Wayne Long's Blog: All Categories

Why invest in Real Estate when the increase in the value of your investment only grows 4-5% per year?   Good question and I am glad you asked.

1) Real Estate is a safer investment than most other investments because of its very nature.  It is real property.  While the stock market has gone up and down at a dizzying pace - the worst year in Real Estate over the last 40 yrs was a 2% decrease in value nationally. 

2) You can live in it while your investment grows.  Have you ever asked if you can live at a stock brokerage?

3) Leverage!  Real Estate can be bought with only 5 to 20% down.  If you purchase stock you must put down 100%.  If you invest $100,000  in $100,000 worth of stock and it increases 5% this year you will have made 5% on your investment.  …

       As in most metropolitan areas the land has become so valuable that if you want to live on a piece of land larger than a postage stamp you will have to live outside Columbus.    The areas to the north of Columbus have become bedroom communities for this reason.   Midland as well as the communities in South Harris County like Ellerslie, Cataula, and Fortson GA are prime bedroom communities for Columbus.  
       Midland is the most northern part of Muscogee Co. bordering Harris Co.  As a community it is one of the more affluent parts of the Columbus  and has some of the top schools  as well.   Many of the subdivisions in Midland are on 1 acre lots as opposed to the postage stamp sized lots in most of Columbus. 
     Ellerslie, Cataula, and Fortson…

Infantry Museum finally breaks ground in South Columbus adjacent to Fort Benning.  The museum should open in 2008 with an IMAX theatre and draw up to 500,000 visitors per year.  The facility will cost close to $85 million dollars of which about $60 million has already been raised.   You can read more about this facility at our Fort Benning Real Estate website. 

Phenix City ALcontinues to improve the infrastructure in the city.  The most recent addition includes the Summit Hospital.  The Summit is a $36 million facitility located at 4401 Riverchase Dr.    Phenix City is growing leaps and bounds and like Columbus is trying to keep up with the demands of growth for hospitals, schools, water, sewer and the other essentials needed for the new residents.   All this is good for the Phenix City Real Estate market.   

In other hospital news long time rivals St. Francis hospital and Columbus Regional Healthcare in Columbus have created a formal partnership that should make health care and insurance concerns improve for the Columbus Ga population. 

Columbus GA is really on the move!   Because of the BRAC military expansion on Fort Benning 3.2 Billion dollars ( that is with a B) is expected to be invested in the facilities on Fort Benning.  This is the largest public investment in the State of Georgia.   Aproximately 10,000 new direct jobs are expected because of the base expansion including military and non-military personel.    AFLAC is based in Columbus GA and has anounced plans for a $100 million dollar expansion that will give us a job increase of 2000 jobs.   The other huge anouncement we have had recently is the new KIA plant has broken ground near LaGrange about 40 miles north of Columbus and expects to employ 3000 with fairly high paying jobs.   The investment in the facility will be $1.2… Read Full Post

Columbus has been and is in a growth phase.   One of the benefits of this growth is that the variety of restaurants and entertainment is improving almost daily.   In the last few years we have added the River Center which is bringing world class entertainers to Columbus.  Previously if you wanted to see a high level show like "The Producers"  or "Rent" you had to travel to Atlanta but now we can have shows like this in Columbus GA thanks in part to our new state of the art facilities and the fact that we have the population and affluence to support shows on this level.  It is nice to grow up!  This kind of growth helps the Columbus GA Real Estate market as well. 

It is tough to be a soldier at Christmas time.  Many of our troops are obviously in harms way right now.  This is especially tough at this time of the year as they miss their families and their families miss them.   As Realtors in Columbus we develop relationships with a lot of military families relocating to Columbus and Phenix City and we have a special appreciation for them.   Join with us in lifting up our military families in prayer through the holidays.

My sister lives in Atlanta Ga and she was discussing with me that they would like to move away from the traffic and congestion in Atlanta but they enjoy the big city amenities.  Columbus Ga is the perfect size town for me because we have the restaurants, shopping, theater and sports like a big city but we can drive across town in 30 or 40 minutes and can be out in the rural areas in the same amount of time.   We still can have access to Atlanta in 11/2 hrs or the beach in 3 or 4 hrs.  It is the perfect setup and just one of the Top Ten Reasons to LIve in Columbus GA.