What was supposed to be a boon for home buyers, especially first time home buyers, has fallen flat. Many folks out there trying to buy houses are being squeezed out of the housing market by cash laden investors. Even those bidding more than asking price are not getting called back.
The investors are paying cash and buying ‘as is’ at discount prices. No regular buyer who needs financing and inspections can compete with the cash-rich investors. Investors are also back to flipping houses. The buy-fix up- resell cycle has begun again.
The down side for those of us who aren’t even trying to buy a house is that those foreclosures will now become rental property. It is no secret that neighborhoods with a disproportionate number of rental properties goes downhill much faster than where homes are owned by the occupants.
According to the Washington Post:
“There are bidding wars out there. It’s like the 2005 market but at discount prices,” said Stella Barbour, a real estate agent at Jobin Realty in Northern Virginia. “I put in offers for my clients only to find there are already multiple offers. They always choose the one that’s all cash.”
Some of these cash-only investors use their own money to buy properties, while others borrow it at high interest rates from other private sources.
Chris “CC” Cormack, an investor, said she used her own money to beat out four other offers and buy a townhouse in Ashburn this year. The home, a foreclosure, was listed for $214,500, and she got it for $220,000. Cormack fixed it up and sold it a few months later for a sizable profit.
“It had been under contract twice before, and both of those loans fell apart,” said Cormack, who is also a real estate agent. “By the time I came along with all-cash offer, the bank said, ‘I’ll take it.’ They did not want to take a chance on the deal falling apart again.”
Many of the real estate practices are happening right here in Prince William County:
Investors have reemerged with brute force in the Washington region’s real estate market over the past few months, triggering bidding wars in some neighborhoods teeming with foreclosed properties and hindering traditional home buyers such as Melissa Diggins.
Diggins and her fiance, George Mills, made a dozen offers on houses in Prince William County but lost more than half of them to investors making all-cash offers.
Frustrated, they gave up their search for a new home, convinced that they could not compete.
“We thought to ourselves: ‘Enough is enough,’ ” said Diggins, a graphic designer. “We’d sometimes offer more than the asking price and we wouldn’t even get a call back. It was crazy.”
A year or so ago we heard several commentators singing the praises of the Prince William County Real Estate market. They spoke of how things were snapping back and how new families were moving in, returning the neighborhoods to the pastoral scenes before the ‘illegals’ came to town. In the first place, many of the foreclosures were not illegal immigrants or even Latino families. They were families who simply had bitten off more than they could chew. This new situation truly reminds us of being careful what we wish for. Homeowner occupancy is generally always superior to a neighborhood of rental units when it comes to homeowner upkeep and the general conditions of the community. One can expect both cities to be undergoing the same real estate situation.
Same darn thing is happening in Loudoun. Investors are becoming a pain in the ass, not only for normal home buyers but also for HOA’s, which wind up with a boatload of renters who have less interest in the community than a stakeholder would have. Too many of these investors buy, rent out, and then become either invisible or awfully hard to find when you need them to deal with the foibles of their tenants.
I have several near me. They are indeed a pain in the ass as are their tenents. They only seem to care about getting the property rented and that’s it.
I never understood why some people, including some of the supervisors were crowing about real estate in Prince William. Someone even bragged about the tour buses coming through here looking at foreclosures. That didn’t sound good to me at the time. Sort of like we were a fire sale or something. Investors worry me. They can ruin a community or neighborhood faster than any other component, in my opinion.
The crowing took place because it’s an old political trick. You boast and brag where you are weakest. The two radical extremists who pushed for the immigration crackdown have mud on their face and they know it. I been to these neighborhoods and then are no less brown than before. So they took the severe financial hit for nothing, and dragged the rest of the county’s property values down with them. I rent, but it still sucks to see police and fire have to cut back because we don’t have the money anymore.
And who do we have to thank for all this? Lets put it this way, I don’t see any large families riding around in new Cadillac Escalades any longer either. Now they’re crammed into older Honda Civics, if they aren’t walking that is. You can fill in between the lines with any answer you desire!
It appears, operative word appears that those who left were single workers. They left when the building market dried up. However Justin, you are right in noting that there are plenty of Latinos still here. Schools bear that out. Perhaps families with kids stayed and single people followed the work or went home. Hard to say.
It does seem that there was much premature trumpeting both on that score and on our housing ‘boon’ which is certainly not. Housing still is extremely inexpensive. Fire sale. And families are not able to buy. The cash cows are buying up the houses and renting them out. You can see it everywhere. What a shame. I hope people don’t believe the hype that is being fed by some of our local politicians.
If I had money I’d be buying houses right now. What would you do? Put it under a mattress? The stock market? 2% bonds?
To answer the question of whether the illegal-immigration ‘crackdown’ in PWC had anything to do with the foreclosure rate you would have to determine that those leaving their homes behind now live in houses elsewhere. If not, then they would have eventually foreclosed anyway with or without a ‘crackdown’, so that is where the answer lies. My guess is they didn’t buy homes in a higher income area, and lived happily ever after. That just wouldn’t make economic sense given that most who left where low payed laborers. So in an effort to help those less fortunate we have royally screwed ourselves by giving loans to those who truly couldn’t afford it! Makes one leery of wanting to help others does it not, yet this administration is all about doting on those ‘less fortunate’ while taking more from those who earned it.
El Guapo, I would probably continue with the market. I have tried my hand at being a slum lord and it was just too time consuming.
Many municipal bonds pay higher than 2% and are tax free. I don’t own any but a good friend does.
I just don’t like what I see happening when investors rent out houses. I don’t think anyone can say overall it is a good thing for a neighborhood.
SA, I am not saying, implying or anything else regarding the illegal immigration crackdown. I am not sure there even was a crackdown. I think most of it was bs and bluster and an attempt to create an atmosphere of fear.
Having said that, I don’t think the ‘crackdown’ caused the housing crash. I think the atmostphere contributed to the real estate situation in PWC and in Manassas. I think we had a perfect storm in our community. However, that is fairly ancient history and we were only a small part of a national event.
The crowing, blowing and bragging about our housing market being so …viril…is much more recent history. I think some folks are prematurely clapping and dancing over something that might not be in our best interests, if the linked article is even partially correct.
All neighborhood problems are not immigrant driven.
True, all neighborhood problems are not immigrant driven……………yet! Just wait until most neighborhoods are majority immigrant, and then we’ll see if this nation can retain its identity or not. I walked into the DMV the other day, and without reading the signs it would have been difficult to determine the country in which it was located based on the people present.
“I been to these neighborhoods and then are no less brown than before.”@JustinT
So there really wasn’t a “climate of fear” caused by the immigration resolution that drove Latinos out of the area? Many of us were saying that a year ago, that we were seeing just as many Latinos shopping and going about their business as ever before, and were roundly shouted down for denying that Latinos were hiding and fleeing in fear from all the racism.
Bad loans caused the housing crisis. The first-time buyers tax credit is just another vote-buying boondoggle that is now proving to be an utter failure, just like cash for clunkers. When will this government stop buying votes with our cash?
Second Alamo,
Did it ever occur to you that the reason the DMV is so crowded with people you deem not compatible with the American Identity, is that most “American looking” people no longer patronize the DMV…they do their business with DMV online. The fees are higher to go to DMV in person and anyone with a computer would take care of business with their computer rather than brave the DMV lines. I would dare say that most American born people have better online access than immigrants do.
The foreclosures began in late 2006, and that’s a good six + months before the resolution was even introduced. The resolution had little to no effect on the foreclosures. The construction jobs were drying up, people signed loan documents that they had NO understanding of what they were signing, and greedy sellers, realtors and banks had everything to do with the foreclosures.
I can speak to my block regarding the foreclosures 12 of 30 houses had been foreclosed on and all but one was occupied large numbers of single men. The “investors” were here years ago. I say this because there were houses that were owned by business owners that crammed their “employees” in their houses and sometimes there were even two shifts of residents at a couple of houses. We also, had those that bought the houses lived there and then rented out rooms of the houses. These “investors” are now gone, at least from block. The investors are out there buying these houses for a song. The down side is some of these houses are in such disrepair that they have to be gutted and this is quite costly. I’ve seen several houses that have been transformed back into homes, that were once rundown boarding houses. I think we still have a couple years before we see the market recover and become stable.
Twin, I respectfully disagree with your comment to SA about immigrants not having the same access to the internet than American born. The public library has computers available for EVERYONE to use. The resolution has NOTHING to do with use of our public libraries.
I go to the library weekly, and I would have to say that often the vast majority of the adult computer users are Latino, if they can wrestle the computers away from the kids browsing Facebook or MySpace. They are not shut off from technology.
My old neighborhood long before this became majority of townhouses being rented out. This is nothing new there – and I don’t really see the number of rental units increasing much there. It’s been that way for the past 5 years or more, which is about the time the neighborhood really went downhill.
All I can say is that the townhouses are selling at much higher prices now than a year ago – in fact roughly up 40% from where they bottomed out. This is good news for me, as I’m looking at selling my townhouse shortly and finally getting out of that crummy neighborhood once and for all.
Maybe other neighborhoods will be affected by investors buying up houses for sale – but my old neighborhood won’t – it’s already been that way with as an example the house next to mine – bought by someone with an Hispanic name – and repeatedly being used as a flophouse for 10 – 15 people. Yes, at one point there were 15 people living in a 3 bedroom townhouse! Just imagine what it’s like living next to something like that! It was however sold last year and I don’t know what condition it is in now – although it could not go downhill much further than when I was living next to it. I have not been back to the old neighborhood for almost a year since my townhouse got rented out, since it is being managed by a professional rental real estate company – it lets me avoid ever having to go back to that place while it is rented out.
Emma,
Haha! “Wrestle the computers away from the kids”. If I did NOT have a computer I would certainly choose the library over DMV. I think most sane people would. I’ve been to DMV three times in the last 3 months, and I would rather walk on hot coals than go there.
I only went there because my daughter is just starting to drive. I would note each and every visit we had to be armed with her documents to prove her Citizenship, and we definately had to show them everytime. One time the lady at the counter didn’t have her supervisor sign off on my daughter’s documents and I had to go all the way back to DMV with the papers again, and this was for a failed written driving test. Needless, to say I was hot under the collar, and they wanted me back there before close of business or they’d suspend my license. Right, suspend my license for the failure to do there job. I wonder how often this happens and how many return pronto with documents like I had to.
http://crede.berkeley.edu/research/sfc/3.4es.html
Lafayette,
I just found with a quick search online the above and many other articles addressing the divide between computer/internet access for American born vs Latino and/or lower income immigrants. Of course the library has computers available for everyone to use…if they know how to use a computer. My point to SA is that the DMV has a disproportionate share of immigrants in their offices because almost all DMV business can now be taken care of online and most people with computer access and knowledge on how to navigate a website would prefer to handle their business online rather than get in those lines at the DMV office.
oops.. suspend my license for THEIR failure to do THEIR job.
Lafayette,
Thank you also for the reminder that anyone doing business at a DMV office needs to be armed with documentation! Therefore, it should not bother SA that there are Latino’s at the DMV…they are simply there to take care of the same kind of business he is.
Exactly right. I’ve been saying over and over the resolution had very little if anything to do with the housing crisis in PWC. I can look at my old neighborhood – and every single foreclosure I saw was a townhouse where someone had bought it at a ridiculous price of $300K or $350K (two across the street from mine – one was bought at $350K and one at $360K). I don’t know if the tenants there were the owners or the renters – but if they were the owners there was absolutely no way they could afford that kind of mortgage – as they worked in construction jobs. Maybe those were just renters – I could never really tell for sure. Whatever, it was no surprise when those two went and foreclosed. Same as the one next to me – which was a flophouse and eventually foreclosed, the owner who never inhabited it as far as I could tell paid a whopping $325K for it originally! I can’t see how he was getting that much rent to cover that kind of mortgage – and as no surprise, it finally foreclosed, which it is too bad it hadn’t much sooner and I wouldn’t have had to suffer living next to that mess all that time. You can blame it on the banks, for lending out money to people with no documentation loans. I’m sure the PWC and Manassas City markets were ripe for those kinds of loans, at least if I look at my old neighborhood as an example. It was easy to look at every foreclosure as it came along, and then look at what was originally paid for the townhouse, and more often than not it was during the peak of the housing boom and more than $300K paid for it. More often than not, it did not appear to me for the ones that I could observe the inhabitants – assuming they were the owners, that they had anywhere near the financial means of affording that kind of loan. Resolution or not, all those sorts of houses would have foreclosed eventually. I suspect PWC and Manassas City (and I’m sure Manassas Park too) had a higher ratio of these kind of no-doc loans and subprime loans than other areas in Northern Virginia. It is just makes sense, and all those who twisted those statistics around to make it sound that the resolution caused such a huge amount of foreclosures, just aren’t looking at the facts.
Speaking of the gov’t aiding the housing crisis – recently just a few months ago – since the gov’t now controls both Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae – they’ve pressured them to loosen up their lending standards after they had tightened them up. Doesn’t this seem like it will just lead to more subprime loans and more foreclosures? It is just an artificial boost to the housing market – and what good is it if those people getting loans only due to the loosened up lending standards eventually foreclose? I guess it will be cyclical – when that happens they’ll tighten up the lending standards again, and the cycle will be doomed to repeat.
I’ll just make one comment about DMV. Last year my wife wanted to start learning how to drive. So we went to the Manassas DMV to get their driver’s license manual. Guess what – they were out of English copies – they had tons of Spanish copies – and they told me they had no idea when they would get the English copies back in stock! I eventually ended up printing the stupid thing off their website – which probably used half a cartridge worth of printer ink. It’s pretty bad when you walk in there and find they don’t seem interested in carrying English copies – but only wanted to give us a Spanish copy, which would be useless.
Twin, thanks for the link. I think the computer “education” would be a project that the churches, boy/girl scouts, and other organizations could do for the immigrants and low-income people.
Gainesville, same thing earlier this year when my daughter started to study for her lerner’s., NO English copies available. I made several trips throughout the year. We did not print the manuel, she read online and borrowed one from a friend.
I saw people from around the globe in the DMV. I thought how do they study in their native language? But if you read/speak Spanish there’s a version in their native language, but not for speakers of other languages. Frankly, I think there should ONLY be an English version if they can’t provide a copy in every language that one might need. Why is it only those Spanish speakers have this luxury that other immigrants do NOT?
My wife complains constantly – why isn’t there a Chinese manual – there’s a lot of Chinese people in Northern Virginia who have recently come here and need to learn how to drive. She sort of has a point. In Fairfax and Loudoun Counties Asians make up a fairly significant percentage of the population between Korean, Vietnamese, and Chinese.
I guess the Manassas office isn’t terribly interested in stocking English manuals – if you experienced them out of stock multiple times.
The lady sort of gave me “attitude” when I asked her when they would be back in stock – she kind of sniped back “I have no idea!!!”. But then again the DMV folks aren’t the most pleasant people to have to deal with.
Many immigrants also do not have the banking system down pat so that they have clear access to being able to conduct business online. It is a pretty daunting task to navigate DMV online to start with. I had to assist Mr. Techno-tard Howler last time because he couldn’t figure out why his plates were $30 plus dollars higher than they should have been. (vanity plates)
Being able to read English easily is also a requirement for DMV online. Many immigrants, regardless of country of origin, simply have an easier time in person where they can look a person in the eye, read verbal and non- verbal clues, etc. For every immigrant one sees at the library, thre are probably 20 who would never take that plunge.
One bitch I always hear is that immigrants bring their entire family to DMV. Why? Their kids help them out with all the intricacies of doing that kind of business in America. You bring enough school age kids, one of them is bound to help you out.
I have hated DMV long before moving to NOVA. It is truly a cross section of America…and that is not always a good thing.
GR, did you write to Richmond to see if any manuals are printed in Chinese? You might put in a request. If they don’t hear from you then they won’t know one is wanted.
Ah, but if you are illegally in the country, and want to avoid paying taxes, then you don’t get a valid SSN and therefore probably couldn’t establish a bank account either. Why do you think so many PayDay Loan places started up during the peak of the Resolution time period, and are now starting to dwindle?
The State of VA went after them over elder-abuse.
Many immigrants who are undocumented do have a TIN which allows them to pay taxes. I agree its a hypocritical way of dealing with things but many do have a TIN, including minors. Many different places accept TIN in place of SS.
Many of the things illegal immigrants are criticized for are things that they are prevented from doing.
We all have to ask ourselves why Prince William and the cities were more impacted than many localities. We were top dog in the state as far as foreclosures. We were top dog compared to our other NOVA neighbors.
I am not saying the Resolution had a thing to do with it. However, one has to question the perfect storm notion of affordable housing, many immigrants and a robust housing industry and a Resolution and politicians hell bent on getting re-elected by beating the anti-illegal immigration drum. Lots of our neighbors have affordable housing also. We will probably never be able to give the proper credit or blame. Some things are just too fuzzy.
PWC had the most bang for the buck during the boom, Moon. Even with the inflated prices you got more house here, decent schools, and safe community, and that’s one thing that made us more attractive for those with limited funds to purchase a home. We had many new housing units added to our inventory during this time which is another factor in the number of “new loans” being made in PWC due to new inventory. Our neighbors in FX, Arlington, Alexandria were not adding new inventory at the aggressive rate we were in PWC.
We will never be able to give proper credit or blame.
I never thought about writing to Richmond about the DMV manuals. Anyway, I’m in no hurry for my wife to drive, actually.
You are right – back when I lived in New Jersey the DMV there was just as bad – it must be universal that all DMV’s are bad no matter where they are.
I agree with Lafayette about having the most bang for the buck during the boom. The prices of houses in other counties were just ridiculous at that point, then again in my old neighborhood it was ridiculous that prices of $350K were common. PWC has always just had a higher ratio of affordable housing than other counties, and that stands to reason that more lower income people bought those houses – who were more prone to foreclose. I really think without any resolution we would have still had much more foreclosures than any other county.
Fortunately, at least in my old neighborhood – most foreclosure activity has ceased, and the market is recovering. Houses were selling 20% below 2009 assessments, but now are selling about 20% above 2009 assessments, which is a good sign. There are some that are actually selling at $170K or $180K that have been bought up by investors and remodeled and put back on the market with updated kitchens, granite countertops, etc. A year ago, it was lucky to get $100K for a townhouse in Point of Woods.
Loudoun certainly had a lot of new housing going in as did Fauquier. We still left them standing in the dust as far as foreclosures went.
I may have to roll my eyes over safe communities and decent schools. I find it noteworthy that not one of our supervisors has their children in public schools. Speaks volumes to me.
I can think of communities I wouldn’t drive in to in broad daylight, door locked and packing heat. All right here in Prince Willy.
I don’t really think it was new housing as much as older cheaper housing that got bought by people who couldn’t afford it and foreclosed. At least in my old neighborhood. Then again in my new neighborhood in Gainesville there were foreclosures, but looking at the names most were NOT Hispanic, even though Hispanic families living in this neighborhood. There was not the percentage of foreclosures as in the old neighborhood – on my block 30% of the houses foreclosed, which is saying a lot. All of the foreclosed houses were bought at the height of the housing price boom too. The one next to me was bought at $325K, then foreclosed and went for the shockingly low price of $93K back in July.
Moon, I understand the eye rolling to some degree, but there are a lot worse schools and higher crime rates in Virginia than PWC’s. No place is exempt from bad things. Every county and yes cities have their problem areas. No place is perfect. Although, some might like you to believe their little city is better than the counties that they sit in and share services with.
There were more supervisors with their kids in private schools and outside of the county too, I might add a few years ago. I think one still has a child in private school outside of the county, and one definately has homeschooled kids. Oh brother!! I agree that the supervisors not all having their kids in our public school speaks volumes, but I do think a couple now have their kids in PWCPS.
I still believe we had the best bang for the buck on many fronts.
We added more housing units to our inventory than Fauquier or Loudoun, thus more foreclosures. Fauquier will not grow like Loudoun or PWC. There are still way too many running family farms that will NOT sell out, and this also applies to Loudoun. I have aunts and uncles with family farms in both counties and they have turned down some huge offers and many of their farming neighbors feel the same way about the family farm. PWC’s family farms started to fade years ago.
M-H,
Sections of Loudoun and Fairfax that were most like the hard hit
sections of PWC in age and price of housing, demographics, etc. had
almost the same outcome. For example, Westgate and Sugarland Run/
Herndon. PWC and the two cities just had more of the most vulnerable
housing stock.
PR, I would also, to your list of examples Georgetown South and Point of Woods of the city of Manassas. Nothing like singling out the “hoods” outside of the City of Manassas. I do agree completely with your statement though.
Faquier has grown up horribly in the last decade. Too bad people don’t have to sign a waiver stating they know it will take them 3 hours to get to work and another 3 to get home. In the morning it took an hour to get from Warrenton area to the Manassas exit.
Two numbers are al rered flags for local jurisdictions.
– Anytime your business tax revenue falls below 35% of the total
tax burden.
– Anytime renters make up over 35% of a neighborhood
“…are real red flags” — PR shouldn’t type and watch football at the
same time. A yellow flag on me.
Fauquier has grown up, true. However, not at the pace Loudoun and PWC did. Fauquier bills it’s self as an Agriculture Business County. Fauqier and Loudound still have MANY farm owners, not the same in PWC.
PR, Interesteing percentage numbers regarding the business and renter base and it’s burden on local jurisdictions. Any idea idea what those ratios for the city and/or county?
I’ve got the Skins on, a yellow flag for anyone wasting their time on that game in San Diego like am. I will only be subjected to half, because I’ll be in the City of Manassas at the American Legion working bingo for the benefit of Stonewall Jackson’s Boosters and Dance Team.
Indeed, I suspect studying neighborhoods that are similar to badly affected neighborhoods in PWC or in Manassas City would definitely show very similar high rates of foreclosures.
The problem is, PWC (and Manassas City) have a higher proportion of these neighborhoods. Again, this is simple statistics, but those who wish to twist statistics (and it was done) to make it appear the resolution highly affected PWC’s foreclosure rate do so.
High rental ratios are indeed a problem – that’s what definitely caused my old neighborhood to really go downhill in a rapid fashion. The rental ratio on my block was greater than 50%! Both townhouses on either side of mine, as well as all 3 directly across the street were rental properties – just to give an idea. Of course, mine has been a rental property for the last year, but hopefully soon it will be sold and after that I really cease to care what happens – not that the neighborhood can go downhill all that much further.
Faquier is indeed very very different than PWC. Even the part of Faquier closest to Gainesville still is full of farmland and huge wide open spaces. There’s also a lot of resistance there to putting up huge amounts of houses on small lots, unlike here in PWC. There’s a lot of fairly well off people there who own huge parcels of property, and aren’t at all willing to sell them to developers to plop tons of houses on those parcels.
GR, that 30% foreclosure in your neighborhood really surprises me. It also blows a few holes in the idea the older cheaper neighborhoods being the magnet for those who are bound to be foreclosed on.
I go back and continue to ask….why was PW hit the hardest of anywhere in Virginia?
Back in the late 60’s, as the federal govt. gorged on Johnson’s Great Society, Prince William became the fastest growing county in the United States. It kept that distinction off and on over several decades. PWC was a bedroom community. Just building up to that perfect storm. Maybe someone will write a book about it one of these old days.
Point of Woods definitely qualifies as a “hood”. Too bad when I moved in there in 1983 it was considered a very desirable neighborhood and many coworkers of mine at IBM lived there. Shocking how the neighborhood really went downhill starting around 2002 or 2003. I couldn’t possibly recommend it to anyone with a family, due to the high crime rate there. Down by Stonewall Park, there was quite often huge gang fights the last summer I was there (summer 2008). When you see and hear police cars zooming down Stonewall Road to the park at least twice a week, it is not a good sign. I would also say Stonewall Park isn’t what I would consider a very safe place to take the family anymore. I used to walk my dog down there often – and there was a time when I even felt safe walking down Stonewall Road to the park after dark. That time had long passed – the last summer I didn’t even feel safe during the daytime – not to mention the huge amount of broken glass (mostly beer bottles) and other trash on the sidewalks and in the street. Again, I remember a time when that park was brand new and was a really nice place to walk.
It’s a sad state of affairs when Point of Woods gets mentioned in the same breath as Georgetown South, but unfortunately it is trending towards being just as bad a place as that neighborhood. Maybe the City police will have to set up a substation there just the way they did at GS. That might be the only way to turn things around at this point, I’m afraid.
From city-data.com for zip code 20110 which is the City – percentage of renters is 28%. Of course, that includes true apartment renters, and I’m not sure for what year that is really for.
Also, in attached housing (townhouses) it appears that indeed, renters make up almost 33%. There’s a chart showing the percentages – I’m trying to read off this chart but the breakdown is as follows:
Single Family Homes Owner Occupied: Approx. 48%
Single Family Homes Rented: Approx. 3%
Attached Homes Owner Occupied: Approx: 20%
Attached Homes Rented: Approx: 9%
Multi-Dwelling Units Owner Occupied: Approx: 2%
Multi-Dwelling Units Rented: Approx: 9%
Anyway, the 6 numbers above should add up to 100% – which shows my reading of the chart is a little off for a few numbers, but it gives you an idea.
For zip 20109 the ratio of rentals appears to be a little lower, but there isn’t that overall number to compare to as with 20110 (the 28% number).
Interesting statistics, GR. What do you suppose the stats are in POW? I would guess well over the magic number of 35%.
It wouldn’t surprise me, and also I have a feeling those stats are several years old – and probably for the city the percentages of rentals are higher.
Gainesville Resident, I understand you had a terrible experience when you lived in Point of Woods because I’ve read your descriptions of it here, and I’m sorry that happened to you.
But I don’t understand what purpose it serves to continue to say negative things about Point of Woods the way it is today, especially since you own property there and want to protect your investment.
I watched neighbors from Point of Woods 1 & 2 and Point of Woods 3 get the top awards at the Neighborhood Conference in November for their efforts over the past six months to work together, along with volunteers from Manassas St. Thomas Church and the Week of Hope volunteers to build community and improve their neighborhoods. And they’re planning more neighborhood improvement projects in 2010 and could use some help from homeowners/landlords and renters.
If you want things to improve so your investment will increase, get involved, or at least stop speaking negatively about how Point of Woods is today. I believe it is changing, but it takes people taking action to do that.
The same goes for the negative comments about Georgetown South — it doesn’t help the neighborhood and it’s a slap in the face to the people who are working hard to make things better. People from Georgetown South, Wellington Condos and Wildwood have started a “Neighborhoods Work Group” that meets the third Tuesday of every month at 7 PM at the community center on Taney Road in Georgetown South. Anyone in the city (or county) who wants to improve their neighborhoods is welcome). The guest speaker at the Jan. 19 meeting is Mickey Rhoades, the new Housing Manager/Advocate for the City.
The county has an established Neighborhood Leaders Group that meets monthly at the Development Services Bldg at the McCoart Center. Anyone in the county or city is welcome there. Look on the http://www.pwcgov.org Website under Neighborhood Services and you will see our plan and goals. We need everyone from Gainesville residents to Dale City residents to join us.
Neighborhoods don’t just get better on their own. It takes people working hard to make the difference.
Cindy,
With all due respect. I can’t believe you would come along and tell GR not to be negative. He’s simply telling his true and factual recounts of what he dealt with while living in the City of Manassas. You need to take a look at what you fellow City resident Poor Richard said. He started the naming of the “bad places”. Funny thing is he didn’t give any mention of a “bad place” in the City of Manassas, but was quick to drop the name of two neighborhoods in PWC and Herndon. The sad reality is EVERY little town and big city across our great nation have their share of “bad places” and “bad things”. Bad things don’t just happen in “less desirable” neighborhoods they happen everywhere, and that includes PWC and the two little cities within it’s borders.
I would encourage any and all to participate in the above mentioned groups. There are many people working hard to improve their neighborhoods day in and day out that blog about it. I would like to think we all work in our way to improve OUR community.