Show HN: Find a home close to work • Hacker News Board

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#61

Post by Schwolop » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 7:10 AM UTC

danieltillett wrote: post #56

ehhuang wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've heard from multiple agents about how redfin agents don't know what they are doing. Of course, that is just one side of the story, but I'm curious about how receptive listing agents are towards working with you guys in hot markets like SF Bay area. Anything you can share?

As an Australian I have always been amazed with that in the USA you have to use a buyers agent. Here you visit the properties yourself and deal directly with the selling agent. Only the buyer pays the agent. We do have very high stamp duty (basically a sales tax on real estate) which is 5% of the property price which the buyer has to pay.

I think you mean that only the _seller_ pays the agent. But yes, I agree the American system is a bit odd. For one thing the listings are WAAAAYYY old by Australian standards - here you list your house with an auction or "sale by" date usually six weeks in the future, and ... it sells (usually). It looks to me like the American system has longer listings because there are fewer open-house inspections - your buyers agent arranges a time to inspect on your behalf, or something like that?

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#62

Post by gricardo99 » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 7:39 AM UTC

There's another solution to this problem: remote work. It's 2015, and with the plethora of Internet technologies that facilitate online collaboration I'm still dismayed to see so many tech companies behaving like it's 1985. The insistence and focus on physical location baffles me. Some companies seem to get it and have embraced an online/distributed workforce but many seem opposed to that model. I'd really like to hear others thoughts on why geography is still such a huge factor in knowledge-based industries.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#63

Post by d_luaz » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 9:12 AM UTC

gricardo99 wrote: post #62

There's another solution to this problem: remote work. It's 2015, and with the plethora of Internet technologies that facilitate online collaboration I'm still dismayed to see so many tech companies behaving like it's 1985. The insistence and focus on physical location baffles me. Some companies seem to get it and have embraced an online/distributed workforce but many seem opposed to that model. I'd really like to he…

I guess remote work is an option, but not quite a total solution at the moment. 1) not all work could be remote 2) self-discipline/communication is tough

Woofoo (about 7 people) did remote, but the founder admit it's tough and challenging even for such a small and motivated company (imagine your workforce > 1000 people), though there are some obvious benefits.

It's not just about tools (slack, skype, etc.) and finding a procedure that works, but more about company culture, motivation, discipline, adaptation to remote environment, family at home, etc. Not every employee could survive a remote environment and continue to be productive :(

Before everyone could work from home, maybe the idea of multiple office location/work-space (rather than centralized) could be explored, yet it will have many pros and cons.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#64

Post by danieltillett » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 9:43 AM UTC

Schwolop wrote: post #61

danieltillett wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Australian I have always been amazed with that in the USA you have to use a buyers agent. Here you visit the properties yourself and deal directly with the selling agent. Only the buyer pays the agent. We do have very high stamp duty (basically a sales tax on real estate) which is 5% of the property price which the buyer has to pay.

I think you mean that only the _seller_ pays the agent. But yes, I agree the American system is a bit odd. For one thing the listings are WAAAAYYY old by Australian standards - here you list your house with an auction or "sale by" date usually six weeks in the future, and ... it sells (usually). It looks to me like the American system has longer listings because there are fewer open-house inspections - your buyers ag…

Yes you are right - the buyer pays the agent.

At the moment is Sydney properties are selling off market which means 0 day sales. The time it takes in the USA seems amazing long.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#65

Post by danieltillett » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 9:45 AM UTC

toast0 wrote: post #60

danieltillett wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Australian I have always been amazed with that in the USA you have to use a buyers agent. Here you visit the properties yourself and deal directly with the selling agent. Only the buyer pays the agent. We do have very high stamp duty (basically a sales tax on real estate) which is 5% of the property price which the buyer has to pay.

You don't need to use a buyer's agent, but it's usually a good idea to have someone at less theoretically looking out for your interest. If you use the seller's agent, that one agent has a big conflict of interest. If you have a real estate attorney (which isn't very common in california, but may be in Australia), then I wouldn't see needing an agent as well.

Yes in Australia as a buyer you will have your own lawyer looking over the details once you buy. The problem with buyers agents is their interests are rarely aligned with your own.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#66

Post by encoderer » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 2:18 PM UTC

rconti wrote: post #46

encoderer wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I have $200k equity in my current home (NC) and if I move to the San Jose area that would still require me to put in another $100-200k of savings to "compete" for a mediocre 1500-2000sqft place near work." Do you mean you'd need that $400k down to "compete"? You would have no problem buying a $1MM home on credit with your 20% down. That would buy you a decent place in San Jose. You could also buy the same home with…

No PMI on jumbo loans. They just require cash reserves. (which, yes, is more money on top of what you have to put down, but there's no requirement that you not spend it once you close). So take that $200k, put down 100, and keep the rest in the bank.

It's not a big deal but I bought a house in Berkeley 2 years ago and paid pmi for a year until I refid. It was a jumbo loan. So I guess ymmv.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#67

Post by rconti » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 7:13 PM UTC

encoderer wrote: post #66

rconti wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No PMI on jumbo loans. They just require cash reserves. (which, yes, is more money on top of what you have to put down, but there's no requirement that you not spend it once you close). So take that $200k, put down 100, and keep the rest in the bank.

It's not a big deal but I bought a house in Berkeley 2 years ago and paid pmi for a year until I refid. It was a jumbo loan. So I guess ymmv.

Huh, okay, good to know. Maybe on a per-bank basis. I assumed PMI was just fannie/freddie-mandated and nobody else cared.

Re: Show HN: Find a home close to work

#68

Post by ppohler » Thu, Aug 13, 2015, 8:31 PM UTC

rgbrgb wrote: post #6

stephengillie wrote: post #2

Very interesting. The site looks clean and it's fast. Where do you get your data? I used to work for one of the industry dinosaurs; our only competitive advantage was that we had agreements with most of the 674 MLSes to rehost their data for our clients, which were RE Agent companies. Zillow is still using Trulia as a pipe to funnel that MLS data from my former employer. Is that one of the reasons for piloting in CA…

As a California RE brokerage we join each MLS and get a direct feed from their RETS api. It's a dramatically better data feed than any of the aggregators offer and we get listings the minute they come on market (well our polling interval is more like 5 minutes). So far we have 100% coverage in San Francisco, Oakland/East Bay, Silicon Valley, and Los Angeles. We've just joined the San Diego MLS and will have data ther…

Nice service! What are the vendor fees associated for the MLSs? Did you go to CRMLS and did you run into a requirement where you had to have a brokerage signed on previously?

Running into MLS/vendor issues at my own real estate tech product.