
WINNERS
Lower income home buyers
Wannabe homeowners and anti-sprawl advocates, rejoice! The median home price in the City Different dropped by 15 percent, according to figures released last week by the Santa Fe Association of Realtors. This is bad news for realtors and folks with bad credit—because of the housing downturn, lenders are not as inclined to dole out financing to as many buyers as before. But with the credit crunch comes new opportunities; a median home price drop from $403,000 to $344,000 makes Santa Fe slightly more within reach.
Santa Fe’s east side
“The east side is still hot,” according to Sotheby’s real estate agent Kevin Bobolsky. The area he is referring to is the Canyon Road/Acequia Madre neighborhoods east of the Santa Fe Trail. He recently had two properties, worth $2.5 million and $2.9 million, go under contract within six weeks. Why? “Most of the multi-million dollar compounds on the east side have been broken down into condominium projects,” he tells SFR. “To have a compound that isn’t chopped up is hard to find these days.”
Senior citizens
Seniors will find a different lifestyle at ElderGrace, a development that will have its official groundbreaking on July 17. Daniel Werwath of the Community Housing Trust, which has been developing the project over the past two years, explains the idea behind ElderGrace thusly: “It’s conscious aging…people take care of each other. The concept is that people are opting for smaller homes, in favor for more common space.” Werwath says 17 of the development’s 28 units already are
LOSERS
Downtown quietude
What does downtown Santa Fe look like these days? Take your pick: a. an adobe-encrusted Erector Set, b. a Rube Goldberg experiment gone awry or c. an obstacle course. If you've driven past the construction of the new state history museum/county courthouse/convention center/housing development lately, a combination of those images may come to mind. Downtown construction has made for a nexus of cars, pedestrians and construction equipment unfit for any tourism brochures.
Las Campanas
Las Campanas has some mighty fine houses and golf courses. But at least one guy will not be tending the greens or trimming the bushes there. Audencio Gollas, a former Las Campanas landscaper, recently filed a discrimination suit against the housing developer, saying it violated the state's Human Rights Act and, according to court records, perpetrated "general mistreatment." A summons was served on Las Campanas in late June but, so far, there has been no response.
NM's small-town pride
New Mexicans may well be sighing a collective "WTF?" by the time Money magazine appears on stands July 21. That issue, which highlights the Top 100 Best Small Cities for Families, has snubbed not only Santa Fe, but the entire state of New Mexico.
At the top of the list is Plymouth, Minn., and if they read the other 99 entries, readers will note towns in Arizona, Utah, Colorado, Oklahoma and Texas…but none in the Land of Enchantment. Corrales was the only NM town listed in last year's Best Small Cities. Housing costs figure prominently in Money's criteria, as well as cost of living.
Considering Santa Fe's median home price, there is little wonder why the City Different was likely squeezed out of the running.