Well, my house may be turning into a TV studio. Yipes!

Boo's post (summer suggestions) reminded me that dh told me his wild new plan is to paint a wall in our garage green. A year or 2 ago he put up a green sheet and did some "green screen" video effects with the kids. I think he got the idea because we just happened to have green bed sheets.

It worked out okay - though not perfect by any means.

Well, he got the Lowe's paint code for the perfect shade of green for green screen - along with good reviews of the paint color - so this is his new idea.

Sounds cheap enough as far as entertainment goes. Kids will probably LOVE it.

What didn't occur to me, when he told me this plan, is how he is working on a web-based comedic series. It just occured to me about now that this is a hint that he wants to use our garage for production. Hmmmm. I guess nothing wrong with that. Probably explains why he was looking into it in the first place.

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With all the foreclosures it's hard to keep track of fair market value in our neighborhood any more. The reason is foreclosures record as "sales" for the amount of the loan (far as I can tell). With time, 2 "sales" relatively close together is a clue. But I haven't been paying as close attention and am not sure on some of the public data if they are real sales or merely foreclosures. Though foreclosure is a pretty safe assumption?

A lot of the data points towards improvement, BUT the biggie around here is that banks have really been falling behind on keeping up with all the foreclosures. So there is a pretty giant "phantom inventory."

With the old foreclosures, our neighbors would move out, and a for sale sign would go up pretty quickly.

These days I know people who walked away late last year, from their homes, with no activity to speak of on the homes. So the lag is pretty clear.

In our own neighborhood there are a few clearly abandoned homes. 2 are just coming up for sale, though sales records show they officially foreclosed last December. I originally wasn't quite sure what was up with these 2 homes, but now it is obvious there is just some serious lag.

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So anyway, homes like ours have been holding steady in the $325k range for a while (for reference, we paid $300k in 2001).

I just saw 2 of the same homes recently sold for $280k. Ouch!

One looks like a foreclosure, so not sure it means much. BUT one had clearly foreclosed first, and then sold for $280k. In the meantime, a few homeowners and banks are asking in the $320k range. Will see!

At $280k, we would still have the enviable position of 25% equity. BUT, I still am not quite sure how low things will really go. For the long term I am not worried. For the short term, who knows.

My spouse says, "who cares?!?"

I understand his sentiment for the most part. But I do care. There is nothing fun about being trapped in a situation. & being underwater in a home is a much worse situation than we have been in our adult lives. Also, the potential for the neighborhood to fall into ruins is not good either. But, silly me for caring about that!

Beyond that, I do agree that we will cross that bridge if we come to it. IT just doesn't look so good, for now.

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The silver lining in this cloud is a reduction of property taxes, right?

Not so fast. A neighbor of mine who paid much more (with equity from another home) was refused a lower property appraisal last year. They needed to provide THREE comparable sales at lower prices. Ugh. Nothing is selling!

So one real sale at $280k means little.

I checked the dates, and value has to be as of Jan. 1 anyway. Too late for us - we had a $325k or so appraisal at that time. Our assessed value is currently about $320k. Our taxes can not rise more than 2% per year, by law. BUT we can lower them for fair market value decreases.

But, at this rate, we may be able to shave off a few hundred dollars a year, come 2010. For that, I have little issue with a home value more than our loan, but lower than we paid. In the short term, it helps.

That being said, we would have to set aside that money into savings - any property tax savings. If property values increase - we go right back to where we left off. Which means if your property taxes are lowered, don't forget about the future. IT's best to pretend like you still have that old bill...

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I am not sure of the median prices, but a quick run down of our home's more recent values:

2001: 300k
2002: 400k
2003: 500k
2005: 650k
2006: 500k
2008: 350k
2009: 280k (Ouch!)

You get the picture...

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Interestingly, I haven't bought much of what I have read/heard about the Bay Area. I remember like a year ago someone was saying you could find things for like $100k. As if!

From what I Could tell talking to firends and relatives who live there, prices were holding pretty steady. Lower, but not any significant drop. Certainly nothing I would call "affordable."

But that has changed. Their market is very different. But ugly, all the same.

They had something like a 40% drop in home values over the last few months of 2008. Talk about OUCH!

Median Home Prices San Jose (my home town):

1999 $300k
2002 $400k
2007 $700k
NOW $400k

Funny enough, dh's parent's home value have mimicked the median value. I guess they own a "median home." It's about 1300 square feet, 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, built around 1970. Yup, that's what $400k buys you. IT's certainly nothing to write home about. (I am often misunderstood - nothing wrong with a median home - it's certainly more than we could ever afford there. BUT my issue is with the PRICE!)

Interestingly, condo values have dropped further. We saw our old condo is going for $10k-$20k less than what we originally bought it for (1999). Another ouch.

Lord knows why. I still don't see anything affordable about that market.

In the long run, median home values in Sacramento have run about 33% of the Bay, since we have lived here - about a decade.

So, I would pretty confidently say median home prices here have dropped back to around the $150k level, here. It was somewhere in that range when we moved here.

So anyway. So I regret moving? Um, no. Do I regret buying? Um no. I can't even put into words how much money we have saved owning over renting, the last 10 year.

Ask me again next year. But unless our neighborhood goes to hell, I won't get too caught up in the short term.

Do I wish I sold my home in 2005 and rented for a few years? HEck yeah!

But yeah, I hear all this hype that the Bay Area is suddenly "Affordable." All I see is the same numbers that drove us away in the first place... At this point, nothing has really changed - just the same figures that led us to buy our current home in the first place.