Loudoun County Real Estate Statistics and News

Thursday Poll-How Much Research Time Would You Need Before Actually Putting Your House Up For Sale?

Power Outage!

Earlier today, Loudoun Stats experienced some down time due to a power outage in San Francisco, which effected TypePad, our blogging platform. According to TypePad, things are up and running once again and should be in the clear.

We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your patience. Now back to blogging...

Home Prices in Loudoun County to Remain Flat for the Next 4 Years?!

If the past is any indication of the future of real estate prices in Loudoun County, then we are in for another 5 years of little if any price appreciation in Loudoun County.  According to annual statistics on the Dulles Area Association of Realtors website, the last market slowdown/correction occurred in 1990 when the average sales price dropped from $181,800 in 1989 to $170,100 the next year.  The market didn't get back to that high water mark until 1994.

The bull market that proceeded the current market slowdown started in 1997 when the average price of a home in Loudoun County was $202,166.  Eight years later the average price had increase to $546,897.  This awesome market was bound to slow down if not retreat.  Through the first six months of 2007 the average price of a home sold in Loudoun County has dropped to $502,005.  This is the first drop in the average price since 1996. 

With the bull market over and a price correction already in place, past market cycles indicate we are probably going to see a consolidation period.   A consolidation period or base building period is characterized by a long period of time with little if any price movement. 

A comparison can be made to the stock market of 7 years ago when a huge correction began in 2000, lasted for about 18 months and then a base building period of 4 years lasted until 2006 and led to the current bull market. 

So look for the next real estate bull market in Loudoun County to start around March or April of 2011.

Thursday Poll-Have Interest Rates Effected Your Decision To Buy Real Estate?

Washingtonpost.com Launches LoudounExtra.com

Washingtonpost.com has launched a new website called LoudounExtra.com that is dedicated to coverage of Loudoun County.  It is a visually appealing site with 7 main categories that include news, sports and one our favorites, blogs.

The Living in LoCo blog written by Tammi Marcoullier is now prominantly displayed on the site.  We wrote about the Living in Loco blog in a previous post and now it seems even more people in Loudoun County will be turned on to the timely and pertinent posts that Tammi writes.

For anyone living in Loudoun County, we recommend bookmarking the new LoudounExtra.com.

We are proud and honored to have Loudoun Stats included in the LoudounExtra.com blogroll of hyperlocal content pertaining to Loudoun County, Virginia. As Loudoun Stats, the Ashburn, Virginia Community Blog, other local blogs and LoudounExtra.com continue to grow, we hope that you will have everything you need concerning Loudoun County at your fingertips.

And we're always looking for suggestions and feedback so if you have something you would like to see a specific topic discussed or have something to share regarding Loudoun County real estate or one of ours posts, please let us know.

Thursday Poll-Are You Happy With Current Real Estate Listing Sites?

Related Articles:

List of Listing Sites

Zillow, Trulia and now...Google?

Zillow Beats Out Yahoo Real Estate; Realtor.com Still King

Homeowners Associations Management Companies Increase Fees by 325% to Home Sellers

Virginia House Bill 2016 went into effect on July 1, 2007.  Among other things, the bill allows management companies of Homeowners Associations to increase the fee they charge to provide a resale disclosure document to a home seller from a maximum of $100 to $325.  Almost all of the associations in Loudoun County use the services of a management company, so this price increase will effect a majority of home sellers in our area.

The full bill can be found here:  HB 2016

In a nutshell, what has happened is the lobbyists for the association management companies were able to convince our elected officials that the cost to make some copies and drive by and inspect the exterior of a home somehow leaped from $100 to $325.  And not only that, they can send the documents over the internet so the cost of the copying actually went down. 

So why is it that it now costs 325% more to do the same thing they did for $100 just one week ago?

So to sum up what the our state legislators and officials have done for home sellers in the last couple of months:

1.  Increased the property tax rate.

2.  Allow for the increase of the grantors tax by 400%.

3.  Increase the liability of the seller when selling a home.

4.  Increase the fee for resale disclosure documents.

Thursday Poll-As A Home Buyer, How Do You Search For Properties?

This week's poll - As a home buyer in Loudoun County, how do you search for properties (choose all that apply)?