Hi, this is Steve Westmark, Counselor Realty.  Thanks so much for watching my video blog this week.  Many times I have people say, “Well, what’s happening in the real estate market?”  And I want to tell you that in the real estate market, there are a lot of things that have value changes.  And so how do you determine the trend to determine where values are going to increase the most?

So I’m going to give you a couple of different things to look at as you’re trying to determine those trends for yourself because each marketplace is different.  One trend is following the demographics.  What’s going on in the demographics of your area?  Are there more baby boomers in the area and those baby boomers are putting off downsizing because of the economy?  Is there a lot of influx of new people coming in such as in immigration where you see a large community that’s coming in and changing the makeup and therefore causing more people to purchase?  Or is there a continued growth in population growth or a reduction in population growth?

As those things happen, you begin to see what happens in demographics to affect the values.  Another thing to look at in trends is looking at systems of transportation.  For instance, in Minneapolis, when they put the new corridor of the light rail going from Minneapolis up to the MegaMall, we saw along the Longfellow neighborhood a huge change in values in that area because of that new transportation.  I see the same thing will be happening as you go along the new corridor that they’re working on going between Minneapolis and St. Paul because that light rail will help.

We have another corridor that just opened up, the 212 access going to the southwest.  But what I would tell you is look at the transportation networks, and as you see new things open up and allow for ease of transportation of people, you will see the values increase in those areas.  The next trend to look at is a trend of your employment.  The employment areas, for instance, if an employer comes in and builds a new building let’s say like BestBuy went to Richfield over on 494 and Penn Avenue.  There was a huge growth and a strong reinforcement of values all around that area because of the thousands of jobs that were put into that area.

What you want to look at is what are new buildings going up.  So, for instance, if there’s a new building going up in Hopkins and  Cargill is moving into it or whatever large corporation, you will see wherever large employment, large office buildings, you’re going to see those things also help in the trends.  These are a few of the things that you look at in deciding on trends and seeing where values are going to go.  I hope you enjoyed these insights.  Make it a great day.  Bye.