We hear a lot of talk daily, yes? Good market, bad market, foreclosures, all sorts of other crap. I think one thing is missing from all this. People buy a home because they want a place to live. They want a sense of place, a community. Or, they buy it as an investment property. I am a firm believer that you can do both, but that our market dictates you do so with the idea of holding on to that home for a while. Why? because we historically experience a steady, slow growth market. No spikey bubbles, no massive pots of gold when you sell, but steady growth.
WLST’s Jill commented here last week and it got me thinking. She lived in University Heights, and wondered about the investment value of her old neighborhood. Couple that with the fact that University Heights markets itself as the ‘City of Beautiful Homes’. So UH is a good community for me to use as an example of this slow, steady growth.
Since Jill used to live on Faversham, I picked that street to use as an individual example so here goes:
Faversham House #1
1991 – Sold for $89,000
1994 – Sold for $103,500
1997 – Sold for $129,000
2006 – Sold for $141,900
Faversham House #2
1991 – Sold for $91,300
1998 – Sold for $124,000
1999 – Sold for $134,000 *
2002 – Sold for $174,000
* I think the 1999 seller was lucky that the market that year was strong enough to allow for a sale after only owning for one year. That is one difference here….you need to think about keeping a home for more than a few years. Traditionally? We were always taught (as home buyers) to plan on at least five years. Because one, it takes that long to pay off interest and get into the equity payments (principal). And two, you make more money on a home when you don’t owe what you paid for it when you try to sell.
Next I am going to look at 1993, 1999, 2004 and 2006 sales for University Heights homes. These are averages for those years, based on homes sold that were listed with a brokerage which got them into our multiple listing (computer) service.
What I did was take a sampling. I used Faversham as a benchmark and drew a rectangle around it. So this group of stats includes streets like Meadowbrook, Traymore, Cranston, Barrington, Fenwick, etc. And yes, same sampling area for each year.
1993: 21 single family homes sold. They sold for an average of $63/square foot, were on the market about 42 days; and the Average Sale Price was $110,383
1999: 108 single family homes sold. They sold for an average of $78/square foot, were on the market about 45 days, and the Average Sale Price was $133,743
2004: 104 single family homes sold. They sold for an average of $88/square foot, were on the market about 69 days, and the Average Sale Price was $159,185.
2006: 107 single family homes sold. They sold for an average of $89/square foot, were on the market about 87 days, and the Average Sale Price was $158,744.*
*So if that same seller who sold their home on Faversham in 1999 after buying it in 1998 had tried to do that in 2006, it’s possible that their sale price would have been flat or even a tad less. And sometimes you can get lucky; and sometimes you have a new job out of state, or some other special situation arises and you just need to sell quickly. In general though, you can see that sales in the last 14 years have been good to University Heights residents. At least I see it that way. Do you?
I was hoping to do this sooner, but the computer system was not cooperating. I’m glad it’s fixed, and I hope to do other communities over the next month; sort of an end-of-year analysis. Peace Out – 3C
0 responses so far ↓
1 Jill // Dec 2, 2007 at 11:11 am
Hi Carole – thanks! That is so fascinating. First thing you must do is copyright it and offer it for a fee, like synidicating it. People would love to have this information!
Enough of that – so – what do you see as the influencers here? Do you look into that?
That’s very interesting about how flat it’s been there in the last three years or so. I think, but I don’t know, but I think that that is a red flag for UH to watch. I don’t know how that community stacks up to similar ones but I think it’s greatest attraction is it’s greatest risk: young families and older ones who’ve been there forever. The young ones move in – but if they don’t like the schools or the extra cost it might take to stay there but use private school they’ll do what we and pretty much every other family that was on our block (all of whom were there for 5-10 years before moving) which was, move.
There’s chatter about CH wanting to incorporate UH but there’s always been resistance. I don’t know anything about the history of how the two communities developed (other than what I could read by googling it) but I’m sure it’s relevant.
I’ve always imagined UH to be a healthy market and a good investment – it looks as though that’s more or less true, but maybe not right now?
Thanks so much for doing this. I’m telling you, you and Bill Callahan need to syndicate your work, among others who should too.
2 Carole Cohen // Dec 2, 2007 at 11:48 am
Jill you are very kind ty. I could certainly say the same about you…I could never ferret out half the political stuff you post about so well.
Your point is valid, about young families and then the elderly, making up so many communities like UH. I personally think one issue is the same old same old, not as many new people moving into NE Ohio so the ‘regeneration’ part of it doesn’t fill the gap like it used to back in the day.
Cities have tighter budgets now and more social services to take care of. I don’t have any stats but I bet that plays a part in it too.
I have always been curious as to why the two communities – CH/UH were separate. I did student teaching at CH High…loved it, love the variety of classes that can be offered at a large school. It blew my mind. I know how I felt when my parents moved from Cleveland to Strongsville. Now Strongsville is a thriving community, but I went from the AB Hart, South High system, where there were tons of electives, a full orchestra and chamber orchestra, for my violin playing to Strongsville with rural aspects, a marching band and a basic curriculum, not much extra in there. I wish there was a way to somehow combine the two ideas lol
LOL and I don’t know a thing about how to syndicate….and of course we are all copyrighted on our posts, no one would dare to plagarize us
3 Cuyahoga County Home Sales Statistics from 1990 to 2007 | Cleveland Real Estate News // Dec 10, 2007 at 1:33 am
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