Tuesday, June 1, 2010

We have houses! In Bulk! Buy them Wholesale!

Linda and I went for a drive yesterday, and decided to check out Pronghorn. We were met at the gate and told to turn around, but we weaseled our way into the place a little bit and got a bit of a gander.

I reserve my comments. Well, O.K. -- it looked like Golf Heaven (or Hell depending on your perspective...)

But it brings me to the current listings of houses in Central Oregon.

If you want to know how much trouble we're in, go the Bend Economy Bulletin Board Real Estate section, and check out Month End Summary for May, 2010.

Scroll down the listings.

And scroll...

and scroll...and scroll....go fix yourself lunch....and scroll....go have a short walk....and scroll and scroll.....

Frightening number of houses and lots for sale.

But I noticed something that -- since I've always been bit perturbed by the ''exclusivity" purveyors of the west side -- that really stood out.

There are plenty of houses for sale on the east side, but they are very spread out. A few in every neighborhood, but not wholesale massacres. Places like Williamson Park and Woodside Ranch or even modest subdivisions like Tanglewood and Stonehaven have a few house for sale each.

But the west side? We have it for you in bulk, wholesale!!!

I picked out a few of the more notable neighborhood and counted how many lots and houses were for sale. This isn't 100% accurate, as it was counted by hand, but it's close.

Awbrey Butte, for instance. I chose this neighborhood because its on the higher end, and because it's mostly matured and mostly houses.

I counted 51 houses for sale.

(This isn't counting Awbrey --- "Court; Glen; North Rim; Park; Meadows; Ridge; Heights;Point....etc. etc. Methinks the builders think that 'Awbrey' has a certain ring.)

I could just have easily chosen Broken Top, or some of the other big house neighborhoods, and found just as many houses for sale.


Northwest Crossing: which was held up to all as a place that would resist falling prices because it was just so darn neat?

44 houses for sale, and 25 empty lots.


Tetherow?

22 houses and 10 lots. (For both Tetherow and Pronghorn, I couldn't be sure if there was a domicile on the lot or not, because even the lots are expensive...)

Hell, I didn't think they had built 22 houses yet....


Pronghorn? (O.K. it's east side, but EXCLUSIVE).

30 houses and 20 lots.


The all time winner (loser?) Ridge at Eagle Crest in Redmond, with something like 180 lots and houses for sale. (Again, I didn't count Eagle Crest itself, which had plenty of houses for sale...)


There is at least one caveat: (I'm sure you guys will point out others....) Older subdivisions like Williamson Park and Woodside Ranch have fewer houses per acre, so less houses to be put on the market. But, hey, that's sort of the point, isn't it? Overbuilding per acre isn't an excuse for house many houses for sale as far as I'm concerned. Driving around the east side, some of these cheaper subdivisions, which you would have thought would be wholesale slaughter, are actually holding up pretty well.

The west side premium houses? Not so much.

3 comments:

H. Bruce Miller said...

"There are plenty of houses for sale on the east side, but they are very spread out. A few in every neighborhood, but not wholesale massacres."

One possible theory is that people who buy on the east side tend to be less status-driven than those who buy on the west side, and therefore less likely to buy a lot more house than they could afford.

And the developers really went crazy on the west side because of the belief that a "fashionable west side" address commands a premium. They built way more houses than there were buyers who could afford them.

Curiously enough, when my wife and I moved here in '85 it was the EAST side that was more "fashionable"; the millworkers lived on the west side. Then the last remaining mills closed and somebody figured out that the old millworkers' shacks could be marketed as "quaint craftsman cottages."

Duncan McGeary said...

I think possibly it also has to do with the 'newest' schools.

My little sister, Sue, transferred to Pilot Butte Junior High when it was new, even though she lived on the west side.

Duncan McGeary said...

I thought of a couple of caveats myself.

I suspect because they are cheaper housing, that more rentals are taking place on the eastside.

And also, available inventory does not equal sales, exactly. I can have a hundred copies of something and sell 90 of them, and look like I have too many; or I can order 3 of something and sell out.

Still, I'm not sure it matters. Overbuilding is overbuilding, and if high end overbuilding means people can't afford to rent them....then that's high end overbuilding...