Multiple offers are sprouting. Homes are selling before they are even listed. And so begins another frenzied year in Silicon Valley's hot housing market. Or so it would appear.
Homes are ever more expensive, and the competition to buy is stiffer in some neighborhoods.
That's the bad news. Stories about multiple offers pushing up prices and cash purchases for more than the asking price are the exception rather than the rule. Since January 1996, during the hottest years of the current boom, the percentage of homes that sold for more than asking never rose past 37 percent. That was in April last year, according to Calhoun, who sifted through data provided by Campbell-based R.E. InfoLink. In January this year, only 9 percent of all resale homes sold for more than asking.