There was a town hall meeting held at the Aberdeen High School in Harford County on Monday March 10, 2008. This was the third meeting that they have held so far. The next one will be in Havre De Grace. The date, place and time have not been released yet. Did anyone attend this meeting? I am still waiting for the video to be released.

According to ABC 2 News, The Base Realignment and Closure Process or "BRAC" will bring thousands of jobs to Aberdeen, along with Ft. Meade in Columbia. "People say ‘When is it coming?' It's slowly happening as we speak right now," said David Craig, the Harford County Executive.

Craig says about 500 new residents have already moved to Harford County because of BRAC. Eight intersections near the Proving Ground will have to be improved, most of them along Rt. 40. Other roads that lead to the base, including Rt. 22, will have to be widened.

Eventually, 8,000 new civilian jobs will be shifted from Ft. Monmouth, New Jersey to Aberdeen Proving Ground. About 2,000 military jobs from Aberdeen are being moved to Ft. Lee, Virginia. "The Department of Defense and the Department of the Army are moving forward with BRAC," said Col. Jeff Weissman, Aberdeen Proving Ground's Garrison Commander.

There have been reports that workers at Ft. Monmouth don't want to move to Harford County. Col. Weismann said that in BRAC-related job shifts in other states, only about 30 to 40 percent of civilian employees moved to a new location to keep their job. That is not slowing the Army down. "Aberdeen Proving Ground has received all the funding that it requires," Col. Weissman said. "We have a plan, we have a schedule and we're on plan and on schedule right now."

And if those statistics hold true in Maryland, Aberdeen Proving Ground will have a lot of job openings. At the town hall meeting, Marlene Lee from the Harford Community College and David Valrath from the Harford County School System discussed a number of new degree programs that are being developed so that local workers can be trained for the new jobs.

Sheriff Jesse Bane told the crowd he's estimating the Sheriff's Department will need 60 new deputies by the year 2011. The county jail will also have to be expanded.

And County Executive Craig said that by 2020, the growing county will need to be able to produce 53-million gallons of water a day. Right now, the capacity is 20-million gallons. Craig said addressing the water issue will take three to four years.

But Craig said Harford County residents will not be asked to pay for it all with an increase in their property taxes. "We're not anticipating an increase in taxes because of the capital improvements we need to make, or because of the operational improvements," he said.

This is the official press release from Harford County

BRAC TOWN HALL MEETING DRAWS LARGE AUDIENCE

(Bel Air, MD - March 11, 2008) - - A near capacity crowd of 400 attended the third BRAC Town Hall meeting Monday evening at the Aberdeen High School. The event was hosted by County Executive David R. Craig and James Richardson, Director of the Office of Economic Development for Harford County.

Among the officials participating in the community meeting were Colonel Jeffrey Weissman, Aberdeen Proving Ground Garrison Commander, Aberdeen Mayor Michael Bennett, Sheriff L. Jesse Bane, Marlene Lieb, Associate Vice President, Harford Community College, David Volrath, Executive Director of Secondary Education, Harford County Public Schools, Bob Cooper, Director, Harford County Department of Public Works, James Richardson, Director, Office of Economic Development and County Executive Craig.

"We are extremely pleased with the attendance at the BRAC Town Hall meeting," said County Executive Craig. "Clearly the citizens of Harford County and the surrounding communities have a keen interest in BRAC and the positive impact it will have on our county," Craig remarked.

The Harford County Office of Economic Development, the lead department for Harford County with BRAC issues, served as coordinator for the event. A fourth BRAC Town Hall meeting will be held later this year in Havre de Grace at a date and time to be determined.

The panel of officials responded to 40 questions posed by those in attendance. A concern of many of those who attended was transportation and the ability of the state, county and federal government to fund the necessary infrastructure improvements necessary to meet the needs of the BRAC.
"We will continue to work with our federal, state and local government partners to meet the challenges and opportunities that BRAC presents," stated James Richardson, Director of the Office of Economic Development. "BRAC is a reality. Jobs are coming to Harford County and that means we must be ready to address the needs of the people who move to Harford County as well," Richardson stated.

The BRAC Town Hall meetings are part of the county executive's "Open Government" initiative, sharing information with citizens and those interested in BRAC and the impact to Harford County. The Town Meeting can be viewed on the Harford County Government website. For more information regarding BRAC visit www.harfordcountymd.gov or the Office of Economic Development website at http://www.harfordbusiness.org/.

Cecil County homes for sale

Harford County homes for sale

In my last post I discussed the S&P Case Shiller home price index report. In this post I am going to discuss the OFHEO (Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight) home price index report. The OFHEO report also uses repeat sales of single family homes. The differences are that it also uses refinances and only uses mortgages that have been purchased or securitized by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. It's data goes back to January, 1975. They do a monthly and a quarterly report. There is about a 2 month lag time in the report.

The newest report from the OFHEO was released on February 26, 2008. The OFHEO breaks their report down by cities, states and divisions. Here are their latest statistics.

Rank 1-Year Quarter 5-Year Since 1980

Baltimore- 134 1.97 0.14 81.47
Towson, MD

Wilmington- 149 1.67 0.23 60.10
DE, MD, NJ
(MSAD)

Maryland 39 0.80 -0.18 80.64 441.83

Delaware 31 1.95 0.44 59.93 421.50

United States 0.84 0.10 41.37 290.20

I included Delaware since it is a small state and Cecil County boarders it, plus the OFHEO includes us in their city report for Wilmington.

Based on this report the Cecil County real estate market is not too horrible. Especially when you compare it to other current markets.

The worst city on this report was Merced, CA
National Ranking - 291
1-Year - -18.98
Quarter - -7.89
5-Year - 53.69

Cecil County homes for sale

Harford County homes for sale

The S&P Case Shiller price indices

In this post, I am going to discuss the different home price index reports for real estate. A home price index report measures the price of houses. The four reports I am going to discuss are The S&P Case Shiller, OFHEO's (Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight), Radar Logic and what I'll call the local report based on data for Cecil County home sales and Harford County home sales, furnished by my mls (multiple list service). I think this is an important thing to discuss now, due to all of the doom and gloom surrounding the real estate market currently. It seems I can not even turn on my tv without hearing something negative about the market. I wonder why consumer confidence keeps falling? If they say the sky is falling it must be, right?

Let me first say that Real Estate is a very localized market. What happens here in the Cecil County Real Estate and Harford County Real Estate markets may not be happening in your market and vice versa.

I am starting with the S&P Case Shiller home price indices because in my opinion it is the most publicized report. They do a 10 city report, a 20 city report and a national report. The data they use are repeat sales for single family homes. There has to be two or more recorded sales for the property and they exclude condos and co ops. There data goes back to January, 1987. The S&P Case Shiller report is calculated monthly and published with a two month lag. There national report is calculated quarterly. They also do a year end report. The year end report came out on February 26th and that is the one I am going to discuss.

The chart above is found at S&P/Case-Shiller ® Home Price Indices and depicts the annual returns of the U.S. National Home Price, the ten City Composite and the twenty City Composite Indices. Here are there year end change percentages.

National -8.9%

Atlanta -3.4%

Boston -3.4%

Charlotte +2.3%

Chicago -4.5%

Cleveland -6.3%

Dallas -2.4%

Denver -4.5%

Detroit -13.6%

Las Vegas -15.3%

Los Angeles -13.7%

Miami -17.5%

Minneapolis -8.0%

New York -5.6%

Phoenix -15.3%

Portland +1.2%

San Diego -15.0%

San Francisco -10.8%

Seattle +0.5%

Tampa -13.3%

Washington -9.4%

Composite-10 -9.8%

Composite-20 -9.1%

That's great, but here in Cecil County we are a rural area and not close to any of the cities they report on. I don't see how this report pertains to my market. If they at least included Baltimore it could be somewhat relevant, but it does not. The headlines are already eating this up and reporting on how terrible the housing market is. I'm not saying that the market is great or even close to being great. What I'm saying is this report tells me nothing about how the Cecil County real estate market is doing. There are markets that are not doing as horrible as the media would lead you to believe and the point of this post is too go over each of these reports and let you decide which pertains to your market the best. Then you can make an informed decision about how bad or good your real estate market is doing. My next blog post will discuss the OFHEO.

Megan McGonigal Realtor RE/MAX Integrity 2825 North East Rd. North East, MD, 21901	Work: 410-658-3100 Mobile: 443-309-1659 Fax: 410-658-3163 http://cecilcountyconnection.com/blog.cecilcountyconnection
Cecil County Real Estate,Cecil County homes for sale,Harford County homes for sale,Cecil County Realtor
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February's market statistics were just released from my mls today. This report is released on the 10th of every month for the previous month. I will post the results here. Here they are for February and January.

Market Statistics for Cecil County, MD

From 02/01/2008-02/29/2008 From 01/01/2008 to 01/31/2008

Total Dollar Sold $13,044,800 $11,997,280

Average Sold Price $255,780 $249,943

Median Sold Price $245,000 $219,000

Total Units Sold 51 48

Average Days on Market 135 163

Average List price for Sold $281,615 $282,828

Avg Sale Price as a

percentage of Avg List Price 90.83% 88.37%

Active Listings 832 829

New Listings taken for the month 190 159

Marked Under Contract

for the month 78 69

February's market statistics while not great are better than January's. We still have too many homes on the market. It has been a busy month for me so far. I think the Spring market has arrived and will be eager to see what March's statistics bring. I have heard both local and non local agents comment on the sudden increase in activity. I just hope our market does not get inundated with foreclosures and short sales. If you have any questions please feel free to comment on this blog or email me.

Cecil County homes for sale

Harford County homes for sale

Letters were sent in the beginning of February to 5,000 Fort Monmouth employees in an attempt to get them to voluntarily move to Maryland in the summer of 2008. According to Maj. Gen. Dennis Via the plan is to transfer 340 positions to Maryland this summer, 600 in 2009, 220 in 2010 and the rest in 2011. As of Tuesday it looks like 221 employees will be coming to APG this summer.

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There wil be a BRAC town hall meeting at the Aberdeen High School Auditorioum on March 10th at 6:30pm. The topics that will be discussed are APG update, transportation, education and workplace development, Public safety, health and community services and outreach. It will end with a question and answer forum. For information, call 410-638-3059 or visit http://www.harfordbusiness.org.. There have been two other BRAC town meetings thus far.

Cecil County homes for sale

Harford County homes for sale