Mr Williamsburg, Revolutionary ideas on real estate!Hampton Roads Virginia

The Virginia Association of Realtors® released its 2011  Housing Report today including housing market data, trends, and comparisons.

Even if you’re not in real estate, the report is packed with articles written by some of the most esteemed experts in the industry. Their informative reviews of the past year and educated predictions on what 2012 will bring should be of interest to any home owner given what we’ve all experienced in recent years! It’s been a challenging couple of years, but VAR’s analysts say that things like low interest rates and affordable home prices could make this year’s progress more significant that last year’s.

As VAR’s website points out:
“That’s just the numbers. It’s easy to forget that there are people behind that data. There are families who can finally afford a dream home, who can move to a better school district, or can refinance to stay afloat.  There are people wondering when they’ll be able to sell their homes, and who have taken the leap into buying their first.

Take them into account as you read through this report:  Virginia’s homes and families, communities and jobs- the lives that are more than dots on a chart or entries in a table.  These are pictures of homes, struggles, and celebration and our springboard into 2012.

The median home price in the state fell 3.3 percent to $225,000 and the volume of sales remained essentially flat, up .2 percent, in 2011, compared to a year ago, according to the report.

“We’d like to think we’ll look back at 2011 as the year things finally began to turn around,” the introduction of the report begins. “We might not be ready to say that Virginia’s markets are out of the woods, but in 2011 — without artificial stimulus — we were able to see significant improvement.”

The report looks at each part of the state, with some interesting data points:

• Northern Virginia’s median sale price rose 1.6 percent to $315,000 from $309,900. Homes priced between $750,000 and $1 million were the bright spot — with a 3.64 percent increase in sales.
• But the big winner was the category for homes priced under $100,000 in the state — they saw 33 percent increase in sales, pointing to likely sales of foreclosures.
• The Central Valley regions experienced the greatest increase in sales and the Northern Virginia region experienced the only decline.
• Median home prices have declined in both Virginia and the U.S. over the past year, although Virginia’s median sales price remains above our nation’s.
• American housing timeline:  see decade by decade beginning in 1930, what major political and cultural events have shaped and built American housing.  Note the effect these events had on interest rates throughout the timeline.

Market Snapshots from regions around the state

Click here to read the full report.

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