Two Years of Recovery in Branson Real Estate

Aren’t you curious to find real stories of real estate rather than the sky falling media version of things that make you want to curl up in the fetal position and regret waking up in the morning?  Me too.  I came across some positive news that I thought was worth sharing.

I talked to some folks from Las Vegas over the weekend and I asked them how things were going.  They said, it was still bad in Las Vegas as home prices were still declining.  They asked how we were doing here in Branson and I gave them the typical Realtor answer that we never had the super high increase that Las Vegas had so we didn’t have as dramatic of a low but we did have some drama.

I like to work with facts rather than opinions so it inspired me to check the real numbers.

I keep a running tab of my own data that I process year after year to keep track of the Branson Real Estate Market and what I found was two years of recovery!

If you look at the number of transactions (closed sales) from  2005 until today you’ll see that 2005 was an amazing year for real estate in Branson with 13% to 15% appreciation in values from the previous year.  Then 2006-2008 were declining years, not only in the number of transactions, but also in the average price of a home.  The market bottomed in 2009 and has had two years of an increase in the number of transactions from the previous year in both 2010 and 2011.

The decline in the average sales price has leveled off to $141,169 from $143,169 in 2010 and $147,000 in 2009.  The foreclosure inventory is being absorbed and as it continues to do so, we should see an increase in that average home price.

But the good news is, buyers are out there and want real estate.  Interest rates are still at historic lows and so are average home prices.  People love a sale, and that’s evident an increase in the number of buyers to Branson Real Estate for the past two years.

Contributed by:

Jeramie Worley, GRI

Broker / Assoc

The Community Real Estate Group, LLC

140 Canyon Crossing, Hollister, MO 65672

Branson New Home Construction: No building code, No Problem?

As a Realtor who sells Branson  new home construction, I always do a double take when I see a new house going up.  Sometimes I’ll even stop and look around.  I work primarily inTaney County,MO which has no building codes

.  They do have a Certificate of Conformity Permit, which is little more than an inspection to make sure the home is habitable, but outside of that, no one is checking to see if  the builder has gone about the systems or the structure properly.

Once I showed a (supposedly) completed branson new home to some prospective clients and I’m not joking, it looked like a large monster had scared off the subcontractors.  There were tools and lunch trash laying everywhere in the yard, the front door was left wide open and there were footsteps embedded in the concrete floor of the garage.

Further inspection revealed that there had been no box or ridge venting to the roof, and the drain for the main level laundry drained right onto the floor of the basement.  It had not been connected at all to the plumbing system.  Imaging, doing a load of laundry after you move in and you are in the basement working on a nice scrapbooking project. The next thing you know,  a soapy shower is raining down on you’re your many pages of grandmas 80^th’ birthday party from last spring…ruined, and darn it, now those die cut wood trees that you put down with dazzle tac glue are warped and just won’t stick anymore.

Just yesterday I saw a small 1400 sq ft home going up in a nearby neighborhood and they had all the forms up for the concrete slab.  There was no footing.  Now, I’m not a builder or an expert by any means, but that seemed like a cut corner to me.

I took a builder, from a development I had listed, out to look at the property and said, “Is this right?”  He gave me the thumbs down  but I still wasn’t satisfied. I had to know why.  Further research revealed that a Slab on Grade foundation is ok for areas where the ground doesn’t freeze, but here inMissouri, it does and therefore a T-Shaped footing is recommended to prevent frost heave.  Wow…seems like the corner wasn’t cut, it was totally hacked off.  All homes are built by humans and will have mistakes, or what builder like to call “character” but if this home is starting out this way, it’s going end up being Jim Carey by the time the roof goes on.

 

Branson new home construction at Branson Canyon

The builder I took over there cut his teeth on the strict and rigid building codes of Kansas City so he is was used to doing things a certain way, even though it is not required.  That’s the kind of gusto you want from your builder. Conversations about building codes or at least what your builder is used to…is a MUST, especially if you are building a home in Branson or Taney County, Missouri.

Contributed by:

Jeramie Worley, GRI

Broker /  Associate

The Community Real Estate Group, LLC

140 Canyon Crossing,Hollister,MO65672

417 336 4200

Author = Worley and Associates

Branson Vacation Homes: when is the best time to buy?

I get asked this question all the time and there is only one good answer – Now!

Before you dismiss me as sleazy salesman, please know, that this is my area of expertise and I sell more vacation homes in Branson than anything else.

This info is a compilation of real stories from my clients.

The 4-6 Bedroom Nightly Rental home is still very in demand in the Branson Real Estate market and key to when to by, falls in the good and bad of our own human nature.

Branson Canyon Vacation home with 6 bedroom, 5 bath

Branson Canyon Vacation Home with 6 bedrooms and 5 baths. Perfect for vacation rental.

There are two types of people: procrastinators and planners and both can help you succeed with a Branson Vacation Home.

With limited properties in the area, than can fit your whole family together in one place, many responsible planners look ahead to find a properly with the availability they need.

The people with this kind of mindset are smart, and instead of calling everyone in the family, they wait until the Thanksgiving – New Year holiday season to talk to everyone and find out everyone’s availability.  When people are together, they search properties online, look a pictures, get more info, and make a decision.

This is why many Branson Canyon owners see a surge in booking activity for the summer months, during the December, even January time frame.

If you waited to buy or build until May, which is right about the time the Season kicks off, you could have missed out on all of those potential bookings.

However, the procrastinators (or folks with last minute vacation plans) need a place also and they don’t want to let everyone down since they’ve been trusted with the job of finding the home. As they start searching for a place, they see that almost all of the properties are booked. Hmmm…what are they going to do? So, when you introduce your property to the market with open availability, you will get a flood of activity and can probably get a better price.

At BransonCanyon, spring and fall bookings tend to come in more last minute (less than 30 days out) but the summertime and holiday dates get booked up quite a bit in advance.

The key is not when to buy, just buy and get your property available to the Branson Vacation Home rental marketplace.

With interest rates low and building costs going up…don’t wait.  Get your Branson Vacation Home on the rental market.

Don’t forget to schedule some time for yourself.!

 

Branson Vacation Homes: when is the best time to buy?

Contributed by:

Jeramie Worley, GRI

Broker / Associate of the Community Real Estate Group, LLC

And owner of Vacation Rental Propery inBranson,MO