Charlottesville Virginia Real Estate

Libertarian state senate candidate Arin Sime got some great press in the Daily Progress today.  I love the libertarian positions on property rights and land use restrictions.  It’s fun to see a third party getting some attention.  The article is here and her website is here.

From LP.org:

Public Policy instruments including eminent domain, zoning laws, building codes, rent control, regional planning, property taxes, resource management and public health legislation remove property rights from owners and transfer them to the State, while raising costs of property ownership.

Biscuit Run now has all the approvals they need to go forward.  Love it or hate it, there is a need for more housing in the area and this will provide much of it.  According to the article in the DP, there was some positive public sentiment expressed at the meeting, which was a first.  I think I tend to skew pro-development, but I think this plan has really done an admirable job atempting to satisify its critics.

The following is a paid review for Scottsdale Fine Properties, a Scottsdale real estate firm. Scottsdale Fine Properties is a midsized Real Estate Agency outside Phoenix Arizona. They seem to focus on the higher-end of the market (I doubt they list many mobile homes).  I like the site overall. There is nothing distracting about the design, and everything you’d expect to find about a real estate agency is there. The text is well written and I didn’t find any content errors that would turn me off (I get turned off by text that is clearly written by someone who doesn’t know what they’re talking about). The most noteworthy thing that I see about the site / agency the One on One program. To quote the One on One page “My one and One program is tailored specifically to meet the needs of CEO’s, professional athletes, celebrities and anyone desiring anonymity in their real estate transactions.” I’ve never seen this sort of service from an agency. I don’t know if they get many celebrities signing up (Are there many in Scottsdale? I guess as a suburb of Phoenix there may be a few.) but having a signup process makes me want to see if I can get the kind of treatment that a professional athlete would receive. I think that’s great marketing.Though as I said, I like the site, there are some details that were overlooked I think. On the agents’ page, several of the pictures are skewed to fit the dimensions rather than cropped (see Berglund Linda). The picture quality varies greatly. Martinson Lesley (the lack of a comma between first and last names bothers me for some reason) for example, has a professional quality photo whereas Martinson Dru has a grainy picture. Also, in the upper right hand corner there are a couple of icons that are way too small to make out. When I clicked on the left-most one, it turns out that it is an award they won for best agency last year. That’s big news! Put that on your front page instead of icons for tontenproperties.net and the homes magazine thing. Those don’t make me want to hire you… the best agency one might.

So those are my thoughts. It’s a nice site. I can tell from bumming around that they do a good job taking care of their customers. Keep up the good work and if I know anyone looking for a realtor in Arizona I’ll mention your name.

I enjoyed the overview of Cville Republicans and the real estate tax issue before the city council at the Charlottesville Tomorrow Weblog today.  They have a great picture of Albemarle County Republicans Chairman Keith Drake’s over-the-top SUV / traveling billboard.  I like Drake’s approach:  only increase your budget if you need to rather than start the budget process with pockets burning from a real-estate tax windfall.

This is good stuff.  DailyProgress reports that the Albemarle County Republican Committee is seeking a substantial decrease in the county’s real estate tax rate, now 74 cents per $100 of assessed value.

The Republicans’ argument hinges on a Virginia law that requires localities to hold a public hearing if property assessments go up more than 1 percent. If localities do not hold the public hearing, the tax rate cannot be set higher than the rate that would account for the increase in assessments.

In this case, Albemarle County Republicans say the rate would fall to 58 cents per $100 of assessed value to account for the rise in assessments. That amount would give the county slightly more in real estate revenue than what it had last year - that’s the point of the law, proponents of the Republican’s view say.

There was a great article in Fast Company Magazine about Music Today, and its founder Coran Capshaw (the man who is slowly acquiring and developing all of Charlottesville and the valley).  The article is fascinating.  it’s disappointing that Music Today has been mostly acquired by heavyweight Live Nation (have the headquarters here insures white collar jobs in addition to the blue collar, not to mention the benefit of donations to the arts and other charities.  Anyhow, the article is a nice inside look at how things work at the company.