How lucky am I? VERY, VERY lucky! Being an active real estate agent in these trying times, I try to remind myself every day of the many ways I count myself lucky!

So here's number one for today: I have tagged along on one of my husband's business trips to Lake Tahoe. Doesn't get much more lucky than that, but what - dear reader- you ask does that have to do with real estate and affordable housing in Pensacola? Well, absolutely everything!

Do you have any idea just how lucky I am to be a real estate agent in an area where housing truly is AFFORDABLE? In today's trying economic climate it makes the difference between making a home sale - and bringing home a paycheck - and looking for other employment opportunities until the housing market turns around. 

So number two for today: I live and work in an area - the Greater Pensacola Bay Area - of AMAZINGLY AFFORDABLE housing.

I had the good fortune (luck again) to meet a young couple in the hot tub at our hotel here in Lake Tahoe. They live just south of San Francisco and were telling me that when they bought their home almost two years ago they were fortunate to pay only - ONLY - $590,000. Did I mention this was a young couple? Perhaps in their early thirties? They were bemoaning the fact that when they bought the home they thought they were lucky (fortune again) to pay less than $600,000, in a neighborhood where most of the homes were selling in the mid $600,000s. Today there are several foreclosures in their neighborhood of approximately 150 single family homes, and while they realize their home has lost value, they estimate it would still sell in the mid $500,000s today.

So, what is the average sales price for a single family home in the Pensacola area? From October 21, 2007, to today, the average sales price comes in at $177,750. I don't discount the importance of wages in the area and certainly Pensacola can not compete salary-wise with northern California, but WOW what an affordable housing market Pensacola really has!

Want to know more about home values in Pensacola? Click Hereto visit my blog at Active Rain.