F2 Real Estate Trends The Washington Post regularly tracks housing sales and prices
throughout the Washington area each Saturday in the Real Estate section, comparing information collected for each residential Zip code from each time period last year with that for the corresponding time period in 2009. The chart and map this week compare single-family house and townhouse sales figures in Charles County from January through March 2009 with those for the corresponding period in 2010, showing the total number of sales, the median prices and the changes in the medians. The median is the point at which half of the sales prices were higher and half lower. Condominiums were excluded. The sales and price information, collected by The Washington
Post, is based on sales recorded in local government offices. That information is in the chart on the right. It excludes some types of transactions, particularly those that are not at market price. As with any statistical compilation, the greater the number of transactions, the more reliable the statistical trend. Moreover, at any given time there may be more sales activity in certain market niches or price ranges, for instance starter homes or high-priced houses, than at other times, and this may influence a median price from year to year. The map provides a snapshot of price trends throughout the geographical area covered by each week’s information.
ON THE WEB
For up-to-date home sales and tax assessments, real estate news and community profiles, visit
www.washingtonpost.com/realestate.
R 206 Indian HeadIndian Head 206 20658 206 20640 206 Nanjemoy 2066 20662 Nanjemoy 20646 Newburg wburg 2066 20645
SOURCE: Full-value transactions as reported by the state
Cobb Island 20625
20664 20693 20611
20611 206
20632 20658 206 20646
Tobacco 206
20677 Port La Pl
La Plata 206
20646 20622 622 206592065
Percent change in median sales price
–3% to –8% 3% or more
No significant change –9% to –14%
–15% to –20% Data not available
–21% or more BY DAN KEATING AND NATHANIEL VAUGHN KELSO — THE WASHINGTON POST 20675 20640 206 20695 20601 20601 2060 20602 2061 20617 206 20637 Hughesville Hughesville 20612 VA. 2061 20616 2060 20603 Waldorfaldorf 20613 20613
FAIRFAX CO.
P.W. CO.
KLMNO D.C. MD.
CHARLES CO.
CAL. CO.
MARY’S CO.
ST.
P.G. CO.
SATURDAY, AUGUST 28, 2010
Charles County January through March 2009
sold
20601 20602 20603 20616 20637 20640 20646 20662 20664 20695 Other TOTAL
33 $252,900 11 219,000 27 295,000 5 249,950 6 370,000 11 279,990 15 342,000 2 320,000 2 130,450 8 369,500 6 233,000 126 $290,049
2010
Zip homes purchase homes purchase in median code sold
Total Median Total Median Change price
price
42 $252,450 33 237,400 23 289,900
price
-$450 18,400 -5,100
6 210,000 -39,950 5 345,000 -25,000 12 244,990 -35,000 28 308,000 -34,000 4 217,500 -102,500 4 244,250 113,800 10 259,950 -109,550 11 248,900
— 178 $255,000 -$35,049
Living green not out of renters’ reach
Water gauges, better light bulbs an easy start
by Tiffany Hsu PHOTOS BY SADIE DINGFELDER FOR THE WASHINGTON POST
The neighborhood is the home of the District’s only perfectly round house. Built in 1901, it is two stories tall and 33 feet in diameter.
D.C.’s Brookland area: Quiet and comfortable
brookland continued from F1
their lawn with pink blossoms. “We like to sit out here, eat din- ner and have some wine — back when we could have wine, before Emily was pregnant,” he said. Sometimes called “Little
Rome,” Brookland sits just to the east of Catholic University, and its skyline is dotted with church steeples and the grand, blue dome of the Basilica. The un- official religion of the neighbor- hood, however, is gardening. Each year, hundreds of Brooklan- ders flock to the Franciscan Mon- astery’s herb and plant sale to buy greenery that thrives despite the neighborhood’s high water table and sometimes-soggy ground, said longtime resident Peggy Armstrong. And many residents find further landscaping inspira- tion in the monastery’s terraced garden, which is open to the pub- lic.
“The grounds there are beauti-
ful,” she said. If you don’t have a green thumb, Brookland’s sprawling lawns might inspire you to sprout one, said Remy Learnard. Previ- ously content with houseplants, Learnard now cultivates a vegeta- ble garden behind her Brookland bungalow. “I have okra, eggplant, cucumber, yellow pepper, every- thing,” she said. Learnard used to share her home with her son-in-law and grandchildren, but they de- camped to Northern Virginia in search of better public schools. They visit almost every weekend — the son-in-law helps with the yard work while Maria, Cristine and Christian sell lemonade and their grandma’s homemade cook- ies.
The variety of housing stock at-
tracts many buyers to Brookland, said Mary Hodges, a Brookland resident and real estate agent
with the Menkiti Group. It’s a neighborhood where rowhouses back up to farmhouses and Victo- rians and bungalows sit side-by- side. It’s also the home of the Dis- trict’s only perfectly round house. Built in 1901, the little round house at 10th and Irving streets NE is two stories, 33 feet in diam- eter and covered in canary-yellow shingles. It’s not a practical shape, said Niki Washington, who inherited the house from her great aunt.
“She had furniture special- made to fit the walls,” Washing- ton said. Her aunt also had all the upstairs furniture delivered through a second-floor window because the spiral staircase in the center of the house is too narrow to accommodate even a card ta- ble, Washington added. Many resident appreciate the old-fashioned feel of the area, said Tracy Davenport, who grew up in Brookland and returned to raise her son, Amir. “It’s the same as it’s always been: Quiet, friendly,” she said. “Everyone’s always looked out for each other, and they still do.” So what is Brookland missing?
“You don’t come to Brookland for the nightlife,” said Hodges, who often drives to Columbia Heights when she wants to go out to a res- taurant or bar. And though the neighborhood’s sleepy Main Street has an organic grocery store, a CVS, a coffee shop and a florist, there’s not anywhere, real- ly, to buy clothes and household items, Armstrong added. That may soon be changing, thanks to new retail space under construction around the Brook- land and Rhode Island Metro sta- tions. “We’re hoping for a Starbucks,” Emily Schilling said.
realestate@washpost.com
Dingfelder is a freelance writer.
los angeles — So you’re a renter and you want to green your space, but your landlord won’t splurge on solar panels. Don’t fret. There are plenty of low-cost ways for apartment dwellers to be eco-friendly. You can unplug appliances or use chemical-free products. It’s as easy as fixing leaky faucets or installing window treatments to conserve heat in the winter and keep your place cool in the sum- mer without cranking up the fur- nace or air conditioning. “There’s a myth that there isn’t
a lot that renters can do,” said Paula Cino, director of energy and environmental policy with the National Multi Housing Council. “Our individual behav- ior has a huge impact on sustain- ability. The resident has a lot of opportunity to make big differ- ences themselves without any in- put from the landlord whatsoev- er.”
Take it from Colin Beavan. The
46-year-old New York writer em- barked on a year-long experi- ment to see how much he could shrink his environmental foot- print. He used candles instead of electric lights. He gave away his air conditioner. He unplugged his freezer and reduced his trash. Beavan chronicled his efforts on a blog, No Impact Man. In addi- tion to cutting his power bills, he figures he and his family elimi- nated 4,000 gallons of garbage that would have otherwise ended up in dumps. “The problem for apartment dwellers is that you can’t change the infrastructure of the build- ing,” he said. “So it comes down to using less.”
Recycling
Americans are consumers to the core, rapidly accumulating and discarding belongings that gobble up energy as they are manufactured, delivered and then eventually dumped into landfills. “Many of us have just been fly- ing through things, purchasing at alarming rates and making no commitment to the things we al- ready have,” said Wanda Urban- ska, author of “The Heart of Sim- ple Living.” She added, “People have not considered that pur- chasing all new products in- volves a heavy carbon cost.” But the recession stopped some people in their consumerist
REAL ESTATE NOTES Rates continue to fall amid economic woes Mortgage rates fell to the low-
est level in decades for the ninth time in 10 weeks as concerns grow that the economy is weak- ening. Freddie Mac said Thursday
that the average rate for a 30-year fixed loan was 4.36 percent, down from 4.42 percent last week. That’s the lowest since Freddie Mac began tracking rates in 1971. The average rate on a 15-year
fixed loan dropped to 3.86 per- cent from 3.90 percent last week. That’s the lowest on record since tracking began in 1991. Rates have fallen since spring
as investors shifted money into the safety of Treasury bonds, low- ering their yield. Mortgage rates tend to track those yields. The low rates have driven bor- rowers to refinance their home
loans. Refinancing applications jumped 5.7 percent, to the highest level since May 2009, in the week ended Aug. 20, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Refinancing made up 82 percent of all new loan activity. However, low rates haven’t
budged home sales. Those have been stymied by unemployment, slow job growth and strict credit standards, and have dropped sharply since the expiration of home-buying tax credits in April. Nationally, unemployment is near a 26-year high at 9.5 percent. Applications for unemployment benefits dropped by 31,000 — the first decline in a month — to 473,000 in the week that ended Aug. 21, Labor Department fig- ures showed Thursday. To calculate the national aver-
age, Freddie Mac collects mort- gage rates on Monday through Wednesday of each week from lenders around the country. Rates often fluctuate significant- ly, even within a given day. Average rates on five-year ad- justable-rate mortgages were un- changed at 3.56 percent. Rates on one-year adjustable-rate mort- gages fell to an average rate of 3.52 from 3.53 percent. The rates do not include add- on fees known as points. One point is equal to 1 percent of the total loan amount. The nation- wide fee for loans in Freddie Mac’s survey averaged 0.7 of a point for 30-year and one-year mortgages. They averaged 0.6 of a point for 15-year and five-year mortgages.
— From news services
tracks. Enter, green renters, like Leslie Gant, 27. “I don’t have the budget to get
a Prius, so I use all the other little things to make a difference,” said Gant, whose airy, split-level con- do in Los Angeles’s Westwood neighborhood is filled with re- used and recycled items. Her seven-piece dining room
set and other furnishings are hand-me-downs or used items plucked from Craigslist, garage sales, even recycling bins. Her wardrobe comes from thrift shops and clothing swaps. “It’s not difficult at all,” said Gant, who shares the 900- square-foot space with a room- mate. “It’s fun for your inner scavenger. Oh, and it gives me peace of mind.” To preserve trees, she stocks
her bathroom with toilet tissue made from recycled paper and cleans with rags. If every house- hold in the nation swapped just one roll of traditional toilet pa- per for one made with recycled paper, the effort could save 424,000 trees, according to the Natural Resources Defense Council. The environmental group has created a shopper’s guide to recycled paper products. For tenants whose buildings
don’t participate in a recycling program,
Earth911.com lists recy- cling collection centers, search- able by city or Zip code. But reusing materials doesn’t
have to be a utilitarian endeavor. Make your music sound sweeter by using sustainable stereo speakers, some of which are made with old sliding door cas- ings. OrigAudio makes a set us- ing recycled newspapers, phone books and pizza boxes, and the Bon Eco Subwoofer 500 is made from old tires and wheat straw fi- ber.
Water
Water requires energy. Pump- ing it, transporting it, irrigating with it, heating it and treating it consume billions of kilowatt- hours of electricity in the United States each year. Producing all that power creates carbon diox- ide the equivalent of 4 million cars, according to the Natural Re- sources Defense Council. So if you want to conserve en-
ergy and reduce greenhouse gas- es, use less water. For starters, collect your old
bath water and dishwater. Known as gray water, it can be used to water houseplants or for outdoor irrigation. But you’ll want to use only natural, biode- gradable soap to keep from harming your greenery and to keep chemicals from leaching into the water table.
Toilet flushing accounts for about 30 percent of the water consumed in an average home, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. Try a trick used by Sarah Masson, 25, of Los Feliz, Calif. The television writing assistant placed a 2-liter soda bottle filled with water in her toi- let tank to displace some of the water, reducing the amount used in each flush-refill cycle. You can also buy a bigger float ball or ad- just the existing one so that it rests closer to the bottom of the tank, shutting off the refill valve earlier. Water monitors such as the ShowerTime from Efergy and the Waterpebble track the amount of water you’ve used in the shower and set off an alarm when you reach a set limit. Or install faucet aerators and low-flow shower heads to reduce water use.
Electricity
Your 700-square-foot pad probably isn’t equipped with so- lar panels or a wind turbine gen- erator. But chances are your pow- er company is generating a por- tion of its electricity with clean sources of energy. You can tap into those renewables, although it might cost you a little extra. That’s because clean power of- ten costs more to generate than electricity from conventional sources such as coal or natural gas. To pay for it, some utilities are offering opt-in programs for ratepayers who wish to support clean-power investments through a small surcharge on their monthly bills. The extra cost is worth it to
Tracy Hepler. The 26-year-old founder of the online sustainable living magazine YourDaily
Thread.com paid an extra $9.39 every two months at her one- bedroom apartment to support the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power’s green energy program. More than 750 utilities across the country offer similar options, according to the U.S. Department of Energy. Even when they’re switched
off, most home appliances and electronic devices continue drawing a little bit of power as long as they’re plugged in. These “vampires” account for an esti- mated 10 percent of residential energy use in the United States. Shedding these leeches is easy:
Unplug the stuff you don’t use most of the time. Make it easy on yourself by plugging clusters of devices into a single power strip that can be switched on and off. You also can replace burned- out incandescent light bulbs with
Adjustable-rate-mortgage indexes
Tis chart is designed to show trends of some of the more common indexes used to set the rates on adjustable mortgages. Borrowers facing adjustments can use the numbers below to figure their new rate, assuming no caps or other special limitations. Data on 30-year, fixed-rate loans are included for reference.
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
SOURCES: Freddie Mac, Federal Reserve, Federal Housing Finance Agency
MONTHLY AVERAGES %
FHFA mortgage rate
30-year, fixed- rate mortgages
compact fluorescent bulbs, which use about 75 percent less energy.
Dealing with the landlord
Now that you’ve done what you can to green your space, here comes the hard part: greening your landlord. Apartment owners these days are in penny-pinching mode and aren’t likely to spring for envi- ronmental improvements — un- less you can show them how they, too, can save money by doing it. “That’s something they’re very responsive to,” said Cino of the National Multi Housing Council. Some tenants are pushing for so-called green leases — a con- tract that would spell out how renters and apartment owners will split the cost of eco-friendly upgrades. Ask your complex to swap out
inefficient outdoor lights with ones activated by motion sen- sors, install timers for sprinklers and replace old appliances with Energy Star-rated products. You also can try to persuade your landlord to caulk and tint win- dows and add programmable thermostats to get the most out of air conditioning and heaters. Basic eco-upgrades to a 900- square-foot apartment can cost just $150, said Doug Walker, sen- ior vice president of UDR, a Colo- rado-based multifamily real es- tate investment trust. Chemical- free paints and adhesives cost no more than their traditional alter- natives, he said. Managers at the Park La Brea
apartments are overhauling the decades-old property with low- emission water heaters, recycled nylon carpet and drought-toler- ant landscaping. They painted the roof of one building white to reflect sunlight and help keep the upper floors cool. They’re now weighing the cost of installing solar panels and ret- rofitting laundry rooms to divert wastewater for irrigation. “It’s a challenge with an older
complex in Los Angeles that’s rent-stabilized,” general manager Ron Bowdoin said. “The ability to pass costs on to residents is very limited.” In a time of high vacancy rates, landlords are also more inclined to make their tenants happy, said Annie Argento, the Southern California director for sustain- ability consulting firm Bright- works. “There is economic payback here in the form of tenant re- tention, quicker lease-up rates, etc.,” she said. “It’s just looking at the equation from a broader per- spective.”
—Los Angeles Times
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