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The Economic Meltdown and Los Gatos Home Sales - 10/25/08 11:17 PM
With all the grim news on Wall Street lately, the question arises as to whether or not home sales are being adversely affected. My clients all seem to have gone into a holding pattern of wanting things to calm down first.My seller clients are either waiting to regain some equity or simply waiting until they feel like they won't be getting so beat up in the market. My buyer clients are now unsure about the basics like job security with a looming recession. Perhaps there will be less insecurity after the election. Meanwhile, though, are sales in Los Gatos this month … (0 comments)
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Creating Simple Graphics for Your Blogs - An Easy "How To" - 10/24/08 11:51 PM
When I started blogging a couple of years ago, my #1 concern was where to get images and graphics. How on earth did people find them without violating copyright????One simple way is to make them yourself. Frances Flynn Thorsen opened my eyes to the easy, simple and amazing things that can be done with Microsoft Paint. It's not enough by itself, but it becomes awesome when combined with Picnik.Let's say you want to make a button. For our example, it will be a "contact me now" button.
Go to Paint.
First decide what shape your button will be. For our purposes, let's choose … (9 comments)
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Halloween Events in Almaden, Los Gatos & Around Silicon Valley - 10/24/08 08:07 PM
It's not too late to get into the "spirit" of Halloween! Our subtropical, northern California weather could not be nicer and there are lots of reasons to get out and enjoy the spookiest of seasons!For a good list of fun things to do in Silicon Valley, please visit my Valley of Hearts Delight blog post: Halloween Events in Silicon Valley.
And if you enjoy real ghost stories, please stop by my Haunted Real Estate blog! There you'll find stories of things that go bump in the night - many of them from real estate professionals who report their hair-raising events in the … (0 comments)
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What Are Your Three Top Tips for Thriving Through the Downturn? - 10/24/08 01:03 PM
When I got my license in early 1993, the market was a little like this. Buyers just weren't buying. It was not nearly so bad, of course, but it was memorable. One young agent simply doorknocked, all day, every day, until she got a client to work with. Her tenacity eventually propelled her to the top of the industry.
Things are far worse now. The number of Realtors and affiliated real estate business professionals has been declining and will continue to do so for the next year or so at least. If you choose to remain in this business, what will … (2 comments)
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Creating a Landing Page - Your Feedback is Appreciated! - 10/23/08 04:12 PM
Do you use landing pages in your business? If you haven't heard of them, they are pages on your site or blog to which you drive targeted visitors. For instance, you could want to get first time homebuyer leads in your town or city, so you could create a page intended for that group. It could be any niche or target, from a type of buyer or seller (first time, luxury, move up) or property (view homes, condos, REOs). I decided that I want to find more Los Gatos home buyers so set out to create a landing page for that … (11 comments)
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Are Robots Writing Website Pages Now? - 10/22/08 03:59 PM
I think I have found a new low for what Google likes. Just a moment ago I did a Google search for "Saratoga Homes for Sale" to see what the nearby agents were doing. There on the bottom of page 1 was a site I'd never heard of before. I thought maybe it was for one of the other Saratogas - the famous one in New York, Saratoga Springs, or maybe the little one in Wyoming. But no, this gobbleygook was showing up for my nearby Saratoga of Silicon Valley. Have a look:
Saratoga Homes For Sale We wish to build our … (8 comments)
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Mapping Los Gatos - The Shape of Things Today - 10/21/08 11:52 PM
Los Gatos has got a funny shape. Our borders zig in and out. It seems like when builders were building, some wanted to be in Los Gatos and some preferred to remain county land or whatever the nearest city was - San Jose, Monte Sereno, or Campbell. And so the borders are pretty odd. This will give you a taste of it:But actually it's even odder than that! The actual edges of town weave in and out like a jigsaw puzzle after half of it was thrown to the ground. To see images with borders detailed, please continue reading here.
… (0 comments)
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Getting Photos for Your Blogs: One Way - PDFs to JPGs - 10/21/08 11:10 PM
This is a trick I learned only a few months ago, which may cause the vast majority of AR bloggers to have a chuckle on my account. But if you don't yet know how to get a PDF file turned into an image file, let me clue you in on an easy way. This will give you many more options when it comes to digging up pictures to populate into your blogs.
Needed upfront: MS Paint, which is available in most PCs, usually under "Accessories". (Start - Programs - Accessories - Paint.)Go to the PDF where you want to do a conversion … (3 comments)
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What is Your Site's PageRank? - 10/19/08 11:17 AM
Google's PageRank system is a great way to see how websites or blogsites are doing. It's on a scale of 1 to 10.
One way to discover a site's page rank is to download the Google toolbar. This works easily but there are some issues. The biggest for me was not privacy (the toolbar, when showing page rank, also tells Google some of what you're doing online) but the fact that my tablet computer kept crashing. (My tablet doesn't like toolbars, period. The California Association of Realtors has a fabulous toolbar but it, too, caused my tablet to writhe and crash.)For … (7 comments)
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Japanese Gardens in Saratoga & Los Gatos Areas - 10/18/08 11:48 PM
San Jose has one of the very few remaining "Japan Towns" in the United States. There are just a few local Japanese gardens, too. Have you ever visited one? They are serene, tranquil, artistic places. Perhaps the best known in our area is the San Jose Japanese Friendship Garden in Kelly Park.
But out on the west side of Silicon Valley or Santa Clara County, there are three more Japanese Gardens, and they are historic to boot. Located in the Saratoga- Monte Sereno - Los Gatos corridor, you may have been to one of them and not recognized it. Curious? To … (3 comments)
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Los Gatos Haunted Harvest Festival at Oak Meadow Park - 10/18/08 11:37 PM
Halloween and Oak Meadow Park go together like Halloween and candy! Years ago, it was "The Haunted Forest" of Los Gatos, but that took a respite and re-emerged as the Haunted Forest. From now through the end of the month, there will be (on most nights) a "Haunted Harvest Festival" at Oak Meadow Park in Los Gatos. As in years past, it's a great fundraiser.To learn more about attending or volunteering, please visit my Live in Los Gatos blog: Haunted Harvest Festival at Oak Meadow Park in Los Gatos
Hope to see you there!
… (2 comments)
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More Neat Photo Effects You Can Do With Picnik - 10/18/08 11:18 PM
I only started working with Picnik a couple of weeks ago, so I have the enthusiasm of a new convert. I hope you will find a few of these tricks new and helpful.The first point I want to make is that it's easier to morph one photo than to take a dozen. So I love it when I can use a picture I've taken and make it feel rehabbed or "like new". Let's use a pumpkin photo for example.Last year I took a shot of a pile of pumpkins. Here's a cropped version of it (to left).It's just a simple bunch of … (9 comments)
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Historic Topographical Maps in Silicon Valley Give Interesting Glimpse Into The Past - 10/18/08 10:45 PM
Recently I've been spending some time viewing old historic topographical maps of Santa Clara County (Silicon Valley) that were created by the USGS more than 100 years ago. I've been viewing the areas near Los Gatos, Cambrian Park and Almaden in one map especially, as well as the Palo Alto, Cuertino and Saratoga Map, and It is really interesting to see these for a number of reasons.
First, with these old maps, apparently each "dot" represents a house. Amazing to think how uncongested an area this was 100 years ago! Silicon Valley real estate has changed tremendously since then. Second, … (0 comments)
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After the Interview or Presentation: The Next Step in Hiring and Not Hiring Agents - 10/18/08 08:39 PM
Client presentations and interviews, whether with buyers or sellers, are a chance for consumers and agents to learn if working together is a good idea. It's a mutal interview. These appointments sometimes end with the buyer or seller letting the agent know that they have more real estate professionals to interview and need a little time to make a decision.
As agents, we'd love to get a prospective client's enthusiastic "yes" (if we also want to work with them) at the end of these meetings. That does happen some of the time. But we Realtors are used to waiting through other interviews to get the decision.
What happens … (2 comments)
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Keeping Your Cool in Stressful Times - Watching the Wild Ride in Home Values and in the Stock Market - 10/17/08 01:01 PM
What to do, what to do? The markets are a mess! Here are some thoughts to help keep your cool in scary times.
There's a lot for those of us in Silicon Valley to be feeling stressed out about lately. Between the stock market's wild ride and sinking home values in Santa Clara County (and around the country), it's a little nerve-wracking. These times are especially upsetting if you're a senior and plan to retire soon. For years, people looked at their homes with the fond sense of "this is my retirement fund" - or at least a good part of it. Some … (0 comments)
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Updating the Campbell, CA, Real Estate Market - 10/15/08 05:35 PM
The Campbell real estate market is levelling out and even improving in many regards but it does remain a buyers market there now. In this look at the real estate market in the city of Campbell, we'll use tools and data provided by two subscription services I have, Altos Research and The Real Estate Report, and also I have crunched some numbers from our MLS myself. We will review both the situation for buyers and sellers of houses as well as condos and townhomes.
To read more, continue here: The Campbell Real Estate Market - An Update Featuring Absorption Rates
… (0 comments)
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How's Your Keyword Density? Do You Know How to Check It? - 10/12/08 10:19 PM
There's a neat tool on Google that some of you may not know about: it enables you to search within your site for words and phrases and see when and where they show up (and how many times). I'm not convinced that it's 100% accurate, but I thought it was quite helpful, so wanted to share it with you.Just go to the Google search page and click on the small button next to the word "search" where it says in very tiny print "advanced search". It will take you to a page with forms on it and the last one you … (5 comments)
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Updating the Cambrian Park Real Estate Market - 10/12/08 03:43 PM
How're things in the Cambrian Park real estate market? It's a bit of mixed bag, with some hints that the worst could be behind us.
The months of inventory have been all over for Cambrian condos, but for houses, that number has mostly been under 6 months for most of 2008. The condo market has been improving steadily such that it, too, is lining up with the single family home market at just under 6 months of inventory. (Six months is the balance point, according to the National Association of Realtors. More is a buyers market, and less is a sellers … (0 comments)
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How's the Real Estate Market in San Jose's Almaden Valley Area? - 10/11/08 10:17 PM
How's the market? In the Almaden Valley area of San Jose, there are mixed signs. Let's have a look at the absorption rate to begin our analysis of the San Jose real estate market in the Almaden Valley area (zip code 95120).
The absorption rate is the rate at which homes are selling. It factors in the current inventory vs the closed sales for any given period of time. It could be months, weeks, or even days of inventory. If no new homes were to come on the market and properties continued selling at the current rate, how long would it … (0 comments)
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Downtown Los Gatos - Fun Event This Weekend - The St. Mary's Country Fair - 10/10/08 06:39 PM
The St. Mary's Country Fair in downtown Los Gatos is back for another great weekend - starting in just a few minutes and running through Sunday afternoon.
The fair includes carnival rides, arts & crafts, talent shows, raffles (a smart car is being raffled), food and drink as well as goodies to buy. Wine, beer and margaritas are available in the evenings.Tonight and tomorrow night there will be free live music and dancing (tonight it's the Joe Sharino Band and tomorrow evening it'll be The Cheeseballs) - no cover charge!
Sundays usually include pony rides and a petting zoo.
The food … (0 comments)
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Why Choose to Live in Santa Clara, California? - 10/10/08 04:41 PM
Santa Clara is a higly desirable city within Santa Clara County, where the largest city is San Jose and the area is generally referred to as "Silicon Valley".
The city of Santa Clara is home to high tech and to history. The north side of Santa Clara is full of biotech and high tech companies as well as the Great America Theme Park (and possibly will some day also be the home of the 49ers football team). The oldest areas of Santa Clara include the El Camino Real (which connects the missions), lovely Victorian homes, an old Carmelite Monastary, Mission Santa … (1 comments)
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The Santa Clara Real Estate Market Update - 10/10/08 04:21 PM
The housing market in Santa Clara, CA, is showing some signs of improvement. Let's first look at the monthly absorption rate, which is a ratio between current inventory and closed sales during the month. It's a way of understanding the health of the market and is a hypothetical figure of how fast the current inventory would be sold off if no new homes came on the market and properties continued to close escrow at the present rate.
The absorption rates for condos and houses in Santa Clara, graphed below, shows that single family homes have enjoyed a rate of less than … (0 comments)
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The San Jose Real Estate Market: Great Improvement, But No Celebration Yet. Are We Near the Bottom? - 10/09/08 11:27 PM
Studying the months of inventory, or absorption rate, is a great way of seeing how the market is doing. It's a ratio of the active listings to the solds that month (or week or year). Today I took a look at a larger area of real estate than I normally study. Instead of looking at just Cambrian Park, Willow Glen, Almaden Valley, Blossom Valley, or West San Jose or somewhere else, I took a look at San Jose as a whole. There are nearly a million people in this sprawling city of Silicon Valley, and it includes all kinds of sub-markets.What … (2 comments)
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Silicon Valley Real Estate Market Update: Spotlight on the Willow Glen Area of San Jose - 10/09/08 04:28 PM
How's the real estate market in Willow Glen? This classy district of San Jose is faring better than most of Silicon Valley in terms of the single family home market, but it's been fairly rough among townhomes and condos, where the market has been more volatile.Below, please find a graph I created using data from our MLS provider, MLSListings.com, for houses and condominiums in San Jose's Willow Glen area. This reflects the months of inventory, or absorption rate (a ratio of closed sales to available inventory each month).
Very few condos are selling and closing - just 2 in September … (0 comments)
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Saratoga, CA, Real Estate Market Update - 10/09/08 03:41 PM
The months of inventory, or absorption rate, in Saratoga, CA reveals that the market is not too unhealthy in this high-end community. While much of Silicon Valley is struggling with long months of inventory, the condominium and townhouse market & single family home market in Saratoga both remain at under 6 months. (The National Association of Realtors says that less than 6 months of inventory constitutes a sellers market, and more than 6 months a buyers market.)
Read more of this post, view graph with aborption rates and find key data and trends:http://www.sanjoserealestatelosgatoshomes.com/market-update-aamp-absorption-rates-for-saratoga-ca-real-estate
This post in its entirety is published on The Valley of Hearts Delight, a … (0 comments)
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AIG Partied Hardy After Bailout - Have You Read This? - 10/08/08 01:51 PM
Did you read about this?"Days after federal officials agreed to an $85 billion bailout of American International Group, the insurance firm spent more than $440,000 for a corporate retreat"
The article is found at The Smoking Gun, and you can read about it here:http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2008/1007083aig1.html This is why America is disgusted. We watch as equity in homes is eroded, the value of any savings in stocks, bonds and mutual funds declines in value, and we see our nation going deeper into trouble, no doubt a recession now. These types of abuses on the way out the door or just after the bailout … (74 comments)
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Months of Inventory for San Jose's Upscale Almaden Valley District - 10/04/08 09:13 PM
The absorption rate is the amount of time it would take for the market to "absorb" or empty out the current inventory if homes continued selling at the same rate with no new homes coming on the market. It can be measured as days, weeks, or months of inventory. This is one of the most helpful ways of getting a pulse on the market in Silicon Valley real estate (or anywhere else)!
Below please find a chart which shows the months of inventory for single family homes in the Almaden Valley area of San Jose.
What is odd here is … (1 comments)
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Saratoga, CA Months of Inventory for Single Family Homes - 10/04/08 06:39 PM
Our MLS provider, MLSListings.com, has not yet given us the statistics for September's closed sales in Silicon Valley, so I've done a little of the data work myself. Below, please see a graph displaying the "months of inventory" or "absorption rate" for Saratoga, California.
The National Association of Realtors uses 6 months as a benchmark for when it flips from one type of market to the other. Less than 6 months is considered a sellers market, and more is a buyers market. Saratoga real estate is very pricey and offers fantastic schools with exceptionally good API scores, so this area … (3 comments)
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How Long are Homes Staying on the Market in Los Gatos? - 10/03/08 09:37 PM
Sometimes we hear so much bad news about the real estate market that we are convinced that the end of the world is just around the corner. But is that the case? In parts of Silicon Valley, the real estate market is improving, and in other areas it's flat or worsening. Los Gatos was one of the last places to feel the impact of the current crisis, and right now, things seem to be worsening overall in my fair town. My sense, though, is that we are simply working through the shockwaves that didn't reach here as early as some other … (2 comments)
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Cambrian Park: Months of Inventory Declining Steadily for Single Family Homes - 10/03/08 09:03 PM
The stats aren't out yet from MLSListings.com, our MLS provider for the Silicon Valley Real Estate Market, so I did a little number crunching of my own to see how things are looking.Cambrian Park, a district of San Jose bordering Los Gatos, Campbell, Willow Glen and Almaden Valley, is a good barometer for Silicon Valley and tends to represent a good middle point for pricing. Want to know how Santa Clara County is doing? Check Cambrian. It's usually in step with the averages and medians countywide.That said, I wanted to see the absorption rate, or "months of inventory" for single family homes in … (0 comments)
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Great Los Gatos Neighborhood: Belwood of Los Gatos - 10/03/08 08:16 PM
Belwood of Los Gatos is a friendly, active neighborhood that sits on the far eastern edge of the Los Gatos town boundaries. The neighborhood runs from Harwood Road to Belgatos Road and Blossom Hill Road to Belridge. Nearby, and often thought of also belonging to Belwood, are the Belgatos and Surmont areas.
The neighborhood has two great focal points: Belgatos Park (see slide show of Belgatos Park here) and the neighborhood cabana, which features a pool, a clubhouse, lawn areas, and hoops. The cabana is also home to the Belwood Dolphins swim team and they are the pride of the neighborhood!
The … (2 comments)
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Welcome to Silicon Valley - A Tour in Photos - 10/03/08 07:31 PM
Welcome to Silicon Valley! Please enjoy these images of Los Gatos, Saratoga, Campbell, Santa Clara, Palo Alto and many areas of San Jose such as Almaden Valley, Cambrian Park, and Willow Glen.
If you'd like to learn more about life in Silicon Valley, please visit Valley of Hearts Delight.com, Silicon Valley Real Estate blog Photos by Mary Pope-Handy. Copyright, all rights reserved. … (3 comments)
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How Many Distressed Properties are Really on the Market in Los Gatos? - 10/02/08 12:31 PM
Recently I was reading a local, online publication in which someone quoted Trulia's numbers of distressed properties in Los Gatos and tied them in to a percentage of the homes for sale here that appeared so high as to be surreal. How could that be? I am on the MLS every day, and the Los Gatos real estate market, while soft, is not "tanking", which would be the case if there were truly so many short sales and bank owned properties on the market today. Part of the answer is that Trulia relies on Realty Trac, which I have found to contain … (2 comments)
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Mary Pope-Handy, CRS, CIPS, ABR, SRES
Mary Pope-Handy, Silicon Valley
Los Gatos,
CA
More about me…
Sereno Group Real Estate
Address: 214 Los Gatos-Saratoga Road, Los Gatos, CA, 95030
Office Phone: (408) 335-1432
Cell Phone: (408) 204-7673
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