Life in North Georgia, Real Estate in the Mountains

As we venture into 2009, I wanted to take a moment to say THANK YOU for you support and your business in 2008.

I know that for many folks this has been a very challenging year and I certainly hope that 2009 will bring us some better news of all kinds.  Despite all the challenging events of 2008, a lot of good things have happened as well and I thought it only fair to take note of that. 

Property sales in our county are slower than the last few years, but not nearly as slow as some of our neighboring counties or states.  Our property values have not increased this year, but they didn’t crater either like properties in California, Nevada or Florida.  Money was hard to come by in some places, but our local banks and the locally managed affiliates of most national brands had money to lend all year.  I didn’t have a single transaction cancelled or even delayed because of funding issues.

We are a small firm and we concentrate on service and value and throw in a fair measure of hard work.  That has resulted in a good year even in hard times.  Not only did we manage to have a good year, but we took advantage of the slower than normal traffic to catch up on professional education and to develop new marketing platforms.  I finished off my Georgia Graduate Realtor Institute (GRI) in October and broker pre-licensing courses early in December.  In mid-December I became an Associate Broker with Torrey Mountain Properties, Inc.  This fall we bought our first ever cover on a major real estate publication (Homes and Land), we began advertising on Cable Television (ComCast) in Atlanta and over the next few months we’ll begin using Video in our advertising and marketing communications.

If you ask 12 economists what this year will bring, you will get about 18 answers, so I won’t confuse the issue with my own prognostication, but I will say that no matter what the market is like—we’ll be right in the middle of the activity, working hard and producing the best possible results.

If I can assist you in any real estate matter as a buyer or seller, please give me a call and an opportunity to earn your business.

 See you round the Mountains,

                                            Don