About James City County, VA

We have seen a recent increase in home sales in Colonial Heritage in Williamsburg, Va.

Colonial Heritage in Williamsburg, Va. is a gated golf course community for residents ages 55 and over. There are many activites for adults such as swimming in either an indoor or outdoor pool, working out in the fitness center, playing a round of golf on the championship Arthur Hills golf course, woodworking, or meeting friends at the owner's club for a game of bridge or a relaxing dinner. The residents of Colonial Heritage can have peace of mind knowing that they have 24-hour gated security.

For well over a year there has been a decrease in property values as well as a drop in home sales in Colonial Heritage in Williamsburg, Va. During the last year or two, many of the residents of Colonial Heritage who chose to sell their property were taking a loss, because of the drop in property values.

There is a silver lining to this cloud. Although the property values in Colonial Heritage are still lower than they were when many of the homeowners purchased their home, there has been a recent increase in home sales.

According to data from the Williamsburg Multiple Listing Service, the home sales in Colonial Heritage in the past six months were more than twice what they were in the previous six months. From November 2008 through April 2009, there were six closed transactions. From May 2009 through October 2009, there were thirteen closed transactions. In addition to the closed transactions, there are five homes in Colonial Heritage currently under contract that have not closed yet.

Homes for sale in Williamsburg Va. are priced lower than they have been in years! In many areas the home prices are lower than they were in 2004 or 2005.

I often have people ask me if the home sales in Williamsburg, Va. are picking up and I am always honest with them about my observations about our real estate market in Williamsburg, Virginia.

Most property owners who ask about home prices in Williamsburg, Va. seem very discouraged when I tell them that I don't think their home's value is going to start increasing significantly very soon. Based on historic trends in home sales and the predictions of many economists, I believe it may be four or five years before we see home prices rise significantly.

Real estate trends have always been cyclical and the cycles tend to go up or down about every seven years. The last "up cycle" that we experienced was longer than normal and prices escalated at rates that our economy could not support. What we all need to accept, whether we like it or not, is that the value of our homes have more than likely dropped from what they were in 2005 or 2006.

Remember that all real estate is local. I posted a blog about home sales in WIlliamsburg, Va. a few months ago. I noted that the values of homes in some areas have remained relatively stable, while in other subdivisions they have dropped dramatically. To read this blog click here.

If you are considering buying a house within the next couple of months, you should probably buy now while the prices and interest rates are low. (Some economists predict that interest rates will start to rise in January). If you are going to buy and plan to stay in the house for at least four to six years, then you will probably see your property's value increase. If you get an especially good buy, the value of your home may begin to escalate more quickly.

When I searched our Williamsburg MLS for homes that have sold in the Stonehouse subdivision in the last six months, I found the data very interesting. If you are thinking of buying or selling a house in Stonehouse, you will probably find this spreadsheet helpful.

Click here to view a spreadsheet of all the homes that have sold in Stonehouse within the last six months. This link will expire November 29, 2008. The data in this spread sheet gives a lot of information about homes that have sold in Stonehouse. You can quickly see how long houses were on the market, the list price/sold price per square foot, age of the house, list date and sold date.

Other data includes number of bedrooms and bathrooms and heated square footage of the house.

If you would like to receive regular emails regarding home sales in Williamsburg Va. visit my website and register for the free MLS search.

I often have people ask me about foreclosures in Willamsburg. Usually when people inquire about foreclosures they are considering purchasing a foreclosure as an investment or to be used as their primary dwelling.

For REALTORS in Williamsburg finding a foreclosure in the MLS is not always easy. When a REALTOR in Williamsburg takes a listing they fill out data input sheets for the office manager or secretary to use when inputing the listing into the MLS system. The data input sheets for our MLS in Williamsburg have a field for foreclosures, but it is not a required field so it does not always get checked

Because of the way the data input sheets are set up, a search for foreclosures in Williamsburg all of the foreclosures will not show up in the search.

There are other ways to determine if a listing is a foreclosure, but it takes a little bit more effort on the part of the REALTOR.

One way to find out if a house is a foreclosure is to look at the owner name. If the owners name is Wells Fargo, Bank of America or FAnnie Mae, well that would be a no brainer. However, there are many other banks and mortgage companies and sometimes a foreclosure has the name REO or is a partnership or an LLC.

Another way to find a foreclosure is by knowing which agents in the area typically list foreclosures and to run a search of their listings. If the listing does not have the foreclosure field checked, a phone call to the listing agent will usually get the answer.

So if you are looking for a foreclosure in Williamsburg, make sure that your REALTOR is wiling to do a little digging to find all of the foreclosures. If you do no have a buyer's agent, feel free to contact me!

Currently there are five homes for sale in Landfall at Jamestown. Check out the details on these homes by clicking here. There are several other homeowners in Landfall at Jamewtown who would possibly sell if a buyer was to come along and make an offer.

If you think that you might like to live in Landfall at Jamestown let me know and I will be happy to help you and provide you with additional information about this waterfront subdivision in Williamsburg/James City County.