- Tom Brezsny

10,000 People will Turn 65 Today…

January 29, 2024Today, 10,000 people in the US will turn 65…  It’s nothing new of course, I’ve been saying the same thing for more than a decade,  since the huge swathe of aging baby boomers (b.1949-1964), started hitting retirement.   It’s been the intro for dozens of columns about aging and downsizing and how they intersect with everyday real estate. And ultimately how they shape the market by contributing to the shrinking inventory of listings. I’d like to say I knew exactly what was behind the radical shift...

- Tom Brezsny

Chanelling the Future of Real Estate

January 22, 2024Nothing surprises me anymore. On New Year’s Eve I was quietly ruminating about the future of real estate when I received a mysterious invite for a midnight Zoom session. At the stroke of twelve the link went live and asked me to share my screen. That’s when one of those infinite mirror effects was triggered along with a series of cryptic messages scrolling through the chat thread.   What follows is a small part of what I saw and heard for the next three hours....

- Natasha Mingay

1% for Good Charitable Foundation: Pajaro Valley Loaves and Fishes

January 16, 2024Sereno 1% For Good Charitable Foundation believes in combating food insecurity. We are honored to support Pajaro Valley Loaves and Fishes. Founded in 1989, Loaves and Fishes is a community-based organization dedicated to alleviating hunger among working poor families, farm workers, and elderly, disabled and homeless individuals of the Pajaro Valley. They help sustain the lives of thousands of individuals by assisting them with nutritious food, education and referrals in cooperation with other agencies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SrPMBxNqb8 "We envision a Pajaro Valley community in which all people...

- Tom Brezsny

The Ladder of Homeownership

January 15, 2024Continuing the conversation… studying the history of homeownership, looking for the roots of our current housing crisis…  To confront a severe housing crisis following WW2, the government launched a massive series of subsidies and incentives that disrupted the housing market, changed the future of homeownership and altered the course of the Country. The Fed program ushered in two decades of almost inexhaustible suburban sprawl and became the catalyst for the largest economic boom in history. As the landscape and the economy were transformed, the detached,...

- Tom Brezsny

Affordable Housing on a Massive Scale

January 8, 2024Continuing the conversation…following the history of homeownership in the U.S.… looking for the roots of our current housing crisis…   As World War 2 drew to a close, the Country faced a severe housing crisis, one that had been fifteen years  in the making, due to the privations of the Great Depression and the forced austerity of the War. It was a watershed moment in the history of homeownership and the government decided to intervene in the housing market on a scale never seen before...

- Dax Nollenberger

Dax’s Data: The Story of Santa Cruz Real Estate in 2023

January 8, 2024Predictability is the word for Santa Cruz Real Estate. Not because every prediction made about the real estate market at the beginning of 2023 was correct, quite the contrary. Rather because the price result based on market conditions was quite predictable. Analyzing the weekly data for an entire year can yield a strong understanding of what may happen next. From 30,000ft my predictions and expectations as the year progressed were pretty strong. This us because I listened to the data and anchored my position to...

- Tom Brezsny

Everything Changed in a Generation

January 3, 2024We’re tracking the history of homeownership, looking for the roots of the current housing crisis. Here’s what we’ve learned: The huge increases in homeownership that followed WW2 grew out of the government’s desire to help millions of GIs who were returning home to a severe housing shortage. The Feds initiated a program of subsidies and incentives aimed at expanding affordability and ramping up the pace of home construction.  To increase demand, the Feds invented the  “American Mortgage” with favorable terms that included low interest, low...