a business and part of our advertising campaign is to remind people of our services. We currently mail our Belmont Market Report, and the Morgan Report real estate update, to thousands of Belmont residents. With the prevalent adoption of high speed Internet access and quality HTML e-mail delivery options, our goal is to replace our postal mailing with e-mail and significantly reduce paper consumption and our costs so we may continue to offer aggressively discounted fees to our clients—it’s a win-win situation for everyone including Belmont’s schools! * Certain reasonable restrictions apply such as being limited to one email address per household, the email must be a verifiable, working email address and the request must come from a current Belmont resident so we can remove them from our mailing list—that’s it! Sign-up now!

The Dual Income Trap

Elizabeth Warren, A Harvard Financial Law Professor writes in a very revealing article titled “The Middle Class on the Precipice” wherein she examines the dilemma now facing dual income families as spouses no longer have the added ability to enter the work force if even to temporarily buoy a family's income.

Ms. Warren’s assertions can be seen as they apply to this year’s increase in foreclosures. In the 1970’s many households were single breadwinner families who purchased their home based upon a single income. This of course meant that if the sole money earner lost their job the other could fill the income void with temporary employment. Now that families are reliant on dual incomes, and qualify for their home loan based on two incomes, a loss of either income can be catastrophic if sufficient reserves do not exists.

Where will the next infusion of income growth come from? It seems highly unlikely that another source of income as significant as when dual incomes materialized will could arise in the future; leading one to speculate that the rapid increase in home values as experienced in the last 30 years is unlikely to continue at the same pace.

• Housing is a necessity yet also very much a part of one’s financial portfolio—especially in the Bay Area. Own a home and let your equity develop.
• Over the long term home ownership continues to be a sound investment. Buyers who are looking to purchase their first home should consider their job security.
• There are better opportunities than in recent years but the days of 7-15% appreciation are over for now and flipping a home in a year almost impossible.
• Qualifying on a dual income bases means you're also reliant on two incomes and should also be considered.
• Having to move due to job relocation or layoffs could put a financial hardship on a new homeowner if values have declined or not risen enough to cover selling costs.

Buyers—Should I Stay or Let it Go?

Much of the current real estate media attention has been focused on foreclosures and sub-prime lending practices. The media’s relentless impending doom stories have certainly rattled the nerves of the many would-be buyers. The question is should a buyer stay in the housing market hunt or let it go?

Buyers tend to fall into at least one of three groups; buyers who believe the market will go down and are waiting on the sidelines, ones who can no longer qualify for a loan due to tighter lending guidelines, and buyers who see the new opportunities to own a home.

The Buyers who can no longer qualify for a home loan are probably better off not trying to get in over their head anyway. Stretching the ability to repay a loan is a recipe for disaster and many of the people who find themselves in foreclosure are probably wishing they had never bought in the first place.

The buyers who are aggressively looking for a home and seeking the market’s opportunities will most likely fare the best in years to come; buyers who wait until the media gives them the “all-clear” sign, will find they waited too long. Warren Buffet of Berkshire Hathaway, arguably the best investor of all time, states very succinctly in his business model that investors “…will understand that volatility provides investment opportunities and will use market drops to make good purchases." Mr. Buffet has also been quoted as saying “A good investor learns to insulate himself from market emotions and to make a distinction between market price and intrinsic value.”

Therein lays the dilemma. Is there any intrinsic value in Bay Area homes or are the prices overinflated?

Much has been made of possible housing bubble and many would claim it has burst while others feel the air is slowly being let out. Looking at historic trends in real estate we see that indeed the California and the Bay Area in particular outperform the country as a whole in housing appreciation.

This graph illustrates the median home price in the United States since 1968 as compared to California’s—the Bay Area was included as of 1982.

As one can see California has outpaced the country and the Bay Area outpaced California. It’s interesting to note that California and the Bay Area are more-or-less in step with each other while both clearly have grown faster than the country as a whole. But is this value real? Why does the Bay Area command these high home costs and can it continue? This is the very sort of data which leads many to conclude that California as a whole, and particularly the Bay Area, cannot sustain the price discrepancies with the rest of the country.

The Dual Income Infusion:

Twenty years ago, more and more California families became dual income families which increased their incomes by 75% and the ability to pay more for a home; and since a larger percentage of California families earned two incomes at higher pay, California began to outpace the rest of the county. Additionally, the advent of technology rich companies in the Silicon Valley infused a great deal of wealth to the Bay Area perhaps forever altering the discrepancy in home values. This added ability to spend more on housing is easily seen in the above chart discrepancy between the cost of a home in California vs. the country as a whole.

Where will the next infusion of income growth come from? It seems highly unlikely that another source of income, as significant as when dual incomes materialized, will develop--leading one to speculate that the rapid increase in home values experienced in the last 30 years is unlikely to continue at the same pace.

Buyers who are looking to home ownership should consider their job security. There are better opportunities than in recent years but the days of 7-15% appreciation are over and flipping a home in a year is currently all but impossible. Qualifying on a dual income bases means you are also reliant on two incomes and should also be considered. Having to move due to job relocation or layoffs could put a financial hardship on a new homeowner if values have declined or not increased enough to cover selling costs.

Locally, there has already been a slight decline in home values but we feel if economic conditions remain the same—or improve—this will be a short-lived adjustment. The market rebound will likely be slow to moderate with less aggressive growth and a healthier more sustainable market.

Housing is clearly a necessity. If you feel your job is secure and you have the wherewithal to afford housing now is an excellent time to entertain the possibility.

Read tomorrow's article on The Dual Income Dilemma

High Noon-October 26th 1881

Well almost, actually it was 1:52 pm.

Today marks the 126th anniversary of the famous “Gunfight at the OK Corral” in Tombstone Arizona—then called the Arizona Territory.

Here are some quick trivia facts about Wyatt Earp and the shootout at the OK Corral:

Wyatt Earp was first and foremost a simple business man who lived to be 81 and died in Los Angels in 1929. (I happen to own a copy of his death certificate.)

Wyatt Earp was never a U.S. Marshall

The “Shoot-out at the OK Corral” was started by an argument over some stolen mules?

Wyatt Earp and Doc Holiday stood trial for their part in the shooting which lasted a month—they were both acquitted.

Wyatt Earp’s favorite city was San Francisco until he stood accused of throwing a prize fight in which he was asked to referee—it made all the papers.

• Wyatt Earp owned a mine outside L.A. near what is now Earp, CA. which he worked the rest of his life in the dessert
• Wyatt Earp loved ice cream, drove a car, and helped consult on some of the earliest films about the Wild West in the 1920’s and became friends with actors like Tom Mix
• The debate about who were good and bad guys in the famous shootout confrontation continues to this day.
• Wyatt Earp was deputized by his brother Vrigil Earp so that he could legally carry a gun on the streets of Tombstone that day.
• The Clantons practiced religioulsy with their six-shotters at their ranch yet as with most peopple of the day, couldn't hit much when under pressure.

Wyatt Earp was cremated and buried in the Jewish cemetery in Colma California named Hills of Eternity—I took the contemporary photo which circulates on the web to this day. Many movies have been made about this shoot-out (near the OK Corral) and glorified it in a way that only Hollywood could do. Unfortunately, the facts have become so distorted that the real story has become lost. As in many cases, the truth is more interesting than fiction. In 1993 the movie Tombstone with Kurt Russell as Wyatt was released and it helped shed some light on who Wyatt Earp really was—a business man, not gunfighter. Later Kevin Costner’s Wyatt Earp was also released further gaining interest in Wyatt’s story. Which movie is best? I believe Tombstone was more realistic. Although they used composite characters and rearranged event timelines as Hollywood will do, their costumes and many of the lines in the movie were from court transcripts and newspaper accounts after the shooting. The 1990’s movies on Wyatt Earp inspired me to find out more about what really happened.

Those movies led me to read “And Die in the West” by Paula Mitchell Marks. It chronicles the political behind the scenes details of what led upon to the famous gunfight in Tombstone. But it goes much deeper than that and I highly recommend it for anyone who wants to understand more about life in the frontier west. From there I read every book I could get my hands on including a grossly exaggerated version of Wyatt’s life titled “Wyatt Earp, Frontier Marshall” written by Stuart Lake and released shortly after Wyatt’s death. I eventually traveled to Tombstone and met with several prominent authors who toured me around the back country retracing the steps of the Earp and Clanton clans. To find out more visit Gary McLelland’s Wyatt Earp web page and relive the Wild West as it really was.

Hunter's Moon--October 26th 2007 The biggest of them all...

Today marks the occasion of the “Hunter’s Moon”. A full moon which occurs each October but this year is special. Tonight's full Moon is the biggest full Moon of 2007. It's no illusion.  The Moon's orbit is an ellipse with one side 30,000 miles closer to Earth than the other. The full Moon of Oct. 25-26 is located on the near side, making it appear as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than lesser full Moons we've seen earlier in 2007.

This can be found on NASA’s web site, “According to folklore, October's full moon is called the "Hunter's Moon" or sometimes the "Blood Moon." It gets its name from hunters who tracked and killed their prey by autumn moonlight, stockpiling food for the winter ahead. You can picture them: silent figures padding through the forest, the moon overhead, pale as a corpse, its cold light betraying the creatures of the wood.

So how many moons do we really have? Twelve to be exact:

• January - Wolf Moon 
• February - Snow Moon 
• March - Worm Moon 
• April - Pink Moon 
• May - Flower Moon 
• June - Strawberry Moon 
• July - Buck Moon 
• August - Sturgeon Moon 
• September - Harvest Moon 
• October - Hunter's Moon 
• November - Beaver Moon 
• December - Cold Moon

Ever wonder why the moon appears so large at the horizon and so small up in the sky? This phenomenon referred to the “Moon Illusion” is best explained by scientists but it has everything to do with your brain’s perception of relative size as it compares the moon to objects on the horizon. Try taking a picture of the same moon and you’ll be sorely disappointed that your camera doesn't see things quite the way you do.

Enjoy the show tonight and as the moon rises near sunset and appears to fill the sky.

Tree-mendous Power Struggle

I have brought the idea of a proposed tree ordinance to the attention of several of the influential people I know in Belmont—some who hold sitting positions. They do not appear inclined to take-up the idea since I believe they tend to shy away from anything which is a political hot potato (unless it’s on their personal agenda). Though I give credit to Bill Dickenson for occasionally challenging his fellow council members, most of the members of our current council (and Planning Department) seem to believe that anything progressive is a threat; as opposed to the other extreme which believe that development should march forward unchecked. The problem with both of these positions is that they are extreme, and we need more fair minded, balanced, and objective people to help make Belmont a great town—prosperous, and with a sustainable and alluring quality of life. Don't get me wrong, I too love our open spaces and trees but there needs to be a balance struck when considering growth and changes. Until our Belmont City Council becomes more like real council--for the people--and less concerned with their own agenda’s, I fear nothing will change.

One need look no further than the example of the council’s decision to ban smoking in Belmont to see that these folks are thrusting upon us their personal agenda (see "Where there’s Smoke There’s Fire").

I bring this point up because it's just one more an example of what needs to change in Belmont. We need a council who will do what is right for the citizens of Belmont, not what is right for their personal vision of a town they want to create.

The current list of candidates includes two candidates who are strongly supported by the current council members Coralin Feierbach and Dave Warden—two like-minded members who would love nothing more than to eliminate any challenges to their control of the current council; Christine Wozniak, who currently sits on the oppressive planning department and David Braunstein, a teacher from Carlmont High School, who’s legacy is organizing the creation of the Belmont library.

The other opposing two Candidates Jason Born and Broderick Page are challenging the status quo and who the majority of the council desperately want not to win. It is my belief with the shenanigans of Dave Warden trying to decide if he should attempt a write-in campaign, and Dave Braunstein getting back into the race, has everything to do with Dave Warden wanting to leave the council yet clone himself before he does so by convincing David Braunstein to come back to the fray after dropping out. As found in this article by the San Mateo Daily News; "Mr. Warden said at the time, "… [He] was comfortable leaving the council because he endorsed two of the challengers running to take his place"; saying, "Mr. Warden believed newcomers Born and Page lacked experience."

Ask him how much experience he had when he got elected.

Want to make a change? Make a change in the council. I’m passing this along to Jason Born and Bill Dickenson since if there’s anyone who would even consider this I believe it to be them. Now all the citizens of Belmont have to do is vote.

Where There's Smoke There's Fire--Belmont's Smoking Ban

The smoking ordinance in Belmont was a classic example of what Belmont's city council is all about. Sure second hand smoke is bad but the issue brought before them was second hand smoke in attached adjacent living spaces--the genesis of the original complaint. However our council (coached by their cronies in other departments with similar agendas—can anyone say Planning Department?) decided to pursue a ban on all outdoor cigarette smoking in Belmont—notice I didn’t say all smoking?

Be clear, this was a personal agenda. Mayor Coralin’s trama had to do with being exposed to second hand smoke from her father and Council Member Dave Warden wanted Belmont to be a "smoke free city". Mr. Warden apparently anointed himself with deciding how one should personally care for themselves stating, "…This ordinance may save lives as it may force smokers to quit or limit smoking".

What they neglected to address was wood burning fireplaces and outdoor BBQ's--no doubt much worse contributors of air borne carcinogens. Mr. Warden’s argument for not banning other more caustic causes of airborne particulate matter such as that expelled by SUV’s was answered with—"[but] we need cars". So what’s his answer to this one—banning outdoor BBQ’s will stop people from eating unhealthy carcinogen laden foods AND stop the air borne particulate matter they cause. Why wasn’t that a part of the ordinance?

Did anyone notice the volumes of billowing smoke at the Save The Music benefit in Belmont wafting by the children

as they sang on stage? The city doesn’t need to bring in experts to intuitively know that the smoke produced that day alone no doubt exposed more people to more carcinogens than any outdoor citizen puffing away on a cigarette. This council is clearly about tolerance (or lack thereof) and what they personally believe should be acceptable.

Why did they ignore addressing these two issues if their real concern was for the health, welfare and safety of their constituents? Because they only wanted to trample on a minority who they knew would not garner any support; they knew that adding a ban on outdoor BBQ’s and wood burning fireplaces would raise too much opposition—they simply stuck with an ordinance which would get them maximum media attention with minimal resistance.

Agent Exodus in Real Estate

This is an interesting article from the New York Times about agents getting out of the real estate business. Sorry, but I got in the business in 1990 when it was waning and made it through the tough times for the next five years. If these agents aren't committed to making real estate a career and were only in it for the fast bucks--well, bye then.

I've seen plenty of new agents coming along without the commitment and drive necessary to take this industry and their business (and mine) seriously. In fact, they've dragged our existing business down with less than professional behavior. (Call first then key safe what does that mean?)

And this article quotes none other than the owner of that company in Seattle, He is quoted, "Some who want to stay in the business are taking a second look at working for commissions." As if to say traditional agents don't? He goes on, "People who used to turn up their nose (sic) at working for us are now drilling holes to get into the building," said Mr. Kelman of Redfizzle, which pays a salary and a bonus based on customer satisfaction. "He said that during the first six months of 2007, Redfizzle received 2,000 résumés and hired 34 agents, bringing the total at Redfizzle to 40. Mr. Kelman says he expects to hire 35 to 50 more agents in the next year."

OK. Simple math tells me he had 6 employees in the beginning of the year! This was a company that you might remember was working with 60 minutes last year and was to represent the new model which would do away with ”traditional agents". Does ABC have an interest in his company? How can a guy with 6 "virtual employees" single handedly alter forever the "traditional" agents’ way of doing business on a comprehensible level? You know the one where agents actually show property?

Read my post on "traditional Agents" and the scam being propagated by "virtual agents" to differentiate themselves when the only difference is the service they provide (or lack thereof).

Drew & Christine Morgan, MorganHomes.com Belmont Real Estate

Belmont View Ordinance-Only a Vision?

Belmont—or beautiful mountain (beau mont)—is one of the most unique and charming cities on the peninsula. It’s heavily forested hillsides and undulating hills make for a delightful backdrop against the busy peninsula transportation arteries.

Belmont offers impressive views of San Francisco and the open space around Sugarloaf Mountain, the San Francisco Bay, and on any clear day Mt. Tamalpias, Mt. Diablo and Mt. Hamilton.

Belmont’s attributes are many but its highly coveted views are among the top reason people choose to live in Belmont.

The hills of Belmont weren’t always so heavily wooded as suggested by this rendering—published in "Heritage of the Wooded Hills—A Belmont History, by Ria Elena MacCrisken and available at the Belmont Historical Society. As Belmont neighborhoods developed tress were planted which forever changed the natural foliage into forested hillsides (one needs to look no further than the Watershed open space to see what Belmont’s hills probably looked like before it was populated).

Ironically, Belmont has no view or tree ordinance which regulates whether or not a tree can obstruct the view of a homeowner; one can’t build a structure to block a view but there’s nothing to regulate allowing a tree to grow unchecked into what once was someone’s impressive vista.

Many of the trees in Belmont which grow unattended such as eucalyptus are not indigenous to Belmont and in fact are not protected under Belmont’s existing tree ordinance—yet those are some of the most offensive trees in terms of obstructing views (well, and they’re pretty messy too).

When living in a society where our existence impacts others it’s essential to have ordinances to protect the health, safety and welfare of the public. We currently have ordinances to protect the quality of life and Belmont should seriously consider adding a view ordinance which will allow for the responsible ownership of trees.

Balancing the rights of a homeowner to maintain their view against that of a nearby property owner to plant and grow trees where they wish is difficult as property ownership rights are always held in high regard—as they should be. Like anything else though, these views must be preserved and a balance must be struck between the property ownership rights of both parties.

Are trimming trees counterproductive to living green? Absolutely not. The International Society of Arboriculture not only recommends tree ordinances they go so far as to suggest how to structure one. Furthermore many adjacent towns which benefit from similar views already have such ordinances in place. Cities such as Tiburon and Berkeley, both where property values are substantially affected by their views, have adopted view ordinances to cope with urban tree growth and should serve as a guide to Belmont to act to preserve our declining views.

The "Traditional" Broker Myth

The "Traditional" Broker Myth

The somewhat fledgling emergence in the real estate industry of on-line brokers would love for sellers to believe that "traditional" agent commissions are limited (some even state that on their web page). Commissions are negotiable and many "traditional" agents are offering very non-traditional commission structures-as in by the hour. And yes, there are some arrangements (as in when your home sells in one week) that you may feel your agent was overpaid-and you might be right. But most sellers hire their agent to get their home sold for the most money in the shortest period of time. And if the agent did that in a week one would think a seller would be pleased. The alternative would be to sell the home after a long period of time (probably for less) and inconvenience to the seller-ending with the same result-a sold home. What about when a seller overprices their home against the agent's advice and it takes months to sell; is the agent over compensated then?

On-line brokers have their place in the market but remember you will be doing most of the work, not them.

It's akin to a homeowner deciding to do a remodel. As a homeowner you have the right to act as your own general contractor; what you have to ask yourself is a) do you want to take that on (do you have the time and ability) and b) are you qualified-as in knowledgeable. You also have the right to hire the cheapest general contractor you can find. But why complain about more expensive ones when cheaper ones are available. Hire who you want-there are options.

Look around; ask for references and experiences from your friends. Determine what level of service you need, or want, and hire someone (or not) accordingly.

The information contained in this piece is educational and intended for informational purposes only.  It does not constitute Legal, Real Estate, or Accounting advice and is not specific to your situation, nor does it substitute for professional advice. 

The Worst Thing That I Ever Did in Real Estate.

The Worst Thing I Ever Did in Real Estate--Coming Clean...

Agents-ever "Just Want to Get Away?"

It rained that day, but that wasn't why I was reluctant to show property-the 49ers were playing.

Being new to the business, I was determined to take my very first buyer out to see property regardless that my home team was playing and I had to forfeit my season pass seats; this was the first buyer I had the possibility of showing homes to and I was excited at the opportunities that awaited me; I was new. I was eager.

The year was 1991. The 49ers were coming off several recent Superbowl wins and remained the talk of the town. If you were a buyer out during a Sunday game-you were a serious buyer, and agents knew it.

The stores were quiet, the streets empty, and only the local pubs benefited from the excitement; nearby, a recent bride awaited anxiously in her new home for her husband's return from the store; she was nervous at the prospect of entertaining his friends for the first time. All was well in America.

Most of the homes we visited were resale properties being hosted by reluctant agents playing the football game in the background-as if to satisfy house hunters who undoubtedly wished they already had a home in which to watch the game and host a party.

Entering a new development, we signed in at the main office-you know-the ones with carpet samples on the walls? Knowing I had to accompany my buyer, we strolled along the manicured gardens and walkways to the first open door.

There we were greeted by a gracious host who also had the game on for our enjoyment and offered us a beverage which we of course courteously declined. Strolling about the lower level of the home, we then began to wander upstairs. That's when the host asked us who we were and I obliged by relinquishing only our first names.

Upon returning downstairs our gracious host asked us how we met Mike. I of course responded with "Who is Mike?" Mike, she said, is her husband who was due back from the store any minute and if we didn't know Mike then why were we at their 49er party?

You can imagine my surprise to learn we had stumbled into one of the occupied homes which had apparently been sold smack in between other models for sale.

We moved on with our apologies and asked if we could return should we not find a suitable home that day.

It's was everything I could do to keep a semblance of composure.

Care to share a story?