Homes for $170,000 Across America

The battered housing market saw a glimmer of hope last month when it was reported that for the first time in five years, homes values are rising. The blip on the screen is not huge — the increase was 0.1 percent from June to July, according to the latest report — but it was an increase, nonetheless.
In looking more closely at the housing data, 25 metro areas in particular have seen a little more of a jump, boasting two consecutive quarters of home value appreciation. There are many recognizable locales, including Fort Myers, FL, Pittsburgh, PA, Battle Creek, MI, Durham, NC, Boulder, CO and Knoxville, TN, to mention a few.
While it doesn’t mean that the nation is quite out of the woods, there are places where you can snag a house for the current median home value of $172,600 and expect a return on the investment.
Here are five cities from the list where we found excellent values in homes priced at $170,000 or below:
Spokane, WA
1017 E 14th Ave, Spokane, WA
For Sale: $169,900

The second-largest city in Washington, Spokane is relatively inexpensive compared to many of the larger cities in the state. The metro area has had two consecutive quarters of appreciation (1.9 percent and 6.6, respectively) and median Spokane home values have risen 0.6 percent year-over-year.
Although this Spokane home for sale was built in 1911, it’s chock-full of 21st century upgrades including a new roof, new gas furnace, flooring and new paint. However, with a romantic master suite balcony, front porch and rear patio, the 4-bedroom Craftsman still retains much of its turn-of-the-century charm.
Washington D.C.
49 Danbury St SW, Washington D.C.
For Sale: $160,000

The economy is on the mind of every lawmaker in D.C., so it’s only appropriate that we take a look at Washington D.C. real estate, whose home values have appreciated in the last two consecutive quarters. Current median D.C. home values have risen 1.9 percent year-over-year.
As median home values in D.C. peak over $360,000, finding a single-family home at the $172K mark is downright impossible. But, for $160K, it is possible to find a newer condo, like the one pictured above, with cherry hardwood floors and an eat-in kitchen with granite counter tops.
Nashville, TN
4429 Frost St, Nashville TN
For Sale: $169,961

Nashville has a lot going for it. Not only is it considered the home of country music (Grand Ole Opry), but it is the state capital, home to several pro sports teams (Titans in NFL and Predators in NHL), and several major colleges and universities. Perhaps these are all reasons why Nashville’s home values have been stabilizing. Median Nashville home values have risen for the past two consecutive quarters, with a 2.2 percent rise from June to July.
While Taylor Swift, Carrie Underwood and other country music stars have multi-million dollar mansions in Nashville, you can pick up a relatively new home in the on the Abbington Park real estate market for just under $170k. This 3-bedroom, 2.5-bath home was built in 2003 and features a formal dining room and a great room with custom built-ins and fireplace.
Pueblo, CO
3811 Bison Ln, Pueblo, CO
For Sale: $169,900

Located 100 miles south of Denver, Pueblo is in the “banana belt” and gets significantly less rain and snow than other Colorado cities. Steel work is the dominant industry of Pueblo, and the Colorado city is often called “Pittsburgh of the West” or “Steel City.” Median home values in Pueblo have had a boost the last two quarters of 2.5 percent and 5.5 percent respectively.
This home on the Pueblo real estate market was built in 2001, but has also had numerous upgrades. The 3-bedroom, 3-bath home has hardwood floors throughout, a heated enclosed porch, and mature landscaping. owners. The home includes a pool behind a screened lanai and is situated in a quiet neighborhood with easy access to freeways and shopping.
Springfield, MA
41 Nevada St, Springfield MA
For Sale: $158,900

Situated on the banks of Massachusetts’ largest river, Springfield is only a few hours from Montreal, Boston and New York City. The city has a modest growth in home values in the past two consecutive quarters and median Springfield home values remain affordable, at $123,600.
This 3-bedroom, 3-bath home on the Springfield real estate market sits on a quiet dead-end street and has opportunity for expansion on the third of an acre lot and third-floor walk-up attic. The home features plenty of updates, including a new roof, new windows, and new two-car detached garage.

“Wherever you see a successful business, someone once made a courageous decision.” – -Peter Drucker

Amazing Treehouse Homes

Treehouses are no longer just for child’s play. While they still do serve as playhouses for lucky kids, they’ve taken on new functions as private home offices or studios, as elevated guest quarters, and as hotel accommodations, as well. Some are real houses that just happen to be located in trees.
Modern treehouses are also typically quite eco-friendly. They have traditionally been built using salvaged materials, and now designers and builders have taken it further with energy-efficient features, such as composting toilets, or utilizing solar panels and fuel-cell power.
We found cool treehouses located all over the world. They’re also all over the map in terms of style: Some are proper houses on high, but this collection also showcases the variety of uses for buildings in trees. One structure is intended as an office, one is a restaurant, one very big example is partly a church, and one house actually is for kids but will no doubt inspire envy in adults.
Here are five treehouses worthy of a climb:
Swiss Chalet
Location: The Olympic Peninsula, Washington

This small-scale charmer built in 2005 by Treehouse Workshop has a kitchenette, a bath, a sitting room with fireplace, balconies, and it sleeps four. It has a window seat accessible by ladder, and the house itself is accessible by ramp, which was built using salvaged Madrona logs.
Alnwick Garden Treehouse
Location: Northumberland, Scotland

The Treehouse at The Alnwick Garden is one of the world’s largest treehouses, and it’s probably safe to say it’s the world’s largest treehouse restaurant. The restaurant serves a seasonal menu sourced from local fare. This patchwork wooden structure of shingles and planks features a fireplace, decks, rope bridges, and, of course, tree limbs growing through the rooms. It looks like something out of a fairy tale or Harry Potter, which is appropriate given its proximity to Alnwick Castle, which starred as the Hogwarts School in two of the Harry Potter films.
The Minister’s Treehouse
Location: Crossville, Tennessee

This 10-story treehouse towers nearly 100 feet tall and has an estimated 8,000 to 10,000 square feet of space—it may be the largest treehouse in the world. That space includes the only penthouse for miles around, a basketball court, a church (including a choir loft), and a VIP balcony. Builder Horace Burgess told USA Today that his inspiration came from God: “I was praying one day, and the Lord said, ‘If you build me a treehouse, I’ll see you never run out of material.”‘ Those materials have included recycled wood from sheds and bars, and judging by the size of this place he did not run out.
Treehouse Djuren
Location: Germany

The Djuren is one of many extraordinary treepods designed by the German modern architecture firm Baumraum, many of which are trapezoidal, orb-shaped, or resemble vintage camp trailers. This treehouse serves as a retreat for adults or a playhouse for the family’s young children, and there’s room on the terrace for a table and some chairs.
Robert Louis Stevenson Legacy House
Location: Northern California

This getaway cabin perched among redwoods, another creation from Treehouse Workshop, has a wraparound deck to take in the grove of surrounding trees. It’s located on property that once belonged to Robert Louis Stevenson, and the reclaimed materials for this home include doors and windows that came from the celebrated Scottish writer’s house.
do you think squierrls built these?

5 Green Homes That Won Gold

The gulf between “green” and “gorgeous” seems to be narrowing. EcoHome magazine’s second annual design awards singled out an array of houses that are not only environmentally exceptional, but look good at the same time.
It hasn’t always been so.
“I don’t want to say that good design and green haven’t met in the past, but I think that they haven’t been considered together as much as they are now,” said Rick Schwolsky, editor in chief of the magazine, which recently bestowed its Grand Award designation on five homes from around the country.
Award winning green homes included:
• a subdivision of affordable homes in Hawaii;
• a passive-solar home in Carmel, Calif., that’s so energy efficient that it has no air conditioning; and
• a major remodel of a 260-year-old home on Nantucket Island in Massachusetts that also had to meet architectural-preservation standards.
The magazine, which specializes in green products and practices for the residential construction industry, chose a panel of five judges that included architects, builders who specialize in sustainable building, and experts on green technology.
Schwolsky, editor of the 4-year-old publication, said that although various organizations offer design awards for “greenness,” EcoHome ups the competition by requiring that the environmental considerations of each home in the contest be certified by an independent third party.
Those third parties can include the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) green-building certification program, or the National Green Building Program administered by the National Association of Home Builders, among others.
What does “green” mean these days? For some time, he said, the ability to cut the heating and cooling bills has dominated consumer thinking, and that’s probably still true. Use of recycled content, the end-of-life disposability of products, and site sustainability are all green criteria, he suggested.
Here are the five award-winning Eco-friendly homes:

Project: Caterpillar House
Location: Carmel, Calif.
Architect: Feldman Architecture
Builder: Groza Construction

The Caterpillar House sits on a bluff in the Santa Lucia Preserve in Carmel, Calif. Its east-west, slightly curved layout maximizes passive solar gain, and additional energy savings come from concrete floors and rammed-earth walls that act as a thermal mass to protect against temperature fluctuations. Overhangs shade the south- and west-facing low-e windows. Ceiling fans and cross-ventilation also work to eliminate the need for air conditioning. A 27,300-gallon rainwater harvesting system supports all site irrigation, and all the plantings are native and drought-tolerant. The house has sustainability-certified cabinetry and reclaimed cork flooring. It has received LEED-Platinum certification.

Project: Kumuhau Subdivision
Location: Waimanalo, Oahu, Hawaii
Cost: Homes range in price from $225,000 to $325,000; average $121 per square foot
Architect: Armstrong Development
Builder: Armstrong Builders

Kumuhau subdivision in Waimanalo on the island of Oahu got praise not only for its green attributes, but also its price tag — the five floor plans in the 45-home subsidized project cost from $225,000 to $325,000. Contest judges applauded the developers for taking a risk by forgoing air conditioning — the homes use whole-house fans to exhaust hot air into the vented attics. Each house uses solar panels to supply about two-thirds of their electricity, and the homes are wired to accommodate more solar panels and to charge up an electric car. Rainwater is collected in 51-gallon storage for drip irrigation.

Project: Nantucket Island home remodel
Location: Nantucket Island, Mass.
Cost: $273 per square foot
Architect: Rosenberg Kolb Architects
Builder: Knapp Construction

It wasn’t enough that the owner of a 264-year-old home on Nantucket Island in Massachusetts wanted an addition that was conservation-minded; the house also had to pass muster according to local historic-preservation guidelines. The extensively insulated and sealed 260-square-foot addition included a kitchen, bathroom and entry, and new mechanical and ventilation systems; the project restored the original single-pane window sashes to conserve energy while meeting historical architectural standards.

Project: GO Home
Location: Belfast, Maine
Cost: $150 per square foot
Architect: GO Logic Homes
Builder: GO Logic Homes

The GO Home in Belfast, Maine, is 1,300 square feet of near-zero energy use. It’s the 12th house in the country to earn the rigorous Passive House designation from the Passive House Institute. Its LEED-Platinum certification is pending. Built with structural insulated panels and passive-solar features, it’s expected to save up to $170,000 in energy costs over 30 years — almost what it cost to build, according to EcoHome.

Project: Celo Residence
Location: Celo, N.C.
Architect: Samsel Architects, Asheville, N.C.
Builder: Sunspace Homes, Burnsville, N.C.

The contest judges especially liked the pairing of energy technology with the use of natural materials inside and outside a 1,538-square-foot home in Celo, N.C. The house won praise for tree preservation; rainwater storage for irrigation; pervious walkways, patio and driveway to control water runoff; and the use of drought-resistant plants. The home also features sustainability-certified wood shingles and locally harvested stone. The home’s walls are filled with spray-foam insulation and the windows and doors use low-e (low thermal emissivity) argon-filled glass.

"It's not what happens to you, but how you react to it that matters. ~Epictetus~

10 Things That Make Your Home a Target for Thieves

A home is robbed every 14.6 seconds and the average dollar loss per burglary is $2,119, according to statistics just released by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. And that’s the good news because burglaries were down slightly in 2010 compared to 2009. Sure you lock your doors and windows when you’re not home (you’d be surprised how many people don’t). But here are ten things that you’re probably doing that make your home a target, and what you should do instead:

1. Leaving your garage door open or unlocked. Once inside the garage, a burglar can use any tools you haven’t locked away to break into your home, out of sight of the neighbors. Interior doors between the garage and your home often aren’t as strong as exterior doors and may not have deadbolt locks.
Instead: Always close and lock the garage door. Consider getting a garage-door opener with random codes that automatically reset.
2. Hiding spare keys. Burglars know about fake rocks and leprechaun statues and will check under doormats, in mailboxes, and over doorways.
Instead: Give a spare set to a neighbor or family member.
3. Storing ladders outdoors or in unlocked sheds. Burglars can use them to reach the roof and unprotected upper floor windows.
Instead: Keep ladders under lock and key.
4. Relying on silent alarm systems. Everyone hates noisy alarms, especially burglars. Smart thieves know that it can take as long as 10 to 20 minutes for the alarm company or cops to show up after an alarm has been tripped.
Instead: Have both silent and audible alarms.
5. Letting landscaping get overgrown. Tall hedges and shrubs near the house create hiding spots for burglars who may even use overhanging branches to climb onto your roof.
Instead: Trim any bushes and trees around your home.
6. Keeping your house in the dark. Like overgrown landscaping, poor exterior lighting creates shadows in which burglars can work unobserved.
Instead: Replace burned out bulbs promptly, add lighting where needed, and consider putting fixtures on motion sensors or light sensors so that they go on automatically.
7. Not securing sliding doors. These often make tempting targets.
Instead: When you’re out, put a dowel down in the channel, so that the door can’t be opened wide enough for a person to get through.
8. Relying on your dog to scare away burglars. While barking my deter amateurs, serious burglars know that dogs may back away from someone wielding a weapon, or get chummy if offered a treat laced with a tranquilizer.
Instead: Make your home look occupied by using timers to turn lights, radios, and TVs on and off in random patterns.
9. Leaving “goody” boxes by the curb. Nothing screams “I just got a brand new flat-screen, stereo, or other big-ticket item” better than boxes by the curb with your garbage cans.
Instead: Break down big boxes into small pieces and bundle them together so that you can’t tell what was inside.
10. Posting vacation photos on Facebook. Burglars troll social media sites looking for targets.
Instead: Wait until you get back before sharing vacation details or make sure your security settings only allow trusted “friends” to see what you’re up to.
Use these tips to Keep your home and family safe.

5 Cities With Hot Housing Values

Living in a hot real estate market offers both home owners and home buyers some consolation amid this sustained economic downturn. But strong sales alone don’t constitute a hot market – it takes rising prices, too.
Online real estate valuation and search company Zillow has calculated the U.S. metro areas that have experienced the largest gains in home values over the past five years, based on the company’s home-value estimates and its Zillow Home Value Index, which is generated from those value estimates.
The five-year gains in estimated value range from 0.6 percent to 16.9 percent, while the estimated gains in dollar value range from $667 to $21,444.
Methodology: Zillow’s Zestimate home valuations are the basis for the Zillow Home Value Index. A Zestimate is Zillow’s estimate of the current market value for a home. The Zillow Home Value Index is the median Zestimate valuation for a given geographic area on a given day. Zillow generates valuations several times a week on more than 70 million homes, or roughly three out of four homes in the U.S., and calculates historical values dating back to 1997.
The statistical models underlying the Zestimates control for the mix of housing for sale by finding patterns in the types of homes that are selling and then applying these patterns to all homes. If only a few homes of a certain type sell in a given period, the models can extract the information from those sales and apply that information to all homes of that type.
Here are the top five hottest markets:
5. Yakima, WA

July 2011 Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI): $132,263
ZHVI 5 years ago: $127,746
Value difference (by percent): 3.5%
Value difference (in dollars): $4,517
4. Tulsa, OK

July 2011 Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI): $111,398
ZHVI 5 years ago: $101,802
Value difference (by percent): 9.4%
Value difference (in dollars): $9,596
3. Oklahoma City, OK

July 2011 Zillow Home Value Index (ZHVI): $111,737
ZHVI 5 years ago: $101,532
Value difference (by percent): 10.1%
Value difference (in dollars): $10,205
2. Fayetteville, NC

July 2011 Zillow Home Value Index: $113,978
ZHVI 5 years earlier: $102,373
Value difference (by percent): 11.3%
Value difference (in dollars): $11,605
1. Jacksonville, NC

July 2011 Zillow Home Value Index: $148,099
ZHVI 5 years ago: $126,655
Value difference (by percent): 16.9%
Value difference (in dollars): $21,444
It surprise me none of these towns are in California.