Wednesday, May 09, 2007

$100,000+ Loss on Downtown Condo at Discovery #516

**Note: I was rear ended a few days ago by a real estate agent of all people and have been caught in all the problems that an auto accident entails, new posts should resume again at the usual pace. I do have 30+ posts backed up so there's plenty to blog about.**

Discovery is located atop Cortez Hill and at least until Aria opens and we get to see the level of quality in the building Discovery will remain the premier building on the Hill.

This particular unit is listed well below its last sale price from the Summer of 2004, almost three years ago.

Type: Listed on MLS(#076035111)

List Price: $519,000

Cost: $595,000
Loss@6% Sales Expenses: $107,140
Loss%: 18.01%

Purchase Date: 08/09/2004
Holding Period: 33 months and counting...

Bedrooms: 2
Bathrooms: 2
Square Feet: 1040

Purchase Details: view

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good luck with the auto repairs, etc. Brightside. But surely you can understand the realtor's point of view; s/he was so busy taking calls from potential buyers that keeping an eye on the road became impossible...

barnaby33 said...

Do you have a particulare attraction to Discovery? I ask because you seem to post on it fairly regularly.
Josh

Mr. Brightside said...

barnaby33,

Personally Discovery is one of my favorite projects and I also like Cortez Hill quite a lot. It could used more retail in my view and it's a shame that Aria, Cortez Blu and Aloft don't have any retail.

I am not sure why there are more losing properties there, it could be that the building simply had a lot of units for sale at the high point of the market. It was common for a lot of units to hit the market after two years from the prior closing as there are certain tax benefits to waiting that long.

I do think that Cortez Hill is seen as "too far away" by a lot of buyers downtown, like any market place demand that is less will result in reduced prices.

Discovery also seems to have a lot of large two bedrooms with only one parking spot, this also hurts marketability there.

barnaby33 said...

I looked at several things on Cortez hill back in 04, never in discovery though. What I felt was that Cortez Hill was too far. There were NO services within walking distance. Whats the point of living downtown if you have to get in your car to goto a store or restaurant.

Second was the noise. There is the freeway right there and then there are the planes. I know its all personal taste, but there is just some visceral feeling I get about that place.

I know you have said several times that its an area you'd like to live in.

Josh

Mr. Brightside said...

Cortez isn't bad however you need to be more of a city walking type as you do end up walking to the other neighborhoods a lot. When I lived there I actually liked that the most.

Cortez is lacking the basics though, hopefully VantagePointe will go a long way to fill that gap. Now that the regulations have changed it's now in the interest of developers to put retail in so any new projects will likely have retail as well.

Anonymous said...

Sorry to hear about your car accident - hope the RE agent had insurance that was paid!!

Discovery is also one of my favorite buildings - well built, and nice views. . .but I too, fall into the category of feeling it is too far and somewhat isolated - especially at night. . .last night I walked down to China Camp for dinner, and walked via India street on the way back to LaVita - felt completely safe with hundreds of people still eating at cafes. . .if I walked back to Discovery at night from Little Italy, one has to go through the "dead blocks" from Union up to Cortez Hill. . .also, I bike a lot, and I wouldn't look forward to pushing my bike up that hill from a nice ride along the waterfront. . .ok ok - it would build my leg muscles. . .

Anonymous said...

an interesting link from Forbes:

http://www.forbes.com/2007/05/03/market-housing-overpriced-forbeslife-cx_mw_0504overpriced.html