Roadmap with Irina - March 2023

Hi << Test First Name >>, 

The February real estate market showed an uptick of activity compared with January of this year, but it was still less active than February of last year. The median sale price for single-family houses and condos went down to the February 2021 level. For the last few years, everyone was talking about low inventory and looks like it continues to go down. The number of single-family homes in February was 25% higher than in January of this year but still 32% lower than in February of 2022. The number of new condos and townhouses for sale remained the same in February, 263 units, which is extremely low for the whole of Santa Clara County.

The recent events in the banking sector directly or indirectly reflected the real estate market. Some buyers faced the possibility of losing money that they saved for a down payment, others saw a sign of the whole banking system crashing and started moving money to different banks, and some rushed into buying a house to park money in real property. Banks reacted by dropping interest rates a bit which benefited buyers who were looking for better rates. It is very hard to predict how the market will be in the next few weeks. I hope for a normal spring market with multiple offers and faster sales. One thing I noticed is that people are more resilient to bad news. We survived so many things during the past few years, so this will pass too. Stay positive, focus on things that you can control, and let me know if you need any help.

If you are thinking about buying or selling, let’s connect, talk about your options, run some numbers, and see if this is the right time for you. Call me, I am always here for you.

The weather this winter is very strange. We have been living in the Bay Area for 20 years, and this is the first time we have had so many incidents. The weather impacted everyone in the area directly or indirectly, and the news is not encouraging: flood in many areas, strong wind, fallen trees, power outages, etc. I am glad that the temperature outside is not so bad these days, and we still have water and gas in our house, so we can cook, use showers and restrooms, so I shouldn’t complain too much. On Tuesday we lost the power in our house along with everybody else in our neighborhood, even schools were dismissed earlier which made kids super happy. We got lucky and the power was restored on early Wednesday morning, but the schools were cancelled for the day anyways.

On Tuesday, when we lost power in our house, I cooked dinner, and we had a very nice uninterrupted time together as a family. This reminded me a lot of the times when I was a kid, and I lived with my parents and my siblings in a small village in Siberia. We rarely had power outages, but when they did happen it was during winter snowstorms. When it happened, my mom fried potatoes on our firewood stove that also served us as a source of heat, and after the dinner we gathered around the table in the family room and had tea and played board games. The room was lit with a candle in the middle of the table, the room was half-dark, the strong wind howled outside, but the house was warm and cozy, and I felt very safe. Sometimes we went to bed earlier with my sister hiding under a blanket and making up stories of creatures hiding under the bed. When the power was restored, the house filled up with bright light, and I was disappointed: the magic of the darkness disappeared, everyone returned to the routine, and I could clearly see that there were no monsters under my bed. That was a great time when my parents were young, and we were very close as a family. Bitter-sweet memories.

Hopefully, my kids will have their own happy memories of the time when they had to go offline and did silly things in the dark. Stay safe! And let me know if you need anything.