Monday, August 11, 2008

Investors! Start Your Checkbooks!

This is it - this is the time - let's go!

I've spent the past week working with investors looking for deals in Skaneateles. And there are deals.

While we were finding properties, more people came into the office, again looking for deals. I just left a small group from out-of-state who asked me what the best deals were and I could show him a 3000 sf home on 3 acres for under 200K, a 40 acre ranch with a new home under 400K, and of course my lovely 11 Onondaga now for $489,000.

Under $200,000 investors have to be ready to put in some work. Many of the homes are vacant - amazingly - and waiting out the current market. Some are bank-owned or estates and in need of major renovation. Foreclosures usually mean unfortunately that the kitchen sink - quite literally - goes with the former owners. If they could have gotten the new jacuzzi out of the upstairs bath that would be gone, too!

But how pretty it all could be! Does anyone doubt that Skaneateles will continue to grow? Do you think people will stop vacationing "where Presidents vacation?" I think just the opposite will prove to be true. Instead of driving off to South Carolina or the Cape, upstaters and even downstaters will be more likely to come to Skaneateles.

Picture it - pretty little cottages in the village, fixed-up and ready to be rented for the summer months. Or like Saratoga, for the Season of the Skaneateles Festival. My professor in college who taught Irish lit came to Skaneateles for a week at the Sherwood Inn every summer. And that was long before Mirbeau or Rosalie's or Bella Blue and Cate & Sally. There's a reason the condos in the village are being dsold for over $500,000.

So investors take note. There are 6 pretty little homes under 200K in the village and another 17 just outside. Buy in to Skaneateles!