Despite Recession, Some Cities are Recovering Well

Pockets of good news

There is a lot of doom and gloom in the news regarding the real estate industry, but despite the downturn, there are cities that are emerging from the housing with strong indicators of recovery.

Forbes.com has named Austin, TX and Washington, D.C. as tied for the two cities where the recession is easing and the housing markets are stabilizing.

Having recently moved from D.C. to Austin, D’Ann Faught with The Goodlife Team said, “While they are both recovering from the economy, I feel that it is for different reasons. Washington DC, by nature, is a very transient part of the country. The existence of our nation’s government, and everything that means for a market (consulting, contract, and political jobs), will continue to keep the Washington DC market strong.”

Faught continued, saying, “Austin, by contrast, is recovering in my opinion, because it never really experienced the huge hit that other markets took. If you look at home values since the early 2000s, Austin has had smaller movements, slight increases and decreases, rather than massive upswings. In addition, the growing technological field and the city’s efforts to attract new businesses, combined with the fact that it is still an affordable, but wonderful, place to live, make Austin primed to bounce back from this economy.”

But not all cities are in the recovery process like Austin or Washington, D.C. Doug Hill, Associate Broker at Coldwell Banker said, “The Greater Phoenix area, where I practice real estate, has a higher unemployment rate and a lower average annual salary than both of these areas. This is being amplified by the fact that Arizona’s growth has often depended on more people migrating into the state than out of. Since this is not happening right now, many markets here including real estate and construction are still suffering.”

Affordable Suburbs

While metro areas garner much of the attention of news outlets, BusinessWeek has outlined the most affordable suburbs by state and of all suburbs in America, with the overall winner being Fishers, Indiana.

Vanessa Wong of Business Week reports, “Favorable real estate values are not the only thing that Fishers has to offer. The town scored high points for livability, safety, education, and economic performance. Fishers’ unemployment rate was 6.5% in December 2009, compared to 9.8% statewide, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. In addition, the rate of violent crime and property crime here is far below the national average.”

So it’s not all doom and gloom, there are bright spots in our housing futures across the nation. How is your market?