How many people write real estate blogs these days? A thousand? A million?

Fortunately, there is an innovative way to filter out the noise. It’s called the Carnival of Real Estate, and this week I am the host.

The Carnival is a rotating celebration of blog copy, an informal nod of recognition by fellow bloggers. Each week a different real estate blogger hosts the party by highlighting a few memorable blog posts on real estate.

The idea was hatched more than a year ago by Zillow.com, the guys who brought instant home price estimates to the Web, and you can see the main Carnival page by CLICKING HERE.

Before we get to the three best blog posts, I’ll explain one more thing: they’re not a sample of all real estate blogs. I selected them from about 30 entries that bloggers submitted over the past few days. I distilled them for originality, relevance and detail.

So here’s three blog posts well worth reading (I did not rank them, so, in a sense, all three are No. 1):

Spicing Up the Neighborhood
What really gets Web hits on Zillow.com? A house that’s a brothel, writes Diane Tuman on the Zillow Blog. I chose her post to start with a lighter note, and because it’s a titillating read. Also, Tuman gets right to the point, something essential in blogging:

The New Rochelle police routinely monitor Internet sites and saw an ad on Craigslist for “Grand Opening Special! Hot models, soft sensual touch…New Rochelle has Westchester’s first and only member’s only club for men and women…We offer role play, fetishes, light body rubs, body rejuvenation and dominatrix.”

When the police showed up, they busted a couple who are allegedly mortgage brokers. They were into house flipping (among other things, evidently) and were underwater with a few houses, including this one.

A Bail Out is Still a Bail Out by Any Other Name
Get ready for a 180 degree turn (from my first pick). Mortgage broker and blogger Morgan Brown summarizes the many proposals by President Bush and Congress to aid financially struggling homeowners avoid foreclosure. He disparages the idea of helping homeowners who gambled on rising home prices and lost. Bottom line: This is a good wrap-up piece with some colorful opinion and ya, you bet I favor writers on mortgages. Here’s a taste of his long post:

The American government has always come to the rescue of those who fall out of the market’s favor. Farmers of cotton receive subsidies north of 80% for each bale of cotton sold; no less than the automotive, savings & loan and airline industries have been receive billions in US government hand outs to help further American interests. If the proletarian homeowner can’t get in line for a hand out with those regulars, what good is their government to them? The US government continues to play with state-sponsored socialism in situations where it benefits them the most; and this year its all about looking good for elections. Joe America is going to be looking at the world (and ballot) through the lens of the bay-window of their McMansion ; and whomever helped keep him there the longest is going to get his vote.

6 Reasons Why Downtown isn’t Over Built
Real estate blogs have become best known for one thing: the debate over a housing bubble. Although there is no disputing a slump in housing sales, the debate rages on over how long and deep the correction will go. As a journalist myself, I decided to highlight a contrarian view on how journalists are allegedly portraying the housing market – the charge is we overstate it to sell newspapers.

I found a somewhat local example among the submissions to the Carnival of Real Estate. Sales agent Denny Oh argues that despite press coverage downtown San Diego is not overbuilt with condos. Here’s three of his examples (let the debate roll on):

1) July of 2007 had 492 active resale listings Downtown – July of 2006 had 613. That’s almost a 20% reduction in active listings.

2) In early 2006, there were about 100 condos for sale at The Grande at Santa Fe – today there are only 38 for sale(out of 440).

* Of the homes currently for sale the average size is 1,521 square feet and the average asking price is $1,134,886 – $731/square foot.

3) The average waterfront condo in Downtown San Diego is priced around $750/square foot, but is closer to $1,000/square foot in other West Coast cities like Seattle, Vancouver and San Francisco.

Posted in: Weird Mortgage Happenings |

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