jim
interesting piece on north CA real estate:
Bay Area tops in million-dollar sales
Cupertino emerges as hot spot for high-priced real estate
BY SUE MCALLISTER
Mercury News
Cupertino 95014: The number of homes in this city selling for more than $1 million more than quadrupled last year, helping the Bay Area surpass Southern California as the state's center of high-priced real estate.
Driven by high-tech wealth and a surge in home values, the number of houses and condos that sold for more than $1 million in the Bay Area rose 74 percent, from 3,093 to 5,373, according to a survey released Thursday by DataQuick Information Systems.
Last year also marked the first full year that the number of million-plus sales in the Bay Area outstripped those in Southern California. In Southern California, sales went from 3,988 to 5,244, a 32 percent increase.
Statewide, a record 11,364 homes sold for more than the $1 million threshold in 2000, an increase of 51 percent over 1999.
Nowhere was the Bay Area boom in million-dollar homes more evident than in Cupertino, a city prized among homebuyers for its well-regarded school system and its proximity to Silicon Valley jobs. In 1999, 47 Cupertino homes sold for more than $1 million, but the number skyrocketed to 206 in 2000 -- an increase of nearly 340 percent.
``Every house that used to be in the $700,000s and $800,000s, suddenly they became million-dollar homes,'' said Mary Tan, a Coldwell Banker agent who's been selling in Cupertino since 1983.
The reason? People with lots of stock-market wealth were chasing a small number of homes for sale most of last year. When multiple offers came in, prices were driven up. Cupertino is popular for families with children and draws lots of interest from those who had ``good schools'' at the top of their list of home-buying criteria. The city has long been favored by Asian-American homebuyers -- at least 59 percent of the 797 home and condo sales there last year were to buyers with Asian surnames.
The DataQuick numbers include sales in which public records showed that there was a seller and a buyer, that money changed hands and ownership was legally transferred. Not included were property swaps, multiple-lot sales, teardowns, or large farm properties.
Schools are key
Milt and Sylvia Machamer moved into their five-bedroom Cupertino rancher on New Year's Day 1968. The new home came with a pool, and they paid the builder extra for an additional room, a second fireplace and exposed beams on the cathedral ceilings.
``I think with all that, it came to about $37,500,'' Milt Machamer said Thursday.
Two weeks ago, he and his wife put their house on the market for $1.4 million.
Though they've been watching prices in his neighborhood rise for several years, Milt Machamer said, they didn't anticipate that the price tag on their family home would someday top the million-dollar mark.
``What can I say? It's a matter of location,'' said Machamer, 65, a retired history teacher. ``The schools here really do the job, and I think that's why a lot of families move into this area who are serious about their children's education.''
The Machamers plan to move to Petaluma to be closer to three of their five children once Sylvia retires from teaching elementary school in the Cupertino school district.
``We wouldn't move if our kids could afford to live here,'' said Sylvia Machamer, 61.
Their real estate agent, John Dozier of Cupertino Properties, said that three years ago the Machamers' house near the foothills would have been listed for a little under $800,000. These days, anything near Monta Vista High School for less than a million is a rare commodity drawing multiple offers.
Randy Pertner, an Alain Pinel agent who sells property in Cupertino and lived there for more than 30 years, said that option-rich dot-com workers were one factor contributing to the rise in million-dollar-plus sales last year. ``It was `play' money to them,'' he said.
Less dot-com money
That environment has changed, say real estate agents. More homes are on the market now than last year at this time. Many potential buyers are touring them, but they are taking their time about making offers and are price-sensitive -- especially in the million-dollar-plus range.
``We have shifted from a market last year driven by the stock market and slap-happy dot-com money to a more traditional market, where people have their source of down payment likely to come from savings,'' Dozier said.
Even if the Bay Area economy continues to slow, the number of million-dollar sales is likely to keep growing, albeit more slowly than in 2000.
``Just the raw appreciation pumps up the count of homes selling for more than $1 million,'' said analyst John Karevoll of DataQuick.
Other Bay Area ZIP codes that experienced a spike in sales more than $1 million included San Jose's 95138 (Silver Creek), where sales went up 146 percent over 1999. Danville also surged, with 94 percent more million-dollar sales in 2000 than during the previous year in the 94506 ZIP.
Atherton and San Francisco -- both cities in which million-dollar sales are common -- didn't make the list of the ZIP codes with the most million-plus sales. San Francisco has multiple ZIP codes that include million-dollar sales, while Atherton had the state's highest percentage of high-priced homes. There, 83 percent of homes sold in 2000 cost more than $1 million. |
