Where readers ask, and we (the community) try to answer.
We pulled this from Lily on Why the Fuss About Noe Valley. The question is pretty simple, the answer, however, is very complex:
What’s the real estate forecast for Bernal [Heights]?
The Fluj has already taken the bait and provided some answers on the thread, anybody else care to chime in here on Bernal Heights?
Our answer…it’s headed down along with the rest of the city and will bounce around the bottom for quite some time. We’d say the free-fall appears to be over, but the feeling of panic is definitely out there amongst buyers that the bottom is here, and there are buyers making offers across the entire city feeling the deals won’t get much better. Our advice to our buying clients, buy if you feel comfortable, then tune out for the next 5 years and enjoy your home. This applies to every nano-market the city has to offer.
I feel honored!
So what is your advice for sellers in Bernal? I’m sitting on the fence..
Sell, unless you have time to wait it out.
Can you explain more please?
Here’s what I think is going on for a lot of Bernal. Take the 729K lending limit. Add a 20% down payment. You wind up with around an 860K house. That’s very much within the capability of numerous buyers, and it encompasses much of Bernal Heights’ single family homes.
If you are a seller, there’s no guarantee that the 729K superconforming limit will go on past 2009. So, in that light, it could be a good time to sell.
860K for a house in bernal – now! Sounds like 2007 prices!!
It doesn’t have to be 860, you know? That would be the max for 20% down + superconforming. But do you follow me? It’s one reason now might be a good time to sell.
Or actually ~900K would be the max for superconforming. Nine hundresd will get you a lot in Bernal Heights.
get it – thanks!
For as long as I’ve been interested in SF real estate — about 20 years (gulp), Bernal Heights and Glen Park have been the perennial “up and comers.” Yet they never seem to quite arrive. My take on Bernal is that it’ll do about the same as the city at large. No numbers to support that — yet — but wait.
What construes “arrival” to you?
Good question. Subjectively speaking, that they be viewed as desirable neighborhoods by buyers rather than “settling for less.” Objectively speaking, I’d say consistently north or $700 per sf.
Some, maybe many, would say that routine $1M+ sales signifies “arrival.” That view would make one think that both Bernal and GP have arrived. In my opinion, Bernal’s infrastructure is always going to hamper it in some ways.
I agree on the infra-structure point about Bernal, fluj. As for GP, some, maybe many, would say that it’s hampered by the weather.