Durango Colorado Homes Showing Appreciation!

For home owners, here is some good news to celebrate the New Year!!

Preliminary research shows positive appreciation for the 4th quarter of 2012 over the 4th quarter of 2011.  Prices in La Plata County, which includes Durango Colorado, appear to be up approximately 5.4% over the 4th quarter of 2011.  With just a few days left in December, the number of homes sold in the County is 218 versus 188 for the same time period in 2011, a 16% increase over last year, with the median price showing $296,000 versus $280,750 last year, a 5.4% increase.

If these numbers hold, which seems likely, this will be the second consecutive quarter of appreciation in La Plata County real estate.  For the second half of 2012 versus 2011, the number of homes sold is up 18.9%, and the prices are up 3.48%.

The bottom of the real estate market for La Plata County in terms of homes sold was back in September of 2009, but for the first time, prices appear to be gaining strength, and it is likely that we will look back and say the bottom of the market for prices was June 2012.

For home buyers, we suggest moving forward with purchasing soon to take advantage of the possible future appreciation.


Don Ricedorff, Broker Associate, GRI, CRS, CCIM, ABR, RSPS, CDPE

E-Mail: don@durangorealproperty.com

Direct: 970-375-7014

Fax: 970-259-5007

Web: www.DurangoRealProperty.com

College Towns A Relative Real Estate Safe Haven

The snow has finally decided to grace our presence this winter and seems to be going a long way towards adding to the Holiday feel.

This week we'd like to share an article with you that appeared in the Boulder iJournal regarding the benefits of home ownership and real estate investment in Colorado college towns.  While Durango Real Estate didn't fare quite the same as the northern part of the state, we were still insulated to a degree from the recession when compared to the rest of the country.

Colorado college towns a relative real estate safe haven during turbulent times

Troy Hooper | Wed., December 12, 2012 @ 3:01 pm

Colorado's college towns braved the nation's real estate collapse relatively well. Home values hung tough and didn't experience the dramatic drops that many of the nation's other locales did. It was the number of home sales that took a dive. But now even that's beginning to improve.

There were 752 houses sold in Boulder between Nov. 1, 2011, and Oct. 31, 2012 — a 23 percent increase compared to the same period the year prior, according to a report the Boulder Area Realtor Association released Wednesday. Homes in Boulder have sat on the market for an average of 75 days over the last year compared to an average of 91 days the year before.

“Our pricing and home values have changed very little over the past few years, even with the economic downturn,” Boulder Area Real Estate Association Vice President Kenneth Hotard said in an interview. “What's changed in our market more than anything else is sales volume and that has begun to rebound.”

The average sales price in Boulder in November was $683,271 and the median was $602,000, records show. The average sales price over the last 12 months was $668,027 — a .3 percent decline from the year before.

Duane Duggan at Re/Max of Boulder said the supply of single-family houses is nearing a 10-year low with buyers snatching homes priced under $600,000 especially fast.

“If they're priced right, they'll go under contract on the first day,” he said.

There are 658 homes in Heatherwood, a neighborhood in northeast Boulder, and at the peak of the market there were typically 20 to 30 homes there for sale, Duggan said. Today there is only one. In south Boulder's Martin Acres, the percentage of for-sale homes under contract is above 50 percent, he said.

“For the last few years, my job had been mostly about keeping in contact with my sellers,” Duggan said. “That's changed. Now it's more about the strategy of pricing it right to get the most money out of it.”

Boulder is the priciest zip code along the Front Range with four-bedroom, two-bathroom houses fetching, on average, over $1 million, according to a recent report compiled by Coldwell Banker.

The most expensive sale in the Denver metro area in October was a four-bedroom, six-bath 4,600-square-foot home in Boulder that sold for $3.9 million, Coldwell Banker reported.

In Fort Collins, home values are up about 4.3 percent over the past year.

Chris Reilly, a broker at The Group, said high-end homes in the Fort Collins area suffered the most during the recession.

“But now my offerings in the $900,000 range are seeing six showings, rather than three, which is what we saw a year ago,” he said. “The number of showings has accelerated dramatically over the last year. Homes that are priced right and show-ready receive multiple offers in the first few days.”

The presence of the University of Colorado and Colorado State University have been instrumental to the relative durability of Boulder and Fort Collins real estate, respectively, brokers interviewed for this story said.

Research at the universities have attracted a bevy of notable federal laboratories and lured private businesses to both Boulder and Fort Collins. Add in Colorado's sunny weather and endless outdoor opportunities and magazine editors routinely hail the towns among the “best places to live.”

“A lot of people who go to CSU don't leave when they graduate,” Reilly noted.

Boulder and its neighbor to the north have seen similar trends. But in Durango, home to Fort Lewis College, the market played out a bit differently.

“Whereas Fort Collins has mirrored the Boulder area experience at a lower price point, I think Durango took a bigger hit,” said Hotard, noting that he owns a property there and has kept an eye on its activity. “Durango saw not only a sales volume reduction but it saw its property values challenged to some degree. Still, it didn't destroy the real estate market by any means.”

Durango was a red-hot destination for baby boomers and the “amenity-driven market,” said Don Ricedorff of the Wells Group and Colorado Association of Realtors, but that all changed once the global recession began to take hold.

“Before going into the downturn we perceived Durango as different. We thought we weren't going to be impacted like the rest of the country,” he said. “We were wrong. Durango was impacted because the whole world was impacted. But the reality is we weren't impacted as badly as a lot of other markets."

Home sales in La Plata County peaked in 2005 with 1,357. Those types of transactions plummeted to 561 in 2009, but they have been on the rise ever since. Ricedorff said 824 houses have been sold over the last 12 months.

“We're seeing transactions grow by 100 every year over the last few years, give or take,” he said.

The median price for a home in downtown Durango this year is off 17.2 percent compared to the market's peak, Ricedorff said. The median price of a home downtown was $415,000 in 2006 and this year it is $343,500. Interestingly there were the same number of homes sold downtown that year — 154 — as this year but their total market value fell from $72.2 million in 2006 to $60.9 million over the last 12 months, according to Ricedorff's research.

Among the differences that distinguish Durango from Boulder or Fort Collins is its relative isolation and the smaller size of its college.

The full-time enrollment at Fort Lewis is 3,856 students — a far cry from the student populations in Boulder and Fort Collins where undergraduates and graduates total nearly 30,000 on each campus. But brokers say without its college, Durango wouldn't be as appealing to prospective property shoppers.

“We're heavily influenced by the college. It is a wonderful thing to have, especially in a small town,” Ricedorff said. “We have a lot more cultural diversity thanks to the college. We have a symphony in Durango if you can believe that. For people looking for a small community with a cosmopolitan feel, Durango can offer what a lot of other towns of its size cannot."

College graduates or, more precisely, "millennials," (people born after 1980 who came of age around the millennium) are already changing the complexion of real estate buying habits, Ricedorff added. With an estimated 83 million millennials in the United States, which is several million more than the baby boomers, the up-and-coming generation will impact society on all levels.

"If the millennials stay after graduation in Boulder, Fort Collins or Durango, they'll be looking for something different than what we used to see: big houses in the suburbs where you commute long distances," Ricedorff said. "The millennials don't care as much about the size of the home. They're into the cultural and ethnic diversity. They want to experience things. They'd rather have a small home in the center of the community with vibrant things happening around them. They're going to have a big impact on these college towns. They already are. I'm seeing the baby boomers start to do the same thing. Soon, we may see those two groups competing for those same in-town homes."

Don Ricedorff, Broker Associate, GRI, CRS, CCIM, ABR, RSPS, CDPE

E-Mail:  don@durangorealproperty.com

Direct:  970-375-7014

Fax:  970-259-5007

Web:  www.DurangoRealProperty.com

Considering A Home Purchase?

If you are considering a home purchase, the following infographic has some great things for you to consider.  When you are ready, or if you have further questions, please give me a call.

The Holidays are rapidly approaching and 2012 will soon come to a close.   As we look to 2013, there are several indicators that the real estate market will continue to strengthen.  Below is a great article that takes a good look at what may be in store.

Real estate: Find opportunity next year

By Carla Fried @Money
After five years of tumult, order and opportunity are finally being restored to the housing market.
Home prices are expected to rise a modest 1% from the fourth quarter of this year to the end of 2013, according to the real estate research firm Fiserv. David Stiff, Fiserv's chief economist, notes that after some choppiness early on, prices should increase 3.4% from the second quarter of 2013 to the second quarter of 2014. In hotter regions out West, you can expect bigger gains.
"Housing is finally turning the corner," Stiff says. "There is no reason to be fearful of further large price declines."
This creates a new playing field for homeowners, who are finally able to sell, as well as would-be buyers who've been delaying a purchase in anticipation that prices would keep falling.
The Mortgage Bankers Association forecasts that more and more house hunters will start coming off the sidelines, with new-home loans for purchases expected to jump 55%, based in dollars, in 2013.
With that increased competition, "the days of buyers sticking it to sellers are over," says Salt Lake City real estate agent Tracie Peay.
Sellers: Don't get too excited just yet. You don't have a viselike grip on this market either. Indeed, for many, it still makes sense to wait to get better prices. This is especially true if you know that you won't be able to break even on your investment by unloading your house now, once you factor in the sales commission and other costs.
That said, don't assume that prices will be off to the races again in a year or two.
Fiserv forecasts that between now and 2017, homes will gain 3.3% a year in value. That's hardly red-hot. But at least the market isn't frozen anymore.
THE ACTION PLAN
Sellers
The price still has to be right
Homes in many markets are selling in a matter of weeks, often attracting multiple bids -- but only the ones that are properly priced. Take San Francisco. Although the city is one of the strongest sellers' markets right now, the average home there goes for 103% of list price, not 120%.
"Buyers aren't going down the road that got so many people in trouble during the bubble," says Dallas real estate agent Mary Beth Harrison.
Focus on the appraisal
Whoever bids on your home will probably finance the purchase. That means any deal is still beholden to a third party.
"You can take the highest offer, but at the end of the day the appraiser has the final say on the value of the home," says David Howell, chief information officer at McEnearney Associates, a real estate agency in the D.C. metro area.
With so much riding on the appraisal -- it can kill an agreement or require renegotiation -- your agent should be present. Harrison has a tip for making sure this happens: "The minute we have an offer, we take the keys off the door to make sure the appraiser has to meet us to get in."
Your agent should also prep a package of pertinent information for the appraiser, says Chicago real estate agent Fran Bailey. That includes the latest comparable sales data and documents detailing any upgrades or renovations to help the seller's cause. "It's part of my job to make sure the appraiser has the correct information," she says.
Buyers
Be ready to deal
With competition heating up, casual house shopping isn't going to cut it anymore. If you are serious about making a move, be prepared:
Three months out. Despite housing's green shoots, getting a mortgage remains incredibly tough. The average FICO credit score for recently denied applications on conventional purchase loans was 729. The score on approved mortgages was 762, with a 21% down payment, monthly payments equal to 21% of household income, and total debt that did not exceed 33% of income.
On the bubble with any of those requirements? Now's the time to burnish your finances. And if you plan to house hunt in the spring, watch your holiday spending.
Deal time. "If you want to buy, you have to be ready to make an offer," says Howell. Plus, your first offer should be very close to your best. "If the house has been on the market for three months or longer, you can be more aggressive," says Bailey. "But if it's a new listing, a low-ball bid will get you ignored."
The Money tracker: What can upset the forecast in the year ahead...
Ben runs out of ammo. Fed chairman Ben Bernanke is lifting housing by buying bonds to keep mortgage rates low. How much longer can he keep that going?
The loss of mortgage deductions. Should the tax break on mortgage interest get cut, that would throw cold water on the real estate recovery.
Sellers sit on the fence. Homeowners could remain on the sidelines as the ranks of buyers grow. In that case, the inventory of homes would shrink even more, lifting prices faster than expected.
Homeowners get bullish. A spate of home construction is already taking place in several major markets. In those regions, the housing stock is likely to stabilize, keeping price gains modest.
Banks loosen their grip. If tight lending standards return to historical norms, realtors argue, the market could see an additional 500,000 to 700,000 home sales next year.
Employer confidence rises. Since jobs are the engine of the housing market, a pickup in hiring later in the year, which economists are predicting, could accelerate a real estate rebound in the second half of 2013.