Get ready folks for a whole flurry of news, blog posts, media coverage and general griping and hallelujah-ing, depending on the perspective.I just got off the phone with the Albemarle County Assessor’s office; two properties’ assessed values in the the same subdivision in Albemarle dropped by approximately 9% and 10%, respectively. The ramifications will be far-reaching.The land values stayed the same; the drop in assessed values came from the improvements (the houses themselves).One argument could be that the new assessments are more in line with where the true market value should have been for the past several years…. Market value is the price that a ready, willing and able buyer will pay, and a seller will accept.The website will be updated at the end of the month.*Here’s my offer to property owners of Albemarle. If you feel that your assessed value is wrong, and you intend to challenge your real estate assessment, contact me and we’ll set up a meeting to discuss your options.
Date Archives January 2008
Death by a thousand cuts
how to tax new construction (and thereby purchasers of new construction) yet another way. Is this where I pull out the argument that, “in this time of the housing market’s transition, this is not the time to put further strains on housing affordability”?I’ve read this bill four times now and still can’t understand why this is needed…. In addition to all other fees imposed by law, beginning July 1, 2008, every local building department shall charge and collect a fee for its issuance of a final certificate of occupancy for any building or any structure, as defined in § 36-97, that is neither exempt from taxation by law nor actually valued at less than $100,000 at the time such final certificate of occupancy is issued. Each such fee shall become due and payable no later than 90 days from the date that the local building department issued the final certificate of occupancy associated with such fee.b.
Charlottesville area housing market report
In Charlottesville, Albemarle, Fluvanna, Greene, Louisa and Nelson there are 1,959 active properties on the market, rather than 3,072 as the report says (this is simply selecting “active” and then clicking “search”) If Waynesboro and Augusta, to our West, are included, there are 2,505 properties on the market.- There were 2,778 homes sold in Central Virginia last year, versus 3,515 in 2006, 3875 in 2005.- For first-time homebuyers, there are 182 homes on the market under $200k; include Waynesboro and Augusta and there are 360! Take condos out of that equation and the numbers drop to 222 and 249.- In just Charlottesville/Albemarle, there are 82 non-condo properties under $200k (116 sold in the past 6 months – about 7 months of inventory), and 117 over One Million Dollars (35 sold in the past six months – just over 3 years of inventory).I’ll refer (shamelessly) to last week’s C-Ville Weekly:“When you actually start looking, the pickings are fairly slim, realistically,†Duncan says…. Now can be a great time to buy – if you’re buying with the appropriate amount of due diligence, proper consideration and the best buyer-representation you can find…. Building permits are down, and I expect 4th Quarter building permits in Albemarle to be even lower when they are released later this month.I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves.Note: Price per square foot is a metric by which to help determine a home’s market value, not the metric.Surprise!
What’s holding the local real estate market back?
One component that I have encountered several times recently – Sellers who are setting their prices based on what they owe. What is a buyer (and Realtor) to do when the Seller won’t negotiate below that price, and would rather go to foreclosure than sell?If the market value is $200,000 and the Seller owes $250,000 – where do we go?Update: here’s a related story -Now, however, some mortgage borrowers who stretched financially to buy a home with temporarily-low “teaser” payments and no money down – and haven’t owned it long enough to gain any equity – are taking the position that it’s hopeless to try to save the house. They’ll await foreclosure and use their money to try to keep up with other monthly bills instead.”We see people coming in who say, ‘We’ll just let the home go. We don’t have anything in it anyway,’ ” said King, who has been a consumer counselor for 15 years.That change in attitude helps explain why there is a subprime mortgage crisis and why banks – who analysts say made credit too easy for too many – have had to set aside billions of dollars in reserves to cover potentially bad loans.
Local economic outlook
Tasha Kates with the DP gets insight from several notable locals. Not surprisingly, housing is a significant factor in each conversation. It’s not the media’s fault…. Inventory levels are but one component of a much, much wider problem.
Which photo would you use?
Or better yet, which one would you want your Realtor to use?This is the first time I’ve used someone to do post-processing for listing photos. I’ll likely use him again.
Charlottesville Area Market Report for 2007
The report will be released tomorrow. I have an advance copy, so I’ll have a post ready to go at 12:01 Sunday morning. I’ll post the full report here with a few quotes, charts and clarifications.