Portsmouth NH Real Estate

The three most common home styles in New Hampshire are:  The Cape, The Colonial and the Ranch.  I was curious to know just how common they were as compared to the multitude of other home styles, so I went about it by looking at all of the homes sold in the past year in New Hampshire, and I made a chart.

Homes Sold in NH July 29, 2008 - July 29, 2009 (excluding condos and mobiles)

10,037 Homes Sold

You can see how the ranch (raised ranches, split level and single levels), Colonials (antiques and neo-colonials), and Capes heavily outweigh the rest of the styles.  But don't go thinking that just because you have Gambrel, that it may not sell as well.  The reason why more ranches, colonials and capes have sold rather than other styles is simply because there are way more of them!  Also, some people may list one home under two or more different home types.  This chart gives you a rough idea about how how common a certain house type is, not necessarily how one style out-performs another.

But I was a little surprised about the steep drop off from the Cape to the Contemporary and going forward.  And according to NNEREN, unless I did my search wrong, not one Tudor style was sold in the past year!  Perhaps I am only surprised because I grew up in a Tudor.  I was also surprised with the New Englander numbers, but perhaps they are only more common in the larger cities and towns.

You would think with the housing boom of the 90's and early 00's that there would be more contemporary homes.  Especially at the rate those builders were going at.  They are my favorites, and a contemporary home in Portsmouth NH can be hard to cme by, but they do exist.  Most of the new homes built them were the new-colonials, beautiful and romantic reproductions of the original colonials in New England (many of which are still standing!).

I hope you found this latest chart as intriguing as I did.  Click the card below to visit me.

The Portsmouth Book Club met last Tuesday, the 14th, to discuss, Three Cups of Tea, by Greg Mortenson and Oliver Relin at McMenemy's Irish Restaurant and Pub.  What a fantastic book!  The book was an auto-biography of sorts of Mr. Mortenson, written by journalist Oliver Relin.  The book details Mr. Mortenson's trials and tribulations during his campaign in Pakistan and Afghanistan building schools for girls.  If Mr. Mortenson had written this book himself, I would have thought, "Oh, sure.  Nice Ego."  And if this had been a fictitious novel, it would have been terrible, because you would NEVER believe the authenticity of the main character, it would have been too unbelievable.  The truth is, the book is written from an unbiased point of view, and brings together quotes from the myriad of people who have known and worked with Mr. Mortenson on his project.  All together it reveals a sort of super-human.  A man who is probably the lest materialistic person in America, and one who cares so much about others, leaving him to sacrifice almost everything he had for a cause, love and passion.  I mean, seriously, this man is my hero.  They should make a Marvel super-hero comic about this man.  Read the book, you will feel the same way.  Mr. Mortenson should win the Nobel.

For our book club next month, we picked, Murder on the Orient Express, by Agatha Christie.  This should be a great summer read.  As always, our meeting will be held at:

McMenemy's Irish Pub and Restaurant

177 State St Portsmouth, NH 03801 603-436-4747

7pm  Tuesday  August 11th, 2009

I also have to take the time to say that McMenemy's is back on the map!  After the bar and restaurant switched owners, I can't say enough about it.  The fish and chips are incredible.  Everyone who ordered them last Tuesday were wild about them.  I had the clam chowder for the first time.  Okay, I grew up in New England.  I LOVE clam chowder and I know a good chowder when I have one.  I am going to go out on a limb and say that McMenemy's had the BEST clam chowder I have ever had.  If you don't come for book club, go out to dinner at this place.  You will be so surprised.  Tracey, the owner, will treat you right.

Here is a synopsis of Murder on the Orient Express: (from Barnes and Noble)

"Murder on the Orient Express. En route to Paris, Belgian detective Hercule Poirot has booked winter passage on the fabled Orient Express. Among the curious assortment of fellow passengers, one wealthy American holds a unique distinction: He has been found dead of multiple stab wounds in the night compartment of the Calais coach. By dawn, thirteen travelers, each bearing a secret, will find themselves suspect in the most ingenious crime Poirot has ever solved.

Agatha Christie is nearly synonymous with upper-class British mysteries, for good reason. She set the standard for the genre in over 60 novels and dozens of short stories, also creating two classic detectives: the fastidious Belgian, Hercule Poirot, and English spinster Jane Marple. No one could match Christie's knack for weaving clues into her stories, then turning the whole thing inside out -- shocking her readers every time."

I just started to receive spam posts on my comments, all with hyperlinked text.  Pretty easy to identify, they had absolutely no relevancy to the actual posts.  I read that some other people have started to get the spam as well.  Someone must have created some auto-post spam software for ActiveRain blogs. 

If you are getting them, just go into your settings, and turn off the selection for "allow Non Member Comments".  It is a shame that we have to do this now, but it is easier than having to report and delete the spam posts each and every time.

The Bow Street Fair will be this weekend in Portsmouth, July 18th and 19th, a beautiful Arts and crafts celebration benefiting the Seacoast Repertory Theatre.  You can have your own booth set up for $200 (visit the Bow Street Fair link for the application), but if you are like me you will be just as thrilled to take your family on a stroll through the booths and the people.

This is a great way to support the arts in our community, and enjoy the weekend as well!

Waterfront Homes in Portsmouth NH

This is a recent post I came across, and I wanted to share it with all.

Residential - Single Family Homes

I have not done a market report in a while because of the season, I have been very busy.  In my last reports, I had been combining single family homes, condos and mobiles and in hindsight, I should not have been lumping them together since the prices on each particular type of property vary too much.  Going forward, I will focus on single family homes as an economic indicator.

PORTSMOUTH

This first graph shows an intense monthly flux in the average sale price for a home in Portsmouth.  The average price increased nearly $100k from May to June.  And the good news is that the difference is much less from the same time last year.

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ROCKINGHAM COUNTY

In all of Rockingham County we see a very similar graph position as in Portsmouth.  We see a rise from the month before, and not far away from this time last year.  The big difference is that the prices are still higher in Portsmouth as compared to the rest of Rockingham, as expected.

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Units Sold - Portsmouth

There were 17 homes sold in Portsmouth in June, up only one from last month, and only three away from this time last year.  Not bad.  You would think (after watching your daily dose of unhealthy news on CNN) that perhaps only one or two homes are being sold - state wide - but the truth is that homes are still being sold.  People are still buying, just as they have been.  But prices are much lower, thanks to our over abundance of foreclosures and short sales!

Please visit my site to see the full NH Market Report for June 2009