Dana Graham

September, 2011

I’ve been in this business since the early 1980’s.  Never in that time have I seen a market where the agent you have makes a bigger potential difference in the outcome.  The world is in seeming turmoil with the Arabs rioting, the national debt rising, money markets in a constant state of flux, buyers aren’t sure they should be buying, sellers aren’t getting the prices they imagined their homes were worth a few years ago, the gnomes in Sacramento gleefully...Continue Reading!

July, 2011

While prices in Palos Verdes have held up reasonably well throughout the current financial "crisis", sales since the first of the year have slowed compared to the same period last year.  In Valmonte, whereas we had 25 sales between January and July 2010, this year we have had 16.  On the entire Peninsula there were 241 sales first half of 2010, with 196 during the first half of 2011.  By "sales" I mean properties going into escrow, not those that...Continue Reading!

Somali Pirates

I am sure this must be in the planning stage, but we've all heard of "bait cars" used to catch car thieves, right? What we need now are a few "bait boats" (if the fishing industry will loan the term), modeled along the lines of the WW 1 British Q Ships. Disguised as innocent, vulnerable merchantmen, they would lure a German U-boat within range, then drop the gunwales and blast the sub out of the water with previously concealed deck...Continue Reading!

The High Price of Greed

This is more important with regard to real estate than ever, so listen up:  Understandably, I have seen more than the usual number of new listings lately come out at unrealistically high prices.  It's understandable because a) every seller wants to get the highest possible price for his house, b) feels his house is special (that's why he bought it), c) may have gotten used to shortcomings in location, lot size, floor plan, etc, d) and, in a slower market, is...Continue Reading!

The Thing About Loans

I'm sure anyone who has tried to get a real estate loan during the past 6 months knows this, but for the rest, it's a lot like going to see your proctologist and about as pleasant. All the old rules are out and the primary hiring criterion for underwriters appears to be that they must have been diagnosed with a severe case of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Want a second opinion? OK, they don't get out much either. To be fair, the...Continue Reading!

World War II Detention Camps

While the commonly held public view of the Government "relocation" of those of Japanese ancestry in the early months of WW 2 is that it was a "disgrace" and "a stain on our national history", there is another side to this that most Americans don't know: While classified information for 50 years following the end of WW 2, it is now commonly known that, in the months leading up to the Pearl Harbor attack, US cryptanalysts had been working feverishly on...Continue Reading!

Around and Around We Go

Do you remember the old carnival ride where you climbed into a big 30 foot diameter cylinder and stood against the wall?  The thing began rotating, pressing you against the wall, and then some nutcase removed the floor from beneath your feet.  However, you were held in place by centrifugal force, which was clear when you looked across the cylinder at the other riders stuck to the wall.  What would have happened if someone had tripped over the cord and...Continue Reading!

All Is Not What It Seems

Apologies to Gilbert & Sullivan.  Real estate price declines have been all over the news during the past few months, with stomach-churning numbers up to 41% decline fairly common. There is no doubt that, overall, prices have declined from their 2007 peaks, but there is an interesting phenomenon afoot below the surface that is fooling those coming up with these numbers: The lower end of the market (under about $750,000) is currently hotter than a 1951 Crosley with a bad thermostat.  One...Continue Reading!

Stuff You Won’t Hear From the Media

I could write a book, but here's what's pertinent to real estate at the moment:  we've all heard the constant reports in the media that the "median price" of real estate is down 36% or some other dire number, right?  You might think that prices are headed south faster than Lee after Gettysburg, but it's not true.  This stuff makes me crazy, but I'm sufficiently medicated to get thru this. There has been an interesting dichotomy in the market for the...Continue Reading!

January 2009 Update

This is my periodic newsletter to my mailing list. This is January, 2009's: I tried to write this as an explanation of why we're in the economic mess we're in, but somewhere on the 6th page I reconsidered.  Suffice to say (and I'm sure you've gotten explanations from all directions), this is the accumulation of 70+ years of government meddling.  Beginning during the Great Depression, people increasingly began to look to the Federal Government to make their lives better, and the host...Continue Reading!