International Real Estate Markets are Improving

Over the last 40 or so years the internationals markets have been a very important part of the local real estate market. As other markets rebound it causes cash buyers to look to the great US market to buy homes and investment properties that will appreciate more than in their home markets. The buyers also get to come to America and enjoy the wonderful cities, parks, coastlines, cultural events, art, music, sports and entertainment of all kinds, not ot mention the relatively safe travel realities and normally a very favorable business and real estate climate that exist here in our country.   

The fact that other real estate markets in cities around the world are rebounding faster than most US cities,  is the beginning of the foreign markets starting to look at America where prices are still very attractive (low). For those of you who want or need to sell your property it is a good time to make sure that the realtor you choose has all the capabilities to market your property on an international scale. The National Association Of REALTOR®(NAR) has developed a classification called an ePRO

®.   

 It is common knowledge that all real estate is local but to sell your property for the highest price possible it is important to have as many interested buyers see your listing. To have all buyers look at your property use all available internet avenues to gain the absolute most interest in your offer.   

In Hong Kong the concept of guan xi, (pronounced: Gwan Chee) is a Chinese phrase meaning relationships.   

I have based my business on is our guan xi in the community, in Malibu and throughout the other local cities here in California. Like anywhere else in the world, it’s about relationships and knowing that you are here tomorrow, and that you are here next week and you are here next month.   

Other advice would be that properties have to have value. You cannot go to Asia or any where else and expect to sell a home that is over-priced. It’s not going to happen. In addition if you treat people right they will respect you and trust you and want to do business with you.   

So to get the absolute most for your property, use a REALTOR®, ePRO® who will market your property to the entire world and especially those markets that are beginning to rebound quicker than the US market.  

Malibu fought the government and won 4 a minute

 

When Malibu (17,000 acres and 21 miles of coastline) was owned by the Rindge family, they were very vigilant in their efforts to keep progress away from their rancho. The county of Los Angeles, the state of California, the railroad companies and the federal government all wanted to build through their land for an access to and from the northwest and access to all the personal property surrounding the ranch. The Rindge family even built their own railroad through Malibu to move products around the ranch, to the cattle, the tile factory, feed fields and to market.

The transportation laws prohibited two railroads competing side by side which helped the Rindge’s achieve their goal of keeping the big RR companies off of their land. The Rindge’s were upset that people would come on to their land and they would be missing cattle and other staples that the campers, travelers and comuters needed to sustain themselves, unfortunately at the expense of the Rindge family Ranchers. In these early years of horse and buggy travel it took a long time for travelers, commuters to travel through the ranch to get anywhere in or into the surrounding areas and most of the coastal route was only accessable at low tide. High tide waves broke right on the bluffs and rocks in most areas. There was even one area that there was an arch that everyone had to go through at low tide only.

As hard as they fought to protect their individual property rights the state and federal roads departments finally prevailed and were able to put in the Roosevelt Highway, later renamed Pacific Coast Highway. This was a big convenience for the adjacent landowners who prior to that time had to travel through the San Fernando Valley route ‘El Camino Real’ and many miles of back road country roads, to access their homes, farms and ranches. It was a long way.

At the same time this local fight was going on many similar fights were active around the entire nation. President Grant, John Muir and many other environmentalists were grabbing up land to preserve for future generations. Thecongressof the  federal government gave to the president the power to automatically create national monuments to be preserved and protected and not destroyed for prsent day profit, recreation or use of any kind. These parklands created much controversy in their day. In hindsight, everyone now thinks that the protection of the park lands and national monuments was genius. 

Malibu is now in the same type of fight. The federal government is creating a Marine Life Protection Area  (MLPA). It has to do with a MPA mandate created during the Clinton administration, somewhere around 1994. There is controversy regarding this MLPA and the mapped out areas that are a potential to achieve the goal and stated requirement. The California Fish and Game will be making the finale decision around March 2010 and about which map they are going to choose and who is going to lose their right to fish in the ocean and off of the beach. I being a spearfisherman really want them to choose map #2. This will allow all of the residents in and around Point Dume and Paradise Cove to continue their heritage of kayak, skiff, beach, pier, spear and beach sustenance and recreational fishing. Most indigenous peoples (us) are allowed to keep their rights to take game even when protection is encompassed. The right being for food, not for commerce.

How the decisions will all pan out are yet to be seen. I am for the right to keep fishing for food. I am also for protecting the ocean for future generations. My children’s children and so on.  I hope the decision makers think long and hard how best to achieve the target goal and not disturb local traditions and if they decide to choose a different map, I will support their decision, even though I don’t think I will like it.

To get involved with this decission, contact me and I will put you in touch with the leaders of the fight. I hope you do.

Jim Wiebe

Resident,

Paradise Cove, Malibu, California, United States of America 90265

Malibu History of Rural Living

 

Malibu is poised to spend $50,000,000 on water quality mitigation.

It has been a long standing problem for the area with all sewage taken care of by septic tanks. In the eighties when Malibu was an unincorporated area, part of L.A. County, the county government was ready to install a sewer line to solve the water quality problem. The residents of Malibu who from the very beginning of the areas occupancy has been anti-growth and anti-development. As a result the residents voted to gain cityhood in 1991 and stop the proposed sewer project. Everyone knew the increased capacity of the sewage system would lead to increased development.

The city has been jockying with the local water quality regulators ever since. The problem has not yet gone away. There has been much debate regarding the issue. The water quality of the local beaches has been compromised on many occasions with the grades of F or D. It is a very important issue that will improve water quality as the cleaning projects begin to work. The completion of these projects will not affect the anti-development slant of the local government, residents and the California Coastal Commission. All the outstanding realities of this Malibu history continue to make Malibu a great place to live with very little risk of development changing the nature of the area. 

Back in the early part of the twentieth century the Rindge family farm  occupied 17,000 acres.  The Ringe family and specifically the widow Mary Rindge consistently battled with all levels of government to stop roads, railroads and access to her/their  family ranch of any kind.  They went as far as building their own railroad because the law did not allow a new railroad to be built where there already was an existing railroad.

 The Rindge family (May Rindge) fought the highway and any public roads with great effectiveness for many years. As a result both the 101 freeway and the main railroad tracks go through the valley and not along the coast as it does in most of the state.

 

The ranch was run with caballeros and horses. They were and still are a part of the Malibu lifestyle. It has always been a very casual euqestrian place to be.

It is still, to this day acceptable to dine in the nicest restaurants in very casual dress, cowboy boots, hat etc. Malibu Beach is not the fancy Beverly Hills kind of life style.  Some of the Carbon Beach homes rent for as much as $75,000 a month and  it is still rural and will stay that way for a long long time. This is part of the charm of living in the country and an eqestrian area close to the big city. I urge you to get to know us and upgrade your life style to a great place in a great area. There are many homes under $1,500,000. There are mobile homes as low as $269,000. with a space rent of around 6 or 7 hundred, right at the beach. If you like the country and still need to be near the big city and you don’t want to drive just to go surfing, get to know the city of Malibu.

 

I will be happy to help learn all about this beach, surf, equestrian, country area with all your home needs and to help you learn more about the area. Contact me and I will help you with your process of discovery and help you gain the Malibu Lifestyle.

www.Malibuevantage.com

Jim

Surfing Malibu

Malibu on a clody day

A sunny day in the front yard, Paradise Cove at low tide

My Real Estate company Logo

Malibu has many hidden wonders. You have to take time to discover the splender around you.

Malibu Surfrider Beach doesn’t always have waves. It always has beauty, Day & Night

   

    In the early seventies from Monterey Park where I went to Mark Kepple High School, I came to Malibu to surf with my senior class vice-president Fred Ryan. It was December and Malibu being a south facing beach normally doesn’t get much in the way of good surfing during the winter. I didn’t know.

    I just had surfed for many years prior to that, mostly Orange County, and could get waves almost anytime as I would drive until I found a good spot. Sometimes that drive took me all the way to San Diego but I was always able to get some surf. We paddled out to a very flat Surfrider line up with almost no one else in the water. Everyone else knew that this was not a time to surf Malibu. I was new. With not much in the way of surf I wondered what all the Malibu hoopla was about.

    I knew it was often featured in Surfer Magazine and all other surf publications. Being an inlander I understood and lived vicariously through photographs of awesome waves and fantastically talented surfers. I was envious of the kids that got to surf everyday and how good they got at it. I wanted to be that good.

    I saw pictures of J. Riddle, Alan Sarlo, Wayne Uknowa, Willy Morris, Nate Young, J Adams, Ronnie Jay, Billy Urbany, Buttons’,  Micky Dora, Angie Reno, Nathan Pratt, Mike Marsillino, Dave White, Mike Lamb, Tobby Lamb, Jefferson (Zuma J) Wagner, John Baker and many others. Some old timers and some in my age group.

    In about 1976 I was working in Culver City with my Grandfather Abe (wild Bill) and I started driving everyday up the coast to Malibu to surf after work. I was a pretty good goofy-footed surfer. I was now surfing almost exclusively right hander, right peelers at Malibu Pier, Surfrider, third point.  This means that my back is facing toward the wave instead of my front. Most surfers find this slightly more challenging than surfing regular footed, front sided.  

     I found as the surf was really great here most of the time. I also discovered there is many, sometimes hundreds of other surfers in the water almost everyday. Many who I had seen in the magazines. Professional surfers who were so good that many times I was just satisfied to watch them ride instead of me. I also found that there was a group of surfers that surf there everyday just as I was now doing. 

    I learned about what it means to be a local and surf with the same group at the same spot regularly. After about two years of getting teased about my boards, my surfing style, and everything else, I began to make some really good friends. I was now able to get the waves I wanted without being snaked by someone.  I had built a reputation that I was going to be there and that I was someone who was regular and they needed to deal with me weather they liked it or not.

    That doesn’t mean that I got every wave I wanted. I was able to get the ones that I was positioned correctly for and the other experts who knew me, knew I was going to make the sections and not waste the wave, therefore they let me go ahead. There was always a few guys that were so much better than me that they could take off in front of me and never fall and always really tear the waves apart. Unfortunately they left in there wake a big trough that was very difficult to surf around, over or through.

     Alan Sarlo was just such one of these guys. He was also one of my heros. He is a local Venice surfer and skater who was determined to be one of the top surfers in the world. His reputation got around the whole world that he was is awesome, and really kills the waves. He earned the nickname Wave Killer. He and a few of the well known photographers in the surfing world have recently made a movie, documentary about his life, career, family and successes. ‘Work to Surf’ is a great explicative about choosing a life style and being devoted and creating success.

    I am happy to say he is a friend of mine and I am very proud that he has been honored with a movie about his life. I don’t know what kind of distribution there is going to be with this just released movie but If you get a chance to see it, I highly recommend you do.

     Besides being a friend he is a role model to me. He decided what he wanted. He worked to achieve his goal. He did not put the work in front of living life as he so chose. He organized his life so that he could work to live his passion. The surfing world over time recognized his talent and he became a leader in the surfing world. At the same time he created a successful career, family and home and he never left his passion behind.

     That is why he is a role model for me. It doesn’t matter that he is slightly younger than me. It is a matter that his choices have brought he and his family the type of lifestyle that they have chosen.

    Life is all about choices we make on a daily basis. Where we live, what we do for family,  health , Income, recreation, sports, activities, friends, neighbors and community. These elements combined with many other elements are some of the important contents of our lives. How we act and what we do will be the creator of our lives, of all our resultsand the happiness that comes to each and every one of us.

    What are you doing to create your life?

    Where do you live? 

    Are the choices you have made bringing you the results you want?

    What can you do different to live the life you want?

    What is it going to take to fulfill your dreams?

    I want to suggest that every person has the ability to live the life they choose. I am talking to you. You to can ‘Work to Surf’ or Ski or walk on the beach, or fish, kayak, skin dive, scuba dive, swim, read, go to school, walk/beachcomb with the pooch, act, paint, write, love, raise children, spend family time, cook, shop, design everything/anything. That’s the idea for life. We are not here long. We only have one chance here that we are positive about. Now that’s a whole other topic.

Jim Wiebe

www.malibuevantage.com

MOST BUYERS ARE MORE EDUCATED W/ INTERNET

Selling homes in the current environment must be done with much information. Buyers do more research about your neighborhood than most agents even know. Buyers pick neighborhoods, learn everthing about the area, learn all there is to know about the market on the internet and every other source available before they buy. This process can take a week or a year according to how much time the buyer has and when they have decided to move.

It is very important to have an agent that will help those buyers with access to knowledge and a good internet exposure with local community information. If you want help with your real estate needs, I am your source for new avenues of buyers, sellers and information. Let me be part of your solution. Every single real estate need is unique and individual in it’s details. Find someone who will listen before they assume what you want, someone who has new procedures for marketing your home to the world, not just the local newspaper.

Call me for suggestions and let me teach you my methods of marketing that are unique and take time to do right. You have now found someone who is a worker 24/7 and will not stop until the goals are achieved.

Thanks,
Jim Wiebe
Your Malibu, California eVantage
www.malibuevantage.com

MALIBU HOMES SELLING SLOWLY

Homes selling slowly in Malibu
Malibu California has some of the most desired and coveted beaches and luxury homes in America. The Malibu Riviera is considered by some to be one of the most beautiful isolated beaches in the world. As a result of this beauty and isolation some of the most successful people from around the world in business and entertainment fields have become full time, year round residents or keep vacation homes here. The mix of beauty and isolation from hordes of people have created a very powerful draw for the elite and celebrities.

This being true it does not protect home values from being affected by the market realities. Since the beginning of 2009, 70 single family homes, mobile homes and condominiums have sold witch is approximately 10% of the homes being listed for sale. This has resulted in Malibu joining the buyers market that has engulfed the entire nation. If you are wanting to sell your home this is not good news. If you want to buy a home here in Malibu NOW is a great time to get a bargain on a home that will provide a great life style in one of the best beach cities in the world.

The homes that have sold are homes that have aggressively chased buyers with price reductions and accepted lower price offers than the listed prices. Many of the homes that were listed for sale have simply been removed from the market by expiring or cancelling. The many homes still for sale will have to be very proactive to attract buyers and successfully make finale agreements for the sale of their homes. The agents need to be very savvy at marketing those homes so as to gain as much interest in them as possible.

This is when experienced Internet marketing is so very important as there are prospective buyers all over the world. The more potential buyers who are familiar with the home offered for sale, the more chances that the seller will get closer to what they want rather than having to accept only what they can get.

I want you to know that weather you want to buy a Malibu home or sell your Malibu home I have technology to increase your visibility to get the best price you can and if your buying I have all the market statistics that will help you negotiate a great deal.

For a link to my home valuation website or to search for homes anywhere in California visit my web site for more details: http://www.malibuevantage.com

Thank you,

Jim Wiebe

HABBAN CUBAN CAFE COMING TO MALIBU

New Habana Cafe coming to the Malibu Lumber Yard Mall
You can read the announcment in the online magazine CURBED LA.

Here I have written a response/comment to their article and announcement regarding a restaurant business and business in general in the Malibu community. It has been slightly inconvenient to go over the hill or to East Malibu to do our hardware shopping. We are still a bit put off. I offer this copy as an introduction of how life is diferent in Malibu than other cities. We are a very small town and have a small town consciousness and want to do our best to keep it that way. This does help us preserve our lifestyle here. We still have a lot of horse property and our cowboy history is not that old. I’ll write about that another time. Malibu history is very interesting. Maybe that is one of the reasons Malibu has such a casual livingness to it.

response:

We here in Malibu were all put off by the disappearance of our local lumber & hardware store. The answer we got was that the property was going to support local businesses with locally made products and art work, etc..

I think it’s always gonna be tough for a company from New York to have long term success here because even though we are a world wide recognized community we still have a very small town way of thinking. We like to support our neighbors and be involved with local creativeness and neighborly type of businesses.

Our celebrity residents come here for the most part to be left alone. Most of them are able to acheive that. Some of them have their publicists call the press when they are going out for dinner or surfing. It does help in the national and international publications sales, but most of them try to live a normal life in a small town invironment and are able to do so quite easily. Nobody cares who you are and what you do for a living. We just want to surf uncrowded waves and eat in our neighbors restaurants. So the best thing for the opperator to do is run a great food establisment and get heavely involved with the community.

Good luck New York company.
Malibuevantage.com

PARADISE COVE MOBILE HOME PARK MALIBU CALIFORNIA

Paradise Cove Mobile Home Park Malibu California
Paradise Cove Mobile Home park is the best mobile home park in the world, according to all of it’s residents and the Travel Channel cable TV show airing a few years back.

It definitely gives a new definition to Trailer Trash. The homes here are upgraded beautifuly. The location could not be better. The ocean, coast, waves, clouds, sky, nature, tree and mountian views are some of the very best in the entire world. Many of the residents who live here could afford to live anywhere in the world and they choose to live here. There is a reason for that.

This place is very special and highly unique. I have lived in most of the coastal cities of the LA area and no where is there a community environment that exists between neighbors like here. People care for one another. They interact with each other. It is a real place and a wonderful place of neighbors who enjoy the Malibu lifestyle and beach living, surfing, tennis, basketball, hiking, biking, fishing, scuba & skin diving or going out to dinner, going to the local mall & theater and all with excelent year round weather. There is no where that has this comminity feeling anywhere in the LA area like here.

Come and experience the area as my guest. We are much more than an expensive beach parking lot or a beautiful Beach Cafe and we are also that.

When I fiirst bought a home here I thought I would never be able to live in a trailer or a mobile home park. After 2 months of commuting back and forth in the deep part of December when the days are short, to the city in the dark, raining most of the time and living in a much smaller home than I was used to, I moved back to one of my larger homes in the city. After helping my partner/girlfriend find another mobile home and asisting her and her two children to move there I was able to move back into Paradise Cove with my two children and have never looked back. I have enjoyed living here more than anywhere else I have lived in my entire life. I invite you to experience this phenomenon. Come and be my guest for the day. I have plenty of parking by my trailer home/coach. There is no on the street parking since they repaved the roads. It will not cost you the day fee they charge to park here if you contact me directly. I am working to build my reputation as a realtor here and you can help me.