The Pats won the Super Bowl in one of the most incredulous victories in NFL history. The whole season, starting with the four-game suspension, was an amazing story, complete with storybook ending.
What does New England’s team have to do with my Sunday River market update? You’d be surprised.
I am well in to my 11th year of selling real estate at Sunday River and for the five years prior was selling the resort experience as part of the resort marketing team. So, in recent weeks I have been telling my Seller clients: It’s the Patriots phenomenon: people are distracted!
That’s not to say that there has been no activity, but I forecast a big uptick in activity in the upcoming weeks, particularly with the great snow conditions.
Meantime, this market update covers the period from November 26, 2016 to February 10, 2017 and includes single-family homes priced $150,000 and above, condominiums and land. The coverage area for this purpose includes Bethel, Newry, Albany Township, Hanover, Greenwood and Woodstock.
There were 24 single-families sold during this period, with Newry and Bethel sharing the bulk at seven and eight homes, respectively. Since I am continuously gauging the market I thought for this update it worth comparing to a year ago—during the same time frame in 2015-2016 there were 16 homes that sold, so we are ahead of last year’s pace.
The sale prices ranged from $151,300 for a ranch house on Rocky Road in Woodstock to $755,000 for a five-bedroom home in The Colony neighborhood in Newry. Also sold in Newry were a to-be-built in Peaks Village for $433,000, a home on Valley View Drive for $425,000, at Vail Drive in Powder Ridge, $367,500, at Ragged Hill Road, $415,000, on Bear River Road, $190,000 and finally on Sunday River Road $175,000.
The seven homes in Bethel comprised of chalets in the Timber Creek subdivision off Intervale Road ($344,500), Will View, off the Sunday River Road, for $337,000, Pointers View off Route 26 South, $319,000 and a home on Intervale Road near the Taylor Woods subdivision for $275,000. A home in West Bethel with lovely land on the Androscoggin River sold for $294,000 and another in West Bethel on Mozee’s way conveyed at $175,000. Two others south of Bethel, on East Bethel Road and Highland Road (which is off East Bethel Road), sold at $215,000 and $165,000, respectively.
A home on Yawkey Way in Woodstock sold at $275,000 and others sold on Black Brook Road ($225,000), Route 232 ($189,000), and Andrews Road (183,000) and the aforementioned Rocky Road sale. Except for Yawkey Way, none of the other sales were chalets.
The lone Hanover sale was a chalet, in a subdivision that is far from built out at this stage, the home is on Tote Road and sold for $260,000.
In Greenwood, a contemporary chalet sold on Rocky Lane for $298,000, a farmhouse on Richardson Hollow Road closed at $255,000 and another contemporary chalet sold at $175,000.
In the weeks ahead we will likely see an upsurge in interest for homes priced $400,000 and above if the historical trend continues. Buyers for these homes often start to surface over the December holiday period but this past year with snow conditions exponentially improved from a year ago, as resort guests were enjoying the skiing and riding. This was affirmed with a couple of visitors in the office the final day of the vacation week who stated just that.
Condominium sales by the numbers followed a similar trend to last year: 14 sales in this current time period compared with 11 from the previous year. Ten of the total sales were in Newry and include two Tempest Ridge sales, compared with no sales in the development all last season. The two sold for $540,000 and $518,000, with the first in Phase III and the second a resale in Phase II. Other condos to sell were in the ever-popular South Ridge complex ($274,500) and three in North Peak $195,000, $192,500 and $180,000 (the former was a sale not recorded on the MLS but was transacted by Mountain Real Estate Company as the selling agency). White Cap wins the race for one-bedroom sales in this time period, with three sales priced between $108,000 and $120,000. Of note is there is another Pending so good season thus far for White Cap. A lovely one-bedroom at Brookside sold at $122,000 and a studio sold there at $60,000.
In Bethel, three condominiums sold, one at the Bethel Inn for $279,500, one at Eden Ridge at $153,000 and a one-bedroom at Riverbend for $96,000.
Land is at a somewhat similar pace to last year during this time frame, 11 versus 9, but the prior year did include six lots that appeared to have been sold in a bulk sale. This year, a lot in The Colony in Newry sold at $110,000 and others sold in Woodstock (Yawkey Way at $30,000) and two on Black Brook Road at $26,900 and $14,500. The largest parcel sold was 33.5 acres on the Irish Neighborhood Road in Greenwood for $48,000. Another sold in Greenwood for $17,000 and in Bethel, two lots sold: Picnic Hill Road for $58,000 and a 10-acre lot on McCrillis Brook Road for $40,000.
When pulling stats for a Seller client last week I could show him that my gut was right, that last winter season started off in a similar fashion (and that was likely due to the lackluster start to the ski season) before momentum picked up. The sales volume clearly demonstrated a marked increase in closings from the mid-February to late May period. In the next Market Update I will reveal whether my instinct in forecasting a strong uptick across all property types will be correct.