Tuesday, October 23, 2007 at 07:57AM
San Diego Fire II
SD COUNTY NOON UPDATE:
241,000 acres burned
1,250 homes destroyed
Over 500,000 people evacuated
2 deaths
Approx 50 injuries
40 aircraft working the fire
23 shelters open
People allowed to go back to their homes in Scripps Ranch, Del Mar (west of freeway), and in the south part of Poway.
Mandatory evacuations still exist for Fallbrook, De Luz, Rainbow, Rancho Bernardo, Rancho Santa Fe, Fairbanks Ranch, Olivenhain, South Escondido, Chula Vista and North Poway.
A "recovery director" has been appointed, federal and state assistance is ordered, and FEMA is on the way. I'm not sure if that makes me feel better.
The City of San Diego will have on their website the addresses of the homes lost in Rancho Bernardo after 2pm today: www.sandiego.gov
All San Diego schools will be closed on Wednesday. All SD Catholic schools closed for the rest of the week.
1:07pm - Harmony Grove's 1,095 households have been notified by the 'reverse-911' to evacuate. That must mean that the RSF fire is burning north, and/or the South Escondido fire is burning northwest.
The Poomacho Fire that started this morning at the base of Palomar Mountain is already up to 20,000 acres. The north part of Valley Center has been evacuated as a result. There is a big concern about this fire and the Witch fire meeting later today, creating a super-fire. They described it as the same effect as when two locomotives collide head-on, and it can have catastrophic results. This could happen somewhere around west Escondido/Harmony Grove area.
Julian has also received a mandatory evacuation notice. There is also a report of homes that have burned on the edge of Fairbanks Ranch.
Here is a blog featuring pictures of Rancho Santa Fe:
http://rsffirenews.blogspot.com/
***************************************************************
The Witch Fire is into Rancho Santa Fe, Channel 8 is reporting the following houses have burned:
7499 Vista Rancho (in the Summit)
16439 El Sicomoro
6125,6129 & 6131 Camino Selva
7026 Via Monalex
16843 Via de Santa Fe
16807 & 16827 Via de la Valle
16501, 16526, 16555, 16583, 16655, 16729, & 16755 Zumaque
16910 & 16924 Avenida Luis
17122 El Mirador
17116 El Vuelo
7035 Las Colinas
These are all on the east side of Rancho Santa Fe, and everywhere between Olivenhain and Del Mar Heights in on alert.
On the north side of RSF it's being reported that the Bridges is threatened, but no houses burning yet.
The RSF Fire Protection District is reporting that 4,400 acres have burned, and 35 structures lost.
In Fallbrook, the Rice fire has burned 1,500 acres, and has turned east, moving towards De Luz Road. Another fire broke out around 3am near Palomar Mountain, and had consumed 200 acres - Valley Center Rd. has been closed and the north side of Valley Center has been issued a evacuation notice. The I-15 freeway is open though.
The rest of North County appears to be OK (there is NO wind at my house) except for the smoke, this picture was taken at 8am:
You'll hear comparisons to the 2003 Cedar Fire, which burned 280,000 acres and 2,232 homes, and caused 15 deaths. During the Cedar Fire there were 50,000 people evacuated, this time over 300,000 people have been evacuated and only one death, which happened on the first day. Currently the totals are around 175,000 acres burned and 1,000 houses lost. There have been 20 people injured, including 5 firefighters.
Jim the Realtor
14 Comments
View Printer Friendly Version
Email Article to Friend
Reader Comments (14)
JtR: Good to hear you're OK. I grew up in SoCal, and fires like this were and are a recurring event. We (the collective "we") have very short term memories when it comes to building highly combustable homes in known-to-be-eventual fire paths.
Keep your head down Jim. The total of houses burned for SD county is offically over 1000 this morning.
Right after the fire started I started reading things about the impact of the fire on San Diego housing market.
So what does this mean to homeowners/banks?
1. Lets say the house price has appreciated from the original price, do most owners increase their insurance to track the increase. Or is it more common for the owners to keep the insurance unchanged, which will result in the owner suddenly loosing most of the equity increase due to the fire.
Even though our property value supposedly increase (in paper J), we never increased the insurance value.
2. Assuming there was equity increase and owners pulled the equity out, does the insurance get increased with each refinance to cover the new mortgage cost at least.
3. If the insurance was increased, but house prices have dropped, do the insurance company payoff the full loan balance.
4. Do you know whether most borrowers would have kept up with their insurance payments, if they were in foreclosure (not yet bank owned)?
5. Do banks keep up with insurance payments when the get the properties.
Peter Pan,
Insurance only covers replacement costs. Since most of the value in SD homes is in the land, it won't be too much affected.
People have a choice to rebuild or pay off the note, sell the land, and leave. I knew a number of people from scripps who just took off to a less combustible area (Arizona) in 2003 after the payout.
There are 2 effects:
1. Reduced housing stock can increase the value
2. People's value of homes based on a discounted model tends to over-react to natural disasters. Earthquakes and fires tend to make houses worth less than before, even with the restricted supply. People just don't want to take the risk of losing personal posessions (even if insurance takes care of the structure, you can't get your grandkids' pictures back)
all in all, tragic for those involved... all of SD county.
Jim, thanks for your reasoned analysis. I am home right now, waiting for the reverse 9-1-1 call. I am sick that on some of the housing blogs, people are celebrating what's happening here. A lot of us in danger are not greedy FBs, did not HELOC, did not pay inflated prices, went to high school here, have lived here almost all our lives. We are still just normal people, scared, our little pathetic suitcases, pet cages, pet food, kids' toys all at the ready at the front door.
What does it mean to payoff the note, sell the land and leave?
If you are upside down on a loan, guess rebuilding would be out of the question.
As in the insurance pays of any remaining loan balances? or you have to sell the land and they will cover the difference?
I have rarely thought about fire insurance and what it really means. I just bought the insurance, asked what was covered and was happy.
I guess there may be some who may be happy, but this really is a tragic thing. If my place burned, there is so much (things that can not be measured in dollars) that will be lost. I don't think I want my family to go through the scare...
We were living close to Ventura fires in 2003. We were 10 miles or so away, but our apartment was covered in ashes. We were watching the fire and trying to figure out what we should take if we had to evacuate.
Question:
How well does the reverse 9-1-1 call work for phone lines from Cable companies .. does this only work for traditional land lines?
Any idea ...
Sad some people are celebrating what's happening. They need to get a life.
In the remote chance that my posts sounds like I am celebrating the destruction. In case my questions above gave such an impression....
I lived through earthquakes and fires in California. I had friends who lost their houses etc.
I was lucky enough to loose little through such events.
Even though I have never lost anything from wild fires .. I migrated to the US from a country plagued by bombs and landmines .. so I am not at all celebrating the destruction....
This whole thing has got me thinking about what the hell do I know about my own home insurance .. and what happens if we get hit by some thing like that.
Chuck is right, the insurance amount has nothing to do with the mortgage amount. The insurance companies normally provide a policy that uses the verbiage, "Guaranteed Replacement", which means they will rebuilt the house based on their book value. They have a standard $/sf they use to determine the amounts, but if there are shortages, they are supposed to cover them.
The owners are still liable for mortgage payments, and I'm sure there will be many who have loan amounts higher than the cost of replacement.
If you were already thinking about letting the house go back to the bank, once it burns down that's probably decide it for you.
There will be some classic battles coming between insurance and mortgage companies.
Can you see it? The mortgage companies will want the insurance company to hurry up and rebuild something so they can sell it.
I can feel a bulk purchase of burned-up foreclosed lots coming.....
This will be a nice boost for the construction trade, except it'll take 6-12 months before actual building begins. (in spite of the fanfare around the planning departments' commitment to 'streamline the process')
Had a surreal business dinner last night at a fancy restaurant in La Jolla, overlooking the ocean. I expected the place would be empty, but there were quite a few people inside. Titanic-like atmosphere, with crab and lobster, and smoke slowly pouring in. Kept asking the waiter for news, and he would come over to our table and whisper "not good news, sir, I'm afraid, not at all".
link to a map of most of he houses that burned in poway.
Link
We got mentioned on msnbc, scroll to "san diego real estate blog":
link to msnbc article
Jim, Thanks for the updates. SD fires aren't getting very strong coverage in O.C. by our LA based tv stations