Spokane homes have solid value

For the past few years real estate has been one of the engines that has made this country operate. A record number of sales have been made here and in most of the areas around the United States, and collectively the record numbers have been awesome.

It makes me feel good encouraging people to buy property as I have for many years because land and a home are things one can take hold of. A few years back, a lot of the seers laughed at people who were buying a house. The stock market was where many were operating. Mathematically, some of the stock people could figure out that a home was a loser when it came to making money.

Today, the stock market is off a bit, and homes have survived the assault they had taken for a decade or two by having significant value when it counted.

With the escalation of home values across the nation, the prices seem to be going up rather dramatically. A friend the other day mentioned that he had been in Boise, the capital of the state of Idaho, our next-door neighbors. The housing market in Boise has been recognized by Californians who have sold their homes in the Sunshine State for very generous amounts of Uncle Sam’s money, looked over at Idaho and liked what they saw and what they were able to do: buy homes for much less than they could in California and pocket the difference.

The difference was usually substantial. Boise is humming today. The same thing is happening in the Inland Northwest.

An acquaintance in Los Angeles was offered about four times what he paid for his home. He decided to stay in the home even when he had been offered $770,000 from a prospective buyer. He had paid about $200,000 for the place. The area was close to his job in the film industry. If he had chosen to sell, the difference would have been nearly $600,000 in his pocket.

Value depends on where the property is located. Any beach property values — whether on the beach or with a beach view — have shot up in value; that is the nature of waterfront property whether at a like, river or ocean.

What’s going to happen down the road in this area? That is just anyone’s guess. The Spokane area is noted for its stability when it comes to cost of housing. When this most recent run-up of pricing began, it was steady because there was acknowledged true value and value is everything in this equation.

If you drew a map of the value over time in the Inland Northwest, you would probably see the dollar volume appear on the paper as a stair step progress line — the price line will be flat for a year or three, then there will be a rise in value and the market will shoot up a bit and then in another few years flatten and then repeat the process. This is how it has seemed to work here.

Prior to the increase in the value of homes that are currently being purchased, resales in this area were bargains when compared to other areas of the country. That just seems to be typical of Spokane — pretty solid.