[AT] OT Land prices was RE: B Allis

Dean VP deanvp at att.net
Sun Jun 12 13:28:00 PDT 2005


Raw Land Prices in Western Washington are a bit crazy too. And we are in the
market to buy some and have crawled back in our shell due to sticker shock. 

Anything within 30 minutes of the Seattle Suburb cities, not Seattle proper,
but the suburb cities, starts at $300,000 no matter whether it is 1 acre or
10 acres. Somebody plugged into sellers minds that land sells for $300,000
on up. That is a bit unbelievable. Lots inside the city limits go up from
there.

Then if one really researches the market one can buy a pretty decent house
and lot in that price range. Something is completely out of whack. This has
caused normal older neighborhood rejuvenation.  Older houses on large lots
are now the only way to get reasonable priced acreage. Tear down the old one
build a new one. 

Houses are being built as rapidly as possible out of raw materials that we
would have never accepted 10 years ago, on lot sizes where one could shake
hands with your neighbor through an open window. And relatively low interest
only loans are causing a further frenzy. Even the Fed and Greenspan are
worrying about that and are getting aggressive about it. It will be a real
nasty situation when those who have purchased find out their property is
suddenly now worth less than 80% of what they paid for it. It could be a
pretty severe economic recession at best. 

So what has happened is the speculators are out trying to take advantage of
the situation; buying, sitting a few months and selling again at an even
higher price. Current conditions include 15% increase in price with 30% less
inventory available. The bubble is building and it WILL break. It's not a
matter of IF, it's WHEN? I suspect fairly soon.  This too will end.

My father used to have a saying that he used in times like this: "It can't
continue to keep going like this!" This is one of those situations. 

Hopefully, we can find something "reasonable" or wait till it crashes.  It's
hard to figure out what "reasonable" is right now. 

Dean A. Van Peursem
Snohomish, WA 98290

I'm a walking storeroom of facts..... I've just lost the key to the
storeroom door 


www.deerelegacy.com

http://members.cox.net/classicweb/email.htm



-----Original Message-----
From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
[mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of ken knierim
Sent: Sunday, June 12, 2005 12:17 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: [AT] OT Land prices was RE: B Allis

On Sun, 2005-06-12 at 08:32, Indiana Robinson wrote:

-- snip --
> 	Central Indiana and in particular Marion County (Indianapolis) and
the 7 "donut" 
> counties around Marion County are rapidly becoming a bit like parts of
California. The 
> level of development is just going absolutely insane... There are a lot of
people with 
> money here now and while they still allow a few of us poor folks to remain
they are 
> quickly trying to get us under control and will likely soon want to
regulate our 
> breeding.   :-)   Land prices are approaching "absurd"... A 20 some acre
field just north 
> of me on this road sold last year for $39,000 an acre. A multi millionaire
friend now 
> owns a couple of fields that we used to farm across the road and is
developing it into 
> hundreds and hundreds of homes. They can't get them up fast enough. They
are popping up 
> during the night like toadstools... I get a chuckle out of this guy, he is
worth maybe 10 
> to 15 million (we never talk money) and owns dozens of good sized farms
over several 
> counties (he doesn't farm). He was telling me a while back about a parts
Gravely he 
> bought (we both like Gravely's) and how much he debated about buying it
because it was 
> $200 and he was afraid it was too high...   :-)   I have not had time to
talk to him 
> lately but last I knew the pick-up truck he was driving looked worse than
my old beater 
> truck. 
> 	A lot of these folks moving in almost don't ask price, if they see
an old tractor they 
> want they just buy it regardless of price...


Here in the Phoenix area it's gone crazy as well. There were 2 parcels
of about 1.25 acres apiece across my street that went for $250K apiece
about 2 months ago (just for the DIRT!). And a developer just paid a
little over $100K an acre for 700+ acres out in Mesa in a state land
auction. Sooo... it makes tractor prices just as stupid. Most of the
iron I look at these days has to come in from out of state or I can't
afford it. Now I get a lot of folks driving by looking at my tractors.
Hopefully I won't have to start locking them up or anything! 

Ken 

Gilbert (central) Arizona

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