Morrisville North Carolina - The demand for apartment complexes continues apace.  A 360 unit apartment complex on 32.7 acres at 1100 Cameron Chase Drive was sold to CWS Capital Partners of Newport Beach, California for $30.55 million.  That translates into $84,861 per unit.  The price represents only a 3% increase above what Archstone Communities, the seller, paid for it in 2001.  The apartments are currently 97% occupied. 

John Fish (919) 696-3474   email: Marvmax@mindspring.com   Website: www.JohnFish.com

Siemens National Competition. This morning’s Raleigh News and Observer has an article in it that I find particularly pleasing.  Now that I am 39 and counting, and counting - it seems that most of what I read about high school age young people is less than thrilling.  Since most of what the newspapers seem to want to print and most of what the TV stations want to show concerns the bad things of life rather than the good, about anything let alone teenagers, it was enjoyable to see what some bright young minds are doing.

Siemens has a national competition in math, science and technology for high school students.  Through this competition, students have an opportunity to achieve national recognition for science research projects that they compete in, in high school.  It is administered by the College Board and funded by the Siemens Foundation.  There are Regional winners and from them are selected the six National Finalists.  These finalists can be either individuals or teams and are selected from a field of 1,660 students. The national finalists from this area are Nicholas Tang and Sagar Indurkhya from the North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics.  Their work is in the field of Synthetic biology.  If you go to www.siemens-foundation.org/competition you can see, in detail, what this competition is all about.  You might find it interesting to see what the fields of the finalist individuals and teams are. If you understand any of them - good for you!

Individuals:  Elizabeth Monier - Keystone School - San Antonio, Texas - The Effects of Gene Suppression and Exposure to MPTP on Dopamine Neurons of C. elegans as a Model for Parkinson’s disease.

                  Dmitry Vantrob - South Eugene High School - Eugene, Oregon - The string topology BV algebra, Hochschild cohomology and the Goldman bracket on surfaces.

                  Dominic Ludovici - University High School - Morgantown, West Virginia - A search for radio pulsars using the GMRT

                  Arjun Ramamurti - Lexington High School - Lexington, Massachusetts - Exploring the Guenon Mystery: An evolutionary analysis using phylogenetic trees

                  Madhavi Gavini - The Mississippi School for Mathematics and Science - Columbus, Mississippi - Engineering a novel inhibitor of biofilm-encapsulated pathogens

                  Guannan (Roger) Wang - Horseheads High School - Horseheads, New York - Thin Film Assemblies of Gold Nanoparticles: Correlation between the Nanostructural Parameters and Conductivity Properties

Teams:  Jenny Yeh and Mary Catherine Wen - Archbishop Molloy High School - Briarwood, NY - Proliferation and Alignment of Osteoblasts on Oriented Magnetic Nanocomposites

            Lucia Mocz and Philip Mocz - Mililani High School - Mililani, Hawaii - Computer-Aided identification of Caner from Photomicrographs by Entropy Analysis

            Catherine McCarthy, Lily Roberts and Rochelle Rucker - Hathaway Brown School - Shaker Heights, Ohio - International Space Station Experiment to Measure Effects of Atomic Oxygen on Spacecraft Materials

            Scott Molony, Steven Arcangeli and Scott Horton - Oak Ridge High School - Oak Ridge, Tennessee - Linking supercomputing and systems biology for efficient bioethanol production

            Sagar Indurkhya and Nicholas Tang - The North Carolina School of Science and Mathematics - Durham, North Carolina - Engineering synthetic oscillatory gene networks at the population level

            Jinju Yi - Plainview Old-Bethpage John F. Kennedy High School - Plainview, NY and Vijay Jain - Herricks High School - New Hyde Park, New York - Surface molecular imprinting of a nanoscale transducer for the rapid detection of bioterrorist agents and early diagnosis of cancer.

How in the ever lovin’ blue-eyed world do you pick a winner out of those individuals and teams?!!  From this area the individual runner ups included Abhiram Chivukula of Enloe High School and Hae Rhee Chung of the School of Science and Math. Team runner-ups included Bing Tan, Anusuya Ramasubramanian and Benjamin Wang of Enloe High.  I salute all of these young people and the parents who saw to it that they had their priorities in order.

There is a young man who just started to college this year who, during his high school years, has been assisting the people in our office with computer problems and needs. I am quite certain he will do very well.  His chosen field is EE.  As I think of him and these other young people I suggest that the next time you see some teen agers in the mall or elsewhere and you wonder what he, she or they are up to you might do well not to ask.  They might tell you and then what would you do?  

John Fish (919) 696-3474   Email: marvmax@mindspring.com  Website:  www.JohnFish.com

A good airport with non-stop and excellent connecting flights to key cities all across the country is essential to an area that is enjoying strong growth and wants to continue to do so. Raleigh/Durham International Airport is such a facility and steps are being taken to see to it that it meets the current and future needs of this areas local travelers and the pass-through traffic it services as well.  A new passenger terminal is under construction that will replace and enlarge Terminal C which opened in 1987 as an American Airlines hub.  The half billion dollar facility will have two phases.  The first phase is scheduled to be completed in the summer of 2008 and will have 20 gates.  The second phase is to be completed in 2010 and have an additional 15 gates.  The completed facility will have 35 gates, 5 baggage carousels, 10 security checkpoint lanes and 60 check-in counters.  American, American Eagle, Air Canada, Delta, Continental, Northwest, America West and US Airways will use the new terminal.

I guess the by-line of this post should be Mount Olive, North Carolina.  In October privately owned North Carolina Turkey, based in Mount Olive, purchased the Butterball brand name and business of ConAgra Foods.  This made Carolina Turkey, in one big bite (if you will forgive the pun), the nation’s largest turkey producer.  To capitalize on the brand recognition of the Butterball name, Carolina Turkey has changed its name to Butterball.  The company’s headquarter will remain in Mount Olive where it has a one million square foot turkey processing facility and which they say is the world’s largest. 

As turkey is a low cost source of protein and as U.S. citizenry seems to be getting more health conscious, turkey consumption, which averaged about 8 pounds per person annually in 1970, was nearly 17 pounds per person in 2005.  As tomorrow is THE turkey day I assume there is a mad dash for the woods by all turkeys who have not already met their appointed destiny.

Incidentally, for many years ConAgra has had a phone line people could call during November and December to get help and answers about how to do whatever it is you want to do to a turkey to get it to the table without buring the house down. That help is still available and if you would like to take advantage of it the number is - - (800) BUTTERBALL. 

Let’s see Mount Olive also produces a whole peck of pickles.  Turkey and pickles - huummmm.  I wonder where they make Mrs. Smith’s pies?  Have a great Thanksgiving!!!

John Fish- (919) 696-3474   Email: marvmax@mindspring.com  Website: www.JohnFish.com  Blog: RaleighDurhamRealEstateBlog.com

In October existing home sales declined in the Triangle for the first time in four years.  Resales declined 4.5% while inventory grew 6.6%  The decline was the result of two main factors: (1) - New residents coming to the area having difficulty selling their homes in the markets they are coming from  (2) - Incentives being offered by builders of new homes.  Conventional wisdom says that current interest rates impacted the market as well. I don’t subscribe to that.  When the market was still realtively healthy nationally interest rates had already come well off of their lows and the Triangle real estate market was still enjoying record sales.  By the same token, even at their current highs rates still are well below their historic and/or average levels for the last 8 to 10 years so I ascribe little if any of the decline to it.  Certainly, they do effect some buyers but not to the degree generally given voice to.  However, I suggest that (at least locally) any interest rate impact is offset by the incentives being offered by new home builders and the price reductions being offered by individual home re-sellers.  Our local MLS indicates that in October 37% of all listings had price reductions.  At the same time Days on Market declined on average, year to year, from 82 to 72 days.  As to average home price, they increased to $227,185 an increase of 3.4%.

John Fish (919) 696-3474   email: marvmax@mindspring.com   Website: www.JohnFish.com

At the end of the third quarter, the Triangle’s warehouse vacancy rate had declined to 12.4% which was the lowest rate in five years.  The average quoted rental rates rose to an annual rate of $4.28 pers square foot.  These rates represent an increase of 6.5% vs. two years ago.

Raleigh - Triangle new home sales increased to 4,298 during the third quarter, an increase of 2.6% vs. third quarter results in 2005.  The median price for new homes in the Triangle rose 6.2% to $222,000 from a year ago.  While there has been a 24% decline in building permits issued lot purchases haven’t backed off.  Nationally, new home sale during the third quarter were down 14.2% vs. a year ago. 

John Fish (919) 696-3474   email: marvmax@mindspring.com   Website:  www.JohnFish.com

Cary - During the dot com bust in this area, Cary’s office vacancy rates dropped to more than 20%.  Now, it is about 13%.  Demand for space is so strong that neighboring markets are in heavy demand as well.  Strangely enough,  while developers are building more than 1.7 millions square feet of new office space all across the Triangle area, there are currently no leasable offices under construction in Cary.  By the same token, half of the 2 million square feet of proposed offices in the Triangle are planned for Cary.  As hot as the market is developers may want to wait until companies commit to space before building.  I rather imagine that problems in other areas around the country are making them a bit timid.

John Fish (919) 696-3474   Email: marvmax@mindspring.com   Website: wwwJohnFish.com

If you could give from $1,000 to $5,000 to your favorite charity, church or organization who would you give it to?  From now through the end of December if you purchase a home anywhere in the Triangle area and use me as your Buyer’s Agent, I will make a donation to that charity, church or organization (or divide it between two or three if you wish) in YOUR name.  Here’s how it works:

  Purchase Price: $100,000 to $250,000 - contribution amount - $1,000 

  Purchase Price: $250,001 to $500,000 - contribution amount - $1,500

  Purchase Price: $500,001 to $750,000 - contribution amount - $2,000

  Purchase Price: $750,001 to $1,000,000 - contribution amount - $2,500

  Purchase Price: $1,000,001 to $1,500,000 - contribution amount - $3,000

  Purchase Price: $1,500,001 to $2,000,000 - contribution amount - $4,000

  Purchase Price: $2,000,001 and up - - - - -  contribution amount - $5,000

The purchase must be finalized during this year but does not have to close this year.  However, the contribution will not be made until the sale does close.  So, if you would like to do something that will help a good organization and/or a lot people who need help in one way or another, this is your opportunity.  I would also suggest that help that is needed and received is just as greatfully received (in most instances) on January 1 or 10 as on December 25.  If you are not in the market for a home you might know someone who is and who would like to participate in this.  If so, why not ask them to call me.  Giving away TV sets, computers, etc. as buying incentives, is almost totally ineffective in this market for whatever the reason(s).  Perhaps helping someone else is a better and more effective way to go.  If you would like to truly be responsible for a gift that will be most greatfully received and keenly felt, here is a way to do it. 

 John Fish  (919) 696-3474     Email: marvmax@mindspring.com    Website: wwwJohnFish.com

Cary North Carolina - It is always a pleasure to see good friends prosper.  Last Wednesday, Tim Sweeney and Mark Rein (Epic Games) rolled out their new video game offering, “Gears of War“.  The game was exclusively developed for Microsoft’s Xbox 360 game player.  The Reviews have been excellent.  In fact, Yahoo Games calls it the best 360 game of 2006.  Great going guys I hope you have a blockbuster!

John Fish  (919) 696-3473   Email: marvmax@mindspring.com   Website: wwwJohnFish.com