Cutest house of the week -- in Atwater!

I showed this home at 4122 Edenhurst ($495,000) in Atwater today.  Even though it's not large, it was totally impressive -- completely redone, yet period details intact and freshened up.  It has a cute (not permitted) guest unit, too and a lovely green backyard.  And the neighborhood...!  I don't show there very often, but I'm going to pay A LOT more attention to it from now on.  Atwater has totally come around in the last few years, the residential homes have been spiffed up and there's lots of pride of ownership evident now in the area.  The home prices are less than what you'd find in similar areas.  It has cool restaurants, golf courses and horse stables nearby (I stepped in a road apple) and a bike path now runs along the L.A. River.  Well, okay, it still has LAUSD schools, but it also has its very own Costco (what more could you want, right?).  If you work downtown, in Pasadena or even the east SFV, it's really well-located.  It would be a great option for those looking for homes in the $450k-$600k range.

14 Reasons why the San Fernando Valley and L.A. are superior to San Francisco and the SF peninsula

I just spent a weekend in Palo Alto and San Francisco visiting my in-laws. Yes, everybody loves San Francisco with its big-city vibe and 20 kinds of olive oil, blah, blah blah, big vacation destination, etc. But really, I missed our land and think we have it all over the SF Bay Area. Here's why.

1. We have more homes for sale. Many more. (Had to get that search term in there, but it's true.)
2. We have Universal City and Disneyland. They have Pier 39. Please.
3. We have less traffic. Really.
4. They have Stanford. We have UCLA, USC and Makeup Art Designory.
5. There, everybody wears hoodies and looks like the Unibomber. We have Aloha shirts and fat kids in baggy, calf-length shorts. Way more cheerful!
6. We have more tattoos and piercings.
7. We have Zankou Chicken.
8. Many of us can see a Costco or Target from our houses. What can they see? The Golden Gate Bridge, maybe? Meh.
9. We have more parking. You can actually turn your car off close to your house here.
10. Housing costs less here.
11. We have more Armenians, and more of every other ethnic group, too. Except maybe Chinese.
12. We have the Lakers. (We'll leave the Dodgers v. Giants argument for another time.)
13. We have The Arclight(s).
14. They have upscale shopping in Union Square and Stanford Shopping Center. We have upscale AND downscale shopping everywhere.

So let's stop with the inferiority complex, folks, and learn to appreciate where we live!

Statue of Lenin unveiled in Burbank

Burbank City unveiled a brand new statue of Vladimir Lenin last week in Burbank!  This pic is a preview, but now Lenin is in front of a giant American flag and is overlooking Costco.  As if.

Oh, wait, no this is Dr. David Burbank.  He just looks like Lenin.

The past week in real estate and a big DON'T for sellers

This past week brought "more of same" as far as real estate goes. I toured Valley Glen, Valley Village, North Hollywood and Burbank for homes that are 3+ beds, 2+baths, 1200+ square feet, and between $450k and $600k.

You would think that would describe every home on the market in the SFV.

Nope.

I found four homes that were more-or-less decent in that price range. One, on Mariposa in Burbank, faces the back wall of Costco. Another in Burbank was decorated with a highly-developed devotion to knotty pine (as versus the medium-developed devotion so common in the Valley) and a third house had no windows in the master bath.

Which brings me to the fourth house in Valley Village, which is arguably the nicest of the bunch. But: the owners made a 1/2 bath of the master bedroom closet. The master was already small. Sellers, putting toilets where they don't belong is a big turn-off to buyers. Toilets belong in proper bathrooms, not in closets, laundry rooms, garages, or back patios. I've seen them in all those locations in homes for sale, and those homes invariably stay on the market for a long, long time and sell for less than comparable sales. So if you're thinking about adding a "bathroom" in say, the hall closet, for the love of God don't.