We've come a long way, baby! And, yes, we still have a way to go.

Here is the master vanity now with it's new marble, new sinks and new faucets.

Here you can see the before.  We still need to paint the master bath.

Here is the livingroom before.

And after.

New carpet and new paint.  Now the ceiling is the same color as the walls.  Doesn't the fireplace look great?  The before photo doesn't show how dirty the carpet was.  The before paint color is very similar to what we ended up using.  The freshly painted molding really brightens things up amazingly when you see it in person. 

Our momentum has slowed with preparation for Anne & Joe to move in.  Father's Day celebrations and our business getting busy has kept us from getting too much more accomplished.  But we will get there!  And the house looks beautiful!

I guess we opened a can of worms!  We could not have imagined such a simple suggestion would cause such a BIG STINK!

We are advising a lovely client how to prepare her home for sale in Santee.  She is a widow in her 70's; a dear.  Among many other things we suggested she do to increase the value of her home before she moved out of state, was to remove the flag pole that was center stage in her small front yard.  Because this client knows us personally, she took absolutely no offense, as we explained that flag poles tend to age a property, and in order to update it for today's buyer, it would probably sell better without a flag pole.  Her daughter agreed that if that is what we believed to be the case, they would remove the flag pole, and they did.

They removed it on Memorial Day.

Let me just tell you that our client's family traveled out from Texas to get this house packed up and updated and they were doing so at a pace that was simply amazing!  They were not even aware it was Memorial Day when they began to remove that pole.  The elderly neighbor next door came unglued.  He was so angry he could not contain himself, letting our client's veteren-son-in-law know exactly what he thought about him in no uncertain terms.  And then the neighbor gave my husband a call!

Mike tried to explain as best he could that the decision had nothing whatsoever to do with a lack of patriotism or love for the good old U.S.A.  It was simply a matter of looking out for our client's best interest and doing everything we could possibly think of to get that selling price up as high as we could in this very difficult buyer's market!  He got so angry with Mike he couldn't speak.  Before he hung up, he did inform us that the entire cul-de-sac is "p$%*ed off" at us.  Mike said he looked around the cul-de-sac and saw three homes with flag poles in the center of their yards, including the angry man's house. 

After we get the outside repainted, we thought we would purchase a flag that hangs off the side of the house from a pole, but then I got to wondering if that would be another faux paux:  The house will be vacant and there will be no one there to take it down each night! 

The bright side is that we take the fall for removing the flag pole.  If new buyers were to have moved in and decided to remove that pole ... well, I wonder if a pox would have been upon their home!!!

~Debbie

Really?  What happened? While we were all reading and listening to the bad news, someone has been buying homes! Dataquick reported that Southern California homes sales in April are at the highest levels since August of 2007. The bulk of the sales have mainly been in homes under $500,000 as those looking for great deals took advantage of the price slump and foreclosures. Thirty-seven percent of the homes sold last month were foreclosures.

In San Diego County, Chula Vista is among the highest areas of sales activity in Southern California. We have been searching for property for a client around the $350,000 range in Chula Vista, and we are finding multiple offers being made on multiple properties of interest to our buyers. It is not only Chula Vista where we are experiencing the phenomenon of multiple offers, we are also encountering it in other areas of the county in properties under $400K. It very much feels like San Diego has decided to buy while the bargains are hot.

"Quite a few more buyers stepped off the sidelines last month to snap up homes at substantial discounts relative to the market's short-lived peak," said Marshall Prentice, DataQuick president. "It's no surprise, given the magnitude of the price declines in inland areas and the fact sales have been so amazingly low for so long. We continue to look for evidence of a sales bounce in the mid-priced and higher-end markets along the coast. If the higher conforming loan limits are making a difference in those areas it's certainly not a large one, at least not as of the end of April."

According to DataQuick, indicators of market distress continue to move in different directions. Foreclosure activity is at record levels, and, understandably financing with adjustable-rate mortgages is way down. However, down payment sizes and flipping rates are stable, and, interestingly, non-owner occupied buying activity is increasing.

Who Knew?  Getting the FLU in the Merry Month of May!?  I certainly didn't expect this.  I was completely blindsided with it this morning.  Not that anyone is ever really ready to get the flu, but some inkling that it's going around town would have been nice.  I would have washed my hands more often. 

So you won't be caught unaware, I'll let you know what to expect if the dreaded virus finds you.  You'll wake up with a bit of a headache, and all of your muscles will ache like you did too much stretching at Pilates' class (at least that is what I thought).  In a couple of hours, you will begin to feel like you have been run over by a truck.  Every joint in your body will be screaming at you.  You have no choice but to lie down after taking as many pain relievers as you deem safe.  The headache!  You won't know what hurts worse: your head or your bones.  Did I mention the chills?  That's what will clue you in that this is serious business and you cannot (and should not) go about your normal day.  It can be 80 degrees outside and you will be shivering and feel the need to burrow under a blanket. 

After several hours of shivering and moaning, and probably too many pain relievers for your liver to handle, your fever will break.  The best part is that your head will no longer feel that it is ready to burst.  You'll begin to perspire and will need to grab a glass of ice water.  Apparently this means the fever has "broke."  I do hope that that is a good thing and that it won't glue itself back together and strike again once all those pain relievers wear off.

Then, you will pray.  You will pray that this is the "24-hour flu" and not some tortuous Asian variety that we read about during flu season that keeps its victims in bed for a week.  By the way, when exactly does flu season end?  For all of your sakes, I hope it ends with me.   Debbie

Day 27

Don't you just love sod? WOW. Instant (well, not for the guys laying it!) beauty!

The inside is still lagging. I remember when we were building our home, the framing went up slam bam and you thought, "We're almost done!" Then the interior, the finishing touches, began. And man, oh man, it seemed to take FOREVER! Well, flips, I am learning, are the same way. The outside paint being done by a sub-contractor, the landscape being done by a sub-contractor, even the back fence being done by a sub-contractor. And here we are still painting interior doors and trim! Didn't I say, "Have Patience" a few posts back? I have to even tell it to myself again: HAVE PATIENCE! And learn from this: Interior paint left to the subs is a GOOD IDEA! We are busy (even if escrow closings are slow, we are working our tail ends off), and we don't have time to spend entire days painting. There is enough pick-up work, sweeping, clean-up and arranging of subs to keep all of us busy enough without adding all of THAT TRIM PAINT! Oh, sorry. I think I sounded a bit frustrated there for a minute. Here. Let's look at some more wonderful photos to calm me down.

That's better. OK. What else is in the works? Setting up bathtub refinishing, getting new mailbox keys made (the USPS charges $30 for that!), picking and order carpet, deciding if sink should be centered with the cabinetry or with the window (poor planning on contractor's part), and, did I mention we are painting the TRIM? ~Debbie

Bloomberg.com posted the news that Consumer Confidence fell to a 5-year low and home prices as measured by the S&P/C-S Index experienced their greatest decline since at least 2001. San Diego experienced a year-over-year decline of 19.2% Will they drop further? Some say yes; some say maybe; some say no.

So, is anyone out there buying or are they all waiting for more declines in prices? Well, SOMEBODY is buying because we have put in countless offers for buyers and EVERY SINGLE ONE has been joined by multiple offers! This holds true for bank-owned and for short sales. (Most sellers who are not selling short or facing foreclosure are still priced out of the market and are holding out hoping for that one buyer to fall in love and buy their home rather than go through the hassle of buying foreclosures and short sales.)

If you are a buyer who is looking for a long-term investment, waiting for the bottom is risky. Once we KNOW we've hit "bottom," the prices will already have begun to rise. Better to shop now while inventory is up and there are less buyers hitting the market. Good luck!

Day 21

Yup.  Picked it out today down at Florentine Countertops off Moreno Blvd in San Diego.  The color is cool - most granite is.  It has a black background with flecks of brown and green.  Nature is amazing, isn't it?  The black will pull in the black-framed garden window, the green will be a nice surprise with the wall paint, and the brown flecks will look awesome with the dark-stained oak cabinetry.  Hmm... Wonder what color tile we should use for the backsplash.  I'm thinking picking up the floor tile color - a neutral tan.  This kitchen is going to be GORGEOUS!

So, I'll save my quartz idea for the NEXT flip.  That is, if we are successful with this one.  So far, fingers crossed, we are very close to budget!                    by Debbie

Day 20

Time to choose kitchen countertops.  Granite seems the obvious choice.  I kind of like quartz.  It looks as good as granite and, according to the salesman, is easier to care for.  Since granite is so common anymore, especially here in San Diego, I think "quartz counters" might give our listing an edge because of the newness of it.  Only problem, though it is less per sq ft than granite, it has to have a custom edge, which is charged by the linear foot.  At Home Depot, the quartz estimate actually came out higher than granite in the "B" price range.  We have one more estimate to obtain before we make a decision.                    ~Debbie