It’s Halloween in Santa Cruz

It’s Halloween in Santa Cruz

It’s almost Halloween in Santa Cruz! Time to get your game- face on and button up your costumed alter-ego. Here on the reservation, we embrace this night with a particular passion.  

I’m going to be heading to the big real estate Halloween party you probably don’t even know about. Think Burning Man – but just for Realtors.  It always ends at midnight when they crank up the David Byrne song and torch a giant effigy of a suburban tract house.

It started fifteen years ago, back in the dark days of the Great Recession, when fear was running rampant through the marketplace and it felt like real estate was going to hell. I’ll never forget that first one… It took place on a spooky dystopian cul-de-sac filled with foreclosures, boarded-up windows and darkened doorways that looked just like the missing teeth and vacant stares of hollowed- out pumpkins.

Cobwebs hung like Spanish moss from For Sale signs leaning at odd angles. Buzzards circled homes in default – marking them as easy prey for all the scary land sharks prowling the neighborhood. Crazy conga lines of buyers were snaking through the streets while loan brokers in Alan Greenspan masks were handing out Nestle “Credit” Crunch Bars and  Real Estate “Bubble” Gum.

Someone disguised as Naked Greed was streaking through the crowd chased by another character dressed in a skimpy Real Estate Rally Thong. There were Monster Houses milling around and a roaming chorus of gremlins whispering fearful thoughts into people’s ears with high-pitched, banshee-like voices.

I saw a couple of Blind Appraisers searching for comps,  groups of Swarming Termites, Sellers dressed up like Statues of St Joseph and Underwriters morphing into Undertakers trying to bury the market by declaring that the word “mortgage” really originates from the French word for “death tax.” 

Prophets of Doom and Gloom roamed the cul-de-sac chased by Zombie Buyers, while a growing Legion of Unsolds hid inside their houses. The American Dream was dressed in a black robe and carried a scythe  while The Grinch That Stole the Economy lugged a bag full of treats labeled Credit Default Swaps and someone else was dressed like a Doctor trying to find the market’s pulse! 

A few people came as Toxic Assets and the Gordon Gekko mask made a big comeback. Freddie Kruger also put in a guest appearance touting his new movie – “Nightmare on Main Street” but he was almost eclipsed by a giant swathe of darkness called the Shadow Inventory.

Wow. What a party. Say what you want about real estate…we do fear well. There are always plenty of lost souls out there wandering around with grave faces on. Gives me goosebumps just to think about it!