Large Cupertino view home now available!   10387 Amistad Court, Cupertino California

Fabulous 5 bed + den, 4 bath home with lovely valley views from several rooms!  Room to accommodate two or more generations or live in help if so desired.  Lower level includes 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and bonus room or retreat.  Upstairs are the main living areas (living, dining, family, kitchen, nook), master bedroom suite, one more bedroom and a large den or office.  Living room, office, balcony and master all enjoy views.  Good sized, private yard.  Located on quiet cul de sac in lower foothills, a very easy drive.  Best schools, including Monta Vista High School!

Please enjoy a slideshow of this fine home, and click to see more photos as well as some panoramas.

This property is co-listed

10387 Amistad Court, Cupertino California is co-listed with Mary Tan and George Tan of Coldwell Banker in Cupertino, tel # 408 861-8832.

Please stop by our open house this weekend!

This fine home will be open Saturday, 3/31/2012 from 1:30 – 4:30 (hosted by Mary Tan) and Sunday, 4/1/2012 1:30 – 4:30 (hosted by me, Mary Pope-Handy)

More information on  10387 Amistad Court, Cupertino California – a beautiful view home in the prestigious Cupertino foothills!

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More information on the City of Cupertino

Cupertino, California attracts Silicon Valley’s best & brightest, both to for work (most known workplace is Apple) and for home (extremely highly regarded schools).  Once an agricultural hub, the area used to be just as renown for apricots, prunes, cherries and grapes.  Those who remember Silicon Valley as “The Valley of Heart’s Delight” can attest to the orchards, farms and vineyards that once lined Sunnyvale – Saratoga Road and were part of the Blossom Tours.  Some of those agricultural spaces are still around today, but a little harder to find.

Cupertino views

In the high tech hustle and bustle, it is often forgotten not just that the area had a great agricultural past, but that even now, much of Cupertino includes scenic views of either the “blue hills”, the coastal range, or, if you’ve got some elevation, the San Francisco Bay, downtown San Jose, or all of Santa Clara County and The Peninsula.  Additionally, some homes enjoy views of Stevens Creek, Stevens Creek County Park or the beautiful 92 acre Stevens Creek Reservoir.   Wineries such as Ridge Vineyards are high enough on Montebello Road to enjoy spectacular panoramic vistas of both the bay, the whole south bay and in some cases as far as San Francisco on a clear day.   While some Cupertino neighborhoods are indeed terribly crowded with tract homes on small lots (a complaint often echoed against it now), that is not true for the city as a whole – there are many beautiful areas, some with stunning views.

These Cupertino view homes offer enduring appeal to the home buyer who wants top performing schools, a convenient commute location, and aesthetic surroundings.  View properties are always highly prized, but all the more when they come with great schools and convenience too.

Browse Cupertino View Homes for Sale

Find a Cupertino view home for sale, enjoy top schools, a great community and scenic vistas!  Browse list below, no registration!

In the middle of the last century, the Santa Clara Valley was bursting with vineyards, fruit and nut orchards, and groves of citrus trees. The mild climate and all of these beautiful blossoms mile after mile warranted the nickname, “The Valley of Hearts Delight“. Most of it was, of course, unpaved.  Following the end of World War II, the agricultural land began giving way to housing and industry, later more housing and high tech in particular, and Silicon Valley was born. And, to quote a song, “they paved paradise”.

Water can be somewhat scarce here at times – the sub tropical climate means mild temps and just enough rain, about 20″ per year for most of the San Jose area, but more as you get closer to the Monterey Bay and Pacific Ocean.  When we do get rain, where does it go? In the days of big agriculture, most of it found its way back into the drinking water: it was absorbed by the soil, and then it filtered down into the underground streams.  Wells tapped into this water source and the water was used for drinking, cooking, bathing, watering the crops and more.  Now, though, much of the valley is paved.  Water runs to gutters, and they lead directly to the bay, skipping the aquifers and also skipping the filtering process that the soil provides.  As you might imagine, this can screw things up a bit.

One solution is to create more places for the runoff water to get back into the soil and meander back to the aquifer.  The City of Cupertino has vegetated swales for just that purpose behind the library and city buildings, and a large sign explains why the landscaping looks the way it does (a dirt strip with a sunken section in the middle, but landscaped).  This is not uncommon in many parts of the US – I have seen it all over the east coast and the southern states – but a little less common here.  A great idea, I hope it catches and becomes more typical. Kudos to Cupertino for working to improve the local ecosystem and water quality! We need to do more for water reclamation. If it gets all the way to the bay, it cannot be drunk any more, but from the aquifer it can. So many reasons why we should be diverting water away from pavement and gutters and onto soil!

After taking note of this a week or two ago, I did some searching online and found a 2006 article by the Cupertino Courier (now owned by the San Jose Mercury News) about this same effort. It’s a well written piece and if you want to learn more, read on over at the archive:
http://mytown.mercurynews.com/archives/cupertinocourier/20060201/cu-news1.shtml

I’m going to ask you something personal…regarding your bathroom habits.  Is your toilet low flow?

If your house was built before 1994, soon your toilets will need to be “low flow”.  So too will your shower heads and faucets.

In 2010, a bill was passed in California (SB 407 Padilla) requiring all homes (all residential properties) built prior to 1994 be retrofitted with low flow devices when remodeled as of 2014.  If not remodeled, the change still must take place by 2017 for all residences built prior to 1994.

So if you are updating your kitchen, wet bar, or bathroom any time soon, remember: low flow’s the way to go!

For those selling, it should not come as a surprise that this will mean another disclosure to make (whether or not the retrofitting has been done).

Last weekend, my husband and I went to the Monterey Peninsula for a couple of days to celebrate our 25th wedding anniversary.  We had a wonderful time there, but would not return to the hotel where we stayed this time.  The worst issue was the mold in the bedroom along the wall and baseboard.  I brought it to the hotel’s attention and it was “cleaned”, but I think the issue is far from solved.

Mold collage, before and after cleaning with bleach

Since we sometimes run into issues with mold in our real estate transactions, I wanted to take the opportunity of having these before & after photos to discuss what to do about it when buying or selling homes.  Luckily, here in Silicon Valley it is not so humid as it is along the coast, so we are helped on that count.  But it is still very possible that you will run into mold or mildew when trying to buy or sell property.

First, I should state that mold is naturally occurring and it is not possible to completely eliminate mold spores from your home.  The question is whether or not the mold inside the house is the same kind and density as the mold outdoors, or whether something unusual is harbored indoors.

Mildew and mold need moisture and the right, mild temperatures to thrive – eliminate the source of water and the mold will go dormant.  Please note that it will not die when the moisture is eliminated – it just goes into a sleepy state.  If water is later reintroduced, the mold spores will spring back to life.

In my experience, the most common place to find mold in the San Jose area tends to be in bathrooms, particularly around older aluminium windows (which tend to be very cold and collect condensation). Mold on these window frames is easily cleaned by using a solution of water and bleach, and it can be prevented by better ventillation and heat, which allows the window frames to dry out. Likewise it’s very easy for mold to grow in showers and tub areas due to the high amount of water present.  That water needs to be able to evaporate, otherwise you’re inviting mold to take hold.

Find mold on sheetrock, wood or carpeting?  First you must discover the source of the moisture.  Most likely, there’s a leak somewhere, either a plumbing leak or around a door, window, roof or flashing.

In the case of our hotel room, the corner where I discovered the nasty stuff backs to a bathroom on one side and another hotel room on the other (which probably has the same floorplan, so probably another bathroom). In fact, directly behind this mess is the bathtub and shower. 

The maintenance man who came to see the mold (and other issues) thought that the problem was a result of not enough caulking around the tub.  That’s possible.  (It’s also possible that the source of water is a plumbing leak.) Something to note, though: if it is from a lack of caulking, the moisture still had to go all the way through the wall and down to the floor and baseboard. What is the issue there? It’s very likely that the entire wall has moisture damage, mold, fungus or dry rot.  Cleaning the outside of the wall with bleach is a tidy short term solution, but that is like covering the tip of the iceburg.  There’s a very high probability that a lot more mold is lingering between the walls.

So too with mold in the home you wish to buy or sell.  First you must find the source of the problem – the leak or place where water has gotten to be where it doesn’t belong. (Sometimes the problem is not a leak per se, but rather construction issues which cause humidity to be held in the home.  This is a bigger issue in more humid climates than ours.)  Then you can repair the leak or replace whatever is faulty and next remediate the mold problem.

Back in September of 2001 (during 9-11, actually), I was at a real estate convention and symposium in Seattle.  I sat in on a 3 hour class on mold, if you can imagine!  We saw horriffic photos of mildew and mold in walls but also in mattresses, carpet padding and all kinds of places where you would not expect it.  In each case, there was a water culprit somewhere. 

In one memorable case, a leak around the chimney at the roofline (flashing) allowed water to travel down the outside of the chimney all the way to the basement, where it hit sheetrock and the mold took over the entire wall.

Sometimes the only solution, after stopping the source of the moisture, is to remove and replace the sheetrock or other materials.

What about that hotel room?  I have to wonder how often the wall and baseboard have been cleaned, only to have the issue resurface later because the wall is full of mold.  If you look carefully at the photos, you will see that the walls’ texturing isn’t quite right. If the sheetrock got really damp, it could swell up.  If it were in my home, I would remove the sheetrock and see what was happening between the walls (or have it professionally done).

As you probably know, not all mold types are equally harmful to humans.  If you run into mold, you may want to get it tested to see how serious it is.  There are companies which can do that for you (testing the surface with a swab or taking an air sample or carpet sample).  Just remember that it is normal to have some mold in the home – if you have a comparison done of the air outside your home, you will find mold there too.

Home sellers: if you have mold in your home, it is very important to both fix the problem and to disclose that you’ve had a problem with it in the past (even if fixed).  The number one reason for real estate lawsuits is non-disclosure by sellers to buyers, and if you don’t disclose or “under disclose” and the problem resurfaces, you are going to be looking at a very expensive problem. 

Home buyers: if you see mold in the home you wish to buy, do some investigating and ask your home inspector whether further testing is warranted and reasonable.  Water is often more damaging to homes than termites, so pay close attention to any hints of water intrusion and leaks. 

Getting a home tested by professionals for mold types and concentration can be expensive, but it may also provide you with very valuable information and possibly also peace of mind.  Contact me if you would like the name and number of a company that can do that for you in Santa Clara County and nearby parts of the San Francisco Bay Area.

For more information on mold, moisture and the home, please see the EPA Guide online at http://www.epa.gov/mold/moldguide.html.

Along the Los Gatos Creek Trail in Los Gatos, Campbell and San Jose, there’s an 80 acre park called the Los Gatos Creek County Park.  This long park includes six percolation ponds, which look a bit like square or rectangular ponds with gravel along the edges.  I passed by one yesterday in Campbell along Budd Avenue near San Tomas Expressway.  It was a pretty sight with the Santa Cruz Mountains in the background.  (This view is looking south toward Los Gatos and toward Santa Cruz and the Monterey Bay beyond the coastal foothills.)

Perhaps you have seen them and wondered what their purpose is?  The series of ponds and waterways enables the rainwater runoff to be filtered and placed back into the underground waterway system, which we refer to as aquifers.  (The Unites States has a number of very large aquifers throughout the country, and the biggest one in California is the Central Valley Aquifer.)

Groundwater levels in the Santa Clara Valley can rise and fall, if left to its own devices, based on the amount of rainfall in any given year.  Willow Glen, a charming part of San Jose, originally was a bit of a marsh when it was first settled by non-natives.  The water which was indiginous to the area continued to flow below the surface, though. 

As you know, if you live in Silicon Valley, we have drought years and El Nino (wet) years in addition to our “normal” amount of rainfall, which is 15″ to 25″ a year or so.

In dry years, the amount of groundwater can lessen.  The aquifers can collapse a bit – the ground inches downward.  In wet years, the aquifers can fill.  Our soil is mostly clay here too.  When wet, clay soil expands and is typically referred to as “expansive soils”.  When dry, it contracts.  So the ground was rising and falling due to the presence and quantity of water underneath.

For homes built over the aquifers, the rising and falling and expanding and contracting can wreack havoc on the foundation. 

The historic part of downtown Willow Glen is perhaps the best known area for foundation problems in Santa Clara County – the older homes in place prior to the percolation ponds suffered due to the flux of the soil.  The other day I showed a home that was classic in that regard: the floor rolled extensively, the outside of the home had a tremendous number of cracks and even the windows belied the apparent foundation problem. I took the following photo earlier this week of a window in that home.

The percolation ponds and the whole reclamation system recharges our groundwater, which in turn helps to keep the aquifers full so that the ground doesn’t rise & fall to such a serious degree depending on our rainfall that year.   The damage in Willow Glen and other places in San Jose can help to be prevented by this system.   So there’s a really important function behind these squarish looking ponds! (Of course there are many causes of soil instability and this solution does not address many of them. Speak with a licensed civil or soils engineer if you have questions about your property.)

The Santa Clara Valley Water District permits some recreational fishing at one of the ponds, by the way.  It’s stocked with Rainbow Trout and includes other fish too.  Water fowl are visible at all the ponds, but don’t feed the birds as that’s prohibited so that they will migrate as they should do.  (At the Budd Avenue pond there was a sign up stating that there are herding dogs hired to startle non-migrating birds to get them on their way as nature intended too!)

If you’ve never visited the Los Gatos Creek County Park, this makes for a good outing for adults and kids.  Field trips can be arranged and there are other educational opportunities available also.

Want more info on the history of water in the Santa Clara Valley? The Santa Clara Valley Water District has a timeline that includes key events. Check it out!

Have you always dreamed of buying a home close to, or in, the western foothills in Santa Clara County, such as Almaden, Los Gatos, Monte Sereno and Saratoga? Some of the prettiest parts of Silicon Valley are snuggled into the base of the Santa Cruz Mountains. With views of downtown San Jose and the southern San Francisco Bay Area on one side, and rolling, grassy and redwood & oak filled hills on the other, its certainly scenic. Additionally, these areas all tend to have very low crime and good schools.

As a saavy foothill-area buyer, you will want to understand some of the unique issues that this geography may present. The most important of these may well be the issue of water control and drainage.

The Santa Clara Valley, and most of the neighboring Silicon Valley areas, is composed of mostly clay soil. This is an extremely strong substance – so much so that settlers used it, mixed only with a little straw and water, to form adobe bricks for building.

The caveat with clay soil is that when it becomes wet, it expands, and when dry, it contracts. In fact, we call this condition ˜expansive. The amazing thing is that the clay is more powerful than concrete. And that is the problem for houses and other buildings if the ground is expanding, contracting, or alternating between the two.

What can a homeowner do? Its imperative to try to control the amount of water near (or under) the home as much as possible.

For homes all over Silicon Valley, its important, my home inspector tells me, to use downspout extenders so that the water from rain collecting on the roof dont all dump out right next to the house. Ideally the water would run to a gutter in the street or to some other drainage system. Additionally, it is important that soil (or walkways) be graded such that any water would run away from the house rather than toward it. Frequently, though, we see homes with ˜reverse grading and any rainwater, pool splashing etc. may run toward the house rather than away from it. Thats a problem that needs correcting.

For homes near or in the foothills, things are further complicated because runoff from the hills may be aimed straight a neighborhood or home. Your home may be in the path of the runoff, for that matter.

Geotech engineers (they are the specialists for this issue) will assist the homeowner (or buyer) in determining how to limit the amount of water moving toward the house. Sometimes that will be a combination of work with the downspouts, grading, and drainage systems. Other times its much more involved and costly. There are some areas in Los Gatos and Almaden Valley, for instance, where the water table is very high. During an El Nino year, with lots of rain, the water table may get pushed beyond the brink and a spring may pop up near or under your house. Capping the spring is not going to be a cheap fix. But be aware, if youre home buying in some of these areas, that you may run into this issue. If so, plan to call an expert, a Geotechnical Engineer, to assess the situation and provide suggestions to remedy it.

What are some of the symptoms, or red flags, to watch for if youre buying a home near the hills, that there may be a drainage problem? Heres a list of possible clues – they could also signal other issues too, so this is not a diagnosis, just a clue that something needs to be investigated:

• floors out of level
• interior doors that dont close or stick
• cracks in walls
• cupped hardwood floors
• musty smell in the house
• cracked or lifted concrete outside, in the garage, or anywhere visible

Many homes in the foothill areas are sold with pre-sale inspections already done. Before writing an offer, review these carefully. The property or home inspection may also flag drainage issues that could be causing (or cause in the future) significant structural damage. Here are a few to look for:

• cracks in the foundation
• stains on the foundation or effusion (mineral desposits), indicating water in the crawl space
• cracked, buckled, or lifted cement (which you may or may not have noticed)
• mildew or mold in the attic (indicating a high amount of evaporation in or through the home)
• reverse grading conditions

By carefully viewing hillside homes and reading the pre-sale inspection thoroughly, you should have a sense of whether or not there are any potential issues with water and drainage. You may also be surprised that the homeowner or seller has addressed these dilligently. When the issue of drainage has been well handled, you may see these features at the property:

• the concrete around the home and in the driveway is in good condition (and is not brand new – sometimes home sellers will replace the driveway or walkways but not address the cause, so sometimes a brand new bunch of paving is a red flag)
• the grading appears correct
• the downspouts are tied to an underground system that moves the water away from the house
• there are drains at points around the home to carry water away
• you see no cracks in the garage floor (if you cannot see the floor due to rugs or storage, make sure you do see it!)
• doors and windows all open easily
• the crawl space is dry and appears to have a history of being dry

Finding a property in which the owner has aggressively addressed the issue of water around the house, particularly before there are any structural problems to fix, is a real boon to a homebuyer. We live in a region where many sellers simply slap granite onto the kitchen counter and call the home improved or well maintained. The structural stuff isnt very sexy, and most buyers dont appreciate if drainage work is there or not, but ultimately it is one of the most important aspects of homebuying to be evaluated. The right improvements and care will make the property more functional and in need of fewer repairs in the long haul, and will give saavy buyers peace of mine when they purchase it.

For further reading:

What about the living in the Los Gatos Mountains (Santa Cruz Mountains)? post on Move2Silicon Valley relocation blog

Cracked Foundations, Adobe Clay Soils and Water in Silicon Valley (this blog)