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Real Estate Sales Have Been Brisk
By Adrien Blanchette
Real Estate sales have been brisk
on the Eastern Shore this summer! Real Estate Agents
report that sales reaching near record highs both in volume and
in prices. As a matter of fact most agents report that there is
a shortage of the more "desireable" properties on the market at
the present time. While driving around the Eastern Shore this summer
we have noticed that quite a number of the "executive" style homes
in the higher price brackets are selling quickly.
Some of these homes had been on the market for some
time so it is an indication of how the market has heated up to see
the "SOLD" signs going up one ofter the other. It would seem that
we are just at the beginning of a surge in sales of better properties
in our area with agents reporting that they do not have enough listings
to meet the demand in some categories.
It seems that Metro area residents are only just
beginning to become aware of the many advantages to living on the
Eastern Shore. Advantages that local residents have long been aware
of.....short commuting time to Dartmouth/Halifax, healthful life-style
with many opportunities for relaxation and exercise on the local
beaches, walking trails, sailing and boating opportunities, quieter
pace of life, yet still with many of the "big-city" amenities
such as local phone lines, cable t.v., good shopping, fine restaurants,
easy drive to the Airport, etc. This increasing awareness has made
the area into a more desireable community in which to live with
the resultant increase in real-estate sales and prices.
The Eastern Shore still presents some of the best
"buys" in real estate in Nova Scotia. You can still get waterfront
land on the salt water for less than $1,000. per acre if you look
around. And if you wish to you can still find buys such as a modest
"fixerupper" in need of TLC on 3 acres of oceanfront land
for as little as $30,000. - I know it sounds too good to be true!!!!!
but take my word for it, there are still a lot of bargains to be
had on this shore.
Remember to look before you take that leap into
the unknown......many trusting folks "from away" have been badly
burned, purchasing land at so-called bargain prices sight unseen
only to find out when they have arrived to take possesion of their
dream-land that it is inaccessible except by water or even worse,
to discover that they have purchased an acre of scrub land covered
in marsh half the year....and they'll never be able to get a permit
to build on it! Then when they go to try to sell it they find that
they have paid many times its real value for it and therefore will
not get back anything like the original purchase price.
Many of these so-called bargains are presently being
promoted in Europe and play on the fact that land is almost impossible
to get in European countries and the laws for purchasing and building
are usually much more restrictive than in Nova Scotia. The result
is that a growing number of Europeans are being taken in when it
comes to real estate and land purchases in Nova Scotia.
The best way to avoid these problems is to deal
with a reputable licensed real estate agent when purchasing property
in Nova Scotia. Sure, the agent charges the seller for his/her services
and this cost is often passed on to the buyer.... but the agent
has a reputation to protect and is known locally in his/her own
area so it is in his/her interest to see that both parties - buyers
and sellers - are satisfied customers. They also have to protect
their reputation with the Real Estate Board which licenses them
to sell real estate in Nova Scotia and acts as a regulatory body
for the industry.
So search out those bargains, but be careful and
look carefully before you leap!
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