jtgolden54's Blog: All Categories

All major metropolitan areas have a number of bedroom communities just outside the suburbs known as the Exurbs. These commuter towns have sprung up all over the country and even the rise in fuel prices over the last few years have not deterred their popularity and growth. What is it about the exurbs that continue draw families to make them their home?

Even in mid sized markets like the Huntsville Real Estate market we are seeing ‘share a ride’ commuter parking lots spring up around the metro area as far as 30-40 minutes outside of the city. These towns and parts of the county come from an agricultural heritage, but are now beginning to burst with large lot subdivisions and a growing population of commuters with recent census figures estimating that 6-7%…

The Huntsville / North Alabama area is a unique economic region in the southeastern part of the United States. With such a resilient and diverse economy the area’s real estate market was one of the last to begin feeling the strain of the national housing crisis and will likely be one of the mid sized metro areas that lead in an eventual recovery.

Like many communities across the country, the number of Huntsville Al Foreclosures has risen to record levels but have recently leveled off over the last few months with approximately 200 foreclosures being actively marketed on the local MLS. These homes are easy to search and monitor with simple saved search criteria’s along with automated email notifications when new short sales, bank owned, of government…

The Huntsville Real Estate market, due to the strength of the local economy, initially held up very well given the national housing crisis of the last few years and the current economic recession. However all good things must come to an end, and in the last 3 months we have seen foreclosure inventory reach record levels, albeit the local situation is quite softer than in many parts of the country.

With Huntsville Al Foreclosures now at record levels in our local market, we are also seeing a much greater interest in these homes from consumers and investors alike. Some of the pricing on these homes measure at 20%-30% below market value using current comparable sales over the last 3 months. Given the first time home buyer tax credit and these special…

What is a value zone you ask? While every area and city has a variety of real estate options, I think all areas have these small niche locations where home prices represent a real value situation.

One of these areas in Huntsville Alabama is Owens Cross Roads. What is unique about the Owens Cross Roads area is actually its proximity to another area of the city, Hampton Cove. Hampton Cove hosts some of the most expensive real estate in the city due to its neighborhood amenities. To mention just one, the Robert Trent Jones golf courses that lie at the heart of the community. Thus Hampton Cove home owners gladly pay premium prices for their amenities and school system and have for more than a decade.

Owens Cross Roads on the other hand borders Hampton Cove…

Then be sure to take a look at Huntsville Alabama

Huntsville Alabama is widely known by many across the country for its economic standing in the high tech, aerospace, and defense industries. Especially over the last few years as the nation’s economy has declined, Huntsville has been repeatedly selected by the likes of Forbes and Kiplinger magazines as one of the best places in American to weather the current recession. Nevertheless in general, the public is unaware of what the community offers in regards to quality of life.

The Huntsville area is very geographically diverse with mountains to the east and large recreational lakes to the south, and west. Thus there are many opportunities and activities enjoyed by a wide variety of local outdoor enthusiasts…

Our local market has been somewhat of a blessing over the last 2 years. As we watched many other markets around the country experience major increases in foreclosure activity and the inevitable weaker average pricing that follows. Our local Huntsville Alabama Real Estate Market remained stable and had one of the lowest foreclosure rates in the country.

The reason we felt, was the strength of our local economy which was receiving recognition time and time again from the likes of Forbes Magazine, etc, as one of the top places in the country to weather the economic downturn. True our economy is a very good one and will continue growing strongly into 2012 due to defense department BRAC job relocations.

However even with a large number of high paying jobs…

This past weekend I finally got around to upgrading an older Wordpress site (version 2.3) to the latest and greatest version 2.7.1.  Like most of you, who self-host your own Real Estate blog, I had dreaded doing this for fear of screwing it up, perhaps even inadvertently modifying post URLs and I envisioned search engines sending potential clients to the dreaded 404 page not found result.

Then I ran across a new Wordpress theme that I simply loved; Thesis by Chris Pearson. I had previously used his Cutline theme but Thesis is in an entirely different class and so much better than his previous work. Needless to say the new theme was not compatible with the older version site, there in explains my decision to finally upgrade.

Anyway long story short,…

Yes, yet another real estate blog. How many is too many?

The simple answer is: when you don’t have time to post original content on all your blogs on a regular basis then you are simply spread too thin.

I am not a real estate agent or broker, but my wife is, and she has 2 blogs (Active Rain, and a self-hosted site with Wordpress) and I must admit she does a fairly competent job of keeping original content posted on a regular basis, although she does cross post with some modification on occasion. She is talking about a 3rd blog (another self hosted) and I am doing my best to convince her that given her business load that it is too much. I will be trying to get her to start a REW blog instaed of self hosting if she insists on having another blog but…