Shelli's & Susan's Guide to Portland

Let us Help You Find a Home and a Neighborhood

Welcome to our website about the Portland, Oregon, metropolitan area. It's our way of helping you become acquainted with the neighborhoods and communities of the Portland metro area and to inform you about the Portland area housing market. Your comments and suggestions about the website are always welcome. 

If you have questions or if you're interested in buying or selling a home in the Portland area, contact us online or call Susan at (503) 497-2984 or Shelli at (503) 497-5061.

Susan Marthens —  Principal Real Estate Broker/CRS GRI
Shelli Gowdy — Real Estate Broker

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New Listings in the City of Portland

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New Listings by Area in the City of Portland

New Listings in Northwest Portland  ♦  New Listings in Southwest Portland 
 New Listings in Southeast Portland
New Listings in Northeast Portland  ♦  New Listings in North Portland 

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New Listings by Community in the Portland Metro Area

New Listings in Beaverton
New Listings in Lake Oswego  ♦  New Listings in Sherwood
 New Listings in Tigard   ♦  New Listings in Tualatin   ♦  New Listings in West Linn

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Homes

Better than a granny shack in the garden: See the ADU plans

16 July 2015 — Ann Wilson's new second house in her Southeast Portland backyard is no granny shack. It's cool, modern and two stories of blue siding that, just like a Mondrian painting, plays with simple geometric shapes. At a generous 800 square feet, it's also more than a kid's playhouse. It's perfect for guests, office space and a host of other ways an owner can use an accessory dwelling unit (ADU), the name given to an additional, smaller home sharing a city lot with an exiting house. Her main house, a 1940s Cape Cod, steered the style of the little house. The City of Portland requires that a second home on a lot match the existing house's roof pitch, window proportions and siding material. (See dozens of other examples of ADUs in Portland.)  Read more…

Portland metro home prices June 2015:  Prices continue to rise and inventory falls

15 July 2015 — Portland continued to see strong real estate activity this June. Closed sales, at 3,302 for the month, showed an increase of 26.2% over the 2,617 closings posted in June 2014 and a 12.2% increase over the 2,942 closings posted just last month. The last time the region had this strong of a June was in 2006, when 3,352 transactions closed for the month  Prices continue to rise in 2015 compared to 2014. Comparing each year through June, the average sale price rose 5.8% from $328,900 to $347,900. In the same comparison, the median sale price rose 7.1% from $280,000 to $300,000.  Read more…

Homebuilders as confident in business prospects as in 2005

16 July 2015 — U.S. homebuilders' confidence in the market for new homes is back up to levels not seen since the height of the housing boom a decade ago. The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo builder sentiment index released Thursday rose this month to 60, the highest level since November 2005. The latest reading is unchanged from May, which was revised upward one point from 59. July's reading is up from 53 a year ago. Readings above 50 indicate more builders view sales conditions as good, rather than poor.  Read more…

News

Oregon fruit growers show concern about early bloom

18 July 2015 — This weekend, Hood River County will host its annual Cherry Celebration Weekend. That’s great news for cherry lovers, but if you were hoping to hit the U-Pick, don’t get too excited; Farmers warn that the guest of honor will be notably absent from local boughs. Cherry trees throughout the region bore fruit nearly a month ahead of schedule this season, and most have already been picked and packed. Craig Mallon, quality control manager at Duckwall Fruit Company, says that the crop has been lighter than average. “What that means for growers is that there is just not enough time to market all the cherries,” Mallon said.  Read more…

Other cities deep into Vision Zero work

18 July 2015 — Portland doesn’t yet have a formal Vision Zero plan — a yet-to-be-named task force will produce that by next summer, in conjunction with a public process. Still, the Portland Bureau of Transportation is rolling out a number of bike- and pedestrian-safety projects this summer that have already been in the pipeline. The efforts in the Lloyd District and East Portland — including paving, crossing improvements, widening of bike lanes and installing “rapid flash beacons” in targeted areas — will help kick off the city’s new commitment toward the Vision Zero initiative.  Read more…

Drought prompts ODFW to restrict fishing on Clackamas, Willamette rivers

18 July 2015 — The Oregon Department of Fish and Wildlife has curtailed fishing hours on most of Oregon’s rivers to avoid additional stress on native fish already suffering from high water temperatures and low stream flows from this year’s drought. Effective Saturday, July 18, and until further notice, all waterbodies defined as streams are closed to fishing for trout, salmon, steelhead and sturgeon from 2 p.m. to one hour before sunrise. Angling for these species will be prohibited at all times in the Willamette River downstream of Willamette Falls, including the Clackamas River up to the Interstate 205 Bridge, the Multnomah Channel and the Gilbert River.  Read more…

Be prepared for, not scared of the 'real big one'

18 July 2015 — The New Yorker article “The Really Big One” triggered a wave of emotional reactions across our region. Or, see your social media feed flooding with that same article being shared by a number of concerned out-of-town relatives. The feature accomplished a feat of great journalism: It started (or re-started) an important conversation. Now the Oregon Office of Emergency Management wants Oregonians to seize the moment. “We want Oregonians to be prepared not scared,” said OEM Director Andrew Phelps in a statement Friday. “What we do now to prepare will save lives and property during any disaster.” Phelps and other disaster managers are pushing that point because the Cascadia Subduction Zone Earthquake is not the apocalypse. Most of us will live through it when it happens. But what our lives look like afterward as we begin to rebuild — or how much we will need to rebuild — depends on what we do now.  Read more…

Linus Torvalds goes airborne at Oregon International Air Show

18 July 2015 — Linux creator Linus Torvalds, who lives in Dunthorpe, was among those going aloft this at the annual Oregon International Air Show. "I was actually expecting it to be slightly more pukey," Torvalds grinned as he stepped out a fighter jet. This year's air show has a tech flavor, since Intel is a title sponsor (Intel has a large software group that works closely with Torvalds on additions to the Linux open source computer operating system.) "This was cool," Torvalds said, "but not pukey." Check out Torvalds' video below, and don't miss video from inside the cockpit as The Oregonian's Luke Hammill fights to keep his stomach in check as he takes an acrobatic tour over Washington County.  Read more…

TreeHug PDX returns to prove Portland is the greenest city

18 July 2015 — After organizers challenged Portland to prove that it is more green and “tree hug" oriented than Seattle or Vancouver, TreeHug PDX brings back the third annual tree hugging event on Saturday, July 18. Everyone is invited to attend the tree hug event at Hoyt Arboretum where there will be live music, bucket truck rides, a climbing wall, and games in addition to the actual tree hug. TreeHug PDX is an event that focuses on conserving forest life and educating individuals about nature. The event is created and ran by people from nonprofit organizations such as Treecology, Hoyt Arboretum Friends, Portland Parks & Recreation, Urban Forestry, City of Portland Bureau of Environmental Services, and Friends of Trees and Ascending Giants.  Read more…