Here at Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Alaska Realty, we have just analyzed the single family permits from January 1 through July 24 2020 and the news is not good for buyers wanting to purchase a newly built home for the average sales price of $391,235 as reported by Continue Reading
Thank You for Reading My Real Estate Columns for Almost Forty Years
As many of you know, I began my real estate career with the goal of making enough money so that I could quit work and write poetry. Poets are inevitably poor and I grew up in a midwestern factory town which manufactured Maytag parts and where my Caucasian grandfather Continue Reading
How Alaska’s Changing Demographics May Affect our Housing Trends
Alaska’s population fell in 2019 to 731,007 which is 8,600 below the peak of 739,649 people in 2016, according to the Alaska Economic Trends February 2020 report. The major factors affecting this decline is the number of people moving out of Alaska and fewer Continue Reading
Why I Work the Street
That’s what I call doing open houses on weekends. That’s about the only time buyers have to look at homes. The rest of the week they’re busy working one, two, maybe even three jobs so that they can qualify to purchase a new home. I work the street Continue Reading
2019 Real Estate Market Report & 2020 Predictions
There’s been little change in the Anchorage real estate market over the past five years. The average price of a single family home has remained stable, varying up and down by only a few thousand dollars from $364,919 to $375,000. Residential inventory has had a slow decline Continue Reading
It’s Time to Increase Lot Coverage Ratios
Seventy-seven per cent of all home buyers, regardless of age or geographical location, prefer to live in a detached single family home. That percentage has consistently increased since 2003 when the National Association of Home Builders first began Continue Reading
Evolution of the Thanksgiving Kitchen
The kitchen will always be the heart of the home, especially during the holidays, but its design and function continues to evolve. Over the decades, we’ve had the galley kitchen, the L shaped kitchen, the peninsula, the island, then the larger island with a sink/dishwasher Continue Reading
Highlights from the Fall Parade of Homes
It was a small tour with only nineteen homes in comparison to other years where there have been as many as thirty entries. That small number is no surprise because Anchorage home builders continue to struggle to find buildable homesites at a reasonable value due to the high Continue Reading
Older Alaskans Need More Ranch Homes
Alaska’s senior population is growing. According to Alaska Economic Trends, Alaska has an estimated 87,304 seniors, up from 54,938 eight years before and more are on the way. Anchorage/Mat-Su added more than 17,000 seniors, representing over half the state’s Continue Reading
How ‘Silly’ is This?
The photo below is an example of the current required driveway width in residential single family subdivisions. According to Title 21: Land Use Planning, page 7-133, the “total width of driveway entrances to a residential lot from a street shall not exceed 40 percent Continue Reading
Connie Yoshimura, Owner/Broker of Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices Alaska Realty.