Dirt to turn on condos

Two projects will start going up near downtown in the next week
09:11 AM CST on Thursday, January 25, 2007
By STEVE BROWN / The Dallas Morning News

Developers are breaking ground during the next week on two long-awaited Dallas condominium towers.

Work will begin Friday just south of downtown on the 10-story Beat condominiums.

And on Wednesday, builders will start construction on the 22-story Tower Residences at the Stoneleigh Hotel in Uptown.

The concrete and glass Beat building will be constructed near the corner of South Lamar and Belleview streets, across the street from DART's Cedars light-rail station.

Plans for the project were announced in early 2006.

"We are just over 30 percent sold," developer Jack Matthews said Wednesday. "We will have the first units ready in December."

There are 75 units in the building, with prices starting at $182,400. David Griffin & Co. Realtors is marketing the project.

The Stoneleigh tower, which has been in the works for more than two years, will contain 97 condos and will be built adjacent to the historic Stoneleigh Hotel on Maple Avenue north of downtown.

A $25 million renovation of the hotel began late last year. Developer Prescott Realty Group and partner Apollo Real Estate Advisors are building the tower.

"We hit sales expectations in the fourth quarter and decided to go ahead and break ground," said Jud Pankey, president of Dallas-based Prescott Realty Group. "We will be delivering units the end of 2008 and the start of 2009."

Condos will start at around $400,000. Allie Beth Allan Realtors is marketing the building.

Dallas-FW housing sales fall 5%

Prices slid 2% in December, marking the end of a difficult year

12:00 AM CST on Tuesday, January 9, 2007
By STEVE BROWN / The Dallas Morning News

The Dallas-Fort Worth housing market ended 2006 with another month of declines.

Sales in December were down 5 percent from a year earlier, and prices were 2 percent lower, according to statistics released Monday by the North Texas Real Estate Information System.

"December results look like a continuation of the pattern we have seen all year – home sales generally lower than last year and prices flat to slightly higher," said real estate agent Bob Edmonson of Allie Beth Allman & Associates.

December was the seventh consecutive month of lower pre-owned home sales in North Texas.

Based on last year's monthly declines, total home sales were down about 5 percent for the year.

It was the fourth consecutive month that home prices were down from the previous year. However, median sales prices were up about 2 percent during the year.

Some of the largest sales declines in 2006 were centered in homes priced under $150,000, where buyers were affected more by higher mortgage rates.

Sales of high-priced homes continued to rise last year. The number of homes sold for $1 million or more increased 18 percent.

With pending home sales running about 6 percent higher than this time last year, sales agents are closely watching to see if the market moves higher in 2007.

"We Realtors are an optimistic lot, and January always marks the beginning of the spring market," Mr. Edmonson said.

Industry analysts say it's too early to tell whether 2007 will be a better year for the housing market.

"January and February will probably still have some decline – normal cyclicality," said Jim Gaines, an economist with Texas A&M University's Real Estate Center. "By March and April, expect an uptick. If not, Dallas may have a rough 2007, but I don't think it will."

At the end of December, 41,598 pre-owned single-family homes were on the market in North Texas, 9 percent more than a year earlier.

On average, it took 76 days to sell a house – up slightly from 2005.

But the area still has less than a six-month supply of homes to sell, which is considered healthy.

And with a median price of less than $150,000, Dallas-Fort Worth is one of the most affordable big-city markets in the country.

Jim Fite, president of Dallas-based Century 21 Judge Fite Co., said gross sales commissions at his company were up in 2006.

"We ended up having a very good year," Mr. Fite said. "I'm very happy compared with what's going on around the rest of the country."