Local experts anticipate trend to continue this year
Emily Nelson, Editor
01-03-2008
Ruston’s real estate market remained healthy throughout 2007, bucking a national trend sparked by the sub-prime mortgage crisis that wreaked havoc in other markets.And the outlook for 2008 seems just as good, said Dicky Nealy, owner and president of ERA Lincoln Realty.
“The year 2007 reflected solid growth for the real estate industry in our neck of the woods. The obvious commercial and economic development in our area leads me to believe the 2008 market is going to be just as strong and aggressive as the 2007 market,” he said.
The Ruston market has a history of remaining healthy, said Warren Post, vice president of mortgage loans for the Bank of Ruston.
“We’re in a unique situation in that our community generally doesn’t reflect what goes on nationally,” he said. “We’re very fortunate in that. For the past 25 years I’ve been here, that’s always been case. I feel like the Ruston area is going to continue to be better than anything we’ll see nationally.”
According to numbers from the Northeast Louisiana Association of Realtors Multiple Listing Service, there were approximately 285 single-family residential real estate transactions closed in the Lincoln Parish area in 2007. These are reported sales by Realtor members of NELAR, MLS and do not reflect non-member or private transactions.
The gross sales price for transactions made in 2007 was more than $46 million. The average residential home sale in Lincoln Parish was $164,000, which is up nearly 2 percent from last year’s average of $160,575.
The average price for a home in Ouachita Parish in 2007 was about $144,500, according to the Northeast Louisiana Association of Realtors figures. In the Shreveport area, the average home sold for $156,000 in 2007.
Nealy attributes the discrepancies in those numbers to the stability of the Ruston market.
“It’s because we’re still a small community; our supply and demand for housing, new construction and existing property is pretty stable,” he said. “We have an equal buyer-seller, supply- and demand-market.”
A more stable market results in higher average home prices, he said.
“Buying here may be slightly higher on average, but there’s still a good appreciation rate here you may not get buying in a cheaper market,” Nealy said.
Information analyzed by ERA Lincoln Realty over eight years shows a growth in residential real estate values in the Ruston/Lincoln Parish area of more than 8.5 percent per year.
The Monroe and Shreveport areas have more industry and economic factors that can affect the real estate market, Nealy explained.
For example, the closing of the State Farm office in Monroe in 2004 had a negative impact on the overall economic condition of that market.
“Our home prices are slightly higher mainly because we’ve had stable growth and we haven’t had any downturns,” he said.
Another factor in the real estate market’s 5 percent jump in sales over 2006, according to Nealy, are the local lenders’ stable mortgage practices.
“Because of our stable mortgage lending practices, the much hyped sub-prime mortgage debacle has had little to no effect on our local economies and mortgage lenders,” he said.
Post and Nealy both said it’s important for prospective homebuyers to sit down with a lender in a face-to-face meeting.
“There’s a lot of dot-coms out there promising a lot of things to a lot of people, and then they’re not able to deliver at closing,” Post said.
“It sounds good and it sounds easy, but generally you’ll get as good or a better deal here locally.”
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