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Is Your Home Kindling for Wildfires in Napa or California?

Is Your Home Kindling for Wildfires in Napa or California?

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How do most homes ignite during a wildfire?

A floating ember or piece of burning wood touches down on a roof, gutter, in a vent, under a deck, or on a porch and ignites leaves and debris, says the National Fire Protection Association. Or else, a surface fire simply takes the fast lane to your home via dry vegetation.

With that in mind, fortify your home like the castle it is with these 14 wildfire-repelling steps. But keep in mind that no product or technique is a failsafe against a raging fire.

Keep the Basics Handy

1. If you don’t already have working smoke detectors or haven’t tested the batteries recently, make that your No. 1 job. Now.

2. Have an easily accessible bucket, shovel (to dig a trench to protect against encroaching ground fire), and connected garden hose to help you defend the area around your home, plus one or two working fire extinguishers.

Remove Debris

3. Keep gutters, porches, and the lawn free of debris, leaves, and fallen branches. If a fire threat is imminent, remove furniture and decorations from decks and porches, including welcome mats.

Landscape Against Flammability

4. Invest in rain barrels to capture rainwater you can use to help douse flames.

5. Use water from your rain barrel or installed sprinklers to keep plants well-irrigated and green. Green plant materials are less likely to catch fire from embers, says NFPA’s Michele Steinberg. Plant fire-resistant plants and shrubs, like irises, rhododendrons, hostas, and lilacs, which have high-moisture content. Your local Cooperative Extension Office can advise you on appropriate species for your area.

6. Remove tree branches lower than 6 feet — fires tend to start low and rise. For that reason, don’t plant shrubs directly under trees; they can combust and cause the fire to rise up the tree. By the way, spacing out all plants and shrubs is a good practice, too.

7. Remove tree limbs that extend within 10 feet of any chimney opening.

Set Up a Protective Perimeter

8. Create a 100-foot perimeter around your home, free of dry leaves, grass, and shrubs that fuel wildfires. Keep petroleum tanks, cars, and woodpiles outside of this safe zone.

9. Rethink your love of wood mulch, or at least don’t spread it directly against the house. Instead, lay a six-inch swath of decorative rocks closest to the home and then use mulch from there. This also helps repel insects, like termites, (bugs like wood) and facilitate rain water drainage.

10. If you have wood fencing around your home, replace any three-foot sections that attach to the home with metal or other nonflammable fencing material. A metal gate or decorative fencing piece is stylish as well as fire-unfriendly.

Shore Up Home Systems

If major home systems are due for replacement, it’s an opportunity to choose materials that do as best a job as possible fending off fire.

11. Cover chimneys and vents with flame-retardant mesh, available for a few dollars from hardware or home improvement stores.

12. Windows should be double-paned or tempered glass, if possible. Such models resist cracking, which could allow embers and flames into your home. Wood frame windows are also more vulnerable to fire, but replacing them with vinyl can be pricey. The “2015 Remodeling Impact Report” from the NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF REALTORS® estimates the national median cost of replacing all wood windows on an average 2,450-square-foot house with their vinyl equivalents at $15,000, of which you’ll recover about 80% of that cost at resale.

13. Wood shingle roofs are the most flammable, but most roofs are made of materials like asphalt, metal, tile, stone, or other fire-resistant materials that provide good protection as long as they’re in good repair. Some metal roofing materials are very attractive. Although they’re much more expensive than asphalt, they can last as long as 50 years.

Some experts recommend spraying homes with fire retardants, which can range from a few hundred to a few thousand dollars, depending on the product, region, and size of the project. But recent reports and studies have questioned the efficacy and raised possible health issues, particularly about the chemicals used in flame-retardant fabrics. Although you might have less exposure to chemicals used on your home’s exterior than those inside, toxicity issues could still be a factor.

14. Fire-resistant or non-combustible sidings like stucco or brick provides the best protection against fire. Make sure your siding, whatever type, is in good repair because if the plywood or insulation are exposed, the home is more vulnerable to flames.

Most importantly, if a wildfire is on its way, evacuate. And have an evacuation plan worked out with your family before the worst case scenario.

#ThomasRayAgent – Pacific Palisades and Santa Monica Agent

Palm Springs Tiny House Real Estate prices are super affordable

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One of the more popular franchises on HGTV is the “Tiny House” programming block, which has grown to include four different shows all devoted to the notion that living small doesn’t mean you have to make design sacrifices.

Locally, the 1960s-era Palm Canyon Mobile Club has taken this mantra to heart and given it a distinctly Palm Springs spin. Ravinia Communities, which owns multiple mobile home parks across the country, has acquired the community and is planning to add approximately 100 new “micro homes.Palm Springs Tiny House Real Estate prices are super affordable

Search Vacation Homes in Palm Springs

Although they’ve never done anything like this previously, they were open to thinking outside the box and thought it would be beneficial to provide this unique housing product not currently available in Palm Springs.” 1/4 Five of the new micro homes are currently on site and an additional six will join them by early July. Five of the 11 micro homes are approximately 600 square feet with one bedroom and one bath, while the others are two-bedroom, two-bath floor plans with approximately 800 square feet.

The homes don’t feel small when you’re inside them. The abundant use of windows with glass
sliders that open to the outside, plus clerestory windows and the nine-foot-high ceilings, make the homes feel light and bright—much larger then their actual footprint. I also love how efficient the design of the floor plan is. Even though it’s small, there’s great separation from living areas and the bedroom area with no wasted space.

Placing the micro homes on a traditional double wide lot allows for a large private outdoor
space.  Clerestory windows and nine-foot-high ceilings make the homes feel light and bright. Shown here is the interior of a one-bedroom residence.  The kitchens include such features as solid surface countertops (Corian or quartz, depending on the plan), Shaker-style cabinetry, and stainless steel appliances—a full-size cooktop range, built-in microwave rangehood, multi-cycle dishwasher, and double-door refrigerator. 3/4 Silvercrest, a Corona-based company located about an hour from Palm Springs, is building the micro homes. They’re one of the biggest manufactured home builders in Southern California [and] they were willing to work with us to customize the homes the way we wanted. I designed the floor plans, working with Silvercrest, using their available finishes, plus mass produced building elements, and incorporated that into our final design. We also worked with H3K, a local design firm, on the interior design finishes and the exterior improvements.

The homes are built in [the Silvercrest] factory, using similar construction materials as a stick-built home and are built to Department of Housing and Urban Development housing standards.
The one bedroom homes start at $126,000 and include a front porch, covered carport, private fenced yard, plus two balcony-sized decks off the bedroom and living room. The two bedroom houses are laid out similar to the one bedroom, except that an additional bedroom and bathroom have replaced the front porch. The two bedroom homes, with a double tandem carport, are currently available for $150,000. All of the houses have private, gated backyards.

The master bathrooms include a large walk-in shower with a glass enclosure.  Some of the homes will feature upgraded finishes such as tile flooring, quartz kitchen countertops, tile shower enclosures, [and] mirrored wardrobes, to name a few. They also include larger decks. Currently, the one bedroom model home, which has all the upgrades, is priced at $170,000. An upgraded two bedroom will be
listed at $190,000.

Ravinia is updating the electrical infrastructure for the entire park and renovating the private clubhouse, which will include a workout room. The community pool, spa, and barbecue areas are also being renovated and a new dog park with a separate area for smaller dogs is currently under construction. Call me for Tiny Homes or a Tiny House in California

MAX OUT your Home Value before you sell in Santa Monica CA

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Doing repairs, building a deck, improving your yard are the best ways to increase the value of your home before you list it. You’ve been spending so much time on projects inside your home (like that new shower you have to drag yourself out of), that your front yard is starting to scream for a bit of attention.

MAX OUT your Home Value before you sell in Santa Monica CA

Poor neglected, thing.You know your yard has some super curb appeal potential, but where to begin?
Below are four projects with so much curb-appeal juice, any money you invest in them is likely to pay you back much more.
#1 Add or Replace a Few Design Basics
Every few years, you overhaul your closet, replacing your worn-out basics with a few new pieces to ramp up your wardrobe. Why not do the same with your yard? Give it a basic makeover so it has some good, classic, value-boosting “bones” to build upon.
Landscape design basics like:
• A winding flagstone walkway
• A couple of stone planters (6 feet by 2 feet)
• A few flowering shrubs
• A deciduous tree about 15 feet tall
• Quality mulch
Why you can’t go wrong: The median cost for this makeover is $4,750. But the recoup (how much more your house would sell for after doing this project) is $5,000! Pretty sweet, right?
#2 Add Color and Texture in the Right Places
Experts call it “softscaping.” But basically, it’s adding plants in a designed, intentional way that makes your yard interesting to look at year-round.
It’s a great project if your yard is already in pretty good shape with some basic design elements mentioned above.
A typical softscaping project includes:
• Five trees
• 25 shrubs
• 60 perennials
• Natural edging
• Boulder accents
Why you can’t go wrong: You’ll invest about $7,000, but you could recoup every cent in home value, according to the Report. Plus, here’s what the report doesn’t include: You’ll get super energy savings.
Who doesn’t love lower utility bills?
Just three trees in the right location can save up to $250 a year in heating and cooling costs, says the source for energy-saving stats: the U.S. Department of Energy.
Shade trees help boost curb appeal
#3 Build a Deck or Patio if You Don’t Have One
If you’re spending sunny days admiring the great outdoors from indoors, it’s time for a change to get you outside… like finally building that deck or patio you’ve been dreaming of.
Why you can’t go wrong: A patio costs about $6,400 and recoups 102%. A wood deck will cost $9,450 with a slightly higher recoup of 106%. Plus, how can you put a price on all those evening cookouts and Sunday brunches al fresco?
#4 Heap Loads of Love on Your Lawn
Yep, you read that right. Especially if you know you’re going to sell in the next year or so.
It’s the easiest project to do — and it has a whopping ROI of 303%!
Lawn maintenance is simple:
• Fertilize
• Aerate
• Weed
• Rake
Why you can’t go wrong: It’s the cheapest project to do with an annual cost of only $330. Every year, you’ll reap the benefits of a lush, barefoot-friendly lawn.
(But note that unlike the other landscaping features listed in this article — deck, patio, hardscaping, trees, etc. — you’ll only get that fabulous 303% ROI on your maintenance costs for the year right before you sell. That’s because lawn maintenance has to be repeated annually, unlike the other projects).

 

Palm Springs CA being found by First Time Buyers

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Go Here: Palm Springs MLS Search – Vacation Homes!

News flash: Palm Springs is hip again! Once a destination for Hollywood elites like Frank Sinatra and the Rat Pack, the community is now host to 20- and 30-somethings priced out of Los Angeles. Perhaps taken in by the allure of the hip Stagecoach and Coachella music festivals, the first-time buyers are bringing notable city brands — including an L.A. brokerage — to the area with them.

There were so many Angelenos looking to buy in the area in the last two years that Beverly Hills brokerage firm the Agency opened a satellite office in town to help their L.A. clients find their dream home out east, said Eric Lavey, a partner at the firm.

“The desert is not the same as it was five years ago. Everything has really changed — in a positive way,” said Lavey, who’s one of 10 brokers on the Palm Springs team that opened up shop there eight months ago.

Numbers show that property values are rising in the area. The median home price in Palm Springs last year was $555,000, an almost 26 percent increase compared to 2013 and a 5.7 percent increase over 2015, according to Desert Real Estate.

Developers are scrambling to create supply for the new buyers. Several residential projects are underway; they include the 110-home hillside enclave Desert Palisades currently under construction and the 24 modern residences of Sunia Homes, which recently broke ground. On the commercial side, downtown will get a reboot, with the planned opening of the 154-room Rowan by Kimpton Hotels this year and Hyatt Hotel’s 150-room Andaz property in 2018.

Hamptons of the West

Like any resort town, the city has weathered sharp downturns.

Richard von Ernst, a partner at real estate firm Partners Trust, recalled the first time he visited Palm Springs in the early 1990s.

“In a way, it was God’s waiting room,” Ernst said. “North Palm Canyon is really hip with lots of cool new stores, [but] half those storefronts were empty back then. It was like a ghost town.”

Paul Kaplan, CEO of an eponymously named Palm Springs brokerage firm, said that during the Great Recession, those seeking investment properties were concerned about what the plummeting prices meant for the value of the properties they were considering. A sales strategy evolved from there. Agents suggested that the potential buyers could make money by renting the homes out to vacationers, Kaplan said. As services such as Airbnb became more popular in 2012, second-home sales also picked up.

These days, renters in trendy neighborhoods like Santa Monica and Silver Lake who can’t afford to buy a home locally will continue to rent in L.A. and make their first home purchases in Palm Springs, Kaplan said. “We’re starting to be like a bedroom community to Los Angeles,” he added.

It’s a trend von Ernst has noticed with his clients as well. “It’s a combination of an investment and a place to get away,” he said. “The demographics have changed. There’s a much younger crowd, and if they can afford to buy, they will.”

Lavey also noted the stark contrast between the current buyers and those from 10 years ago — increasingly, clients in their 30s are contacting him to purchase property.

“It is the West Coast Hamptons,” he said. “It’s not crazy expensive like the Hamptons, where you get the $100 million houses. You have a lot of luxury, but nothing [here] is off-the-charts obnoxiously expensive.”

Airbnb impact

While the housing market is going strong, some residents are irked by their part-time neighbors, since buyers are increasingly renting out their newly purchased property using Airbnb and similar services.

It’s become such a point of contention that in March, a local group called Protect Our Neighborhoods Palm Springs filed a lawsuit against the city to prevent it from handing out additional vacation rental permits.

But the city approved a vacation rental ordinance just two days after the lawsuit was filed. The new ordinance allows vacation homes to be rented up to 36 times a year if four of those rentals are not in the summer. Otherwise, the cap would be 32 rentals per year. New owners will be allowed to operate only one vacation rental permit. Existing owners of multiple properties were grandfathered in and can keep their permits.


Mark Owens, spokesperson for Protect Our Neighborhoods, said the community of 52 single-family homes where he lives has 13 or 14 permitted for use as vacation rentals, and one is located behind his home.

“Their pool is 15 feet from my bedroom,” Owens said. “And they could have 12 people in a house. So, to have 12 people next door is going to change the face of your neighborhood and not for the better.”

Owens said residents aren’t opposed to its part-time neighbors but simply want to preserve the community’s charm.

“It’s not like we don’t love tourists,” said Owens, who moved to Palm Springs more than two years ago from Atlanta. “We’re built on it, but we feel like part of this city should be for the neighbors. The people that lived here have really kept the lifestyle — it’s the reason people come out [to visit], and we’re very protective of those things.”

Lavey points out that vacation rentals also increased because of the lack of upscale, boutique hotels. Before purchasing a home for himself in Palm Springs five years ago, he recalls having only a handful of options, like the Colony.

But several boutique hotels are now in the pipeline and will join a number of trendy properties in town, including the Ace Hotel and Saguaro Palm Springs.

Peter Stamberg, partner at New York design firm Stamberg Aferiat + Associates, said the city has come a long way from when his firm began designing the colorful Saguaro Palm Springs in October 2011. Today, the property is a popular spot for Instagrammers to capture in their feeds.

Stamberg recalls the argument that broke out when his firm first presented its design plans to the city.

“It was crazy,” Stamberg said. “One woman said she was going to [drive her car] into it.”

Once the hotel was built, it helped revitalize the area by bringing in a younger demographic. A year after the hotel opened, many residents who opposed the project, including a City Council member who voted against the development, admitted their mistake in not supporting the project, Stamberg said.

The designer also noted that Palm Springs has come a long way from its roots as a fairly drab retirement community.

“If you saw color anywhere, you were shocked,” Stamberg said, describing his visits prior to the hotel’s opening in February 2012. “Now, people have painted their front doors and none of that was there before.”

Paul Aferiat, also a partner at Stamberg Aferiat + Associates, said that he and Stamberg visited the city in February to speak on a panel at Modernism Week and were surprised by the changes.

“The energy of the city is completely different,” Aferiat said. “What really blew us away was the amount of new buildings. We all wish we had had the wisdom to buy a little bungalow.”

Von Ernst, who has owned several properties in the area, said he purchased his first home in Palm Springs in 1997 for about $218,000, then sold the 2,800-square-foot property the following year after the value more than doubled thanks to the sudden popularity of mid-century homes.

]“The last time I checked, it sold for a little over a million,” he said. “Hindsight is 20/20, I would’ve bought as many as I could.”

Tags: #ThomasRayAgent, #PalmSpringsListings
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