Santa Cruz Real Estate News

Site Editor: Maggie Barr, Realtor, Keller Williams Santa Cruz
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Real Estate Economic Trends

Silicon Valley workers snap up homes locally

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Tech industry employees invest in first and second homes within county

By Elaine Ingalls, Santa Cruz Sentinel

Original article: https://www.santacruzsentinel.com/2019/02/28/silicon-valley-workers-snap-up-homes-locally/

FEBRUARY 28, 2019, SANTA CRUZ, CA >>> The number of Silicon Valley employees seeking homes in Santa Cruz County is on the rise. Michael Kaufman, a realtor with Coldwell Banker in Los Gatos, was the buyer agent of one of the highest-priced houses in the county in January. The three-bedroom and four-bathroom house at 114 Central Ave. in Capitola, closed escrow Jan. 30 for $2.1 million, according to Kaufman. He said it was originally listed at nearly $2.4 million and was on the market for 100 days. Kaufman said it was a six-day close and the South Bay buyer paid for it in cash. “To the seller, that’s very appealing,” he said.

When the buyer pays all cash, the risk of the deal not happening is eliminated because there is proof of funds, he said. Kaufman said there has been a trend in the last few years of affluent buyers in the technology field buying primary or secondary residences in Santa Cruz County.

Mike O’Boy, sales manager at Sereno Group Aptos, said a majority of home buyers in the county are still coming from Silicon Valley, buying second homes or primary residences here because they are priced out of the Bay Area market. O’Boy said many in the industry were expecting to get back to normal inventory levels after last fall’s slowdown in sales, but that hasn’t happened yet this year. “We’re not seeing a lot of new, good quality inventory hit the market,” he said.

The unsold Inventory Index shows the relationship between supply of houses and demand for purchase. The normal inventory of houses is at about a five- to eight-month supply, O’Boy said. He said the market is now at a four-month supply, but has been less than a two-month supply for almost three years. However, the real estate market is facing a stronger spring than the market was in the fall because the economy is a little more stable, he said.

“Good properties that are well-priced are still getting multiple offers,” he said. The median home price, the midpoint of what sold, for single-family homes in Santa Cruz County, was $826,000 in January, according to Gary Gangnes of Real Options Realty, who tracks the numbers. Gangnes said the median price was $787,000 in January 2018.

By the numbers

How median home prices shifted:

Month Year:Price

January 2019: $826,000

December 2018: $926,000

November 2018: $911,250

October 2018: $907,500

September 2018: $920,000

August 2018: $920,000

July 2018: $885,000

June 2018: $927,500

May 2018: $900,000

April 2018: $905,000

March 2018: $935,100

February 2018: $800,000

The median price for condominiums and townhouses was $602,500 in January, according to Gangnes. It was $637,500 in January 2018.

January 2019 statistics

Single-family homes

Median price: $826,000 ($787,000 a year ago)

Listings: 305 (247 a year ago)

Sales volume: 74 (114 a year ago)

Distressed: No bank-owned or short sales

Unsold Inventory Index: 4.1 months (2.2 months a year ago)

Average price: $926,018 ($858,940 a year ago)

December’s average price was, $1,132,420, according to Gangnes.

Condos/townhouses

Median price: $602,500 ($637,500 a year ago)

Listings: 107 (58 a year ago)

Sales volume: 28 (33 a year ago)

Distressed: no bank-owned or short sales

Unsold Inventory Index: 3.8 months (1.8 a year ago)

Average price: $645,023 ($650,410 a year ago)

Source: Real Options Realty

Close to the median:

City of Santa Cruz

1222 Laurel St., $950,000

206 Glover St., $855,000

242 Jackson St., $775,000

134 Fernside St., $734,000

120 Grandview St., $714,000

County of Santa Cruz

411 Brook Lane, Boulder Creek, $830,000

415 Seventh Ave., Live Oak, $827,000

112 Siesta Court, Aptos, $825,000

4435 Bain Ave., Live Oak, $820,645

9754 Live Oak Ave., Ben Lomond, $820,000

Highest

25300 Quail Ridge Road, Los Gatos, $2,160,000

114 Central Ave., Capitola, $2,100,000

24846 Skyland Road, Los Gatos, $2,005,000

199 Shoreview Drive, Aptos, $1,697,500

828 Pelton Ave., Santa Cruz, $1,600,000

Lowest

7 Landis Ave., Amesti/Green Valley Road, Freedom, $410,000

15475 Big Basin Way, Boulder Creek, $407,000

617 Redwood Road, Felton, $397,500

467 Argos Circle, Watsonville, $302,000

160 Woodland Drive, Ben Lomond, $285,000

Source: Real Options Realty

This entry was posted in Market at a Glance, Real Estate Economic Trends.

Santa Cruz County home owners reduce prices to make deal

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Congratulations to Jondi Gumz on her retirement! Thank you for your years of service to the businesses in Santa Cruz.
Maggie

By Jondi Gumz, Santa Cruz Sentinel

DECEMBER 31, 2018, SANTA CRUZ, CA >>> Single-family home sales in Santa Cruz County dropped in November — from 183 a year ago to 134 — and the median price, the midpoint of what sold, was $911,250, according to Gary Gangnes of Real Options Realty, who tracks the numbers.

Sellers who expected they could tack 5 percent onto their asking price found fewer buyers. Deals were made after sellers lowered the price, sometimes more than once.

This 4,931-square-foot oceanfront designer home at 1443 San Andreas Road in La Selva Beach, a finalist in HGTV’s Ultimate House Hunt, sold in November for $9.4 million. (Contributed)

Asking price was $849,000 in July for a two-bedroom Southview Terrace condo on the Westside; after two price reductions, it sold in November for $745,000. Asking price in May was $4.899 million for a gated oceanfront estate at 1425 San Andreas Road, La Selva Beach; after three price cuts, it sold in November for $3.8 million. The priciest home sold in November, a 4,931-square-foot oceanfront home at 1443 San Andreas Road, was a finalist in the 2017 HGTV “Ultimate House Hunt” and fetched $9.4 million but the seller had listed it for $9.999 million.
This 4,931-square-foot oceanfront designer home at 1443 San Andreas Road in La Selva Beach, a finalist in HGTV’s Ultimate House Hunt, sold in November for $9.4 million. (Contributed)

“I think it’s buyer fatigue,” said Paul Bailey, co-owner of Bailey Properties with 43 years in real estate, citing negative political news, stock market gyrations, the Federal Reserve raising interest rates as reasons for buyers slowing down.

“We’re seeing homes sell if they’re priced correctly,” he said. “It’s not about the color of the carpet, it’s the location and the price.”

Buyers have more to choose from — a big change after years of shrinking listings. As of the first week of December, there were 425 single-family homes for sale, up from 387 a year, and 131 condos and town homes for sale, up from 75 a year ago, according to Gangnes.

A key indicator shows the market is less of a seller’s market. The unsold inventory index, how long it would take to sell available homes at the current sales rate, jumped to 3.2 months from 2.1 months a year ago for single-family homes and to 3.9 months from 2.1 months a year ago for condos. Bailey calculates there are 1.9 homes per buyer, up from .8 per buyer in March, when the median price set a new record of $935,100. He said that means there’s a balance, with neither buyers nor sellers having more leverage.

“We’re not used to this,” he said, recalling the last time the real estate market was this way was in the late 1990s.
This three-bedroom home in Scotts Valley, listed for sale for $999,999 on Oct. 26, has not sold yet as the market has slowed down.

Forrest Cambell of Monterey Bay Mortgage in Soquel said he’s seen sellers more willing to make repairs or give credits to buyers “whereas previously the buyers had less opportunity to negotiate.” The housing market has shifted from one side to the other, with sellers having the edge as prices advanced during the housing bubble, buyers having the edge as prices plummeted in the housing collapse, then sellers regaining the edge again due to limited inventory.

Bailey said the up-and-down of the stock market may help buyers if worried investors shift their funds out of stocks and into investments such as bonds, Treasury bills and mortgage-backed securities. “That liquifies our type of interest rates,” he said, adding that rates on a 30-year fixed mortgage rates, currently about 5 percent, could drop to 4.5 percent, an incentive for buyers.
Tax changes

Seb Frey of Realty World Virtuoso in Capitola contends 2018 was the peak year for local real estate, with the market stalling because buyers can’t afford to pay more for a home. He expects a drag on the 2019 market when taxpayers see the full impact of the reductions in state and local taxes and mortgage interest tax deductions. “For most would be buyers in the greater Bay Area, owning a home won’t pencil out favorably on a month-to-month basis,” he said.

Amba DesJardins, an agent with Coldwell Banker in Santa Cruz, noted that “record levels of sustained low employment have often been an indicator of a forthcoming recession.” DesJardins noted the abundance of jobs in Silicon Valley, and that if Google were to set up shop in Scotts Valley — nothing official on this — that would benefit the local real estate market.

Bailey sees UC Santa Cruz, Silicon Valley and millennials driving future demand. A three-bedroom home can house six students paying $800 each, that’s $4,800 a month. Millennials like the uniqueness of Santa Cruz, riding bikes on West Cliff Drive, walking to coffee shops, and home prices, while sky-high here, are higher in Silicon Valley. Bailey’s conclusion: “San Jose is coming, so hang on — the merry-go-round is not stopping.”

November 2018 statistics

 

Single-family homes

Median price: $911,250 ($865,000 a year ago; $800,750 in 2016)

Listings: 425 (387 a year ago; 389 in 2016)

Sales volume: 134 (183 a year ago; 144 in 2016)

Distressed: 2 bank-owned, 0 short sales

Unsold Inventory Index: 3.2 months (2.1 months a year ago)

Average price: $1,042,905 ($985,702 a year ago)

 

Condos

Median price: $637,000 ($590,000 a year ago; $479,000 in 2016)

Listings: 131 (75 a year ago; 93 in 2016)

Sales volume: 34 (35 a year ago; 47 in 2016)

Distressed: 0 bank-owned, 0 short sales

Unsold Inventory Index: 3.9 months (2.1 months a year ago)

Average price: $636,100 ($611,224 a year ago)

 

CLOSE TO THE MEDIAN

 

City of Santa Cruz

118 Wanda Court, $915,000

151 Carol Ave., $950,000

314 Pacheco Ave., $965,000

104 Flower St., $969,000

216 Fair Ave., $1M

 

Santa Cruz County

3868 Glen Haven Road, Soquel, $907,500

1731 Grey Seal Road, Live Oak, $920,000

332 Loyola Drive, Rio Del Mar, $925,000

27600 Havenhill Lane, Los Gatos, $928,000

455 Deer Run Road, Felton, $940,000

 

Lowest

418 Hillside Drive, Boulder Creek, $363,000

707 Primavera Road, Boulder Creek, $375,000

618 Ester Way, Watsonville, $375,000

229 Madrona Road, Boulder Creek, $415,000

4 7th St., Watsonville,$425,000

 

Highest

170 Corday Lane, Scotts Valley, $2.025M

401 Eagle Ridge, Corralitos, $2.3M

320 Bridlewood Court, Santa Cruz, $2.73M

1425 San Andreas Road, La Selva Beach, $3.8M

1443 San Andreas Road, La Selva Beach, $9.4M

Source: Real Options Realty

This entry was posted in Market at a Glance, Real Estate Economic Trends and tagged .

Fewer than 1 in 5 residents can afford a home in Bay Area

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By Louis Hansen, Bay Area News Group
https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/08/09/fewer-than-1-in-5-residents-can-now-afford-a-home-in-bay-area

Just 12 percent of Santa Cruz County residents could muster enough money to buy a home, the lowest rate in California.

AUGUST 9, 2018, SAN JOSE, CA >> The Bay Area continues to lead the state in shattered home-ownership dreams. Record home prices and rising interest rates have pushed statewide home affordability rates to a 10-year-low. In the Bay Area, fewer than 1 in 5 residents can afford to buy into one of the nation’s most expensive real estate markets, according to a study released Wednesday by the California Association of Realtors.

Home affordability in California has reached a 10-year low. Growing demand and limited inventory have driven Bay Area home prices to record levels in 2018. (FILE: Courtesy of Pacific Union Real Estate)

“It’s not the worst I’ve ever seen, but it’s pretty darn close,” said Dave Walsh, vice president at Alain Pinel in San Jose. “It’s a challenge for any segment of society.” A swirl of forces has made the region too pricey for even double-income families: a shortage of new housing, booming job growth bringing more professionals to Silicon Valley, and interest rates ticking up from recent lows.

The run-up in prices has proven a spectacular investment for homeowners, even as many newcomers feel locked out. Median sale prices for Bay Area homes have increased every month over the previous year for a record six straight years. It’s led to an exodus from the area — only to be replaced by even more newcomers — and calls for housing reform in Sacramento and in city councils across the region. The CAR affordability index is based on a region’s median household income and the median home sale price. It also assumes a 20 percent down payment and a mortgage rate at the national average.

Nationally, more than half of households can afford an average home priced at $269,000. It takes a household income of $57,000 to pay the mortgage and have enough left over for food, health care and other essentials.

In California, the percentage of residents able to buy a single family home has hit its lowest point — 26 percent — since the first quarter of 2008, when the residential housing industry was beset by inflated prices and the subprime mortgage crisis. A typical state resident needs an annual income topping $125,000 to afford a median home priced at $596,000. In Los Angeles, about 3 in 10 households could afford to buy, while about 4 in 10 residents in the Inland Empire could make a purchase.

Bay Area residents find a much starker balance sheet. A household needs roughly $220,000 in income to afford a home at the median price of $1.04 million, according to CAR. After a down payment of more than $200,000, a typical new Bay Area homeowner would have a $5,500 monthly mortgage payment. Five of the nine Bay Area counties became less affordable in the second quarter: Alameda, Contra Costa, Santa Clara, Solano and Sonoma. Higher wages improved the home buying environment in San Francisco and Marin counties, while the index remained steady in Napa and San Mateo counties.

Just 12 percent of Santa Cruz County residents could muster enough money to buy a home, the lowest rate in California. About 14 percent of residents in San Francisco and San Mateo counties could afford homes, while 16 percent of residents in Alameda and Santa Clara counties could.

Matt Rubenstein, a Danville-based agent, said the market remains tight, but his office has stayed busy. Many of his recent sales have come from repeat buyers using their home equity to buy a larger home — either by moving away from an expensive area or trading up from a condominium. “Our area has gotten really expensive,” said Rubenstein, who sells in Contra Costa County. But, compared to the Peninsula, he said, “there’s still some really good values here.”

A typical buyer in Santa Clara County needs to make about $300,000 to qualify for a mortgage. Walsh said that’s a narrow market: “Two college-educated professionals holding two very successful jobs.” Unless the region builds more homes, Walsh said, a low affordability index may be common in the future. Blue collar workers, young professionals with student debt and non-tech professionals will be squeezed out. “We’re at crisis levels now,” Walsh said. “We must do something. We no longer have an option of just thinking about it.”

Louis Hansen Louis Hansen covers Tesla and renewable energy for the Bay Area News Group and is based at The Mercury News. He’s won national awards for his investigations and feature stories. Prior to joining the organization, he was an enterprise reporter at The Virginian-Pilot, where he covered state government, the military and criminal justice. Follow Louis Hansen @HansenLouis.

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Why are there so many more homes for sale in Monterey than in Santa Cruz (or in Marin for that matter)?

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By Maggie Barr, Keller Williams Santa Cruz
https://www.quora.com/Why-are-there-so-many-more-homes-for-sale-in-Monterey-than-in-Santa-Cruz-or-in-Marin-for-that-matter/answer/Maggie-Barr

MARCH 5, 2018, SANTA CRUZ >> Why are there so many more homes for sale in Monterey than in Santa Cruz (or in Marin for that matter)? In one word, Traffic. The vast majority of jobs in Central California come from Silicon Valley and companies like Facebook, Google, LinkedIn, and this company, Quora. The cities and towns that make up the area know as “Silicon Valley” (not a real city), are San Jose, Santa Clara, Mountain View, Campbell, Milpitas, Palo Alto, and Redwood City. Before the tech boom in the 90’s those towns were primarily orchards. Homes were built spread out – not packed in efficiently like in a major city. Thus there are NOT ENOUGH homes for all those tech workers. 90% of the workers at those companies can’t afford to live in Silicon Valley today. The average 2-bedroom home a typical family would buy costs $1.5M. The average worker makes 85k/year. Not good.

Higher wage areas in Northern California correlate to high housing prices. (Source: http://www.opm.gov)

Most tech workers have to live in the suburbs WAY out of the area, with over a 1-hour commute in horrible traffic due to insufficient infrastructure. Towns like Pleasanton and Gilroy that are 40 minutes away without traffic now take 2 hours to reach in rush hour. What’s a tech worker to do? Well, how about the beach? If you’re going to sit in miserable traffic anyway, might as well go live somewhere nice.

The young hip workers like San Francisco. But the young families and seniors like Santa Cruz and the Santa Cruz Mountains — Scott Valley, Felton, Ben Lomond, Brookdale, and Boulder Creek (where I live). In Boulder Creek, you can get a 2-bedroom with 1200 sqft in good condition for $600k. Not cheap, but it definitely beats $1.2M! And it’s a beautiful mountain community with good schools and a little downtown area. Gas station, restaurants, drug store, dentist, all that you need for a lovely lifestyle. 4 State Parks close by for hiking, and 45 minutes to the beach. Santa Cruz is a good option too, if you’ve got a little more to spend. For a 2-bedroom with 1200 sqft in good condition, you’ll pay $800k. Still much less than Silicon Valley. And you’ve got the beach!

Monterey is also a lovely seaside town like Santa Cruz. But it’s another hour’s drive to Silicon Valley. Thus fewer tech workers choose to live there. And if you take the route through Santa Cruz, there’s a terrible bottleneck South of Town in Aptos that slows traffic to a crawl between 4pm-8pm every weekday. That makes your commute home (at to work in the AM) more like 2.5 hours, instead of 1.5 hours. If it weren’t for that horrible traffic bottleneck I’d guess more tech workers would live in Monterey. There are alternate routes through Gilroy – but you get stuck in traffic in Gilroy too, for the same reason. Roads don’t have the capacity to handle the Silicon Valley commuter volume.

Last time there was a tech boom int he 80’s there was lots of building and road expansion that happened to accommodate the greater demand for housing. But, then there was a tech crash and employment in Silicon Valley dropped dramatically over the course of a year. Some developers got burned, and the city lost out of the property tax revenue the housing boom was promising. Home values crashed, and there were thousands of foreclosures. So for this tech boom, there is hesitancy for the city and the major developers to do more building in town — when is the next tech crash?

The number of jobs in Silicon Valley is directly correlated to the stock market. When we have a bull market tech companies that are normally considered high-risk get more capital from institutional investors – and thus take on more projects and need to hire more people. In a bear market institutional investors shy away from “risky” tech stocks, thus reducing the number of new tech projects in Silicon Valley, leading to slower hiring or even layoffs.

Think of the Silicon Valley housing market like a balloon. The hotter the tech market and stock market, the bigger the balloon gets spreading upward pressure on the housing market further and further from the center. Housing prices in Monterey (and Marin) go up too, but not at the same rate as Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz values go up slower than Scotts Valley. San Scotts Valley prices go up slower than Los Gatos, and so on. When the stock market, and thus the tech market contract, the balloon gets smaller. Thus buying real estate in markets farther away from Silicon Valley is more risky. Those values are likely to come down sooner, and ultimately down farther, than homes closer to the “hot” center.

The smartest investors buy property in the center of Silicon Valley during the bust years, then sell them in the boom years. But who knows when the next bust will be? Anyone? Also, more and more tech jobs at these top employers are moving overseas. Many companies prefer to hire developers in India, China, and Korea. Just like manufacturing jobs go overseas, developer and supporting jobs go overseas too. And what point will the majority of those jobs go overseas? And what impact will that have on the housing market in Silicon Valley, and the surrounding areas? Only time will tell.

Maggie Barr is a Realtor at Keller Williams Santa Cruz that specializes in mountain properties. She serves on the Santa Cruz County Women’s Commission on behalf of the 5th District County Supervisor, Burce McPherson. Maggie serves as Treasurer on the board of the Valley Women’s Club of the San Lorenzo Valley. Maggie also serves at the 2018 President on the board of the Women’s Council of Realtors Santa Cruz. Maggie lives in Boulder Creek with her husband Michael Barr. To contact Maggie Barr visit her website at http://www.MaggieBarr.com, or call 831-252-0504. 

ABOUT KWSC: Keller Williams Santa Cruz is a top-ranking brokerage with over 80 REALTORS serving the greater Santa Cruz County area. For more information about working with, or becoming an agent at Keller Williams Santa Cruz, contact Elaine Della-Santina at 831-457-5577, or visit www.kwsc.om.

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Proposed hosted rental regulations worry Santa Cruz County residents

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County planners want rooms to go to year-round renters, but homeowners reluctant.

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20171201/NEWS/171209956
By Jondi Gumz, Santa Cruz Sentinel

December 1, 2017, Santa Cruz, CA – APTOS >> When Delia Gilligan’s son attended UC Santa Cruz, the cost of that degree

Delia Gilligan has converted the room in which her son grew up into a hosted rental on Airbnb. (Shmuel Thaler — Santa Cruz Sentinel)

meant taking on a lot of debt. An empty nester since her son moved out, she’s been renting his room for three years on Airbnb.

Cayley Lanctot, 38, a nurse, and her husband Alex, a teacher, have a toddler and hope to have another child. To pay for $20,000 in infertility treatments, they rent out a room in their Aptos home on Airbnb.

Jeanell Martin, 60, emptied her retirement account to replace a unpermitted retaining wall, which she said cost her $340,000. She’s had knee surgery and pays $1,400 a month in health insurance premiums, so renting rooms in her four-bedroom Seacliff home has helped her stay afloat financially.

In March, Santa Cruz County planners proposed a limit of 60 to 75 nights for these “hosted rentals,” overnight accommodations in a private home — less expensive than a typical $245 summer hotel room and made possible by software platforms such as AirBnb. Hosts are pushing back, creating the Hosted Rental Alliance of Santa Cruz County to lobby county supervisors.

ARBITRARY?
The new proposal, emerging after an online survey of 242 hosts and 856 neighbors, calls for a limit of 55 nights in coastal Live Oak, Aptos-Seacliff and Davenport, popular beach areas, and 110 nights in the rest of the unincorporated county — restrictions veteran local land-use planner Kim Tschantz contends are “arbitrary and not based on facts.”
County supervisors have scheduled a public hearing for 1:30 p.m. Tuesday at 701 Ocean St. It’s no. 58 on the agenda.
The scrutiny comes in the wake of concerns that vacation rentals — renting entire homes for up to 30 days — are a factor in the housing crisis along with the growth of UCSC enrollment to more than 18,000.
With hosted rentals, one county concern is fewer bedrooms available to year-round renters. Another is rental income boosting home prices and rents. Another is hosted rentals bringing noise, trash and traffic to residential neighborhoods. Yet another involves room taxes — transient occupancy tax funding government services. An agreement with Airbnb in April 2016 brought the county room tax revenue of $1.5 million. Justin Acton, 33, of Boulder Creek, said he’s paid nearly $10,000 in taxes since 2011, but not all hosts pay.

The county’s housing advisory commission, which heard hosts say the income is crucial, declined to make a recommendation. The Planning Commission heard from two dozen people, most objecting on grounds of financial hardship, and voted 3-2 to send the proposal to the supervisors, with a grandfather clause allowing tenant hosts to continue. That would help Evan Lohr, 33, of Santa Cruz, a baker who rents out a room in the house he rents to save up to become a homeowner.

DATA SCRUB

With the “sharing economy” a relatively new development — Airbnb was founded in 2008 — and turnover among hosts depending on personal circumstances, accurate data on hosted rentals has been scarce. Host Compliance, a San Francisco startup, offers monitoring and tax compliance services to regulatory agencies based on the number of hosted rentals.

Hired by the county, Host Compliance found 169 properties in June on Airbnb with private rooms for short-term rent in the unincorporated areas of Santa Cruz County, down from 180 found in October 2015 by InsideAirBnB.com.
Lohr was frustrated by outdated listings on Airbnb. When hosts become inactive — empty nesters want to keep the room free for their children to visit — the listings are not removed. Concerned about decisions being based on faulty numbers, he spent 20 hours on a “data scrub” of Airbnb listings, looking for errors and outdated listings. He found 177 hosted rooms in unincorporated Santa Cruz County, with 57 inactive, leaving 118 available. He counted 96 hosts — with 16 hosts renting multiple rooms, stretching the definition of hosted rentals. He found the most hosts, 36 in the Second District, which includes Aptos and Seacliff, 31 in Live Oak and Soquel, and 26 in San Lorenzo Valley and Scotts Valley. He found five homes, cabins and accessory dwellings mistakenly listed as rooms.
The county survey asked if respondents had lost housing due to hosted rentals, and 95 percent said no. Only 15 hosts said the hosted room was previously occupied by a roommate.

EX-INSIDER VIEW

Tschantz, who has spent 38 years in land use planning, managed environmental review for the county before forming his own consulting business in Aptos in 2002. He said he does not have a client on this issue.
In a letter he sent to the supervisors, he contends the regulations proposed for hosted rentals are based on seven faulty assumptions and would hurt property owners rather than provide a social benefit. The idea that property owners would converted a hosted rental to a long-term renter is faulty, he said, citing the county’s survey that found 81 percent of hosts would not convert their guest room to a long-term tenant. “That’s something I did when I was 19,” said Lohr, the number-scrubbing host.

Jeanell Martin, the host in the four-bedroom Seacliff home, said, “Month to month, there’s lots of problems, it’s easy to make mistakes.” She said if she had long-term tenants, there would be parking problems that don’t exist with the irregular schedule of hosted rentals.

Delia Gilligan, the empty nester, pointed out Airbnb has reviews of guests. “You can check if they are a problem guest, you can say, ‘No, not a good fit,’” she said.

COMPARING CODES

Tschantz, the local land-use planner, pointed out the proposed regulations were not driven by citizen complaints and that potential problems were greater with vacation rentals, where an entire home is rented to a large group with the owner absent. He noted county regulations allow small-scale commercial enterprises such as child care, adult residential care, foster homes and home occupations such as yoga studios, music instruction and counseling offices, which he said would generate more activity than a hosted rental.

The county proposed one-year renewal for permits, adding expense when vacation home permits run for five years, he said. As for the maximum on hosted rental nights, Tschantz noted, “No other use including vacation rentals, have this type of limitation … Singling out hosted rentals for this type of treatment is discriminatory.” He contended prohibiting renters from hosting rentals would also be discriminatory.

COMPLAINTS

Elisabeth Henri-Ellsworth, a property owner on Tindall Ranch Road, a private road in Corralitos, wrote county supervisor Zach Friend in May, complaining about outside music, noise and partying at an Airbnb rental where homeowners are not present. She invited Friend to visit to see for himself. Pam Wood and Shaun Keller, also on Tindall Ranch Road, wrote Friend to say code enforcement staff has not been seen. By definition, hosted rentals are supposed to have a host on the premises.

ALTERNATIVES

Lohr, the data-crunching host, said he’s never had complaints, which he attributes to the Airbnb review system for guests and hosts. “It weeds out bad actors,” he said. He contends the county’s own data show hosted rentals are not “exploding,” as was feared by county supervisors in March. He favors regulations matching those for whole home vacation rentals, eliminating the limit on hosting nights, allowing renters as well as property owners to host, allowing two rooms maximum per property to be rented, and “a simple, inexpensive permit process” with permits renewed every five years.

SURVEY RESULTS

Santa Cruz County’s online survey got 1,098 responses, allowing multiple answers.
Not a host: 856
Have hosted: 221
Rent rooms in more than one home: 21
WHY HOST?
173 responded
Income: 149
Sociability: 73
IMPACTS?
698 responded
No impacts: 398
Parking: 209
Noise: 160
Source: Dyett & Bhatia, Sarah Neuse

View original article: http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20171201/NEWS/171209956

This entry was posted in Government & Regulations, Real Estate Economic Trends and tagged , , , .

Developer withdraws from Scotts Valley Town Center vision

Posted on Updated on

Retailers were difficult to secure, says city manager

by Jessica York,  The Santa Cruz Sentinel

www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20170724/NEWS/170729835

July 24, 2017, Scotts Valley, CA – Vacant Santa Cruz-owned land in the heart of Scotts Valley’s Skypark is no easy sell. In the latest stumble for Scotts Valley’s more than two-decade-old vision to develop a new “heart” for the city’s downtown, developer Foothill Partners Inc. will back out of its involvement in developing the Scotts Valley Town Center.

“I just got an email from Foothill Partners that they’re intending to withdraw from our exclusive negotiation agreement,” Scotts Valley City Manager Jenny Haruyama said Monday.

RRM Design Group was retained by the City of Scotts Valley to prepare a vision plan to conceptualize its new town center and a specific plan, with guidelines to implement that vision. The 57-acre site is comprised of a mix of ownerships, between the City of Scotts Valley and a number of private landowners, as well as other public landowners including the federal government (which operates a post office and the regional transportation authority’s transit facility in the project area).

Though many issues have contributed to developers’ difficulties in completing its 58-acre vision for the former Santa Cruz-owned Sky Park Airport, one major hurdle includes obtaining some three parcels, about 8 acres worth, from the city of Santa Cruz.

This spring, a Santa Cruz-commissioned appraisal of the vacant land put the properties’ combined value at about $8.3 million, said city Economic Development Director Bonnie Lipscomb. Since then, Santa Cruz and Scotts Valley negotiators, on behalf of the developer, have exchanged several iterations of a purchase sale agreement, Lipscomb said. The El Dorado-based developer, led by Doug Wiele, had been in a Town Center exclusive negotiating agreement with Scotts Valley since September.

A changing retail market made it difficult for the developer to obtain commitments from desirable retailers, Haruyama said. For one, the market is shifting toward online sales. Secondly, bigger retailers tend to overlook Scotts Valley due to its small population, not realizing the potential San Lorenzo Valley customer base.

Scotts Valley Mayor Randy Johnson, who serves on the City Council’s Skypark subcommittee, said developing the Town Center has been a hole in his resume over his tenure, a project whose future he would like to bring to resolve by the end of his current term.

“What happens is, everything pretty much gets down to cost of land and the cost of developing. So the higher the land cost, the greater the risk. I think in some ways, that’s where we are right now,” Johnson said. “When we get back to the risk situation, developers and businessmen in general are risk averse.”

As Scotts Valley continues to update its general plan document, the city may be at a “critical juncture” that would allow city leaders to step back and look at its Town Center-specific plan afresh, Haruyama said. “The plan is almost a decade old, so there might be a need to take a look at that plan and refresh it and see if there are some changes, because what is palatable in the market may not coincide with what the plan reflects,” Haruyama said.

Asked whether the city might need to consider an updated plan for the site, Johnson said developers always will need to weigh the realities of land costs.“The city of Scotts Valley is not going to fork over any money to develop this, because we don’t have any,” Johnson said. “We’re going to let the market decide whether it’s a viable thing — most things happen organically. We’re hopeful that there is a fair price, a fair profit and also something fair for the citizens of Scotts Valley.”

The Town Center project, as described in the city’s 2008 plan, envisions a walkable new Scotts Valley town green surrounded by two- and three-story buildings with 180,000 square feet of retail on the lower levels and about 250 residential units housing or office space above. Of the 58 total acres bounded by Mt. Hermon Road, Skypark Drive and Blue Bonnet Lane, the plan includes 15 acres of vacant centrally-located land.

This entry was posted in Government & Regulations, Real Estate Developer News, Real Estate Economic Trends and tagged , .

Bidding war erupts for Santa Cruz rentals

Posted on Updated on

by Jondi Gumz, The Santa Cruz Sentinel
Published April 27, 2017

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/business/20170427/bidding-war-erupts-for-santa-cruz-rentals

1/27/17, Santa Cruz, CA – UC Santa Cruz student Owen Thomas, who teamed up with four fellow students to look for a place to live off-campus next year, was taken aback when Santa Cruz landlord Harry Dong emailed to ask if his group would be willing to pay more than the advertised price for his rentals and how much.

“Unfortunately, many more qualified applicants have applied to rent these houses than usual — indeed, more qualified applicants than houses I have available to accommodate them,” Dong explained to Thomas via email, which was forwarded to the Sentinel.

Demonstrators protest Wednesday on Mission Street, contending a landlord’s tactic of asking rental applicants to bid against each other is unethical. (Dan Coyro — Santa Cruz Sentinel)

Thomas, who needs a place because he’ll no longer be a Stevenson College residential adviser, called the landlord’s strategy “unorthodox.” He and his friends decided not to bid. “It’s not ethical,” said Elyse Fischground, 21, a senior at UCSC and co-founder of Students Uniting Renters, a new group. “This market drives people to do things that are not really just for the renters.”

The Sentinel called and emailed Dong, the former longtime owner of Larry’s Photography, on Thursday and Friday but he did not respond.

FIRST TIME

Attorney Gretchen Regenhardt of California Rural Legal Assistance, which aids low-income county residents facing unlawful eviction, said this was the first time she had heard of a bidding war for rentals. “Because of how the market is, there’s no relationship between the property owner investment and what’s being charged,” said Regenhardt. “It’s whatever the market will bear.” She called the tactic “creative” and “terrible” and pointed out there is no law against it. “I don’t see why it wouldn’t be legal,” she said. “There’s nothing at all to prevent a property owner from charging as much as they want in rent… It’s a symptom of how terrible our housing crisis is.”

The strategy also was new to Scott Hernandez-Jason, director of news and media relations at UC Santa Cruz, where undergraduate enrollment has grown from 14,900 in 2010-11 to 16,200 this year. With juniors and seniors living off campus and little new housing being built locally, that drives up rent and pushes middle-income families out to Watsonville or Boulder Creek, where rents are lower.

Zillow, the real estate information company, reports median rent in Santa Cruz County is $2,913, and expects a 6 percent increase in 2017.

A year ago, UC Berkeley economics grad Alex Lubinsky launched Rentberry.com, a rental auction platform touting “transparency” for renters and landlords and charging tenants $25 once they get a lease. A BBC report said Rentberry has grown 100,000 listings; a search turned up 4,000 rentals in New York, 40 in San Francisco but none in Santa Cruz.

REACTION

Thomas posted the landlord’s email, redacting his name, on the UCSC student page on Facebook, sparking comments. “A lot of people were chiming in that people should not be surprised,” said Thomas.

Zav Hershfield, a UCSC alum and a leader in the Santa Cruz Tenants Organizing Committee, saw the post and rallied a small group of students and sympathetic local residents with protest signs Wednesday outside Dong’s property rental office on busy Mission Street.

“Housing prices are high enough as it is without landlords sparking bidding wars among tenants,” said Hershfield. “This practice will only cause prices to increase more quickly than they already do and speed up Santa Cruz’s ongoing gentrification.”

Fischground, who joined the protest, said her group will appeal to the Santa Cruz City Council on May 9, when UCSC Chancellor George Blumenthal comes to talk about the 2020 long-range development plan for the campus. “We need development but we need it to be affordable,” Fischground said.

Supply and demand have driven up the Santa Cruz County median home price to $826,000 in March, just shy of the $826,000 record in August, according to Gary Gangnes of Real Options Realty, who tracks the numbers.

RENTER BURDEN

Santa Cruz County is the third worst metro area in the nation for renter cost burdens, according to the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies. Among renter households earning $30,000 to $45,000 in Santa Cruz County, four out of 10 pay half their income for rent. Fischground, a community studies major from Marin City, lives near campus in a house on Western Drive, splitting the rent of $4,500 with nine other people. “Everybody is doubled up,” she said.

Fischground surveyed renters in Live Oak for the “No Place Like Home” research project co-led by UCSC sociologist Steve McKay.

She said Students Uniting Renters will ask the City Council for regulations on “just cause eviction” to prevent landlords from requiring tenants to move out without giving a reason and rent control.

This entry was posted in Real Estate Economic Trends and tagged , , .

Fixing the Bay Area’s housing crisis: One advocate speaks out

Posted on

by Richard Scheinin, The Mercury News
Published January 2, 2017 at 7:00 am | Updated: January 3, 2017 at 6:03 am

http://www.mercurynews.com/2017/01/02/fixing-the-bay-areas-housing-crisis-one-advocate-speaks-out

1/2/17, San Francisco, CA – When Gabriel Metcalf suggested at a forum on affordable housing that cities should be penalized by the state for failing to build enough housing, he drew gasps from fellow panelists.

Photo by Jorg Hackemann/Shutterstock
Photo by Jorg Hackemann/Shutterstock

It’s not that the other panelists disagreed with Metcalf, who as president and CEO of Spur, is one of the Bay Area’s better-known housing advocates. It’s just that no one else had been willing to make the suggestion.

We talked to Metcalf to discuss the region’s housing crisis and some strategies that might fix it. As the head of SPUR — the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association — Metcalf is in the thick of the housing conversation. That makes sense: Over the decades, SPUR — which has offices in San Jose, San Francisco and Oakland — has helped catalyze some of the region’s critical policy moves, from the founding of BART to the preservation of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.

Q: The housing crisis rises from a thicket of seemingly intractable problems. How do you stay motivated?

A: The good news is that we have the power to make the Bay Area much more affordable than it is. It might not be something where we ever feel like it’s fully solved, but it could be much better than it is now. And so in that sense, it’s different than some other problems, like cutting carbon emissions where only action at the global scale can address the problem, or even income inequality where really a lot of the biggest solutions are at the national level.

 

The housing market in the Bay Area is broken because of local decisions, and that means it can be fixed through different local decisions. We need a group of Bay Area cities to decide to open up the housing market. We need a “coalition of the willing.” Cities need to change their zoning and their planning processes to make it really easy and quick to add housing.

Q: But I’m guessing you want to guard against incoherent or environmentally damaging development.

A: The good news here is that high-density settlement patterns are the most environmentally efficient way for humans to live. The “greenest” city in the United States is New York, if you care about the per-person carbon footprint — because people in great cities can walk and take transit for most trips. So it turns out that building compact, walkable neighborhoods focused around transit stations is good for quality of life and housing costs and the environment.

Q: Mountain View has several thousand new units planned or underway. San Jose’s General Plan commits the city to building 120,000 new units by 2040. That’s something. Are any cities doing enough in terms of redressing the imbalance between job growth and new housing?

A: We see small glimmers of hope, but it is not yet happening at the scale necessary to change overall housing costs at this point.

The three largest cities in the region – San Jose, San Francisco and Oakland – probably have the capacity to make a difference, just because of their scale and because of how much transit they have. I would add that any cities that have a BART or a Caltrain station also have the opportunity to make a difference by adding large amounts of housing around those transit hubs.

Q: What are a couple of initiatives that you’d like to see happen at the state level?

A: One would be to change the state’s environmental review law to have an assumption that in-fill development — as opposed to sprawl — is good for the environment. Another idea is to require that cities meet their housing production targets in order to maintain local land-use authority. In other words, if a city isn’t hitting its targets for housing, then the state could issue permits to build housing there.

Q: You’re saying that the state might preempt local land-use authority; I saw you suggest this at a housing forum a few months ago. So, as it stands now, decisions about land use are made at the local level, where new housing proposals often get quashed?

A: Yes. California has turned over land-use authority to cities — even if cities refuse to build more housing and essentially turn themselves into gated enclaves of wealth and exclusivity.

Q: Facebook has pledged to spend about $20 million on affordable housing, and Mark Zuckerberg and his wife, Dr. Priscilla Chan, met over the summer with a number of housing experts — which made some people wonder if he and his wife might launch an initiative via their foundation. Do you think Silicon Valley will finally do something to solve the housing crisis?

A: I’m really encouraged by the focus that tech leadership has on housing. If a group of leaders from tech decides to go big on solving these problems, we could go far.

Q: You’ve espoused a “wave of experiments” to increase the stock of middle-class housing. What might that entail?

A: This is one of the issues we have not yet solved. My belief is that we can’t help middle-class people afford housing through local subsidies; we’re going to have to actually fix the broader housing market. But within that context, we need to try a bunch of things to see if we can bring down the cost of market-rate housing. Ideas might include ramping up prefabricated and modular housing construction, which in theory could reduce the hard costs of construction by a lot… There’s also room to do a lot more with unit design — to make our units more like what you typically see in New York or Paris: well-designed, hopefully, but smaller.

Fully embracing car-free living is another way to reduce housing costs. If people aren’t using cars, that eliminates the cost of building garages under new apartment complexes. And if you look at the typical household budget, car use is expensive. So if we can put housing in the right places, so people don’t have to own cars, we can put more money in people’s pockets.

About Gabriel Metcalf

Gabriel Metcalf, president and CEO of SPUR, the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association poses for a photograph in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Dec. 23, 2016. SPUR has helped shape critical regional planning decisions, from the founding of BART to the preservation of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and are now looking into the current housing crisis. (Anda Chu/Bay Area News Group)
Gabriel Metcalf, president and CEO of SPUR, the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association poses for a photograph in San Francisco, Calif., on Friday, Dec. 23, 2016. SPUR has helped shape critical regional planning decisions, from the founding of BART to the preservation of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and are now looking into the current housing crisis. (Anda Chu/Bay Area News Group)

Born: June 21, 1970 in Madison, Wisconsin

Place of Residence: San Francisco

Jobs: President & CEO of SPUR, (2005-present); Deputy Director (2002-2005), Policy Director (1999-2002)

Education: Antioch College, Ohio, BA in political theory, 1993; U.C. Berkeley, Masters in City and Regional Planning, 1999

Family: Partner, Elizabeth, a psychotherapist; two sons, aged 9 and 13

Facts About Gabriel Metcalf

  1. He comes from a background of social involvement. His father, an economist, worked in economic development for the state of Colorado. His mother, a lawyer, worked for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency.
  1. His book “Democratic by Design: How Carsharing, Co-ops, and Community Land Trusts Are Reinventing America” (2015, St. Martin’s Press) is a history of alternative institutions within progressive social movements.
  1. He teaches a class in U.C. Berkeley’s department of city and regional planning on the intersection between political theory and regional planning.
  1. Before working for SPUR, he helped found City CarShare, one of the first car-sharing programs in North America.
  1. His chosen mode of commuting: bicycle.

This entry was posted in Real Estate Economic Trends and tagged .

Newsmakers 2016: Rent rising again; record median price for homes, condos

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by Jondi Gumz, Santa Cruz Sentinel

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20160729/NEWS/160729472

1/2/17, Santa Cruz, CA – For renters in Santa Cruz County, it’s been two very tough years. The median rent rose to $2,900 a month, from $2,782 a month in 2015 and $2,493 a month in 2014.

The issue of housing is designated as a Sentinel newsmaker for 2016.

The landlord’s rule of thumb is the renter’s gross income should be three times the cost of the lease, but wages is Santa Cruz County haven’t kept up.

New construction of 11 town homes nears completion at 716 Seabright Ave., Santa Cruz. Palisades Builders say these will be rentals; rates are not available yet. (Jondi Gumz -- Santa Cruz Sentinel)
New construction of 11 town homes nears completion at 716 Seabright Ave., Santa Cruz. Palisades Builders say these will be rentals; rates are not available yet. (Jondi Gumz — Santa Cruz Sentinel)

Those depending on Social Security checks did not get a cost of living increase in 2016. Personal income for Santa Cruz County residents grew 4.9 percent, but lagged behind the 6 percent rent increase and behind Santa Clara County’s 6.6 percent gain in personal income.

Santa Cruz County and SLV Rental Listings, a Facebook group started in 2015 by two priced-out moms, has grown to 5,200 people, most looking for an affordable rental.

Santa Cruz Housing, a Facebook group started in 2014 for renters and landlords, has grown to 4,380 people. Some have a large rental house or a sublet to fill, but most are looking for a place, or just a room, to rent.

A Harvard study called out Santa Cruz County as third worst in the nation for renters, with rent a burden for 63 percent of those households. Median household income for renters was $41,900.

Some 26,900 households paid more than 30 percent of their income for rent and utilities. For 15,000 of them, rent and utilities devoured over half their income.

In March, Sentinel readers learned about Edith Whiting, 104, who had sold her home to live at Sunshine Villa but was running out of money. A “GoFundMe” campaign started by her niece, Norma Holmes, kept her aunt at the oceanview senior home until her death in November.

The median price for condos set a record in July at $575,000, and the median price for single-family homes set a record in August at $827,000.

Since then, the median price for both condos and single-family homes has slipped downward, which usually happens as fall turns to winter.

This year, a survey by UC Santa Cruz students overseen by sociologists Steve McKay and Miriam Greenberg documented the burden of rent, when renters pay more than 30 percent of their gross income for housing.

Of 435 renters living in Beach Flats and lower Ocean Street, 68 percent of those earning from $30,000 to $64,000 reported rent burden. Some 45 percent of those surveyed reported a forced move or eviction, disrupting family life.

Out-of-town investors, looking for returns, have bought up rentals, seeing the shortage.

Building hasn’t kept up with the number of people wanting to live on the coast near the mountains, bringing gridlock to Highway 1, Highway 17 and local streets in Santa Cruz.

In the fall, UC Santa Cruz put more beds on campus to accommodate a bigger freshman class, 650 more than in fall 2015.

UCSC houses 53 percent of students on campus, but freshmen get priority, which pushes more upperclassmen to live off-campus. With four or five or six students sharing a home, they can pay more than a two-income family.

In December, Aptos was abuzz over a “for rent” ad on Craigslist pitched a van for $800 a month, with no restroom parked near Rio del Mar State Beach.

Most of the new homes built this year are for sale.

Ground was broken for Sunshine Garden, an 87-unit development in Watsonville, mostly townhomes for sale, but it won’t be ready until 2018.

Two rental complexes under construction by Palisades Builders of Campbell could be complete in March, company president Doug Ross said Friday.

At 716 Darwin St., across from Staff of Life market, 15 apartments have sprung up. At 716 Seabright Ave., 11 townhouses are being built.

Websites will be developed shortly for potential renters, Ross said, adding that rental rates are not yet available.

SANTA CRUZ COUNTY RENT BURDEN

Renter cost burden rank: Third of 381

Renters paying over 30 percent of income for rent: 63 percent

Renters paying half their income for rent: 35 percent

Renter households with cost burdens: 26,900

Renter households paying over half of income for rent: 15,000

Renter median household income: $41,900

Renter median monthly housing cost: $1,490

Source: Joint Center for Housing Studies at Harvard University.

NEWSMAKERS

During the final weeks of 2016 and into the new year, the Sentinel is taking a look back at the most newsworthy wroties and newsmakers of the year. You can access the stories at SantaCruzSentinel.com/topic/newsmakers-2016.

 

Repost from Santa Cruz Sentinel
http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/lifestyle/20170102/newsmakers-2016-rent-rising-again-record-median-price-for-homes-condos

This entry was posted in Real Estate Economic Trends.

Santa Cruz County median rent: $2,914 a month and rising

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by Jondi Gumz, Santa Cruz Sentinel

http://www.santacruzsentinel.com/article/NE/20160729/NEWS/160729472

10/12/16, Santa Cruz, CA –  Zillow reports the median rent in Santa Cruz County is $2,914 a month, up 6.2 percent from a year ago, and is expected to rise 6 percent over the next year, just behind Seattle, which is expected to lead the nation with rent jumping 7.2 percent. What this means is county renters are paying $181 a month more than a year ago and could pay another $175 more a year from now, giving them less to spend on groceries, eating out and shopping.

Zillow is best known for its real estate database online but the company has done more in the rental market in recent years, producing a rent index for large metro areas and then expanding to report on smaller metros such as Santa Cruz County, generating statistics that previously were unavailable.

Homes for Rent in Santa CruzSteve McKay, associate professor of sociology and director of the UC Santa Cruz Center for Labor Studies, is drilling down further. He will present the results of a six-month study of renters in the city of Santa Cruz at 7 p.m. Thursday at the Museum of Art and History, 705 Front St.

The event, “No Place Like Home,” will include art, statistics and testimony on how local renters experience the housing crisis and possible steps forward. It will launch Affordable Housing Week, which offers a legal clinic for tenants, a tenant organizing workshop and a City Council candidate forum on issues of interest to renters.

Why the attention on tenants? Two Facebook pages created by local residents and geared to local renters looking for a place to live have grown dramatically, 4,900 members in Santa Cruz County and SLV Rental Listings and 4,000 in Santa Cruz Housing. People post daily looking for something affordable, the medical practitioner transferred to a new Kaiser Permanente clinic in the county, a man who works at Trader Joe’s, a mom with a 6-year-old boy, a single gal who is a stylist, a Cabrillo College student. Occasionally, a property owner posts, seeking a renter for a home in Watsonville, a bedroom in Live Oak, a master bedroom in Felton.

McKay points out 57 percent of residents in the city of Santa Cruz are renters. “Renters are among the hardest hit by the crisis, thus it makes sense to focus on them,” he said. The survey will highlight four issues: rent burden, defined as paying more than 30 percent of your income on rent, overcrowding, forced moves or evictions and major problems such as maintenance.

A total of 54 UCSC students worked in bilingual teams to collected 435 valid renter surveys in April, May and June in Beach Flats, Lower Ocean and portions of Lower Pacific and Laurel St. They conducted 29 in-depth interviews. Of those surveyed, 57 percent earned less than $30,000 a year, 56 percent have children, 52 percent were female, and 51 percent were Latino.

“We chose the neighborhood and this population because Spanish-speaking and low-income renters are often undercounted as they are ‘difficult-to-reach’ populations that may not respond to census surveys or telephone surveys,” McKay said.

Not all those surveyed were living in poverty. About 27 percent of the participants earned $30,000 to $64,000 a year and 16 percent earned $64,000 or more.

The study was a joint endeavor of four UCSC entities, the Center for Labor Studies, Critical Sustainabilities Project, Sociology Department, Chicano Latino Research Center, and local nonprofit Community Bridges. The project was funded by the UCSC Blum Center for Poverty Research, the Social Science Division, and a grant from the UC Humanities Research Institute.

The Affordable Housing Week activities are a first in Santa Cruz, according to Nancy Abbey, active in Affordable Housing Now! “It’s just the crisis in affordable housing,” she said, crediting Councilman Don Lane for bringing 40 groups together to create a housing advocacy network in January. “I hope to see tenants organize that vote as a bloc,” said Cynthia Berger, who founded the Santa Cruz Tenants Organizing Committee and hosted a council candidate forum attended by Rochelle Noroyan, who was elected, Bruce Van Allen and Leonie Sherman, who did not win.

Berger said three changes are needed to improve the situation for city renters, enacting a real estate transfer tax to fund affordable housing, adopting rent control and creating a department of tenant affairs to respond to problems. The federal Section 8 program for low-income tenants is “sorely underfunded,” she said.

AFFORDABLE HOUSING WEEK

A number of community organizations in Santa Cruz County worked together to organize Affordable Week events highlighting a crisis situation for renters. They include the Santa Cruz Tenants Association, Santa Cruz Tenant Organizing Committee, NAACP Santa Cruz County Branch 1071, Economic Justice Alliance of Santa Cruz County, UC Santa Cruz Center for Labor Studies and Critical Sustainabilities Program, United Auto Workers, which represents student workers at UCSC and Affordable Housing Now! Here are the events:

  • California Rural Legal Assistance No Place Like Home: Santa Cruz Affordable Housing Crisis Study, 7 p.m. Thursday at Museum of Art and History, 705 Front St., Santa Cruz. Free, open to the public. Simultaneous translation available. Campus-community event showcases findings from multi-media research project. Students and community members will share their stories, testimonies and art work, followed by community dialog about issues facing renters in the community and possible steps forward. Information: events.ucsc.edu/event/3804,
  • Tenant problems: Free consultation with tenant lawyers from nonprofit California Rural Legal Assistance 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday, at Live Oak Family Resource Center, 1740 17th Ave., corner of Capitola Road, Live Oak. Translation available. Lawyers will respond to situations such as: A landlord did not return a security deposit, did not make repairs, terminated the tenancy for no reason or raised the rent.
  • Organizing workshop: 2 to 4 p.m. Saturday, at Live Oak Family Resource Center, 1740 17th Ave., Live Oak. The Santa Cruz Tenants Organizing Committee will present information on basic tenant rights, how to take legal action on your own behalf and the benefits to tenants of working together as a voting bloc. At the end, attendees can ask questions, talk about their individual issues and discuss ideas for city and countywide organizing.
  • Community update: What’s being done to reduce homelessness, 5:30 p.m. Tuesday at Calvary Episcopal Church, the “Red Church” Parish Hall, 532 Center St., Santa Cruz. Topics include smart solutions, veterans who are homeless, progress on the “All In” strategic plan, “Coordinated Entry,” landlord outreach and whether more housing should be built.
  • Candidates forum: 6:30 to 9 p.m. Wednesday at Louden Nelson Community Center theater, 301 Center St., Santa Cruz. Santa Cruz City Council candidates will address renters’ issues such as creating a city-sponsored tenant affairs department, tenant protection ordinances, eviction protections, rent rollbacks and rent control, increasing affordable housing and limiting vacation rentals. Voter registration available.

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