Archive for July, 2008
$45 Million Estate For Sale in Cumming | You Can’t Pick Your Neighbors Though
categories: Buyers, Forsyth, Luxury Homes, Stuff I like to talk about
Listed at $45 million dollars, the Le Reve Estate in 
Cumming is one of the 10th most expensive residential properties in the U.S. What do you get for $45M? How about this:
- Private golf course (and indoor virtual golf)
- 2-lane bowling alley
- Full arcade and restaurant
- Home theatre (seating at least 25) replicated after The Fox Theater
- Model train room
- Horse stables and riding ring
- Carriage house
-
82 rooms; 10 bathrooms; 9 half bathrooms - 12-car garage
- 2 elevators
- 28 foot ceilings
- 47,000 square feet
- 72 fenced and gated acres
I could go on; there is no shortage of benefits of this property to highlight.
But even with all that, check out the property next door, which is also for sale, by the way. This is hilarious; talk about a contrast. You can probably get a much better price for it.
Just goes to shows, you can pick your friends, but you can’t pick your neighbors even if you are spending $45 million. Don’t worry though, Le Reve’s iron fence, hi-tech security system and 65 security cameras will have you sleeping easy at night.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently 1 Comment »
Prices Rise and Fall in Forsyth County at the Same Time | 13% Decrease on One Side, 3% Increase on The Other Side
categories: Buyers, Forsyth, Local Market Conditions
CUMMING GA - I had an innocuous question yesterday from an out-of-town buyer looking to relocate to the Alpharetta area.
The Question
He actually prefers to be in south Forsyth, just over the county line and asked what prices have done in Forsyth County in that past year.
The Canned Answer
I’ve had a working number in my head that I share with clients: Prices are down about 5-6% along the GA-400 Corridor (Alpharetta, Roswell, Cumming, etc) over the past year. There was an analysis in a local magazine this month showing prices are down 6.8% from May 2007 through May 2008, so I thought I was close to being accurate.
The analysis done by the magazine was for the zip codes 30004 (Alpharetta and Milton), 30005 (Alpharetta), 30024 (Johns Creek, but also Suwanee and large section of Gwinnett County), 30040 (Southwestern Forsyth County - Cumming), 30041 (Southeastern Forsyth County - Cumming), 30097 (Johns Creek but also Duluth all the way to I-85 on the east), 30075 (Roswell West) and 30076 (Roswell East). The 30022 zip code, which covers a large part of Alpharetta and Roswell East, was mysteriously left of of the analysis.
The Problem With The Canned Answer
This just goes to show how hard it is to do meaningful analysis on a geographic are like North Fulton. Even though we obviously know where it is, it is so hard to define in the real estate data: Zip codes cross municipal and county boundaries and city names don’t work because so much of the area was unincorporated until recently.
Past sale data won’t have a good city name and even current listings are labeled as Alpharetta when in fact they may be in Milton or Johns Creek. The Postal Service doesn’t help any because all they really care about is the zip code; there is a difference between your postal mailing address and your actual municipal address.
Therefore, I always do my analysis based on FMLS Area Number. The FMLS divides the city into ninety defined, geographic areas . Areas 13 and 14 are North Fulton. Area 13 is west of GA-400; Area 14 is east of 400.
So I turned my sites to Forsyth County to confirm the data to answer my client’s question. I was curious if the 6% decrease held up for Forsyth. What I found proves that even at an eight zip code analysis level like was done by the local magazine can be too large. Real estate is indeed local, even down to an elementary school district.
Forsyth has three FMLS areas, Areas 222 and 223 west of GA-400 and Area 221 east. In actuality, Forsyth needs to have four areas, one for each quadrant because the north and south parts of the county are so different.
The Reconsidered Answer
That probably has something to do with the results of my analysis, which showed that Areas 221 and 223 have lost 13% in average sales price over the past year . That is double what the magazine was reporting for the area, which infers that some other areas in the area are doing significantly better than reported.
Here is the kicker, though. Area 222, that part of Forsyth County west of GA-400 and south of Highway 20, actually has seen a 3% INCREASE in average sales price over the past year. I didn’t have time to breakdown the numbers by new construction and resales, but I still found it interesting, if not amazing, that there is an area realizing positive sales price growth in this market.
My suspicion is that the same is true of South Forsyth on the east side of GA-400 but it is not as easy to analyze in the data because there is not an FMLS area just for the southeastern part of the county.
If I had to venture a guess, though, I’d say that the northern part of the county is dragging down the average sales price for the southern part, so don’t let the 13% sales price decrease fool you in south Forsyth east of GA-400. I’m not saying they have positive growth there, or that it is not a buyer’s market, but statistics can be misleading.
To see a full chart of the last year’s average sales data for Forsyth County, CLICK HERE .
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently 1 Comment »
Carnival of Real Estate Returns to LiveInAlpharetta.com | Fellow Real Estate Bloggers Take Me Back to School
categories: Stuff I like to talk about
I was thrilled to host Edition 44 of the Real Estate Carnival over a year ago, but am even more thrilled to host this week’s 101st Edition. Why?
Two reasons: First, it proves my perseverance and commitment.
It seems that blogging was a bit of a fad a year ago and I sometimes wonder what has become of all the past Carnival hosts. Many are still around but some have fallen to the wayside. I’m proud that I’m still here over a year later and stronger than ever. I plan to be here for many years to come: same url; same caustic writing. Blogging and further building my online presence is now second nature and the blog is the cornerstone of it all.
Secondly, I enjoy hosting the Carnival because it gets me out of my box. I spend way too much time on my own blog and it is nice to have a diversion to go read other blogs, see other styles, other widgets, other layouts and other ways of doing things.
But wait, before we start the tour, I was sitting with thumb hovered over the left mouse button thinking: What’s the theme going to be? Every good post, every good story, every good tour needs a theme. Then it came to me. School starts in Alpharetta in two measly weeks and we are already getting in Back to School mode. Since I believe that people read blogs not only to be entertained but mostly to learn something, I thought we’d make this the back to school edition.
The blogs that I’ve chosen to highlight for this week’s Carnival are the ones that actually taught me something.
1. Dan Melson at SearchLight Crusade gets top nod with his post Buying Teardown Properties and Condemned Buildings. Since my of my business is with resale or new construction real estate, I didn’t know a lot of what Dan explains in his post about how to finance a “tear down.” But if you need to know, Dan’s post is the perfect place to start. Just remember that when you get a mortgage you are getting a mortgage on the land and the house. Is a lender just going to let you just tear down the house if that is part of the collateral? Probably not. Dan offers some options - and one that I’ve always recommended to investor clients is to approach your local community bank and get some sort of construction loan, not a residential mortgage.
2. Silicon Valley Blogger educated me about the return on investment for various home improvements with this post: Doing A Home Improvement Project? Know Your Return on Investment. It makes perfect sense, but did you know that the cheapest improvements like decluttering and “lightening and brightening” your home have the highest percentage payoffs? Also, if you live in the South, like I do, the highest return on investment you can get is by replacing your fiber board siding with cement siding (also referred to as Hardiplank). Sounds like I have a project on my hands.
3. Chris Harris from Inventure Global changed my thinking about how we should compensate lenders for originating mortgages with his post An Idea to Fix Mortgage Origination. If there were ever a problem looking for a solution. I don’t want to steal Chris’s thunder, but think about how brokers in the insurance industry are compensated. Maybe he is onto something here.
4. A mini-mention goes to home stager, Craig Schiller, and his post Selling Your Vanilla Box. What I hadn’t thought about was why it might be more important to stage your condo than your house. Craig’s case makes sense, but I knew what his conclusion was going to be all along ‘cuz he’s a stager ;->
5. Finally, Tiger … I mean a post by Diane Tuman on ZillowBlog.com about Tiger: Southhampton Estate: Did Tiger Buy It or Not? Remember that I said people go to blogs to be entertained as well? Well this is my hat tip to entertainment. Since I’m an avid golfer, I find it entertaining to see what real estate golf’s Number One player is buying and where. Perhaps the biggest clue in solving this mystery is that Southhapton is only 58 miles from Bethpage, the site of next year’s U.S. Open. Are you thinking like a Tiger?
I will say that Tiger is reported to have paid $65 Million for the seaside estate. He could have saved $20 Million and bought Le Reve, a 72-acre estate here in Cumming that already has an 18-hole course on the grounds. Tiger, if you have setup Google Alerts on yourself and see this post, call me, please. You may be one of the few guys in the country who can afford this property. It isn’t THAT far to Augusta from here. (Hey, it can’t hurt to plant a seed, can it? You never know what will happen.)
See I can turn any topic eventually to golf and then back to real estate!
That wraps up this week’s tour. Hopefully you learned something AND were entertained. We’ll see the Carnival when it comes back to Alpharetta in a year or so…we’ll be here.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently 6 Comments »
Build a Custom Home in Alpharetta
categories: Alpharetta Real Estate, Luxury Homes, New Construction
Do you want that "dream home," that home that you will leave feet first?
Do you just not like resale or think that all the resale homes are tired and need updating? And you’re not going to be the one updating them!
Do you think that builders building on spec are just popping out cookies, even if they are nice, expensive cookies?
The other option is to build your own home. To some people, that sounds like a daunting task, but it is not has hard as it sounds, particularly if you have a good builder who you can trust. That, of course, is the key to the exercise: a trusted builder. One of the ones that I would recommend is Artisan Custom Estates . They have some excellent properties available, like this one , which is a good example of their quality.
To help people who are interested in building a custom home in Alpharetta , I just finished building a new section of this website. From there you can search for developed lots in the area, which range in price from around $150,000 to as much as you want to spend. For instance, you could spend three or four hundred thousand for a 3-4 acre prime lot probably with some water front and or view.
On the new page , I’ve highlighted and mapped a few new developments in the area for you to puruse. I’ve also created a search page where you can easily search for every available developed lot in the 30004 zip code , which is Alpharetta west of GA-400, Milton and portions of East Cherokee County and South Forsyth County.
Finally, there is a Frequently Asked Questions section and a Free Report on Building a Custom Home . If you have questions that are not addressed in the FAQ or Report, please just leave a comment here and I’ll make sure we update the information with the answer to your question. Please let me know what you think of the new information and how we can continue to enhance and improve it.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently No Comments »
Top Ten Elementary Schools in Fulton County | 2008 CRCT Test Score Results
categories: Schools
Things haven’t changed very much at the top in Fulton County over the past three years. Shakerag has scored the best on the CRCT test for the last three years. Mountain Park, Crabapple Crossing, Summit Hill and Findley Oaks are also perennial favorites in the battle of the No. 2 Pencils.
Below is a chart showing the top ten Elementary Schools as ranked by CRCT test score results over the past three years.
| Rank | 2006 | 2007 | 2008 |
| 1 | Shakerag | Shakerag | Shakerag |
| 2 | Crabapple Crossing | Mountain Park | Findley Oaks |
| 3 | Mountain Park | Crabapple Crossing | Mountain Park |
| 4 | Summit Hill | Summit Hill | Summit Hill |
| 5 | Findley Oaks | Wilson Creek | Crabapple Crossing |
| 6 | State Bridge | Findley Oaks | Wilson Creek |
| 7 | Cogburn Woods | New Prospect | Medlock Bridge |
| 8 | Wilson Creek | Cogburn Woods | Cogburn Woods |
| 9 | New Prospect | Medlock Bridge | New Prospect |
| 10 | Sweet Apple | State Bridge | Barnwell |
For a complete analysis of all the score data where you can break it down by subject matter and grade level, goto my Elementary School CRCT Analysis Page .
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently 1 Comment »
CRCT Scores Released for 2008 | Analysis of Fulton County Elementary Schools
categories: Schools
This is the third year that I’ve downloaded and analyzed the CRCT test scores from the Georgia Department of Education. You see, I appreciate the department’s positive spin, but I like to look at the numbers myself and see what patterns and trends I can unearth.
There are a thousand ways to Sunday to slice and dice this data. For the past two years I’ve allowed you to simply select different grades and subjects and sort the data to see the school rankings. That is all fine and fun, but the story isn’t changing much in macro terms.
CLICK HERE to see my traditional analysis of CRCT scores for Fulton County Elementary Schools updated with 2008 data.
There are fifty-five elementary schools in the Fulton County School System. The top half of the schools ranked by average percentage of students not meeting the state standard are all North of the Chattahoochee River. The bottom half is South of the River.
Not much has changed at the top; the top scoring schools are still the same. Four of the top five schools from 2007 are still in the top five in 2008 with Shakerag still number one and Mountain Park still number two.
I’ll hopefully have time to comment more on this year’s CRCT results in a later post, but for now I wanted to try something else. As I was working with this year’s data, it dawned on me that I now had three year’s worth of data and that I could start looking at trends WITHIN a single school. I could see, for instance, if Shakerag was achieving the testing standard better or worse that three years ago.
I realize that this might be splitting hairs for a school - or any school - where already less than 2% of the students are not meeting the standard. I’m not picking on Shakerag here; just using them as an example.
In fact, in 2006 only about 1% of students did not meet the standard at Shakerag. In 2008, 2% did not meet the standard and the rise is mostly attributable to the first, third and fourth grades.
I don’t know if this sort of analysis means didly squat. However, I do find it interesting to play with the numbers and see what sorts of stories they can tell you. I haven’t looked at the graphs for every elementary school, but the ones I did look at were mostly trending in the wrong direction. 
Barnwell Elementary, however, is one that I found which has done better on the test each of the last three consecutive years. I’m sure there are others. Take a look at the data and see what you can find. A trend line down and to the right is good.
Is the CRCT test getting harder? Is the new curriculum affecting the results? Are less kids taking the online practice tests? Who knows, but I’m curious if administrators look at the data this way and find any cause for the trend - or any concern.
Take a look for yourself. Check out your kid’s school and share in the comments here your reactions to the scores, the trends, the test and how it relates to the environment in the school and educational attainment.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently No Comments »
Progess Coming Along on New Birmingham Elementary School in Milton
categories: Stuff I like to talk about
Since they started construction of Birmingham Elementary School around the first of June, I’ve been taking pictures to document progress for you online.
I thought it would be fun to have a pictorial history of the school being built. Don’t get too excited yet, as there is only dirt work and ground infrastructure work currently going on but to check out the progress go to this post and see the pictures .
My goal is to update that post every week or ten days, so keep it bookmarked.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently No Comments »
Easy Search for Alpharetta Homes by Neighborhood
categories: Alpharetta Real Estate, Buyers, Stuff I like to talk about
A few days back, a reader of this blog suggested that a search feature he liked was the ability to quickly find homes by neighborhood.
He specifically mentioned that the Coldwell Banker Atlanta website has good capability for this with an implementation that allows you to simply switch the name of the neighborhood you are interested in by editing the url.
To satisfy this reader and not to be out done, I wanted to make sure that he understood the search engine I use can search by neighborhood, too - and give you some additional capabilities to add search criteria. To check out this solution, go to this page:
Search for Alpharetta Homes by Neighborhood - With Bells and Whistles
If you are a power user and want a really simple implementation like Coldwell’s, I built a Quick and Easy Home Search by Neighborhood page. To try that, go to the Quick and Basic search below. This search defaults to the Crooked Creek subdivision. To search other subdivions, just edit the url for the subdivion you want.
The advantage of using the Bells and Whistles search is that you don’t have to know the exact name used in the MLS for the subdivision because you can pick from a list. With the Quick and Basic search you have to know (or guess) the name. Some subdivision names can be tricky, like Atlanta National. Is it called Atlanta National, Providence at Atlanta National, Providence @ Atlanta Nat’l, Providence @ ATL National? I’ve seen all these derivations because the MLS does not normalize the subdivision names. In that case it is best to consult me directly because I do have the ability to do "wild card" searches directly on the MLS to minimize this problem.
Search for Alpharetta Homes by Neighborhood - Quick and Basic
I appreciate the suggestions and feeback as I’m always trying to make searching for homes online more efficient, powerful and easy, which are sometimes opposing objectives. For instance, I was one of the first realtors in Georgia who implemented map-based searching for homes, which I still maintain is one of the best ways to search for real estate online, particularly with $4/gallon gasoline.
Try it out and let me know what you think and what else I can build to make it better for you.
PS: if you are not already registered on my site, it is FREE but you will have to quickly register to use the search features. Sorry, that is just a policy I implemented years ago that has proven to work well so far.
Posted by Kevin Warmath | Currently No Comments »
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