Last Friday, Standard Pacific Homes officially closed its sales office in Campbell, Calif., near San Jose. About 25 people who worked in that office, including its division president, were let go, as the Irvine, Calif.-based builder consolidated that operation into its office in Pleasanton, Calif., a San Francisco Bay suburb. The Orange County Business Journal reported last week that StanPac is merging its Central Valley operations in Salida, Calif., with its Sacramento office.

Steve Scarborough, the builder's CEO; Doug Krah, Standard Pacific's regional president in Northern California; and Tom Burrill, who runs the Pleasanton office, could not be reached for comment, so it could not be immediately determined how these consolidations will affect the builder's construction activity. California has been an erratic market for Standard Pacific lately: Its deliveries in the state during the three months ending June 30 were off 55 percent, but its orders in California during July and August rose 100 percent.

Evelyn Glen, a 130-townhouse development that StanPac is building in Sunnyvale, Calif., south of San Francisco, has had interest from over 2,000 prospective buyers in the last six months, the builder told the San Jose Mercury News last week. Models there are scheduled to open next spring.

But in San Jose, the only thing that seems to be attracting buyer interest - and municipal approval - these days is attached product. "The lowest density that's being developed right now is 20 to the acre," said one market watcher. Different developers of three high-density projects with a combined 1,349 units and an investment value of $450 million have reportedly been given the go-ahead by San Jose's planning board. However, there's no guarantee that any home there, attached or detached, will get hesitant buyers off the fence.

One of the most highly publicized projects in San Jose, Centex's Fifty-One condominium and loft redevelopment of a former Del Monte canning plant, has had a dozen cancellations this year, according to local sales tracking services. On the other hand, Centex's Trellis complex in Sunnyvale - which converted a mobile home park into a community with 56 single-family detached homes - reportedly has sold 53 units through mid-October of this year.

Learn more about markets featured in this article: San Francisco, CA, San Jose, CA, Los Angeles, CA.