[Poll] Mid-2011 Buying decisions

What are your home buying plans for the rest of this year?

  • Buy in one of the new Irvine communities

    Votes: 19 38.0%

  • Buy an Irvine resale

    Votes: 14 28.0%

  • Buy new elsewhere

    Votes: 4 8.0%

  • Buy resale elsewhere

    Votes: 13 26.0%

  • Wait until 2012 or later

    Votes: 20 40.0%

  • Other (please specify)

    Votes: 4 8.0%
  • Total voters
    50
irvinehomeowner

irvinehomeowner

Well-known member
So now that we've seen most of the 2011 New Home Collection, for those looking to buy... what are you favoring?

Most of the new Irvine homes still seem overpriced to me (save maybe Las Ventanas) but it does seem like the lack of demand is causing prices to soften (and incentives to appear).

I'm not too sure about the Irvine resale market though... good inventory is still a bit tight and sellers still think it's mid 2000.

We're not in a hurry... so we can wait it out until the end of the world next year... either incentives/prices have to be really good for the new homes, or a floorplan/area in resale has to come up at a reasonable price.

What about you guys?

<insert k-pop here>
 
ideally i would like to have new construction just because there is less to worry about, ideally it would be in irvine for convenience, but the substitution effect is hard to resist. 

for example, 700K can get you this brand new home in anaheim hills, they just dropped the price by 50K last night.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Anaheim/625-S-Morningstar-Dr-92808/home/4292424

a couple of other homes im looking at in Orange dropped their price as well in the last couple of days. If prices are softening/continue softening with 4.75% interest rates part of me would like to wait it out another year or two to see what 7% interest rates would do to pricing. When this house came out i thought it would sell for 715-720K, guess i was wrong there.
 
qwerty said:
for example, 700K can get you this brand new home in anaheim hills, they just dropped the price by 50K last night.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Anaheim/625-S-Morningstar-Dr-92808/home/4292424
Click to expand...
Nice house... does it have a tandem 3CG? :D

I hear ya' on the substitution siren call. For what is softening in Irvine, it's amplified in other cities. Like I've mentioned before, Aliso Viejo 3CWGs are getting more inventory in the sub $700k range and the other South OC cities are even going sub $600k
 
irvinehomeowner said:
qwerty said:
for example, 700K can get you this brand new home in anaheim hills, they just dropped the price by 50K last night.
http://www.redfin.com/CA/Anaheim/625-S-Morningstar-Dr-92808/home/4292424
Click to expand...
Nice house... does it have a tandem 3CG? :D

I hear ya' on the substitution siren call. For what is softening in Irvine, it's amplified in other cities. Like I've mentioned before, Aliso Viejo 3CWGs are getting more inventory in the sub $700k range and the other South OC cities are even going sub $600k
Click to expand...

unfortunately no 3CWG, but it does have a portion of the wall carved out for extra storage space, so its like a 2.25 CWG
 
We're looking at resales with larger lots.  2011 homes for us have too small lot sizes, high mello roos, and are priced too high.  We don't need a huge lot, but do want more privacy.  When your yard is only 15 feet deep and your neighbor is another 15feet away, that's just 30 feet away from hearing someone else's conversations, parties, music, and drama.

 
shokunin said:
We're looking at resales with larger lots.  2011 homes for us have too small lot sizes, high mello roos, and are priced too high.  We don't need a huge lot, but do want more privacy.  When your yard is only 15 feet deep and your neighbor is another 15feet away, that's just 30 feet away from hearing someone else's conversations, parties, music, and drama.
Click to expand...

+1. Exactly my thoughts and one of the main reasons why I didn't buy new.

IHO, do you have any preference on communities in Irvine? The poll choices span a wide range of locations.


EDIT: just read your choices, you're considering outside of Irvine? Personally I would prefer to not raise kids in Irvine but I'm weird. Picked either wait till 2012 or buy resale outside of Irvine.
 
We've been waiting since 2009 and glad that we didn't drink the Kool-aid.  Another year won't hurt.  If we're going to spend $900k+ on a home, we want larger lots and more privacy.  The 2011 collection seems to fail in both price and lot size.
 
Looks like we're on hold as well, Maricopa is still a possibility but with the softening of the market, don't want to buy something on the way down.  Financially we'll see how the mortgage market goes after June and Oct.
 
For me, the value and desireable features are in the resale market.  The high density, small new homes on small new lots being sold in Irvine, where the schools arguably are in decline compared to other communities, are not appealing.
 
ps99472 said:
Looks like we're on hold as well, Maricopa is still a possibility but with the softening of the market, don't want to buy something on the way down.  Financially we'll see how the mortgage market goes after June and Oct.
Click to expand...

Same. Same and Same. Finally decided to hold and hope that prices will come down a notch. Softening housing market, OC economy not there yet, (perhaps too much TI lurking) does not pressure us to buy new or resale in Irvine anytime soon as we thought we would this year.
 
I am curious for any of those that have decided to wait, do you have a home to sell first or are most people renting and waiting for the right time to buy?  We feel like the decision of when to buy is not really in our hands as we have a home to sell.  So yes, we have a decision to make on when to list the home, but after that, when it sells is when it sells and we do not really want to rent in between to avoid two moves.  Isn't this how it usually works when you have a home to sell first - you chose from what is available at the time?
 
Buying new seems to far easier to plan when you have a home to sell.  Pick a floorplan, a lot, some upgrades and 4-6 months later you'll have your move-in date.  In the mean time, you have that much time to put your home on the market and sell.  Moving twice is sooo inconvenient, but is far less of a headache than financially trying to manage two mortgages or timing of a two real estate transactions.

Otherwise it's sell, rent, and wait and wait for the right home to appear at the right price. 
 
We live in our own house outside Irvine. Our plan is selling our house first and renting for a couple months while we wait for our dream house coming along. The downsides are you have to pay the rent and move twice. But you don't have to rush into any urging purchase. And since the real estate market is moving downward, we prefer to get cash on hand first.
 
Sticking to renting and resisting to pull the trigger on a new home purchase. Honestly we're a bit tired of renting and want to move into a larger and newer space.
All indicators show that it is sound and less risky to just wait and see what will happen this summer, how fast these new homes are selling and what kind of incentives might be available later in the year. It's no fun to wait and we may miss out on the lowest interest rates ever. We also take the risk to see new home prices go higher if FCBs go on a buying spree this summer. But think about it, the Irvine brand may also be tarnished a little bit across the ocean, FCBs have internet, have eyes and read TI.
 
OCMommy said:
I am curious for any of those that have decided to wait, do you have a home to sell first or are most people renting and waiting for the right time to buy?  We feel like the decision of when to buy is not really in our hands as we have a home to sell.  So yes, we have a decision to make on when to list the home, but after that, when it sells is when it sells and we do not really want to rent in between to avoid two moves.  Isn't this how it usually works when you have a home to sell first - you chose from what is available at the time?
Click to expand...

We sold first and then looked for the house we wanted before pulling the trigger.  Yes, it sucked moving twice but it also took the pressure off of being forced to find anything available to buy within a short timeframe.  It gave us peace of mind in being able to take the time to look for what we wanted and not have to compromise due to a ticking clock.  In addition, we knew exactly how much cash we had on hand for a house and our offer was stronger than others since we had a pile of cash and no 'pending sale' looming over our offer.  The long term happiness in getting the house we wanted was worth the short term pain of storage rentals and moving twice in my opinion.
 
I guess I must be the minority here.  Been searching 2+ years for the dream house.  Decided to hold off on the new constructions as those have smaller lots and rather pricey at this point.  Will most likely rent out current house when we find our dream resell house.  Don't want to sell at a lost and feel pretty confident with the rental market in our neighborhood.  Just curious, for those wanting to sell before buy, have you considered how long it might take to sell before you move into your new home?  That is why I would rather rent out than to sell my property.
 
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