All Forum Posts by: Manch Hon

You need to watch out for Prop G. You can't flip a multi-family or risking paying uber high flipper tax. I believe as a result there are many multi's on the market right now. People are heading out for the exit... which should make buy-and-hold guys like @Amit M happy?

One old-timer in the Redfin forum said condos and townhouses in Bay Area are undervalued compared to SFH. He didn't bother to cite any stats, just his hunch from memory. I wonder if anyone has any opinion?

Personally I love townhouses. As long as HOA is around 300 or so I am good.

@Sandeep S. Where in Hayward? Up in the hills? Near the Cal State campus?

@David C. I like Berryessa as well. Bart is coming to town and I think that area will do quite well. 

I suspect SF Bay Area is on a very strong secular uptrend right now. That phrase from @pmarca "Software is eating the world" gets a lot of hype around here, but there is a lot of truth in it. Many problems have turned to software solutions and that allows Bay Area to grab a huge chunk of value.

Some examples:

1. Transportation: Uber

2. Car: Tesla

3. Banking: Lending Club

4. Logistics: Instacart

Tesla is particularly interesting. An article on the journal a month back talks about how Tesla is pulling in a lot of car design studios and parts suppliers into Fremont. It's shaping up to be a modern Detroit down there. 

I say software engineers are still grossly underpaid compared to traders and investment bankers on Wall Street. And we are the ones who contribute to society! :)

Most posts on this thread are borderline bearish. And that's enough to tell me market still has ways to go. :) You don't have market top unless everyone says "Go Go Go". One gent said Canadians are tired of crying wolves foretelling market crash and just think their current market as normal. To me that looks more like a sign of market top.

I have this on my bookmark

http://money.cnn.com/data/fear-and-greed/

Today's reading (9/23/2014) is 23 out of 100, in the "Extreme Fear" territory. That doesn't look bubbly to me at all. Everyone is on the fence scared and that usually means the stock market will keep on rising.... 

Chinese food is pretty meh in SF. My then girlfriend now wife used to live in North Beach and we always struggled with where to go. We routinely had to go outside of SF proper to Daly City or even Millbrae to get something semi decent....

The low-brow Chinese restaurant in some ugly strip mall next to our house in SJ serves some killer dim sum. That restaurant may be the thing most difficult to let go when we sell our house and move.. :) 

My impression is SF is great for high brow Michelin star grade restaurants. Anything Asian or ethnic is pretty depressing. I can confidently say South Bay has better Chinese food. And I suspect we also have better Vietnamese and (gasp) Indian food too. 

@Amit M. San Jose actually has better food than SF, for the type of food I eat most often. :) That plus warmer weather you are missing out up in the foggy north...

@Account Closed Obviously I am not you and we have different situations and risk tolerance etc etc.

That formality aside let me lay down what I would do. I would simply sell the smaller current house and buy a larger one. 1.5M in Cupertino is good, but you can go less good and still have a bigger house in a top notch school district. 2k sq ft house in Irvington can be had for around 1.2. Schools not as good as Mission or Cupertino but still plenty good. Evergreen also has good schools and is cheaper still. If you can stomach the commute San Ramon has crazy good school and still very affordable.

My point is that you have a lot of knobs to turn. Turn the commute longer and price will be cheaper. Turn the schools better and price higher. House size, age, lot size etc are also knobs you can turn. 

Investing in primary residence is a great investment in Bay Area. Even if you do nothing and just stay in the same house for the rest of your mortgage term, you will be 1M+ richer! Think about that. Why slog it out in Midwest collecting $100 a door? 

15 years from now your 800K house will at least double if not triple in price. So your equity will be 1.6M (double) to 2.4M (triple). Can your midwest rentals fetch you anything close?