Post fire rebuilding

[Mandelon]

I have a cousin with a house in Hidden Hills and a while back maybe 7-8 years ago there was a Malibu fire and they rented their home for $30K a month to a fire victim and they moved into their ventura beach home and retired living off the monthly rent. I'm sure there will be plenty of fire victims willing to pay something like that to stay within a close radius to their old home. People nearby will gladly cash in and rent their house out and leave the state or move to a lower cost locale. I have a client that does fire/flood restoration I bet he is salivating or whatever the word is.

This is genius! If I managed rental properties up there I would be going door to door suggesting this to people.

 

[2Driver]

If you are over 50 you have to ask yourself …

Do I want to live the next 3 years in temporary housing fighting the city and contractors and rebuilding a house just to move in and spend the next 4 years living in a stark construction zone or do I want to use those 7 years somewhere else more pleasant

 

[BabyRay]

If you are over 50 you have to ask yourself …

Do I want to live the next 3 years in temp housing fighting the city and contractors rebuilding a house just to move in and spend the next 4 years living in a stark construction zone or do I want to use those 7 years somewhere else more pleasant

No kidding! I told my wife today that if we lost our house, I’d have the lot cleared, sell it, and find an existing home to buy. I don’t have enough time left to waste it on building a house.

 

[Racer56]

Some of my random thoughts.

The city of LA building department is a total wreck and has never recovered from covid. Our mayor in her infinite wisdom has given priority for building permits to 100% affordable projects, which has delayed all other permits, including emergency repair permits for damages caused by rain last winter. Drastic changes are going to have to be made at the ladbs, or the rebuild is going to take 15 plus years.

The cost of building materials and supplies is going to go through the roof and be in short supply for the entire western US. Again certain things haven't recovered from covid and are still in short supply.

Developer's are already lining up to buy properties that people can't or don't want to rebuild.

There's not enough architects, structural engineers, soils engineer's and deputy inspectors to come even close to handling the upcoming work load.

Pacific Palisades has a architectural review board run by local residents and it will be interesting to see how they handle the approval process.

Every Manny, Moe and Jack is going to become a contractor and construction in Socal is going to go into the toilet. The level of construction knowledge, professionalism and experience has been consistently slipping at astonishing rate and this will be the nail in the coffin.

 

[NicPaus]

I didn't know it was LADBS is it the LA office? This will screw me up on my own projects. San pedro is only open 2 days a week since covid. And most everything goes through LA. Which is a nightmare to deal with before covid. During covid good lord.

It makes sense though. One of the guys I know that does the design and build with several jobs a year in palisades. Just got a addition approved in LA city in 4 months. He knows them all. The other architect took 17 months for there adu.

 

[Racer56]

I didn't know it was LADBS is it the LA office? This will screw me up on my own projects. San pedro is only open 2 days a week since covid. And most everything goes through LA. Which is a nightmare to deal with before covid. During covid good lord.

It makes sense though. One of the guys I know that does the design and build with several jobs a year in palisades. Just got a addition approved in LA city in 4 months. He knows them all. The other architect took 17 months for there adu.

Pacific Palisades is West LA LADBS on Sawtelle.

 

[BigQ]

I can only speak of what we encountered after our loss, post 2007 Witchcreek fire. All permit fees were waved. Permits were expedited and turn-around was reasonable. I imagine they will rely on the newer "Fire" construction codes so won't be re-creating the codes from scratch. During the rebuild process we were initially only taxed on the value of the bare land, until final. Previous accessed value was preserved --- with the exception of any additional interior square footage.
In our case we added a modest amount of square footage and the taxes were raised accordingly, based on the previous assessed value.
San Diego County was actually impressive to work with. Shortly after the fire the setup a local One Stop Shopping of sorts. You enter, go from table to table, various departments provided documentation to assist in your rebuild. They had all your tax records, recorded deeds, basically paper work you might have lost in the fire.

Took us three years because we were evaluating if we wanted to rebuild. It was a time of numerous foreclosures, so that presented an alternative market. But one must consider, if you move and don't rebuild, you lose many additional monies that are available on your insurance that pay for most all the upgraded code, fire and environmental rules. In other words, your insurance will only pay you for what it would cost to rebuild your old house.

After living in a 5th wheel in our driveway for three years, we were damn glad to get a real shower

That sounds like they knew what they were doing and fair about the value.

 

[Taboma]

That sounds like they knew what they were doing and fair about the value.

Where it became far more complicated was using the "Special provision" to maintain your prior home's tax basis and instead of rebuilding you were going to relocate to a new location within the county.
In our case, since the fire was Oct. '07, foreclosures were offering some appealing prospects for re-locating versus rebuilding. In this case it gets more complicated because you're not selling the entire property and moving, you're retaining the value of the lot.
In this case the value that county had accessed for each, the lot, and the improvements (Home, structures) becomes important.
What I'd noticed on ours, but had never paid any attention to since I was only taxed on the 'Whole', was this split.
I felt they had it overly biased for the land value, and under for the Improvements.
This bias would limit our ability to transfer our tax base for the Improvements as they were undervalued. Amazingly, I was most pleased when with a single phone call to the appraisers office and after providing my FEMA number, she agreed to, and made my recommended changes without my having to submit a single document.

San Diego County did us right from start to finish, I have zero complaints.

 

[riverroyal]

Some of my random thoughts.

The city of LA building department is a total wreck and has never recovered from covid. Our mayor in her infinite wisdom has given priority for building permits to 100% affordable projects, which has delayed all other permits, including emergency repair permits for damages caused by rain last winter. Drastic changes are going to have to be made at the ladbs, or the rebuild is going to take 15 plus years.

The cost of building materials and supplies is going to go through the roof and be in short supply for the entire western US. Again certain things haven't recovered from covid and are still in short supply.

Developer's are already lining up to buy properties that people can't or don't want to rebuild.

There's not enough architects, structural engineers, soils engineer's and deputy inspectors to come even close to handling the upcoming work load.

Pacific Palisades has a architectural review board run by local residents and it will be interesting to see how they handle the approval process.

Every Manny, Moe and Jack is going to become a contractor and construction in Socal is going to go into the toilet. The level of construction knowledge, professionalism and experience has been consistently slipping at astonishing rate and this will be the nail in the coffin.

All accurate. But every Manny moe jack already is. The 'old' tradesmen are gone. There will be more for sure. But not until home owners start to get funds. That won't be anytime soon

 

[Orange Juice]

If you are over 50 you have to ask yourself …

Do I want to live the next 3 years in temporary housing fighting the city and contractors and rebuilding a house just to move in and spend the next 4 years living in a stark construction zone or do I want to use those 7 years somewhere else more pleasant

Decisions will be all money driven, as reality sets in.

If you have ever wanted to build, with a fabulous view of the southern California sunsets, I suggest you find a real estate agent, and buy two lots next to each other, so you can fit an RV garage on the property. The location is priceless.

 

[Kenboat]

For any one wanting out after the fire, consider Columbus, Ohio. The city is growing with lots of great tech job, construction, and health care. Housing cost is 50% lower than California. And you can still buy land and drive to work in 30 minutes!

 

[JayBreww]

For any one wanting out after the fire, consider Columbus, Ohio. The city is growing with lots of great tech job, construction, and health care. Housing cost is 50% lower than California. And you can still buy land and drive to work in 30 minutes!

And on Tuesday it’ll be a high of 15* with a low of 5*.

 

[Dettom]

I'll bet a lot of them will leave California after this. Wonder what it'll do to Havasu home prices, if anything. California may never recover from this.

 

[Racer56]

Governor Newsom signs executive order to help Los Angeles rebuild faster and stronger​

Governor Newsom signs executive order to help Los Angeles rebuild faster and stronger | Governor of California

www.gov.ca.gov

 

[Travmon]

Not sure when they can even clean up dwelling spots , if they are insured the insurance company may search through debris to create inventory list. We had a top story fire and the insurance company went through the debris. If they found the small metal eraser holder on a pencil then a pencil was put on the list. I was impressed BUT this was 40 years ago. If I was a homeowner that lost a house i would protect that debris pile for a bit

 

[Travmon]

I would be curious what exactly the city is telling people to do or not do

 

[Dettom]

Governor Newsom signs executive order to help Los Angeles rebuild faster and stronger​

Governor Newsom signs executive order to help Los Angeles rebuild faster and stronger | Governor of California

www.gov.ca.gov

Well if he could do it now, he could have done it years ago.

 

[Paradox]

I was talking to a single co-worker today who lost his 3,000 foot home in Malibu. He told me he had the FAIR plan that maxed out at $800,000 and another policy that covers his personal belongings for $100,000. Even then, he said the premiums and deductible were big.

He showed me videos of the house. Just gorgeous. His art work alone was clearly worth more than the 100.

Unbelievably, he was talking it in stride. He rented a 3 bedroom / 3 bath townhouse in Santa Monica (as of yesterday for $6,100 a month) and is sharing it with one of his neighbors who also lost his house. He’s not sure what he’s going to do long term.

He did note that he had digitalized all his photos and they are on the cloud.

 

[Racer56]

I was talking to a single co-worker today who lost his 3,000 foot home in Malibu. He told me he had the FAIR plan that maxed out at $800,000 and another policy that covers his personal belongings for $100,000. Even then, he said the premiums and deductible were big.

He showed me videos of the house. Just gorgeous. His art work alone was clearly worth more than the 100.

Unbelievably, he was talking it in stride. He rented a 3 bedroom / 3 bath townhouse in Santa Monica (as of yesterday for $6,100 a month) and is sharing it with one of his neighbors who also lost his house. He’s not sure what he’s going to do long term.

He did note that he had digitalized all his photos and they are on the cloud.

That's not even half of what it take him to rebuild his home.

 

[riverroyal]

I was talking to a single co-worker today who lost his 3,000 foot home in Malibu. He told me he had the FAIR plan that maxed out at $800,000 and another policy that covers his personal belongings for $100,000. Even then, he said the premiums and deductible were big.

He showed me videos of the house. Just gorgeous. His art work alone was clearly worth more than the 100.

Unbelievably, he was talking it in stride. He rented a 3 bedroom / 3 bath townhouse in Santa Monica (as of yesterday for $6,100 a month) and is sharing it with one of his neighbors who also lost his house. He’s not sure what he’s going to do long term.

He did note that he had digitalized all his photos and they are on the cloud.

$6100? He may have lied on that.
Rental market in LA is brutal this week

 

[lbhsbz]

Not sure when they can even clean up dwelling spots , if they are insured the insurance company may search through debris to create inventory list. We had a top story fire and the insurance company went through the debris. If they found the small metal eraser holder on a pencil then a pencil was put on the list. I was impressed BUT this was 40 years ago. If I was a homeowner that lost a house i would protect that debris pile for a bit

If I was an effected homeowner I'd be there right now with a shovel piling it all in my neighbors lots or in the street so that all that was on my lot was dirt.

 

[lbhsbz]

$6100? He may have lied on that.
Rental market in LA is brutal this week

depends where it is. We looked up the house the wife grew up in a few weeks ago....grandparents died and it was sold/scraped/rebuilt (but looked about the same from the outside) 10 years ago, on 12th street just north of Montana....they were asking $27,500/month for rent. It's no longer on the market for rent....after the fires started, it's for sale for $8.5M. The estate sold the house for $1.2M.

 

[NicPaus]

$6100? He may have lied on that.
Rental market in LA is brutal this week

Probably 12,200 since he is sharing it.

 

[Paradox]

$6100? He may have lied on that.
Rental market in LA is brutal this week

He described it as a small 3/3 townhouse. Off of Wilshire and 11th. Perhaps a glorified apartment? Don’t know.