2010 Year in Review

Highlights:

 

• Prudential Georgia Realty leads the way in listings and closed sales
• Buyers had incredible Buying Power, interest rates at all time historical lows can you believe as low as 4%?
• $8000 Buyer tax credit created a hearty Spring sales market
• My Short Sales & Foreclosure Resource (SFR) Certification came in handy…successfully completed short sale transactions for a Win/Win situation for all
• Many banks are starting to streamline their short sale acceptance process, speeding up the process
• Mellow Mushroom and Brown Bag Deli moved to Suwanee Town Center, creating a lot of new activity
• Prudential Georgia Realty gets involved in the Suwanee Community Garden and the Suwanee Day Parade
• Suwanabee™ makes appearances all around Suwanee
• My Army son and his family moved to Dahlonega and he didn’t deploy overseas this year
• My teenage son was accepted for Governor’s Honor Program at Valdosta State University and had a wonderful experience
• He’ll be graduating Gwinnett School of Mathematics, Science and Technology in 2011 (see lowlights too)
•  Great college shopping trip to Washington DC, Philadelphia and New York in Spring
• Sugar and Spice (my puppies) are more lovable than ever and even “tolerate” my two grand-sons at our Sunday dinners
• Our Norcross High School reunion was in July (do I have to say which year?)
• Much less new construction inventory on the market...good for sellers
• Snow on Christmas in Suwanee!!! First time in my life!

 

Lowlights:

   

• Short sales are the most dreaded transaction, for agents, buyers and sellers
• Average sales price and number of sales both decrease from same time period last year (both Suwanee and Gwinnett County stats, Single Family).
• It’s a beauty contest and a price war – and you have to win BOTH when your home is on the market, making the competition brutal for Sellers
• My teenage son started his last year of High School…will be off to college in 2011
• My favorite WWII Veteran, Mr. Harold Humphries, passed away this year. I was honored to know him. He'll be missed.
• Bank owned properties are often good deals for buyers, but must navigate thru the "our way or no way bank mentality"
• My neighborhood lake still does not have the drain cap repaired, nearly 1.5 years after the great flood of 2009
• Appraisal values continue to be nail biters (many appraisers not familiar with area due to new government rules)
• Lots of shadow foreclosure inventory poised to come on the market this year

  Words to live by in 2011:

 

  Life isn't fair, but it's still good.

 

Don't take yourself so seriously, no one else does.

 

Frame every so called "disaster" with these words: In five years, will this matter?