October Newsletter

Mammoth Real Estate: Third Quarter Results

After an early October snow storm Mammoth has been granted a reprieve. An interlude of quiet grace. Gilded low angled light sets the countryside aglow. Temperatures arc into the 70's. Aspens and willows, cottonwoods and birches turn out in luminescent golds and shocking reds.

Fishing, by some accounts, has gone off, like a pre-holiday two hour sale. One local tells of bolting down 395 on his lunch break, clomping through a mile of boggy meadow in waders to a Crowley Lake glory hole, making two casts, catching and releasing a 23 inch broad girthed 4 pound rainbow and returning to work without anyone being the wiser.

It's a swell time to be in Mammoth.

It's not a bad time to be looking for real estate either. Mortgage rates hover near 4%. Sellers are eager to move before the real snow hits, and marked down prices, paced by short sales and REOs, haven't looked this cheap since, well, since 2001.

80 condos changed hands in the third quarter of 2011, up 11% from last year's third quarter. The median price eased 16.6% to $223,000 from the same period in 2010. Bank and developer negotiated transactions accounted for 55% of sales while just 17.5% of the current 215 active condo listings are short sales, auction offerings or bank owned. One lucky Mammoth Realty Group client snapped up an 1849, 4 bedroom/3 bath condo for the pre-historic price of about $380,000.

20 homes sold in the third quarter, a 150% increase over last year, leaving just 66 active home listings. The median price slid about 10% to $530,000. Just 10.5% of the home market is made up of REOs or short sales. If you hurry you might still catch the glory of Mammoth's Fall and maybe even a piece of Mammoth real estate.

For the latest listings please contact me at: dphillips.dpbp@verizon.net.

606 INCHES! MAMMOTH MOUNTAIN SNOWFALL RECORD SHATTERED.

Maybe we should have seen it coming. After all the Mammoth ski season got off to the best possible start, a record 209 inches in December. But this was a La Niña year, unpredictable as a three year old at a petting zoo. January was subdued. February marginally above average. Then wham, this petulant March, that has weary locals reaching for liquor and analgesics. Snow piling beyond the seldom seen 500, snowballing toward the never seen 600 inches.  


My Mammoth Neighborhood

This morning, after 12 feet of new in the last 8 days, the record set in 2005-2006, a seemingly insurmountable 578.5 inches, is a goner. Mammoth Mountain Ski Area is reporting a season's snowfall total of 606 inches. Fifty feet, five stories, over two feet more than the previous high mark. Now March, at 178 inches, joins December in the record books. But wait, it's only March.

Five stories! The big five-o, the magic 600. Come on, don't be intimitdated. The streets are clear, ski patrol is setting charges to open up the whole mountain and the forecast is for warmer temperatures and clear skies. So grab your gear, pack up the car and don't forget your camera. It's gonna be great!

HEATING SYSTEM FAULT CLOSES THE WESTIN FOR A WEEK

Temporary Boiler On Line Thursday Morning

The Westin Monache, Mammoth's lone 4 star hotel, was closed Wednesday, January 19, due to smoke coming from the heating system's flue. The exhaust flue of the hotel's propane fired boiler overheated causing insulation material to smolder inside the nine story flue chase. Smoke was sucked into the building's ventilation system and circulated to many of the rooms. The boiler had to be shut down and guests were relocated to neighboring lodging.

After a week of cleanup and air filtering, the heating system was coupled to an industrial looking boiler chugging away outside the hotel entry. By the evening of Thursday the 27th, the Westin was ready to receive guests again.  An investigation is underway to sort out the cause of the malfunction.

2010 MAMMOTH REAL ESTATE SALES CLIMB

Sales were up last year as buyers discovered value in Mammoth real estate. 371 condos changed hands in 2010, a 25% jump over the 295 sold in 2009. The total value of sold condos climbed 15% to $131 million from 2009's total of $114 million.

Single family transactions were also higher. Escrows closed on 72 homes worth nearly $62 million in 2010 compared with 62 homes transacted in 2009 valued at $50 million.

The median price of sold properties eased last year, 14% for condos ($279,750), and 6% for single family homes ($625,000). Of more interest, the percentage of sales attributed to motivated sellers of "distressed" real estate shot up. Bank owned properties (REO's), short sales and auctioned real estate constituted 36% of condos and 39% of sold homes in 2010.

The flow of distressed properties to the market can be erratic and their shelf life brief. For instance, REO's and short sale listings comprise only 9% of homes and 17% of condos currently listed. These bargains often fall quickly to nimble buyers who've scouted the market and know what they're after.  So, while more troubled real estate assets are on the way, buyers should research the market, line up financing and enlist the aid of a REALTOR®.

Bargains Meet Buyers, 2002 Pricing Triggers Sales Increase

Local real estate prices continued to retreat across most sectors in the first half of the year. But in a sign the market is trending toward equilibrium these cheaper prices—often at 2002 levels—were greeted by eager buyers. 

Sales of condominiums grew  in the first six months by 44% over the same period last year—to 162 units, while closings of single family homes ratcheted 150% higher to 40 transactions. 

The increase in both condo and home sales was paced by short sales–the lender accepting less than is owed, and REO’s—banked owned inventory. In 2009‘s first half not one home sale fell into those categories, whereas they accounted for 42.5% of transactions in the first half of this year. Short sales and REO’s totaled just 25 of 2009’s first half condo sales but ballooned to 59 closings in the same period this year.

Meanwhile, the median price of condos sold in the second quarter of  2010 eased to $316,000 from $367,500 for the same period last year. While the median price of homes sold in the second quarter slipped to $625,000 from $749,500 for the second quarter of ’09.

As attractive as real estate prices are these days my clients want to know where prices will be tomorrow. Are we doomed to a double dip recession? To high unemployment and an endless cycle of foreclosures? 

In Mammoth short sales and REO’s total just 18% of current condo inventory and a mere 5% of listed homes. In July the number of Californians behind on their payments dipped to a 3 year low. 

And yet nationally over 4 million households are at least 60 days overdue on their mortgages. It’s impossible to tell how many of these properties will hit the market in the months ahead. One thing is certain, in Mammoth, buyers are finding current price levels attractive.