Home Price Appreciation Still Going Strong in Washington State

According to the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight’s (OFHEO) quarterly House Price Index, Washington State had four of the top twenty Metropolitan Statistical Areas ranked for national home price appreciation. These areas include Wenatchee (1st), Yakima (12th), Spokane (13th), and Seattle-Bellevue-Everett (19th). Washington State is still showing positive housing market signs! Washington has consistently held the first or top percentile in this quarterly study for the past three years. With appreciation still on the rise, there’s never been a better time to invest in real estate!

Wishing Tree Picture

Here's a picture of the Wishing Tree, complete with wish ornaments. Good thing the picture got taken right after the tree trimming - some wishes have already been chosen, and it isn't even December yet! I guess there are more Santas in our midst than I realized.

Wishing Star Ornament Party!

Sullivan Homes has adopted two Wishing Star families for the holidays. Each family has one or more children with a life-threatening illness. One family has 15 children! Sullivan staff members had an Ornament Party this week, to decorate the ornaments for a Wishing Tree. Some were glittered, painted, sequined, simple, ornate - each one had a distinctive flair. Every glass ornament has a wish inside it, along with the recipient’s name, age, gender, and some wished-for items. The Wishing Tree is in the lobby of the Sullivan Centre building. All gifts will be collected by Friday, December 14th, and delivered to the families the week before Christmas. Seeing those sparkly ornaments are a reminder that sometimes the smallest gestures have the greatest impact. :)

Absolute-ly

I think we as humans are compelled by absolutes. The biggest, best, worst, funniest.

Nothing dissipates our attention faster than mediocrity. Particularly with the surroundings we choose.

Working for a builder that prides themselves on crafting distinctive homes, it occurred to me that I don't seem to hear much about absolutes in the construction industry. Quite the contrary. It seems as if the more middle-of-the-road you are, the safer and more likely destined for mass appeal. (There are plenty of cookies straight from the cutter that support a statement like that.)

This, naturally, led to a quest: an -Est Quest. I will post the current winners in each category, subject to revision if the throne has been clearly usurped. It would seem best to keep this quest continental, for the time being. If anyone has cause for a global quest, please let me know. The categories are as follows:

• The Oldest
• The Funniest
• The Ugliest
• The Scariest
• The Smallest
• The Largest
• The Most Controversial
• The Most Extravagant
• The Quirkiest
  

Your submissions are welcome - let me know if I've left out a great category or nominee! After all, when was the last time you heard someone brag about the most 'average' thing they ever saw?

New Frontiers for Sullivan Homes!

Sullivan Homes has crossed into the social networking frontier, boldly going where few builders seem to have gone. (At least from my research, that is!)

We can now be found on Facebook (link), and Myspace - so.....Find me on MySpace and be my friend! :) You can never have too many of those, right?

Clicking around these places, from a business standpoint, is similar to the Tourist Experience: you may initially stand out in your tropical shirt, but within a few days you manage to blend in a little better and feel almost native. Almost. It is way too interesting not to see beyond the Google search engine horizons and see what other people do, and where their circles of interest are. If there are over 50 million people on Facebook, that is a large chunk of our population that is not only online, but involved - and more and more are using it (and Myspace) as professional networking. I don't know about you, but I am far more likely to take an interest in something my friends recommend, than something a random algorithm generated. What do you think?

November 2007 Extreme Team Project Begins

Today is the beginning of our November Extreme Team project! The Team will be renovating the home of a single mother who is currently going through treatment for an aggressive cancer. She needs a lot of renovations and repairs, so this should be an exciting project to watch come together. Our LIVE reveal will be this Thursday night at 6:30 pm, on KXLY channel 4. We'll post some preview pics tomorrow!

New Floor Plans Feature!!

Our Sullivan Homes website now features a separate Floor Plans section with each listing for Home Plans, Under Construction, or Available Now homes. This makes searching by actual floor plans much easier than when they were in their previous location, tucked behind the photos and renderings.

Floor plans are a great way to start the dreaming process towards your own custom home, too! With our in-house drafting and design teams, ANY of our floor plans can be modified to your own specifications. Now you just have to agree with your spouse on the color palette. :)

Trivial Fridays!

In honor of Fridays, here are some fun Home trivia facts:

The construction of the White House started in 1792 and was first occupied by President John Adams in 1800. The total cost was $232,372. link

The largest home in the U.S. is the Biltmore in Asheville, North Carolina. Completed in 1895, the George Vanderbilt estate took 6 years to build, and has 4 acres, 250 rooms, 43 bathrooms, 34 bedrooms, and 65 fireplaces. The Biltmore was modeled on sixteenth-century French chateux, and is on 125,000 acres. link

Contrary to popular belief, the original color palettes for Victorian homes were drab and dull, to blend in with their surroundings and their organic materials. link

The most reportedly haunted house in America is the Whaley House in San Diego, California. Built in 1857, the Whaley house was also not only the Whaley family residence, but also San Diego's first commercial theater and the county courthouse. Many people have visited the Whaley house convinced beyond all doubt of supernatural events. link

Backyard History!

Ever driven past some of the historic neighborhoods in Spokane and wondered about them? In our own area, we have nationally recognized architecture in varied styles such as Craftsman, Tudor Revival, and Victorian.

Here's a great link to the Spokane Register Historic District site, with plenty of interesting info and suggested sites. link

Great NEW Offer from Sullivan Homes!

Sullivan Homes has a great offer on all of their available homes: Choose any move-in ready home, then select from the following: either no payments until July 2008, or an interest rate as low as 5.375%!

Click here for all the details - the offer expires soon, so now is the time to take advantage of these incredible deals.

Top 5 Reasons to Buy A New Home

• You found the perfect flooring - now you just need the home to go with it!


• It's a lot easier to dominate a neighborhood when you get there first.


• That "new House" smell is far better than the reek of paint fumes as you try and cover up someone else's outdated decor.


• In just a few months, you can have exactly the home you want - not the one someone else doesn't.


• And, just in time for Halloween: statistics have shown that a new house is the least likely to be haunted.

The Truth About the Real Estate Market

The Washington real estate market is a stable and an excellent investment that you get to live in. :)

Facts About Foreclosures
The foreclosure rates today are the same as they were 10 years ago.
Fewer than one percent of mortgages end in default in Washington state.
As of mid-June, sub-prime, adjustable-rate loans represented 20 percent of loans nationally, but just 6 percent of home loans in Washington.

The Market is Strong
Home appreciation in Washington continues to out-perform the rest of the nation with year-to-year price increases every quarter since the spring of 1995.

The Market is Stable
Home prices in Washington have increased an average of 8.1 percent since the same time last year. Many counties, however, have experienced price hikes much higher: Chelan 29.8 percent, Okanogan 24.5 percent; Douglas, 22.2 percent; and Lewis 19.3. (WSU Center for Real Estate Research (CRER))
The demand for median-priced homes has never been greater.

Why Washington Is Different
The home market isn’t keeping pace with the growth of the state’s population, which is continuing to increase at 1.8 percent per year.
The state’s population will increase by nearly one million over the present decade and reach 6.8 million by 2010.
About two thirds of the growth is due to in-migration; the rest is a result of the growth of families now living in Washington. (Washington State Office of Financial Management)

What About Inventory?
The key to stability in the residential real estate market is balance, where balance is about a six month supply (or inventory) of homes available on the market at any given time.

Additional Source: National Association of Realtors, 2007

SHBA Wishing Star Auction Coming Soon!

The Annual SHBA Charity Auction for the Wishing Star Foundation is coming up, November 16th. Wishing Star helps grant special wishes for children with life-threatening illnesses. They have granted over 1,100 wishes in the last 25 years, and have had an enormous impact on the community, serving northern Idaho and eastern Washington. Sullivan Homes has been proud to partner with Wishing Star, building their 2007 Play House which will be raffled off this Halloween, and helping sell raffle tickets. The charity auction proceeds will all go to benefit Wishing Star children, and is a critical part of their fundraising. Visit the Wishing Star website for stories and information on volunteering or donating.

Extreme Site Makeover..!

Sullivan Homes' new website recently launched, with dramatic changes. You can search homes by community, floor plan, or build phase (under construction or available now). All available homes have a photo slide show as well as a floor plan slide show. There is plenty of beautiful photography, but there is also much more information available - our site has tripled in size! Communities each have their own site-within-a-site format, which allows visitors to get a great overview and introduction to each development. The Gallery section has a great Flash Presentation of the in-house Design Studio, and gives new home buyers a great overview of what they will be able to select with their interior and exterior packages.

The website is updated daily with new photos and listings. There are also several new features in the works as the site continues to develop - so stay tuned!