HOW TO MAKE YOUR BEDROOM FEEL LIKE A LUXURY HOTEL

Enjoy the spirit of five-star hospitality in the comfort and convenience of your own home by taking some cues from some of the world's finest international hotels

Imagine being able to enjoy the unbridled luxury of a hotel suite every night. To slide between the finest sheets of Claridges, or bathe in the boutique bubbles of The Langham before slinking into a stylish set of custom-made slippers. With a few carefully selected purchases you can re-create the nights of luxury and pampering you’d normally associate with your favorite hotel in your own bedroom.

The mattress: Vispring

Building the perfect bed is an art form, and one that luxury hotels take very seriously. Every year, five-star properties invest huge sums on downy soft mattresses and luxury bedlinen to meet the expectations of discerning guests. For a place of refuge, rest and love, the Vispring promises the comfort of a Shangri-La suite with the support of a custom-made mattress. From the level of tension in the vanadium steel springs to the softness of the wool, cashmere and silk filling, you choose exactly how your mattress is built.

The bed sheets: Frette

Favored by Claridge’s, The Ritz and The Orient Express (back in the day), Frette has been the bed linen of choice of the rich and royal for over 150 years. Such is the joy of waking between a crisp pair of Frette sheets that the brand supplies the Italian royal family, and has launched a string of retail boutiques at the behest of their customers. Their success springs from an understanding that it’s the raw materials, and not simply the high thread count, which makes for flawlessly soft sateens and percales.

The candle: Miller Harris

For luxury hotel groups, scent is as much a part of their branding as the interior décor. So it seemed a fitting union when The Haymarket teamed up with the London-based perfume house Miller Harris to develop their own distinctive Marché au Foin (French for hay market) scent. Including tones of lavender, orange, nutmeg and cardamom, the English-country-meets-urban-sophisticate connotations suit the character of the hotel perfectly, and set an irresistibly relaxing vibe. Re-create the atmosphere in your own bedroom with Miller Harris’s Citron Citron, which draws on the same citrusy notes.

The soaps: Penhaligon’s

Relaxing in a hot, aromatic bath is a pleasure few of us have time to indulge in amid the busyness of everyday life. In a luxury hotel, however, it’s the perfect way to while away an evening. Set the scene in your own bathroom with a set of Penhaligon’s soaps and toiletries. The Langham in London provides each guest with an enviable selection of the luxury perfumer’s wares, including their invigorating Quercus soaps.

The slippers: Bowhill & Elliott

In keeping with the trend for bespoke footwear, Bowhill & Elliott offer a custom service of handmade velvet English slippers. Established in 1874, when Obadiah Bowhill purchased a Norwich shopfront that still serves as the base of business today, Bowhill & Elliott passed through the generations to become an enduring heritage brand of British luxury footwear that specializes in custom designs incorporating special fabrics and unique tapestry and needlework. 

Articles and photos sourced from www.chritiesrealestate.com

Real Estate Roundup: San Francisco Luxury Condo Buyers Are the West’s Most Educated
June 1, 2015 by Pacific Union • Posted in Weekly Real Estate News Roundups   

Here’s a look at recent news of interest to homebuyers, home sellers, and the home-curious.
stanford_campus

The Stanford University campus in Palo Alto.

BAY AREA LUXURY BUYERS ARE A HIGHLY EDUCATED BUNCH
Do you hope to eventually become the proud owner of a high-end, high-rise unit in San Francisco? If one recent study is any indication, your chances get a whole lot better if you obtain an advanced degree.

Citing a survey of more than 12,000 luxury condo owners in six Western U.S. cities, The Wall Street Journal reports that 97 percent of buyers in San Francisco hold a bachelor’s degree or higher — tied with Seattle for the highest percentage of college-educated owners. The survey says that 60 percent of San Francisco luxury condo owners have graduate degrees, the most of the six cities by a sizable margin. Across the bay in Emeryville, 92 percent of luxury buyers have bachelor’s degrees or higher and 33 percent have earned advanced degrees.

According to the article, the Bay Area likely has brainier residents than other places due to its concentration of tech and biotech companies, which have many positions that require highly educated workers. Another reason is the region’s top-notch colleges, with one San Francisco real estate professional citing the city’s proximity to Stanford University as a factor.

NEW GRADS NEED SIX-FIGURE SALARIES TO MAKE RENT IN SAN FRANCISCO
San Francisco’s plentiful, high-paying jobs are drawing recent college graduates from around the globe. However, these new workers may find it sobering to learn that they will need to earn three times more than the median income in order to afford San Francisco’s astronomical rents.

A recent Trulia study says that the median annual income for recent college graduates in San Francisco is $41,244, the most in the nation. But with a median monthly rent of $3,500 for a two-bedroom unit as of May, grads would actually need to pull in a yearly salary of $137,272 – also the most in the country — in order to afford to live comfortably. According to the company, 3.9 percent of rental properties in San Francisco are affordable to new grads, who need to take on an average of 2.3 housemates to meet the monthly payments.

Oakland also ranked among the top 10 markets where new grads require the largest yearly incomes: $76,971 to afford the $1,963 monthly rent. A recent Oakland grad can expect to earn $27,841 per year after earning his or her degree. Trulia says that just 0.8 percent of Oakland units are affordable for new grads, who would need to find 1.7 housemates.

Trulia concludes that “The lesson here for recent grads is that although it may be tempting to seek out metros with the highest wages, doing so may not necessarily lead to a better quality of life because these metros also have high rents.”

BAY AREA RESIDENTS CAN SAVE BIG BUCKS BY BUYING A HOME NOW
Bay Area residents who are tired of paying the aforementioned high rents and are considering buying might be surprised to learn how much money they can save by acting now while interest rates remain low.

Citing data from Realtor.com, a Bloomberg article estimates that San Jose buyers who can get in the market today will save almost $62,000 more than they would if they waited another year to purchase a home. The publication projects that San Francisco residents will save nearly $300,000 over the course of 30 years by purchasing a property instead of renting one.

Realtor.com Chief Economist Jonathan Smoke told Bloomberg that it was no surprise that high-priced markets such as the Bay Area offered the greatest long-term financial reward, but he noted that a median-income household in San Jose could currently afford less than 10 percent of homes for sale.

U.S. PENDING HOME SALES HIGHEST SINCE 2006
Demand for real estate across the country remained strong during the traditionally busy spring buying season this year, with U.S. pending home sales reaching their highest level in nearly a decade.

The National Association of Realtors’ Pending Home Sales Index increased to 112.4 in April, up 3.4 percent from March and 14 percent from one year ago. April marked the fourth consecutive month of pending home sales gains, and the index is now at its highest point since May 2006, when it was at 112.5.

The PHSI in the West was 103.8 in April, a month-over-month increase of 0.1 percent, up 16.4 percent from one year earlier.

(Photo: Flickr/Don McCullough)

Real Estate Roundup: San Francisco Is World’s Fastest-Appreciating Luxury Market

May 26, 2015 by Pacific Union • Posted in Weekly Real Estate News Roundups
Here’s a look at recent news of interest to homebuyers, home sellers, and the home-curious.

Homes in Sea Cliff, one of San Francisco’s high-end neighborhoods.

SAN FRANCISCO LEADS WORLD FOR ANNUAL LUXURY HOME PRICE GAINS
Demand for high-end homes in San Francisco is driving up prices, so much so that they grew more than in any other luxury market around the globe.

Citing data from the most recent Knight Frank Prime Global Cities Index, CNN reports that high-end home prices in San Francisco grew by 14.3 percent over the past year, edging out Bangalore, India, for largest annual increase in the world. San Francisco was one of three U.S. regions to crack the top 10 for appreciation, along with Miami, where prices increased by 12.2 percent, and Los Angeles, where they grew by 8 percent.

The index echoes findings from Christie’s International Real Estate’s 2015 Luxury Defined report, which ranked San Francisco as the second hottest luxury real estate market in the world.

DISTRESSED SALES IN SINGLE DIGITS IN ALL NINE BAY AREA COUNTIES
Distressed sales hovered in the single-digit range across the Bay Area in April, with two local counties claiming the lowest rates in the Golden State.

According to the California Association of Realtors’ April pending home sales and Market Pulse Survey, distressed sales accounted for 1 percent of single-family home transactions in San Mateo County last month, the fewest in the state. San Francisco County tied Santa Cruz County for the second fewest distressed sales at 2 percent. Across the rest of the Bay Area, distressed-sales rates ranged from 3 percent in Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, and Santa Clara counties to 9 percent in Solano County.

CAR says that while pending home sales in the Bay Area slipped by 6.8 percent from March, activity increased by 12 percent on an annual basis. Across the state, pending home sales fell by 0.6 percent month over month and rose 13.6 percent from April 2014.

U.S. 2015 HOUSING FORECAST IMPROVES
Freddie Mac upped its expectations for U.S. home price gains last week, though the company is not as optimistic as it was about the economy.

In its May 2015 U.S. Economic and Housing Outlook, Freddie Mac forecasts home prices to grow by 4.5 percent this year, revised from 4.0 percent in April. Having previously predicted the U.S. economy to expand by 2.6 percent in 2015, weak first-quarter data has prompted the company to instead project 2.3 percent growth. Still, Fannie Mae notes that the economy has added 5 million jobs over the past two years, and that the U.S. unemployment rate is substantially lower than it was in 2013.

In a statement accompanying the report, Freddie Mac Chief Economist Len Kiefer said that low interest rates kept affordability high in the first quarter even as income growth remained sluggish.

CALIFORNIA FAVORITE STATE FOR CHINESE INVESTORS
Chinese investors have pumped more money into California than any other state over the past 15 years, while China-based companies have contributed a significant number of jobs to the economy.

CNBC reports that Chinese investors have funneled $5.9 billion into California since 2000, the most of any U.S. state. China-based companies employ 8,300 California workers, mostly in the Bay Area and Los Angeles.

The article says that 370 Chinese companies have a presence in California, including Baidu, Huawei, and Alibaba.com.

(Photo: Flickr/Joe Ross)

San Francisco One of World’s Hottest Luxury Real Estate Markets in 2014

May 6, 2015 by Pacific Union • Posted in Market Conditions

A home in San Francisco’s Presidio Heights neighborhood.

After astounding growth in 2013, luxury property sales returned to more normal levels in San Francisco last year, although the region still ranks as one of the top-performing high-end real estate markets in the world.

In its 2015 Luxury Defined report, Christie’s International Real Estate gave San Francisco the second-highest score – 54 of a possible 100 – on its Luxury Thermometer metric, which tracks growth and demand at the top end of the global market. CIRE uses four factors to gauge a region’s luxury temperature, including annual sales growth and fewest average days on market.

In 2014, sales of $1 million homes in San Francsico grew by 19 percent on an annual basis, down from a whopping 62 percent in 2013. Pacific Union CEO Mark A. McLaughlin told CIRE that the slowdown was predictable and that the region’s high-performance economy will continue to drive growth in luxury home sales.

“The Bay Area is still experiencing a perfect storm of hot market conditions, exceptional job growth, excellent income levels, and limited supply,” McLaughlin said.

Because housing inventory in the Bay Area remains constrained, high-end homes in San Francisco leave the market quickly. According to the report, luxury homes in our region sold in an average of 71 days as of December 2014, eight days faster than a year ago and second only to Toronto.

And though San Francisco remains a pricey place to purchase a luxury property, it is still relatively affordable by global – and even national – standards. CIRE says the entry point for a luxury home in San Francisco is $3 million, compared with $5 million in New York, $6 million in London, and $8 million in Los Angeles.

Luxury buyers can also get more home for their money in the Bay Area than they can in other top international destinations, says the report, which compares listings from around the globe. For $5 million, a homebuyer in San Francisco could purchase a four-bedroom, 4,800-square-foot, single-family home with Golden Gate Bridge views. In London, $5 million buys a two-bedroom, 1,300-square-foot flat, while in New York, that money fetches a three-bedroom, 1,865-square-foot condominium on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

Last year saw an uptick of so-called “trophy home” transactions, CIRE says, with global sales of $100-million-plus homes reaching an all-time high. According to the report, five such homes around the world sold in 2014, and there have been 13 $100-million-plus sales since 2010.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, two of those 13 trophy sales happened in Silicon Valley, where mind-bogglingly expensive real estate is almost a given. In 2011, a single-family home in Los Altos Hills found a buyer for $100 million, while a home in Woodside sold for $117.5 million the following year.

(Photo: Flickr/Allan Ferguson)

Articles and photos sourced from: www.pacificunion.com 

Luxury Home Sales Are Way Up, Most Purchased With All Cash

Although the number of homes sold so far this year in San Francisco is down by nearly 2% from the same time last year, there has been a huge jump in the number of super-luxury homes sold. New research from real estate website Redfin examined sales figures for the city's most expensive 1% of homes. 72.2% more of these super high-end properties have sold through April 2014 than had sold through the same time period in 2013. To make it into the top 1% of the San Francisco market, homes must be priced at $5.35 million or more, the highest price for any of the 29 metro areas examined in the study. In San Francisco, 55.7% of those extremely high-end home sales have been all-cash transactions. 

For those buyers who don't pay all cash, Redfin determined that it would take an annual income of at least $916,000 to afford a home in the top 1% of San Francisco's market. The monthly mortgage payment on a $5.35 million house, assuming a 20% down payment, would be a whopping $21,369. The neighborhoods with the highest average price for top 1% homes so far this year are, unsurprisingly, Presidio Heights, Pacific Heights, Russian Hill and the Marina. All of those neighborhoods made it into the top twenty most expensive luxury neighborhoods in all of the markets examined by Redfin. 

California Luxury Buyers Far Prefer Hilltop Views to Oceanfront Homes

Luxury homebuyers in California love hilltop views. An oceanfront home? Not so much.
Forty-one percent of buyers who purchased luxury homes in the state last year opted for a property with a hilltop view, according to a survey by the California Association of Realtors, which defines a luxury home as one costing $1 million or more. Just 10 percent bought an oceanfront home.
In fact, hilltop homes were so popular that they bested oceanfront homes and ocean-view homes combined (38 percent).
Sixteen percent of buyers in 2013 picked up luxury homes located near golf courses, followed by those in mountain areas (12 percent), resort areas (9 percent), lakefront (4 percent), and ski resorts (1 percent).
Most homes sold for $1 million to $2 million (76 percent), with 13 percent priced from $2 million to $3 million, 6 percent from $3 million to $5 million, and 3 percent from $5 million to $10 million.
Luxury buyers had a median income of $350,000, according to the survey, and a median age of 53. Seventy-one percent were Caucasian, 74 percent had a college degree, and 48 percent were single.
One-quarter of luxury buyers cited the desire for a larger home as the main reason for their purchase, while 20 percent said they wanted to upgrade their location.
The survey found that 35 percent of luxury buyers paid cash for their property, compared with 27 percent of traditional buyers and 11 percent of first-time buyers.
Because luxury buyers are likely to have larger incomes, they were also able to make average down payments of 30 percent — 5 percent higher than traditional buyers. Nearly 56 percent of luxury buyers financed their down payments via personal savings, while about 28 percent used proceeds from an investment.
In the Bay Area, luxury-home sales have jumped dramatically over the past year — up an average 27 percent from the first quarter of 2013 to the first quarter of 2014 in Pacific Union’s nine Northern California regions.

By the way, luxury buyers’ love of views was confirmed in another recent survey mentioned on Pacific Union’s blog. That Realtor.com survey found that 44 percent of buyers consider the home’s views of mountains, oceans, or cityscapes to be the second most important feature when considering a luxury purchase. The most important feature, at 54 percent, was a chef’s kitchen. 


(Image: Flickr/Sonny Abesamis)