Coastal Currents · Archive
Past issues.
A monthly read on what's actually happening in coastal South Orange County real estate. Real numbers, the streets I'm watching, and the deals moving from San Clemente to San Diego.
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We slept in a van.
A weekend in Yosemite with two little kids, and why the hard parts stop being scary with the right people beside you. Hurricane Marie's swell red tagged seven homes on Beach Road in Capistrano Beach. San Clemente's August sold at 97.3 percent of asking in 17 days: softer than July, still tighter than last August. Plus cheap money, brutal terms.
Read this issue →Quick pause from real estate.
A birthday and book signing at the Petrol Club in North Beach, then six numbers on San Clemente. Homes priced at what the market pays sold in about ten days, slightly above asking, while 44 percent of everything still listed has already cut its price. And what a year of waiting on rates actually bought.
Read this issue →A home that earns its keep.
The honest answer to "will we ever be able to buy here." It is not the white-picket single-family home you pictured, it is a home that pays part of its own way. Because you live in it, it counts as your primary residence, which opens loans that get you in for far less than the 20 percent everyone assumes. Plus the Beach Trail reopening timeline.
Read this issue →Six months to ten weeks: the Dana Point shift.
A year ago, Dana Point was clearing inventory in about six months. This spring it is closer to ten weeks, and homes under $5M are closing at list in under two weeks. That is the steepest one-year shift of any coastal town in the South OC peer set. Featured area: Dana Point.
Read this issue →Peak spring, and pricing discipline is deciding everything.
Homes priced aggressively and correctly from day one are moving fast, while anything on the high side of its range is sitting. San Clemente closed March at a median of 11 days on market against 38 for Orange County overall. The difference is not demand, it is pricing. Featured area: San Clemente.
Read this issue →March closed strong. Here's what that tells us about April.
South Orange County led OC on closed sales in March, with San Clemente and Dana Point pacing the coastal peer set. Featured area: Capistrano Beach, the small unincorporated stretch between the SC pier and Doheny.
Read this issue →Spring is opening with a different tone than last year.
February closed faster than expected. The spring buyer pool is forming earlier this year, with sharper criteria. Featured area: Dana Point, the harbor town anchored by Doheny, Salt Creek, and the Headlands.
Read this issue →What I'm watching as the 2026 market opens.
After a slow December, January numbers came in. The pattern that defined the back half of last year still holds: pricing discipline is the difference between a quiet listing and a competitive one. Featured area: San Clemente.
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A new issue every month. The market read, the streets I'm watching, and what's moving across coastal South Orange County.
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