ALPHARETTA GA HOMES FOR SALE – Alpharetta, Ga Real Estate

Every year, United Van Lines generates a press release about their annual migration study. Its a fun read, but hardly scientific. The report measures inbound and outbound relocation in each state. In other words, how many of their clients are moving into or out of a particular state.

A strong mobility pattern continued in 2006 as many Americans packed up their belongings and headed to the West and Southeast parts of the country, while the Central Northeast region of the country experienced an increase in residents departing. The statistics are among the findings of United Van Line’s 30th annual “migration” study that tracks where its customers, over the last 12 months, moved from and the most popular destinations.

United classifies each state in one of three categories — “high inbound” (55% or more of moves going into a state); “high outbound” (55% or more of moves coming out of a state); or “balanced.” Although the majority of states were in the “balanced” category last year, several showed more substantial population shifts.

MOVING IN

Known for hospitality and gracious style, the Southeast states welcomed many new residents in 2006, with North Carolina coming in as the top destination (64.0% inbound). South Carolina (60.6%) continued its 13-year inbound tradition, while Alabama (57.5%) experienced its fourth year as a high-inbound location. Although Tennessee saw less people move in this year (55.8% in 2006; 58.0% in 2005), it still captured a spot on the high-inbound list.

Outbound leaders

The midwest is struggling with weakening economic conditions from serious problems with the auto industry.Michigan leads the pack with 66% outbound traffic.New York is second with 59.5% outbound traffic. Upstate New York is still struggling economically and largely missed the housing boom like the New York City region did.

Want more information on North Carolina Homes? Visit www.huntforhousesnc.com

For more information regarding Relocation to North Carolina, Real Estate or Lots for sale call Traci at 678-575-6735 or 1-888-277-2006 x6 or e mail huntforhouses@yahoo.com 

Atlanta area golf courses

The Atlanta area has some first-rate courses. Unfortunately, many of them are private.
• Augusta National. Enough said. One of the most revered golf courses in the world, and home to the Masters, probably the most revered golf tournament in the world.
Chairman Hootie Johnson and the boys may be old-fashioned when it comes to gender equality, but they try hard to keep up with changing times when it comes to golf. They made changes to six holes before this year’s tournament, involving holes 1, 4, 7, 11, 15 and 17.
• Peachtree Golf Club. The bentgrass greens are the story here. They are fast, undulating and well-bunkered, and 10 of them are multi-tiered. A creek feeds several lakes on the course, bringing water into play on 14 of the holes. This is a classic
Robert Trent Jones Sr. work that opened in 1947. It’s 7,043 yards long with a slope rating of 139 from the back tees. Caddies are a must if you want to walk the course.
• Reynolds Plantation in Greensboro is a golf community on Georgia’s “Antebellum Trail,” on the shores of Lake Oconee.
Three of the courses at Plantation made it into Golf Digest’s top-20 ranked courses in Georgia: Great Waters (11th), Oconee ranked (16th) and National (19th).

Southeast, coastal Georgia golf courses
• Sea Island is actually on St. Simon’s, a barrier island on the southeast coast that combines the primeval and the luxurious. It’s like stepping back in time, but with a whirlpool and fancy fixtures.
• Davis Love III lives here, and the island has eight distinct neighborhoods tucked away discreetly around the island, off the main roads that take you around.
Most residents have available to them the 54-hole Sea Island Club as well as the superb and private Ocean Forest Golf Club, ranked third in the state by Golf Digest.
Sea Island Club has three courses, including the excellent Seaside course. Originally designed by Harry S. Colt and Charles Alison in 1929, Seaside was given a thorough modernization by Tom Fazio in 1999.
Seaside is advertised as an ocean-side links course, and certain sections of the course do indeed have a wild, windswept feel to them, as the course climbs naturally over grassy dunes with their backsides up to the ocean breezes.
• The Hampton Club Golf Resort is one of the best marsh courses from Florida north through Myrtle Beach and the Carolinas, in terms of the views.
That’s because, at the Hampton Club, the views are from the marsh. Situated on the relatively isolated northernmost reaches of St. Simons, the Hampton Club pulses with the kind of raw beauty usually found on these islands of the southeastern coast, with ancient oaks framing the fairways. It’s simply one terrific, camera-ready view after another.

North Georgia golf courses
From the plains to the highlands, you might think you’re in Tennessee when you get this far north in Georgia, where the great Appalachian mountain range comes to its southern terminus, in the form of the Smokies.
• Currahee Golf Club in Toccoa is ranked in the state’s top-20 by Golf Digest, Currahee is 90 minutes north of Atlanta, and is situated on more than 1,100 acres with views of Lake Hartwell, the Tugaloo River and the Blue Ridge Mountains from nearly every hole. You can also see North and South Carolina.
Click here for a Georgia golf vacation quote.
• Cateechee Golf Club in Hartwell is considered one of the better courses in north Georgia. It has lush, rolling hills with great views, and is Audubon certified, known for its wildlife. The course is named after a Choctaw Indian maiden.
• Highland Walk at Victoria Bryant in Royston. The course, part of the Victoria Bryant State Park, is easily the most difficult of the eight courses in the Georgia state park system.
• Lookout Mountain Golf Club is in Georgia, but overlooks the city of Chattanooga, Tennessee. It’s a private course so you may need to belong to a club that has reciprocal privileges. Designed by Seth Raynor, the bentgrass greens have hidden breaks and undulations, and the fairways are open.
• Brasstown Valley Golf Club in Young Harris, Georgia. It’s in the heart of the Blue Ridge Mountains, two hours north of Atlanta. Designed by Dennis Griffiths, the course winds through wildlife preserves, ponds and streams and its framed by the mountains.

South Georgia golf courses
• There isn’t much in south Georgia once you get away from the coast, other than the excellent Kinderlou Forest in Valdosta. The dominant feature of Kinderlou Forest Golf Club is an old borrow pit that comes into play early on. The course is difficult, measuring 7,781 yards from the back tees, a handful even for the long-hitting pros. An excellent, Davis Love III design.
September 25, 2007

Any opinions expressed above are those of the writer and do not necessarily represent the views of the management. The information in this story was accurate at the time of publication. All contact information, directions and prices should be confirmed directly with the golf course or resort before making reservations and/or travel plans

For information about Alpharetta, Ga Real Estate, Market Trends, Events and Happenings in and around Alpharetta, please call Traci at 678-575-6735 or send an e mail to
huntforhouses@yahoo.com

INSIDE ADVICE: In a slow market, there are many reasons to list with an agent
By John AdamsContributorPublished on: 07/01/07

I was recently asked whether a home should be sold “by owner” or listed with a real estate agent. I replied that it depends on the seller’s circumstances.

In today’s world of real estate, a seller has more options than ever. You can list with a traditional real estate agent and pay a typical commission of 6 percent or 7 percent of the purchase price, or you can go it alone and try to save the commission. In addition, many brokers offer services somewhere in between, charging different fees for various services you might select.

If you are trying to make the same decision about how to sell your house, here are some relevant topics. You will likely want to list your home with a traditional real estate agent …

If you are in a hurry to sell your home. Let’s say your spouse has been transferred to Chicago, and he’s already there living in a hotel. The only thing keeping you here is the house, and you need the full benefits of a full-time professional to get your home sold as quickly as possible.
Remember that a significant part of the buying market is being transferred into Atlanta, and those buyers work almost exclusively with agents. These are the hottest buyers in town, with a high motivation to purchase quickly, and cash in their pockets. And those buyers usually don’t view homes listed by owner.

If you have never sold a house before and simply don’t have a comfort level with the transaction and the steps needed to make the sale happen. Getting a buyer to agree to pay a certain price is just the beginning. And if you’ve not sold a home before, you can easily miss an important part of the process, putting your entire sale in jeopardy. Effective agents specialize in getting the sale to the closing table.

If you’re uncomfortable with the prospect of showing your home to strangers and would welcome the agent’s presence when your home is shown. Reports of crime associated with home sales and open houses are rare, but any time you open your home to the public, it’s smart to anticipate potential problems. You’ll want to screen prospective purchasers, and make sure you are not alone when showing your home to interested parties.

If you are trying to sell in a slow market, like the one we are in now. Even a small advantage in marketing may make the difference between a sale and another 60 days on the market. For example, agents are members of the local multiple listing services, and that’s where other agents go to find prospective matches for their buyers’ needs. Having your home listed in the MLS is a huge advantage over simply having a “for sale” sign in the yard.

In addition, many MLS listings are automatically placed on national listing Web sites like realtor.com, where out-of-town buyers are more likely to view them.

If your time is better spent doing whatever it is you do than answering lots of unqualified callers’ questions about your house and how low you might be willing to go. Some folks are simply so busy with their job that they really have no business trying to sell their own home. Answering calls and returning inquiries is time-consuming, not to mention the obligatory open houses you will want to hold on the weekends. In contrast, agents are set up to handle this type of volume and have systems in place to convert leads into buyers.

If your skin is so thin that you will be personally offended when a prospective buyer makes fun of your decorating. In that case, you need someone else to handle the sale. Buyers come from all backgrounds and walks of life, and everybody’s got an opinion about your paint colors and your furniture. To make matters worse, they will want to poke their head into every nook and cranny of your house. Part of the selling process is encouraging buyers to visualize themselves living in your home, asking them how they might make changes to better reflect their own likes and dislikes. If that process will offend you, call an agent.

And finally, if the idea of negotiating prices back and forth with the purchaser is distasteful to you. If that’s so, you should probably hire an agent. Agents receive training in how to handle back-and-forth negotiations, trying to bring the parties to a meeting of the minds and getting to an acceptable price.

In the market for a new home? Contact “the best Realtor in Alpharetta” Traci at 678-575-6735 or send an e mail to huntforhouses@yahoo.com

Houses stack up as market softens
By JULIE B. HAIRSTON: Atlanta Journal-Constitution: 07/01/07

Lela Hinson put her Campbellton Road house on the market last fall just as the U.S. real estate market plunged into its deepest sales slump in years.

Working without an agent, Hinson only managed to draw a few lookers and no takers. Month after “stressful” month, her house languished on the market.

“I did get a few calls, but mostly people just wanting to look at the house and who were not prequalified,” said Hinson, 28, a paralegal. “Nobody was really interested.”

Throughout metro Atlanta, agents and brokers are reporting slowed sales and rising inventories of unsold houses, even as national reports indicate month after month of falling sales and prices now projected to last well into 2008.

Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies reports that the current national oversupply of unsold houses would take two years to sell off.

We work closely with sellers now to negotiate the tricky choices the soft market imposes.

“Are you willing to list your home slightly below the market value in order to make the sale?” she asks them. “Some sellers are not willing to do that and some are.”

From May 2006 to May 2007, inventories of unsold houses in metro Atlanta soared in every county, climbing between 18 percent and 70 percent in just one year, depending on the area.

Cobb County seems to have struck the best balance in the softening market, holding its inventory to less than an eight-month supply, an increase of just over 21 percent from the year before.

Hardest hit were Rockdale County, where inventory increased more than 70 percent to more than one year’s supply, and south Fulton, where a 53 percent increase pushed supply to almost 13 months.

The marketing director for a local RE company said Atlanta’s market slowdown began last spring and “the bottom fell out at the end of the year.”
“South Fulton,” Carver said, “a few years ago was the talk of the town. Everybody was flocking there. Then, the months supply [of unsold homes] just rocketed up.”

Soft-market strategies
After mulling her options, Hinson, whose home was in that tough south Fulton market, decided to call in an expert. She had met an agent this year when Wilson stopped by to look over the property.

When Hinson decided to hire the agent, the agent made a careful analysis of the property’s value. Impressed with the 1-acre lot and attractive interior features, the agent actually advised Hinson to raise her asking price to $130,500 from $120,000 based on sales of comparable properties in her area.
Potential buyers sometimes suspect a hidden flaw or legal entanglements when a house is priced below its market value.

Two weeks later, Hinson and her agent had a firm offer. The property is set to close at a price of $129,500 on Tuesday — more than six months after she first began her efforts to sell.

“It’s just taking longer to sell. Buyers have so much to choose from,” she said. “A home might be out there 60, 90, even 120 days now.”

Cancellations rise
Greg Duriez, division president for KB Home, the national builder that debuted the popular Martha Stewart line of homes last year, said the slowdown is showing up in more ways than one.

“Net sales are slower than they were last year, and not only are sales slower but [contract] cancellations are up,” Duriez said. Hampton Oaks in south Fulton County was the second Martha Stewart community in the country. The company has since launched Windchase in Cherokee County, also a Martha Stewart community.

KB Home is reporting about 30 percent of its contracts for new homes in metro Atlanta are being canceled before closing. In 2004 and 2005, he said cancellation rates averaged in the 15 percent to 20 percent range.
In part, Duriez blamed tighter mortgage lending standards for the high cancellation rate as a growing rate of default on risky, subprime loans sweeps the nation. He said he expects the effect to fade as buyers become more accustomed to the new standards.

David Tufts, president of the Marketing Directors, a national marketing firm for new condominium developments, said the real estate slowdown has affected metro Atlanta sales, but he expects the area to be spared its worst effects.
“There really is a lull in the market, but it’s not for any economic reason in Georgia,” Tufts said. “Atlanta in particular is not a ‘bubble market’ and never has been.”

Cities like San Diego and Miami are prototypical of the so-called bubble markets. In those cities, real estate prices experienced double-digit increases for several years running as speculators bought and sold property for quick profits. Such areas have been especially hard hit as investors withdraw and overbuilt, speculative projects sit unsold.

Atlanta, by contrast, has seen smaller but steady gains in the 3 percent to 5 percent per year range, and growth projections for the metro area continue to buoy developers’ optimism that currently high inventory levels will be absorbed quickly in the recovery.

“Once the national market improves, [Atlanta] is really going to pop,” said Metro Brokers’ Carver. “We’re going to see a huge pent-up demand.”
Duriez shares Carver’s perspective.

Metro Atlanta, which is gaining some 500 new residents every day according to the U.S. Bureau of Census, is expected to gain 1 million more people by 2030.
“It’s still a healthy market,” Duriez said.

Intown, luxury hold up
While average prices nationwide have recently experienced their steepest decline in 16 years, Atlanta’s median home price continues to increase at about 5 percent a year, reaching $191,587 from $182,500 in 2005. Fayette County on metro Atlanta’s Southside posted the highest median price for a new home at $370,187, while north metro’s Forsyth County posted the highest median resale price at $252,000.

With empty nesters and traffic-weary suburbanites repopulating the city’s core, prices and inventories in the city of Atlanta are faring better than many other areas, according to Carver.

And outside the Perimeter, Douglas County and north Fulton are faring well in the luxury house price categories starting around $1 million, Carver added.
“Right now, the high end in certain areas is holding up well,” Carver said.
But metro Atlanta is unquestionably a buyer’s market, with developers sweetening their incentive packages and sellers showing great flexibility in price negotiations.

“Don’t be afraid to ask for things now,” Carver said.
Having fared well as a seller, Hinson and her architect husband, Antonio, ended up in good position as buyers of a new College Park house, where the builder upgraded their new home’s accessory package while they were waiting for the contract on the Campbellton Road house to close.

Lower Fed Rate Means Opportunities on the Rise

For the first time in more than four years, the Federal Reserve cut its Fed Funds Rate, which directly impacts millions of American borrowers. And while this important decision has many implications, there’s still some debate among experts about what this means to the economy as a whole.

The Federal Reserve meets again in six weeks, and no one is certain how market volatility and inflation concerns will affect their future policy and decision-making. Bottom line: Take advantage of this opportunity while you still can. Call me right away.

If you’re looking to capture a lower interest rate for refinancing or buying a home, this could be your best opportunity to do so. If you have an Adjustable Rate Mortgage, while this rate cut might help to improve your situation, now is the time to refinance into a fixed-rate loan.

If you have a Home Equity Line of Credit (HELOC) or credit cards tied to the Prime Rate, the Fed’s cut in the Fed Funds Rate just put a little money in your pocket.

Borrowers waiting for a lower fixed-rate mortgage may be waiting for a long time. The chart below clearly shows how Fed Funds Rate cuts do not translate into cuts in fixed-rate mortgages. In January 2001, the Fed Funds Rate was at 6% and 30-year fixed rates averaged 7.03%. By December 2001, following 4.25% in cuts throughout the year, home loan rates were actually up to 7.07%.