Ask Pete, Chapter 2: Your questions, answered

This article was originally on a blog post platform and may be missing photos, graphics or links. See About archive blog posts.

You folks asked some good questions. As is my custom, I’ll answer the easy ones:

1) Mike at 12:55 pm asked, ‘ why do you sometimes post in 5 minutes and sometimes in 3 hours??’
Thanks, Mike. If I am sitting at the computer at work and doing nothing else, I post comments very quickly. If it is 7 p.m. and my 4-year-old son yells at me, ‘DADDY! Turn OFF the computer, let’s play baseball!’ Then I turn off the computer and play tee-ball in the back yard. Seriously, it’s just me moderating comments. I have other duties at The Times, and in life.

2) Uncle Billy at 12:56 p.m. asked, ‘Did you have an inkling of how different our real estate market would become when you started this blog?’
Thanks, U.B. I thought the market would weaken, but not this quickly, and not this unevenly. I did not see the collapse in the mortgage industry coming. I would have guessed prices in better neighborhoods would be lower right now.

3) mark g at 1:04 pm asked, ‘Are lender Short Sales impossible to bid for at this point? I saw a property that I was interested in and would like to make an offer, but the offer would be tailored to descend in value with the lengthy time frame that it would take to approve by their loss mitigation.’
Thanks, mark. Banks are really slow to approve short sales these days. My guess is, if your offer has strings attached, or an expiration date, it’s doomed.

4) Cal at 1:08 p.m. asked, ‘How do appearances like your appearance on CNN on Saturday happen? Producer calls up and says we need someone to talk about foreclosures?’

(Click below for the answer to that and many more questions)
Thanks, Cal. I’m pretty sure the CNN interview came about because CNN folks -- like just about everyone in the news business -- read The Drudge Report, and Drudge had a link to one of my posts last week. What usually happens is the producer will email me and ask if I’m available for an interview. Then they’ll call and do a ‘pre-interview’ to get an idea what my thoughts are. Sometimes producers go through the p.r. department here, sometimes they just email me directly. 5) Chuck W at 1:22 pm asked, ‘What would have to happen to the LA housing market to convince you to pull the trigger and buy?’
Thanks, Chuck. Short answer: some combination of higher income, better job security and lower prices.

6) xtine at 1:27 pm asked, ‘What do you think is the best web resource to find out about foreclosed houses?’
Thanks, xtine, good question. I don’t know a good free resource. I’ve been using Property Shark lately, but I’m wide open to suggestions. Anybody?

7) Carter at 1:40 p.m. asked, ‘what chances do you give for the Frank-Dodd plan to go thru?’
Thanks, carter. I think odds are decent -- 60-40 maybe -- that Congress will pass a watered-down version of the Frank plan, maybe daring the president to veto it. Politically, a veto might help the Democrats -- making the White House appear to be defending the status quo.

8) MyLessThanPrimeBeef at 1:47 pm asked, ‘ Pete, is it possible to invite a flipper or two here?’
Thanks, MyLess. Yes, it’s possible: Come on all you flippers, come on in and tell your stories. You made a ton of money and stopped flipping just in time? Tell us about it. You stayed too long at the party and now you’re stuck and bleeding cash? Tell us about it.

9) TakeFive, at 1:54 pm asked, ‘What do you look for in a story to consider posting it on this blog?’
Thanks, Take. If it comes in email from a regular reader like you, I usually trust your judgment and post it. Otherwise, I’m looking for a story that makes a point, has a strong piece of news, or a single quote or an anecdote that begs to be highlighted and opened up for comment. There’s a ton of great stuff out there and I feel like I scratch the surface every day. I generally don’t like long, even-handed stories about issues -- ‘thumb-suckers.’
10) Mike G at 2:01 p.m. asked, ‘Often, the discussion in this blog trends worryingly toward racism, in my personal opinion. Do you feel that some of the more colorful comments on the blog are, in fact, racist?’
Thanks, Mike, excellent question. I wrestle with this. It happens almost every time I post about a low-income community. Someone will soon post a comment arguing that illegal immigrants have ruined the neighborhood, or they’ll write about cars parked on the lawns, or gang-bangers, taggers, etc., and then the comments fly fast and furious. I generally post the comments. These are realities in Los Angeles: illegal immigrants, gangs, poverty, street crime. These are big issues when homeowners choose a neighborhood. Racist? I don’t know. I can’t get inside someone’s head or heart. If a comment goes over the line, I don’t post it. In every long thread there’s one or two really objectionable comments that don’t get published.

11) Arroyogrande at 2:05 p.m. asked, ‘A question on ‘the media’ in general ... (In stories about foreclosure) ... why do your fellow reporters insist in casting the borrowers as victims?’
Thanks arroyo, great question. I don’t know but I have a few theories. There’s a widespread belief in newsrooms that stories about big issues are boring, and to make them accessible and give them life, reporters should tell them through the experience of one person, to ‘humanize’ the story. So we get journalism by anecdote. Character-driven journalism. The search for victims is a broad trend. We live in a great age of victimization. Everyone is a victim of something, or so it seems. Lastly, journalists seem to embrace and defend homeownership as a time-honored American ideal -- kind of like the family farm. The American Dream. Well and good, but that view fails to recognize recent changes in what it means to buy and own a house: for many recent homebuyers, buying a house involved no saving, no downpayment, no equity, no financial sacrifice, and no real ownership. It was a mirage of sorts.

12) Last question. Wilson at 2:38 pm asked, ‘With a letter grade of A-F, how do you grade the credibility of real estate agents? Month after month, they say, ‘It’s a great time to buy.’ But prices have fallen like a rock and they’ve been saying that for the past year!’
Thanks, Wilson. I don’t think that’s the best way to grade agents. You, the buyer, decide whether it’s a good time to buy and how much you can afford to spend. Then you get an agent and tell them what you’re willing to spend and what you want for it. If it’s findable, a good agent finds that for you. If it’s not, a good agent explains why you can’t have what you want.
Photo Credit: A Beverly Hills-area contemporary home designed by Hal Levitt, and now listed for $7.895 million, by Josh White.