Need little info about commute to/from Aldie (Reston, Chantilly: sales, real estate)

[calredd]

Hi all,
I am planning to move to kirkpatrick farms or Stone Ridge community near Aldie (near south riding) and would like to know whether the home prices are still on high end or is it a good time to buy there. SF homes are selling for abt 530K and TH are selling for about 450K. Is it a good time to buy or still worth waiting for a while ? Also anyone knows how long will it take to commute to McLean or Tysons corner from Aldie ? I heard of nightmares commuting on RT-50 and would like to know whether this situation will improve in near future. Any inputs are appreciated from you all experienced people.
Regards,
Carl

[tarp]

Route 50 sucks bigtime and it is choked with the worst kind of traffic: lots and lots of big, smelly trucks. There's a bunch of stone quarries out that way so you have the big heavy trucks on Route 50 all the time, which also happens to make the road deteriorate pretty quickly and get full of potholes every winter.

The situation will NOT improve in the near future...
If you live in Aldie try to work from home, or commute no further than Chantilly, or work a staggered schedule.

Oh another thing about Route 50... it is backed up almost all the time coming into Fairfax County from South Riding.. even during lunchtime.

[DavidS827]

SF homes are selling for about 530K and TH are selling for about 450K. Is it a good time to buy or still worth waiting for a while ?

I personally don't think home prices will come down much, if any, more. If you look at the trends, the inventory has come down in many areas, the sales volume has increased slightly for two consecutive months (and novemeber will make it three) and rates continue to remain flat to down slightly. Beside all of this, there are just some great deals...builders are giving away all sorts of upgrades and resales have homeowners paying a substantial part of your closing costs.

Hope this helps!

Dave

[jmarkd]

calredd,
You might check out some of the developments along Evergreen Mills Rd. between Leesburg and 50. Pulte has 2400sf townhomes (different from the normal ones around here) asking $450K at The Hamlets at Red Cedar. There are a few more developments along that road. There's not any shopping or schools nearby but it seems a bit more country than Aldie and you don't have to deal with 50. From there I would go north on Evergreen Mills to the Greenway/Toll Road to Tysons.
I really liked the Pulte townhomes- they dropped their base price from 535 to 450 in August. Still about 150K too much for me, though! I am sure those guys are having a heck of a hard time selling anything out there. Builders are a lot more likely to drop their prices than individuals, though.
South Riding is a little closer in, better developed, and cheaper (if that word can be used to describe northern virginia home prices).
Good luck!

[calredd]

Thanks to you all for the info. Leesburg will be little farther to commute to places like Vienna, McLean, Reston or even to Herndon. Probably I will take a look at the Hamlets by Pulte homes though I am surprised at 450K for SF. Though South Riding and Aldie are little closer, RT 50 sucks big time and going by the trends I dont see the situation improving in near future. Toll brothers in S.Riding is priced at low 600's which is too much for me. I can strech to a max of 500-520 for a SF and SF homes in these range are only found in Aldie. Not sure abt where to move....
Thanks
Carl

[jmarkd]

Sorry- when I say 2400sf I mean square footage- they're townhomes.
Leesburg would be a cinch if you took the Greenway. 14 miles to Dulles. The only downside is the $3.20 toll each way.
You could find a nice SFH in western Loudoun (Hamilton, Purcellville, Lovettsville). They're farther than Aldie, but the first two are convenient to the Greenway and thus closer in terms of time.
If you're not dead set on new construction...there are a few SFHs in South Riding for under $500K- I just found 10 online, starting at $444,900. vamlsrealty is a useful site, far better than realtor.

[calredd]

ok got it. I thought of them as single family. Anyway the only affordable SF homes around 500's I think are in Aldie area which is the closest to metro areas. Not that I am only interested in new construction but the sellers of old homes are dead bent on their prices while the builders are giving lot of incentives but they dont realise. Many of these sellers bought homes at high prices and wont decrease much as the builders do in the form of incentives. And more over if they are cheap then they are really old, so on and so forth. So watching the current market trends I feel like buying new home is better than buying older ones. What say ?
Thanks
Carl

[miko920]

Carl - Not sure if you have any interest but I have been talking to a realtor about homes at Martin Chase (Lennar is the builder) which is technically a Leesburg zip code but is right near Brambleton. The smaller of the two homes are 3100 sf finished living space and 3 car detached garage with many upgades (stainless steel, granite, etc). The builder's website shows them at $600K but per the realtor they have been selling them around $525K plus 6% back to buy down rate and pay all closing costs. HOAs are $160/month (pool and fitness center) but builder is paying for 2 years.

Of course, I don't know where you are interested in being but thought I would let you know that there are SF homes out there in this price range.

[DavidS827]

Originally Posted by calredd

ok got it. I thought of them as single family. Anyway the only affordable SF homes around 500's I think are in Aldie area which is the closest to metro areas. Not that I am only interested in new construction but the sellers of old homes are dead bent on their prices while the builders are giving lot of incentives but they dont realise. Many of these sellers bought homes at high prices and wont decrease much as the builders do in the form of incentives. And more over if they are cheap then they are really old, so on and so forth. So watching the current market trends I feel like buying new home is better than buying older ones. What say ?
Thanks
Carl

For resales it depends on the seller. If they bought their house within the last 18 months, then they just don't have the room to discount it as much...if any. The exception to this could be if they put a contract on the house during the pre-construction incentives and bought at a great price. If they bought it before then, then you have much more room to negotiate. I know of countless examples of sellers that wont budge on their advertised price, but will, or would have, taken a much lower price had someone come in with an offer. Your real estate agent should be able to tell you how long the person(s) has owned the house and how much negotiating power you have.

Also be sure to ask your realtor how much prices have come down in a particular new construction project. This is important because if you put a contract in now and the builder lowers prices again, then you just lost equity before you moved in and also creates headaches when it comes to getting your financing. Before I changed jobs, I trained many underwriters at national lenders for a GSE and this was starting to become a major problem. This, however, doesn't mean that you won't get financing, it just means that your loan terms can, and probably will, change.

[calredd]

Txs of the info. The Aaron model in Martin Chase seems to be a good one except that it has detached garage which kills the deal. But 3000sf single family home for abt 525K (dont know how far its true but I will visit and check it our myself) is a very good deal.
David, I visited some of these builders (Ryan, NVAR, VanMetre) in Aldie and they pretty much kept the base price the same. I hoped that they decrease the prices but they are holding the base prices the same level as it was a month ago. I read lot of news abt dropping prices but in No.VA area, I dont see the prices going down. Probably the builders have high confidence that they can sell it in this area but it all depends on how soon can they sell out the inventory.