Currently there are 105 short-sale and foreclosure properties on the market for San Clemente real estate, or approximately 15% of the current homes listed for sale are of this distressed nature.  Please note this number does not include all the deliquency notices that lenders have filed with the county court for San Clemente homeowners who have fallen behind on their monthly payments and may be in a short-sale or foreclosure situation soon.  Below you will find a more in depth analysis of the San Clemente foreclosure and short-sale real estate as well as the areas in which it is most concentrated.

First, the average listing price for these distressed properties is currently $707,331.  The lowest price is $144,900 for a one bedroom San Clemente condo to $1,699,000 for a 3,719 square foot home in Southwest San Clemente’s neighborhood of Cyprus Cove.  The average square footage of San Clemente foreclosure and short-sale real estate currently for sale is 2,296 with a range from 438 to 5,537 square feet.  This puts the average price per square foot for these distressed properties at approximately $308.  Bedrooms and bathrooms for these distressed San Clemente homes and condos for sale both range from 1-7 . 

The San Clemente real estate market is broken into ten distinct areas/neighborhoods and the concentration of the distressed properties throughout San Clemente are among just a couple of these areas. One of the areas, Talega real estate, has the greatest concentration as there are currently 44 Talega short-sales and foreclosures on the market.  This represents 41.9% of the total foreclosures and short-sales among the 10 different areas of San Clemente real estate.  Currently, 30% of talega homes and condos for sale are distressed properties.  The Talega real estate market is experiencing the greatest amount of distressed properties since it was built out during the real estate boom with a lot of sales occuring over the past 3-5 years. 

On the other hand, North San Clemente real estate and Forster Ranch real estate currently have 15 or 14.2% and 17 or 16.1% of the distressed properties for sale respectively.  The areas west of Interstate 5 and closer to the ocean, Central, Southeast, Southwest, and some of the Coast District, have the lowest concentration of foreclosures with a total of 9 foreclosures among these four areas.   The other areas of the San Clemente real estate market, Rancho San Clemente and Marblehead have 8 or 7.6% and 12 or 11.4% respectively of the distressed properties currently for sale.

For more information and a more up to date analysis, feel free to contact us.

Disclaimer:  Please note the information above may not be completely accurate and the most up to date, and therefore, should not be solely relied upon for your San Clemente real estate purchase.  San Clemente Coastal Living does not validate that any of the above information is 100% correct, however, we try to represent the most accurate and up to date information as possisble.

 At San Clemente Coastal Living, we wanted to bring attention to the new Talega real estate still available for sale as the community is nearing completion.  If you happen to be interested in any of these new Talega communities, please contact us as we will be happy to give you a tour of the Talega real estate market and the homes available for sale.  Buyers should keep in mind many of these builders are offering incentives to buy a new home in Talega, and therefore, these homes may represent some of the best deals in the Talega and San Clemente real estate market. 

Below are the new communities still available in Talega with links to their specific pages on our website with more detailed information beyond what’s provided here:

• Sabella - three two-story designs offering 2,085 - 2,629 square feet, 3-4 bedrooms and are priced from the mid $700,000s. 
• Carillon - five two-story designs offering 3,450 - 4,178 square feet, 3-7 bedrooms and are priced from the high $900,000s.
• Lucia - three two-story designs offering 5,685 - 6,070 square feet, 5-7 bedrooms and are priced from the low $2,000,000s.
• Alta - three two-story designs offering 4,719 - 5,399 square feet, 5-7 bedrooms and are priced from the mid $1,000,000s.
• Bella Vista - three two-story designs offering 3,521 - 3,807 square feet, 3-4 bedrooms and are priced from the low $1,000,000s.
• Stella Mare - Four two-story desings offering 3,048 - 3,823 square feet, 3-6 bedrooms and are priced from the mid $800,000s.

With 63 days left until Election Day on November 4, residents of San Clemente must make their final decisions on which two candidates they will elect to the San Clemente City Council along with a City Treasurer and City Clerk.  In Monday’s Orange County Register article, each candidate offers a brief summary of their positions and what they will do as City Council members.  At San Clemente Coastal Living, the welfare and vitality of the community is very important to us, so we hope that San Clemente residents will take the time to educate themselves on the different candidates so that we may elect the most qualified individuals.

For more information on Election Day in San Clemente, please visit the City of San Clemente’s website.

For the first in this series on Financing 101, San Clemente Coastal Living thought it would be appropriate to address how important your credit score is to getting approved on the the purchase of a San Clemente home or condo for sale.  The first thing as a buyer you need to take a look at is your financial profile, or in other words, your credit score.  Credit scores range from 300-850 and borrowers with a score of 700 or above are typically considered prime borrowers.  So lets break down how your credit score is calculated and how you can improve it.

First, 30% of your credit score is based on what’s known as your credit utilization ratio.  This is how big your balances are compared to how much credit is available to you.  It’s recommended you leave 50% of your available credit open in order to not ding your credit score.  Therefore, one of the fastest ways to improve your credit score is to pay those balances down.

Another 30% of your credit score is based on your payment history, and therefore, paying on-time is critical.  Late payments will stay on your records for as long as seven years, however, your credit score will begin to improve after six months of on-time payments.   After one year of on-time payments, you should see a huge leap in your credit score.

10% of your credit score is based on how many times you apply for new credit, and therefore, opening new credit lines before you want to refinance or take out a mortgage could prevent this from happening.

 The rest of your credit score is based on length of credit history among other factors.  One thing to keep in mind, however, is to review your credit report annually for errors as a recent study found that over 75% of credit reports contained some sort of error.  Having an error on your report could prevent you from buying the San Clemente home of your dreams.  With this being said, you are entitled to a free credit report every 12 months and can obtain it off FreeCreditReport.com.  If you happen to find errors, then you can respond to the credit bureau as they have 45 days to investigate the claim once found.  You will also want to contact the creditor who reported the error.

For more information about financing or San Clemente real estate, please feel free to contact us as we will be happy to provide you a free consultation.

At San Clemente Coastal Living, we specialize in San Clemente real estate, but we also have a deep fondness for the community of San Clemente. We chose to work exclusively in the San Clemente real estate market because it is such a unique coastal city, and we want our clients to understand everything San Clemente has to offer before deciding on a real estate purchase. With that in mind, we will periodically post reviews of San Clemente businesses, be it restaurants, coffee shops, beaches, etc. For the first in this series, I wanted to write about one of my favorite joints in San Clemente: OC Tavern. OC Tavern is a neighborhood restaurant and bar located off El Camino Real in Southeast San Clemente that boasts a large ocean view patio and a concert hall featuring live acts and excellent DJs. OC Tavern serves breakfast, lunch and dinner and is open daily until 2:00am. Being a big football fan, I frequent OC tavern on weekends during football season and can watch any game I want on the 22 plasma screen TVs surrounding the inside. There are also pool tables and video games along with a full bar and a smaller side patio with a firepit.

While OC Tavern is a great bar, they also serve excellent food.  They have a wide assortment of appetizers, including excellent chicken wings and surprisingly good seared Ahi Sashimi (I lived in Hawaii for a few years, so as an ahi connoisseur, I can tell you that OC Tavern’s version does not disappoint). I like to try new things when I frequent dining establishments, but I always have a tough time passing on the Tavern Burger - trust me, the cooks here know how to make an excellent burger; it is always cooked the way you want it, and it doesn’t fall apart in your hands. Make sure to try the Sweet Potato Fries on the side. Besides the typical bar fare, OC Tavern also features sandwiches, salads, pizzas and pastas (my wife loves the Ahi Tropical salad). Try to get seating on the front patio if possible (it is always packed around dinnertime); you get a very nice view of the San Clemente coastline from all of the tables.

For more information on OC Tavern, you may visit their website.  For more information on the San Clemente real estate market or San Clemente lifestyle, please contact us.

Due to recent requests from current and past San Clemente real estate clients, we have added a foreclosure and short-sale section on our website under Real Estate.  This page includes all the current foreclosures and short-sales currently available in the San Clemente real estate market.  In addition, you now have the opportunity to search foreclosures and short-sales through our property search engine at the top of our website.  This will enable you to search San Clemente real estate foreclosures and short-sales by price, bedrooms, bathrooms, neighborhoods, etc. 

Please keep in mind the majority of the foreclosures and short-sales are in the Talega real estate market, the most inland and newest area of San Clemente.  Talega real estate, both homes and condos, has experienced the most foreclosures due to the majority of the community being developed and sold during the real estate boom.  Since a lot of the Talega homes and condos have been sold over the past couple years, many homeowners are either forced to foreclose or face the difficult choice as their homes are worth less than the amount they owe.  Some of the other areas of the San Clemente real estate market are experiencing the foreclosure pain as well, however, not as significant.  Lastly, buyers need to remember that while the San Clemente real estate market has experienced price declines and foreclosures, the market has held its ground relative to the rest of the county and state as median price has fallen around 10% over the past year as compared with 26% for Orange County and 35% for California.

For more information on foreclosures, please read our past blogs, “How to Buy a San Clemente Foreclosure“ and/or contact us.

The OC Register has reported some excellent news for real estate sellers in Orange County.  According to this article, Orange County home sales in July increased by 17% from last year, the first increase since September 2005 (a 33-month span).  The numbers also show a 45% increase from last month.  It seems that buyers are finally recognizing the great values to be had in the current real estate market and are making the decision to move ahead with a purchase.  Besides bargain prices, the change in consumer confidence in buying real estate can be attributed to the passing of the Housing Bill and the return of investors to the marketplace. 

For sellers in San Clemente with houses currently on the market or residents thinking about putting their home up for sale, this is very welcome news.  Buyers are returning to the marketplace throughout Orange County, and if you look at the large increase in sales as compared to last month, they seem to be doing so very quickly.  Another interesting point the article uncovers is that investors have changed their outlook and are renting out their purchased properties until the market recovers enough to begin “flipping” the real estate in their portfolios to turn a profit.  As we have stated repeatedly in this blog, real estate is one of the smartest, low-risk investments one can make, regardless of the economy’s health.  Even when the housing market is down, investors still see the benefit in purchasing real estate; the patient ones know that they will see excellent returns on their investment, it just will not happen as quickly in this type of market.  There is also good news here for buyers: homes are at the lowest median price ($461,000) since January 2005, meaning there are still amazing deals to be found in the resale and foreclosure markets.  Another positive sign for buyers and sellers is that, due to the recent passing of the Housing Bill and federal aid to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the amount of cash flow for borrowers has increased. 

The lesson San Clemente buyers should take from these developments is that, if the market continues this upward trend, home prices will slowly increase, and the great deals on San Clemente real estate will begin to disappear.  As you can see, the Orange County resale market is beginning to show signs of life, and as the saying goes, “Strike while the iron is hot.”  For more information on purchasing or selling San Clemente real estate, please contact us.

With the San Clemente real estate market being a buyer’s market, sellers should consider a pre-inspection.  In this article, the value of the pre-inspection incurred on the sellers behalf may completely outweigh the cost of $300-500.  The pre-inspection allows you, the seller, to fix the problems before they might surface during a buyer inspection.  This could prevent a potential sale from falling apart in today’s market and take a lot of time and hassle out of negotiations. 

San Clemente real estate buyers are in the drivers seat right now, so the pre-inspection may also function as a marketing tool.  For example, we can advertise in the listing that the property was pre-inspected.  At the house, there can be a sign out front and cards in the house alerting potential buyers and their agents that a pre-inspection report is available.  This becomes a great bargaining tool to differentiate yourself and your home from your competition, the other properties the buyer is interested in the San Clemente real estate market.   Lastly, it will give you much more confidence in the price at which we list your house.  In today’s buyers market, this pre-inspection could mean selling your house next week versus six months from now.

San Clemente State Park, located in Southeast San Clemente, has recently upgraded its visitor’s center providing a much better glimpse of San Clemente’s history according to this article in the Orange County Register.  Visitors and locals, both adults and children, can learn more about the surfing, wildlife, American Indians, and other aspects of the state park and San Clemente. 

For those unfamiliar with San Clemente state park, it is located just south of downtown San Clemente on the coastal side of Interstate 5 off the Calafia exit.  The state park has campsites with beach access to some of the most prestine and beautiful beaches in all of Southern California.  For more information, including maps and reservations, please visit the state park website.

For the past five years, the City Council of San Clemente has been developing plans for the usage of 53 acres of land in Rancho San Clemente/Forster Ranch at the cross streets of Avenida Vista Hermosa and Avenida La Pata.  The plans included building a new 42-acre sports and swimming complex, which now, according to this article in the OC Register, is closer to becoming a reality.  The Council has decided to go ahead with plans for the La Pata/Vista Hermosa Sports Park and Aquatics Center, with a projected construction start date of January 2009 and opening of the park in June 2010.  Features of the new park will include:

1. Baseball, football and soccer complexes, complete with restrooms, spectator seating and mixed-use fields.
2. Aquatics center with 50-meter competition pool, 25-meter activity pool and a large bath house with restrooms and changing areas.

To help fund the construction of the new park, the Council has agreed to sell the remaining 9 acres to Target for the building of a new shopping center; this plan is still in the works as this area will need to be rezoned for commercial use.  Future plans include building a gymnasium, basketball courts, a community center and a group picnic area; these developments would cost an extra $25 million and have been tabled for now.

As this blog frequently states, infrastructure is a critical part to a community’s value with regards to real estate and overall appeal, and San Clemente is a city that continues to excel in adding areas for community use.  San Clemente is already well-known for its beautiful parks, and the addition of this large sports complex creates more activities for families and residents.  The location is centralized between three large residential areas in San Clemente: Forster Ranch, Talega and Rancho San Clemente; with freeway access off Avenida Vista Hermosa, the park will be easily accessible not only for San Clemente residents but visitors as well.  The Target shopping center is another bonus, not only because its development will make the park’s funding easier to obtain, but also because, let’s face it, everyone loves Target (I pity you if you have not visited one before - it is sometimes hard to get my wife to leave a Target once she gets going).  To donate funds to the new park and sports complex, please visit http://www.sanclementeparksfoundation.org. 

For more information on the San Clemente real estate market and future infrastructure plans in the area, please visit San Clemente Coastal Living or contact us.