What’s Hot, What’s Not
The hot thing going (at the moment) seems to be “land”. The fewer improvements the better. I’ve been fielding a lot of inquiries from folks looking for 50-100 acres, with views and access to good water within 10 miles of town. Of course, there is very little (to nothing) available that meets this description so if any potential sellers of this property type are reading this, please call me!
New homes continue to move well. The hot area continues to be Stone Ridge with Cross Mountain West following a distant second.
Residential lots continue to sell very well. The 6th phase of Stone Ridge sold about 80% of the lots within the first week of their offering. Cool Water Ranch (an “acreage” subdivision just outside of town) has seen good activity as well.
Slow sellers continue to be homes in need of substantial remodeling and “over-improved” ranch property. Prices from homes in need of repair are such that buyers are unable to justify the high buy-in price added to the increasing cost of remodeling. An “over-improved” ranch is a subjective animal that is best described as a ranch with game fencing, paved roads, barns, corrals, pens, multiple wells, dams, landingstrips and enormous haciendas. Today’s ranch buyers seem to be seeking a blank canvas.
Do I have statistics to back up the above? No, these comments are merely reflect my current activity and my observations of the MLS (what’s for sale, what’s under contract or pending, what’s selling and the days on market). In the recent re-design of our MLS, our illustrious leaders changed how the data is tracked. Statistics are no longer broken down to the detail they once were (e.g. areas C-1, C-2, C-3, etc. and R-1, R-2, etc) and are, instead, placed into generic categories such as “City-Southwest”, City-Northwest”, “County-Northwest”, etc.
The dumbing-down of our business continues unabated! How are we to speak with any authority on market conditions when the very systems that were supposed to allow data tracking no longer do so in any meaningful way? Oh well, Onward through the fog!
