Aerial View - Old American Golf Course

For many, it’s the American Dream: Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of… Golf Course Living. In 2011, the first Baby Boomers turn 65 and the demand for golf course real estate in Sunbelt states will likely skyrocket as Boomers look for homes in a climate conducive to their hobby.

But those who have long dreamed of living adjacent to fairways and greens could be disappointed. Development of a golf course community is exceedingly rare in this slumping economy. After almost two decades during which new golf course communities spread like wildfire across the Sunbelt, both the real estate and golf industries have suffered major setbacks.

In 2010, builders started on 15,000 homes in the Dallas-Fort Worth area, according to Ted Wilson of Residential Strategies, Inc. That’s down nearly 70% from the 51,000 housing starts in 2006.

New golf course construction has also taken a major hit. The overbuilding of courses in the 90’s and early 00’s oversaturated the market. When the recession descended upon the industry, many courses were forced to close, some in the middle of construction.

With every rule, however, there is an exception. In 2010, only one course opened in The Metroplex. What vaults this course from exception to veritable anomaly is it is part of a residential community.

The Old American Golf Club, located in The Colony’s The Tribute Resort Community, opened its doors to public play in September 2010. In addition to fairways, greens, bunkers and water hazards, The Old American features brand new residential lots alongside select sections of the course and dozens more just off it. In the desert that is the current landscape of new golf course development, The Tribute is an oasis, affording golfers the opportunity to live alongside the game they love.

The Old American and The Tribute were brought to life by Matthews Southwest, a DFW-based developer that has transformed The Metroplex’s real estate market through urban redevelopment and suburban lifestyle development. In The Tribute, Matthews Southwest saw the opportunity to deliver a suburban community where people could enjoy their hobbies right outside their front door. The community’s location on the shores of Lewisville Lake, combined with The Old American and The Tribute Golf Club (opened in 2005), has provided residents with access to golf, boating and fishing.

Even in the down economy, builders and homeowners have pounced on the opportunity The Tribute presents. Matthews Southwest reported a more than 100 percent year-over-year increase in residential lot sales at The Tribute in 2010. The community’s 1,150 acres showcase many of North Texas’ most prominent and distinguished builders, offering home designs that emphasize the Old World-themed atmosphere of The Tribute and begin in the 240’s.

As Baby Boomers and golf enthusiasts search for a place to live in harmony with the game they love, they may be hard up as developers and builders continue to tighten purse strings. However, The Tribute serves as proof that golf course real estate still has a pulse in the Heart of Texas.

The idea of an HOA is that all of the neighbors join together to maintain infratstructure that they all enjoy. HOAs take two forms, voluntary and mandatory.

In a voluntary HOA, membership is just that, voluntary. Each home decides whether or not to participate. The HOA usually does some community building activites, may form a crime watch, and sometimes does little beautification projects like planting flowers by the neighborhood sign.

A mandatory HOA exists when a neighborhood is built with additional community infrastructure such as a community pool, private parks, gated entrance, etc. Membership is mandated in the deed to each property. There are guidelines established for how the HOA is to run, how dues are determined, etc. These HOAs are frequently managed by professional companies and take care of the maintenance of all of the common grounds.

Fees for voluntary HOAs are usually very small – less than $100/yr. Fees for mandatory HOAs all depend on the amount of common infrastructure in the neighborhood and can range from $50 to hundreds of dollars per month.

I love the real estate market – there’s always a great story to be told, and a new experience to be had. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any crazier, they did. Here’s the story…

I recently represented a young lady in the purchase of her first home. Being a first time home buyer, we were looking at small homes that were financially distressed – we were bargain hunting. We found the perfect home in east Dallas, a 1950′s era 3/2 that was in short sale for about 60% of the value it had appraised for just two years ago. As we toured the home, we could not access the garage – it was locked and the key did not fit. When I later inquired about accessing the garage, I heard the craziest story ever about needing to re-key the property.

After the owner vacated the property, a person we’ll call Joe ConMan noticed that it was vacant. He proceeded to pose on the internet as the owner of the property. He entered into a lease agreement with a unsuspecting young couple, newly married with a small child. He collected the first month’s rent and the damage deposit. On move-in day, the Tenant could not get access to the house. Joe Conman has the Tenant call a locksmith, and then meets them at the property. He cons the locksmith into believing that he is the property owner, gets him to open the house, and then leaves – vanishing to never be seen again.

The Tenant begins moving into the house when a neighbor comes over to investigate. Having not seen either the owner or the owners agent, he calls the listing agent to confirm that the house had been leased. A very surprised listing agent then called the police. The tenant was forced to vacate the property, and lost the damage deposit and rent they had paid to Joe ConMan.

I learned a couple of lessons from this story. First, get to know the neighbors around your listings, especially if they are vacant. The actions of a consciencious neighbor kept this situation from getting any worse. Second, keep a close eye on your vacant property listings – you never know when something crazy like this might happen to them.

Here’s a Spring present for all you homeowners. As usual, the Dallas Central Appraisal District (DCAD) is lagging the market. Just as real estate values and activity are increasing, The Dallas Central Appraisal District has announced that sixty percent (60%) of homeowners will see a decrease in their taxable property value this year – YEAH! That means that most of us will be receiving a decrease in our property tax bill for 2010. Enjoy the break – I believe it will reverse next year!!

The Dallas Central Appraisal District also stated that approximately twenty percent (20%) of home values will rise. I suspect a number of these are homes which had permitted improvements accomplished over the last year, or are recent sales of previously undervalued real estate. The final twenty percent (20%) of values will remain constant.

That’s a fairly substantial move for the Appraisal Distict to have made, adjusting the values of about eighty percent (80%) of the homes in Dallas County.

For a complete report on this issue, please see the Dallas Morning News article.

Texas Real Estate Commission

My Dad always told me that if something seemed too good to be true, it was probably not true. This simple piece of advice has kept me out of many sticky situations. I just received an e-mail from the Texas Real Estate Commission (TREC) warning the public about real estate brokerage scams in the DFW area. I felt compelled to pass the warning along. It is very easy to find out if a person hold a license from the Texas Real Estate Commission – you can look up any persons license number by following this link.

Here is the beginning of the warning message from the Texas Real Estate Commission:

The Texas Real Estate Commission Standards and Enforcement Services Division (TREC) has received complaints against a group of individuals and companies that have been doing business in the Dallas/Fort Worth area. The individuals and companies named in the complaints represent themselves as real estate agents and real estate brokerage companies but do not hold Texas real estate licenses. Owners of real property, tenants, buyers, and investors claim to have lost large sums of money related to the group’s real estate schemes. Among other things, the complainants allege that the group takes and keeps deposits for properties over which they have no authority or no control. They allegedly do not pay rent to property owners on property they claim to manage for those owners, or take large security deposits from tenants and then keep the money. They take deposits or earnest money on properties that they claim are available for a short sale but in reality are days away from foreclosure. Apparently, much of the solicitation of potential victims has been conducted through www.craigslist.com.

For the full article, click here.

Magnificent Interior of the Winspear Opera House, Dallas, TX

Okay, so I’m a little slow to get excited by the latest architectural masterpiece to be erected in Dallas. Fact is, I have never understood opera as an art form or why it has such a tremendous following. So when the buzz surrounding the new Winspear Opera House began to sound, I placed all the hype on ignore. Wow, did I ever miss something great!

My wife is an enormous fan of the theater, so we celebrated our 22nd wedding anniversary by attending South Pacific at the Winspear Opera House. The play was fabulous, the cast stellar, but the physical surroundings were absolutely extraordinary!! From the exterior it is an impressive contemporary structure, but for my taste, it was the interior that took my breath away. The stacked vertical balconies are impressive and functional – there is no bad seat in this house. And the retractable chandelier is absolutely beautiful.

Arch Daily states “The new Winspear Opera House in Dallas redefines the essence of an opera house for the twenty first century, breaking down barriers to make opera more accessible for a wider audience. Responding to the Dallas climate, a generous solar canopy extends from the building, revealing below a fully glazed sixty foot high lobby. This establishes a direct relationship between inside and outside, enhancing transparency. Beneath the canopy, which forms an integral part of the environmental strategy – a shaded pedestrian plaza creates a major new public space for Dallas, defined by the masterplan for the Performing Arts District.”

If you have the opportunity to attend any performance at the Winspear Opera House, I strongly encourage you to take advantage of the opportunity.

The Plano City Council is set to vote Monday on a $2 million economic incentive package to woo Pizza Hut from its current Addison headquarters location to a new facility to be developed in Plano.  The new development would be part of the Legacy business park in West Plano.

Time for a move?

In my opinion, this is a great play by the city of Plano.  Plano has done an exceptional job of attracting corporate headquarters to its fair city, and this is another shining opportunity.  The Pizza Hut relocation comes complete with approximately 450 high paying jobs and will provide a boost to the Plano economy.

Even though the relocation distance from their current location on the Dallas North Tollway in Addison, the move to Plano should serve as a nice stimulus to property values in West Plano.  The additional jobs will create additional residential housing demand in the neighborhoods in close proximity to the Legacy Business Park.  The move will not happen immediately.  The current lease on the Pizza Hut headquarters expires in 2010, and Pizza Hut will have to ready its new facility before making the move.

Kudos to the city of Plano who in the past year has attracted approximately 20 companies and over 4,500 new jobs in the midst of the largest economic downturn our country has faced in many decades.  No recession in Plano – keep gowing!!

For more information on this story, please see the Dallas Business Journal article – Pizza Hut Incentives on Plano’s Agenda.

There is an existing bike trail that circles White Rock Lake in east Dallas. This trail extends north from the lake along White Rock Creek all the way to LBJ Freeway and Hillcrest Road. The Santa Fe Trail is currently under construction. Upon its completion, White Rock Lake will be linked by a bike trail to Fair Park. For more information on the Santa Fe Trail