In Hennepin County, real estate professionals say it is still predominantly
a seller’s market, especially in the $200,000 to $400,000 market. “I think the houses being on the market for just one day, has cooled down a little bit. There are still not enough homes in a particular price range that I can find for people,” said Ross Michelson, buyer specialist for the IgotRealEstate.Kristen and Jon Anderson looked at eleven homes before finding the

Minneapolis Home values are closely tracking the national average, yet manage to hold more value than the fast declining national market. Largely this a result of the Minneapolis Market not experiencing the huge inflation of the bubble at its height

We are seeing a general return to sanity in the real estate market in the US. Just like the Tech Bubble caused people to lose sight of what truly makes a company valuable, so did the real estate bubble lead to confusion as to what makes a house valuable. People were buying houses for all the wrong reasons.

During the boom everyone was thinking like an investor, unfortunately 99% of those people were unqualified. This has led to the current correction in the market, during which smart people are buying. The foreclosure market has opened up opportunities for bargain buying.

Home sales continued their recent upward streak for the week ending,

with pending sales posting a 21.1 percent increase over the same week in 2007.

While this doesn’t match the extreme increases seen throughout September, it remains a positive indicator of recent buyer demand.

Just shy of 50% of the properties bought during the week were lender-mediated foreclosures or short sales—47.3 percent.

New listings declined by 10.0 percent for the same time period
comparison and are down 11.5 percent over the last three months.

The total supply of active homes for sale sits 9.4 percent below this time last year.

Inventory should decline for the rest of the year as traditional home sellers take their homes off the market with greater frequency during the fall and winter months, waiting for the inherent optimism and renewed spirit of spring’s thaw.

Highlighting a common theme of this blog, the core cities of Minneapolis and St. Paul are benefiting most from the
price appreciation trend of the last five years. Next in line are some of the developing ex-urban areas and most of the first ring suburban communities.

This is further confirmation of the importance of location in choosing real estate. Commuting an hour or more makes outer ring homes inherently unattractive and when you remove the promise of an ever inflating real estate bubble, people get back to the basics of real estate– Where do I want to live?

Downtown Minneapolis Market remains dynamic. The combination of attractive new developments and a demographic shift in which “baby boomers” and empty nesters seek to retain their youth by enjoying the benefits urban living opposed to suburbs.

This contributes to the commercial success of lofts in the North loop (Warehouse district) and Mill Ruins areas. Also latest High Rise projects like “The Carlyle” and the “Yvy Tower” have seen a strong interest from buyers. Both have seen over 90% of units reserved within the first two days of availibilty.

With a booming entertainment district circling Block E and a “Renaissance” of the Mississippi River banks, Downtown Minneapolis offers to date its best growth, leaving room yet for more affordable real estate. Projects to come…

Uptown Minneapolis shows a remaining interest for ‘condo conversions”. With yet a limited offer and continuously growing demand. Linden Hills neighborhood of Southwest Minneapolis has successfully joined the pack of conversion developments.

Last year the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality ranked Minnesota first in the nation for the overall quality of its health care. Minnesota is also the top-ranked state for residents covered by health insurance, at 91.5 percent. And despite its frequently inclement weather, the Minneapolis metro area ranks among the top ten in the country for share of residents who exercise regularly.

But those are just the numbers. Ask any Minnesotan why the Twin Cities area is a great place to live and you’ll get a litany of reasons, from its forward-thinking policies (the state was the first to designate smoke-free areas in restaurants, in 1975) to its many cultural offerings (which include the new Guthrie Theater on the Minneapolis waterfront) to its sense of community (four in ten residents do some kind of volunteer work, the highest rate in the nation).

“There is a can-do spirit here,” says Charlie Boone, 80, who has a weekly radio show at WCCO-Minneapolis. “It’s easy to stay healthy because it’s easy to stay connected.”

The recent spike in gas prices reinforces the primary tenet of real estate, location, location, location. Right now people who bought great “houses” out in the suburbs are realizing that even granite counter tops can’t compete with a good location. Little old tear downs close to the Twin Cities are holding their values better than any of the fancy new luxury homes stuck out in the country.

While some outlying neighborhoods with strong community amenities are faring well, the prices of the great majority of the cookie cutter homes built during the recent boom are falling faster than a paralyzed falcon. This is a great reason to make sure that choose a realtor who has been in the business for a while, realtors with staying power like Jeff Lundquist of IGotRealestate.com have seen market ups and downs and advise clients based on sound principles not media hype. 

The Minneapolis school board voted Tuesday night to adopt a $652 million budget for next school year that officials said better reflects the academic priorities of the district.That budget is up 2.4 percent, despite the expectation that 1,600 fewer students will enroll in district schools next fall, requiring 63 fewer teachers. In part that increase reflects the approval by the Legislature of $16 million more than the amount of state aid anticipated when the budget was drafted.

One academic priority in the budget is money to buy new math textbooks for elementary and middle school students. They’ll be put to use in the 2008-09 school year after teachers are trained. There’s also money to beef up International Baccalaureate programs at Northeast and Anwatin middle schools.

The district faced a $16 million gap between projected spending and expenses when budget discussions began in January. It dipped into reserves for half of that and made operating cuts for the balance.

The district cut busing costs by $1.8 million by making bus scheduling changes that offered charter and nonpublic schools less favorable times. The savings came from more efficient routing and some nondistrict schools opting to arrange their own buses.

The district also plans to close its three-person musical instrument repair shop, which has operated since the early 1950s. It will send instruments out for repairs.

The school board recently was told by finance chief Peggy Ingison that it ended the 2005-2006 school year with a $30 million available fund balance. That’s the best since at least the mid-1990s.

The district drew down $6 million of that to balance the past school year’s budget and is planning to use $8 million in the upcoming year. That cuts the balance to about $18 million, with Ingison projecting at least a $30 million budget gap over the following two years as enrollment declines more. That requires more cost-cutting, she said.

Meanwhile, the board voted to pursue negotiating the first lease of district classroom space to a charter school, Oh Day Aki, which it sponsors.

By Steve Brandt, Star Tribune

The current Aggressive Solicitation Ordinance states solicitation is unlawful if:

• In a restroom
• At a crosswalk, bus or light rail stop or shelter
• On public transit
• In a vehicle parked on a public street or alley
• In a sidewalk café
• In line to be admitted to a government or commercial establishment
• Within 20 feet in any direction from an ATM or financial institution

Minneapolis has been ranked among the top cities in the nation in the Earth Day Network’s Urban Environment Report. Out of the 72 cities studied, Minneapolis ranked ninth overall and second among mid-sized cities for its environmental quality of life.

To develop its rankings, the Earth Day Network looked at how cities deal with toxins, drinking water quality, climate change, air quality, quality of life, parks and recreation, and public health, among other criteria. More than 200 indicators were used in the study. To see the study results, visit www.earthday.net/UER/report/. Earth Day Network, which was founded by the organizers of the first Earth Day in 1970, promotes environmental citizenship around the world.

Minneapolis has focused resources on developing plans to be a more sustainable city, which means a city that meets its current needs without sacrificing the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. This can be accomplished by balancing environmental, economic, and social equity concerns.

To learn more about Minneapolis’ sustainability efforts, visit www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/environment/Sustainability-Initiatives.asp