The economic conditions don't seem to impact the wealthy. In Dallas, the high-end homes are still selling. See the article in Sunday's Dallas Morning News by Stewart Lytle.
Story: Demand for high-end homes stays strong
Demand for high-end homes stays strong
12:00 AM CST on Sunday, February 8, 2009
Jennifer Duncan, a high-end homebuilder in the Park Cities, was surprised by her quick sale of a $4 million Preston Hollow speculative home. She and her family, who were residing in the house, had to find a new place to live.
No problem. Her company, Jennifer Duncan Designs, is almost finished building another speculative home, a mansion with 12,949 square feet of living space on Armstrong Parkway in Highland Park. Duncan's family has moved into it while she gets it ready to go on the market at $8.9 million unfurnished or almost $10 million with the furniture, says Lydia Player with Virginia Cook Realtors.
This is just one indication that the high-end homes market is not acting like the rest of the Dallas-area housing market.
In the Dallas area, the upper-end home market is "slower" than it has been, according to several top Realtors. But sales of very expensive properties are still strong.
In 2008, there were 181 houses valued at more than $2 million sold in the Dallas area -- about the same as in 2007. And that number does not include what Realtors called "private sales," where homes change owners without appearing on the public Multiple Listing Service.
Linda McMahon with Briggs Freeman Real Estate Brokerage says she knows of four properties, including one lot that sold in January, that were not publicly disclosed. Two homes sold for $16 million each, another for $8 million and the lot sold for $10 million -- all in the Park Cities.
Many of the buyers of high-end homes are moving to Dallas from Atlanta and cities in California and Oklahoma, McMahon says. But there are a large number of Dallas-area residents looking for expensive homes as well. A doctor, she says, just bought a house in University Park for $1 million.
Homes in the high-end market typically take longer to sell, Player says. There is currently about a 2½-year inventory of homes valued at more than $2 million in the Dallas area. "That is not too bad," Player says.
Doris Jacobs with Allie Beth Allman and Associates,! who was one of the top-selling Realtors in the high-end market last year, says, "More people are looking. Some big buyers are in town, but they are being very selective."
Sheila Rice with Virginia Cook Realtors agrees there is less impulse buying.
While the overall housing market in the Dallas area is down about 3 percent, the price tags on high-end homes are not coming down.
"If the house is priced correctly, it is holding its value," Jacobs says.
She says there is a lot of pent-up demand for houses. She has sold several homes, each worth more than $1 million, in January, a traditionally slow month.
Ginger Nobles of Briggs Freeman says she is seeing a lot of buyers "sitting on the sidelines." Once confidence in the market returns, she says there will be a "frenzy" of selling.
There were more than 100 Realtors last year in the Dallas area who sold more than $3 million in properties. And they were not all veteran Realtors.
Relative newcomer Gianna Cerullo in her first 18 months in the residential real estate business sold more than $37.5 million in properties. And since she moved to Dave Perry-Miller and Associates in September, she has sold $8 million in houses.
The reason for all the high-end activity, Player says, is that real estate is still a good investment. "A lot of people lost half their portfolio in the stock market," she says. "I haven't heard of anyone losing half the value of their real estate holdings."
Stewart Lytle stewart.lytle@sbcglobal.net
Monday, February 9, 2009
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