Gary Senser

I study what actually moves housing markets in the South Bay: pricing strategy, demographics, interest rates, and human behavior. No hype. No talking points. Just data, context, and straight talk. I'm Gary Senser — Your Real Estate Insider. Manhattan Beach · Hermosa · Redondo garysenser.substack.com

@SacAppraiser I’ve done that twice for auto insurance.

Our homeowners insurance went up $600. So, I called an insurance broker friend, and the new policy with a different insurer is going to be $1,000 lower than the existing plan. Gotta love insurance stuff.

The simple "houses hot, condos cold" narrative is breaking down. The new story is geographic. Some neighborhoods are accelerating into summer. Others have plateaued. The current split. Most people don't know which channel they're in.

In 1849, two men stood ten feet apart on the American River. One found gold. The other found mud. The South Bay real estate market is doing the same thing right now. Same streets. Different universes. Wrote about it → open.substack.com/pub/garysenser…

South Bay April snapshot: 85 homes closed 55 SFR | 30 condos SFR: 101.4% avg SP/LP, 20 days avg DOM Condos: 99.3% avg SP/LP, 42 days avg DOM Houses sell twice as fast and above asking. Condos take twice as long and close below ask. The market isn't one thing. It never was.

16 BMWs. One salesperson. 18 years as the #1 BMW salesperson in the US. Neda Shahrokhi just moved to BMW of Santa Monica, and this video captures why we've never gone anywhere else: "If you don't take care of your customer, someone else will." That's the standard — in car sales, in real estate, in everything.

Same dynamic in the South Bay (LA) — but with a twist. All four of our beach cities sold SFR above asking in April (101.2-101.6% SP/LP). But unlike SF, not all of it is strategic underpricing. Altos shows 14-47% of listings had price reductions depending on the city. Some sellers priced right and got bidding wars. Others started too high, reduced, and then sold at or above the adjusted price. The SP/LP ratio tells you the ending. It doesn't tell you the journey. Both stories live inside the same number. Great point about SF — that strategic pricing culture is something most markets haven't adopted as consistently.

Almost everything sells over the original asking price in San Francisco. The market is hot, and properties tend to be priced strategically low. Both things are true.

Seeing the exact same split in the South Bay (LA). SFR across our four beach cities: MAI 47-57, selling at 100-102.5% of asking, inventory tight at 90 active listings. Strong seller’s territory. Condos in the same zip codes: MAI 35-45, selling below asking, 113 active listings and building. South Redondo condos dropped 11 MAI points in a single week. Your Las Vegas high-rise data confirms what we’re tracking here — the vertical/attached segment is telling a fundamentally different story than detached. Same market, different realities. (Altos Research + CRMLS, April 2026)

Clark County Las Vegas Closed Sales: March 2026 🎰 Overall sales pushed higher year over year, showing broad market strength. But high-rise activity moved in the opposite direction, signaling a split between segments. #HousingMarket #RealEstate

That's a great point — in Sacramento at 5% of sales, the condo trend is easy to overlook. In the South Bay, condos are closer to 40% of total closings, so the divergence isn't just a footnote — it's reshaping how we advise on pricing, timing, and strategy for nearly half our clients. Would be curious to see your Sacramento detached-vs-condo breakdown sometime. Bet the trend lines tell a similar story even at different scales.

@garysenser Thank you, Gary. I really appreciate hearing this. I purposely break out condos separately in my market. Granted, they are only about 5% of total sales, but the trend is so different.

The housing market isn't the same in every location. It's a good reminder that there isn't just one narrative that fits all markets. It's true in local markets also as the temperature might not be exactly the same for detached homes, condos, entry-level, high-end, etc...

Seeing this play out at the hyperlocal level in the South Bay (LA) — but with a split your national data doesn't capture. SFR across our four beach cities: 90 active listings, MAI 47-57, selling at 100-102.5% of asking. Inventory is tight and tightening. Consistent with the national trend. Condos in the same zip codes: 113 active listings, MAI 35-45, selling below asking. Inventory is building, not shrinking. The rate-sensitivity story is real — but it's hitting property types differently. SFR buyers are absorbing inventory faster than it's being listed. Condo inventory is replenishing and sitting. National YoY numbers may go negative soon, as you're forecasting. In markets like ours, they already have — but only for houses. (Altos Research + CRMLS, April 2026)

Market shifted mid June 2025 here, and now we are running into harder comps for growth until mid June 2026

South Bay SFR: selling at 100-102.5% of asking in 7-8 days. South Bay condos: selling below asking with 4x the inventory. Same zip codes. Two completely different markets. New analysis with Altos Research + CRMLS data: garysenser.substack.com

The first 2 weeks of April in the South Bay: 40 homes sold, 95 pending, 214 active listings. Manhattan Beach: 6-day median DOM at $4.8M. South Redondo: 6.6 months of inventory. The market is rebalancing — but it hasn't slowed down. Full breakdown in my newsletter. Link in bio.

You noted Bay Area sellers cut the least. Same story in the South Bay (LA). Hermosa Beach: 0% of SFR listings with price reductions. Manhattan Beach: 17%. Market Action Index across all 4 South Bay cities: 47–60 (strong seller's territory). The one exception — North Redondo at 58% price cuts — still closed at 100% of asking. Sellers price high, get corrected, and buyers pay the adjusted price in full. National averages hide the real story. Housing is local.

US home sellers are increasingly cutting prices: A record 34.2% of home sellers lowered their list price in February, the highest for any February since records began in 2012. Since 2022, the percentage of sellers cutting prices has more than tripled. Sellers who cut prices cut by an average of $40,915, or -7.3%, the highest February percentage since 2023 and the 2nd-highest since 2017. Among all sellers, the average price was reduced by $13,463, or -2.4%, the highest for this month on record. Home sellers in Texas and Florida led the price cuts, while sellers in the Bay Area cut the least. Elevated mortgage rates and rising housing inventory continue to weaken seller pricing power across the country. The US housing market is increasingly favoring buyers.

@Simi_2210_ 179

If you solve this, you’re different Can you solve ?

This tracks nationally. But the local picture tells a different story. In the South Bay (LA), the first two weeks of April: - Manhattan Beach: 6-day median DOM at $4.8M - North Redondo: 12 closings at 100% of list price - 40 homes sold across 4 cities in 13 days MOI has expanded from 1.6-3.4 in March to 4.1-6.6 — so inventory is building. But absorption hasn't stalled. The buyers who are active have already absorbed 6.5%+ rates. The national median masks how uneven this rebalancing really is.

Mortgage rates hit the upper 6s this week - up 65 bps in a month. The affordability gains of early 2026 are gone. Here's what the data shows: ➡️85,000 pending sales this week, down for the week. Still 1.5% above last year but down from 4% gains recently ➡️928,000 homes on the market, only 5.2% more than last year. Inventory growth could resume with higher rates. ➡️New listings running 2% below last year, There is just no supply wave coming. ➡️Price reductions jumped to 34.1% of listings. Still less than last year, but shows how fragile prices are ➡️Median home price at $424,000 is less than 2025 and 2024. See the chart below, prices could be under 2022 by summer. Conditions are acutall still slightly better than a year ago. But that margin is shrinking fast. Full details in this week's video: youtu.be/Nky0IXK5Zm4

52.2% of U.S. home listings are now "stale" — sitting 60+ days without a single offer. That's $347 billion worth of homes nobody wants to buy. Meanwhile, in the South Bay, the median home sells in 10-11 days. New article — here's what's driving the gap. The national numbers are stark: 66 days: median time on market (slowest in a decade) 630,000 more sellers than buyers (record) Miami: 62.6% of listings stale San Antonio: 58.3% Pittsburgh: 58.1% More than half the country can't move their inventory. Now look at the South Bay (March 2026): Manhattan Beach: 11 days median, 0.657 MOI North Redondo: 10 days, 100% of asking price South Redondo: 11 days (down from 57 in February) 97 homes sold across 4 cities This isn't a soft market. This is velocity. Three structural forces explain the divergence: 1. The lock-in effect hits hardest in high-cost markets. Trading a 3% mortgage for 6.46% on a $3M home = $6,000/month more in interest. So homeowners don't list. 2. Geography. Manhattan Beach is 3.9 sq mi. No new land. Ever. 3. Tariffs are making it worse. 50% on steel/aluminum. 10% on lumber. $17,500-$18,500 added per new home. In Sun Belt markets, this is slowing the construction pipeline. In the South Bay, it reinforces the scarcity that already exists. The velocity gap is widening, not narrowing. National stale rate: 50.1% to 52.2% (getting slower) South Redondo ADOM: 57 to 11 days (getting faster) Two markets. Two completely different realities. Full analysis with city-by-city data, tariff impact breakdown, and what it means for buyers and sellers: garysenser.substack.com If you're making a real estate decision based on national headlines, you're using the wrong data.

South Bay homeowners: has the national 'cooling market' narrative changed your thinking about selling this spring? Or does the local data — 97 homes sold, under 1.5 months of supply — tell you a different story?

Walking the Sand Section this morning. Three open houses on one block. All priced under $4M. All will have lines. The spring market isn't theoretical here — it's physical.

The spring market is two weeks old. In the South Bay, it's confirming everything the winter data suggested: constrained supply, deep demand, and a structural disconnect from the national narrative. 97 homes sold. Under 1.5 months of supply everywhere. Have a great weekend.