Raleigh Residential Real Estate Blog

Raleigh Residential Real Estate – This Home Just SOLD in Cary, North Carolina

The PolingTeam just sold this well cared two story home in an established Cary neighborhood. It featured 4 bedrooms, an office, 2 ½ baths, a stone gas log fireplace in family room, a single car garage, a large screened porch and deck, and a large private back yard with another deck and above ground pool.

It sold for $230,000 with the seller paying $5,000 in closing costs.

The PolingTeam received this listing from a past client and we listed the home just before Thanksgiving. The home went under contract in just 17 days and the sale closed on Thursday.

This sale again shows that if a home is priced right and marketed well it will sell, even in a buyers market.

Most of the PolingTeam’s business comes from referrals or past clients as we really do provide a high level of personalized service and because we really work to get our listings out there on the internet. Because of my background in IT, we do innovative things to market our homes.

So if you are thinking of selling your home, contact us for a free market analysis  to get your home’s value. Should you select us, we’ll help you to sell your home quickly too.

Raleigh Residential Real Estate – Debate on Knightdale Growth – What some Knightdale Home Owners are doing.

One of the things the Poling Team likes to do in our Raleigh Residential Real Estate blog is keep readers informed about issues involving growth in the local real estate market. Today’s blog will focus briefly on Knightdale, NC.

With all the new Growth and Development in Knightdale, some growing pains surfaced with the decision of the Knightdale Town Board to rezone a site off of Highway 64 for a new Super Wal-Mart this past year. This week the issue went to the North Carolina Court of Appeals.

Local residents went to court to block the building of the new Wal-Mart so close to the Timber Ridge and Widewater Village subdivisions.

“The suit claims the town did not properly notify residents about the rezoning and that one of the council members who voted in favor of the project had a conflict of interest.”
 
The suit was denied by a Superior Court Judge last spring.

“Thursday, a panel of three, Judges John Tyson, Barbara Jackson, and John Arrowood, heard the case without oral argument. They were scheduled to look over briefs and documents submitted by both sides of the case.
 
A decision is expected to come down in about 90 days.”

Read the full article about the current status of the lawsuit at:  Judges To Decide Knightdale Wal-Mart’s Fate

It is not unusual for the proposal of a new Wal-Mart to cause controversy. There is a national push to stop Wal-Mart and it often brings high emotions to the issue of grow and development. One internet website dedicated to stopping Wal-Mart is http://walmartwatch.com/

Raleigh Residential Real Estate – An interesting Raleigh Real Estate Market Indicator - The Consumer Confidence Index

One of indicators that those who are involved in investing in the stock market, the buying and selling of real estate or other kinds of investments is the Consumer Confidence Index. The Consumer Confidence Survey that determines the index is based on a representative sample of 5,000 U.S. households. This index is not based upon any kind of reality or scientific measurement of how the economy is actually performing; rather it is based upon the opinions of a random group of 5000 people.

If you read the reports the index has been declining since the summer, but consumers have not lost their holiday spirit and anticipate spending more on gifts this season than they did last Christmas. So despite how they feel about the direction of the economy, at least those surveyed are going to do the opposite. They are going to spend more.

Another facet of the survey covered what consumers are thinking about future jobs. “The outlook for the labor market was also more pessimistic. The percent of consumers expecting more jobs in the months ahead fell to 10.8 percent from 13.3 percent, while those anticipating fewer jobs rose to 23.1 percent from 20.2 percent.”

Again, this is based upon the feelings of these 5,000 people who were surveyed. It is not based upon any scientific evidence. The recent job numbers came in better than anticipated and last months figures were adjusted upward.

So one of the indicators that is used to help in day-to-day decision-making and long-term planning in based upon how 5,000 people feel about things. And those feelings are quite fickle and as we have seen their actions are inconsistent with their thinking.

You can read the November 27 Press Release here: The Consumer Confidence Press Release

Raleigh Residential Real Estate – There is some good news for the Raleigh, NC real estate market. Good news for Raleigh, NC home buyers and sellers. Mortgage Volume Escalates After Thanksgiving

I am always amazed at the amount of negative news that is out there on almost every topic. As we have seen over the last months real estate has been talked down by just about everyone. Home selling stats are used to generate uncertainty and that uncertainty generates fear and fear affects what is bought and sold.

I do not mean to downplay the effect of the national downturn in real estate, but some in the news media jump on every statistic and then spin the worst case scenario. Today, I am happy to report positive news regarding real estate.

Today, the Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) released the results of its Weekly Mortgage Applications Survey for the week ending November 30, 2007 and the mortgage volume soared after Thanksgiving. There had been an error in reporting due to Thanksgiving shortened week and the numbers had to be revised.

Read the full article: Weekly Mortgage Application Survey

Most of this increase appears to have been a result of refinancing as a result of lower interest rates. However, this still is good news for home sellers and home buyers. Lower interest rates are a good thing for real estate sales.

Visit our website and see our new home search tool or try in out by clicking here: Best Home Pro Search
 

Raleigh Residential Real Estate Good news for existing Raleigh, NC Home Owners! Mayor Meeker said on Thursday of this week that he plans to move forward with higher impact fees on builders and developers of new housing in the city of Raleigh.

While it may not be a “politically correct” thing for a realtor® to support development fees, I do believe the mayor and several of the newly elected City Council members have it right. New construction should pay its fair share of the impact it will have on roads, parks, water and sewer facilities and other infrastructure. And Raleigh’s impact fees are too low.

The Poling Team was opposed to the recent actions of the General Assembly which gave the counties the right to ask voters to add a home tax as a part of the budget approval process this year. Read our Nov. 6 blog on this topic: Home Tax

This tax is in addition to the yearly property taxes. It is paid by the seller every time a home is sold. It hurts our state’s existing homeowners by arbitrarily singling them out to pay for more than their share. Fortunately, the issue was rejected by all 16 counties where it was put on the ballot.

Opponents have said that this will slow growth in the Raleigh, NC housing market which is feeling the effect the housing market slowdown and the recent mortgage industry problems. I am not favoring slowing our growth, but I believe it should be done with proper attention to the cities ability to pay for and to support the growth.

While it is true that everyone can benefit from growth, I do not believe the numbers have been equitable in Raleigh for some time. Developers and new home builders should pay more