Proud to be a naysayer. (Especially if it means I can afford a house in Bend someday.)

This is what $200,000 looks like in Bend, Oregon money.

I read something that someone posted on a Bend blog, the quote went something like this… "They look to the Bulletin as an unbiased news source that actually interviews Realtors as real estate experts. That's like going to Bill Gates and asking for an unbiased opinion about software & what brand you should buy.” and forgive me for not knowing or remembering who posted this genius comment. Everyday I read something new posted by idiots, investors, realtors, the people with mortgage payments that exceed the value of their property and the poor saps such as myself waiting for that market to crash, crash, crash…so that I too can be a homeowner in the American Dream that is, Central Oregon.

I’ll tell you something that will be a very good indicator about how educated I am on these topics. I went to college for Graphic Design. That was 10 years ago and I currently do not have any sort of degree to show for it. I live, for the most part, paycheck to paycheck…with minimal savings and checking accounts. In 3 years I will be the sole owner of a nice all-wheel drive vehicle that gets just under 30 mpg (and since I live in Bend I’m sure that it goes without saying that said car is indeed a Subaru Outback.) I have been a home renter for my entire adult life, which is getting more adult like every single day. (I know, I know Dad! I said too much...I could hear your voice in my head when I was typing this paragraph!)

I have lived in Oregon since the age of 9, so I pretty much consider myself an “Oregonian”. I did not move here from California…but you can dock some points because I came from Arizona. (We all know that in California you can go two ways, you can go south if you're red and north if you're blue.) Now in all fairness, you have to add back some points because I stayed in Oregon after I became an adult instead of running back to where I came from. I have lived in Bend for a year. I moved here because I love Oregon and I hate the rain. I’m one of those non-Californians who loves Bend because it makes me smile…not because it made me an assload of money.

I’ve been reading a lot of blogs about the real estate bubble over here in Bend. It’s easy to decipher the REAL agenda of each and every poster. It’s really easy to spot the folks who’re in debt to their eyeballs and then some. These are the same people who try to persuade us that the bubble burst already and the values are heading back up again. (I clearly missed seeing those rock bottom prices, but then again...I spend a lot of time doing things like working...which seems to be something that people in Bend don't really do a lot of these days.)

Why? Because the Bulletin posts a story with their main source of information coming from the realtors of Bend? Anyone with half a brain knows the bottom line for the realtors of Bend. Anyone who is semi-comatose or better knows what sort of career you don’t want to be in right about now.

If the real estate companies in Bend really wanted to get the facts straight with us, they would do what Assist 2 Sell does and publish their sold list as soon as they sold, that way we could really see, with our very own eyes what is selling and for how much. All the houses that are selling this March (an increase from what sold in February the Bulletin told us today) are they actual houses that sold…or are they houses taken off the market? Who wants to fess up and show us some proof? Because if Assist 2 Sell is NOT lying (and what reason would they have to do so)…not much is being sold in 2007.

I went on their website, I took a look at what sold. Currently there are 74 houses for sale over at Assist 2 Sell. Now assuming that all 74 of these houses have been for sale for the duration of 2007 (which I have no way of knowing) it means that Assist 2 Sell has sold 9.7% of their inventory this year. That’s right folks, a whopping 8 houses have sold through Assist 2 Sell in 2007.

But you want to hear the good news? Six out of eight of those houses sold for, get this…lower than asking price! That means that 75% of the houses they sold, sold for less than the over-inflated asking price. The average sale price was $319,000 at an average 4% less than asking price. One home sold for asking price and one sold for 4% higher than the asking price and that single house that sold for more, sold for under $300,000. How about that for some statistics people?! You’re not seeing that printed in the Bulletin are you? I wonder why that is? Who has the most to lose from this sort of information being realized by the masses?

Yeahhhhhh. Things are really looking up for the real estate market in Bend. We're not headed in a downward spiral, we're heading on up! Selling some houses...making some money!

Whatever helps you sleep at night folks!!

I’m not going to take into account any of the other real estate companies in town, unless they want to start publishing on their site the houses they are selling, the houses that are being pulled from the market and the houses that are in foreclosure! These DO NOT count as sales. But that’s what the Bulletin is trying to tell us!

The boom happened in late 2005 and the first 6 months of 2006. That was the time to sell your house and make some money. You missed out! The cold, hard truth…for anyone with their home listed right now at 75% more than the value…you missed out. You need to invest in a really good time machine and go back to May 2006. I've got several for sale if you're interested...just email me. I'm unloading those babies at a very reasonable $347,000.

Last year, 2006, Assist 2 Sell sold 65 houses. I don’t know how many houses they had listed, but that translates to roughly 5 per month. What a booming market! 13 of those 65 houses (20%) sold for 7.8% higher than the asking price. 13 of those 65 houses (20%) sold for the asking price. (Which were all less than 400k) If you are good at math, you know that leaves 60% of the remaining houses selling for less than the asking price. People who bought these 39 houses last year in Bend, got them for $547,000 less than the asking price. Which doesn’t mean squat, considering that they still overpaid by about 70% when everything was said and done.

So who is doing the math on the statistics provided to the Bulletin?! I mean, I figured these statistics out pretty easily and I never made it past high school Algebra! I understand that Assist 2 Sell is just one of the dozens of realty companies in town, but still! Multiply those statistics by the amount of realty companies in town and they still add up to the same thing. Shit is not selling...and it’s DEFINITELY not selling for what you’re asking! Plain and simple.

This is the truth, and it hurts. But not for me, because I want to buy a house in Bend someday before I die, without having a $2,300 a month mortgage payment (which is what it boils down to on a median house of $347,000) Because like I said before, I don’t even have a college degree and without one of those babies you sure as hell aren’t making $90,000 a year, which is what you would have to make to qualify for a mortgage that size.