On May 7th, the Atlantic & Pacific Real Estate name went the way of the dinosaurs and we rebranded to Carrington Real Estate Services.  Over the last 18 months you’ve grown accustomed to the orange and green signs outside of our listed properties.  Now you’ll see our fresh new look of the Carrington Real E

Bad blogger, bad blogger.  When you realize your last post was March’s RMLS Market Action report and April’s came out two days ago it’s time to start typing.  So here we go.  There’s no real surprise the inventory is low.  At  3.1 months that mean that if we stopped taking new listings, the 6498

How low will it go?  RMLS Market Action for Portland real estate was released yesterday.  Metro inventory dropped to 3.2 months which is the lowest it’s been since June 2006.  “Metro” is a five county area so when you look at the closer-in areas the picture changes: North Portland: 2.6 months Northeast

You can’t buy a house if you can’t find the house.  Finding a Portland address is pretty easy if you remember these tips. In an era of GPS navigation, Google Maps and cell phones we may spend less time not knowing where we are but it’s still nice to have a basic understanding of the...

When the Portland Business Journal’s January 2013 Case Shiller Index headline is, “Housing recovery starts to look like a boom,” y’all better be paying attention.  Long the messenger of doom and gloom Portland’s 8.3% year over year increase is something that’s hard to ignore.  That said

A little tardy with regarding last week’s December 2012 Case Shiller Index but here we go.  The Index in Portland dropped .78 of a point in December.  Even though that’s more than the .5 it lost in December 2011 and many areas posted positive December 2012 numbers the reason for the title of this post...

All of the conversations I have been having with Realtors lately center around a the theme, “I am loving this market, just wish there were more houses to show my clients.”  December gave us the lowest Portland housing inventory we’d seen in years.  Inventory climbed to 4.7 months in January but there were only six..

A few weeks ago I found a reference to an 1997 HUD directive for the creation of FHA Bridal Registry Gift Fund accounts.  Google was little help in uncovering what the in-and-outs about the program.  There are lots of references to it on Realtor websites, recent blog posts and the like but not one of...

I love my in-laws but I don’t particularly want to live with them.  That said, there are certain life events that might necessitate that later on.  What would we do?  Where would we put them?  Maybe an ADU would be the answer.  An accessory dwelling can be internal to the main house, attached or detached. ...

The loss of .31 of a point in November 2012 ended seven straight months of gains for Portland’s Case Shiller Index.  The Index, at 142.13 is nearly nine points higher than it was this time last year and closely matches February and October 2010, and November 2004.  The Index is up 12.5 points (10%) since...

We have an rental property that we had a full blown appraisal on about 90 days ago.  It came back at $315,000 which is about what I expected given that it does not have the showroom ready curb appeal that I would want if listing it for sale.  While testing out Realtor’s Property Resources site...

The December 2012 RMLS Market Action gives us the complete picture of the 2012 Portland real estate market.  There 17,84 fewer new listings than 2011.  Coupled with 3,340 more closings than 2011, inventory was driven to lows we haven’t seen since 2006.  The low inventory has created the first seller’s market we’ve

When RMLS Market Action was released this afternoon the first thing I noticed was that December’s inventory is the lowest shown on the graphic.  The write-up doesn’t help as it just says it, “is the lowest in months.”  A quick dive back into the December 2006 & 2009 Market Actions helps paint a better picture.

Portland’s Case Shiller this month is really only worth a twitter type post: “PDX CS up 1pt in Oct to 142. Down 1pt same period in ’11 & ’10 so good news.  Winter key to recovery picture. Market strong at year end.”  138 characters, ’nuff said.

‘Tis the season to expect real estate markets to slow down.  Right on cue, all indicators were off from October but that doesn’t mean the market is in free fall.  Inventory remains historically low for this time of year.  At 4.2 months, that’s less than half of November 2010′s 10.2 months and well ahead of...

The Case Shiller Index was released this morning for the September 2012 reporting period and for the sixth consecutive month, the Portland MSA has increased.  Today’s 141.10 is the highest since November 2010 and 11.5 points above the March 2012 low.  The next few months will be the most telling as we head into the...

RMLS Market Action for October 2012 was released yesterday and inventory has dropped even further to 3.8 months. 2012 has seen fewer new listing than 2011 but an increase in closed sales has pushed inventory levels even lower.  At the end of October there were only 7981 active residential listings!  That’s a huge drop f

You probably got your property tax bill in the mail a couple of weeks ago.  If your mortgage payment doesn’t include an impound account to pay your taxes and insurance, in order to get the maximum discount you need pay the bill by November 15th. This time of year we tend to get a lot...

The Case Shiller Index for Portland continued to climb in August. The market looks much better than it did last year but history also paints a cautionary tale. The graph below shows the Index for Portland for the last two years. We’re showing the change from the previous month and the change from 12 months...

RMLS Market Action was released this morning just after I hit “post” on the time lapse video so today is a twofer.  New listings are down compared to last year and last month but inventory returned to 4.6 months which is better for the overall health of the market than last month’s 3.9. Year-to-date the...

We took this time lapse video last week during the full moon from the deck of our listing in Kings Heights in NW Portland.  It starts late afternoon and goes through the moon coming up out of the east.

I’m recycling this photo from a February posting on, ‘How often will my home get shown?’ as it is even more apropos to the Mayor’s Office proposal to require vacant property registration.  One September 13th, the Mayor’s Office posted a request for feedback on the proposed code.  While the problem is obvious and

The July 2012 Case Shiller Index was released this morning and Portland continues to climb.  At 140, the Index has climbed back up to November 2010 levels from its January through March 2012 low of 129.  That’s an eight percent increase but we have to look at 2011 for potential warning signs: in 2011, the...

RMLS Market Action for August 2012 was released yesterday and almost all metrics are better than they were last month and last year.  Inventory dropped back to 3.9 months.  The same as June which is the lowest level in years.  Inventory is a good measure of urgency and competition.  Fewer houses means buyers are competi

Is it cheaper to rent or buy a home in Portland?  It depends.  There are so many factors that determine the answer but Trulia released a report today showing that it is cheaper to own than rent.  The article also shows the importance of taking all the deductions possible to make that math work.  Appreciation...

Con-way has long owned the majority, but not all, of land to the west  of I-405 by the NW Vaughn exit around NW 21st.  Development plans have been in the works for years and a coming closer to fruition.  Historically the area has been known as Slabtown and abuts the Alphabet District but that may...

The Case Shiller Index for June 2012 was released on Tuesday.  For the second month in a row, Portland showed strong gains, increasing 2.5% to 138.51.  Combined with the 2.6 % gain from April to May, the Case Shiller Index for Portland is up 3.0% in the last year.  It’s good news but has a...

Tomorrow marks the closing ceremonies for the 2012 Portland Street of Dreams in at the Vineyard in West Linn.  This has to be my “better late than never” post on the subject as I misplaced my notes from my visit a few weeks ago.  Overall, the show is making a progressive return to to dreamy. ...

RMLS Market Action for July 2012 was just released and it shows positive metrics compared to July of last year.  Inventory has bumped up to 4.6 months which is probably healthy for the overall market; if inventory stays too low for too long its going to put unsustainable pressure on the market. All measures of...

What does the London Shard, pictured here to the left of Tower Bridge, have to do with the 2012 Portland Street of Dreams?  Very little, but as a comparison, you could by EVERY house in this year’s show four (maybe five) times over and still have money left over to fill all the garage spaces...