Real Estate Agents

Real-Estate Agents Dish on the Crystal City Buying Frenzy That Followed Amazon’s HQ2 Announcement

Keller Williams agent Jordan Stuart tried to move a couple of condos at the Waterford House in Crystal City for months. He’d executed perhaps 5 showings of each unit. But the building wasn’t producing an awful lot hobby—it became older, with excessive monthly prices and a strict no-pets coverage. Then came November 13, 2018—the day Amazon announced it’d build half of-of HQ2 in the community.

“I became flooded with calls that subsequent day. Like, heaps,” says Stuart. Almost all, he says, had been from out-of-city traders. “Probably eighty-five percent have been Chinese.”

Real-Estate Agents Dish on the Crystal City Buying Frenzy That Followed Amazon’s HQ2 Announcement 1

Waterford House’s area on bland Crystal Drive has been not anything special earlier than. But now it becomes nearly smack inside the center of the National Landing HQ2 web page. Stuart pulled each condo off the market, then relisted them for approximately $20,000 greater apiece.

He brought one significant detail in all caps: AMAZON HQ2.

Six offers rolled in on the one-bedroom unit, which sold for $450,000. Three came in on the two-bedroom, which closed at $574,000. Stuart says one of the triumphing customers changed into “an outstanding seasoned athlete” from some other metropolis. “They had a savvy economic adviser who referred to me as me directly and said, ‘This is who I constitute. They need to invest in Amazon.’ ” A handful of devices indexed by other dealers at Waterford House also offered immediately and for all cash, says Stuart.

TTR Sotheby’s agent Dawn Wilson felt the HQ2 craze, too. “My phone blew up,” she says. One of her listings—an Arlington rental about three miles from the Amazon website—has been available on the market for more than a month. The day after the HQ2 announcement, it went under the settlement for $306,500, or $eight 500 above the listing price.

She had even higher success with a one-bedroom rental right in Crystal City, in constructing a couple of blocks from Waterford House. She indexed it for $324,900. On December 17, it went under the settlement for $355,000. Wilson won’t say exactly how many offers she got, simplest that it was “a variety of” and that her sense became that many came from buyers.

The stats again up the anecdotal proof of a feeding frenzy within the weeks following the HQ2 statement. By the stop of November, the number of listings under contract inside the 22202 Zipcode—which includes Crystal City and Pentagon City—turned up by way of more than 121 percent, as compared with November 2017. In December, closed income there had been up, 12 months over year, with the aid of a wonderful 137.5 percent, in line with the actual-estate statistics company MarketStats by using ShowingTime.
There is a restriction, but to how far buyers are willing to go. “We noticed traders snap up houses after which relist them for more, attempting to turn a brief income,” says Redfin agent Brian MacMahon. “Some of those parents were given a touch too greedy.” He recollects one unit offered for $610,000 on November 30 and changed into relisted a week later for $850,000. The dealer finally dropped the rate to $695,000 earlier than taking it off the marketplace entirely. He points out another belonging bought for $495,000 on November 19, then relisted for $599,000. The seller sooner or later dropped it to $550,000, and it eventually went below settlement in February.

Though agents say the call volume has waned considering those heady days at once following the HQ2 news, they still obviously see Amazon as a primary selling characteristic. A quick online search yielded several listings touting their proximity to National Landing. For instance, a two-bedroom condominium for $699,500 became advertised as “Adjacent to the brand new Amazon HQ2 . . . The most up-to-date location in all of NOVA.” Long & Foster even launched a web web page in February devoted to HQ2 transplants, on which it touts itself as “The Prime Choice for Amazon Employees.”

Now that Amazon has pulled out of its different HQ2 web page in Queens, Washington agents report they’re feeling even greater bullish. Says Keller Williams’s Stuart: “I assume people are truly going to double down on Northern Virginia.

Margie Willis

When I decided to start blogging about real estate, I knew this would be a long journey. I was right. As you can see, I've grown my blog over the years and now have many followers. The reason why I started blogging is that I wanted to share my passion for designing and decorating my own home. I want to help people with home improvement ideas, trends, and inspiration.

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