Back when I lived in Beverly MA (born and raised) my family would come up to the mountains every summer to camp. My aunts and uncles would go to Dolly Copp Campground in Pinkham Notch, just north of Jackson NH or Sebago Lake State Park in Maine, and all of my cousins and I would pretty much take over the social scene by sheer size of our families. In those days there was no more cost effective way to get 20 people or so together for a couple weeks of summer vacation. We didn’t see it that way as kids. What we found was a wonderland of other kids and secretive places and trails to get lost and then found. It was just so different than home!
Today, as a realtor in the Mt Washington Valley for 15 + yrs, I sometimes forget how different it can be “back home”. Just by virtue of living here I am sure that I receive a bit less input throughout my day. I pass by fewer advertisements and I see fewer styles of dress and cuisine, on a daily basis, for sure. By design, what we don’t see up here is the daily reporting of the frenetic pace of the housing economy. We here lose touch with what it feels like to actually live, and be immersed in, an economy with housing expenses running way up into the 40-50% range of the average income earners income because double digit appreciation of real estate is the new normal. In the Mt Washington Valley we don’t have a strong primary home market. Primary homes are bought based on a need to have housing close enough to viable employment to support that housing and other household expenses.
The tourism and service economy doesn’t provide many jobs at that income level here in the North Conway NH – Fryeburg Maine area. The core real estate market of all of the White Mtns and Ossipee Lake region (yes it is different -vis a vis Rt 16 access to larger cities – than Winnepausaukee and Sebago Lakes regions) is the vacation home – retirement home buyer. Every year since 2003, when my wife and I moved up to get deeper into nature and carve out our piece of the mountain lifestyle, I have observed that 97% of my sales are for second home owners and vacation/second home buyers. The 3% primary home buyer sales are not enough to fuel demand to increase appreciation above 5% or so. The demand in the vacation home market buys based on different needs that they WANT to fulfill but they aren’t necessarily committed to one area or one type of property. Retirement homes are a little different in that the buyers often have the wherewithal to build their dream home if they can’t find the perfect property in the inventory that they have probably scrubbed clean in the 10 yrs leading up to the dream retirement home purchase.
If you are looking for a retirement home and you are reading this I know you are nodding your head. You have been looking since Birch Hill was a new develpoment and lo and behold the inventory of the valley, built mostly in the 80s and 90s and updated, maybe, once since, is not what you dreamed of back in Danvers… So you decide to build. This makes you a buyer that isn’t motivated enough to buy current inventory to drive appreciation. This leaves the WANT BASED buyer that has a need, whether it be escaping from or attracting family and friends or whatever other reason driving a vacation purchase, but not a need to that tolerates over payment and isn’t committed to one specific area.
How does this fit in to losing touch with being immersed in a feverish real estate economy? I just need to remind myself that the people I will be working with to list their homes will be viewing their sale through the lens of a need-driven sellers real estate market. Expectations of strong appreciation and fast and furious, blind demand will need to be tempered with compassion and respect for the individual financial situation that each seller and buyer may be confronted with in their pursuit.
Bill Barbin is a real estate broker at 3641 White Mountain Highway in North Conway NH 03860 with
Bill Barbin Real Estate – Keller Williams Lakes and Mountains Call 603-986-0385 to reach Bill right away! Serving Jackson NH, Bartlett NH, Hart’s Location and Hale’s Location NH, North Conway NH, Conway NH, Tamworth NH, Ossipee NH and Ossipee Lake, Freedom, Madison NH, Eaton NH and I am also licensed as a broker in Maine and serve the towns of Brownfield, Lovell, Fryeburg, Bridgton and Denmark.