Leveling Off Seen for Housing Appreciation

People buying a house in California should expect to see little or no price appreciation over the next five years, according to Christopher Thornberg, the senior economist for UCLA’s Anderson Forecast. While not predicting a sudden collapse in home prices or sales, Thornberg observed that “it looks like the beginning of the end” of the housing boom that has helped sustain the U.S. economy for the past five years. The typical household in California saw an average increase in their property value of $80,000 last year, he said. The housing cool down won’t precipitate a recession, he said, because even if construction jobs were to drop by 20%, they would represent 5% of the state’s employment base and other sectors are generating jobs. Sharon Hanley, who publishes a weekly report on housing sales in San Diego County, said that 89 single-family homes were sold and 30 sales were canceled for the week ending Feb.5. That represents a 33.7% cancellation rate, compared to 10.9% the same week two years ago, when the area was near the peak of the boom. However, some builders and real estate agents have been reporting a faster sales pace since the beginning of the year. (www.signonsandiego.com)
San Diego Union-Tribune (2/17/06); Roger M. Showley

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U.S. Real Estate Foreclosures Soar 45% in January

RealtyTrac, an online marketplace for foreclosure properties, reported that about 103,540 properties across the country had entered some stage of foreclosure in January, up 27% from the previous month and a 45% increase from a year earlier. RealtyTrac’s monthly survey found one new foreclosure for every 422 households in Georgia, the highest rate among the 50 states; followed by Nevada, with one foreclosure for every 483 households; and Colorado, with one for every 488 households. Texas and Indiana rounded out the top five. Along with Texas and Georgia, the five states reporting the most new foreclosures in January included California, Florida and Ohio. California reported 9,354 properties entering some form of foreclosure, an increase of 22% from the previous month and 62% from a year earlier, and the third highest level in the country, but the state’s foreclosure rate still fell below the national average. (www.inman.com)
Inman News (2/21/06)

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Running Dry? Maryland’s Growth Could Threaten Water Supplies

Mount Airy and two other growing towns in Carroll and Frederick counties in Maryland have been forced to curtail development — either voluntarily or under orders from the state — because their growth was outstripping their water supplies. In a state where annual precipitation ranges from 36 inches out west to 46 inches in the east, water is becoming a critical issue because the state’s population grew 35% from 1970 to 2000 and is projected to gain another 1.1 million people, a growth rate of 20%, over the next 25 years. Statewide, nearly 1.5 billion gallons of fresh water are withdrawn daily from streams, reservoirs and wells to provide drinking water, irrigate farms, generate power and run factories. By 2030, demand for water could grow by 16%, an extra 233 million gallons a day. (www.baltimoresun.com)
Baltimore Sun (2/5/06); Timothy B. Wheeler

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Clouds Over Condos: Are Stormy Times Ahead?

While the downtown condo markets in Boston, Atlanta, Minneapolis, San Diego and Sarasota, Fla. all had strong overall sales last year, their resale markets are showing signs of struggle. Developers of intown condos in Atlanta have dropped the median size 12% to 972 square feet and are offering incentives to drive sales. In Boston, condo resales in last year’s fourth quarter fell 30% from a year earlier. New owners in a condo-conversion in East Boston were offered $1,000 gift certificates to Ikea for finding buyers for any remaining units. In Minneapolis, where the downtown population has increased by a third to 30,300 since 2000, 1,326 units were sold last year, up from 557 the year before; but the market has slowed, with only four sales of existing apartments in January, compared with 27 the same month a year earlier. In San Diego, in the fourth quarter of 2005 the median price per square foot for downtown condos fell 0.2% from a year earlier, to $517, and the city saw an 82% rise in the inventory of existing condos last year as speculators stopped buying. Still, the downtown population has grown from about 12,000 to 30,000 since 2001. In Sarasota, with a population of 55,000, more than a dozen condo projects have been built since 2001 and there are as many units under construction now as have been completed in the past six years. There are about 263 condos on the market and there were six resales in January, down from 14 a year earlier. (www.realestatejournal.com)
RealEstateJournal.com (2/13/06); Amir Efrati, Wall Street Journal Online

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Is Your Garage Begging for Attention?

Garages aren’t being used strictly for cars anymore, but as a catchall for whatever can’t be squeezed into the home, especially in states like Florida where most homes don’t have basements or attics. The “Harley” garage created for this year’s New American Home by Orlando, Fla. builder Alex Hannigan is separate from the house’s standard three-car garage and was envisioned as a space where the home owner could park his Harley and hang out with his buddies in front of a flat-screen TV without ever going inside. There is an attached half bath with an automatic-flush urinal, stucco walls for a finished look, Harley-logo cornices over the windows and a metal refrigerator. The space is furnished with the Gladiator GarageWorks system by Whirlpool, which includes wall storage options, workbenches, tool and gear storage, floor covering and even appliances in a hammered-metal look. (www.orlandosentinel.com)
Orlando Sentinel (2/5/06); Carrie Alexander

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Chestnut Lodge Plan Gets Green Light

A $45 million project by Bethesda, Md. developer Morton H. Levine to transform the grounds of the defunct Chestnut Lodge psychiatric hospital in Rockville into 43 houses and condominiums selling for at least $1 million each has received approval from the Rockville City Council and is headed to the planning commission. The property’s main building, which was built in the late 1800s as a hotel, will be restored to its former grandeur and house seven luxury condos. Two cottages, an ice house and an old red barn are also being restored. Thirty-six Victorian-style homes will be built on the rest of the property, some with elevators. (www.washingtonpost.com)
Washington Post (2/9/06); Michael S. Rosenwald

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