Grand Junction weathers slowdown after boom times: building permits, home sales in steep decline this year.

• Author: Lewis, David
• Position: WHO OWNS [colorado] - Report

The home-sales outlook in Grand Junction and its satellite towns of Fruita, Clifton, Palisade, Mack and Loma seems to be teetering away from optimism these days, a strange sensation in a market that has been so robust for so long.

Do the numbers lie? Real estate sales in Mesa County dropped 29 percent in the first quarter 2008 from first quarter 2007. Single family home building permits fell 44 percent in first quarter 2008 compared with the year before. The county in February issued 42 single-family permits, the lowest monthly tally since February 1993, according to a study by Grand Junction-based Stewart Title.

Nor was this dismal third-quarter performance a freak: In fourth-quarter 2007, real estate sales fell 20 percent; dollar volume dropped to $368 million from $414 million; and single-family building permits declined 21 percent from the same period in fourth-quarter 2006, Stewart Title reported.

These are devastating-looking numbers. In March, Stewart Title district manager Bob Reece declared: Grand Junction home ownership now was demonstrably more expensive than home ownership in Denver or the United States overall; and, while middling-costly houses continued to sell, the upper realms were under a strain.

Finally, Reece asked a keen question: With the local economy so good, "Why is the real estate market limping along?"

One answer might be that, perhaps contrary to the evidence, many Grand Valley real estate people don't believe the market is limping along.

Rather, "It's still good. Not as good as it was last year, but it's still very good," says Marie Ramstetter, broker with Grand Junction-based Pavlakis Realty and listing broker for Gold Lake Estates, a "large-lot" development close to Mack.

"The last three years have been really hopping around here, and now there's a lot of new building that has been going on, a lot of new subdivisions; so there's a lot more on the market now. But I don't think there's anyone around here having a real problem selling anything," Ramstetter says.

The slowdown, they say, is only slow compared to the recent overheated market.

"Price has pretty much leveled off, is what has happened," says Ann Hayes, broker associate with Coldwell Banker Homeowners Realty and chairwoman of the Grand Junction Area Realtor Association. "The last three years we have had extremely strong appreciation of 14 percent to 16 percent."

In 2008, "We will be back down to a more normal appreciation of 6 percent to 8 percent...