Oakland. Oakland. Oakland.
We have been looking at buying a house in Oakland on and off for about a year. It is frustrating for a variety of reasons. Not a lot of inventory, price(s), mortgage rates, blah, blah, blah all the stuff you read about in the news.
This experience (so far) I have come away with some take-aways LIKE-
house stagings vary A LOT
"needs work" can mean anything from $10,000 to $300,000 in repairs
photos can be deceiving
realtor apps are amazing
you don't have to read every single word of a disclosure
open all doors
look out of all the windows
look up- example- went to a place the other day and the bathroom had been redone and there was a funky ceiling panel with weird fuzzy stuff coming out of it.
and down- example- there was a house that had a buckling floor in the corners of multiple rooms.
look at who your potential neighbors will be- examples
there was a place that had a hoarder next door, I can still see the broken Christmas lawn ornaments, half pitched tents, and 3 mowers on the front lawn
another place had no parking (red flag) and the realtor said in passing at the open house that there was some discussion about the side yard with the neighbor- the side yard was filled with junk as was the front yard of the next door neighbor
Another major factor is that semi-decent places go over asking. Months ago places were going WAY over, now not so much, but they still are going over. I don't get it, I understand it, but I don't get it.
And maybe it is because of the Idon'tknowhowmanyhouses we have looked at I only every think about 2. One that went over 100,000 over asking the other one was at the beginning of our journey and we didn't know what we were doing.
Oakland is my home and I don't have any interest in living anywhere else. So fingers crossed that we find a place. But I am realistic and know that we may be renters for the foreseeable future.
