LOCATION,LOCATION,LOCATION! This one-of-a-kind Don Pedersen designed custom home is located steps from the wonderful shops and restaurants of Montecito’s Lower Village and Butterfly Beach. Inspired by tropical plantation style homes and integrated seamlessly with charming Santa Barbara details this home is impressive! The dramatic entry and open floor plan boasts soaring 30′ beamed ceilings, warm maple floors, and is flooded with natural light from an abundance of windows and skylights. A fantastic property for entertaining with multiple sets of French doors opening to an expansive veranda. The generous sized master suite has his and her baths and walk-in closets and is located on the main level. There is an elevator for easy access to the lower level with additional rooms and hugh 3 car garage – a perfect place for autos and hobbies. The beautifully landscaped grounds feature a magnificent magnolia tree, colorful and mature plantings, a charming stone wall and pathways plus an enchanting 2 bdrm guest cottage. For the garden enthusiast there is also a wonderful greenhouse which could serve as an art studio. A rare opportunity for so much in such a prime Montecito area. Offered at just $2,699,000.

For more details contact Pat Saraca at 805-886-7426, Distinctive Real Estate

Dramatic Living Room

It was a beautiful day for viewing estates for sale in Montecito! There were 21 properties in Montecito on the broker tour this week.  The newest estate listing is a spectacular Mediterranean on 20 gated acres complete  with 7 bedrooms,  8.5 baths, media/screening room, fantastic gourmet  kitchen, 4-car garage, gorgeous pool, incredible ocean and mountain views, a guest house with its own gated entrance, bocce ball court, lawn, fruit trees, and Koi pond. This Montecito luxury home is located on one of the most desirable streets in Montecito. It  is offered at $12,700,000. On the other end of the spectrum there lies a  wonderful opportunity to purchase a Montecito property via a short sale. This single story, ocean view home set amidst larger estates,  overlooks red tile roofs and the Montecito Country Club. The 1/2 acre Montecito property is gated, has 4 bedrooms, 2.5 baths and boasts lush landscaping and magnificent ocean views.
This is a rare opportunity to purpose a Montecito property in a distress sale. Whether you are looking for a high end luxury property or an entry level Montecito home now may be the best time to start your search! There are some great deals to be had!

There were 26 properties on the agent caravan this week in Montecito. There were 3 new listings ranging from at the low end of the price range a  5 bedroom home on a hillside location with fantastic ocean and city views with an asking price of $1,725,000. Though in the city of Santa Barbara this Via Alicia home does have a Montecito zip code.  This home was previously listed at $2,295,000 so presents a good buying opportunity for someone seeking a Santa Barbara view home. At the high end of the price range is a wonderful property on Cima del Mundo. This Santa Barbara  luxury home sold about 1.5 years ago for $18,000,000 and is now priced at $22,000,000. This is a great opportunity to purchase one of the finest luxury homes in Montecito. The buyers did put some exquisite upgrades into the home which was brand new at the time they bought it and it is essentially brand new still as they have rarely come to the property.  For someone wanting a premier Santa Barbara property this is it. It offers privacy, incredible quality, unbelievable views and all the amenities on could want. It is truly one of the  finest Montecito properties currently available.

Santa Barbara

Watched the Fourth of July fireworks from a magnificient bluff top location on the Mesa in Santa Barbara. This oceanfront (click to view Santa Barbara Ocean Front homes for sale) location is a prime spot for a Santa Barbara luxury home. Plans are in place for a gorgeous Tuscan Villa. This remodel opportunity is a rare offering. This locale has a unique orientation facing south and east over the Santa Barbara coastline allowing incredible sunrise views plus ocean, city, harbor, mountain, and island views. Just steps to Shoreline Park, Leadbetter beach – great for surfing and paddle boarding, Santa Barbara Harbor and Santa Barbara Yacht Club plus restaurants and shops. Also close enough for a stroll to State Street and downtown Santa Barbara. Directly in front of you is a favorite local surf spot, for your own live surfing extravaganza. Watch kayakers and paddle boarders from Santa Barbara Harbor, a regular Regatta of international visits from the most spectacular sporting yachts in the world, weekly sail boat races, occasional cruise ship visits and visits from the USS Ronald Reagan, a state of the art U.S. Naval Aircraft Carrier. You may also be delighted with the appearance of dolphins and whales! This is what Santa Barbara beach homes are all about! Build your dream home on one of the most spectacular view properties in Santa Barbara! For additional details on this fantastic offering go to www.BeachFrontSantaBarbara.comAct now and you can watch next year’s fireworks from your very own Santa Barbara beach front home!

According to the top California foreclosure tracking resource, which tracks every California foreclosure and provides daily auction updates, and has issued its monthly California Foreclosure Report for May 2010. Foreclosure filings, outcomes and inventories dropped overall from April to May. Foreclosure filings have declined substantially year-over-year with Notice of Default filings down 43.3 percent and Notice of Trustee Sale filings down 35.8 percent. The only significant increases from the prior year were Cancellations, up 141.3 percent, Sales to 3rd Parties, typically investors, up 75.4 percent, and Time-to-Foreclose, up 30.5 percent from May 2009.

Santa Barbara had 208 notice of trustee sales for May of 2010, down from 273 the same month last year. We have participated in several of these sales and the speed with which the REO are moving and the processing of these sales has improved dramatically. Banks are better equiped and more familiar with the process and the REO buyers are better informed and pepaired as well. This all bodes well the for the Santa Barbara real estate market, California and the nation as we are moving towards a market normalization as this inventory is absorbed. Purchase loan rates are some of the lowest in years once again and prices are still very favorable, which is a combination seldom seen in and real estate market. As more loan product becomes available and lenders get back to favorable lending practices, markets are stabilizing as show by these Santa Barbara foreclosure and state wide foreclosure numbers. For a customized list of the best forclosure properties available in Santa Barbara, contact us here and we will email you the current list.

The Santa Barbara real estate market has proven itself through good markets and bad, that the old real estate tenet of , Location, Location, Location is still enforce!! The Santa Barbara properties market continues to out perform most markets in the US and the world for that matter. Just review many of our “Santa Barbara properties outlook” post on this site for proof.  Santa Barbara area homeowners are thankful for these facts. With all the negative national press about real estate, it is still a local phenomenon.

Althought the Santa Barbara real estate market will see little of it, not much detail has emerge from the Treasury department about $50 billion housing rescue plan, which has caused the big banks to temporarily halt foreclosures. J.P. Morgan Chase announced it would stop foreclosure proceedings, through March 6, “we will not add any new owner-occupied residential loans foreclosures that are held by JP Morgan Chase.” as reported by Diana Olick of CNBC and excerped here.

Citigroup CEO Vikram Pandit committed to virtually the same Wednesday, before the House Financial Services Committee, and issued this statement, extending their foreclosure hold offs to March 12th. “Today’s announcement expands on Citigroup’s current foreclosure moratorium in where Citigroup does not initiate or finish a foreclosure sale on any eligible borrower where Citigroup owns the mortgage, the borrower seeks to stay in the home, which is their primary residence, is working in good faith with Citigroup and has sufficient income for affordable mortgage debt.”

JP Morgan also says it will stop on loans they hold, but Citigroup is only acting on Citigroup owned loans. One of the largest impediments to foreclosure mitigation is the fact that most loans are held by outside investors. Which actually could be the blessing in disguise.

As for any new details on Geithner’s new plan, except for a haandful at the Treasury, none can expand on the recent leak that it would involve some sort of standard modification process that the government (read “US Taxpayers”) would subsidize.

But on top of all that rhetoric, came the announcement from the “Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC)” along with the “Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS)”. These are the ones who gave a report in December on re-default rates on mortgages that had been modified (nearly 50-60 percent!) that gave everyone a harsh reality check, that this yet again, poorly supervised or hastily put together program, simply forestalls the inevitable, and at taxpayers expense. And now because of all that concern, they are expanding their data, which, as we’ll see, is more wasted resources. Ultimately the market will prevail with or without programs paid by taxpayer money to manipulate it.

John Dugan, Director of the OCC said, “I’m hopeful that the numbers we collected already and the numbers we collect in the future, will help this going forward”. Unfortunately, statistical analysis is always in hindsight and only tells us if a program has worked or not, based on whose analyzing the data, and does nothing to ensure the program will wok at all, particularly in the case of brand new programs with no history of success or failure. So, by the time we figure out if any of this has worked, what’s done will be done, and we’ll have great detailed analysis of how clever we were to have paid to much for the program, and the added bonus of paying too much for the analysis of same. 

 ”We’ll then take the new categories and for each, figure out what was the re-default rate in each of those categories,” Dugan explained. This data of course would be very helpful to the government bean counters crafting a massive mortgage modification plan, and of course to homeowners who might otherwise rely on their own resourcefulness and help themselves out of their situation, but might now be induced to sit and wait for government entitlements, “expecting” to be saved by government, or worse, become resourceful in manipulating the goverment program itself, which has already been evidenced. (Didn’t Democratic Icon John Kennedy say “Ask not what your Country can do for you, ask what you can do for your Country. One of the greatest statement of US citizen’s right to self determination. What happened to that once prevalent American sentiment? The presumption that government needs to protect us from ourselves.) And of course in perfect harmony with this perfect storm of preposterous government, Mr. Geithner won’t get those stats until long after he’s announced his hastily constructed social mortgage plan. Dugan, however, assured, “I know for a fact they’re taking re-defaults into serious consideration.” Re-defaults we know are simply forestalled foreclosures that happen anyway, but only after the US taxpayers subsidize the stalling process, which in turn delays that housing inventory from becoming a performing asset, which of course is ultimately what the economy needs to be normalized.

The Santa Barbara International Film Festival 2009 (SBIFF) runs in Santa Barbara, California from January 22 through February 1. Along with its idyllic Mediterranean climate and setting, the SBIFF has put Santa Barbara, California on the map, providing notoriety to Santa Barbara as a resort destination. Even through today’s market conditions, Santa Barbara view, oceanfront and estate properties have proven to be prime real estate holdings, including Montecito Estates, Oceanfront Properties, Hope Ranch Estates, and Santa Barbara Estates. Many in the film industry call Santa Barbara and Montecito home or have vacation homes in Santa Barbara.

Arlington Theatre, Santa Barbara

This year there will be over 200 films screened including 21 World Premieres. This year’s festivities include the presentation of awards to Penelope Cruz, Clint Eastwood, Mickey Rourke, Kristin Scott Thomas, and Kate Winslet. Roger Durling of Santa Barbara, California is the SBIFF Director. This year’s theme is”Discover by Day and Be Dazzled by Night” promising a fun time of films, events, and parties. The SBBIFF 2009 guest director is David Fincher. He will discuss his films including his most recent work “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button” starting Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie attended last year’s film festival in Santa Barbara where Angelina Jolie was presented with Outstanding Performance Award for “A Mighty Heart”. The films and events will take place at various venues throughout Santa Barbara including the historic Arlington Theater. There is speculation as to part time Montecito resident Oprah Winfrey making an appearance! Oprah purchased her Montecito Estate for $42,000,000  in 2000 and it is estimated to now be worth over $90,000,000. A testament to the relative strength of Santa Barbara and particularly Montecito real estate values even through down markets, which currently present a new round of buying opportunities.

This expansive Montecito estate compound is situated on one of the most desirable Montecito estate parcels in the Santa Barbara estates market segment. This magnificent Montecito estate offers spectacular ocean, island, harbor, city and mountain views, a very unique combination, all from a "close in" elevated vista close to the Montecito lower village on Coast Village Road in Montecito as well as the upper village on East Valley Road in Montecito. Perched on the most sought after Montecito estate parcel in the desirable Pepper Hill neighborhood, with its awe inspiring sweeping view vistas from all vantages within the gated compound, this rare Santa Barbara estates offering has not been available for 15 years and has been extensively updated within that time to become one of the premier Montecito estates offerings within the Montecito real estate market place. 

The Santa Barbara real estate market, estates offerings has rarely seen an estate property of this magnitude within the Montecito estates for sale market segment at any price point, much less below the $10 million ceiling within the last 8 years. Montecito estate properties like this are truely rare indeed, particularly in the Montecito Cold Springs Schol District. View details and over 30 photos of this Montcito estate for sale. This Premier Montecito estate is offered at $8.5 million.

This quintessential Montecito view estate includes 5+ bedrooms, 4 full and 3 ½ baths, with full guest suite. Detached opulent office, work shop and fire placed entertainment area. Gated entry. Pillared stone lined motor court. Two 2+ car garages. And gracious, matured landscaped grounds. An extraordinary Montecito estate situated on one of the most desirable Montecito estate parcels, with a prime location close to Upper and Lower Montecito Villages.