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Another high rise condo proposed for Tempe Town Lake

 A Scottsdale developer announced Wednesday it hopes to begin construction of a 26-story condominium tower on the north shore of Tempe Town Lake early this year with sales opening in March. Developed by WestStone Communities, Onyx Tower would include 196 condos, ranging in price from the $300,000s to more than $1 million. The high rise “” with its solid black glass walls “” would sit near Rural Road and Loop 202.

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Buckeye development buys another in Sun Valley

 Douglas Ranch buys Trillium along Buckeye’s Sun Valley Parkway. The principals of Douglas Ranch, a 35,000-acre project west of the White Tank Mountains, bought the 3,000-acre Trillium project for nearly $86.3 million in two transactions that closed this week, real estate records say. Buckeye city government sounds like Payton Place but they sure have ambitious plans. The acquisition of Trillium gives the developers frontage on the Sun Valley Parkway and the chance to develop both projects in tandem so they have similar themes. Site work has started on Trillium. Douglas Ranch is not under construction. Together, the two projects have been approved for more than 90,000 homes, Buckeye planners say.

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A Realtor’s take on the 2006 Las Vegas real estate market

 In addition, 2006 was the first year that a high-rise condo project was the number one-selling subdivision in Las Vegas. Can anyone else see the writing on the wall? I watch California and Las Vegas real estate to see trends that may be coming our way and it sure looks like high-rise condos are coming to Arizona. The Residences at MGM had 979 closings in 2006 with an average price of $593,192. Sun City Anthem and Solera, both single family residence subdivisions, were second and third. Solera is an active adult community.

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Arizona home auction planned

 The Arizona Republic had a long article starting on the front page today on one Arizona home auction being planned for March 24 at the Phoenix Civic Plaza. So far it’s much ado about nothing. As of midweek, McCann had seven or eight homes consisting of resales and builder specs signed for his Phoenix auction. Seven or eight. Hummm. Katie bar the door. And, of course, a seller probably has a reserve price so he doesn’t have to sell his home if he doesn’t get his price. The auction company, however, gets its price from the seller upfront. The sidebar to the article says sellers have to pay the auction…

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PMI Housing Appreciation Study – 3rd Qtr 2006

 PMI, the private mortgage insurance company, comes out with a study every quarter that ranks the top 50 metropolitan statistical areas (MSA) in the United States based on their assessment of the probability of a house price decline within 2 years. The PMI Market Risk Index score for Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale increased significantly in the 3rd quarter as our appreciation rate declined from 31% (3rd Qtr 2005 over 2004) to 16% (3rd Qtr 2006 over 2005). Overall, however, metro Phoenix is still in the middle of the pack. Home Affordability Income growth was strong in the 3rd quarter so that many markets saw slight improvements in home affordability as incomes grew faster…

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No blue screen of death since Monday! YEAH!

 It looks like I’m back in business. Since removing one of the 2 memory sticks from my 1.5 year old computer on Monday, I haven’t had 1 blue screen of death. My desktop HP has 1 GB of memory total from two 512 MB memory sticks. I also was having a problem with a failing fan in the power supply. When I called HP technical support on the memory stick problem, I also brought up the fan problem. Yesterday, they sent out a technician who replaced the power supply and tomorrow I expect to receive the new memory stick by mail. That, I can replace myself. HP technical support has…

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