Last week I put together a market analysis for a client in Milton (a local suburb in northern Atlanta) and I started looking at and thinking about how and why some of the sub-markets differ from each other and from Metro Atlanta as a whole and how they not only relate to each other, but, how they interrelate to other local real estate markets and therefore the national real estate market. As a real estate agent, I often read blog posts from other agents. Sometimes it's to learn, sometimes it's for entertainment while other times I am reading to try and spur an idea of my own so that I can write something myself. One theme I run across frequently is the real estate agent, who swears up and down that all real estate is local and they are the local expert and all we need is a period at the end of that sentence because they are the end all be all know-it-all. Period. I say nonsense.

I say that only a very naive or new real estate agent thinks all all real estate is local. I say that markets are interwoven more now than ever. Homes for sale in Atlanta and the housing market here is dependent on homes for sale in other cities around the country in a similar way that home sales in sub-markets of Atlanta affect and are affected by each other. Maybe relocation is more of a factor in some places than in others, but, if homes aren't selling in one area of the country, it's going to affect other areas by the time you compound that problem to a national level. I think it's true that there is little value in a median or average price of a home in the United States, but, new starts, sales volume and pricing trends on a national level are an integral part of a local real estate market.

Too often, I see the arrogant, know-it-all real estate agent in the office - or, more and more often on their personal soapbox they call a blog, extolling their virtues as the Yoda of real estate because they say that all real estate is local. Nothing could be farther from the truth. So, before you run off telling someone you think that all real estate is local, you might want to consider why second home sales on the beach may be affected by factors other than hurricanes or think about why someone can't relocate from Michigan because they can't sell their house to buy your listing or why the couple in Kansas who dreams of moving to San Francisco can't because homes are not affordable to them. these are legitimate factors that affect a local real estate market, but, they are not local factors.

There is a lot going on at Family Reunion in Orlando and it has been an exciting event. Here is a photo from Gary Keller's vision speech I thought was interesting.

The event has been jam packed with panels and classes from technology to open houses to pricing - basically anything that you can think of. I wrote a longer post about Keller Williams Family Reunion here with some more pictures from the vision speech and a few additional items. If there was any doubt in my mind as to whether I should have attended, they are gone now.

First, it will shake you out of the routine that we are all acustomed to falling into. That has been followed by a resolved commitment to be held more accountable to what I want for my business, and quite frankly, for my life.

It's really to early as the event is still going on to absorb and reflect on what will ultimately come from the experience and of course what will come will only be what I make of it so when I return to Atlanta, I have already set some time aside to review everything and prioritize things. It's going to take some time. There is just that much I have taken in and I can't see it all yet.

If you are with KW and you are not here or have never been to Family Reunion and you care about your business, you really need to attend next year.

Off to the next event for now...

 

This Sunday, January 11th, between 1 and 3 p.m. we will have an open house at 750 Crest Valley Drive inside the perimeter in Sandy Springs. Here is an edited version of the Microsoft Birdseye view (I'll post the original at the bottom of the post for full disclosure).

Property Details:

4 bedroom

3 full + 2 half baths

1.4 level acres

3 car garage

This is quite a bit of home inside the perimeter in Sandy Springs for $650,000. You can view more details on the single property website or if this doesn't look like the right house for you, you can view all Sandy Springs homes for sale on our website.

So, here is the unedited version - I'm still working on my Photoshop skills...mid-winter, after a rain, I wanted to try and show what a new homeowner might see with an edited summertime view.

 

 

This is an one of the best kitchen remodels that I can remeber having seen recently and if you are in the market for a home in the Dunwoody area, you really should have a look at this home. You can get more information about this home on its single property website, here.

While there are lots of cogs that make up the wheel that is the real estate market, at the end of the day, nothing really matters accept perceived value on the part of buyers. What we have to look at here is what it is exactly that can affect the perception of buyers. Lower values for homes is a gross oversimplification of what needs to change before we see a real turnaround in the market because fear that prices may go even lower can override the simple solution of lower price.

Fear itself of course is something that will need to change because right now, consumers have a lot of fear because they perceive a significant loss of control of their own pocketbooks because of the economic crisis.

Then of course, we have to get down to some real estate basics like the constriction of lending guidelines and the supply of homes that is too high. Nationally, and here in the Atlanta real estate market, supply is beginning to decline, but, it has a long way to go before demand begins to outstrip supply. I've just seen and read too many things recently that keep saying that lower prices will by itself fix the real estate market which it cannot do. This post highlights a small but important reality that I hope will begin to let us see that there is a far bigger picture than just home prices that need to change before we see a real bottom and then the beginni9ngs of a turnaround.

I'm not sure when it happened, but, about a week ago, I started noticing that the city of Milton was being map correctly by Google. This may not seem to be a big deal, but, many homes don't map with GPS. The iPhone eliminates this as a problem now because with built in Google maps and GPS it will be a bit easier to find many of these new construction homes that were previously not mapping. Perhaps it will help to get agents to list homes correctly in Milton rather than in Alpharetta. For those familiar with the area, Milton real estate really is different than Alpharetta and a lot of buyers find the distinctions to be very important. Now if most agents cvould figure it out...

While it does not signal an end to the buyers market, it does indicate how much of an impact, right or wrong, that the media can play on a real estate market. Atlanta homes have increased in value for 2 consecutive months this summer and while the increases may not be stellar, they do lend credence that some of the talk about the disaster on the real estater market may be accentuated with a little bit of hype on the part of the media. The chart below show the value of sold Atlanta homes going back to January of 2007 through the most recent data available in the FMLS:

So, the trend is still down and this indicates an uptick in values only during the summer months, I don't think that we would be seeing any increases if the market for Atlanta homes was anywhere near as bad as what we here in the media. At least here in Atlanta.

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